Phony Potions

Chapter 35.75

Winsor drew his hand out, extended it for a shake. Ricardo took it. Winsor pumped his hand once, and then, jerked violently. He was smaller, but he threw Ricardo off balance enough that his other arm was able to come behind him. Something glinted in Winsor's hand. Ricardo recovered enough to drive his fist into Winsor's stomach, crippling the smaller sorcerer over it.

"I finally extend the hand of friendship to you and this is how you react?" Ricardo spat on Winsor as he twisted Winsor's pale, thin arm. Winsor crumpled to his knees. He rolled his face away. "Your brother was right; you are useless." Ricardo kicked at Winsor's back.

A bottle dropped from Winsor's hand. It crashed against the floor, and a cloud of powder rolled upward from the shards. Winsor exhaled, and with his free hand reached for his belt.

The sorcerer and sorceress who had been working at the girl were staring at Ricardo and Winsor. They began to chant. I lunged forward and slammed into the sorceress, knocking her sideways. Phlo crashed into a shelf, which stood sturdy. She staggered.

Phil grabbed me. I brought my elbow up and hit him in the jaw. He stumbled backward. My attention was split again by Phlo behind me, and I spun to kick her. I was terrible at fighting, but against these sorcerers I was doing a fair job of it. They were knocked around easily, like vases with uneven bottoms.

Juris stood back where I'd started, watching in shock.

Winsor rolled to avoid another kick, this one aimed at his head.

"All you had to do was submit! Your life didn't have to be so hard." Ricardo's ankle landed next to Winsor's shoulder, pinning tufts of black hair. "You made yourself an outcast. You could have been one of us, but you always had an opinion—"

The cloud reached up to Ricardo's neck. As he gasped in to prepare another verbal assault, the powder invaded. He started to cough on the noxious fumes. His footing slipped as his large body shook. Winsor, obscured by the rolling powder-smoke of the potion, twisted onto his side. The knife he drew from his belt dug into the fatty muscle of Ricardo's lower leg. As the steel slid in, Winsor let go of the handle. Arcs of blue-white light shot out from the weapon.

I recognized the writhing magic crawling along Ricardo's body; it was the same enchantment the arrows the Avalons had shot Mallow with used. Just like Mallow had, Ricardo began to convulse. With a burning smell, the greasy hair tuft ignited. He was a screaming candle before the flames spread everywhere, consuming his clothes and his skin alike. Ricardo was gone, leaving only smoke that was pink and billowy in his place.

"Two Enchanted fiends soaked in girl's blood, change so all you can do is chew cud!" Winsor shouted. Phil and Phlo, still reeling from my punches, fell to the ground. Their arms and legs shrank while their chests and stomachs swelled. Mooing helplessly, the two sorcerers staggered toward Winsor.

"Cows quietly fall asleep so no havoc they can wreak," he shouted as one of them grazed against him. The cow stumbled, and then slid to the ground. It thudded against a cabinet, knocking loose a series of glass vials. Most of them fell without shattering onto the bony hide and rolled down the curves to the ground. The other cow teetered for a moment, and then collapsed in place, its legs folding beneath it.

"What happened to Ricardo?" I asked, realizing that all of Winsor's actions meant the spell must be broken. My own words sounded foreign to me, even after such a short time of being unable to speak.

"I killed him," Winsor cried, frantic with panic. "I-I-I had no choice, it was the only way to break the spell so I could save her." Winsor stared wide eyed down at the girl. "Hex it, she's bleeding out without their enchantments. I don't know what they did—"