The Fire Bringers: An I Bring the Fire Short Story (IBF Part 6.5) Read Free Page B

“Lemurlikes”, as they’ve come to be known, are. “Perhaps when you’re older,” she says.
    Durga’s brow crinkles, her shoulders slump, and she bends even further at her waist. The weight of Durga’s wings always makes her lean forward a little, like a child carrying a backpack. Now her back is nearly parallel to the ground. Amy’s heart constricts. People have asked why Amy hasn’t surgically removed the wings, commenting that Durga is flightless. But Amy is sure that one day Durga will be able to fly; do you remove a weight today that one day may give your child the gift of flight? She’s so glad that Bohdi’s never once argued with her on that, or Durga’s blue skin or tail. Other parents, with magical statuesque-non-typicals, have divorced over whether to surgically alter their children.
    From behind her comes a voice. “Amy, you’re here! I have a problem.” Amy turns to find Hoenir, now a fellow veterinarian in the rehabilitation center, waving a digital tablet. Hoenir is still youthful, even though he doesn’t eat apples. They wonder if it is a carryover from living as Creation for so long.
    Amy sighs. “Is Senator Fellman insisting that his daughter be allowed to work in our facility?”
    Hoenir nods. “I keep telling him that no matter how magically capable his daughter is, if she doesn’t have a doctorate of veterinary medicine, or at least a certificate to be a veterinary technician, she isn’t allowed to join our staff.”
    Amy grumbles. “Kids these days—”
    Hoenir shakes his head. “Thinking they can skip the science and go straight to the magic.” He huffs.
    Amy walks over and takes the tablet. Reading it, her skin heats. It’s even worse than she expected. The senator’s precious child hasn’t had a day of college-level biology or chemistry. But she did mend a broken bone, and that makes her an expert, to the senator’s mind.
    Pulling out her phone, Amy dials the senator’s number. She almost presses the connect button, but then stops herself. If she makes this call, she will explode—she will shout at the senator, and it will become an “incident.” This is a job for Steve, he will chuckle and be charming and convince the senator that his daughter should take an internship elsewhere … or else. He’ll do it by … well, Amy doesn’t know precisely how he does it — if she did, she’d do it herself. Hitting the button for text, she clicks on the Darth Vader icon she uses for Steve and starts to type out a message, but then Hoenir says, “Hmmm … where did Durga go?”
    Amy lifts her head. Durga and the dragon are gone. Amy sees shadows playing on the walls in the cave. “She’s in the cave, don’t worry,” she says.
    Hoenir’s phone beeps with a text. Glancing down, his eyebrows rise. “Oh, a totoro … I’d better get on it. Talk to you later.”
    “Sure thing,” says Amy, heading into the cave. “Durga, you know if the baby dragon has found some pennies you shouldn’t …”
    She stops. The baby dragon is curled up in a ball at the tiny area at the cave’s end. But there is no Durga.
    Amy crawls out of the cave. “Durga?” She peers behind rocks, and even goes up to the perches to see if Durga’s pressed herself against the rocks to hide.
    She doesn’t see her anywhere. She must have snuck out of the room while Amy was talking to Hoenir. Feeling frightened and angry at herself, or Durga, or both, Amy pulls out her phone. “Show security cameras in the rehabilitation center.” All the camera views flash on Amy’s phone in a neat grid pattern. Amy sees Durga in the former ballroom that houses the World Gate to the Tenth Realm. Amy clicks on the feed to enlarge it. The guards are talking to Durga jovially as she walks to the circle of tiles that demark the World Gate location. Amy breathes a sigh of relief. During the Magical Renaissance, computerized, technomagical World Gates were invented, but the gate to the Tenth Realm is only accessible to