Creation Mage 6 by Dante King (red scrolls of magic .TXT) 📗

“Best not to let your great grandfather here you talkin’ about his brandy, sir,” said a voice that pronounced the letter ‘r’ with something approaching fanaticism.

A rotund figure wearing a cowboy hat and a plaid shirt was ambling across the lawn toward us.

The person heading over the snow with a rolling gait was so plump, with a beer gut of such immensity, that if you’d cut his stumpy legs and arms off, he would have been a beach ball. The belt holding up a pair of cut-off jeans looked like the equator of some small, hairy planet—for the wearer of the belt was hairy. Extremely so.

“Chubbs! Good to see you, you son of a bitch!” Igor boomed genially.

It was a rugged greeting, but when the figure—Chubbs—stopped by the head of the lead bull, I noticed that he was of the werewolf persuasion. The all-over body hair, reversed knees, pointed ears, and snout and tail were a dead giveaway.

Son of a bitch, indeed.

“Chubbs?” Enwyn asked Leah in an aside, as Igor and the werewolf fell into an easy conversation. “That’s a bit mean, isn’t it? I mean we all have our crosses to bear, don’t we? Don’t need to rub the poor werewolf’s snout in it.”

Leah pinched Enwyns’s cheek between my thumb and forefinger. “My! The golden heart that beats under that rather beddable bossom, Enwyn Emberskull! You’re a warrior-princess and a sweetheart, I knew it since the moment we met. Never fear though; Chubbs has one of those ironic nicknames, you know. Like tall people who are called ‘Shorty’ or really thick people that go by the name ‘Brains’.”

Enwyn glanced over at Chubbs. The almost spherical werewolf was panting and puffing as he took the reins of the six ginormous black bulls. His cowboy hat was pushed back on his head so that his pointed ears stuck out like the wings of an airplane. His legs were so fat that his knees were almost invisible.

“Yes,” Enwyn said slowly and tactfully, “but Chubbs is actually chubby.”

“Grossly fat, I think you’ll find,” Mort said helpfully, helping Mallory down from the sleigh like a footman helping down a lady from a carriage. “Excuse me for butting in.”

“Right,” said Enwyn. “That’s my point, really.”

Leah snapped her fingers. “I see what you’re getting at. Yes, that can be a bit confusing, sugar. When he started working here though, you see, he was rake thin. That’s why Great Granddaddy Gorlbadock coined the name Chubbs. Then, after working here for a few years and dealing with the constant strain of having Great Granddaddy going off his head every few moments, dear old Chubbs took refuge in chocolate pudding, thus taking took on the form that you see now.”

We watched as Chubbs nodded respectfully to Reginald and shook hands with Igor, and then ambled away with his bovine companions, toward a large barn.

“Don’t worry about Chubbs,” Leah said, patting Enwyn on the shoulder as Idman came to stand with us. “Having a vaguely insensitive nickname is probably the last thing on his mind.”

“Why—” Enwyn started to ask.

Our attention was diverted by the sound of the front door to the main ranch house crashing open behind us.

A portly old man, hobbling quickly along with the aid of a walking stick, came bursting out onto the porch. He was yelling incoherently and gesticulating wildly with his free hand, his slippered feet thumping on the wooden boards.

Without warning, he took the walking stick in both hands, aimed it in our direction like a shotgun, and a spray of spiraling silver Chaos Magic darts came spouting forth from its tip.

“Great Granddaddy Gorlbadock!” Reginald cried delightedly, throwing out his arms wide as if to hug the old man from afar. The swarming burst of silver swirling projectiles were stopped dead in mid-air, just as they were about to tear into the Headmaster of the Mazirian Academy. They contorted, scrunched inward, like a soda can being stepped on, and shattered into wisps of nothingness.

Great Granddaddy Gorlbadock stopped in his tracks and glared down at the sleigh and those of us who had just alighted from it. He was an imposing figure, despite only being about five feet tall. He had a heavy oval head, wobbling jowls, and the same dark, erudite eyes that all the Chaosbanes shared. He wore a small knitted blue hat, from under which bright white curly hair stuck out around the brim. Suspenders held up a pair of typical old man beige slacks. His feet were slippered, but his torso was clad in the most eye-watering paisley waistcoat that must ever have seen the light of day.

“Damn me, boy,” the old fellow bellowed, “you may go about most things completely backasswards, but it can’t be denied you’re a fine mage!”

Reginald walked up the steps of the ranch house, his arms still spread wide.

“Well, I had to get pretty good at warring, didn’t I, Granddaddy, what with you trying to curse me everytime I walked around a corner?”

“Kept you and your cousins sharp, didn’t it?” the old man said, lowering his walking stick.

“It kept us hospitalized for much of our youth as well, if I recall,” Reginald said.

The Headmaster moved in to embrace Great Granddaddy Gorlbadock, but the old man held up a warning hand.

“Hug me and I’ll tear you a new asshole,” the old man grumbled. “Gods, I always make the mistake of thinking that I’m dealing with an adult when you visit.”

Reginald dropped his arms. “Can I make the introductions then, Grandaddy?”

“Let me see my family members first, boy!” Great Granddaddy Gorlbadock snapped.

Mort, Leah, and Igor all trooped dutifully up the steps while the rest of us hung back.

Leah was the only one of the clan who got a quick embrace from the old patriarch.

When Mort came to stand in front