Page 21 of The Underachiever’s Guide to Love and Saving the World

brYCE

Courtney didn’t come to dinner.

“I don’t want a friend,” she’d screamed at me back at the stables.

Words that should have stung made my heart ache with how familiar the sentiment was.

Her dysfunction fit with my dysfunction.

Maybe the fact both of us were avoiding relationships was what had made our weird not-relationship work so well.

“Where is Lady Courtney?” someone at the table asked.

Maybe she found a way home , the catastrophizing voice in my head whispered. She’d seemed pretty upset. Maybe she’d done a small, good deed—like helped an old lady cross the street—and it had bettered the world enough to open the portal for her, and she’d abandoned me.

Sure, I wanted her out of my life, but not like this. Not before we were both safely home.

“I saw her head into the woods.” The faint voice of a maid in the shadows snapped me from my thoughts, and my self-pity morphed into a new kind of dread.

I was well-acquainted with fear. I thought I knew it inside and out until that moment. Until I stopped feeling scared for myself and started feeling scared for someone else. It was brand-new and a thousand times more terrifying.

“The woods?” I repeated, words sharp, mind filling with horror stories of murdered joggers and bear attacks. “Where? Alone? ”

Ten minutes later I’d mounted a living death machine and was galloping into the forest. As the shadows closed around me, my mood darkened further.

The sun was fading fast. Fog hovered above the ground, opaque wisps weaving among the foliage.

It split around the horse in coiling ripples as we galloped through.

As the trees grew thinner, the horse’s hooves scrambled for purchase over stone.

I slid from its back and rushed forward on foot.

The stones took shape as the ruins of a house, its chimney the only thing still erect—like a skeletal arm bursting from the ground, reaching for the sky.

I crashed into a clearing, boots sliding over slick bricks as I fought off rosebush thorns and spiderwebs. Light from the orange-sherbet sunset poured through the opening in the tree canopy above. Below, a stone barn stood forlornly in a circle of brown, matted grass.

A cloying burnt smell stung the back of my throat.

Fog rose off the ground, turning the dying sunlight into something hazy and dreamlike.

Spindly forms twisted from the hovering fog here and there, maybe the blackened remains of farm equipment…

no, they were trees—what was left of them, burnt and twisted. A foreboding chill swept up my spine.

Through the sound of crickets and tree frogs, a metallic clinking met my ears.

My head snapped toward the sound. Courtney stood before the barn doors, fiddling with a chain that was looped through their handles.

She let the chain go, the padlock securing the ends together, smacking against the heavy steel doors.

I took a step, boot snapping a charred twig, and I noticed the grass underfoot was blackened too.

Courtney whirled. “Bryce? Why are you here?”

It was strange seeing her like this. Usually, she went around so unfazed by everything. “Are you okay?” I asked, momentarily ignoring my creeping suspicion that the clearing was created by an unnatural and deadly fire.

Giving me the cold shoulder, she turned back to fiddling with the padlock. “Why do you keep bothering ? You’re like that guy. That character in a TV show who dies, but their body is never shown, so you know they’re going to come back.”

I crossed the eerie clearing, wishing I didn’t recognize her defense mechanism—lashing out when vulnerable. Wishing I didn’t care.

“The first time the character returns, it’s this whole cute, clever thing.

” She grew more agitated with each word, rattling the chain every few seconds for emphasis.

“But then they keep dying and popping up over and over, and soon everyone just wants them to meet their graphic end on-screen so we can be done with it.”

I drew up short behind her. “You think I’m cute and clever?”

Ignoring me, Courtney slammed the chain against the side of the barn. “Why is any of this our problem, anyway? We don’t even live here. Isn’t it unrealistic for these fantasy worlds to expect one person to save them?”

“I… guess?” She was upset and rambling, and I was having a difficult time keeping up.

“Back home, our own world is falling apart, but no one is expecting a single random pedestrian to save us.” Courtney grew more impassioned with every word.

“But go to a fantasy world and suddenly everyone looks to the least qualified person in existence for salvation. If they say no, suddenly they’re the selfish bad guy. ”

“What’s with the barn?” My fists clenched. “What are you up to? Are you all right? You shouldn’t be out here alone.”

“No, I’m not all right. I’m angry .” Courtney wiped roughly at her brow.

“Don’t you see what I’ve been driven to?

It’s disgusting. An all-time low. I’ve set aside my personal beliefs and betrayed everything I’ve ever stood for.

” She shuddered. “I’m out here, sweating my butt off, working .

Because—stupid Amy and stupid Charisma and stupid you . You’re ruining everything.”

“How am I ruining everything?”

“With your bothering ,” she said, like that explained everything. Shaking her head, she dropped her voice to a condemning tone. “You feel something for me.”

What? What gave her that idea?

Perhaps internally I’d been experiencing some weaknesses toward her, but she couldn’t know that. I needed to shut this down now so she wouldn’t make the same mistake again.

“Sure, yeah, you do make me feel things.” I shook my head ruefully—a man bested. “You make me feel the same kind of intense irritation I experience when I step in water while wearing socks.”

She rolled her eyes, but her shoulders eased slightly.

Stepping around her, I took the lock from her hands. “Here. Let me try.”

“Don’t tell me you conveniently know how to pick a lock.”

“I don’t conveniently know how to pick a lock.” Stretching, I plucked the key off the top of the doorframe. “But I am taller than you and saw the key.” I twisted the key in the lock and gave the chain a sharp tug. “What’s in here, anyway?”

Courtney pushed me aside, using all her body weight to pull open one of the doors. It creaked. A slit of sunlight slashed across the dusty barn floor. Something stirred in the shadows.

“Courtney,” I asked, trepidation tightening my muscles, “what’s in there?” For the first time, I noticed the bag at her feet—some kind of white material stained with red. A red that resembled blood.

She hoisted the Disturbing Sack (possible band name?) and pushed the door open farther. A low clicking issued from the depths of the barn. Something glinted and shifted in the far corner.

Courtney strode inside. I tiptoed after her, blinking as my eyes adjusted. The barn smelled of decaying straw and musty grain. Heavy cobwebs coated every surface like sheets over furniture in a mansion.

“The prophecy says—” Courtney began.

“You were paying attention to the prophecy?” I failed to keep the impressed tone out of my voice.

Her back stiffened. “ Actually ,” she said, as though she were a stranger in a social media comments section about to say something deeply untrue with a great amount of confidence, “yes. But don’t get used to it. The prophecy states the dragon will help the Chosen One.”

I choked and almost tripped over my own feet. “Dragon?”

Her teeth flashed in the gloom. “Scared?”

Snick tick tick tick.

The sound slithered forward, sending the hairs on the back of my neck on end.

Something peeled itself off the far wall of the barn. I staggered back, cursing under my breath, heart hammering the inside of my chest. “Courtney,” I whispered.

Ignoring me, she opened the Disturbing Sack, withdrawing a slab of raw meat. “Even if I’m not the Chosen One, I’ve always been pretty good at taming strays.” She extended her bleeding offering, inching farther into the barn.

The clicking picked up excitedly. Shadows took shape as the dragon emerged from the darkness, its four wings reared back and twitching.

It had eight spindly legs ending in dual hairy tarsal claws.

They jabbed the barn floor one after the other in halting, inhuman movements as the creature came closer, closer, closer.

Its pinchers clicked together in front of its wide, fanged mouth.

Its eight eyes blinked independently, never letting Courtney and me out of its sight.

Adrenaline whooshed through my veins, setting my muscles alight. I did not sign up for winged, fire-breathing spiders. The spider dragon took another step forward, long talons crunching bones littering the ground.

“Uh, Court, maybe this was a bad idea.”

All eight of the dragon’s eyes clicked in succession, swiveling toward me.

Courtney flapped the raw steak around. “Here, dragon, dragon, dragon.”

Eight eyes snapped to her.

The dragon struck at a speed I couldn’t track. Zip, zip. Courtney’s jaw dropped as she stared at the quivering, bleeding scrap of meat left in her hand.

The dragon pulverized the steak like an infomercial juicer, pulp flying. My stomach churned. “Run.” The word came out a raspy nightmare whisper.

The dragon snapped its wings wide, stirring up a tornado of dust within the barn. It arched back its head, toothy maw gaping wide. Fire roiled to life in the back of its throat, sending a heat wave blasting over us.

I stumbled away, but Courtney stood frozen, that bag of scraps dangling uselessly at her side.

“Run!” I yelled, but she didn’t move, silhouetted in the blinding light filling the barn as flames churned and licked around the dragon’s razor teeth.