Thorfinn and the Putrid Potion Read online

  “We’re in a scrape, brother, and Velda is good in a scrape,” replied Oswald. “Now please excuse me, but there’s something I’ve been dying to do for days.”

  “It’s not another multi-coloured bottom burp, is it?” asked Harek.

  Oswald took a deep breath and…

  HICCUP!

  Velda stopped singing. She stared down at her fairy costume in horror. “EURGH!” Clawing off her crown, she threw it on the floor and stamped on it, shouting, “I. AM. A. VIKING!” Then she tore off her fairy wings and flung her wand onto the pile. “Anyone got a match?”

  “Afraid not, old friend,” said Thorfinn. “We were actually wondering if you could lend a hand.”

  Velda leaned against a pillar and folded her arms. “Sure, what’s the beef?”

  Thorfinn explained. Velda nodded, then jabbed her finger at Piebald. “Okay, first of all, when we get out of here, I’m going to toss him in the nearest river.”

  “You have NO sense of humour!” protested Piebald.

  “Oh, shut up!” snapped Oswald. “It’s the least you deserve!”

  Velda picked up the rackety old metal tray that their dinner slops had been brought in on, then tossed it against the wall. The tray clattered loudly, scattering plates and bowls across the stone floor. Then she sighed and reluctantly pulled her fairy costume back on.

  “Might this be part of an escape plan?” asked Thorfinn.

  “’Fraid so,” Velda grumbled, just as the guard came stomping up the corridor carrying a flaming torch.

  “Now someone hiccup,” Velda instructed.

  Oswald shrugged his shoulders. “Sorry, I’m all out.”

  “Ooh, may I have a go?” said Thorfinn. He took a huge gulp of air, held up his forefinger and waited. A moment later, he produced a gentle, ever-so-polite “HICCUP!” “Pardon me!” he giggled.

  “What’s all this racket?” barked the guard. His face appeared through the bars, cruel and battle-scarred. He eyed the prisoners with disgust, until he saw Velda. Gentle, polite Velda, wearing fairy wings and an angelic look on her face.

  She opened her mouth and sang, in a lovely, clear voice that filled the dungeon’s dismal depths.

  Oh, oh, oh, oh,

  The Vikings will a-roving go.

  Ay, ay, ay, ay,

  Our enemies will run away.

  Um, um, um, um,

  We’ll steal your gold and kick your bum!

  “Awww!” The guard melted. He leant down to smile at Not-Velda. “What a little angel!”

  Just then, Harek’s giant hand reached out, grabbed the guard’s head and WHACKED it against the metal bars.

  D-OINNNGGG!

  The man slumped to the floor. Not-Velda reached through the bars and plucked the keys off his belt.

  “Ooh, look! Sparkly!”

  CHAPTER 17

  Thorfinn led his friends up the steps out of the cold dungeon. They weaved through corridors, ducking every so often to stay out of sight of the guards.

  As they passed through the courtyard, the king’s roundhouse was in view, but the sound of heavy footsteps approached around the corner. Thorfinn swiftly spied an open door and ushered them all inside. They found themselves squashed inside a cramped room, which looked and smelled, like a…

  “URGH! Toilet!” said Velda, who was now back to her usual self thanks to a well-timed hiccup from Harek. “It stinks worse than an elk’s armpit in here.”

  Percy covered his beak with his wing.

  “Do you think this is the king’s other throne?” asked Harek, peering at the toilet and almost falling in headfirst.

  “Cork it!” hissed Velda. “We don’t have much time.” She flicked the thistly tip off Not-Velda’s wand, then passed it to Thorfinn.

  “Thank you, dear friend.” Thorfinn knelt down, using the twig to draw a map of the roundhouse on the sawdust-covered floor. “Poor King Fergus is lying in the middle of the roundhouse, here. There’s only one door, at the front, and there are two guards inside. So we’ll have to use the only other way in – the chimney hole in the roof.”

  Velda patted a coil of rope around her chest that she’d stolen from the hangman. “I’ll lower Thorfinn down, then Percy will swoop in and pluck the hair. Thorfinn will add it to the potion and give it to the king.”

  Percy puffed up his chest and raised a wing in salute.

  “What will I do?” asked Harek.

  “Something that doesn’t involve a lot of hand – eye coordination,” growled Velda.

  “It’s been a long time since I climbed anything,” Oswald wheezed, sounding like a deflating set of bagpipes.

  “Me too,” added Piebald.

  “Don’t worry,” Velda smirked. “I’ve got another job for you two.”

  ***

  Outside, Harek went off to ‘borrow’ a cart for their escape while Thorfinn and Velda sneaked around the back of the king’s roundhouse. They propped an abandoned ladder against the roof and climbed.

  Slowly, they crept across the thatch to the chimney hole, where they peered inside. King Fergus was lying on a table down below, snoozing peacefully. Two guards stood to attention, facing towards the door.

  Thorfinn tied the rope around his waist then handed the rest to Velda. “My dear friend, would you please be so good as to lower me down?”

  Velda spat in her hands, then grabbed hold of the rope, stretching it round her shoulders and digging in her heels to take Thorfinn’s weight. “No probs. Ready when you are.”

  CHAPTER 18

  Piebald burst through the roundhouse door, leaning on his brother and wailing like the ghost of an elderly lady with no teeth. Wearing their hoods up as a basic disguise, the two old men staggered towards the guards.

  “Help!” cried Piebald. He held his hands up to them. The thumb of one hand was bent under his fingers, and the thumb of the other hand was half-hidden behind his forefinger. He kept moving them together, then apart, over and over, which made it look as if the top of his thumb had been chopped off. “I’ve been de-thumbed!” he wailed. The illusion was helped by a splash of ‘blood’, which came from a vial of reddish potion Piebald had in his pouch.

  Seeing that the brothers were in place, Velda took the chance to lower Thorfinn gently through the chimney hole.

  Unfortunately, the guards either didn’t buy Piebald’s trick or they didn’t care that some doddering old man had lost one of his digits. One of them stepped towards the brothers, brandishing his spear. “Be on your way! Go on, you pair of old FARTS!”

  “Oh, er…” The two brothers fidgeted and glanced at each other. Their plan was already falling apart.

  And it got worse. On the roof, a hungry Mr Fluffikins chose that moment to pop his head out of Velda’s pocket and start chewing furiously on the first thing he could find… which just happened to be the rope in Velda’s hands. It slipped through her grasp, and Thorfinn dropped like a stone.

  WHOOSH!

  Velda hung on for dear life and he jolted to a halt just a few feet above King Fergus, his arms and legs spread out like a starfish.

  “Oh dear,” he whispered.

  Velda’s face turned red, then purple, as she clutched the rope. One more slip and Thorfinn would land on top of the conked-out king. Just as the rope began to slide through Velda’s fingers, a pair of giant hands grabbed it tight.

  Harek’s face appeared through the chimney, smiling and waving at Thorfinn. “Who’s clumsy now!” he grinned, before toppling halfway through the hole and getting wedged in.

  Thorfinn held his breath, watching Oswald and Piebald, who were stammering and sweating in front of the two guards.

  “Think of something!” Piebald hissed to his brother.

  “Me?” Oswald whined back. “Why should I think of something? This is all your fault!”

  “Oh, shut it, Noseybonk!”

  Oswald spluttered. “How DARE you call me that!” He turned to the guards, their act forgotten. “That was a horrible nickname he made up for me at s
chool.”

  “Call you what? Noseybonk? NOSEYBONK! NOSEYBONK!” Piebald did a funny little dance, shouting Oswald’s childhood nickname over and over.

  “Shut up! SHUT UP!” yelped Oswald, and the two brothers came to blows, standing on their tiptoes and slapping each other’s hands. They looked like penguins doing a courtship dance.

  The guards gazed in astonishment for a second, before collapsing in hysterical laughter.

  Seeing their opportunity, Thorfinn cast a look up at the now dislodged Harek, who nodded and lowered him down the final few inches towards the sleeping king.

  Thorfinn reached out his hand towards King Fergus’s beard – but it seemed to be getting further away. The rope, tied round Thorfinn’s middle, was twirling him – very slowly – away from the king’s face.

  Thorfinn’s brow furrowed, before his eyes sparkled with an idea. Calmly, he began to do breaststroke, as if taking a pleasant dip in a tranquil fjord.

  Velda and Harek shared a look of disbelief. But Thorfinn’s display of mid-air swimming seemed to work, and before long his rope swung him back round towards King Fergus.

  Right on cue, Percy swooped down and landed on the king’s chest, pulling out a single hair from his beard.

  PLUCK!

  The pigeon passed the strand to Thorfinn in his beak. “Thank you, my dear old pal,” mouthed Thorfinn, before whispering in the king’s ear. “Sorry about this, your royalness. How about something to help with that toothache, to make up for any inconvenience?” Thorfinn delved into one of his pockets and pulled out a tiny clove, which he gently popped inside the king’s swollen cheek.

  ***

  Meanwhile, Piebald and Oswald had stopped fighting and were now in the middle of a brotherly heart-to-heart. The guards were completely engrossed in the drama, the sleeping king forgotten.

  “You were so mean when we were children,” sniffed Oswald. “Always playing tricks!”

  “Well, you were so serious all the time!” replied Piebald. “All I ever wanted was for you to laugh at one of my jokes.”

  “But I did!” cried Oswald. “That time you catapulted Granny into the midden, I laughed so hard I threw up my kippers!”

  “HA! Did you?!” cried Piebald.

  “I did! I did!” droned Oswald, laughing.

  “Oh, you don’t know how happy that makes me!” Piebald beamed and put his arm around his brother. “What do you say, shall we put the past behind us?”

  “Let’s, little brother,” replied Oswald. “As long as you promise never to call me Noseybonk ever again?”

  “Of course not!” grinned Piebald, crossing his fingers behind his back.

  “Aww! I love a happy ending!” blubbed one of the guards. They were both in floods of tears, each using the other’s uniform as a handkerchief.

  While all this was going on, Thorfinn mixed the hair into the bottle of Goodnight Gloop, his tongue sticking out in concentration. Then, wedging a tiny funnel between the king’s lips, he poured in some of the putrid potion.

  They didn’t hang around for the king to awaken. Harek hauled Thorfinn back up, while Oswald and Piebald retreated from the bawling guards, who pulled them in for a group hug as they were leaving.

  Together, Thorfinn and his friends jumped into Harek’s stolen cart and raced off towards the ship, and home.

  CHAPTER 19

  The village of Indgar was a much-changed place since Thorfinn and his friends had been banished.

  No more roaring! No more fist fights! No more meat! A sad, turnip-scented fog hung over everyone.

  The villagers were sitting in the square around the long tables that Thorfinn had used for his tea party. Their heads were bent, and they worked feverishly, peeling mountains of stinky turnips in a production line.

  A short distance away, perched above the shore, Ragwich reclined in an open-air bathtub. He hummed idly, twiddling the legs of his giant chicken headdress while a stream of men trooped down from the woods, adding firewood to the flames heating the bathwater.

  Erik the Ear-Masher appeared at Ragwich’s side, his face still strangely blank. A towel was draped over one arm, and he carried a silver tray with a goblet. “Your elderberry mead.”

  “Ah, thank you,” said Ragwich. He took a long, relaxing sup. “Are my turnip fries done yet?”

  Seeing his father bow and shuffle away, Olaf’s eyes flashed with fury. He took a deep breath and stepped up to the bath. “Ragwich, why have you moved your horse into our Great Hall?”

  “Why not? You weren’t using it,” replied the soothsayer calmly.

  “There’s manure all over the place!” yelled Olaf.

  “I’m sure dung isn’t the worst thing that’s been served up in that hall.”

  “B-B-But—” Olaf stuttered. He was about to retreat, when he glimpsed movement from the corner of his eye: familiar figures that somehow gave him courage. “And our chief, Harald. You moved him into the grain store.” Olaf glanced at the hut that housed both the year’s harvest and a giant snoring Viking. The doors were usually locked, but from this angle they looked to be ever-so-slightly open.

  “It’s got nothing to do with me. Your father is in charge now,” said Ragwich, and he smiled, a slippery, snakey smile.

  Olaf gestured at the production lines of villagers. “Our people, you’ve put them to work ten hours a day peeling horrid vegetables.”

  Ragwich shrugged and sipped his mead.

  “And worst of all,” Olaf huffed, pointing towards the village cooks, who were stirring boiling cauldrons in the marketplace, “You’re forcing us all to eat TURNIP SOUP!”

  “I told you, turnips are the food of the gods! Now off you go, little boy. You’re ruining my ME-time.”

  Olaf trudged off. Ragwich gave a long, satisfied sigh and gazed out at the fjord as he supped his mead. A contented smile spread across his face as he closed his eyes. “Ahhh, peace.”

  Such was his feeling of relaxation, Ragwich didn’t see the pigeon that landed on the edge of his bathtub and dropped a tiny pellet of poo into the steaming water. Nor did he see a small hand, a girl’s hand, as it reached over the lip of the bath and tipped a bottle of liquid into his cup.

  CHAPTER 20

  Meanwhile, in the grain store, Thorfinn was carefully pouring the remaining Goodnight Gloop into the sleeping Harald’s mouth. The chief sputtered slightly between snores, before he woke with a…

  “BAAAAHHHHHHHH!”

  “Dearest Dad!” cried Thorfinn, hugging his father tight. “It’s lovely to see you awake again!”

  “Thorfinn!” Harald leapt to his feet and picked up his son, twirling him in the air, before looking around with a confused stare. “What happened? Why I am in the grain store?”

  “I can explain everything, Father,” said Thorfinn. “You’ve had a rather long nap…”

  ***

  Ragwich took another sip of his mead. He didn’t notice the strange taste, but there was something he did notice.

  One big, scary, ENORMOUS thing.

  The doors of the grain store burst open. Standing there, looking ANGRY and giving him the sort of stare that might make Odin himself do a scared little scream, was Harald the Skull-Splitter, legendary Viking chief.

  Asleep no more, Harald growled like a hibernating bear that had been woken up by a loud party in next door’s den. His eye twitched fast enough to cause a small hurricane.

  At his side was Thorfinn, Percy now perched on his shoulder, while Piebald and Oswald tottered up to meet them, arm in arm. The mast of the Green Dragon could be glimpsed in the fjord behind them.

  “What potion did you make for Ragwich?” Oswald asked his brother.

  “Oh, a good one,” chortled Piebald. “A good one.”

  The rest of Thorfinn’s crew followed on behind.

  Grut the Goat-Gobbler cried out in terror as he glimpsed the village cooks at work. “TURNIPS! Why are they cooking turnips? Am I in hell?!”

  Harek laughed heartily. He was SOOO happy to be home. T
hen he slipped on some spilled turnip soup…

  “AIEEEEE!”

  …and crashed to the floor in a gloopy heap.

  SPLAT!

  Velda popped her head over the lip of Ragwich’s bathtub, twirling the empty bottle between her fingers and whistling a tune that Vikings only sang at funerals.

  The soothsayer leapt out of the tub and whipped on a cloak, his chicken headdress flapping frantically. He thrust out his arms in a dramatic pose and addressed Harald. “Great chief! The gods have woken you from your slumber!”

  “Don’t even try it, soothsayer. You’re not going to slither out of this one!” barked Harald, moving towards him like a hairy mountain lion stalking a goggly-eyed deer.

  Ragwich reached for his medallion, except it wasn’t around his neck. Percy flapped down and dropped something shiny into Thorfinn’s palm. “Is this what you’re looking for, dear sir?” Thorfinn asked.

  “A-ah,” Ragwich stuttered, finally lost for words.

  Thorfinn tossed the necklace in the air. Velda whipped out her axe, screamed and chopped it in two before it hit the ground.

  Ragwich whimpered, then suddenly clutched his tummy, which gurgled loudly. “Oh my, I feel… a bit… strange…”

  CHAPTER 21

  Ragwich’s eyes bulged. His arms flapped at his sides. He began to scratch at the ground with his bony feet and his head bobbed back and forth. Then he opened his mouth and shrieked:

  CLUUUUUUUCKKKK-CLUCK-

  CLUCK-CLUCK-CLUCK!

  “HA!” Oswald slapped his thigh. “Now he really does look like a chicken. Oh, well done, brother!”

  “It’s called Barnyard Boogie,” laughed Piebald. “It’ll make him feel a bit fowl for a while, geddit?!” They watched Ragwich as he scuttled away after the other chickens.