Withdrawal Pending

"Next, right here please," Cora called to the next customer in line. A very tall man came forward and she wondered what he was. She could tell he wasn’t human.

"Bank card and ID, please," she said, and he passed her what she asked for through the slot in the spell-proof glass. She asked, "And what will I be helping you with today?"

"I would like to withdraw some of my gold," he said, and Cora's heart sank. The teller next to her almost dropped the ID she had just been handed by her customer. The man continued, "Fifty pounds worth. All in coins, please."

"Just making sure I heard correctly. You want to make a withdrawal?" Cora repeated, trying to sound as professional and friendly as possible.

"Yes, me and some friends are planning a competition. The leprechauns are doing that whole gold at the end of the rainbow thing. We are making bets on whose pot gets found first. There will be a big celebration after. A lot of fair folk like to go to them." She was barely listening to his small talk. She most certainly was not looking forward to getting money out of the vault. He asked, "Have you ever been to one of the celebrations?"

"No. Can't say I have, but it sounds nice," Cora said. Her smile became hard as she tried not to show her displeasure. "I'm going to take care of this for you. You are withdrawing currency from the special vaults, so please have a seat and fill out this paperwork while I go take care of your transaction."

He thanked her and went to sit in a chair in the far corner of the bank, and Cora quickly walked to the coded door on the wall behind the teller's desk. The other teller and the manager watched at her with pity.

The paperwork was more of a distraction than necessity. It kept the customers from growing too impatient while they went to retrieve the valuables that were requested.

 There were many different types of valuables and different forms of currency held in the vaults at the Great Bank—from paper money to phoenix tears—but gold and jewels were the most taxing to try to deal with. Even vials containing the blood of sacred mountain spirits or books containing the secrets of the ancients were less troublesome to retrieve from the vaults. Not that she had the clearance for that, but she had heard from those who had it that they would rather go through all the security checkpoints than have to go retrieve gold.

It was enough gold to where she could not simply put it in a sack or two and carry it out, she would need a cart and that would slow her down.

She went to the back of the modern vaults, and went through a door in the floor that sloped underground. She stopped at the station where the carts were located, and found a clerk returning from helping someone else at one of the less troubling vaults. Cora said, “I need a cart. Can you come with me?”

“To the vault?” the clerk asked, looking startled.

“You’ll only push the cart. No fighting.”

“Oh, thank the spirits,” she said, clutching her chest. She followed behind Cora and they came to the armory. Cora was greeted by a human man in his mid-forties. He was already holding arm guards, shin guards, and a breast plate. He asked, “The vault?”

“Yeah,” Cora said, and he handed her the armor. His eyebrows furrowed as he watched her place it over her uniform, with no mention of equipping the clerk.

"Did you not bring an ally?" he asked. She had been working at the Great Bank for three months, but she knew it was rare to come down to the vault alone. She had been lucky to not be the one tasked with going to the vaults very often, but the past two times she had been lucky and had the assistance of the manager or another teller. Unfortunately, everyone that wasn't on break had their hands full. It was lunch hour for most people and that was when people rushed to the banks.

"It's crowded up top. It's probably a strain on everyone else for me to have even come down here, but I'm sure they would rather deal with that than this."

 “I’m sorry to hear that.”

“I notice you are not offering to come with me.”

“I would, but I really don’t want to,” he said, passing her a sword, which she placed next to her wand. Staffs were too big to deal with. “Besides, I am assigned to stay here to help anyone else who comes down here.”

She let out a grunt, and walked onward to the hallway lined with different family vaults. She stopped in front of the door that had been indicated in the Great Bank system, and looked at the clerk.

Cora said, “This is it.”

"I'll be waiting out here," the clerk said.

Cora typed in the code hesitantly, and the door slid open. To her shock, she found the exact person she had dreaded seeing, standing less than five steps in, with his talon tipped hands clasped behind his back. The branch manager. She had thought she would have at least a minute or two to access the correct safe and weigh at least some of the gold. She had not expected him to be in the vault. He should have been in his office managing reports or doing sales plans. Anything other than standing in the vault at peak hours.

She gasped and the clerk squeaked and shuffled backward out of view of the huge man in a suit.

"I see you have returned,” his voice boomed, as his eyes locked on her. They were a chilling golden color with vertical slits for pupils.

"You know who I am?"

"Of course. I have been keeping an eye on you. Bold of you to enter my treasury," he said. "You think you can steal from me?"

"Sir, please, that money belongs to someone," she said. "Please don't do this."

"All the world's treasure is mine,” he said, as scales began to form around the perimeter of his face, and horns began to sprout. He seemed to keep this attitude with everyone, and it made work very difficult.

"I’m sorry, Sir, but a withdrawal must be made,” Cora extended her wand and aimed a bright blue stunning flash at his face. She heard the door shut behind her, closing off the rest of the bank from the ensuing battle. The light blinked out and he was gone. He had taken to the air, having anticipated her first move. It didn’t surprise her. How could she really surprise a dragon?

 The vaults were not big enough for him to take his complete beast form, and she was grateful for it. He was menacing enough. She had learned it was easiest to make the first move. Never look at him for too long. Especially not in the eyes. Don’t let him intimidate you with talk.

 "Do you really think you are worthy of this treasure?" he asked.

"My worth is not the issue. This money is not yours to keep.” She made a run for the heap of gold he hovered over. She could not do her job until he was dealt with.

“Do you think you really have what it takes to defeat me?”

Cora frowned and extended her wand. There was another flash of light, this time followed by a roll of thunder as a storm cloud spontaneously materialized over the branch manager, and tried to strike him down with lightning. The branch manager flapped his wings forward, hard, throwing himself out of the strike zone, and the attack cracked the stone floor below. The lightning was far stronger than Cora anticipated and she instantly regretted it. She should have tested it elsewhere before bringing it into battle with the branch manager.

Cora stared at the branch manager’s back as he stared down at the damaged spot and she wondered what was going through his mind. She did not think she wanted to see the expression on his face.

He turned to her then and gave a deranged grin, showing his razor-sharp interlocking teeth. His face began to morph then, and his suit seemed to struggle against his body, frozen in the quarter transformed state of a bipedal dragon. Just because he would not grow to full size, did not mean he would not change form and act on his terrifying instinct. With a menacing and nearly gleeful growl, he said, “A fun one.”

His chest puffed out as he inhaled and his cheeks swelled before he expelled a stream of fire from his mouth. She let out a yell, and quickly waved her wand in a circle before her, creating a portal to take the flames. The exit to the portal appeared behind him and the flames struck him in the back. It did not knock him down. He just grunted and lowered his head.

She could not believe he had really tried to torch her. All positions required some form of physical fitness or proficiency in magic, but they preferred both for this reason. The spell she used was not a beginner’s defense spell, but it was not so complex that it could not be done spontaneously when the portal was small and the travel distance was short.

They were lucky the walls were fire proof, but the gold was not enchanted at the moment. Cora said, “Sir, please, you are going to melt the gold. I don’t want to be melted either.”

 He didn’t say anything, but the way he bent his body and angled his wings told her that she needed to take out her sword. He did not have to do it so slowly, but she appreciated the warning he was giving her. Unfortunately, she only had seconds to switch her wand to her other hand, pull out her sword, and block his talons as they came toward her face.

This was out of hand. She was not well trained with the sword, but he would have snapped the wand if she had tried to use it to block. She held her wand up and point-blank, fired a blast of water into his face. To her horror, he was not knocked back even an inch.

She could not see him behind the water wall, but his clawed-hand broke through the spray and grabbed her by the wrist. His terrifying face followed after, and he opened his mouth wide, and she heard a rumble. Surely, he would not burn her head from her shoulders. Cora stared in to the dark abyss framed by two rows of razor-sharp teeth, and felt her blood run cold.

           Then the branch manager started to laugh. It was not a pleasant laugh. He said, “My apologies, young lady. It is just a nice change of pace when someone actually goes for the kill. Sometimes I think of the old days, and get carried away.”

           Cora stood frozen as the branch manager took a few steps back and turned to walk toward the center of the room. There was a burn in the back of his suit, and rips where his wings had sprouted. He didn’t say anything more.

His wings twitched, then he shot up through a wide rectangular opening in the ceiling. It was said it was part of a network of tunnels that led straight to his office. No one dared try to sneak through them or break into the vaults because the branch manager would quickly be upon them. Even if he was not present in the office. No one dared try to steal from the Great Bank and risk his wrath. He could easily track down a thief, and if what he had done with her was just having a little fun, his true anger would be devastating. It was said that he was bored because no one could match him, so she pitied anyone who had to come to the vaults.

One did not defeat the branch manager. He decided when he was done engaging with you. You either annoyed him into leaving or put up enough of a fight to make his day less dull, so that he would let you work in peace. He would not kill anyone, but that didn’t mean he would not put the fear of death into you.

She knocked on the door twice and the beeps of the code being input could be heard, before it slid open a crack. The clerk with the cart peeked in. She asked, “Is it over?”

“For now.”

“It was really loud in here.”

“Things got a little out of hand. Let’s load the gold before he decides he wants to fight again.”

“But he already let you go.”

“But he seemed to be having fun,” Cora said, and the clerk cringed. It was unspoken that it was not a good idea to be too interesting. The branch manager had a history of giving interesting people a tougher time.

They quickly weighed the gold and wheeled it up to the upper floors in bags. Cora waved the man over and greeted him at the side access door. She said, “Thank you for the wait. Here is your gold. Would you like me to help you walk this out to your transportation?”

“No. We got it.”

“We?”

“Oh, I came with my brother,” he said, and there was a pop and a flash like little festival sparklers being lit. Suddenly, two men slightly below her height stood before her and one bent to pick up two of the bags.

She stood in shock, then quickly looked at the ID that she was still holding to clarify. The ID card did say he was actually five feet tall. She had just been too distracted to notice. She would remember not to get distracted like that again. She said, “I thought you were betting on leprechauns. I did not realize you were the leprechauns.”

“More than one of us usually come at a time so it is harder to get robbed, but if we come to a bank looking like ourselves, people are more likely to try to rob us,” the second leprechaun said, and stood to go toward the door, followed by the first.

“I see,” Cora said, walking with them. She held the door open for them, but she also stood watching to be sure they go into their portal safely. She had fought a dragon, she could hex anyone that tried to attack them on their way out.

A fae came shuffling up toward the door with a small box that look suspiciously like something for carrying out withdrawals. Cora said, “Good afternoon, what brings you here today?”

“Oh, just depositing some of my family’s valuables.”

“Lovely,” she said, and reached into the greeting podium. She handed the woman the form and said, “You should be able to fill this form out in line.”

Cora quickly went through the coded door that lead behind the counter and said, “I’m going on break.”

The other unsuspecting tellers nodded, understanding that she must have needed the rest after her time in the vault. Cora did not want to risk having the fae come to her window. She was not going back down into the vault. It wasn’t as if the branch manager cared to distinguish between deposit or withdrawal visits.