The Rogue Crew

Now the voice sounded truly wrathful. “Enough! The boldness of your tongue has brought down doom on ye—yeeeeeek! Gerroff! Lemmego!”

Lieutenant Scutram came marching out of the dunes with his prisoner.

Sergeant Miggory fell about laughing. “Hahaha. Where’d ye get that liddle maggot, sah?”

Scutram had a pygmy shrew by the scruff of its neck. It wriggled and kicked furiously, striking out at him with a huge megaphone fashioned from birchbark. Captain Rake brought a halt to its struggles by placing a claymore point to its tubby little stomach.

“Be still, ye wee ruffian, or Ah’ll carve a bit o’ the blubber from ye. Be still, Ah say!”

Scutram placed the pygmy shrew next to the small sand lizard. He upturned the megaphone and slammed it down, imprisoning both creatures beneath it.

Buff Redspore smiled sheepishly. “So that’s all it jolly well was—a couple o’ bloomin’ runts, eh, wot!”

Always on the alert, Miggory spoke out the side of his mouth to the tracker. “There’s more’n h’a couple o’ runts marm, look around ye.”

The dunes were crowded from top to bottom with sand lizards and pygmy shrews, who seemed to have appeared from nowhere. The shrews were armed with bundles of what seemed to be reed javelins. Most of the lizards carried thin slings or spears tipped with pieces of broken shell.

Buff Redspore inched closer to Sergeant Miggory, gazing fearfully around. “There must be a horde of the blinkin’ little fiends. What do we jolly well do now?”

Rake Nightfur sheathed both claymores, spreading his paws wide in a gesture of peace. He addressed the lizards and shrews in a cordial tone. “Mah friends, we mean ye no harm. Och, we’re only passin’ through here, on the way tae the north.”

An aged pygmy shrew came forth to speak. He was dressed in a woven grass tabard and carried a carved driftwood stick. His manner was terse.

“Ye have no permission to pass through that barrier of spears. Why did ye not make a request?”

Scutram could tell by Rake’s erect ears that he was not about to put up with the old one’s attitude. Sidling past the tall, dark captain, he remarked casually, “Sah, if you’ll allow me, a touch of the jolly old diplomacy mightn’t be out o’ place, wot?”

Rake stepped aside. “Aye, carry on, Lieutenant. Buff, Sage, retreat guid an’ slow now, then get ye back tae the column an’ bring them here on the double, ye ken.”

As Buff and Sage backed slowly away, Scutram smiled disarmingly. “Apologies for our clumsiness, sire, but there didn’t seem t’be any of your chaps about to, ah, put in our request to pass through your domain.”

A sharp little voice rang out from a dunetop. “It’s my domain, not his! Me, Empraking Dibby Drampik! Hah, you should’ve asked me!”

A half dozen sand lizards scuttled to his side. They were towing a moss-cushioned chair, which slid along on broad, flat runners. The empraking sat on it, waving the lizards to proceed. They set the chair in motion downhill, jumping hastily onto the runners and standing to attention. Despite the comical idea of an armchair sliding down the duneside, the empraking retained his regal dignity. His retainers steered the chair-cum-sled to a smooth halt in front of the hares. He did not alight until several attendants dressed him in a colourful woven cloak and a ridiculously tall crown adorned with seashells, dried flowers and small bird feathers. A ceremonial mace, topped with a polished agate, completed the ensemble. He peered shortsightedly up at Scutram.

“I’m the one you ask! I’m emperor round here—king, too, an’ ruling Bloodripper! So, what d’ye want? Speak out.”

Lieutenant Scutram saluted courteously. “Permission to pass through your territory, sah!”

The pompous little creature scratched his rotund stomach, paced up and down once, then sat back on his chair, waving a dismissive paw.

“Not today. Tomorrow maybe, I don’t know.”

Colour Sergeant Miggory planted himself in the path of the chair, his jaw jutting aggressively. “Then ye’d better git t’know, bucko. Y’don’t talk like that to h’officers of the Long Patrol!”

He was suddenly dragged down by a score of pygmy shrews, who were making stabbing gestures with their javelins.

Rake Nightfur sprang into action. With a bound, he was at the empraking’s throat with both claymores, roaring, “Touch mah sergeant, an’ Ah’ll slay this wee braggart. Stan’ ye clear o’ him—Ah mean it!”

Through the centre of the melee came a pygmy shrew wearing a coronet. This was the empraking’s queen, Dukwina, a dumpy little figure in regal garb, with a voice of earsplitting volume. “What’s all this, what’s all this? Gerroff that ole rabbet this instant! An’ you, big black un, stow them swords or I’ll make ye eat ’em!”

Everything stopped. Shrews and lizards threw themselves facedown on the ground in homage to the one who was the real power in Bloodripper territory. She stumped up to the empraking and seized him by the ear, twisting savagely as she gave him a public dressing-down.