Dracula Hearts of Fire Book two of Dracula Hearts
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

JENNY WAS TRAPPED inside Jeptha’s mind, and she was frightened. Being so inexperienced at being a wizard wasn’t good at all. She thought about Dracula and that he had probably already been in that freaking cottage. Being trapped in another’s mind wasn’t something she would have thought possible. Such a thing had never occurred before, and she had no experience extricating herself from the situation. Her body was now prone on the forest floor. The old man stood near her with his arms crossed and a big nasty smile. One wizard had taken advantage of the other, and getting the upper hand on one’s own kind was always satisfying, even though she was a child. He reached down and poked her as if to say TAKE THAT. One wizard was never allowed to touch another for fear of magic trickery, so the fact that he was able to touch her made his day.

Jenny found herself inside the wizard’s mind at the point where her white portal should have been, but there was nothing there. Without that door to escape, she was stuck in there, perhaps forever. How had it worked? Had her soul been imprisoned in there? She could hear Jeptha laughing, and it sounded hollow. The mocking made her angry and more determined. If her white way out wasn’t here, she knew it had to be somewhere in his mind. Was it now disguised as another door? Jenny ran down one of the black corridors, and her footfalls sounded like they were in an empty gym, with reverberations off the walls. She entered the first door on the left only to replace another fire pit; stopping there, she stared at it. After a bit, she realized that the flames had a hypnotic effect. It was trying to keep her in that one location. She put her hands in the fire, not thinking that it would burn her, but it did. Her body on the ground jerked from the fire, and the burn on her finger healed instantly.

“Not so easy, is it, Jenny, even with your power. I’ve got you.”

All the doors in that labyrinth had been red, so when she discovered the bright yellow one, she was a little puzzled. What if what lay beyond that door with the golden doorknob was a deeper trap, sinking her to a lower level? However, it could also be the way out. She could continue in a different direction or go through it. She stood akimbo, staring at the door. What to do? Jenny placed her right hand on the doorknob and discovered it was cold. She tried to turn it, but it wouldn’t budge. Jenny checked the door up close, and it was genuine. In anger, she kicked the door, and it swung open. As it commenced to close, it creaked like a door in a haunted house, as if it was a hundred years old.

The world she was now stuck in wasn’t real but just as dangerous as the physical world. There had to be a way out, but would she replace it in time? She was becoming more frightened, and that could influence her actions.

In the new room she had entered, the walls were butter-yellow. The fire pit in this chamber had yellow flames that shot up almost to the ceiling. Instead of heat, it produced a banana smell. She was getting the feeling that a lot of this was a distraction. Was he making fun of her in his mind? She then saw the second door, also yellow. As Jenny approached it, there was a pounding from the other side; she opened it to discover a sizeable African male, so muscular that he must have spent every waking hour in the gym. His muscles had muscles.

“You are wanting to come in here? You no get by Badru.” He spoke with an accent, but the girl didn’t recognize it.

On the outside, her magic would be an advantage, but in here, who could tell what the rules were? His body language told her not even to attempt to get in there. He smashed his gold bracelets together, causing sparks to fly from them. Then one fist loudly struck the palm of his hand.

“I’m going in there, like it or not.”

“I break you head.”

Jenny considered that this guy ate more than her weight for lunch. She stuck her head through the door to observe its contents; it was full of flowers of every kind. It smelled wonderful. Besides the fire pit, the place was nothing but flowers. She was knocked down by a sucker punch to the top of her head, and boy, it hurt. “You bastard!”

“Hurt head? See big bump.”

Jenny kicked him in the crotch so hard that it sent him flying some ten feet into the flowers, with pots and flowers flying everywhere, breaking one of the pots with his head; he screamed repeatedly.

“Hurt head?”

Badru got up slowly, seemingly in a lot of pain, but surprised her as he rushed her exceptionally fast. He picked her up over his head, throwing her right out of the room and back into the yellow one. He crossed one hand over the other as if to say she was out and staying out, but before he could finish, she was on him; she swept him off his feet, and he fell hard. Badru got up, and she jumped and kicked him into the fire; in mid-scream, he disappeared as if he had never existed. One didn’t have to worry about killing someone that was the product of a sick imagination. He hadn’t been real, but his punches had certainly felt genuine.

A little Bichon Frise ran in seemingly from the yellow room and started to bark up at Jenny. It was as white and as puffy as a cloud. She looked down at the dog and wondered if it was some trick. It was so cute that she bent down, and it licked her face. Although she didn’t know it, some of Jenny’s magic was automatic. The dog had come out of her mind and not from the wizard. It barked as it moved back and forth. It ran out the door, and she followed it through several doors before going down a purple corridor and into a room on the right. The room was full of books, some in the corner, but most were on brown bookshelves. The floor was a reflective white, and she could see herself in it. She picked up one book and looked at Madman in the Mirror; she’d never heard of it and tossed it. The white puffball ran and pawed at a bookshelf on the far left.

Jenny looked down at the dog. “What’s so special about that bookshelf?”

“Bark, bark, bark!” The dog was now overly excited as it ran in circles.

She pulled out a couple of books and then put them back in. Jenny looked down at the dog as it ran its head into the bookshelf. Then she noticed a slight glow from behind it. When she moved the bookshelf, it fell over; she observed a large board painted black, and the smell of the fresh paint was quite strong. The paint, when touched, melted off into a puddle on the floor. There it was, the way out! Without hesitation, she stepped into it and returned to her body on the ground.

“You poke me one more time, and it’ll be your last poke.” Jenny stood up, dusting herself off, and from the look on his face, he was surprised.

The old wizard was astonished; he stepped backward and fell onto his ass. “That was impressive little girl.” With that, he blurred around to the other side of the house and out of sight.

Jenny followed him only to discover that he was gone. She couldn’t even sense him anymore. Wizards were tricky buggers, but Jenny smiled because she was talking about herself. Then she heard him laughing from the inside of the cottage. “You son-of-a-? Are you in there?”

“Oh, I am, I am. You need to get in here, but you can’t. Therefore Ipso facto, I win. ”

“I’ll facto you when I get in there.” Jenny was furious, but how on earth did he get in there?

More laughter originated from inside.

“Oh, shut up!”