Page 18

Leopold

L eopold was exhausted.

Which made sense—he’d been hopping between worlds and running from death for what felt like years but was really just one super eternal day.

He’d hitched a ride on a giant, was nearly eaten by Mothra, and had become Crispy’s theoretical pet.

Um, and there was a kiss in there too. But more than that, Leopold was exhausted in part because he’d just found out he wasn’t human.

He slumped in the chair while Crispy and Juzir had an animated conversation. It was about him, so he really should have paid attention, but he was too preoccupied.

Not human.

Chaos.

It was insane. But also… it fit. And it explained so very much about the way his life had gone.

“Oh my God!” he shouted as a new revelation hit him.

Crispy turned to look at him, worry clear on his face. “What? What’s happening?”

“I think I killed my parents.” The realization shook him to his foggy core.

“Pardon me?”

Leopold wrapped his arms around himself and moaned. “My parents. The people who adopted me. I think I killed them.”

Crispy came as close as he could without touching the ward. “What makes you say that?”

“Camels. They died in a freak camel accident. Crispy, that’s not normal.

People don’t die that way—at least not in California.

But they did, and it’s my fault ‘cause I cause chaos—I am Chaos—and everything goes to shit around me.” He was shaking and wasn’t sure whether he wanted to cry or puke. Maybe both.

“Plenty of odd things happen to people without any, er, interference from you,” Crispin said.

“I have an ancestor who died when a roc—the bird, I mean—accidentally dropped a rock—a solid collection of minerals—onto his head.” Crispin reached for him, but was stopped by the protective ward.

“Even if you did in some way influence their fate, you didn’t do so intentionally or even knowingly.

You were a child. You can’t blame yourself. ”

Oh yes, I can. And while he was at it, he could feel guilty about all the other disasters that had bloomed in his presence.

Thea’s malfunction was undoubtedly his fault, which meant he was responsible for Crispin’s ruined perfecality score and for the fact that they couldn’t reach the Office of the Lost.

“Oh God. I’m evil.” Leopold moaned again and hid his face in his hands.

“Listen to me.” Crispin sounded unusually forceful.

“Chaos is not evil, not any more than… oh, fire is evil, or water. Yes, those things can cause damage, but not because they want to—it’s simply due to their nature.

And recall what Juzir said: Chaos is also the source of creativity.

Without it we’d have no arts, and then wouldn’t the worlds be dull places? ”

Leopold felt slightly comforted. Not just by what was being said, but also by the fact that Crispin was the one saying them.

He was trying to make Leopold feel better.

Crispin, who’d kidnapped him and who was the prissiest, most infuriating creature Leopold had ever met.

But who hadn’t abandoned him when things went south. There was also that kiss.

“What are you going to do with me?” Dread sat heavy in Leopold’s stomach. “And why is the… the other Chaos chasing after me?”

“I don’t know. But I expect that my mother can help.”

At some point Leopold got off the chair and curled up on the floor at the edge of the ward, which had expanded to give him a little moving-around space. Soft voices lulled him to sleep.

He woke up covered by a blanket and with a pillow under his head.

He wondered how Crispin and Juzir had gotten those items past the defenses.

Then he wondered how he’d so easily come to accept desk fae, dinosaur wizards, and magical wards.

Maybe that was the upside to being a piece of Chaos—you weren’t too shook up when your world turned deeply weird.

Leopold sat up and then slowly stood and stretched.

He was sore. The pillow and blanket had been nice, but the floor was still hard.

There was no sign of Juzir, but Crispin was curled up on a lumpy piece of gray furniture filled with weird holes that might have been the dino equivalent of a sofa.

Asleep, he looked young and untroubled, all his uptight fussiness gone.

They’d kissed, hadn’t they? Leopold hadn’t imagined it. Possibly due to moth pheromones. Possibly due to Leopold’s chaotic influence. Or possibly because they found each other attractive. Hell, maybe all three.

As if sensing Leopold’s stare, Crispin blinked awake. For just a moment, he smiled brightly.

And then wham! Out came the tight-faced scowl. “We shouldn’t have slept so long.”

Leopold shrugged. “I dunno what time it is. Pets don’t have watches.”

Crispin rolled his eyes. “You needn’t be so peevish about it. It could be worse. What if archosaurs considered apes tasty, for instance? At any rate, we’ll leave here shortly.”

“To see your mother.” Leopold had gotten the impression that something bad had gone down between Crispin and his mother, but his desk fae—friend?—was being tight-lipped about the whole thing.

“Yes,” said Crispin, shoulders slumped.

Leopold was going to ask how they would achieve this feat, but then Juzir entered with a tray. He was clearly still wary of Leopold and avoided looking at him, but he smiled at Crispin. “Breakfast!”

When had Leopold last eaten? He’d lost track of which world it had been. His stomach growled loudly enough to startle their host. Man, I would sell my soul for a breakfast burrito or a big stack of pancakes.

But wait—soul. Assuming such things existed, did he have one? It didn’t seem as though Chaos would. God, he’d almost forgotten that he wasn’t human. But if he wasn’t human, why was he so damned ravenous? And also why?—

“Breakfast,” said Juzir, frowning at Leopold. Then he muttered something else that Leopold didn’t understand, and two metal bowls appeared on the floor. One of them contained water. The other had something yellowish with green bits; it might have been scrambled eggs with herbs. Or it might not.

Crispin had a regular plate and some kind of cutlery, although he was struggling with it since it had been designed for archosaur hands. Leopold, however, had dog dishes. But he was hungry, so he dug in anyway, muttering to himself about asteroids and extinction events.

Once the food bowl was empty, a new need became urgent. “I have to use the bathroom.”

Juzir wrinkled his nose. “You smell odd but I don’t think you need a bath.”

“I am housebroken, but I won’t be much longer if you don’t get me to a toilet.”

Comprehension dawned on Juzir’s face, but he still didn’t look happy. “I can bring you a… bucket.”

“No. Absolutely not.” Leopold might have only a shred of dignity left, but by golly he was going to hang on to it. He crossed his arms.

Then, to his mild surprise, Crispin intervened. “Juz, let him go. Surely it couldn’t hurt to release the ward for just a few minutes. He’ll do his business and then hurry back, you’ll find a way to whisk us out of here, and we’ll be out of your, erm, scales.”

Looking a bit dyspeptic, Juzir waved his arms for a few seconds.

Something made a loud pop! And Leopold suddenly felt…

freer. Sort of like when he took off a pair of really tight skinny jeans and pulled on baggy sweats instead.

He was going to ask where the bathroom was, but Juzir pointed down the hall and Leopold dashed there with as much decorum as he could manage.

The bathroom was large, with one of those rainforest showerheads he’d always coveted.

There was also a small sink, and a weird bristly thing attached to one pale-blue wall.

He peered at the bristles in confusion until a few trapped iridescent green scales gave him a hint of its probable use: to help Juzir shed. Ugh.

But since archosaur personal grooming was not his immediate worry, he examined the toilet, which, unfortunately, wasn’t well suited for human anatomy.

It was still better than a bucket, though, and Leopold did the best he could.

He felt better immediately… until he went to flush the thing and was stymied.

An electronic control panel displayed a dozen buttons, each with a different incomprehensible symbol.

It was worse than one of those fancy Japanese bidets.

He pressed a button at random—then winced when music blasted from hidden speakers.

At least it might have been music. Or it could have been a recording of someone being tortured.

Another press turned the cacophony off, thank gods.

The next button made the entire toilet glow violet; he had no idea why.

A third released puffs of eucalyptus-scented steam from the ceiling.

Frustrated, Leopold pushed them all, repeatedly, pounding out the Darth Vader tune from Star Wars. Baam baam baam bam-bam baam bam-bam baaam….

The toilet flushed. Hooray! But Leopold’s exhilaration was short-lived, because now the toilet started to shudder, jets of water erupted from the bowl, the music intensified, and, somewhere deep inside the building, something rumbled.

Leopold did what any sensible person would do under these circumstances: he ran.

In the living room, Crispin and Juzir were deep in conversation, apparently about Thea, who was clasped in one of Juzir’s hands.

“Get back on the chair,” ordered Juzir. He must not have noticed whatever was going on in the bathroom.

Leopold, sensing that wasn’t going to last long, scurried to his chair and sat down. The ward was up again in a jiffy.

“So,” said Juzir to Crispin, “I can repair it, but the incantations will take several hours to set. Would you like to go to the movies while we wait? Iron Stegosaurus 2 is playing. I’m not sure it’s as good as the first one, but I hear it’s lots of fun. It’s about this billionaire inventor who?—”

“I’m not leaving Leo,” said Crispin, which earned him a point in the tally that Leopold was keeping.

Then he cocked his head as if listening to something, his eyes widened, and he shot Leopold a quick, panicked look before turning back to Juzir.

“I think we ought to move things along. Is there a faster way? We’ve been using reflective surfaces. ”

“Well… maybe. But it’s not very precise. You could end up back home or you could end up in a tar pit. Look, we could pick up some pizza and?—”

Juzir sounded lonely. Leopold wondered when he’d last gone out on a date. If at all.

Crispin shook his head decisively. “I’ll risk the tar pit.”

Leopold wasn’t sure he agreed, but now he was catching the noise that had Crispy so uneasy. An ominous gurgling rumble that might be due to unhappy plumbing. “I’ll risk it too,” Leopold said loudly.

Although Juzir looked a trifle offended, he shrugged. “All right. But don’t blame me if you end up neck deep in sticky pitch. I lost a cousin that way. Crispy?—”

“It’s Crispin!”

“Crispin, take your transport device and stand close to the ape. On the count of three, I’m going to lift the ward.

You’ll need to grab him and imagine your destination as clearly as possible.

Details matter. The taste of your favorite meal there, the feel of the carpets under your feet, the color of— Do you hear something? ” Juzir cocked his head.

“Just my pet’s stomach.” Crispin closed his eyes in thought. “Let’s see… my mother’s floors are usually carpeted in meadow-grass and chamomile. Now can we please move this along?”

Juzir hummed, wiggled his fingers, and started chanting something that sounded a lot like the bathroom’s torture music. Then he huffed. “One. Two.” The rumble grew louder and the floor began to subtly vibrate. “Three.”

The ward popped away. With Thea in one hand, Crispin grabbed Leopold’s elbow with the other. Somewhere in the distance, an alarm began to sound.

“Now, Juzir!”

Clearly distracted, Juzir started chanting again. A noise came from the bathroom—something that sounded suspiciously like a large porcelain vessel shattering. The floor shook so hard that some of Juzir’s vases wobbled off the shelves and crashed onto the floor.

There was an explosion loud enough to deafen Leopold.

And then the universe tilted.