Round Robin: Part Seven

To view earlier pieces of the round robin, here's the link: http://herebemagic.blogspot.com/p/round-robin-story.html

Happy reading!


PART THIRTY-FIVE
By Jody Wallace (http://www.jodywallace.com)  

Dash flashed her a huge smile and leaned toward her. His sexy blue eyes twinkled. “C’mere, wife.”

“No!” Delphie scuttled away from the handsome, muscular djinn. She was crazy not to let him kiss her. But she wasn’t a total jerk. “You have to stop touching me.”

The abbot, Uncle Zip, Dash and Stride stared at her in shock.

“My dear, there’s no turning back now. The bindings have already been set.” Uncle Zip tsked and shut the box that had held the marriage cord.

“Yes indeed,” the abbot agreed. The jolly man had a fringe of white hair around his shiny gold cone hat. “The only way to break a djinn marriage bond is to die.”

“And since saving me from death is why we married, we might as well enjoy it,” Dash said.

As much as Delphie wanted to kiss her new husband—though she wasn’t believing that whole “forever” part until they went to see a lawyer imp she knew—she couldn’t bear the guilt...well, the guilt-trip...of forcing wishes out of Dash. Entrapping him the first minute of their marriage was no way to begin a relationship.

Theirs would simply have to be a—sob!—sexless union.

Unless she wanted something and he wasn’t cooperating.

But she should at least start as she ought to go.

“I can’t touch you or you’ll have to grant me wishes.” Delphie folded her arms because it was very, very tempting to touch him. And stroke him. And run her fingers through his silky, long, dark hair. And nibble her way down his...ahem!

“I’m not afraid to touch you. Anywhere.” Dash demonstrated by catching her hand, the one that had had the cord wrapped around it, in his own. Blue lines gleamed briefly on their skin and then faded.

“Oops,” Delphie said. The blue glow confirmed it. Dash had probably just signed up for another three wishes. “How many have you granted already? Because you’ve touched me a lot. I figure the Nutella was one and the random portal in the frat house was one and who knows what else I said?”

“Zero,” Dash said. “No wishes for you unless you include me. I’m a wish come true.”

“What is this nonsense about the pixie entrapping anyone? Why isn’t she quenched?” The abbot threw up his hands. “Dash al Fortunata al Ainmire, you might be a very, very recently-pardoned traitor, but you know you aren’t supposed to bring outlanders into our dimension and certainly aren’t supposed to marry one without making sure they are completely quenched.”

“I don’t even know what that means,” Delphie said plaintively, “but people keep saying it and I’m really thirsty by this point.”

“Stride, get my beautiful bride some wine.” Dash didn’t seem concerned that the abbot was turning purple with rage and giving him an unholy mean glare. He slid his arm around Delphie’s waist. “It’s bad luck to leave your bride’s side so soon after the wedding.”

“Allow me.” Uncle Zip bustled into another room and returned with a bottle and five glasses before Delphie had fully registered he was gone. He handed glasses around, a set of intricately carved wooden tumblers. “We should toast the happy couple.”

“Wait.” She turned to the abbot, sensing a sort of ally. “I don’t want to toast. I want to know everything. I’m married to Dash now. Part of the family. Doesn’t that mean you can tell me about the djinn?”

“You may be married,” the abbot said, “but if the whippersnapper hasn’t properly quenched you, you’re a danger to us. This is highly irregular.”

A proper quenching was beginning to sound more and more like something Delphie did not want to have done to her. Was quenching like shushing? Subduing? Or, good heavens, brainwashing? Was this one of those horrible patriarchal dimensions, and had she just signed her little-pixie-in-the-kitchen warrant?

Suddenly Dash’s arm around her, his hand resting on her hip, felt confining.

“I’ll try not to be dangerous or touch anyone.” Delphie wondered where she could find an access portal. All dimensions had permanent ones, and she could sense them if she was close enough. “Look at it from my point of view. I was minding my own business in the prime dimension when Dash and I, well, we had a conflict.”

“That’s one way of putting it.” Dash chuckled and snuggled her closer. In truth, she’d started it, and her malfunctioning fairy dust had worsened it, but Dash had been rude and unhelpful. Then the queen had shown up as soon as they’d arrived, and finding a portal so Delphie could leave had been the last thing on her mind.

“The end result is he pushed me into this dimension on purpose.” Delphie took a deep drink of the wine. Oooh, nice. “Since I’ve been here, Stride and Dash have avoided explaining everything they possibly could. They wouldn’t tell me what they were, and they wouldn’t tell me about wishes.”

“Oh, they aren’t allowed to tell you about wishes,” the abbot agreed. He nodded at Uncle Zip to indicate his glass was full enough. “That’s part of the code of silence.”

Delphie drank some more, beginning to feel quite mistreated. She leaned on Dash—on her sexy new husband who wasn’t afraid to touch her. “They wouldn’t tell me what powers they have.”

“Of course not,” the abbot said. “No clan members voluntarily share the powers granted to them by their King or Queen.”

“And Stride...” Delphie paused for another nice drink. The wine tingled all the way to her stomach. It packed a wallop, unlike the weaker wines of the prime dimension. Or was that Dash’s hand, with his finger sneaking beneath her waistband to caress her bare skin? “Stride wouldn’t tell me where the money...the mona...the monastery was.”

“Naturally. Stride is our most decorated enforcer.” The abbot nodded wisely. “We’ve been in a wish feud with Clan Aurora, you understand, and we keep our physical location obscured at all times.”

“Ahhhh-rora.” Delphie smiled at Uncle Zip when he filled her pretty wooden cup to the brim again. “Is that the chickie who supposably...”

Dash inserted himself between Delphie and the abbot. Or, rather, he shoved Delphie behind him. She hopped on her toes, trying to see over his shoulder, while his muscular arm kept her firmly in place.

“Your Adequacy,” Dash said, “we don’t mean to keep you. It’s daylight, and I’m sure many in the clan would like to confess various indiscretions.”

“It’s no trouble,” the abbot said. “I have time for another glass of wine. Weddings don’t happen every day, you know.” He held out his tumbler. “Well, not until tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?” Stride and Dash exclaimed.

“Right, right. You boys have been outland.” The abbot brought his hands to his chest in a genuflection. “Tomorrow we celebrate the grand juncture of King Ainmire and Queen Aurora, long may they reign. Thus shall end the wish feud of our clans. It is a momentous occasion indeed.”

“I hope,” Delphie said, interrupted by a hiccup. “Hope ish longer than our sheremony.”

“This can’t happen,” Dash said grimly, and then...he was gone.

“But it’s bad luck to leave your bride after the wedding.” Delphie’s knees wobbled right before she had a seat on the floor to stop it from moving so much.

PART THIRTY-SIX
By Angela Campbell, http://www.angelacampbellonline.com/

A hiccup shook Delphie’s petite body. Holy goblin balls, she felt…funny. And good. Kind of relaxed. Maybe even a little horny. She glanced around for her new husband. Was he playing some kind of weird sex game? Hiding so he could jump her or something? Well, just let him try. She was ready. No touching! Even if she was a little horny now.

“Sash? I mean, Dash?” She giggled at her mistake. Wouldn’t it be funny if he had a cousin named Sash? Sashay? Her giggles erupted into full, bent-over laughter. Oh, these djinn names were too funny.

Beside her, Stride shook and then hung his head. “Another mess I’ve been left to clean up for my brother. His bride is drunker than a hobbit on mead, and he’s run off to check on Aurora. Mark my words, I know he has.”

Wait? What had he just said? “Aur-roar?” She shook her head. “Aurora? My husband left me to go see her?”

She wasn’t laughing anymore. Now she was angry. Why, that—!

“Now you don’t know that’s where he went,” Uncle Zip interjected, stepping close to Delphie and laying a calming hand on her shoulder. “Besides, isn’t there a more important matter at hand?” She glanced over and saw him nod his head toward her. “Someone still needs to be quenched.”

She shoved the old djinn away and stumbled toward Stride. “If you know where that faithless scoundrel I married is, you’d better take me to him. Now! I mean it!” She tried to put her hands on her hips to seem more forceful, but her fingers had a hard time finding them. She wanted nothing more now than to give Dash a piece of her mind. The thought of him with another female suddenly caused tears to well in her eyes.

“If he’s caught with Aurora before her wedding tomorrow and before word has spread of his own, that fool could still be executed. It would be no more than he deserves, but...” Stride’s gaze softened to something close to sympathy as he looked at Delphie. “I am an Enforcer. I can track where he’s gone. Come, pixie. Let’s find your husband before he does something else foolish.”

Stride held out his hand toward her. Uh-uh. No way, pal. She wasn’t touching him again. She stepped back and almost tumbled over a chair but caught herself.

With a grunt of disapproval, Stride moved away, only to reappear with thick, white gloves covering his hands. “Just a precaution,” he told her. He stepped forward and grabbed her arm, jerking her to him. “I can’t leave you on your own. No telling what trouble you’d get into like this.”

Delphie blinked, felt the world around her blur and rush past, and before she knew it, she was standing on some sort of balcony. She took a step and almost fell over she was so dizzy. “I thought you said that you weren’t fast like Dash?”

“I’m not. I warned you I was slow. But I have great stamina.” Slow? Was he pulling her wing? “Pixie, you’ve been passed out for most of our journey. You didn’t even notice the jarring of the wagon or me flying us up here.”

They’d traveled by wagon? News to her. Her head felt clearer though. And it hurt like a jersey devil. “Where are we?”

His lips thinned, and he didn’t answer. She glanced into the room that opened from the balcony and felt a rush of dizziness again as she saw Dash standing there, holding hands with a beautiful djinn woman dressed scantily in a few pieces of white ribbon—and nothing else.

Her feet seemed to have a life of their own as they carried her forward. “You scoundrel! Not even married an hour, and you’re with another woman.” She poked Dash in the chest with her finger, ignoring the djinn woman beside him. “That’s it! I want a divorce. Better yet, an annulment.” She crossed her arms and glared at him.

Dash grinned down at her. “Are you jealous, my little pixie?”

Of course she was! She was his wife! Pixies were 100 percent always — well, maybe 90 percent always — monogamous when married. Hence the short marriage spans. But still. “I consider my responsibility fulfilled. What you do to screw up from this point on is your prob—-Hey!”

She squealed as a pair of strong hands hauled her forward and into his chest. His lips descended upon hers, and anything she might have been thinking evaporated like a fairy’s mist.

Oh, my. He was such a great kisser. Better than her last seven husbands combined.

“Ahem.” The djinn she suspected was Aurora cleared her throat and smiled when Delphie lifted her gaze toward the woman.

Delphie felt ridiculous. She glanced over at Stride and found him smiling, too.

“Queen Aurora, this is the deliciously beautiful pixie I was telling you about.” Dash’s arm curved around her shoulder and tucked her close against him. “May I present to you my wife, Delphie?”

The queen bowed her head a little. “I’m so very glad to meet you, Delphinia Bathsheba Slippery-Elm.”

Uh, o-kay. Was she supposed to do a full-on bow or something now? Tough! Delphie wasn’t bowing to any woman who thought she could—

Gasping, Delphie tore away from Dash’s side. “Oh, no,” she moaned, looking at him with horror-stricken eyes.

“What is it, my wife?” Concerned, Dash followed her.

“I touched you again.” Tears welled in her eyes. “Now you’ll be forced to grant more wishes.” Another thought struck her. “Wait a minute. You were touching her, too. Does that mean you have to do what she tells you?”

Maybe this was making more sense. Maybe the queen had ensnared Dash and was forcing him against his will to grant her own wishes. She spun on the female djinn.

“I wish you’d stay away from my husband!” Too late, Delphie covered her mouth with her hands.

But nothing happened. The queen was still here.

"My dear, I wish you wouldn't be jealous," the Queen said in a musical voice.

"I don't think you wished hard enough," Delphie said. She was definitely still jealous of the tall, elegant, almost completely naked djinn woman who seemed to have a special relationship with Dash.

“Married couples can no longer wrest wishes from one another but I, too, would like to know why you were touching the Queen.” Stride stepped closer, reminding everyone he was still in the room. “Why haven’t you granted the Queen's wish?” he asked Dash.

“Because I don’t have to, brother.” A huge smile covered Dash’s face. “The queen and I weren't lovers, as everyone assumed. She sent me on a secret mission to find a cure for the wish compulsion to ensure peace among the royals.”

Stride raised his eyebrows. “And you actually found one?”

Dash held out his hands. “Indeed, brother. I have a cure.”

Before Delphie could process the full meaning of his words, the wooden doors to the queen’s chamber burst open. Djinn dressed in armor rushed forward with weapons.

“It’s the traitor, Dash al Fortunata al Ainmire. Seize him!”

*****

Tune in in two weeks to find out just how Dash has cured himself of the wish compulsion, what quenching is, and whether or not any of it will matter in the face of the djinn soldiers!

Jody W.
http://www.jodywallace.com  * http://www.meankitty.com