DRAGONDARK: FABLES - TOMMY TALLFELLOW AND THE SILVER WEB
DragonDark Fables
“Tommy Tallfellow and the Silver Web”
20 years from now...
"Tell us another story grandpa!" Cinsi said bouncing up and down excitedly. The small halfling child loved bedtime stories. Her brother and sister were fast asleep though. They were triplets who were born far sooner than expected but were as healthy and lively as any other halfling children.
"OK, OK, one last story, but then bedtime. Your mamaw will have my head if the three of you aren't in bed soon," Tommy Tallfellow said. The old halfling sported a long gray ponytail and his skin was wrinkled and loose but his eyes sparkled with as much life as his grandchildren's.
He sat in the old rocking chair beside the fireplace in the small home. Next to him on an end-table sat his hot tea.
Dellin sat up groggy and rubbed his eyes, "Is she going to have your head as the dragon did?"
"Yeah, or is she going to kill you as that vampire necromancer did?" Pumpum said rolling over to face her Grandpa and yawning.
"Be quiet you two, he hasn't died that many times, plus you're gonna wake up mamaw," Cinsi ordered the other two.
"Twenty-eight is a lot," Dellin said.
"Twenty-nine," their Grandpa said giving them a wink. Pumpum, Cinci, and Dellin all giggled quietly.
Tommy leaned forward to sip his tea, "I was running through the castle, stone walls on either side and down a long corridor. The guards were right behind me and were really mad. Like, super mad. Especially the one covered in tomato sauce..."
"Stop him! Someone stop him!" the guard yelled as he ran down the hall after me.
"I'm gonna tear him apart!" the other guard covered in tomato sauce said.
I ran as fast as I could. The window at the end of the hall was only a few yards away. A large rotund maid with hairy nostrils stepped out of an adjoining doorway with blankets and pillows in her arms.
"Don't worry, I'll give it back," I said, and slid around the side of the maid grabbing one of the blankets on the way. I dove through the open window of the tower.
"Move! Move!" the guard yelled along with his sauce-covered friend at the maid. The three became a cluster of getting in one another's way.
I flew through the air and wrapped the blanket around a railing of a balcony on a lower level of the castle, catching myself, and climbed the blanket up onto the balcony. I quickly pulled the backpack off my shoulder and looked inside. The silver web statue was safe, but I was still in disbelief at the strange glow it had.
"There he is!" yelled the sauce-covered guard from the above window, pointing down at me. I looked up and saw the disgruntled and saucy-smelling castle employees had spotted me.
"I'm sorry about the spaghetti!" I yelled back and then ducked into the doorway from the patio into the castle itself.
The three halfling children burst into laughter. The old Grandpa halfling adjusted his sitting and sipped the tea again.
"Spaghetti! I bet that guard was a real noodle-head," Dellin said.
"That's a dumb joke," Pumpum said.
"Be quiet you two. Keep going grandpa," Cinsi told her siblings.
"He wasn't just a noodle-head, he was a really mad noodle-head," Tommy continued.
I found myself in a bedroom. It was big and I knew it belonged to someone important. Probably a duke or high-standing knight. Whoever it was, I needed to get out fast before they came back. I slipped across the room as quietly as I could and opened the door. Peeking out into the hall, both directions looked the same. But I could hear the chink-chank of chainmail and knew more guards were coming. See, I had been able to sneak into the treasury easily enough. But when I went to make my leave with the silver web, I smelled herb bread.
"Like the kind mamaw makes?" Dellin asked.
"Shush!" Cinsi scolded her brother.
"No. Your mamaw's is the best," Tommy said with a smile.
But it smelled so good and I hadn't eaten the oatmeal breakfast that morning as I should have. I was starving! I followed my nose to the kitchen where two cooks were arguing over that day's lunch items. The guard walked in and--
"He got sauced!" Pumpum said, now wide awake and listening with excitement.
He got sauced. A large bowl of uncooked sauce somehow got flipped into the air. The cooks blamed me, but I didn't even make the sauce! The next thing I knew I was being chased by everyone and saw the maid with the blankets.
"So what happened when you snuck out of that room?" Cinsi asked.
I looked down the hallway in both directions. I knew I had to escape the castle and return the silver web statue to the library of Peregren. I didn't mean to take it from there and I definitely didn't mean to lose it in the card game with the ogres. And if I didn't get it back to the library, your mamaw was going to be so mad.
"Like that one time, you almost set yourself on fire with that glass oil bulb for light?"
"Or that time you fell off the fence and twisted your ankle?"
"Or when you almost let loose that wild opossum in the house?"
"Madder. The silver web statue was an important relic to the library and she was over the librarians and scribes as a Prime Minister. She was going to be super-mad!"
I heard guards coming from my left so I went down the other direction of the hall. It came to a T and on one side was a small alcove that had barrels of flour. The left had led down another hall. I hid behind the barrels and watched the guards pass. I then watched them come to another T and they went left again. I went down the same hall and went right. It led to a staircase down to the main antechamber of the castle. There were a lot of guards about and the gate door was just ahead. One stood in front of it.
"What did you do?" Cinsi asked, her eyes wide with excitement.
I waited a few minutes trying to decide what to do. You see your Uncle Tank was waiting.
"Uncle Tank is the best!" Dellin said.
When Tank had found out I lost that statue he knew your mamaw would be really mad too. So he agreed to help. We hatched the plan of him waiting at a nearby market with a wagon for a quick getaway. But that was when the gate door flew open. Two guards came in both holding onto an arm of Tank.
"We found him in Steller's shop. Says he wasn't stealing anything. Can never be too sure with a halfling," one of the guards said, giving Tank a shove forward. The halfling stumbled and an older guard with a giant red mustache looked down at the halfling. He then looked up at the other guards.
"You imbecile! This is Prime Minister Zoei Fantasy's son! Do you want to end up in the stockades for a week?" the older guard yelled at the other two.
"Sir, I beg your apologies, my men are not usually this foolish. We will make sure--" the guard tried saying to your Uncle Tank before I was shoved into the antechamber.
"Well look what we found," one of the guards said as he shoved me forward. I had no idea guards could be so sneaky. I stumbled out into the open area of the antechamber near Tank.
"What is happening here?" the lead guard demanded.
"Sir, we found this halfling in the kitchen. Nothing seems to be missing, but he is a halfling," the sauce-covered guard said sneering at me. He was really ugly.
The lead guard stared dumbfounded at the other guard.
"That is the Prime Minister’s husband! Why are you covered in....is that sauce?"
"Y-yes sir, it's uh, sauce sir. Tomato to be exact. With rosemary and basil, sir," the tomato guard said, licking some of the sauce off a finger.
The lead guard took a deep breath.
"You are both free to go, we apologize deeply my sires," the lead guard said bowing deeply to the halfling father and son.
"Well, you should be. I never stole anything in my life!" Tank said and deftly turned toward the gate door.
"Yeah, and when I tell my wife she's gonna be super mad," I threatened them with a stern glare that I usually reserve for ponies that don't listen.
As Tank and I turned to leave, the stitching ripped out of the bottom of my bag. The glowing silver web statue fell out and onto the stone floor with a loud clank. Everyone stared at it in silence. I slowly bent down and picked it up.
"So we were just returning this when--"
"THIEVES!"
I had never been interrupted so rudely in all of my life!
"We are not! We're--"
"Come on," I said grabbing Tank by the shirt collar. We ran for the door!
I may have been married to your mamaw, but she's Prime Minister of Peregren, not me. And there were definitely those who would love to accuse me of theft to hurt her politically. All of the guards rushed at us at once!
One very tall guard with a hawk-like nose tried to stand his ground in front of the door. I tossed the statue to Tank. It was supposed to look so great in my head. He would catch it, and I would slide between the guard's legs, catching his foot and tripping him, bringing him face first to the ground. Tank would do a twisting backflip over the guard as he fell and the two of us would make it out!
"What do you mean, 'supposed to?" Pumpum asked.
I tossed the statue to Tank. He caught it, but the edge was sharp. It nicked his finger and he both fumbled to try to catch it and avoid it from cutting off his fingers at the same time. It clattered to the floor again. The tall guard instead ran toward the statue. All of the guards did! They all rushed Tank and the statue and dove on him! One big giant pile of sweaty, stinky, ugly, guards, one of which was covered in sauce.
They all threw punches as kicks and kicks as punches and most of them hit each other as Tank climbed out from underneath the pile of dumb dumb dumb guards. The statue was in his hand. He tossed it to me and I fumbled with it trying to catch it without cutting my fingers off. It nicked my palm and then my wrist and fell to the floor. I picked it up and Tank and I rushed to the door. It was locked!
"Yeah right!" Dellin said, scoffing and rolling his eyes.
Exactly! There's no such thing as a "locked" door to us Tallfellows. Never has been. Never will be. Tank had the lock popped and had it open before the ugly guards even realized what had happened. They were all mad at each other now. Mostly they yelled about who would get the credit for catching us, which I thought that was very rude.
"It was!" said Pumpum.
"Yeah, they should at least catch you first. Stupid guards," Dellin said.
We ran down the long and wide stone steps toward the street where Tank's wagon waited. We hopped on and made our escape!
"That was a great story Grandpa," Pumpum said. The three small halfling children all kissed the grandfather on the cheek and rushed to bed. Tommy reminded them to hurry before their grandmother woke and got after all of them for being up so late. Once alone, Tommy walked across the room to a cabinet. He opened it and pulled out a dusty rug that covered something round and flat. He removed the rag and there in his hand was the glowing silver web.
"Does Mom know?" Tank asked.
Tommy glanced at the shadowy corner of the room where his son waited in secret.
"Yes. She says there are two more we have to steal. Three are needed she says," Tommy said.
"But for what?" Tank asked.
"Something about the magical orbs that existed decades ago when the plague first started," Tommy said.
"The orbs?" Tank asked.
"Yes. The red one, the yellow one, and the white one."