“Do we actually need to meet every week?”

That question, naturally, came from the Dragon King of Caltrop Pond, because who else would ask a question like that at a taskforce meeting? Let alone a taskforce that had been meeting once a week for several moons now and was firmly entrenched as part of our schedules?

The rest of us eyeballed Den. (He’d given us permission to use his nickname after Taila butchered “King Densissimus Imber” a few times. Personally, I thought he was trying to head off the dreaded contraction to “King Sissy.”)

No one said a word, but the little dragon defended himself, “I’m not asking because I want to start partying earlier! It’s just that we’ve already fulfilled all of our goals! No one’s trying to hurt Taila or any of the Jeks, and even if they were, the ducks and cats have it covered.”

“The rats too,” squeaked Master Rattus, the plump, glossy, grey chief of the local rat spirits.

He was the one whom Stripey had approached about spying on Master Gravitas and Boot. We’d added him to the taskforce too, since, as Stripey argued, he already knew about the cats. His rat spirit underlings kept an ear on marketplace gossip and castle chitchat and monitored conversations for anything that might lead to trouble for the Jeks.

At Master Gravitas’ glare, Master Rattus bared his long, yellow teeth in a grin. “We’re so good, you don’t even know we’re here.”

“Yes, the rats too,” Den amended before the cats’ and rats’ rivalry could derail his attempt to dissolve the taskforce. “But my point is, Honeysuckle Croft is probably the safest place in the whole barony! Honestly, if Sir Black Pine or the Green Frog or the Dragon King of Black Sand Creek ever invaded, I’d rather hole up here than in the castle.”

I pointed out, If anyone invaded the Claymouth Barony, it wouldn’t be your problem. You’d only have to hole up somewhere if they invaded Caltrop Pond.

It might be completely surrounded by the Claymouth Barony, but Caltrop Pond was a separate fief.

“Well, true, but anyway! My point is that we’ve fulfilled that mission objective! And the ones about improving Taila’s life too. I mean, she’s going to school now. She’s training to be a mage. What more could we want for her?”

Floridiana smiled.

The loving parents, however, looked concerned. Obviously, they thought their precious daughter’s life could use more improving.

To most task members’ surprise, it wasn’t Mistress Jek but Bobo who spoke up. “But ssshe’s not completely sssafe yet! If the neighbors or the Baron get mad again, or if there’s another drought…. We can’t ssstop watching over her yet! We jussst got ssstarted!”

“I agree with Bobo.” Stripey seconded her, earning himself Mistress Jek’s eternal gratitude. “We’ve seen how bad things can get. It’ll be a lot easier to maintain the taskforce, keep an eye on the situation, and head off any problems – than to dissolve the taskforce, let disaster strike, and then re-form it to deal with the disaster.”

His argument drew thoughtful nods.

“I wasn’t suggesting that we dissolve the taskforce!” protested Den. “I just meant that everything is on track, so maybe we don’t need to meet every week! Maybe we should change it to once a year, like the Meeting of the Dragon Host.”

“Once a year?” exclaimed Floridiana.

All of a sudden, the dragon king remembered that humans dealt with much shorter timescales. “Once a month?”

Silence.

He backpedaled further. “Once every two weeks?”

More silence, but of a considering variety this time.

He looked around the table, gauging support for the motion. One by one, Master Gravitas, Master Rattus, Floridiana, and Stripey nodded, accepting his logic. Master Jek didn’t say anything, as he mostly didn’t, and Mistress Jek folded her arms across her chest. Bobo’s head swiveled back and forth, but when Stripey began to nod, she moved to as well.

Oh no, I couldn’t have that. As Bobo herself had pointed out, and as Master and Mistress Jek were surely thinking, we’d only “jussst gotten ssstarted.” There was so much more to be done, so much more karma to be earned.

This was my fault. I was the head of this taskforce. I was the one who’d let its members get complacent. I’d let them drift into the mindset that doing the minimum necessary to fulfill each objective sufficed.

And I still had a task for them that required their absolute max.

I rapped my forefoot on the table to draw their attention. I hadn’t wanted to bring it up so soon, but Den was forcing the issue.

No. We’re not done yet. There is still a major threat to Taila that we haven’t dealt with.

That Den, as a dragon king, was uniquely suited to deal with, and for which I had used procuring food for the Jeks to test his abilities. By now, I had the measure of him. He was competent enough when properly motivated, but he lacked ambition and attention span.

I cast a sidelong glance at Stripey. He should have known what was coming, but he cocked his head, as confused as everyone else.

We need to kill Lord Silurus.

Silence.

Stunned silence.

Flabbergasted silence.

Then:

“Lord Silurus?”

“Kill Lord Silurus?!”

“Lord Silurus – the catfish demon?”

“Do you know how many mages have failed and died?”

“That’s impossible! Madness!”

None of those shrieks came from Bobo who, as previously established, placed great faith in my ability to develop plans and in Stripey’s to execute them. She fixed her big, shining eyes on me, ecstatic that we were finally going to wipe out his negative karma.

The duck demon hadn’t uttered a word either. He’d buried his head under one wing, and his whole body was shaking.

That was odd. He hadn’t acted that scared when I first broached the topic.

“I’m in.”

The two flat words cut off the squeaking and screaming.

Clenching his fists, Master Jek leaned forward and met each taskforce member’s eyes in turn. “I’m in. That demon’s killed too many people.”

Mistress Jek gave a single, curt nod. The sort of nod an empress would give when passing a death sentence.

Bobo bowed her head, eyes brimming with tears. She must have known Maila, might have babysat her the way she did Taila.

Stripey pulled his head back out from under his wing at last, traces of laughter still on his face. He opened his bill, glanced at Bobo, and didn’t speak.

Master Rattus did open his jaw, but at a hiss from Master Gravitas, shut it again.

Den’s mane fluttered as he darted nervous glances around the room. The dragon seemed unsure how to treat grieving parents – whether he should ignore their distress or try to soothe it and, if so, how.

That left only the traveling mage to shrill, “That demon is unbeatable! He is! You know why powerful mages never come here? It’s because of him!”

It was the first time she’d so much as hinted that she might not be the most powerful mage in existence. Everyone but Den and I looked shocked.

Jumping out of her chair, Floridiana scrambled to the small mage supply shelf that Master Gravitas had installed on the wall above Taila’s reach (at a reduced friends-and-family-and-fellow-taskforce-members rate, of course). With trembling hands, she removed A Mage’s Guide to Serica, a codex stained and battered by passage through the hands of generations of traveling mages. Laying it on the table, she undid the leather strap that bound it shut and reverently turned the sheets of warped parchment. She stopped on a page with a fantastical sketch of a monster that might have been based on a fish. It did have long, wiry whiskers.

Of those present, only she, Den, and I could read, but even then, the writing was so tiny, messy, cramped, and riddled with errors that I could barely understand it. The gist appeared to be that a monstrous catfish dwelled in Black Sand Creek and murdered every mage or knight errant who dared challenge it. “Beware the Catfysh Demon, Lord Sylurus,” the text warned, “for he ys most foul and most fyersome. In hys Youth he apprentysed under the Nyne-Taeled Fox Demon Pyry and learned all Manner of Evyl from her.”

Ha! As if I’d taken any apprentices or disciples! As if I’d bother to mentor anyone who wasn’t a fox.

But I caught a lot of sidelong glances that darted away when they crossed mine.

This book is full of lies, I pronounced. I can assure you that Piri never traveled to this area and never took any apprentices.

Most of those who knew my true identity winced but accepted what I said. Those who didn’t assumed that an emissary from Heaven knew what she was talking about.

Floridiana’s mouth, however, set into mutinous lines. “A Mage’s Guide to Serica contains the accumulated knowledge of generations of mages. It is the authority on Serican geography.”

I shrugged. Never heard of it.

“It says right here that Lord Silurus learned from – ” She swallowed the pronoun, remembering that Master Gravitas and Master Rattus didn’t know who I really was.

And I’m telling you that that’s wrong.

Her throat worked. “So you’re saying that we can’t trust this book? But if we can’t trust it, then how do we know anything about the mountains and rivers and creatures of Serica?!”

Not my problem.

But I didn’t want to waste time arguing about it, so I said with no sincerity whatsoever, I’m sure it’s just this one part that’s wrong. Maybe the geographer heard a tall tale from someone who heard it from someone who heard it from someone who heard it from someone who actually traveled to Black Sand Creek. Or maybe Lord Silurus himself lied.

“Oh, of course. Of course he lied to make himself sound more important. Of course a demon would.” The mage’s lip curled in scorn.

I forbore to comment, for more than one reason.

We’re getting sidetracked from our goal. We can consult the book to see what has been tried to kill him and get ideas of what not to try ourselves –

“Hang on a sec,” interrupted Master Rattus. “We never agreed to it! Far’s I can tell, the only suicidal people here are you and Master Jek!”

“Me too,” grated Mistress Jek. “That monster needs to die.”

The rat spirit inclined his head out of respect but persisted, “No one else thinks this is a good idea. No one else thinks we can do it.”

Stripey had pulled up one leg into his thinking pose. Cocking his head to a side, he mused, “I don’t know…were those lone heroes?”

“Yes,” confirmed Floridiana after squinting at the page for a moment.

“I thought so. Forget chivalry and single combat and all that,” said the bandit. “If we go in as a team, we stand a much better chance.”

“Most of us aren’t water creatures,” pointed out the cat spirit. “Plus the only water creatures on this taskforce are a duck, an emissary in a mortal turtle body, and, begging your pardon Your Majesty, a very small dragon. I’m not likin’ our chances.”

Two dragon kings, I interjected.

“Pardon?”

Not just “one small dragon.” Two dragon kings.

“Who’s the second?” asked Den.

Yulus, of course.

“King Yulus?” snorted Floridiana. “What makes you think he’d be any use?”

“Also, he’s the one who’s let this demon run rampant in his river for six hundred years. What makes you think he’ll do anything now?” Stripey asked.

Because Den is going to convince him to.

“Me?!”

Yes. You convinced him to deliver food to the Jeks, didn’t you? I’ll bet he didn’t want to get involved.

Although Den hadn’t shared details of the negotiations, I knew Yulus and, more to the point, Nagi.

But you convinced him. You’re better at diplomacy than you give yourself credit for. You can do it.

Something about those exhortations felt familiar….

Right. I’d coached Yulus through his attempts to wrangle his fair share of rain at the Meeting of the Dragon Host. It hadn’t worked that time, but Den wasn’t Yulus. He wasn’t nearly as hangdog.

Right now he was doing his best impression of it, though. “Oh, gosh, you want me to negotiate with King Yulus? Oh boy, Prime Minister Nagi’s never gonna go for it….”

I shook my head. Who are the dragon kings? Who are the decision makers? It’s you and Yulus. Not a mere minister. Both of you put far too much stock in her opinions. She is a minister. Her role is to advise, not rule. Both of you need to remember that and act like it.

While Den was digesting that, I met Stripey’s eyes.

If Dragon King Yulus and the Black Sand Creek Water Court throw their full force behind this endeavor, will you?

I already knew his answer, but Bobo beat him to it. “Yes! Yes! We can do it! I know we can! We have to do it! To cansssel out your bad karma!”

He sighed but said, “Yes.”

Keeping the momentum going, I turned to the next-easiest target. Mage Floridiana? You are a capable underwater fighter. I’ve seen it.

“Uh….” She must have assumed that I’d watched her from Heaven, because she didn’t question it. “I…uh….”

“You’re a great mage!” Bobo exclaimed. “If you help, we’ll definitely sssucceed.”

The decidedly mediocre mage was torn between her desires to prove herself and to go on living, but she couldn’t very well argue that she wasn’t a skilled underwater combatant or a great mage, so in the end she grunted her assent.

I looked at the last two holdouts. Technically, I already had support from all the taskforce members I needed. As Master Gravitas had pointed out, cat and rat spirits wouldn’t make good underwater fighters. But they could still play important support roles on the riverbank, and most importantly, I didn’t want their negativity dragging down morale.

Before I could make an argument for their participation in a supporting role, however, Master Rattus jumped off his chair and skittered out the door. Over his shoulder, he yelled, “I’m out! You made me that girl’s godfather. Nobody ever said anything about fighting demons that aren’t anywhere near her!”

Master Gravitas, too, rose. “Hurts to say it, but I’m with him.”

The cat followed the rat out of Honeysuckle Croft.