by Paul Kater
as he said the two words. For some reason he was not in the least amazed by flying brooms.
Hilda decided to go for the direct approach. She swung her broom around and lightly touched down on the black deck. The men who were on deck first made a run towards her, but when William landed, they stopped and kept a safe distance.
"Now why do they stop when you come in and not when I do?" Hilda wanted to know.
William shrugged. "Let's go and ask them."
The two cats that had come with the two magicals were already wandering around on the deck, entirely unimpressed by the men that grouped together and talked among themselves. As their humans started to move towards the men, they quickly followed. After all, they had come along to participate in the fun.
"See that?" Hilda pointed. "Chicken coops. That one actually has chickens in it."
William nodded. Obsi and Grim had found that out already. They had also found that the wire in front of the chicken's fortress was quite able to keep the chickens in and them out.
"Hello there," the witch then addressed the people on the deck. "Who are you, what are you doing here, and how, by all things magical, did you get this ship in this lake?"
The men probably made up the crew of the ship. The striped shirts, black pants and big arms with many a tattoo made that very obvious. It was a bit eerie to the magicals that the men who had yelled so loudly as they had flown around the ship now remained silent.
"Come on, you people," said William, "I am certain you can still speak. Our cats have not been near your mouths, so that can't be the problem."
The men stared at the wizard in his purple cloak. So did the witch.
"William," she sighed, "when will you stop saying this kind of disturbing things? I am sure that these gentlemen now are worried about you." She turned to the men. "So, gentlemen. Who is running this show?"
The assembly of sailors remained quiet. The only sounds came from the sails that flapped in the gusts of wind, the meowing of one of the cats, and then also from a door that was thrown open somewhere out of view.
2. Moro
The line of sailors split up and gave Hilda and William an unobstructed view of the door that had opened. It was one of the several doors in the enormous building that was the stern. The darkness that lay behind the door was clearly visible against the black of the building, proving that black is not just black. A heavy thumping started, making the deck tremble. Bong... krrr... bong... krrr... went the sound and each bong made the wood under everyone's feet shiver. The krrrs that filled up the time between the bongs gave the impression that some kind of clockwork was operating, hidden in the bowels of the ship.
Onyx Grimalkin and Obsidian Shadow found safe havens between the legs of their humans. The humans looked at each other for a moment, after which their eyes were pulled to the open door again. All the sailors' eyes were on it too as a shape appeared from it. It was huge, if not downright enormous. It had big feet which it dragged from what had to be a staircase, and manoeuvred itself into a normal standing posture.
William's eyes almost popped out of his head. "That is the most incredible robot I have ever seen," he said. This of course was easy; the robots he had seen could be counted on the fingers of one hand.
"A what?" asked Hilda. She stared at a huge metal man with its oversized tin head, red blinking eyes and round mouth.
"Well, well, what do we have here," the voice echoed. It had to come from inside the metal hulk. The metal apparition raised one of its arms, a massive cylinder that hung from its broad shoulders, and pointed at the witch and the wizard. The sound reverberated inside the round and big body. It look like a elongated barrel standing on two overdone legs with wide thick feet.
Krrr... bong.... krrr.... bong.... The krrr happened as a chain, retracting into the metal belly where it came from, pulled up a leg. The gleaming, coppery body leaned forward a bit and the chain released. The foot bonged onto the deck, sending tremors through the black wood. Then the other leg was krrr'd up with the inevitable bong to follow. The thing moved forward sluggishly, but it looked as if not much would be able to stop it.
"Right, William, you seem to know this kind of thing. What should we do now?" Hilda popped up her wand as she spoke and was ready to use it. Before William could reply, the tin man on steroids stopped its advance. A rattling noise rang inside it. A small cloud of steamy air puffed from the thing's head, accompanied by a merry hiss, and the entire machine seemed to sag where it stood.
"Wait, wait," a concerned voice said. Its owner had to be inside the robot-shape. "I'm coming out..."
As a precaution, William also made his wand appear. A hushed whisper went through the lines of sailors, much to the annoyance of the witch. She had popped up her wand first, after all.
Something squeaked. It was a sound so unexpected that it drew Hilda away from her upcoming grumblings. A few clunks and screeches later a man in a long red coat stepped around the metal hulk. "Bon giorno, dear people."
Hilda reached for William's sleeve and held it. "Suck an elf... what is that?"
The man they saw brushed his shoulder-length black hair back and made a bow. His hair fell forward again of course. As he raised himself up again, leaning heavily on the sword at this belt, he introduced himself as the captain of the 'Mimosa'. "My name," he said with an Italian accent, "is Doctor Maurizio Blunt."
"Doctor who?" William asked.
"No, not him," Maurizio Blunt said, "Doctor Maurizio Blunt." The man raised both hands and stared at them with the eye that did not have an eye patch over it. He shook his head and then scratched his head. "I am sorry, the hook has not long gone. You may understand my confusion."
The magical couple almost needed supports for their jaws. "When are they going to do something about that stick under your knee?" Hilda managed.
Maurizio looked down and laughed. "Oh, that, the wooden leg. Oh no, signora, I like that. It adds something to the appearance, do you think not? Now, may I have the honour of knowing your names? One of my people told me that you were flying on a... scopa? Broom? Like a real witch?"
Hilda planted her left hand on her hip and pointed her wand at the man in the red coat. "A real witch. Yes. You got that right. I'm Grimhilda the witch and this is William. He's a wizard. Now you know us and you can tell us why your ship is in this lake. And how it got here. And what's that?!" She added the last question in amazement as a colourful bird flew from the darkness behind the door and landed on Maurizio's shoulder.
William laughed out loud. "That, Hilda, is a parrot. And that's a very pretty one too, Mr. Blunt."
The colourful captain did not respond to William immediately. He turned to the men that were grouped behind him. "Hey, ragazzi, don't you have things to do?"
"Nope," one of the men said, crossing his arms over his massive chest. He seemed entertained by the goings-on.
"I see," said Maurizio. "Carry on anyway." He shrugged as he turned back to Hilda and William.
The parrot was not pleased with that. "Watch it!" it screamed, regaining its balance.
"Shut up, Polly," Maurizio snapped. William collapsed with laughter as he heard the name. Hilda frowned at him, not getting the fun of it.
"Shut up, shut up!" The colourful bird retorted to the man on whose shoulder it was perched.
"Perdone," Maurizio said, "the bird is like that sometimes." He lifted the eye patch, rubbed the eye beneath it and then moved the patch to the other eye. Polly started gnawing the strap that held the patch in place and snapped at fingers as the make-belief pirate captain slapped at her.
"Hey," said Hilda, "aren't you forgetting something? I asked you questions and all you did was get bird poop on the back of your coat."
Hilda was not about to get her answers. The new interruption came in the shape of a female voice that yelled out "Moro!"
Polly flew up from the man's shoulder and screamed: "Rebel! Rebel!" It found a new place to sit on the head of one of the sailors, who seemed to be used to that. Maurizio looked
at the magicals in despair. He raised his arms and let them fall down his sides. "You hear... Rebel." Over his shoulder he yelled: "On the deck!"
"Easy, Hilda," said William. Through their bond he sensed that she was quickly getting to boiling point as she was definitely not in control of the situation. He took her hand and squeezed it.
"Don't you easy me," she grumbled as she pulled her hand free. "I'm the witch here and he is trespassing." Before the wizard could do something she was pacing towards the man with the eye patch. "Now listen..."
As one, the group of sailors started moving. At an astounding speed they appeared between Hilda and their captain, effectively blocking her from getting to him. For the moment, anyway. She swung her wand, muttered something and the large men were thrown left and right, as if a magical bowling ball had hit them. The men did not need more encouragement to move away as far as they could.
Maurizio's neck muscles worked overtime as he looked left and right, trying to keep an eye on whoever had shouted at him inside the ship and on Hilda who was still charging at him. "Madonna," he moaned, looking at William for help that did not come. William was a wizard, and no fool.
As Hilda approached the man, William noticed someone else coming from the dark hole who also paced towards the captain. It had to be the woman whose voice they had heard. She had short brown hair that stood out as if it was electrically charged. Sunlight bounced