OPENBOOK

ABRAXAS the LOVESICK SEA DRAKE

“No! I'm not going to give you legs,” said Onus. “You're a fish!”

“I am NOT a fish!” whined Flick. “I'm a sea horse.”

From within his robe, Onus's bulbous eyes flared and the water around him began to boil. Ye gods, what is a wizard of my caliber doing down here bickering with a fish.

“I want legs like Arion and Pegasus. I want to go galloping just like them.”

Onus reminded Flick that Pegasus had wings. “Pegasus was a flying horse, not a swimming horse. And I don't think Arion was a fish—”

“Octopuses have legs and they swim,” Flick argued.

“Those aren't legs, they're arms.”

“Crabs have legs.”

“And crabs get eaten because of those tasty legs!”

Flick continued to plead his case. “Our sire, Neptune, is the god of horses, isn't he? Galloping horses pull his chariot across the sea, don't they?”

“Actually, those are hippocamps, only half horses—”

“Pleas-s-s-se!” begged Flick.

Omniscient though he was, the wizard saw no escape from the persistent seahorse. “All right, you can have two legs,” he said. “More than that would offend the hippocamps.” Before Flick could mount any further objections, Onus handed over a vial of Leg Elixir #2 and sent him swimming off with high expectations.

Such exchanges wearied Onus. He hunkered down in the sand and proceeded to sulk. Why can't my patients be satisfied with the way they are? He was tempted to rant on about the fishes' soggy-witted notions, but then he had to admit their notions were not so different from his own, like his yearning to rejoin the others of his ilk. Not these lowly simpletons of Neptune, but the ones up there, in the firmament—the angels.