The Four Queens
Copyright© 2026 by Uncle Jim
Chapter 4
The following characters appear in this chapter:
Jorani Sweeney
Deirdre’s Sister-in-Law and Queen of the East, 5’-2’’ tall (157 cm), 121 pounds (55 kg), 34C-22-34, 34 years old, long black hair, brown eyes, still very good looking, she is a Turquoise Dragon
Mliss
Kiry’s Mother, Cambodian, 5’-2’’ tall (157 cm), 115 pounds (52 kg), 35 years old, black hair, brown eyes, very strong Talent
Fak-tong (with a long O)
Not a character, a soup enjoyed by many in Southeast Asia. It is made using pumpkin or winter melons. In this case, it had been made with large chunks of Kabocha squash along with onions, garlic, coconut milk and several curry spices such as ginger, turmeric, cumin, and salt and pepper to the individual’s taste.
Deirdre has the Narrative
Arriving back in the lobby of the Charleston Dragon Security building, I thought that my job was finished. It didn’t take long to discover just how wrong I was. It only required Nick appearing a few seconds after our arrival to learn the truth of the matter. We were still in our Dragon forms when he arrived. He was in his Human form. I quickly changed us back to our Human forms.
“So, this is our newest Dragon,” he said with a large smile, startling Kiry.
“Kiry,” I said turning toward the youngster, “this is Nicolae Mayer. He is the manager of the Dragon Security office here in Charleston. He was born in the early tenth century and has been a Dragon for well over 450 years,” I told him to a shocked look from him.
“Four hundred and fifty years!” he said in amazement.
“Yes, he is one of the first modern Dragons. There are very few that are older than he is, except for the old original Dragons who are mostly over 4,000 years old,” I told him to a look of absolute astonishment from him.
“Four thousand!” he repeated with a look of disbelief.
“Yes, 4,000 years old. It appears that your Father, who was an original Dragon, was a Green Dragon, as you are a Green Dragon,” Nicolae told him following that, but he had a question for him.
“Do you know where you live?” he asked.
“Yes,” Kiry told us and gave us the exact address and a description of the house and the area around it.
“Very good, Kiry,” Nick told him before turning to me.
“When are you going to take him home to his Mother?” he asked. I stared at him in shock for several seconds.
“Me!?” I asked. “I only came here to rescue him. Nothing was said about taking him home. I thought that you or your people would be doing that,” I told him on recovering.
“You are the one who rescued him and know what was involved in the incident, so you are the logical one to explain what happened to his Mother in addition to explaining to her that he is a Dragon. You will probably need to transform him again to convince her,” Nick told me. “I will provide a car and a driver to take you to their house,” he added after a few seconds.
What was I going to do? I wasn’t very good at explaining things to adults, especially those I didn’t know, and who were upset with me and not ready to listen. Especially those who probably had poor English skills and who spoke Khmer, which I wasn’t anywhere near fluent in. That was when I had a brilliant idea. Jorani, the Queen of the East and my Sister-in-Law, was Cambodian and spoke the language, plus she would be sufficiently important to impress Kiry’s Mother.
“Your Mother speaks Khmer a lot, doesn’t she?” I asked him.
“Yes, she speaks mostly Khmer at home. She can speak English but not too well,” he told me but had a question.
“Are you really going to tell my Mother that I’m a Dragon?” he asked in a frightened voice.
“Yes, Kiry. She will need to know since you will need to go to a better school and will need to start studying Magic as well as learning Gaelic. You wouldn’t be able to hide all of that from her,” I told him to a resigned look from him. Nick had been busy while I was thinking and talking to Kiry and had some information for us.
“There will be a car out front in a couple of minutes. The driver already knows the address of the house. You can leave whenever you are ready,” he informed us.
“I have something that I need to do first. It should only take a few minutes,” I told Nick and Kiry. “Can you show Kiry around Dragon Security while I take care of that?” I asked him.
“You’re sure it will only take a few minutes?” he asked looking at me suspiciously.
“Yes, I just need to speak to someone,” I assured him.
“Very well,” Nick agreed before turning to Kiry. “I’ll show you how our security company works,” he told Kiry and took his hand before starting off by explaining what a security company was, and what they did.
I waited until they were out of sight, and then quickly transferred to Jorani’s house. It was very easy as I had been there a million times, at least, visiting her Daughters. Arriving in their large parlor, I immediately detected Jorani in the kitchen and headed toward her.
“Good afternoon, Deirdre. The girls aren’t back yet,” she said as I entered the kitchen. She appeared to have just finished preparing something to eat.
“I know, ma am. That’s not why I am here. I have a problem and was hoping that you could help me with it,” I told her.
“A problem?” she asked with a grin.
“Yes,” I said and went through all that had happened since Mother had sent me on this task.
“You said that he is only eight years old and has already achieved his Dragon form, and that he is part Cambodian?” she asked in an amazed voice when I finished.
“Yes, he and his Mother are both Cambodian, and I don’t know how to explain to her that he is a Dragon ... a Green Dragon. Kiry said that his Mother speaks some English, but speaks mostly Khmer at home. My Khmer isn’t all that great,” I told her.
“If this young man is eight years old, as you have said, he must have a huge Talent to have achieved his Dragon form. I believe from that, that his Mother must also have a very strong Talent. That would be why the anonymous Green Dragon chose her to have sex with and have his offspring,” Jorani told me, but she had more to say.
“So, yes, I believe that you definitely need some help when you go to see his Mother and explain things. I’ll be glad to go with you and speak to her. In fact, I believe that I’ll take this pot of Fak-tong that I have just finished making with us, and we can eat it there,” she told me just before sending the pot and its contents to the Timeless Zone.
“Shall we go?” she asked before adding, “Where are we going?”
“Kiry is at the Dragon Security building in Charleston. Nick is providing a car to take us to his Mother’s house,” I explained before casting the Transfer spell.
We arrived in the entrance foyer of the Dragon Security building in North Charleston a second later. It appeared that my explanation to Jorani had taken longer than I had thought, as Nick was there waiting for us with a very apprehensive looking Kiry. Nick bowed to Jorani when we appeared.
“Your Majesty,” he said with a smile.
“Nicolae, are your wife and children well?” she asked.
“Yes, they are all well. Thank you,” he replied. I had already turned to Kiry.
“Kiry, this is my Sister-in-Law Jorani Sweeney. She is Cambodian, and she is also the Dragon Queen of the East. She will help in explaining things to your Mother,” I told him.
“Dragon Queen!” he asked in English in an amazed voice before Jorani spoke to him in Khmer. He was soon more relaxed than I had seen him previously.
“Shall we go?” Jorani asked in English after a time, and Nick showed us out and to the waiting car in front of the building.
“The driver knows where to go,” Nick reminded us before closing the rear door of the SUV, and we started off. I wasn’t at all familiar with the streets and roads of North Charleston, so the drive while not long in duration was not something that I was terribly interested in. I could return to their house by Magic if I needed to. I would be sure to leave a marker there to do that. The driver stopped in front of a house in a medium sized subdivision a short time later.
“Here we are,” he announced.
The house that we had stopped in front of was a typical medium size tract house for a family of three or four people. It was set back from the street about 30 feet (9 meters) or so and appeared to be the same as the other houses around it. You could only tell them apart by the numbers on their mail boxes.
Kiry’s Mother must have been alerted to the problem by someone, perhaps the school or the police, as she was out the front door and on the way to meet us as we exited the vehicle.
“Should I wait?” the driver asked looking out his window.
“It won’t be necessary. We know the way back,” Jorani told him politely.
Kiry had seen his Mother coming toward us, and he saw the look on her face; he didn’t look well on seeing it. Whatever she had intended to say or was going to do was short circuited by Jorani greeting her in Khmer. She stopped dead in her tracks on hearing that and appeared rather confused, or at least startled. My Khmer wasn’t good enough to follow what she had said, as it wasn’t the usual greeting that her Daughters and I exchanged. Kiry, on seeing his Mother’s changed expression, hurried over to her. She stopped him two feet (60 cm) or so in front of herself and visually checked that he was alright before opening her arms and hugging him as he joined her. In the meantime, I had turned to Jorani to speak to her.
“What did you say to her that caused such a change?” I asked. “I wasn’t able to follow your greeting.”
Jorani has the Narrative which is mostly in Khmer
(The Narrative is presented here in English as most of my readers neither speak or read Khmer.)
“What I said was ‘Good afternoon, Mother of this exceptional young man’,” I told Deirdre in English but needed to speak to the Mother again as she obviously had questions.
“Are you from the school or the police?” she asked in an unsure voice in Northern Khmer.
“We are from neither the school nor the police. We were called to assist your son in his time of need,” I assured her in Khmer.
“But what happened? Who do you represent? I was called by someone from the school, and they said that Kiry was in trouble, and the police had him,” she explained somewhat surprised that I had spoken to her in the same Northern Khmer dialect that she used.
“Kiry was attacked by another student who threw a pot of excrement on him. This greatly upset him, and he responded with a Dragon’s response,” I told her.
“Dragon! What is a Dragon’s response? I never heard of such a thing,” she said in confusion. “I know that all Cambodian people believe that we are descended from Dragons, but we are people not Dragons,” she continued.
“I know all about our beliefs, but that is not what I am talking about. We, Deirdre, your Son Kiry, and I are actual Dragons. Your Son has a very powerful Talent, and he is the Son of a Dragon. This is how he was able to transform into his Dragon form and to breathe a bit of Dragon Fire on his assailant,” I informed her, before casting the spell for a Defensive shell around us and changing its outer surface to silver, so no one could see into it. Deirdre and I joined hands with Kiry, and I transformed all of us into our Dragon forms inside the shell.
Kiry was still only eight feet tall (2.44 meters), but Deirdre and I were were both sixteen feet (4.9 meters) tall so we would fit into the above-ground half of shell that I had cast. Kiry’s Mother stared at the three of us in absolute shock and confusion.
“I am Thangakili, the Dragon Queen of the East, but I am Jorani Sweeney in my Human form. Your Son is a Dragon because his Father was a Dragon, a Green Dragon,” I told her when she had recovered somewhat and was ready to listen. Because she has a very strong Talent also, my Dragon name in Gaelic did not cause her any problems.
“Now, let us go into the house to discuss what changes will be necessary for both you and your Son to continue your lives. We will do this after I have returned us to our Human forms and have canceled the Defensive shell. I will also need to cast a Forgetfulness spell on your neighbors who may have seen what happened,” I continued before doing that, as we didn’t need any wild rumors circulating in the neighborhood about strange silver structures. On finishing, we all entered their house to discuss their future.