Wednesday has come around again, and I’m happy to present this week’s flash fiction.
“Where is that incompetent–” Myrill missed what epitaph Othid pared with incompetent. Still, the bellow was all the warning he needed. Sweeping the open tome from the stand he dumped in the chest beside the cauldron.
Thudding the chest shut, he bent over the cauldron and breathed in to center himself. Orthid thrust the open door, shifting the currents. The concoction went straight up Myrill’s lungs. “There you are!” Othid bellowed.
Eyes burning, Myrill squeezed them shut as they watered. Not quick enough for Othid to miss. “Look at you.” The edge of disdain was back. “A poor substitute for Enwyld.”
Sputtering out a few more coughs, Myrill thought his lungs were clear enough to speak. “What can I –” He wheezed out a bit more smoke with his words, “help you with?”
Othid snorted. “I doubt you can.” He paused, deliberately. Myrill wasn’t about to talk into the silence. Again. “But since the Trenadin haven’t yet sent a proper replacement, I’ve got no choice.”
Myrill forced his face calm. Five years hadn’t erased Othid’s disdain for him. Myrill doubted fifty would. The man would resent him to his deathbed.
Myrill hadn’t asked to replace his brother. Nor for his brother, Enwyld, to encounter that dragon.
Arranged or not, the Trenadin refused to recall or replace him. He’d have to make the situation work until Othid joined his brother. “I shall do my best.” He stepped forward, and tripped. His robe had caught in the chest. Othid smirked.
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