Giving Fantasia: The Taking Fantasia Sequel

Chapter 94: I See Fire, Blood in the Breeze.

Chapter 94: I See Fire, Blood in the Breeze.

Peter charged through North's reindeer. Sleigh bells jingled as he skimmed the sleigh en route for Maleficent, Arthur, and Excalibur. Maleficent was contorting, fighting to keep her dragon form, and Arthur was fighting tenfold to escape. Both bodies were illuminated by the moon, but as Peter flew the moonlight dimmed beneath a black... something. The gathering darkness was sheer and dusky; like a gigantic shadow.

Instinctively Peter touched his neck, feeling for Wendy's thimble.

It wasn't there. With a sickening jolt, Peter remembered. He'd removed the thimble to spite Wendy, to release her from his memory.

"Thanks Wendy. Thanks a lot." Peter kneaded the dread inside his stomach. Then, sardonically he added. "Who's the damsel now?"

Peter kicked, powering through mesmerized dragons. Bumping into Jack Frost and Elsa along the way, he gestured towards King Arthur. Jack nodded, bolstering Elsa and twirling his staff. Although she couldn't see Jack, Elsa agreed to help, desperate to redeem her sins. Peter lead, and the trio flew to King Arthur's rescue.

But the shadows grew. As they neared the blackness, Peter differentiated the single mass as a sea of skeletal horses. The horses were frightening. They were smoky but skeletal, like carcasses glued together with ash and bone.

They were... horses...mares...nightmares.

Peter suddenly felt vulnerable. His innards felt hollow. His ears pricked like antenna, listening as the nightmares sniffed his empty soul.

Again, Peter probed his neck, touching the spot Wendy's thimble use to sit. Thinking of her, and their lost love, he raced after King Arthur.

"SCHMENDRICK!" Kayley reached helplessly after Peter. She panicked as Pitch's nightmares surrounded Maleficent, preparing to swallow The King. "Schmendrick! Do something! Save The King! Save Caliburn! Use your magic!"

"Magic? But I —" Schmendrick floundered as Sandman suddenly leapt from the sleigh. Dodging the dreamsand, Schmendrick clumsily regained his footing. 

"But I can't use magic! Remember the last time I tried? Ladies Odette and Amalthea were transfigured, and Master Emrys disappeared! Kayley I am the world's worst magici –"

"But you have to try!" Kayley shouted, so passionately North glanced back. "You have to do something!"

"I would if I could!" Schmendrick cried. "If I could, I'd send The King and Caliburn far away, somewhere no human could find him! But that would take a real magician with real magic! And I can't pretend anymore."

"But you have magic!" Kayley wrung Schmendrick's robes, trying to stir his confidence. "Schmendrick the magic is inside you! Maybe you can't see it, but it's there, I know it's there! You have all the power you need, if you dare to look for it!"

An odd expression pulled Schmendrick's face, as if he were simultaneously appalled and touched by Kayley's praise. For the first time in his life Schmendrick didn't feel like the world's worst magician. He felt like a hero.

But he still was dubious. And he remained dubious until Maleficent's shadow curled over Kayley, cracking the indestructible light in her eyes.

"Schmendrick please – Don't let my father die in vain."

Schmendrick stiffened his upper lip. Then he rolled both sleeves and straightened his conical hat.

"Magic....do as you will." Schmendrick chanted, squeezing Kayley's hand. Blue magic twinkled between them as Schmendrick delivered his own incantation, and not Master Emrys' 'Higitus figitus' charm.