Book 3: Chapter 4 (1/2)

Alice sighed as she and Mr. Skelly stood outside of the cave that the dragons had entered. She flinched when Mr. Skelly poked her ribs. She glared at him, but Mr. Skelly grinned in response and asked, “Are you sure you don’t want to go inside?”

“I won’t,” Alice said and snorted. “I’m an outsider, and dragons don’t exactly see eye to eye with humans, you know?”

“Yeah,” Mr. Skelly said. “Humans are too short for that.”

Alice stamped her foot. “I’m not short!”

“I didn’t say you were short,” Mr. Skelly said and chuckled. “I just said humans, in general, are short.”

“Then what? I’m not a human?”

Mr. Skelly rubbed his chin and made a humming sound. “Never mind. You’re short.” He collapsed into a heap as Alice slammed her shield against his spine, shattering him into pieces. A sigh escaped from the pile of bones as it reformed itself. “You know I’m spending your mana to rebuild myself, right?”

“It’s worth it,” Alice said as her shield shrank.

“Aren’t you supposed to be in love with me?” Mr. Skelly asked, his skull contorting as his brow rose. “You don’t hit someone you love.”

“They’re love taps,” Alice said. “Besides, you can’t feel it anyway.”

“Nonsense, skeletons can feel pain,” Mr. Skelly said with a sigh.

“Wait, really?” Alice asked, her eyes widening. “How? You don’t have nerves! Or a brain! There’s no way you can feel any pain.”

“I can speak without vocal cords, can’t I?” Mr. Skelly brought his hand to his chest. “Whenever you hit me, I feel pain”—he tapped to the left of his sternum—“right here. In my poor, poor broken heart.”

Alice shattered Mr. Skelly again with her shield. She snorted as she dusted bone powder off of her hands before snapping her head to the side as something drew her attention: a walking ball of meat. “Is that … a person?”

The ball of meat flinched and froze. A second later, a childish head popped out of a hole at the top. The meat-person’s eyes were large and round, pooling with tears. Like a penguin, it waddled over and tackled Alice, hugging her thighs while sobbing.

“You never fail to see new things while traveling in different lands,” Mr. Skelly said as he grabbed his spine and reattached it to his pelvic bone.

Alice lifted the little girl up and held her out with her arms extended. “Hey. What’s wrong?”

“That’s not how you’re supposed to hold a crying child,” Mr. Skelly said. He held his arms out towards the girl. “Let me show you.”

The little girl wiped away her tears and turned her head to the side. Mr. Skelly’s grinning face appeared in her vision and seemed to grow larger and larger as her eyes widened to the size of saucers. An ear-piercing scream split the air as the girl thrashed around before twitching once and passing out, her head dropping forwards.

Mr. Skelly scratched the back of his head. “Or not. I forgot how excited kids could get when they meet someone they admire. It’s not every day you see someone as charming as me, eh?”

Alice sighed. “You’re terrible.”

***