Ch. 24

Dolubo showed Rosemary and Michael up the stairs and down a brighter hallway. They stopped at Rosemary’s room and opened the door. The room itself was nothing special. Just a normal bed with normal covers, normal walls and normal floors. It was just the view from the window that was anything but ordinary.

The view was spectacular. You could see the city, the sky, birds flying about, everything! Rosemary ran to the window and opened it. A tree outside was singing magnificently.

“You’ll be plenty safe here. If you haven’t entered through the hospital door, then you think that it’s a recording center. Which it is, but this is a separate dimension. It’s very complicated magic, but we managed. I hope you’ll like your stay here,” Dolubo said to them. He left the room and locked the door behind him.

After a few minutes of looking outside, Michael asked, “Where am I going to sleep if there’s only one bed?”

“Well, we’ll just have to sleep together. Do you have a problem with that?” Rosemary asked him. She sat down on the bed, still looking out the window.

Michael blushed and stammered, “Well - I - uh - no . . . I don’t have a problem with that. I just - thought - that . . . I think I just should shut up right about now.”

Rosemary laughed and said, “I’m glad that you don’t have a problem. I thought that we might have to squeeze another bed into this room. But here, have some food.”

Michael gladly accepted his food and ate quietly. They spent the rest of the week quiet until on the fourth day . . .

“Rosemary! Michael! Oh, I’m so glad you made it!” Susan yelled, barging into the room. Bodoleck and Medeleck followed closely behind her. Susan ran up and hugged Rosemary before saying, “You were right. We tried getting on a plane, but it was infested with other vampires. They were under cover, but we recognized them right away. Rosemary, we’re lucky we’re here. You have to be careful!”

“How did it go back at your place?” Michael asked, seeing as Rosemary was barely able to breath.

At that, Susan let go of Rosemary and turned to face him. She was silent, but Bodoleck said for her, “Terrible. We would be dead if that dragon hadn’t showed up. Thanks for sending it. Veripema ran for her life, and the dragon followed, but she slipped away and we don’t know where she is now. I’m sorry.”

“No, I’m sorry. If it wasn’t for me, we might not even be in this mess right now,” Michael said.

“Stop saying that. It wasn’t your fault. I think we should all agree that it’s our grandparents’ faults. They obviously sent Veripema to find me, seeing as I’m the only person who knows where the spell is. And . . .” Rosemary stopped when Dolubo entered the room.

“I have some great news for you. We have the medicine! It just came, and you should be able to leave tomorrow,” Dolubo said excitedly. A nurse came in with a cart with a few bottles of green liquid on it.

Rosemary looked at it and asked, “What am I supposed to do with this? How am I supposed to take it?”

“We take a little bit of a feather and a drop of blood and put it in these bottles. That tells the medicine what it’s healing. You take one serving every three hours, and you drink it five times,” Dolubo replied.

Rosemary drew out her wings and a dagger. While Michael took off the feather, she cut her hand slightly. Her blood was black, and Michael gasped.

“What? Oh, did I forget to tell you that a vampire’s blood is black? I could have sworn I did. Here, Dolubo. The ingredients.” She handed him the dagger and the feather and turned back to Bodoleck. “We’ll be out of here tomorrow. I want to exit through the human building if we can. Veripema will know we’re here. She’ll try and stop us.”

Bodoleck nodded in agreement, but Susan cried, “We can’t! Don’t you know how much energy that takes? We could very well die. And then all this would have been for nothing.”

“No. It’s not for nothing. As long as I never breathe word of the location of the spell, Grandma and Grandpa will never find it. Besides. We have three lockets. If you know how to use them, then we can make a portal out of here. I have one, and I gave one to both Bodoleck and Michael in case we get separated. It’s the only way,” Rosemary replied. Dolubo, not knowing what was wrong, stared in amazement at Rosemary’s magical abilities.

Medeleck told his wife, “Rosemary’s right. It isn’t that hard. You don’t even have to be able to cast spells. It’s all in the lockets. I’ve heard of it before, but I was never sure it was possible. Now I know. It is the only way to do it.”

Susan sighed in defeat, and Michael said, “So, I have to activate my locket? I don’t think I can. I don’t want to hurt anyone.”

“Don’t be silly. You won’t hurt anyone. It takes a lot for this locket to hurt anyone. After we leave here, Michael and I have to go and see the fairies. You three can meet us in Brno. Stay there and wait for us to meet you there,” Rosemary ordered. Dolubo, still mostly clueless, handed Rosemary her first bottle and she drank it. After she finished it, she winced.

“Does it really taste that bad?” Michael asked her.

“Yes. I wouldn’t want to wish it on anyone to drink it. But it’s the fastest way to get rid of the poison and heal my wound,” Rosemary said sadly. She set the bottle down and sat back on her bed.

Dolubo, coming to his senses, said to them, “We’re going to have to get a bed in here if you’re all going to spend the night in this hospital. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

When he closed the door, Michael said, “What are we getting when we visit the fairies?”

“That’s a good question,” Susan said.

They all looked at Rosemary until she said, “You’ll just have to see. I can’t risk anyone overhearing my plan that shouldn’t hear it. I’m sorry, but I can’t tell you anything yet. But I will need your help when the time comes to put that plan in action. And I’ll tell you when that is.”

Michael was staring grumpily at the ceiling when Dolubo came back with a bed. Dolubo looked at him, shook his head, and said, “It’ll be a tight fit, but you five should be able to all sleep in here if you squish together. This bed is bigger than the other one, so it should fit you three.” He pointed to the adults.

The next morning Rosemary got up first. Fangblood had come in and given her the last bottle of the medicine. It was five in the morning and they sat whispering to each other for and hour before Medeleck got up. They waited for the others to get up, and Michael was the last to awaken.

“What time do vamps get up, midnight?” he complained. He sat on his bed before asking, “I thought vampires couldn’t sleep. What happened?”

“We cast a spell on ourselves to put us in a trance that does the same this as sleeping does to you. We dream, get more energy, everything that all the other creatures do,” Susan replied.

Rosemary stretched and said, “Let’s get this over with. People shouldn’t be getting there for another hour, so we’ll have to hide or else we’ll get caught. Fangblood, Dolubo, thanks for everything. I’ll have Dekanire pay for everything. Now if you could leave, I think I would like to keep how this is done a secret.”

“Okay. We’ll see you later. Bye!” Dolubo called as Fangblood closed the door.

“Now, Michael, open your locket and say ‘ot’ when I tell you to. Susan, you’re saying ‘latrop.’ I’m saying ‘namuh.’ Then we all say ‘dilrow.’ Susan says her work first, then Michael, then me. We all say the last word at the same time. We join hands with Medeleck and Bodoleck in the middle. They know we’re in another dimension. It will transport us to the other building. Go,” Rosemary ordered.

There was a great hustle as Medeleck and Bodoleck squeezed into the triangle. Rosemary took hold of Michael’s hand and nodded at Susan to tell her to start.

“Latrop.”

“Ot.”

“Namuh.”

“Dilrow,” they all said.

A whirling sound started in the room. It was all around them, and growing louder at each passing second. A light came from the middle, and soon the light engulfed them and then darkness.

They had done it.