Chapter 2: The Fate of Bandit Pirates
“Eh?” The wolf of robbery-related occupation looked with confusion at Kejo.
“I said, do you want to hear a joke?”
“What? You joking around mate? We here are fierce pirates, coming to kill your goods and despoil your bodies!”
There was some murmurs of dissatisfaction from the ship.
“I thought we were bandits Capt’n”
“I thought we was despoiling the goods… wait, that ain’t right either”
Other such grievances came up as well as older ones, finally the trembling Wolf-bandit captain possibly pirate snapped.
“Ah! Shut it the lot of you, and Froka if you didn’t want someone eating your puddn’ ya shouldn’t have let it creep out!”
The wolf panted heavily.
“Now, like I was saying, you joking kid?”
Kejo rotated his head until it was looking at the wolf upside down.
“No, not yet, that’s why I asked if you wanted to hear a joke” Kejo explained calmly.
“You don’t need their permission” A panicked muffle came from Yerdl’s plain clay pot.
“You and momma are always telling me to be polite though” Kejo objected.
“Being polite is pretty good boy. You have good parents!” The wolf yapped.
“Why, thank you sir, we do try” Ismi gushed.
“Gosh mom. *ahem* Well, do you want to hear a joke sir?” Kejo asked again.
The wolf noisily scratched his chin.
“Is it a funny one?” he asked.
Kejo replied, but could not look the raider in the face.
“Y-yes, real funny”
A further bit of strangely loud scratching.
“Nah”
“Oh darn” Kejo said.
“Just tell them a joke anyway!”
Yerdl and Ismi both screamed at him as the bandit pirates were swinging grappling hooks.
Kejo opened his mouth.
It must be understood, that in spite of all appearances, what was coming out of Kejo’s mouth was words, but to the raiders, it was stabbing pain, it was doom. A stronger being, perhaps even just one with the will of a warrior or mage would have been able to withstand such terrible jokes that leaked out like malignant smog.
The ship however only had bandits that weren’t even sure if they were actually pirates!
So, after a bit of pitiful screaming, they fell down dead. Simple as that.
Well.
All of them except the captain that is.
That wolf wasn’t quite a stupid as he seemed, no he had stuffed his paws deeply into his ears and thus escaped doom!
“AHAHAHAHAHA! TAKE THAT YOU HORRID LITTLE POT! THIS BIG BAD WOLF HAS BEEN AROUND A BIT! I’M NOT SO IGNORANT!”
“Well, that is good for you, but aren’t you on your own now?” Ismi asked.
The wolf took his paws from his ears.
“Sorry what?”
Sonic horror dribbled from Kejo’s lips.
With that, the capt’n was easily defeated.
Ismi and Yerdl popped their heads out of their pots.
“Fhew, thought we were in trouble there for a moment.” Yerdl exhaled.
“Good work son” Ismi cheered.
“Pity about the bandit… er pirates?”
Yerdl put a comforting finger around Kejo’s brassy pot.
“Son, it’s us or them, and I’d choose us every-time. Besides, they’d have run afoul of some adventurers or beasts or something eventually. We can have a moment of silence for them if you…”
“HEY GET UP HERE YOU TWO THIS SHIP IS REALLY NICE INSIDE!” Ismi yelled.
As it turned out, the ship was indeed very nice inside. It had likely belonged to some eccentric rich person what with its plush fuzzy upholstery, rare ivory furnishings, needlessly elaborate sculptures, extremely desirable tassels and a boiling cauldron of ill omen.
“Dear, why does this have such a large and worrying cauldron?” Yerdl asked.
Well. Perhaps it was less eccentric rich person and more sinister cooklord or something of that nature.
Ismi had a displeased look on her face.
“Forget all that. We don’t know how to move a ship, and I don’t think Turmeric can shift it”
Turmeric, the twipstrider that the frulid family owned, snorted noisily as if protesting at the very idea of the plan.
“Turmeric agrees!” Ismi moaned.
“Wait, why is he even inside the ship?”
“We’ll just have to strip out whatever we can!” Ismi fussed, pulling down
“Uuuh Dear? Dear? Can you hear me dear?” Yerdl asked.
“KEJO! GET IN HERE AND HELP ME STRIP THIS PLACE BARE! YOU TOO YERDL!”
“B-but the cauldron!”
In the end, the cauldron was completely ignored and the ship was stripped of so much that Ismi had Yerdl and Kejo construct a makeshift sled for all the stuff that couldn’t fit in the caravamel.
Ismi being the model of a fine wife had a good eye for value! Or at least that is what she thought of herself. In reality she basically took anything she could.
The ship looked like it had been attacked by some foul wood eating monster.
Tears in her eyes, Ismi waved her fingers at the receding sight of her girlish romance.
She really wanted to have the ship.
Yet Turmeric grunted and pulled his increased load through the snows, and the ship vanished in the falling snow, until some other denizen would discover it and its strange cauldron.
The snows however, were getting far heavier as they moved on.
In a short amount of time, they could barely see anything.
It was then, amid whirling sheets that they broke through, as if curtains had been drawn back.
They arrived at the village. It was not their village.
It was a village filled with dead silence.