Captain Rainbrain and the Tanglevine: Part Six

By: Josprel

Captain Rainbrain and the Tanglevine: Part Six
by
Josprel

Part Six

At Prince Ludani’s command to burn the vessel, three slaves leading pack mules led their animals toward Uri’s militia. Slung across their backs, the mules carried open containers of heated tar. As they passed, each Larsian militiaman leaned down to dip his torch in the tar. It was a tacky, somewhat painful operation; on lifting their torches from the containers, the hot tar spackled both the riders and their mounts, causing some discomfort to both. Fortunately for the militiamen, their mounts were battle trained, disciplined to carry on regardless of painful injuries that were not life threatening. Nevertheless, the burns now endured by men and mounts polluted the air with the stench of singed hair and seared flesh.

“Light your torches and move to the ship!” Uris ordered. At his words two other slaves on foot, gripping flaming torches, ran to the militiaman. When they withdrew, all the torches finally were burning, and both the Royal Guard and Uri’s militiamen prodded their mounts forward toward the vessel.

The cheering, anticipating mob next expected to hear their administrator’s command to burn the ship, but it never came. Instead, from around the bow of the ship, seemingly from nowhere, appeared the stranger seen by the emperor, but whose existence Prince Ludani scoffed at. This time, however, he appeared to be garbed for battle, though the emblem he displayed were the same - the figure of a man holding seven stars in one hand and a two-edged battle sword in the other. The personage reined in his steed. His white flowing tresses crowned with a jeweled diadem, for several moments, he stared with piercing, unwavering eyes at the now stunned multitude before him.

Then he spoke, his voice deep and authoritative, “Prince Ludani, your father was warned to do no harm to the ship or to its builders. At my command, Noiman and his family build it. When your father received my warning, he was told that should any attempt be made to destroy the ship or harm its builders, those who did so would suffer servitude and death. You have defied and blasphemed Logos who is of The Three. I am he! I have heard your words, Prince Ludani. I have heard the multitude’s applause for the scorn you heaped on The Three. Therefore, neither you nor those with you shall leave this place. This day, you and those with you shall pass through the portals of death, into the place of everlasting servitude and anguish. You have chosen Lucifin as your god. This day, I send you to him and you shall learn too late that Lucifin is no god, but an evil impostor who shall torment you in his fires.”

The sight of Logos and his decree of judgment completely unhinged Ludani’s hitherto coddle mind. “What have we to fear from one lone horseman?” the prince screamed with rising madness, “Guardians! Militiamen! I command you to move forward! Kill him and destroy the ship! Execute all the men who work on it! Capture their women that they may serve as slave whores in the temple of Dagon! Obey me!” he raved in a delirium of lunacy, “I am Ludani, your prince! Kill this false, lying braggart, now! I command it! Kill him now, I say! Uris, I command you to fulfill your commission! Obey me now! Destroy the ship!”

Pale with terror, Uris shook his head, sadly. “Did I not warn you Prince Ludani, that today we die? I shall not obey you. I shall not destroy the ship.”

“Then die now, traitor!” the prince screeched. Pulling a dagger from his belt, he stabbed Uris in the chest. Withdrawing the weapon, he stabbed the administrator twice more in the belly. With a low moan, Uris slipped slowly to the ground, emitted a death rattle and died.

“And now you shall join him, Ludani,” Logos promised, lifting his right arm heavenward. Slowly he drew it downward in a wide arc. A loud rumble shook the ground. Before the mob along the path could react, with a thundering roar, the entire path split open, becoming a massive, smoking fissure that swallowed Ludani and his horse, the Guardians still astride their mounts, the administrator’s corpse along with his militia and their horses. Together with the entire procession they fell screaming into the fissure. And when the fissure closed, Noiman and his family were alone. Horrified by what they had just witnessed, they covered their eyes. They heard and felt a second earth quaking rumble. When they again stared at the site of the catastrophe, the earth had closed over the doomed revelers, leaving a narrow fault line in the billowing smoke. Tracking the fault line, only a few sundry articles gave evidence that the procession had been there.

Learning of the loss of his son and how it had occurred, the emperor made no further attempts to destroy the ship and its builders. Moreover, Noiman and his family received a welcome respite from heckling spectators. They gradually returned, however. But the throwing of rocks and the attempts at sabotage entirely ceased.

Continued in Part Seven

© Josprel (Joseph Perrello)
Josprel@verizon.net

Josprel is an ordained evangelical minister who resides in Western New York - just across the Niagara River from Canada. Though brought up in a Christian family, he rebelled against the Lord at an early age, finally enlisting in the U.S. Air Force. He served three years in the Air Force, two and one half of them in the Far East, as a sergeant of operating engineers. Josprel was among the first Air Force troops to enter Japan, after World War Two. Upon returning home, he accepted Christ as his Savior and studied for the ministry. A prolific writer, Josprel hold an advanced degree in theology. Many of Josprel's stories and articles have appeared in print and on the Internet. For some ten years, he pastored in Attica, New York, site of the nation's worst prison riot. After the riot, at the request of the Attica Prison administration, Josprel sponsored and conducted three-hour-long, weekly Bible studies for the inmates. He is the author of two novels in progress, "Beloved Apostate" and "Kanfal."

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