The Clue of the Missing Socks - Chapter 43

The Clue of the Missing Socks.

Chapter 43

          “What’s the matter?” Bergr asked because me as well as everyone of my friends seemed frozen from what he said.

         I finally found my voice and then stated, “Hamish II was the son of a chief of Berk.  Just recently did a very good friend of ours just solve an old, old mystery from some of Hamish’s riddles.”

          “That’s very interesting.  I’ll show you the notes of Hamish on this mystery when I get of work,” concluded Bergr.

          My friends and I bed Bergr so long for now, while we walked out of The Watering Hole.  Explod then mentioned, “See.  That visit proved productive.”

          “Though there is still one thing we still didn’t do,” I declared.

          Ashley then replied, “Get a drink of water?”

          “Yeah,” I chuckled as I took a sig from my flask.

          To kill time, I told Cazi to take us on a tour of The Gathering Place.  This hall was very much like Berk’s own Great Hall.  There are places to sit and talk business or pleasure, places to hold village meetings, a small platform or stage for speeches or trails as Cazi had mentioned before, and there looked to be something of a small medical section in the back.

          Standing outside the doors after the tour, I looked at the shadows of the villagers and of the surrounding buildings.  I noticed we had only used up barely ten minutes.

          “I’m a little hungry.  Why don’t we go back to The Hole and get a bite to eat?” I suggested.

          Everybody agreed.  We re-entered The Watering hole and sat in the same seats as before.  Bergr was a little surprised to see us so soon.  Hat said we did not have much else to do, so we decided to get something to eat.

          All my friends and I got a small House special: two perches cooked the way you like it, between two slices of bread, and two pieces of cabbage.  The sandwich was very good.

          The end of the hour was nearing, so Bergr came over and said he was ready to take us to his home.

          However the doors to the building flew open and three men walked in.  It was Steinson, Adam, and I am assuming GR!

          “They’re not suppose to be here this early,” I thought to myself, then whispered out loud, “Slowly get under the table to hide.”

          All of my friends complied.  Cazi and Bergr didn’t have to because our enemy does not know we know Cazi and Bergr.

          Bergr acted like he would normally do at an empty table; collecting the dishes.  As he bent down closer to the table he relayed in a soft voice, “I’ll stall them and see what they want.  Cazi can take you to my house, she knows where it is.  The notebooks are upstairs on the top shelf of my bookcase.”

          Bergr collected all the plates and took them to the kitchen.  The kitchen was a small room in the back right corner.  Bergr then walked over and joined what looked like the owner of The Watering Hole.  I saw Bergr intentionally sit Steinson, Adam, and GR away from us facing the far wall from us.  This would give us the cover we needed to exit the building.  Cazi led us through the kitchen to a back door and outside.

          When we were outside The Watering Hole, we all noticed that GR’s men were patrolling the main pathways.

          Cazi interjected, “Follow me I know a back way to BK’s house.”

          We followed Cazi through the back alleyways and in five minutes we were at BK’s house.  Well we were actually across the main pathway from it.

          “Wait,” I grabbed Cazi’s arm.

          “What,” she questioned.

          “We can’t all go out.  Look down the street there,” I said.

          “Oh, there are three of GR’s men down there,” Cazi saw and spoke.  “They might spot us if we all go over.”

          “Yeah, so that is why I am going over by myself.  Try to stall those men if they try to enter Bergr’s house, Cazi,” I told my friends before they could stop me from going over.

          I rushed over and tried the front door handle.  It was locked somehow.  To keep from being spotted I ran quickly to get behind the house.  I looked around for a way in.  The back door was locked to, but I saw a window above the doorway.  The window was open, but how to get up there?  I saw some crates nearby; I stacked them on top of each other and then stood on them.  I jumped straight up and grabbed the window seal, but not without almost losing my grip after grabbing it.  I pulled myself up and through the window.

          As I looked around the room, I realized I was in Bergr’s bedroom.  I scanned the room and found the bookcase on the other side of the room.  I walked over and stood on a stool to reach the top shelf.  I saw the notebooks Bergr had been talking about.  They looked like they were purposefully placed under a small cloth as to conceal them from anybody just looking in the room.  On the notebooks it said "Two Taverns".  There were three notebooks in all.  I grabbed the three books and went back to the window I had climbed in.  Unfortunately I saw that I could not get back down because the crates I had stacked had fallen off each other.  I think this happened when I jumped up to the window.

          That being the case, I walked down and slipped out a side window in one of the bottom rooms.  I closed the shutters behind me so that everything would look like it was before.  To be sure this was true, I went around back and put the crates back where I found them.

          When I walked back towards the front of the house, I glanced around the corner to see if anyone was there.  I saw that those men I had previously seen must have gone another direction for they were not there anymore.  I rushed back to my friends and show them the notebooks.

          “Where should we go from here to meet Bergr?” asked Hattori.

          “Good question,” said Annett.

          “Shouldn’t we go back to The Hole and just wait for Bergr to come out?” suggested Explod.

          “You won’t have to,” said a voice coming from behind us.

          All of us whirled around to see Bergr standing there.

          “Sorry didn’t mean to startle you guys,” Bergr replied.

          “That’s okay,” I replied.  “We just didn’t expect you to be there.  We thought we’d have to go after you.”

          “Who me?  Nah, I can take care of myself; even if those guys came back,” voiced Bergr.

          “Now that we have the notebooks, we should regroup with the rest of our friends and head back to our base camp,” stated Ashley.

          “I agree.  Though easier said than done,” I replied.  “Without our dragons and GR’s men snooping around, this will definitely make things interesting.”

          “Then let’s get a move on,” said Explod.

          Cazi took point because she knew her way around the island better than anyone according to Bergr, Bergr brought up the rear.  My friends and I filled the middle.  So that we would stay close together, we went in rows of two.  I told Cazi that we were going to have to make a break for the boat we rowed on and after we find our friends.  I remembered that the group that my two sisters were in would be the closest group because they had taken the general direction that we took to go to Bergr’s house.

          To keep concealed, we headed through the back alleyways down to the beach.  When we came to the end of the alleyway, we halted to see if there were any of GR’s men hanging around.  There were several actually.  We stood in silence for a few moments.  I then heard a strange sound that I seemed to have recognized.

          “Did you hear that?” I asked.

          “Hear what?” Annett questioned.

          The strange sound had repeated itself.  It was my sisters’ warning call if they were in danger or needed help!

          “That call is from one of my sisters!  It is a variation of a thunderdrum call that we arranged among ourselves to call if we ever needed help,” I voiced.

          “It sounds as if it is coming from our left down near the beach by the docks,” stated Bergr.

          “Well let’s go after them,” Annett said.

          “We can’t go just yet; GR’s guards are patrolling the streets.  We won’t know what to expect if we turn a corner and suddenly find a guard standing there,” Explod expressed.

          “Well then, what do you propose we do?” questioned Annett.

          “Wait here I have an idea,” Cazi announced.

          Cazi ran off through a side alley.  Bergr said she might get caught, but I replied that she would be more likely than not because she lives here and has a right to move around as she pleases.  Cazi came back with a bundle of clothes.

          “Here put these on quickly,” Cazi stated.

          “What are these?” Explod asked while putting on a large tunic.

          “There clothes silly,” Cazi replied.

          “Well I know that, but what are these suppose to do,” Explod repeated.

          “Well since you are afraid of being spotted by GR’s men, the main thing that gives you away is your Berkian clothes,” Cazi said.  “So all you need to do is..”

          “Put on some of your native island clothes and we’ll blend in.  Smart,” concluded Hattori.

          When we had put on the clothes that Cazi had brought us, we walked right out into the streets and acted naturally.  The guards, though they look more like soldiers, hardly even noticed us.  Bergr pointed to where he thought the sound had come from.  We then walked down to the beach.  He pin-pointed the location better there and said we could either continue walking on the beach or go up the pathway to our left and come over top of where he thought our friends we at.  I quickly decided to take the pathway so we could have the drop on whoever might have been holding our friends.

          We all rushed up the pathway and then walked swiftly over to the place where Bergr and previously said.  As we neared the edge of the embankment, we crawled up to it so we could plan our next move.  As we peeked our heads over the edge, we saw that we were on a considerable high cliff.  We saw our friends down there all kneeling down.  They all looked like their hands were tied behind their backs.

          I then voiced a return thunderdrum call to my sisters.  This call was to acknowledge the warning call and say that help is on the way.

          “How are we going to get down there?” asked Ashley in a soft tone as not to give away our position.  “I’d say that was a fifty feet drop off from where we are at, to the base of the beach.”

          I scanned the area around us and down by the beach around my friends.  Down near them it looked like there was a boardwalk coming from the docks and there was two men standing guard over my friends.  Up near us there was a small shack with several trees around us.  I entered the shack and saw some tools laying in there.  I then had a plan and told my friends to go back down the pathway and then wait near a large rock formation near the edge of the cliff.  I pointed to where I wanted them to wait.

          As they were on their way down, I grabbed an arrow out of my quiver and attached a long rope I found in the shack.  I tied the other end of the rope around a tree next to me.  I grabbed a long leather strip, which was also found in the shack.  I aimed my arrow for one of the lampposts.  I drew my bow back and then fired.  The arrow hit exactly where I wanted it to.  I grabbed the leather strip, swung it over my rope, and jumped off the cliff.

          As I jumped I saw that the two guards heard my arrow hit the lamppost and whirled around to see what was going on.  By the time they saw me I was already on the beach.  There was just enough slack in the rope that when it tightened and jerked, I let go of the leather strip and hit the beach rolling.

          The two guards started to rush me, so I started to run away from my spot there on the beach.  Hopefully my friends that were behind me took the clue to come in and untie every one of my friends.

          As I was running I saw that I was much faster than they were, but I only went fast enough as to let the guards think that they could catch me.  But then I saw that the cliff that was around on my left suddenly cut of my path of escape because the cliff went around and out to the water nearby.  There was no more beach to run on, but I still got as close as I could to edge of the cliff and the edge of the water tide.  There were also several large rocks and stones scattered about too.

          “What ya gonna do now kid?” asked one of the guards.

          “You’re trapped,” said the other one.

          “Who says?  You two?  Pftt, try and take me,” I taunted.

          The two guards rushed me, but as they neared me I ran and jumped off a good sized rock that was in front of me.  I dove right over the two of them and did a tumble to regain my footing and started running back towards my friends.

          “Why you little..,” one of them said while I took them by complete surprise.

          I ran away, but again allowing them to keep the same distance from me.  When I turned the corner my friends were waiting, so I stopped.  However when the two guards turned the corner, Thoreous and Cullan were waiting for them.  Thor and Cullan quickly had them pinned and Tory and Asvord used the ropes the guards used on them to tie up the guards themselves.

          “Well hey,” said my sister Asvord.  “Nice of you to ‘drop’ by.”

          “Haha, very funny,” I replied.  “We need to quickly get to the boat and get back to our base camp.  Are you guys all right?”

          Everyone said that they were and we ran off to the docks.  Cazi had nearly completed prepping the boat for takeoff when Elsa suddenly realized, “Wait, where is Meen?”

          “What,” I said.  “I thought she was with you guys.”

          “I haven’t seen Meen since I got off the boat when we first arrived,” replied my little sister.

          Everybody else there had the same answer as Elsa.

          “We have to go look for her before we shove off,” Elsa reacted.

          “Go looking for whom?” asked a calm, slightly high toned voice.

          All of my friends, my two sister, and I turned around to see Steinson, Adam, and GR standing on the docks.

          “Well whomever this person is, is of no importance now, because you will all be coming with me,” GR spoke mockingly.

          “I think you know the answer I’m about to give,” I retorted back at GR.

          “Yes I do, unfortunately,” replied GR with a sigh.  “Vemund!” GR said with a gruff tone now.  “Take these kids to the main hall on this island we have a litt-,”

          GR was cut off by Steinson yelling out.  Someone had just pushed Steinson into Adam in which they both went off the pier.

          “What is this?!” demanded GR.

          Before GR could turn around, there was a loud bang.  GR then slumped over.

          “Meen!!” me and all of my friends answered in great surprise.

          “This person ‘whom’ you speak just wanted you to greet a very good friend of mine,” Meen stated trying to imitate GR’s voice.  “Mah pan says, ‘Hello.’.” she said in her own voice.