both, Rosie and my rapier. But where was Jozlyn?
I squinted across the cave in the dim light coming from a wide tunnel behind me. My eyes were still having trouble focusing. There was a slender lump of something huddled against the far wall. When I saw that it wasn’t moving, I inched closer.
The lump was Jozlyn in the same corpse’s position that I’d seen her in on the hill. Her hands were folded across her chest with the glowing wand between them. She still didn’t seem to breathe.
In alarm, I scurried closer for a better look and leaned my head down toward her chest. I wanted to listen for a heartbeat.
“Oh no you don’t!” Jozlyn said suddenly, sounding like a person scolding a puppy. “The wand is mine. You got the sword, hero-boy.”
With a flick of her wrist, she swatted me on the nose with the wand. My nose started to tingle the way it had after the silver-eared cat had scratched it.
I sat back up and tried to think of something clever to say, but couldn’t. When I really want to be funny or to sound smart, my mind draws a blank. Later, like when I’m lying in bed at night, that’s when I think of the right thing to say. Hours too late.
Jozlyn waved the wand in small circles just inches from my tingling nose. “Gri…” she teased. “Gri…”
“Jozlyn, no!” I shouted in a whisper. The last thing I wanted was for her to experiment on me with the wand. She was close to saying the magic word griznt.
“Gri…griffin!” she finished with a giggle, shaking the wand vigorously in my direction.
“Come on, be serious,” I told her angrily. “The ogre must be nearby. How else do you think we got here?”
I stretched out my arm to indicate the cave and realized this was a switch. I was bossing Jozlyn around and sounding like Mom or Dad.
She shrugged at me and pouted. “We’re still alive,” she said, sniffing. Then her eyes brightened. “Maybe someone rescued us from the ogre!”
I liked the idea right away but didn’t think it was very likely. How many people could live near Croneswart Swamp—a witch, an ogre, and some heroic rescuer? That didn’t even take into consideration all the creepy-crawlies.
Plus why would a rescuer take us to a cave like this?
“I don’t—” I started to say but Jozlyn was already moving.
“Let’s find out,” she said, taking charge and being the big sister again. In a crouch, she headed toward the tunnel leading out of the cave. I followed on her heels.
The tunnel widened so that we could walk side-by-side. It was tall enough for us to stand, too, but we crouched anyway. Crouching just seemed like the thing to do while sneaking along.
Flickering light guided us down the tunnel. I was pretty sure it was from a torch or fireplace. The air got warmer the farther we went and the reddish glow got brighter.
The tunnel opened into another cave. We crouched near the entrance on opposite sides of the tunnel and studied the room. It was round and had a large opening in the ceiling toward the far side. Through the opening, I could see daylight, trees, and leaves.
A big wooden ladder leaned against the wall next to the opening, and a fire burned inside a ring of large stones. The smoke from the fire wafted up through the opening in the ceiling.
There was no one in the cave. But by the size of the ladder, I had an idea of who might live there, or what. No one but an ogre needed a ladder that big.
O-gre, I mouthed silently to Jozlyn. Now that we knew where we were, talking out loud didn’t seem like a good idea.
I pointed to the ladder and Jozlyn nodded.
Still crouching, we scampered to the ladder as quickly as we could. We had no idea when the ogre might return so we had to hurry. This might be our only chance to escape.
I cupped my hands at knee level to give Jozlyn a boost and she started to scramble up the ladder.
Pushing and pulling one another, we slowly climbed. For some reason, the climb made me think of a baby trying to get out of its crib. To the ogre, we probably were baby-sized.
Halfway up, we heard a familiar thump, and then a big shadow darkened the opening above.
The force of the thump shook the ladder, knocking us down to the rung below. We landed on our backsides and wrapped our legs around the wood.
When I caught my balance, I risked a look up. Sure enough, the ogre peered down at us with a big, sloppy grin on its face.
“Hallo, leedle peeples,” it slobbered.
Jozlyn gasped and lost her grip on the wand. It tumbled and bounced down the ladder. The fall seemed to last forever, and then the wand landed right in the ogre’s fire.
27: RUDE DINNER GUEST
AS Jozlyn’s wand fell, something happened to me. It was like figuring out the answer to a riddle. One moment I had no idea and the next I couldn’t believe that I hadn’t seen the answer before.
I knew what I had to do.
I pulled myself up and jumped back down to the ground with a grunt. Even before hitting the ground, I ripped my rapier from its scabbard and stared defiantly up at the ogre.
From the ladder, Jozlyn shouted. “No, Josh! What are you—?”
I didn’t pay her any attention. I pointed my rapier at the ogre and worked up my deepest voice.
“Leave us alone!” I screamed at the monster. “We aren’t food and we won’t be your dinner!”
The ogre stared back at me with a blank look on its face, so I continued. “You have to let us out of here right now. We’re on an important mission to Croneswart Swamp.”
The ogre squinted at me and scratched its head with a stubby finger. “Leedle peeples…dinner?” it asked slowly as if it were trying to figure out a riddle of its own.
“No, no,” I replied, wagging the point of my rapier back and forth and shaking my head. “Not dinner.”
A gaping smile split the ogre’s face and it let out a deep, bubbly laugh. It clapped its meaty hands together. “Leedle peeples needs eatin’. Mougi feeds mushrooms.”
The situation wasn’t going at all like I’d thought it would. Instead of being frightened by my threats, the ogre seemed happy, maybe even delighted.
I lowered the point of my rapier in confusion. What was happening here? Was the ogre named Mougi? Did it want to feed us poison mushrooms?
Jozlyn hopped down from the ladder and rested an arm on my shoulder. “He’s not going to hurt us, Josh,” she told me softly.
He? She was calling the ogre a he? It was a monster, a beast from a story. An it, not a he.
I pushed Jozlyn’s arm away and took a step forward. I wanted the ogre to know that Jozlyn and I did not agree. She might climb into a cooking pot, but I wouldn’t.
“Stand back, beast,” I ordered. The seriousness of my tone surprised even me. “We’re leaving.” I started to turn to Jozlyn.
Before I turned all the way around, there came a heavy thud followed by something very big and very solid crashing against my side.
I went sprawling helplessly to the dirt floor, and the air burst from my lungs. My rapier flew from my hand and clattered noisily against the stones near the fire.
“Bad and rudely manners,” the ogre gurgled unhappily.
The creature was almost on top of me. I could feel the rumbling vibrations of its words in my chest.
Still gasping, I rolled onto my side and looked up. The ogre stood over me with its hands on its hips. It must have jumped through the opening above when I’d turned my back.
Without my rapier, I was defenseless, and Jozlyn’s wand was still in the fire.
28: BOOK BY ITS COVER
“WHAT are you going to do to us?” I asked the ogre. I didn’t mean for it to happen but my voice squeaked. It didn’t sound very heroic.
The ogre stared at me for a long time. A strand of drool streamed from its lips, forming a small puddle on the floor. Finally, it wiped a hand over its mouth and smiled again.
Surprisingly it didn’t have any teeth except the two front tusks. That fact should have told me something, but I wasn’t
thinking straight. I was more worried about being eaten, and I remembered Dad’s stories.
“Mougi feeds yous then takes yous away from mushrooms,” the ogre told us. Its tone was friendly and its words didn’t sound threatening. “Mushrooms make bad air for short leedle peeples. Mougi carries yous to swamp.”
“So you…you’re not going to eat us?” I stammered. Jozlyn’s foot found my shin with a quick kick less than a second later.
Mougi wheezed and coughed once. The sound reminded me of a dog’s bark.
“Eats you?” A second barking cough turned into a wet laugh. “Eats? Mougi eats mushrooms, not leedle peeples. Mougi gots no teef.” The ogre smiled broadly to display its toothless mouth.
Jozlyn giggled but covered her mouth politely. She obviously wasn’t afraid, and her confidence told me that I’d jumped to the wrong conclusion again.
When I saw an ogre, I immediately thought of a man-eating monster. But Mougi wasn’t like that. He wasn’t an it after all.
He was a vegetarian.
“We thank you, Sir Mougi, for your kindness,” Jozlyn said with a curtsy. “My name is Jozlyn and this is my little brother Josh. We would be grateful for your help.”
When she’d said little brother, she’d glared at me, making a point. I was the younger one who had acted without thinking again.
“Me Mougi,” the ogre beamed, thumping his wide chest with a thumb as thick as my arm. “Nice very much to meets you leedle peeples.”
He bent over and picked up my rapier and Jozlyn’s wand from the fire. The flames didn’t seem to bother him at all. “Yous sticks,” he said seriously.
Sticks! To the ogre, my sword was nothing but a harmless stick.
Cauldron Cooker's Night (Epic Fantasy Adventure Series, Knightscares Book 1) Page 14