#waldorkler

Once she was ready for the day, Lilly headed downstairs, grabbing food from the kitchen before she settled at the table. It was a long table. It was much too long for one person, honestly, but that was just what happened when you went from a large family to a family of one. Lilly wondered if the table would’ve seemed less large if all the servants had stuck around. Ah well, at least she had the bugs to keep her company.

As if on cue, a roach crawled across her hand, onto the paper she’d been about to read. She smiled at the thing and gently brushed it off so she could see the printed words. There was nothing particularly special in there. Just the typical information giving on the newest party being held down the road, or the latest robbery. The front page rarely held anything of interest to her, though. Lilly sighed and flipped the page, looking for the corner bits she knew would not disappoint.

Most people wrote the “supernatural intervention” bits of the paper as silly stories for the crackpots of the town, but she knew there was truth to them. Either that or she was the crackpot the stories were written for. Either way, it gave her something to do.

There hadn’t been anything of interest to read the week before, but this time, it seemed she would have a good week after all. Her eyes lit up when she read about how strange things had been going on by the farm on the edge of town: Trees were being randomly torn to shreds, sheep were disappearing, and the family living there had been plagued with nightmares for several days in a row.

It sounded like the typical dragon haunting to her.

People too often put dragons in the category of “gold hoarder” or “people eater”, and didn’t quite understand that there were several different subspecies of the giant reptiles, and all of them had their own quirks. Some liked eating people and hoarding gold, but most just liked messing with people. They were like snakes. Snakes with wings and giant clamping jaws, and impossibly long claws.

Lilly looked down at her dress and shook her head. She’d have to change immediately if she wanted to have any chance of catching the creature. The one thing she’d learned about those entities was that they only hunted and terrorized people for so long before giving it a rest and moving on.

She headed back upstairs and promptly changed into her shorter dress, which she wouldn’t have to worry about getting too dirty or tripping on it while hunting. Pulling on high boots and lacing them up, she thought about how she would go about the hunting this time around. It had been awhile since she’d taken down a dragon, after all. She grabbed her pack and secured it on her person, running her hands over the intricate, delicate designs in the fabric a moment while she let her thoughts spin.

She grabbed the things she typically needed for trips such as these: Her cigars and blunderbuss, both as purple as everything else she wore (which was as much aesthetic as it was for camouflage). Her brothers used to tease her about her love of the color, telling her she would look like a giant bruise if she wasn’t careful. She’d just laughed at them. The memory now made a smirk quirk her lips as she shoved one of the fat cigars between them.

After that she grabbed her helmet and goggles, slipping both on so she didn’t have to carry them the entire way.

Once she was certain she had everything needed for dragon hunting, Lilly skipped outside, her violet hair bouncing happily against her back. She stopped only momentarily in the cemetery to inform her family that she couldn’t stop to chat yet, because she had a job, and once that was done she headed out.

The farmer’s home wasn’t a terribly long jog away for an adult, but seeing as she was small and needed to get their before dinner time, she needed to use her other method of transportation. She dragged her mother’s cannon out with practiced ease, taking the time to properly aim it in the direction she needed to head before climbing in.

She slipped her cigar out of her mouth and reached around for the fuse. It lit for her nicely and she brought her arms in close to her body, waiting to be propelled through the air at painfully fast speeds. The first couple times she’d done this, there had been a certain rush of excitement. Now though, it just felt like taking a bath-- nice, but boring.

The air in her face as she flew probably would’ve deafened and blinded her had she not been wearing her helmet and goggles and she was glad her grandpa had suggested it to her the first time she’d done it. The very first time she’d come to the landing bit, she’d wondered with morbid curiosity if she would die, if that would be how the curse got her. But then she always landed softly on her feet, as if her the ghosts of her family caught her right before she hit the ground, and she was left completely unharmed.

This time was no different, and within moments she was in the field next to the farm. She tilted her head, a hand on her cocked hip as she surveyed the damage that had been described in the paper. Honestly, the print hadn’t done it justice.

Everywhere she looked, trees had been cut apart or uprooted completely, and blood (presumably the sheep’s) stained the fences and grass-- if the family had tried to wash it up, it didn’t look like they’d done a very good job. Actually, it looked like a mob had torn through the place instead of a dragon. At least she knew better.

Lilly took a deep drag on the cigar and puffed out lavender smoke as she began forming a plan of action. The family suffered from nightmares, which meant the creature hunted after dark, so she knew she had enough time to figure something out. She went over everything she knew about dragons in her mind while she stood in the middle of the field.

Unlike wolves, the reptiles hunted alone, which was good, because she didn’t know if she could take down several in one sitting. They had hard hides that were difficult to pierce unless one knew their weak spots. There were plenty of weak areas specific to each type of dragon, too, which made the job a bit trickier. All of them had a specific spot in their neck in the juncture where their collarbones were located that was soft compared to the rest of their scales, but otherwise, their vulnerable areas were in the air and unknown to her. The only dragons she’d taken down in the past had been a winter one that tried to freeze her cemetary over, and a river one that kept drowning the children in the neighboring town.

From what she knew of most supernatural entities, this dragon was a shadow dragon, or something in a similar category.

---------------

By the time night rolled around, she had a pretty solid plan in mind. Lure the creature away from the farm by shooting at it and angering it, and once it was far enough out of the way of civilization, she’d just run under the thing and shoot it. There were perks to being so young and small, and being able to sneak about. She liked to use those things to her advantage whenever she could.

There were probably simpler and safer ways to take the dragon down, but if there was one thing Lilly didn’t do, it was simple. There was nothing dangerous about simplicity, there was no rush to be gotten from simple methods. There was no potential mortal danger when things were done the simple way.

At least her plan had some risks to it.

She hunkered down by the trunk of a tree that still remained in the ground, puffing on her cigar while she waited for the beast to show itself.

The wait wasn’t a long one, and before Lilly knew it, the dragon was landing in the field, only a few feet away from where she was stationed. The reptile stood at least fifteen feet tall (not the largest breed, then) and it’s eyes glowed a fascinating shade of sanguine, casting a haunting glow against its midnight blue body. It was sleek and long, and its claws dug into the soft earth cruelly while its teeth gleamed in the moonlight, wet with fresh saliva.

It was magnificent.

Lilly narrowed her eyes and brought the barrel of her gun up, aiming directly at the beast’s closest eye. She lit the fuse to weapon with practiced ease, not even removing the cigar from her mouth as she leaned forward and stuck the end of it on the wax coated rope.

She counted down the time it took for the shot to sound, and after she made sure to follow through, she got up and ran as fast as she could away from the dragon, which was screaming in pain and anger at that point. She’d hit her target.

After several seconds of pumping her legs, Lilly figured she’d covered enough ground between herself and the reptile when she finally turned around, another shot ready to go as soon as she picked a target.

To her shock, however, she’d misjudged the speed of the particular creature and instead of a distant target, she found herself face-to-face with the thing. It’s nostrils flared with rage as it roared at her. She scrunched her nose when its foul breath slapped her right in the face but didn’t let the rancid smell stop her from taking the shot the dragon had been so kind to give her. She couldn’t get the juncture in its neck from this angle, but the inside of the throat would be even better, anyway.

The dragon snapped at her, and in anticipating the movement, Lilly rolled out of the way, lighting the fuse to her blunderbuss as she popped back up. As expected, the dragon opened its mouth again. She smirked and lined up the shot. She figured she’d have enough to to get it fired before the reptile could snap its jaws at her again.

She only noted her error when she felt herself being pulled into its warm, wet maw.

The shot had gone off before it could get her, that much she’d gotten correct, but her error had been in assuming this breed of dragon didn’t have scales on the inside. Only a select few did, and she wasn’t used to coming across those.

As she was swallowed, slipping down the beast’s throat, Lilly couldn’t help but wonder how such a small brand of dragon could stomach someone of her size. She’d figured the only reason it hadn’t eaten the other humans was because it couldn’t due to its smaller-than-normal stature.

Other people might have been more panicked about the whole ordeal, but Lilly had gone through it more times than she could count, and found it more tedious than anything. Honestly, why was eating her the default for anything that was even slightly bigger than her? She couldn’t have tasted that good. And yet, once again, there she was.

When she finally stopped moving, landing smack dab in the creature’s stomach, Lilly sighed. Experience told her she had exactly one minute before the acid in the dragon’s organ would begin eating away at her flesh. She rolled her eyes as she slipped her backpack off, unzipping it to look for something that would help her out of there. She was thankful, once again, for her smoking habit that many looked down upon, when the soft purple glow of her cigar illuminated the area around her.

“Yeesh,” she said to herself after pushing around the various many bombs she’d packed away, “is there really nothi- oh!”

She hadn’t realized she’d been talking aloud until the cigar fell out of her mouth and into her bag. Lilly scrambled to pull it back out before it could do much damage and grimaced when the action resulted in several of the bombs’ fuses to be lit.

“Uh-oh.”

Well, this was it, she decided with a tired sigh. She’d managed to outlive everyone in her family, and it had only been a matter of time. Ah well, at least she knew she was headed to an afterlife with the rest of her family. When she was a ghost, maybe she could haunt the townspeople when she got bored. That would be funny. And maybe she could make friends with the weird kids who weren’t afraid of paranormal entities.

At least she would get to kill the dragon as an accidental last hurrah. That felt like justice at least.

When the first fuse burned out, Lilly closed her eyes and dropped the bag into the stomach acid so that the explosion would make even more of a mess, because the idea just appealed to her, even if she wouldn’t get to see it.

The bright flash of light came soon after and Lilly felt the heat from the explosion across her entire body. Oddly enough, it didn’t hurt like she’d always figured death would. In fact, it felt sorta nice, being bathed in that warmth like she was sitting beside a fireplace instead of being engulfed by flames.

When the light behind her eyes disappeared, however, Lilly noted that the wind whipping around her didn’t feel like death at all (not that she knew what that felt like). In fact, it felt a lot like fly… or falling.

She blinked several times when the acrid smell of burnt flesh reached her nostrils. With a start, Lilly realized that falling sensation had been a result of her… well, falling. She’d somehow managed to survive the explosion and had been shot right out of the dragon when it had blown up from the inside out.

Huh. Cool.

Nobody could normally survive something like that, and Lilly made a mental note to ask which family member had tagged along and messed with the life and death rules again for her sake. She wasn’t complaining, but she was still interested in finding out.

She landed on her feet once more and stared on with wide eyes at the bloody scene of the dragon lying on its side with its stomach blown out. Guts were strewn all over the ground and silver blood stained the earth beneath its massive body. Lilly whistled lowly and brushed some of the drool and stomach acid off of her arms as she did so. It was always interesting, seeing how the creatures she hunted came out the other end of things.

This one was very cool to look at.

She made another mental note to just have the next dragon she fought ingest some explosives. It was, apparently, a lot easier than shooting at it and hoping for the best. Plus, the results were more spectacular.

Oh, and she needed to have a new backpack made, seeing as this one had been thoroughly destroyed.

Her job done, Lilly pulled out the single, long cigar she always brought with her in case of victories and held it out against a nearby flaming piece of flesh until it lit. She grinned as the violet smoke swirled around her face and she turned away from the dragon corpse.

Shortly after, she pulled out a piece of paper and a writing utensil from the bag at her hip; she always brought them when she was taking care of something for someone in town.

The problem has been taken care of. Sorry about the mess.

~ The Hunter

She never liked signing her name to the notes, because it was better if people just left her alone. If they knew she was the one protecting the town from nuisances such as these, they wouldn’t leave her be.

Besides, it was more fun to leave that mystery element around what she did.

Lilly took a glob of sticky blood from the ground and ran over to the front door of the farmer’s house, using the gooey substance to glue the note to the door.

In a practiced form, Lilly knocked thrice on the wood before zipping off into the forest before anyone could answer the door or see her.

She did watch, from the safety of nature’s cover, as the lights inside the house turned on and the man came out to the front porch. He held a knife and Lilly giggled at his attempted bravery. It was cute when people got so fed up with the supernatural that they decided to straight-up fight it.

His defensive nature dropped almost immediately though, and Lilly watched with pride and amusement as the blade fell out of his grip in shock and he stared at the still-on-fire corpse of the dragon that had been haunting his farm and family.

“Oh my Lord… Sarah! Sarah get out here, you need to see this!”

Lilly Cobb

The vapors of a dream drifted up from the dying embers of a violet cigar; the various aristocratic faces caught in the curling tails of smoke began to fade as the young Lilly Cobb stirred. She had fallen asleep in the parlor, lying face first on an antique settee, patterned in wilting silk flowers. Her cigar holder rested precariously between two thin fingers, threatening to catch the rug on fire. She couldn’t decide if the mansion set ablaze would be an awful way to go or not, there was something appealing with the idea of the Cobb Estate pershing in a glorious blaze with it’s last remaining occupant. Yet, she thought again that perhaps it should remain standing as the largest mausoleum in history, a hollow symbol that stood for the loss of an entire lineage.

The Cobb family had been cursed. The entire bloodline had slowly began to vanish, as one by one each member had perished, until the sole remaining member was the young Lilly Cobb. Lilly was not a lonely girl, for whatever reason, the spirits of her late family still roamed the estate. It was not quite the same as when they had been alive, the large estate that had been filled with the constant bustle of life was quieter now, but even so she was never in want for company.

Lilly stretched and pulled the twirls and tangles from her long lavender hair, retrieving her lacy head wear that had fallen to floor. She collected herself, lit another cigar, and began to explore the mansion to see if she could find any of her family and discover what they might be up to. With no purpose in her mind, she eventually came to the nursery. It was made up of two large, adjoining rooms. One was the play area and the other filled with bassinets and small beds. She admired the room that had once held her and many small cousins for generations. She noticed some toys were strewn about the floor and one of the rocking chairs was slowly coming to a stop. Oddly enough, the room was empty. Emptier than a home filled with wandering spirits could be, that is. It was strange, but she moved on chasing the phantom smell of something cooking downstairs.

China lined the entire length of the long dining table. The other banquet tables had been brought out and were also set up, as if to reenact a family gathering. As of late this display was something normally that was reserved only for the rare guests, that occasionally wandered into the mansion. The faint smell of food she had followed downstairs was gone and the dishes remained as vacant as the chairs set before them. Interesting.

The members of Lilly’s families all spent the afterlife in their own way. Some liked to try to rekindle the pleasures or habits they had had when they were alive, with varying levels of success. It was difficult to imbibe earthly pleasures when one was essentially hollow, after all. Others had not taken as well to their new state, despite being in the warm presence of family. They wallowed in their sorrow or madness and displayed uncouth or even violent tendencies. Yet, Lilly only had a smile waiting for them, because what else could she do. Today it seemed she’d find no one in the dining room or kitchen areas so she moved on again.

Before she could return upstairs she saw a flash of light and made a new discovery of her old home. The flickering light illuminated an invisible space between the wall. She ran her fingers over the floral wallpaper until she felt air hit her finger tips. She gave the wall a gentle push, something clicked and the door came open. A gleeful surge came over her as she entered the narrow passage. It was completely dark except for a glowing ball at her feet. It must have rolled down the path and created the light she had seen, the crystal orb bumping on the uneven floorboards. She picked it up and found it was very cold, it’s innards swirling with a pretty white smoke. She used it to light her way down the hall that had more turns than she was anticipating. Lilly followed on, barely able to make out some old portraits of family members she had never seen before. Other odd trinkets like clocks or a compasses were also encased in shadow boxes on the wall, defeating their purpose.

Eventually she came to a room and saw a glowing claw on the table that must hold the orb she carried. She placed it into the hand and the room lit up with star light. Tiny lights began to twinkle throughout the room, a candelabra and sconces on the wall ignited with soft flames until the room was bright with flickering pastel shades of blue, green, lavender, pink and orange-red flames. Now she could see all that awaited her in the room.

Books lined shelves that encircled the room in all the languages of the world, and some that were a world apart. Small herbs and mushrooms grew in a garden that thrived in darkness. Rocks with strange symbols and crystals of all kinds were sorted into slots and glass vials. Cabinets were filled with jars and objects that were labeled with numbers and letters. There was more too, in chests and in alcoves, hanging from the wall and ceilings. All of it, the entire room carried a smell she had never known until now, but she knew it surely, Magic.

Uncertain of how much life she had left to claim Lilly was ecstatic at the prospect of this new hobby.  What girl wouldn’t want to study the wonders and potential esoteric horrors of magic? It was determined instantly in Lilly Cobb’s mind that she would become a witch. That task would be proven easier said than done, shortly.

The first part was organizing, she had to sort the piles of notes and books into an order she could use. First were the books that were written in languages she could understand, and those were sorted into what contents she could even begin to comprehend. This severely narrowed down the resources she could use, but that was helpful in it’s own way. Finally she settled down into trying to decode the notes and books, taking notes of her own. Trying to break the frustrating shorthand took hours, and Lilly found herself tired before even beginning to reach the lower branches understanding. She closed her books and rubbed her eyes. She went off to find food or rest, whichever came to her first, carefully closing the passage behind her, in case any relatives had any ideas about disorganizing her notes. As she began to make her way upstairs once again, she heard a voice.

“Lilly,” It called to her in a high feminine voice she did not recognize. She approached the hand calling from a darkened corridor at the end of a hall. “This should help you.” The voice told her, handing over a blue book with silver moon embossed on it’s moleskin surface. Lilly looked up from the book to say thank you, but the darkness had vanished and so had the pale reaching hand. It must have been a relative she hadn’t met she reasoned, and thought that they might have had something to do with the crystal ball that lead her to the secret room in the first place. After all it was unlikely that ball had rolled off the table and through all those twists and turns on its own.

The next time Lilly entered the room she had the blue book, and when she opened it things began to click. It was written as guide for someone without understanding, and contained an index of simple enchantments and spells. Lilly found the idea of a new wardrobe appealing, specifically for when she was here in the Witches’ Lair. It was as good a starting point as any.

Following the instructions carefully, reading them three or four times, Lilly took spider’s silk from a vial and placed it on old spinning wheel. Chanting a few clumsy words while touching it’s surface, it began to work on it’s own and would make the process far easier. When it gave her piles and piles of gossamer thread, far more than she should have been able to yield. She placed the soft, silky pile carefully on a dressforms’, headless, neck and began to envision what it was she wanted. But first she would need a wand.

She took her cigar holder, and dipped it into a smoking poultice she had made from strange herbs with strange symbols in their names. Then she held it over a flame until the whole of it turned burning orange, yet it never warped or turned to ash. She whispered a few words, and a small puff of visible air came from her lips wrapped around the holder and began to spark. She took it between her fingers, held it up to the mass of thread, ready to test that she had done everything correctly.

She said the words that needed saying, and the thread began to work it’s way down the form like water. She played with the layers, moving her wand like a conductor, shifting the shape this way and that. Finally, with sweat fresh on her brow she was finished. She took the outfit from the dress form and slipped it on, it had an icy burn from the fresh magic still crawling over it’s stitching. Lilly stood before the mirror and admired herself, a proper conical hat with a wide brim and a dress that lightly sparkled, maintaining the webbed pattern from the spider’s silk, with flowing sleeves. The outfit was of course purple, and brought out the stunning shade of her features.

Tired, but overjoyed in her success, Lilly retired her spellcraft for today. Cleaning up her newfound workspace,  she felt eager to to begin conquering her next feat. One a little more difficult, not to mention dangerous. She could already picture it, sailing over the estate, casting a shadow over the moonlit graves.

A few weeks had past, but Lilly was finally ready. With a flick of her wand her cannon began to glow and spark. She had tried to enchant this thing a few times before, and each time at this stage it always went wrong. The last attempt had nearly destroyed the cannon. This time she knew she had it, without breaking connection, she lifted her arms up and then brought them down commanding a cascade of energy onto the cannon. She caught her breath, looking at the cannon, before grinning. This was it.