The Lizard Kings' Threat

At the end of Larry’s speech a great roar of approval from Captain Rotskagg Blenkinsopp caused several small children to burst into tears. There had been little in Mad Jack or Larry’s adjurations that had not rung true to the philosophy of the gaily-coloured Tamworth Ranters. They began to saunter away to continue enjoying their gala. The Scots and Corsairs however had travelled a great distance, prepared to argue forcefully for their ancient and traditional right to pillage. They had come down with the intention of arguing long and hard, winning concessions and drunkenly conceding as few privileges as possible. Were they really going to go away and just get on with each other? They hung around in small groups shrugging and mumbling.

            ‘Well, it sounds good enough to me,’ boomed Rotskagg. ‘Gué fatu, Camaradas? You Reivers be masters of animal husbandry, though in the past they have tended to been someone else’s animals. You will prosper. And us corsairs will find noble outlets for our seafaring bravado. Here is ale and women and I shall have exhausting of both. Vadu dal lavutana, fetch me a fiddler, I have a mind to Hornpipe. Anna, wildling, put those matches away and teach me Stripping the Willow.’

            The stage was cleared and the Massed Mariachi, taking up position at the microphones, began to play La Cucaracha with the Kittens of Chaos doing a daring can-can in the background. Barely into the second chorus the music tailed off, black clouds covered the sun and the sky darkened. A large group of heavily armed Chats Suterrains materialised onto the stage all in white leather coats, purple-glassed goggles and pith helmets. They brushed the band aside whilst the Kittens of Chaos seethed. Outnumbered and outgunned they sat heavily on Kiki le Berserker before she could start a scrap. Her boggle-eyes fired imaginary thunderbolts and her spittle ate corrosively into the smoking floorboards. Several sturdy Chats dragged two heavy campaign chests to the front of the stage and opened one of them out to reveal a Tesla coil on a copper coloured pylon. A polished metal cage was bolted in place around it and heavily insulated high tension cables were run out to the second crate. Le Chat-in-charge threw a large knife switch and the contents of the box set up a wild humming that ascended in pitch until it achieved a nerve shattering whine. Lightning crackled outwards from the Tesla coil and an eerie green ionised mist began to spread from around the arcing electro-magnetic discharge. Slowly an image formed within the billowing cloud. It was a holographic figure, convincingly life like except for being green, transparent and a bit wobbly. It was bipedal, bulky and scaly. An angular reptilian head hissed and flicked out its tongue and Phoebles felt he could discern something a bit tentacley around the upper lip. Piercing, bilious eyes with narrowly slit-pupils seemed to grow and grow until they were all that the onlookers were aware of. They appeared to glare disconcertingly into the soul of each individual in the audience.

            ‘MEDLING EARTHLINGS. WE KNOW WHO YOU ARE. WE KNOW WHERE YOU LIVE. AND WE KNOW WHERE YOUR CHILDREN GO TO SCHOOL. WE WILL REMEMBER!’

Pause… then a dramatic crack as the coil discharged and the plasma cloud dispersed. Les chats packed up their equipment and departed without a word.

            ‘Bugger me!’ exclaimed Dark Flo.

            Everyone seemed to be looking around at once, some scared, some bemused. A search for Les Chats Souterrains was rapidly organised, Polly Karpova flew her Red Rata in low-level sorties over the fair ground, but no trace of their presence could be discovered. Slowly the skies cleared and daylight returned; for the moment the prophetic threat was put to one side and the Mariachi struck up once more.

Much later the gang were having a romantically lantern-lit picnic supper spread out on a luscious vintage tangerine/red, Chiadma goats wool rug that Beryl had picked up in an Essaouiran souk. Scrumpled napkins and greasy paper plates of discarded chicken wings and sandwich crusts littered the carpet and surrounding grass.

            ‘Did we actually fix anything?’ asked Phoebles.

            ‘Doubt it.’ Googleberry looked up from his bowl of pyrotechnical bread-and-butter pudding, with custard. ‘It looked a bit working class, so I stuck a sparkler in it,’ he explained as he reclined, sucking noisily between mouthfuls on an Iznik porcelain hubble-bubble pipe.

            ‘And the Lizard Thing’s threat?’

            ‘Oh, probably just the prelude to another adventure.’

            Boz watched a white plume moth carelessly spiralling in towards a guttering, spluttering Tilly lamp that illuminated their repast, and he sighed.

Captain Rotskagg Blenkinsopp

A short while later the entire group were clambering up the slope onto a grassed earthen platform of approximately one hectare in area. On it stood two, singular buildings. To their left a three-story timber frame hall was raised up on Doric columns of black and white oak. A market was spread out amongst the pillars and a sweeping stairway led up through the floor to a Georgian doorway. The dun coloured lath and plaster infill between the dark frames was pierced where ever possible with leaded windows. This sober building was the Moot Hall, the place where serious issues were thrashed out and important decisions made. Facing it, and far more jocular in nature was the Mead Hall. Entirely constructed of heavy, deeply carved oak, the main structure was windowless with a steeply tiered shingle roof out of which sprouted a tower and flying grotesques. It was decorated with intertwining ravens, deer, boar and dragons, and painted in earthy reds and yellows and a vibrant electric-blue. Smoke seeped through gaps in the roof and a great deal of noise issued from its dark interior.   On the green between the two buildings our merry gang found at last the Tamworth Ranters, dancing and carousing, a motley, unkempt band. Exposed skin, of which there was a great deal, was painted and tattooed, their scant clothing, brightly coloured and patterned, hair unruly, or elaborately entwined with ribbons and feathers. Many of the aged amongst the groups, wrinkled, sagging and tanned, seemed to shun clothing almost entirely. A manic hoop dancer twirled past, her plaited hair writhing like a medusa on speed. There was a hurdy-gurdy and a flautist in a huge floppy hat, standing on one leg.

            With Anna taking the lead, they approached the Mead Hall.   At once a slender girl burst into the open like a faun breaking cover and came prancing down the wide steps that led up to its entrance.   She was stained with red ochre and decorated in strange black Cabalistic symbols, an ankle length heavy woollen, tiered and pleated skirt hung from her hips and she had tiny bells on her toes.   She was towing a golden youth, a naked youth, gilded from blond hairline to the tips of his toes, He was lithe, physical perfection with cornflower-blue eyes, yet unnaturally passive. The girl winked at Anna on her way past, bound for a small orchard down by the river.

            “Isn’t he just too gorgeous?”

            Anna smiled back without comment.   Ferdy looked stunned and, ever so lightly, bemused.

           

Obvious within the Mead Hall, even from the imposing doorway, despite the jostling crowd, was a massive bulk of bulging muscle beneath a covering of sun blackened hide, criss-crossed with livid scars and almost entirely covered in tattoos, a red beard, plaited and bowed, a stub of clay pipe, a third hand black leather Saint Laurent biker jacket, scuffed and stained with sump oil, over a pink, Eric Bloodaxe t-shirt, striped Bermuda shorts, Doc Martens 14 eyelet Black 1914s, a red headscarf and black felt hat with black ostrich feathers and an extra wide brim turned up and pinned at the front. It was seated on a straining Windsor oak chair with a Ranter lass on each knee and a quart pewter tankard in its gnarled fist.   This was unmistakably Rotskagg Blenkinsopp the pirate king.   He stood up with a roar, letting the two girls fall, giggling, to the ground.

            “Anna, miri feely yog chavi, sastimos. Y kon shee deze bold ryes?”

            (“Anna, my young fire child, greetings. And who are these daring gentlemen?”)

             “Tooti vada kushti, skipper. Mira compañeros, o famosos Boz, Ferdinand o vlieger y Phoebles kon shee nossa martini constante,”

(“You look well, captain.   My companions, the famous Boz, Ferdinand the aviator and Phoebles who is our steadying hand,”) replied Anna.

            “You polari’s improving,” boomed Rotskagg, now in thickly accented English. He lurched forward, lifted Boz by the shoulders and shook him in a companionable way.   Dropping the Boz, he grabbed Ferdy’s wing stub and shook it so vigorously that several feathers had to be straightened, once the bird had freed himself from the crushing grip.   Advancing jovially towards a horrified Phoebles the corsair swept his hat from his own head and dropped it over the rotund ginger tom.   It buried him.   As Phoebles battled to escape, the hat twitched and it’s black plume quivered, and Rotskagg clung to the furniture, overcome with mirth.   Deeming introductions to be at an end the captain turned his attention to the ragged band of wild cats, wilder Scots and scurvy sea dogs that were shambling into the hall.

            “Mira wortacha, pralas, avela y schlumph, y xa.   Mandi wil parlé.   Eğlence daha yeni başlıyor.”

(“My confederates, brothers, come and drink, and eat.   We must talk.   The fun is only just beginning.) Rotskagg retrieved his hat and Phoebles rejoined his companions, blinking.

            “What’s all that jabber?”

            “The Pirate King prefers to communicate in a bastard form of Lingua Franca.   It is the common language of the corsairs.” Explained Anna before she turned her attention to the ruffian band. Rotskagg had scooped up Bui and was tickling her behind one ear. Ale was ordered.

“Have we been dismissed?” asked Ferdy.

            “They do seem to have forgotten us.” replied Boz.

            Phoebles was edging towards the food. A long table was piled high with ornately displayed snacks. Multi-coloured catnip muffins vied with mooncakes and neat little triangular fish-paste sandwiches for the attention of prospective diners. There were exotic flans and trifle and, at the centre a life-size ice sculpture of Lady Æthelflæda in full armour and winged helmet, already melting into the brocade tablecloth. Almost before he could grab any of the refreshments there was a commotion and Snowdrop wobbled her way through the crowd on her unicycle, juggling three white mice who were squeaking Rule Britannia, not very well as they were a little nauseous.

            “Come on,” she shouted, spinning round and heading for the door, “The brass band competition is about to start.” 

The Tamworth Ranters’ Gala

Almighty Cod created the universe and all that is in it.   It created cats and men and tortoises.   It anointed kings to enforce its laws and appointed bishops to interpret its words.   And all was right with the world.

            This proved very lucrative if you happened to be a bishop or a king, but was not necessarily regarded as a good thing by everyone else. Then after eons of malcontent, the ‘English Civil War and Almost Revolution’ happened and the world turned upside down.   The scum on top of the placid lake that was the class system within this sceptred realm lost cohesion, began to break up and loosen its grip.   And out of the silt at the bottom rose up every kind of fanatical crank and loony demanding equality, emancipation, universal suffrage.   Pacifists and feminists, naturists, atheists and suffragists felt empowered to speak out; compelled to cry from atop soapboxes and from the backs of carts the length and breadth of the country.   Out of this turmoil emerged The Ranters.   Almighty Cod, they asserted, was not an omnipotent being somewhere out there.   A little piece of Cod (a piece of Cod that passeth understanding) existed, in equal part, in every living thing.   They reasoned, on the strength of this revelation, that no individual had more claim to represent the laws of Cod or man than any other.   Every man, woman, cat or carrot had an equal right to rule, and therefore no right over others at all.   Every man, woman, cat and carrot had sovereignty over its own existence and wellbeing, unfettered self-determination.

            Over the intervening centuries The Tamworth Ranters came to believe that the Piece of Cod was not a thing in itself; it was a metaphor, it was the spark of Life.   All living things were free and equal.   They also embraced the golden rule of philosophers and prophets to do to others what they would have done to themselves, and to love one another as they loved them selves, enthusiastically and often.   They tended to throw a good party.

June had been damp and dreary.   Not that this was noted to any degree by the people of Tamworth.   In Tamworth June was almost always damp and dreary.   However, on this festive day the sky was clear and the morning sun was already warming the recreation ground, though the overnight drizzle still puddled on the tarmac of the vehicle park, reflecting silver-cerulean against the dark grey clinker.   Boz glanced back as the gang strode out across the disused landing strip.   Several airships swung gently at their pylons.   Lady Æthelflæda, freshly painted, was dwarfed next to the looming black vastness of Rotskagg Blenkinsopp’s brutal Queen Anne’s Bounty.   The corsair’s flag ship bristled with quick-fire cannon, rocket launchers and Gatlings, her canopy emblazoned with the crimson, crowned skull (crowned with a papal coronet) that was the Blenkinsopp sigil.   It even had a hangar and launch port for its complement of armed ornithopters.

            “The pirate king’s here then,” he said to the others, “wonder who he’s brought with him.”

            “I noticed Larry’s dirigible back there too,” replied Phoebles.

            “I reckon we’ve missed the parade,” chipped in Ferdy, pushing his goggles up over his flying helmet.   “Told you we shouldn’t have spent so long over breakfast.”   But the bird was wrong.   As they reached the row of Portaloos and temporary litter trays by the road gate they could hear the trumpets and guitars of the Massed Zapatista Marching Mariachi as they played La Valentina, and see the tops of the wavering crimson union banners above the heads of the spectators.   The annual Gala parade always drew a large crowd.

            They squeezed through as near to the front as they could manage and Dark Flo lifted the vertically challenged Ferdy onto her shoulders.   They were in time to see Snowdrop’s techanka wreathed in flowers with Consuella in her most exotic Carmen Miranda outfit, letting rip on her tambourine.   The techanka was followed by the prancing cavalry of the Snake Pass Zapatistas led by Aunty Stella, in her Subcommandante Everyman outfit, sans ski mask, but wearing a delicate feathered purple half mask that perfectly matched her hair.   Each caballerro lofted a fluttering black SPZ flag.   Next came the Catnip Growers Association rainbow float, swathed in a purple haze.   Bringing up the rear, with the Kittens of Chaos crammed on the roof rack, came the Vicecream van blaring out the Slasher Theme from Psycho.   As the last of the parade passed, the crowd spilled onto the road and followed into the Recreation ground.