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The curious, frosted object was dumped on Anar’s work desk in the small room that made up his student accommodation; it tinkled as it landed among the detritus of sweet wrappers, vibrant orange Wotsit dust, spilled black wax globs, shards of bone and bits of Blu-Tac. It was rather pretty really; an arrow-tip sort of shape, faint lines upon the surface that reminded him of a seashell you might find on a tropical beach. The sort of holiday he wouldn’t be enjoying again any time soon.

Digging in his backpack, he pulled out some books that he’d been carrying around in the vague hope they were applicable for his studies. He’d asked Rap and Rave to fetch certain titles off the library shelves, and, well, they’d been randomly selected and unceremoniously lobbed at him. That had been before Rap had asked one of the resurrected librarians if they had any Mills and Boon romance novels stocked. Anar wasn’t looking forward to going back into that part of the college any time soon, but, upon seeing what study material he had available to him, it was clear he was going to have to.

The other students in the class had been given random objects at the apex of the ritual they’d performed, as well as him. Now, their work was to write a page on what the object was exactly, and why it was of particular importance to them. Because all the things they had in their possession were connected to them, somehow. That was what the translation had been about. The translation he’d not finished for his homework.

He was a little bit excited, truth be told; this could be something to do with his ancient ancestor: the powerful mage from hundreds of years ago. He didn’t know a lot about him other than his name, and every extra bit of knowledge would be cool and wicked and rad.

“The library?” Rave asked, “do we have to? They don’t even have any Spider-Man comics.”

“I’ll go!” Rap clapped, eagerly, “I want to brush up on my tarot. There’s a whole section all on reading the cards.”

Anar gave the smaller dinosaur a scowl; “you’re not reading mine again. Last time was bad enough.’

Rap was dismissive; “I just need practice. It only didn’t make sense because I’m new to it. Every tarot reading is different, anyway. They won’t all be doom and gloom.”

Anar scooped up the Goosebumps books and illustrated guide to Voodoo, putting them back into his Nike backpack. He gave a last glance to the innocuous looking item on his desk and decided to leave it there. He had a curious feeling in his gut that it shouldn’t be paraded around for all to see. It was private and secret.

The library stretched out, filling a cavernous space, rows of long walnut shelving as far as the eyes could see. Beams of dim light from the narrow windows hit them, throwing crazy shadowy patterns upon the carpeted floor. Hooves made no noise, boots trod lightly, even the succubi stilettoes failed to clack. Up on the second level that ran around the perimeter like a circular balcony were desks and chairs for quiet reading. It was a hushed place. The faint rustle of dry pages and the gentle wheezing of ancient creatures were the only sounds.

Until the velociraptors turned up and began playing Hide and Seek.

Anar shuffled quickly round the ‘Myth and Magic’ section before the pale wraith of a librarian inevitably kicked them out.

“Ooooh! Anar, come look!”

He flinched, pulling his hood up further. Nosing around the shelf corner with his snout, he hissed for Rap to be quiet.

The smaller reptile was pointing excitedly at a noticeboard, his tail swaying, knocking a pile of paperwork to the ground. Someone wouldn’t be happy about that!

He sighed, grabbing a book from the selection in front of him, and walked over quickly. “This better be good!” he warned.

“There’s a Ouija club on next door! Can we go? Can we?”

He furrowed his grey brow. Ouija was a board game used for contacting the spirit world. They didn’t need Ouija; the spirit world was right here!

“What… why would…?” he began, quietly.

“You get to give the answers!” Rap grinned. “I bet it’s loads of fun. You move the little thingy on the board around when the players ask questions.”

“You mean, we get to be the spirits they’re meant to be contacting?”

“Yeah! Oh, come on, Anar, pleeeease?”

“If you shut the Hell up, I’ll consider it,” Anar hissed.

Rave lumbered over, “I counted to lots, and you didn’t even hide!”

“We’re going to do Ouija,” Rap smiled, brightly.

Rave looked shocked; his eyes widened, “we’re gonna wee in jars?? That IS despicable.”

Anar frantically flapped his sleeves for them to keep the noise down. The hairs were prickling on the back of his neck, signalling the approach of an undead; the resurrected librarian. “No-one is weeing in any jars!” he insisted, “now let me get some blasted books, and you pair keep quiet.”

Rap gave two thumbs up, and set off for the tarot guides. Rave trod all over the printed sheets that his partner had knocked to the floor. Someone really would not be happy!

Anar about-turned on his trainer heels, and took in the grand view of the library. He felt as though he were trying to find a needle in a haystack. Every other student here knew about their past; took pride in their lineage and had their family tree memorised. They’d take one look at whatever they got and just know what it was and where it had come from, who had owned it, and what they’d done with it. All they had to do was write it down, and they’d get top marks. Boffins.

Where did he even begin? All he’d got was just a small, glass-like sliver of something. It could be anything. From anywhere.

“Warlock!”

It was a low growl; a very familiar low growl, that belonged to one particular person.

He turned, slowly.

Alexis was crouching, menacingly, his wings not fully spread out, as he would be knocking everything over if he did, his long claws picking up the strewn papers that Rap had scattered and Rave had carelessly crumpled. It was clear from the glare of his evil eyes that he thought Anar had deliberately tossed them about, in an effort to sabotage his homework.

“It wasn’t me!” Anar rumbled.

“Oh, of course not. My mistake. If it was, you’d own up straight away, wouldn’t you?” he snapped. “Do I look stupid?”

Anar’s mouth flapped instinctively for a witty retort, but Alexis cut him off.

“I don’t even need these, anyway, I know what my token was. You don’t have a famous great-grandfather like mine without knowing everything there is to know about them,” he sneered. “I’m offering it up as a tribute to the Dark Lord for Hallowe’en, too. I’ll be granted special privileges for the celebration so you better watch out, demon donkey.”

A chill touched the back of Anar’s robes. A twisted smile crept upon his obscured, long grey face. “Pfff! Yeah, right. My dad’s a H.A.S Director, so I’ll be the one making the best offering, actually, and it’ll be miles better than whatever stupid rubbish you’ve got from your boring, crummy ole dead grandad…”

Alexis straightened up with a jerk, his wings springing open, sending a table lamp flying into a bookcase, roaring with rage, “you dare insult the great Aleister Crowley?!”, the glass lamp shattered, the noisy outburst ringing like a gunshot, startling everyone in the library. Angry murmurs could be heard.

Rap and Rave padded up just in time to see the pale wraith of a librarian bearing down on the red-skinned human who, realising he had been goaded by his rival, was a spluttering mix of embarrassment and fear.

Anar had done what he was good at, and had ducked swiftly away out of the line of fire. Making Alexis cross was too easy. Making Alexis really cross within earshot of a wraith too tempting.

“Come on,” Anar said, grabbing the two dinosaurs by the arm, “let’s go check out this Ouija thing.” He didn’t look back, but his long ears could pick up the librarian’s chilly rasping voice as it threw Alexis out of the library, with dire warnings of terrible consequences if he kept up his disregard of the rules upon his return.

It could have been a frog or a toad, sat at the long table in the next room across from the library. It had a shirt and a tie. It was slowly moving its webbed hands across the table. Large, round eyes swivelled on them, and wide curved mouth turned into a smile. “Salutations!” it gurgled. “Are you here for Ouija club?”

“Yes!” Rap answered, immediately offering a handshake, chummily, to the clammy creature in charge.

“Excellent, excellent. Sit, please, and I shall explain what we do here.”

They took seats around a large, black rectangular board upon the tabletop. The edge of the play area was covered in a pretty, intricate swirling pattern. Across the top the alphabet was printed in white, beneath that: two choices – YES and NO. The brown amphibian sat back as the board shimmered and a faint voice could be heard, asking a question about what to wear to a Hallowe’en party.

“It’s nearly always a group of schoolgirls asking about boys,” the club leader explained. “You can be as cryptic and unhelpful as you like. If you don’t know what to reply with, ask them a question instead. That really freaks them out! Most mortals who use these don’t believe they actually do anything, so it’s always fun to keep them on their toes.”

Rave grabbed a triangular piece off the board. “What’s this do?”

“That signals your answers. If you move it here, it will move on the twin board, wherever that may be.”

“Planchette,” said Rap.

“No need to be rude, just ‘cos you know everything,” sniffed Rave.

“No dear, that’s what it’s called.”

“Oh! I thought you were calling me a prat.”

“Not this time. OK, so what are we going to say about this party?”

Anar reached for the pointy thing known as a planchette, “ask ‘em if any cute girls are going!”

Rave pulled it out of his mammalian friend’s reach, “ew! Yuk! You’re not using this for dating! How ‘bout we tell ‘em they don’t need to dress up, ‘cos they’re already scary?”

“That’s mean,” breathed Rap.

“Brilliant!” Rave slammed the pointer down, and slowly moved it around the letters.

“No!” Rap cried, pleadingly, “we need to know what they’ve got in their wardrobe to choose from.”

The big, round, squat toad-like guy reached under the table and pulled out another board, “have one of your own, if you like. The more the merrier. Most of the time these Ouija questions get auto-generated answers from a machine as smart as a Casio calculator, it’s only since the Exorcist film was so popular that we decided to give students a bit of fun with them.

Rave was cackling as he whizzed his planchette around. He couldn’t spell for shit, whoever was on the other end probably thought they’d managed to contact the only otherworldly spirit with dyslexia. “Tommy doesn’t love you, because you smell!”

Rap listened intently to the voice on the other end of his board connection, and nodded to himself, no doubt about to launch himself into full Agony Aunt mode, complete with tea and sympathy.

Anar rubbed his chin. He’d dropped his pointy hood and opened his student robes, not having to worry about his trendy clothing being un-becoming for a demon, in this room. He wondered if he could contact a spirit? What if he could talk to his ancestor? He had the same name, didn’t he? Maybe his ancestor knew what he’d brought up from the ritual in the classroom?

He accepted his board, pressed his grey fingers on the planchette, closed his eyes and took a breath. It worked similar to calling up a demon, didn’t it? You had to ask for them by name.

“Anarchy Warlock, are you there?” his voice was wobbly, self-conscious in case his pals heard him. They weren’t paying a blind bit of notice, luckily enough. Too busy with their own boards. He cleared his throat. Nerves wouldn’t help him, you had to command spirits, didn’t you?

“Anarchy Warlock, I call you from the spirit world!” he said, clearly.

A sharp, loud whine of feedback loop assaulted his ears, and he let go of the pointer piece. His head rang.

Rap and Rave looked at him, crossly, covering their tiny audio receptors.

The frog fella was momentarily stunned.

“Sorry,” he mumbled, as silence returned.

“Flippin’ ‘eck, big ears! What are you playing at?” Rave huffed.

“I’m going back to the library,” Anar sighed, sadly. He still hadn’t found what his mysterious item was, and his ancestor clearly didn’t want to be contacted, so now that Alexis was out of the picture for a while he could actually study in peace.

He swung his bag over his shoulder, pulling his robes back together and tugging at his hood.

He sulked among the ancient tomes, running his finger along dusty spines, traipsing back and forth, not even having much enthusiasm to read the titles in full. Some were in Latin. Some in Infernal. Others in dead languages forgotten in time. His mind was pre-occupied with dark thoughts as he wandered; would Alexis really be in the favour of Hell’s elite with his Hallowe’en offering? Should Anar try to gain favour too? The token that was laid back in his room on the table was of no value to him, but maybe it was worth something to the right people? It certainly made him feel a certain way, even if he had no words for it. There had been a lot of that, recently; feelings he had no way of explaining. The book he’d randomly grabbed before Rap had started off about Ouija club had felt like the right book. He’d dismissed it. Maybe he shouldn’t…

Ascending to the balcony level of the library, Anar sat at one of the small, wooden tables with the little glass lamps upon it, one of the same type Alexis had shattered when his wings had popped in anger. He hated being a swat. Books were lame. It was sad, sitting and flicking through them, reading and learning. Cool kids didn’t do that.

He flopped the pages over, sulkily.

A subtitle caught his attention:

Dragons.

There it was again, the funny fluttery feeling in his stomach. Between that and his bubbly blood, he was a medical mystery for sure! Butterflies in your tummy was supposed to be when you were kissing girls, not reading books.

He'd never thought about dragons, before. Did they even exist? No-one had ever seen one. They were in nerdy fantasy books where the swords were given more names than the main characters. He supposed if demons and spirits were real, dragons might be, too. They probably occupied another plane of existence. Wouldn’t want to muck about with smelly old mortals.

He skimmed a few paragraphs; it was as he suspected, nobody could prove the existence of dragons, there were plenty of theories about them, ancient legends and myths. They were untrustworthy, controlling, coercive, meddling, power-hungry and terrible. If they were real, at any rate. They liked collecting things, not always inanimate objects, sometimes people too.

As with all good books, there was an illustration of what the paid artist thought a dragon might look like. It was on four legs, breathing fire, horned and winged, with a pointy tail.

Anar’s mouth felt a little dry. The demonic form that Rap had chosen for him was, now he thought about it, rather dragon-like.

He closed the book. His hands were trembling slightly. This was all ridiculous; he was letting his imagination run wild, and being stupid. Dragons did not exist. There’d be bones. Teeth. Claws.

Scales...