But the only answer Sabre Tusk received was a direct hit on the nose from a very sloppy bird dropping. “Yieeeah! I’m hit—” he cried, falling to his knees and crawling over and among the lizards. The once fierce Rummer Boar, now reduced to the appearance of a filthy wildman, wriggling among the lizards, broke into a crazed, delirious shrieking.
“Oh, darlin’s, make room for me, please!” Sabre Tusk wailed, talking to the lizards. “Don’t let them poop on me! Help me, protect me hat! They’re soiling my feathers! Your kingdom is big and vast! Who is your king? Take me to him to plead my case! I’ll serve him forever if his army will protect me against all that poop falling from the sky!” The poor beast, his mind snapped, crawled senselessly among the lizards, stopping here and there to plead his cause.
Getting little response, he turned his elegant damask coat inside out and, pulling it over himself and his precious hat, the insane seabeast collapsed in a quivering mass, tucked tightly under his coat.
Helbara Freed
Katteo walked quickly to the Mis’tashe station house and entered, pushing open a heavy oaken door. She was surprised to find the place completely empty! She and Red Whale had understood that their comrades—slaves on their way to Tilk Duraow—were being held at the station. By way of the ruse Katteo and Red Whale had employed, they had succeeded in negotiating the purchase of their comrades with Milky Joe, in exchange for the plundered trallés. The ruse, however, having worked beyond the wildest hopes of Katteo and Red Whale, now seemed to offer the possibility of freeing their comrades without exchange of the valuable trallés!
This happy possibility required that their comrades actually be present at Mis’tashe, however, and Katteo’s heart fell as she surveyed the silent station-house. Had Milky Joe double-crossed them? Perhaps they had been lured into a trap and they were the ones who were victims of some grand performance? These doubts and fears rushed through Katteo’s mind as she struggled to grasp what had happened to her shipmates—essential parts of their plan!
“Who’s there?” came a voice, causing Katteo to startle. Wheeling around rapidly to view the entire room again, Katteo still saw no other creature. “Who’s there?” the voice asked again, coming from some unseen point nearby.
Searching more closely with her gaze, Katteo realized that the voice was coming from outside the station-house, the voice filtering in through an open window. Rushing outside, she found a female Wood Cow, with white shaggy hair falling down across her neck and shoulders, chained to the wall by a rusty chain attached to a roughly-made iron collar encircling her neck. She wore a dirty, wide-brimmed had with the brim rolled up tightly on one side.
“Dear beast!” Katteo cried, embracing the prisoner, feeling an immense bond of affection with the unknown captive. “Who are you?” Katteo asked urgently. “Are there others with you?”
“Slow there, friend,” the Wood Cow replied, smiling broadly. “I was asking the question first!” she laughed.
“I’m Katteo Jor’Dane, and with Captain Red Whale Gumberpott, we’ve come to free our comrades from the clutches of Milky Joe and his slavers! But, we’d expected to find them here and I’m troubled of mind that they seem to be nowhere around.”
“Oh, they’re here, all right,” the Wood Cow said. “I’m Helbara and I make it my business to know everything about the movement of slaves, trallés, and all that nasty business. You knew the route of the trallé caravan you raided, because I passed that information on to the Borf!”
Katteo was stunned. “You mean you—chained to the wall in this remote place—helped the raid we made?”
“Aye,” Helbara said proudly. “Why I consider this ring around my neck a certain sort of badge of honor! The more chains they put on me and the more they send me away to distant, unheard of places, the more I know they consider me dangerous to their filthy business! But they can’t figure out what I’m doing to them—Ha-Ha-Ha-Ho! They don’t see me doing anything and they won’t let me talk to anyone, but they sense that somehow I’m the cause of a lot of their caravans being plundered! Ha-Ha-Ha-Ho!”
“That’s pretty interesting, Helbara, but you’ll have to tell me more later,” Katteo interrupted. “We can’t count on our success lasting forever—we’ve got to find out friends and get everyone out of here!”
“The key to my collar is hanging on the wall inside behind the counter,” Helbara said. “Release me and I’ll lead you to your friends.”