The mayor of Cobpleton spent his tax payers money well, in his opinion. The luxurious bath he drew for himself was in a marbled porcelain tub, trimmed with gold and wreathed in bubbles. His constituents might not have agreed with spending their money on a bathtub, but it was, officially, a public bath. It just so happened to be a public bath in a private residence.

Gods bless legal terminology. Neither push nor pull magic had magic words persay, so politicians lawyers came up with a magical vocabulary all their own. If anyone got uncomfortably curious about the mayor’s creative bookkeeping, all he had to say was the magic words, ‘I do not recall’.

The mayor wasn’t an evil man. Unless you count the corruption of a machine built on greed that keeps down the poor and protects wealthy who steal from our meager pay, pollute our land, and would resort to violent massacres if even a penny of their vast fortunes was threatened as ‘evil’. He, at least, organized bake sales.

Suddenly the bath didn’t feel so comfortable. He turned his attention away from the thought of himself as a blood-greased cog and looked to his goldfish, Alfred. The little guy was swimming in his bowl next to the mayor’s tub. Two little fish in their comfortable little ponds, Alfred in his bowl and the mayor in his tub. There were, after all, people who were richer and worse than him. He bet that the mayor of Amoz had an entire swimming pool funded by his tax payers. He laid back in the tub, comforted by the thought.

He dozed off until he heard a bubble pop. He lifted a cucumber. Bubbles were starting to form at the other end. That’s strange, he had refused to purchase the turbo jet model on the principle that it was an (unknowing) gift from his constituents. He was only a little corrupt, not actively malicious. A chill traced its way up his spine as he felt something surface. He could feel his heart start to pound as out of the water, bursting as if from nowhere, was his loofah. He let out a sigh of relief.

Had this been a funnier book, our heroes might have burst out his bathtub drain. Three women suddenly in the bathroom of a naked man? Mom groups would be scandalized for weeks.

Instead, they were thrown up by Alfred the goldfish.

As if in slow motion, the spaghettified form of a red headed, bespectacled girl came shooting out of the fish’s mouth. She inflated to her normal dimensions as her face planted on the floor. Before the mayor’s synapses could even fire, Thistle Nightwarren sprawled onto his sink, knocking his jade water basin to the floor. A third woman spilled into the reality that was his bathroom.

“Everyone alright?” she said.

The mayor’s scream caught in his throat, blocked by a mix of surprise, confusion, and embarrassment.

“Don’t worry, I just landed in my face,” said the redhead sarcastically.

“I think I bit my tongue-oh hey we’re back in Cobpleton. Hello Mr. Mayor!” waved Thistle. She was clutching some moldy hunk of metal.

He waved back instinctively.

“We need to get a seal on that portal,” said the dark haired woman.

“Agreed,” said the redhead. “Mayor, we’re going to need all your soap.”

Dark hair looked thoughtful.

“Do they need to be made out of soap?” she asked.

“Yeah, good thinking,” answered red hair. “Mayor, we’re going to need your towels too, does anyone here know who to fold towels in the shape of a seal?”

The only sound the mayor could make was guttural.

“No, I mean I know a place in town where we can get a lot of seals,” said dark hair.

“This is a really nice bathroom,” said Thistle as she looked around. “I hope we didn’t damage it too much,” she apologized.

“Great! But I don’t have a lot of money do you?” said the redhead.

The dark haired girl replied. “Not on me.” They both looked to Thistle, who just shook her head, and then all turned to the mayor.

Something deep within the mayor’s psyche heard ‘money’ and came out fighting.

“What the hell are you doing in my bathroom?!” he roared.

The three women exchanged glances, the redhead shrugged.

Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

“To make a long, long story short,” she began. “We tried to plug up the hole you have in reality, fought a giant worm, almost drowned when it exploded, went into the portal, ruined some guy’s life long quest, got spat out of your fish, and now we need to borrow money to fix this problem before it floods the town.”

The mayor just gawked at her. He could barely parse her story before she got close to his face.

“If we don’t seal this hole as soon as possible, your town will be under three feet of water by sunrise.”

“Well I don’t exactly have it with me,” he gestured to his naked body in the tub, bubbles working overtime to cover him.

“Do you have a safe? Or a penny jar?” asked the dark haired girl. He did have a safe, but it had been long empty. The mayor spent money faster than he could pilfer it. Tax collection day meant presents in the mayor’s household.

“I…uh, invested it into personal assets,” he mumbled. He let his words sink in, which, judging by the women’s expressions, was a bad idea. Their eyes looked around the bathroom. It was very nice and very expensive.

“Fine, we’ll just borrow some of this gold leaf,” said the redhead as she reached for the tub.

“No!” gasped the mayor, his hand shooting out of the water. “It’s a…family heirloom,” he lied.

He had accidentally splashed her with water. Her expression was unreadable. She leaned over the tub, her face mere inches from his.

“I’ve had a very long, very violent night. I’ve decided that I’m going to sleep once all this is over. But I’m still deciding if I want to have a violent morning too.”

“What about that?” asked Thistle.

The redhead glared until she finally looked at what the older woman was pointing at. It was his silver toilet. It was plated to the seat by some magical practice called ‘electro-lolosis’. The salesman had assured him that it was real silver. True to his morals, he spent the taxpayer’s money on the less ostentatious silver toilet rather than the golden one.

“That’s…also a family heir-“ before the mayor could finish, the redhead strode over to the toilet and ripped the seat clean off its hinges. Everyone’s jaws dropped at that. She rummaged through his medicine cabinet and pulled out a bottle of rubbing alcohol.

“I’m taking this too,” she declared, shaking the bottle at him. Before she left the bathroom, she paused, turned to the mayor, and said, “Thank you for being a patron of the magical arts,” and walked out.

The remaining three just sat there.

“Remind me not to get her that mad,” said the dark haired girl.

“Stewart!” came a female voice from the hall, shaking them out of their stunned silence. “Who was that strange woman and what was she doing with our toilet seat- Thistle?”

The mayor sank into his bath as his wife rounded the corner into the bathroom.

“Magical mishap, Minnie. Everything’s alright,” assured Thistle. She clasped Minerva’s hands in her own. “Remember how I told you about me learning magic?” she whispered excitedly to his wife.

“Well…yes but who’s-“

“Well silly old me accidentally messed up the spell and we ended up here. That girl you saw was Mace, my teacher. And this is Tria, she’s…um,”

“A student supervisor,” added Tria quickly.

“Exactly! Come dear, I’ll put a kettle on and I’ll tell you all about it!”

“But I-,” started Minnie, but Thistle was already guiding her out of the room.

“Oh Tria. Tell Mace I’ll meet her back at the roadhouse.”

Tria nodded. “I’ll make sure she doesn’t upend a house or something,” said Tria.

After the three left, the mayor just sat in his cold bath water, still trying to piece together what had just happened. He squeezed his eyes shut and tried to relax. Hopefully, once the wizards left, no more surprises would burst out of his fish.

He eyed Alfred nervously. The goldfish just burbled in his bowl. He leaned back and felt his muscles loosen. He’d have to draw up another hot bath just to- Alfred’s mouth opened, inside was a yellow eye that locked onto the mayor’s. He bolted out of the tub without enough presence of mind to throw on a towel.

By the time Thistle returned to Ye Olde Roadhouse, the sun was just about ready to pounce over the horizon. It took nearly an hour to regale Minnie on the bizarre night she just had. She left out the nearly deadly bits, but even that was enough to frighten poor Minnie.

When Thistle left, she spotted Arnie and Nate trying to sneak back to their house. They spotted her as well. A stern look was all it took to send them scrambling towards their rooms.

She exhaled as she entered her garden. She never understood why people thought a pretty garden was a well ordered one. The world was wild and beautiful. She wandered towards the thicket where the stone was. It was a little overgrown, but Clover would have liked that. He was a little secret hidden in the wild, waiting to be discovered by an adventurer.

“Hello Clover,” she whispered through a slight smile. “I finally found that magic sword we always talked about!”

The only response was the chirping of birds in the cool morning air.

“My mentor Mace helped me retrieve it. She’s an actual wizard you know! You would have loved her. It’s a little rusty and dirty, but I slew an actual beast with it!”

She laid the sword on the stone. “Oh, but you probably can’t see it under all those leaves.” Thistle darted back to the house to fetch a broom. She swept the dead leaves, revealing smooth stone underneath. She scolded herself for letting it get this bad.

It was her husband’s broom. He always insisted that he could still sweep, even when his body was failing.

The first rays of dawn illuminated Clover’s headstone, and Thistle dropped the broom. Tears welled up as she chastised herself for not doing this sooner. She fell to her knees. For the first time in a long while, Thistle allowed herself to cry again.