Chapter 175: In Which Flicker Pulls Rank
So glad you asked, said Stripey grimly. The demons want to sacrifice Lodia to appease the Dragon King of the Western Sea.
Bobo expected Flicker to be shocked, but he did work in the Bureau of Reincarnation. Even if he didn't live on Earth, he saw enough of it secondhand through the lives of the souls he reincarnated. He knew what demons were like.
"Can you ssstop them?" she asked urgently. "You have to ssstop them!"
Flicker blanched. "You want me to confront one of the most powerful dragons in existence?! I'm a clerk! I don't do the whole – " he made some thrusting gestures, kind of like how Mistress Jek pointed a ladle when she was scolding her kids – "fighting thing!"
But you do come from Heaven, don't you? pointed out Stripey. You must carry some extra authority because of that, right?
Flicker winced and hunched his shoulders, like the Jek kids when they were being scolded. "Not really. I'm not supposed to be here. I, uh, may have snuck down…."
The demons facing off against Den were inching closer to him. They must have decided that there were enough of them to take him down. Uh-oh. Bobo had never seen him fight with his full strength, and she really hoped that he had some tricks up his mane.
Think! What could she do? What could her friends do? What could anyone do when they were outnumbered and outpowered?
Hmmmm. Nobody thought of Rosie that way – small, weak, outnumbered, and outpowered – but that was what she always was, wasn't it? In all the time Bobo had known her, Rosie had been either a mortal turtle or sparrow. Yet she'd found ways to command armies.
How did she do it? What would she do if she were here?
Oh, Rosssie, where are you? I miss you. I wisssh you were here, Bobo thought, but that was pointless right now. Rosie wasn't here, and they had figure out how to deal with all these demons on their own.
Bobo cast her mind over Rosie's many clever tricks. Sphaera would understand them better – the five-tailed fox was always following Rosie around and writing down everything she said – but Sphaera was part of the problem.
Think! What did Rosie do?
She always acted like she was important, like she had the right to order people around. She did a lot of prep work to set up dramatic scenes that she pretended happened on their own. She also pretended that the gods stood behind her. Actually, Flicker often came down to help her out with that. Like that time they had to impress Baron Claymouth. And that other time they had to impress the Kitchen God worshippers. And that other other time they put on a show of defeating Sphaera and her army.
An oil lamp lit up in her head. Flicker was here! Right now! Even if Rosie weren't here, with his help, they could pull off another trick!
"Flicker Flicker Flicker!" she cried, so excited that she forgot herself and slithered right up in his face. He stepped backwards. "It's ssso sssimple! You're not a clerk!"
"I'm not…?"
"No! Um, I mean, to them, you're not a clerk! You can ssstop them!"
"Uh…. And you want me to ssstop – I mean, stop – them how?"
"All we have to do is tell them that you're a messsenger from Heaven! Um, um, um, isssn't there sssome kind of rule againssst sssacrificing innocent people to ssstop a ssstorm?"
"Surprisingly, no. There isn't." Flicker's voice was very dry.
"There isssn't? Why not???"
"Because – well, it's complicated. But you see – "
He was going to start lecturing her, like Floridiana teaching her students, wasn't he? "Sssorry, you can tell me later! Right now we have to sssave Lodia!"
Flicker surveyed the scene on the beach again and sighed so heavily that Bobo could hear it over the wind. "Some kind of rule," he muttered, to himself, she thought. "Some kind of law, to scare them, to scare him into calling off the storm…. Oh!"
"Do you have it? Do you have it? Do you know how to do it???"
"Yes! I do! But for this to work, we'll have to get an emissary of the Dragon King of the Western Sea, or preferably His Majesty himself, to come up here."
"Easssy! We'll get Den to do it! They're both dragons, right? Doesn't that make them family? Sssort of?"
"Well, not really…."
On the side, Stripey muttered, Even if they were, have you seen some families?
"I'll go tell Den!"
With that, Bobo slithered down the beach as fast as she could, circling around the demons. One of the joro spiders heard rocks clatter, opened his mouth to hiss, spotted her, and did a double-take. Smart boy. She gave him an approving grin that made him scuttle into the crowd for some reason. Maybe she'd shown more of her fangs than she should have. Oh well.
"Den, Den!" she called, standing up on her tail tip. He lowered his head to see her better. His eyes were very big and very fierce. "We know how to stop the storm! But you have to get the Dragon King of the Western Sea to come up to talk!"
Den's lips peeled back from his teeth. "I can do that. You and Flori hold them here. I'll be right back." And with a flip of his tail, he dove into the ocean.
He wasn't "right back," but Bobo grew to her biggest size and grinned at the demons, and Floridiana brandished her seal at them, and they turned from an angry mob into a confused crowd. They didn't let Dusty and Lodia go, but they also didn't attack.
Some time later, Den popped back out of the water and told them that the Dragon King of the Western Sea was coming, and some time after that, the ocean split open all the way to a crystal palace so far down that Bobo could hardly see it. A parade was making its way up the path, taking its sweet time.
"Step aside, Caltrop Pond," ordered Sphaera. Her rosefinches had carried her litter all the way to the edge of the water. "As Empress of Serica, I speak for all who dwell on land."
"Absolutely not," Den snapped back. "This is a parley between dragon kings. It has nothing to do with you."
She gave him a smile that was sweet and innocent but somehow made Bobo's scales stand on end. "Who do you think he will prefer to parley with? The Empress of Serica – or an insignificant dragon from an insignificant pond in the middle of nowhere?"
Den ground his teeth. "This is dragon business. Stay out of it."
"Oh, I think not. This does, after all, concern one of my vassals."
Floridiana stepped forward. "However, historical precedent has it that…."
While they argued, Bobo whipped her head back and forth between them and the approaching parade. This was not good. Sphaera wanted to sacrifice Lodia. She was the one who had manipulated the demons into trying to sacrifice her. So Bobo couldn't let Sphaera be the one to handle the parley. She had to settle this before the Dragon King of the Western Sea arrived.
She slithered back up the beach to Flicker. "Can't you do sssomething about Sssphaera?"
"She does have a point. Unfortunately, technically Lodia is one of her vassals. As are the rest of you."
"No I'm not! I'm a vassal of Baron Claymouth!"
"But you've acknowledged her as the Empress of all Serica, haven't you? Which means that technically, she is the liege of your liege."
"Oh. Oh. But – but – " Bobo had never thought of it that way. She shook her head. "No. No. We can't let her be everybody's liege. It would be horrible for Ssserica."
"On that, we are agreed."
"Ssso can't you do sssomething?"
Flicker scratched the side of his head. "Well, I guess I am from Heaven. I'm not very good at it, but I can try pulling rank on her…?"
"Yep yep! It's worth a try!"
Flicker started to glow brighter and brighter, attracting everyone's attention. "Sphaera Algarum!"
His voice came out a little cracked. From nerves, Bobo thought, so she nodded encouragingly at him.
His chest rose and fell in a deep breath. "Sphaera Algarum, cease this unseemly squabbling at once."
"Unseemly – !" squalled the fox.
"Yes, unseemly. Look, of the gods and goddesses in Heaven, the only ones who insist on their authority are the ones who lack it. The truly powerful ones don't need to say a word."
Sphaera actually did look. At Flicker, at the demons surrounding Lodia and Dusty, at Den, and finally back at Flicker. Her cheeks turned as red as a pomegranate.
The demons cocked their heads and angled their bodies so they could see this new fight better. Seizing on their distraction, Dusty blew a pheasant out of the way and galloped back into the village with Lodia on his back. A few heads turned, but no one gave chase. Sphaera's nails started to lengthen into claws.
Flicker went on. "Do you think the Jade Emperor goes around Heaven saying, 'I'm the ruler. Everyone obeys me'?"
Bobo tried to picture it and couldn't. But Sphaera wasn't backing down yet.
Flicker followed up with, "Do you think Piri goes around, well, anywhere, saying, 'I'm the ruler! Everyone obeys me'?"
Hmm. Could Bobo picture that? No, not really. It was more the sort of thing Rosie would think, and that you could read all over her turtle or sparrow face. She decided not to point this out, though.
One by one, Sphaera's tails drooped to the ground. "You're the one who works for Lady Piri, aren't you? The one who helped with that fake battle outside Goldhill?"
There was a slight hesitation before Flicker said, "Yes."
"I see. I see." Without meeting anyone's eyes, Sphaera declared, "Very well then. Draconic matters are best left to the dragons. Do not fail me, Caltrop Pond."
In a swoosh of silk, she flounced back into the village, with her rosefinch handmaidens twittering after her.
Den's eye roll said it all.
If only the Dragon King of the Western Sea were as easy to deal with as Sphaera! He was the biggest dragon Bobo had ever seen in her whole life. He towered over the beach. Even though he wasn't flying, just floating on top of the waves, his horns rose higher than the tallest palm tree. His body was so wide that he could have lain down on and smooshed Den, Floridiana, and Flicker without noticing them.
Bobo watched in awe as they bowed to him without looking the least bit scared. She herself was up in the coconut palm she'd climbed earlier, partly wrapped around the trunk and partly wrapped around Stripey to keep the storm from blowing him away.
You don't want to be down there with them? he asked.
"Me?"
Down by the water's edge, the two sides started on some seriously complicated greeting protocol. How did anyone remember all of that, much less pull it off gracefully? She'd trip over her own tail and embarrass herself.
Yes, you. You've been with them from the beginning, haven't you? You have every right to be down there, negotiating with him, if you wanted.
Really? She did? But she was just a bamboo viper spirit from the Claymouth Barony. She didn't know anything. She didn't have any authority.
But when she pointed that out, Stripey said, Den is "just" the ruler of Caltrop Pond. Floridiana is "just" a traveling mage. Flicker is "just" a clerk. And Rosie was "just" a mortal turtle or sparrow.
Bobo was flabbergasted. But they were all so calm, so confident. They acted like they knew exactly what they were doing, especially Rosie. She'd never thought of any of them as "just" anything. Could she be like them too, one day?
She'd have to think about it.
"You'd be better at it," she told him. "And you've known them for as long as I have. You're the one who ssshould be down there with them."
He shrugged his wings. Best not to risk letting him find out about me. Weird, talking mortal animal, remember?
Oh, right. It was so easy to forget that he wasn't a spirit when he had the same personality he'd always had.
Down below, a crab spirit wearing a ridiculous gold helmet encrusted with pearls was giving a long speech, so long that Den was going glassy-eyed.
"Nope," Bobo decided. "I'd rather ssstay here and watch with you."
Maybe she had the right to be down there, talking to the Dragon King of the Western Sea, but she didn't want to be. She was happy right where she was.
Well, actually, she'd be happy once they got the Dragon King of the Western Sea to stop the typhoon and stop trying to murder Lodia.
As if he could hear her thought, Den looked straight up into the much larger dragon's eyes and asked, "Pardon me, Your Majesty, but may I see the authorization for this storm?"
A/N: Thanks to my awesome Patreon backers, Autocharth, BananaBobert, Celia, Charlotte, Ed, Fuzzycakes, Ike, Kimani, Lindsey, Michael, TheLunaticCo, yoghogfog, and Anonymous!
