Oirdan swished his tail as he indulged in Marissa's freshly conjured coffee. Although I never saw him actually consuming anything, I knew that the cup before him was now as empty as the plate of eggs and toast that'd just occupied it.

For all the magic and mystery of the universe, this was a party trick which tickled my curiosity the most. I'm not sure when it was that dragons developed the ability to eat and drink without actually touching anything, but I at least could guess why it was necessary.

Even a dragon's hoard would dwindle if they had to pay for every tea cup they broke.

“An excellent brew. A deep yet balanced flavour profile. Rich hazelnut with undertones of vanilla, mellowed by a finish of clove and spice, not dissimilar to that of a fine wine. I would inquire as to its secrets.”

“It's run-of-the-mill inexpensive coffee beans mixed with a sprinkling of dark chocolate shavings and freshly harvested elderflower buds. The vanilla undertones mostly come from how it's brewed. Not in a kettle, but a cauldron. Mine naturally comes with hints of vanilla extract.”

The dragon nodded. His golden eyes glanced around the conjured wooden table, as though searching for the cauldron which could outcompete wine barrels for a robust flavour profile.

“A secret offered. And yet no price extolled. I will overlook your charity. What would you ask of me in turn?”

Marissa set down her tea cup. She gave a thoughtful tilt of her head as she considered what query she could present to a dragon, itself a prize that nations would war over in times past.

Despite all the treasures that dragons had, none were greater than the knowledge and wisdom they hoarded long before they ever amassed that first gold coin.

“Do you have any advice for how I can prevent myself from eating bits of my own hair when I fly at rapid speeds? I tie my hair and wear a hat, but it's still a problem I've yet to fully prevent.”

Oirdan gave a deep, rumbling hum.

Then, a shake of his head.

“The sky is the domain of the heavens. Even dragons, for all our arrogance, do not command it. For a witch to traverse the clouds, you must pay the fee.”

“Oh, I see.” Marissa looked thoughtfully into her tea cup. “What fee do dragons pay?”

“Our eyes itch fiercely during summer.”

“Is that so? I have an ointment for that. It's only been tested on toads and witches, though.”

“Do you have a sample on hand?”

“No, but I can deliver it.”

Oirdan's golden eyes flashed with interest.

I took a sip of the coffee, then gave a small cough.

It was time to put business back on the table. As much as I wanted to ask Marissa about which run-of-the-mill inexpensive coffee beans she used, I had to get back to the cafe. Although not necessary, I always wanted to at least help Lize put the chairs away. I felt less guilty that way.

“We have a small problem,” I said. “The conditions for the rise of the Next Great Evil has been met. We have a pot of coffee, quasi-poached eggs on toast and the younger sibling of the Last Great Evil. Given the thematic significance of this occurring within the presence of, well, me, I believe there's an approximately 99% probability that Oirdan is the Next Great Evil.”

Marissa's expression took on a glum turn as she downed a swig of her prophecy confirming brew.

“Apologies yet again. It was a thoughtless oversight to bring about the prerequisites to the rising of the Next Great Evil.”

“Oh, it's fine. If it wasn't you, it'd be someone else. You just drew the short straw.”

Marissa shook her head.

“I didn't draw the short straw. I conjured it. And from my own hat, too. I apologise unreservedly.”

“Misfortune is nothing to apologise for.” I looked around at the treasure amassed in the cave, then at the dragon eyeing one of the conjured muffins. “Excuse me, Mr. Oirdan, but are you quite sure you have no grand designs on laying waste to the world? You did attempt to remove me by means of a hidden mechanism, followed by an attempt to summon your horde of minions on me, and finally to bribe me away.”

Oirdan scoffed. Whatever liquid remained in his tea cup was instantly incinerated by the vapour pressure produced from his nostrils.

“Only because I wished to be rid of you, which I vaguely hoped would prevent any prophecy business from occurring in the first place. There can be no meeting between dragons and heroines without fate adding to the conversation. This is all very inconvenient.”

“I understand. But I did need to check if you possessed any plans for decimating any major population centres. We'd need to spot check dragon evacuation corridors, and likely rehabilitate dozens of critically endangered animals native to the surrounding region at short notice.”

“I have no desire to subjugate the realm, nor to disrupt local fauna.”

Oirdan directed his gaze at the sword hanging off my back. I, in turn, leaned to the side and looked at the dragon's tail, which was currently not crossed into any sort of loop.

I breathed a sigh of relief. No tell-tale sign of deceit. If Oirdan was lying, then he was being very sneaky about it.

“World domination is tedious and boring,” he added with a yawn, vaporising the air. “Yet still minions keen to conquer this northern land flock to me. And all I did was place a few ads for housekeepers. For even the lowliest of creatures feel that is my calling. My purpose. So get on with it and save me the hassle of burning a few villages. I am prepared.”

“Excuse me?”

I looked on in confusion, even more so as the dragon then proceeded to lower his head until it was just hovering over the table. The gingerbread finger at the top of the biscuit pile wasn't so lucky. It was impaled by the tip of Oirdan's chin.

“What I wish and what fate wishes is different, and so I defer to the greater power.”

I blinked as I struggled to look over Oirdan's snout.

“I'm sorry, but I'm still not quite understanding?”

Oirdan scoffed. I waved away a cloud of steam fogging up my vision.

“Is it not already clear? I am offering my neck, heroine. You should have no issue removing my head with that sword which burns brighter than my flames.”

“Mr. Oirdan, I believe there's been a misunderstanding. Head removing isn't really something I do, especially for those who don't have any world conquering agendas.”

Oirdan stared quietly at me.

It was no small thing to look into the eyes of a dragon. Doing so was like facing down an endless library. With dragons as old as Oirdan, it was as though every page and every word was being thrust into my mind. And all I saw was the word indignation in bold, capital letters.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

“Prophecy is no fickle thing. For me. Or for you. If fate decrees that I am to rise as the Next Great Evil, then you are the one marked to halt me. And I would rather do away with the extraneous effort in my inevitable defeat.”

I glanced away. Far, far, away.

“Now, really. I wouldn't say it's inevitable.”

Oirdan was not impressed, which is probably why he proceeded to summon a wall of parchment as tall as the ceiling. Names and dates filled my vision among a haze of conjuring smoke. Dragon names. Death days.

“Do you see this chart? Empirical evidence dictates that dragons have a 100% chance of death or serious injury when facing a heroine with a sword. Those are terrible odds.”

I raised an eyebrow.

Sometimes, I wondered whether dragons were frightening or merely acted the part. They certainly enjoyed their portion of melodrama.

“It's also a 0% chance of death or serious injury so long as we're enjoying Marissa's savoury crumpets. Neither your demise nor anything leading up to it is set in stone.”

“Dwarven poetry is set in stone. Fate is written in the stars. This is not a gentle hand which guides us. It is a whip. And it will call on us to see out our roles to the end. Do not deceive yourself, heroine. It is an unnecessary blight to an otherwise good table spread.”

I pondered over this conundrum while gratefully accepting a refill of my tea.

True, fate ran a tight ship and any shenanigans usually resulted in fairly severe pushback. If Oirdan simply refused to start setting fire to barns, I was fairly certain an unlikely chain of events would happen to push him into it.

Even so, it wasn't as if the threads which hung over him were impervious.

Fate or not, I'd yet to find something which my trusty sword couldn't cut. It wouldn't be elegant, but there was probably a way I could brute force my way through this, which despite what some of my peers liked to think was more or less standard procedure for hero stuff. We'd been bashing stuff in before the first caveman learned to wield a club.

Oirdan, evidently misreading my silence, proceeded to make himself more comfortable by wriggling his head slightly as he continued offering his neck.

“Do not be aggrieved at the hand I was dealt, for there are far crueller lives to live than that of a dragon. Now hurry up. I desire no eulogy or sympathy. Only that you clear my abode of any crumbs before you leave. I detest mice.”

I decided not to mention the little tufts of grey eyeing up the picnic spread from the edges of the cavern.

Instead, I stood up from my conjured chair.

Heat burned in my sword as it fought to ward off the very aura that even a dragon politely waiting for its end could emit. I raised myself to my toes, leaned towards Oirdan, then firmly poked him in the snout.

“Ow.”

“Don't ow me. Look here, I know defying fate is sort of like defying gravity. But as it turns out, you're a dragon and so that doesn't apply. Not a lot does when you’re 20,000 pounds and breathe fire. Honestly, you lot have been carving out the world since the rest of us were still taste testing different varieties of rocks. I see no reason why you shouldn't carve out your own stories, too.”

For a moment, only silence and rather obvious indignation met my fingertip prodding at his nose.

Then, Oirdan slowly raised his head.

He also did the same with his legs.

Invaluable treasures, shimmering trinkets and ancient coins cascaded past his scaled figure like a second hide as he stretched out. His full shadow loomed over me, extinguishing the few shafts of light slipping into his abode until all I saw were the flames burning in both his eyes and the back of his throat.

“A story twists and turns, but its ending can never be altered, especially for us whose existence is birthed as much from dreams as from eggs. We command more than the sky. We command the imagination. For that, we have the greatest strength and the greatest weakness. And we respect our purpose. I am a dragon in a world of fairytales. And my role is now to make room for the next. So take your good ending and be done with it. I will exit the stage on my own accord.”

I offered the only response there was.

Tapping my foot.

“If a good ending means killing a dragon going about its day, then I'll try my luck with a bad one. I have very little intention of giving you an early exit.”

Oirdan narrowed his eyes.

“Very well. Then I must resign from this tale at the appropriate time instead.”

All of a sudden, Oirdan raised his great tail.

“... I also do not weigh 20,000 pounds. It is 19,950.”

Poomph.

The tail striking the ground was like the sound of a thunderbolt smashing into Madame Zaiba's porcelain collection.

The effect was far more gentle, though. As draconic magic flared throughout the cavern, I felt myself briefly lifted from my feet. And that was that.

Solid ground was replaced by ashen sand, and the hot air replaced by a faint breeze.

I blinked as light washed over me. Or as much light as could be gleaned from the clouded sky of a fully dimmed evening outside Oirdan's mountain.

Behind me, I heard the sound of a tea cup being placed down on a saucer.

Marissa was still sat in her wooden chair, albeit now beside a table which was missing half its spread. She wore a look of shock. But probably not from the sudden change in scenery. After all, being flung around without consent by teleportation magic was the first rite of initiation when it came to learning to be a witch.

“Oh, he took the gingerbread cookies,” she said. “I was sure he didn't like them.”

“He probably refrained so that he wouldn't eat the whole thing in front of us.”

“A dragon thing?”

“No. A 'not looking like a glutton' thing. I had to stop myself from taking another strudel. May I?”

“Of course.”

I scooted over to the diminished table to help finish off what the 19,950 pound dragon couldn't finish. The strudel that soon glided into my mouth was leaking with baked apples and toasted hazelnuts and smothered my nose with the scent of childhood and cinnamon.

Unfortunately, since I now officially had a home to save and thousands of innocents to defend, I only had time to eat one.

“Right,” I said, as I chewed through my third helping. “That didn't go as planned. We inadvertently, if also predictably, set the dragon we'd hoped wouldn't become the Next Great Evil onto the path of becoming that very thing. Moreover, he appears resigned to his fate and seems only concerned with hurrying his demise, which I believe is overwhelmingly likely to involve forcing my hand.”

Marissa creased her brows with guilt, then conjured another strudel onto the plate.

“I would like to apologise again for allowing the conditions to be met for triggering Oirdan's ascension as the Next Great Evil.”

I shrugged, eyed the freshly conjured strudel, then remembered that not even magical butter had zero fat.

“Don't worry. It would've happened one way or another. And trust me, you really don't want to see what another looks like. Fate is as subtle as a falling piano when it comes to getting the message across. And goodness knows we have enough of them already.”

Marissa nodded.

“What now, may I ask?”

“I suppose I need to get ready.”

“To fight a dragon?”

“No. To help Lize with making the rye bread. It takes the whole night to set.”

I glanced again at the table spread, this time feeling a pang of depression. Sadly, no witches staffed the Bread & Berry Cafe. Mostly since witches were barred from almost all professions on account of invalidating most of them.

Marissa blinked at me.

Once, twice.

Three times.

“Oh, I see. Making rye bread. By … hand, yes? With mechanical tools? And whisks?”

I nodded as Marissa continued to communicate purely via the language of blinking.

“Would you like to watch? Maybe try the whisk?”

The witch clapped her hands.

“Gosh, that'd be wonderful!”

I smiled as a wayward spark of unfiltered magic swooshed past my ear. Then, I patted down my backside.

For a moment, I thought about the feasibility of heading back into the mountain and asking Oirdan if he could teleport us all the way back to Witschblume. The biggest barrier not being the dragon's magical reserves, but the awkwardness of popping my head back in.

Luckily, it wasn't a question I needed to stew on.

Unluckily, it was because from the mountain peak which served as the roof for Oirdan's abode, I saw as a large silhouette burst through a glacial chimney and left a dragon sized hole in the clouds. Its flight trajectory left little doubt as to the destination. After all, I'd already provided it.

Elise Rowe.

The official heroine for the Duchy of Witschblume.

I turned to Marissa.

Her giddiness at the prospect of holding a whisk had vanished. In its place was a professional look of expectation. Witches took their duties very seriously. And that meant knowing when a rush job needed to be done pronto.

“What speed?” she asked, catching the broomstick in her hand before the puff of smoke had even finished dissipating.

I thought about it.

“The one I won't talk about, and will never have experienced, since it's well known that all broomsticks have an inherent maximum flight speed owing to ultimately being a piece of wood, and that there is no conspiracy among witches to propagate this thought in order to prevent the financial burden of constant innovation and fair manufacturer competition.”

Marissa gave a polite smile.

What happened next, I have no idea.

After all, Marissa Haycroix would never break the sacred laws written in the smallest print by the archwitches' ruling cabal.

And I certainly would never keep my eyes open to witness it.