The Curse of the Werepenguin

by Allan Woodrow

  As the villagers shouted in alarm, realizing what was about to happen, a blast of lightning struck the side of the manor from the violent thunder snowstorm. Bolt slashed his teeth, now penguin sharp, against the tether. The catapult rocketed up and flung Bolt out into the sky and toward the shore.

  47.

  The Battle along the Blacker Sea

  It was peaceful up here, amid the snow and wind. In the air, high above the lawn and the forest, the thunder silenced and the lightning halted. Bolt heard nothing.

  This was how a bird felt. Not a penguin, since they were flightless, but geese and doves and eagles and other winged creatures.

  Bolt hated it. His kind was not meant to fly, but to be earth- and water-bound. He did not belong up here near the trembling clouds and the ghastly mix of black and faint violet lights that reminded Bolt of a purple pen running out of ink.

  Bolt soared over the trees and toward the shoreline. He could see all of Volgelplatz from up here: the village to the shore. Ahead, a large cluster of penguins waddled in the shallow water. And where Bolt found penguins, he would find the Baron.

  He sailed past the final line of trees, the sandy beach growing closer. Bolt thrust his half-penguin body forward as he landed on his penguin-turned stomach.

  OOMPH!

  Bolt smashed into the ground, but instead of plopping heavily, his belly slid like a well-oiled eel on the wet, snow-covered sand.

  He skidded to a stop just a few feet from the rocking waves crashing against the Blacker Sea’s shore. As soon as his skidding ceased, the thunder growled and the lightning resumed its display.

  Hundreds of penguins stood around Bolt, staring at him. Afraid. Bolt sensed it. He held out his hand. He opened his mind. The Baron was not here. Not yet. But he was coming, of that Bolt was certain.

  I won’t hurt you. Bolt fought against his own anger, concentrating on sending words of hopefulness across the beach. I’m here to help. I’m your brother. He tried to connect with each of the birds, spreading his message into the air, where it nestled inside the penguin brains, soothing them and showing the birds there was another way, a better way. A family way.

  As if on cue, the thunder grew softer and the crackling tentacles of electricity shifted away from the beach. The storm was passing, although the clouds still blocked the moon.

  Bolt filled his mind—and the penguins’ minds—with thoughts of smiling chicks and loving parents. He thought of festive picnics, vacation road trips, and games of water polo, and then removed the water polo thoughts since he decided that wasn’t something most families really did together. But he let his imagination soar, filling the air with pure, unbridled emotion: joy and love and celebration and fish sticks. He wished he hadn’t thought of fish sticks, but he was very hungry.

  Unlike the Baron’s malicious thoughts, Bolt’s spoke a sort of penguin truth: we are peaceful, family-loving birds.

  Turning their thoughts was easy. This was what Bolt was chosen to do.

  But there were so many penguins—hundreds if not thousands. Bolt wasn’t sure if all of them heard his message. The Baron had clouded the birds’ brains for so long.

  Unite. Family. Love.

  He could hear a few of their minds answering back.

  We are family . . . We will protect each other . . .

  The penguins stood in place, emitting loud braying calls and bobbing to the right and left. Bolt continued spreading his message. We are family! More penguins echoed his thoughts, some as a question, but others as a statement.

  We are family?

  Yes, we are family!

  The more Bolt hammered his message, the more the gray clouds of the Baron’s evil thoughts dispersed. Families take care of each other. The penguins wobbled in agreement. You can be a family again. All of you. If only we stand up to the Baron. Together.

  An enormous splash filled the sea behind them, and Bolt turned to see a large flipper sailing up from the watery depths. A spray of water shot into the sky and a set of teeth—the largest Bolt had ever seen—seemed to swallow the world.

  The orca. It was here, with all its devastating might. Mostly black, but with a white underbelly, the killer whale leapt out of the sea in a tight arc. Lightning ripped apart the sky, its glare reflecting off the whale’s long and powerful choppers. Water sprayed from the mammal’s blowhole.

  Whatever comfort Bolt had tried to provide for the penguins a moment earlier vanished. Frightened, the birds ran from the shore. Their thoughts of family were ripped away and replaced with the primal urge for survival. Bolt wanted to run, too, but he fought the impulse. He needed to be calm. Don’t be afraid . . . You are safe . . .

  Some answered back.

  We are with you . . . We understand . . . But help, it’s a whale!

  Other noises erupted from the woods opposite the water. Countless penguins waddled out from one side of the forest, and they brought a barking wall of anger. The fleeing penguins halted. The barking penguins hissed.

  Bolt hadn’t heard this new group coming; his mind had been too busy reaching out to the penguins at the beach, trying to comfort them, and also trying to calm himself and to stop thinking of fish sticks so much. But now there were more penguins than he could count, and a steel door of anger surrounded their brains.

  The Baron strode out of the forest, his mind spreading across the beach like the shadow from a blimp. He too had half changed from the cloud-hidden moon. His face was that of a penguin but he had the body of a boy, still dressed in his black pants, tuxedo shirt, and cape, although his webbed feet had ripped through his shoes, leaving only a few strands of leather attached to the soles.

  Bolt reached for his whale-tooth necklace with his one non-wing hand. If Blazenda was right, it was the only way to put an end to the Baron’s immortality, and also break his own curse. Bolt ripped the tooth from its chain and gripped it tightly.

  “Going somewhere?” snapped the Baron, his voice a high, half-penguin squeak.

  “Just visiting family,” said Bolt. “My family.” He continued thinking happy thoughts. More and more penguins were responding to his hopeful message of togetherness.

  But a storm of rage flowed from the Baron. Bolt’s happier thoughts pushed against the Baron’s menace. It was an invisible war, one evenly matched for now, yet one Bolt knew he would lose once the clouds moved again. After the moon lit the beach, Bolt would become a werepenguin forever and all would be lost.

  But that time had not yet come.

  We are family!

  The Baron-penguin growled at Bolt. “All I wanted was for us to be BFFs: Bird Friends Forever. Was that too much to ask?”

  “You didn’t want a BFF. You wanted a slave.”

  “Same difference,” said the Baron.

  “No. BFFs care for each other. Respect each other. Just like family does.”

  “You sound like a greeting card,” hissed the Baron.

  “Really? I’ve never gotten a greeting card,” admitted Bolt.

  “Join me and you can have all the greeting cards you want. I’ll give you one more chance. I’m willing to forget this. You’ll get used to being a despised creature of the midnight moon. Trust me. Sure, the manor is in flames. Yes, I need to buy some new tuxedos because we keep ripping through ours every time we transform into penguins. But you and I are kings, Humboldt. The true Penguin Kings. These penguins know we are their leaders.”

  “No!” cried Bolt. “You killed my parents. I’ll never follow you! Besides, the penguins don’t need a leader. They need a family. I’m not their ruler. I’m their brother.” He sensed the Baron’s thoughts creeping into his own, and he shook his head. The invisible thought war raged all around them.

  Hurt! Attack!

  No, we are family!

  “You can’t control me,” said Bolt.

  “Not yet, it seems. But those clouds won�
��t hide the moon forever. Face it. You’re a natural, Humboldt. Look how you speak to the penguins. See how they listen to you. Just think of it! When these penguins salute me, someday, I’ll make sure they salute you, too.”

  “I heard penguins never salute.”

  “They will,” the Baron snarled. “And then we will take our rightful place as the rulers of all Brugaria. With the penguin army obeying our every command, the world will soon bow to us.”

  “And what of the people?”

  “The commoners? Who cares? Some will be dinner. Others will languish in dungeons. Those who are lucky will work in the fish stick kitchens or labor deep in the salt mines.”

  “We have salt mines?”

  “Not yet, but that’s because we don’t have laborers. Anyway, this is your last chance, Humboldt. Join me!”

  Bolt pictured Annika frying large fish under the tyranny of an evil penguin foreman. He saw the villagers shackled in cells. He even imagined the housekeeper, Frau Farfenugen, being chewed by hungry penguins—but he didn’t imagine it for more than a moment because it was too gruesome. “Never!”

  “Very well.” The Baron pointed to Bolt. “Penguins, attack! Show him the power of our wrath!”

  The penguins did not move.

  “Don’t you hear me?” cried the Baron.

  Still the penguins remained where they stood.

  “They hear you,” said Bolt. “But they are done obeying. Penguins are about family. About protecting each other. They now know there’s another way.”

  The penguins barked and Bolt understood them perfectly. We are family!

  The Baron’s face turned purple with fury, and then blue, and then back to purple. He trembled. “They will listen to me once you are defeated. But now I am very angry. And as I have warned, you do not want to see me very angry!”

  48.

  The Family That Fights Together

  Before Bolt faced the Baron, before he even reached the manor, while he was running through the dark forest with trees blazing in lightning-blasted flames and the snow coming down in acorn-size flakes, Annika and the bandits were fighting the penguins that had helped Bolt escape.

  Brutus, the largest bandit, threw a piano at them, but it didn’t help very much. All he did was ruin an expensive piano.

  Felipe had fought, but he’d left his knife in his tent, so all he had were toenail clippings and postage stamps, both of which were as useless as a piano in a fight.

  But the bandits had other weapons. Vigi hurled apples with skillful aim. Annika ducked and dove out of the way of flapping wings, distracting the penguins with her nimble speed while other bandits hit birds on the head with sticks and stones. A few bandits had small crusty pieces of French bread left over from dinner, which proved to be effective weapons.

  Once Bolt had flown the coop, so to speak, the penguins quickly lost their desire to fight. They ran away, although not without swiping a box of fish sticks from the bandits’ fish stick tent.

  Most of the bandits, breathing heavily, lay down to catch their breaths. Other than random nicks and bruises, no bandits were injured, and only a couple needed bandages.

  Vigi’s eyes rested on the ropes that had bound Bolt but now lay on the ground. He scowled and cursed to himself. His eyes rested on Annika. “You released him, didn’t you?”

  Annika nodded. “I’m sorry, Papa. But he can save us. He can save all of Brugaria.”

  “We’re bandits! What do we care of Brugaria?” Vigi demanded.

  “We are not just bandits, but Brugarian Forest Bandits,” Annika reminded him. “We need all of the Brugarians free, so that we can kidnap and rob them. In a way, they are our family, too.”

  “A family we kidnap and rob,” said Vigi.

  “Exactly,” said Annika.

  “She is right, Daddy,” said Frau Farfenugen. She had not fought the penguins; she had no bandit training. Instead, she and the Fish Man had hidden behind a tree. But when the fighting ceased, they joined the rest of the group. “My entire life I have been nothing but a lowly housekeeper, worrying about myself and hoping the Baron would not get very angry and eat me, or tape me to the wall and play Pin the Tail on the Donkey, with me as the donkey. But now that I am free, I know this isn’t just about me, or my fear of donkey tails. I am also a Brugarian. We must help Bolt, band together, and defeat the Baron.”

  Vigi pulled at his hair. He gritted his teeth. “I know you’re right, but I have to protect you, and all the bandits!” He curled his hands into fists and pounded his legs in frustration. Then he winced, because he’d pounded his legs too hard. “What should I do? There aren’t rules in the Code of the Bandit on how to raise a family. Right, Felipe?”

  Felipe, who had been standing to the side, looked down at his feet. “Actually I’ve never read the code. It’s way too long and boring. Sorry.” Vigi stared at Felipe, stunned.

  Felipe looked back up. “But I don’t have to read a bandit code to know that not all things need to be written down to be true. You must be ready to fight for the things you love. We need to fight for each other.”

  “I might not know everything about being a bandit,” admitted Annika. “Not yet, anyway. But even I know that.”

  Vigi wrapped his arms around Annika. His eyes watered. “What did I do to deserve such a wonderful daughter?”

  “You kidnapped me?” Annika guessed, but her eyes watered, too.

  Tears rolled down Vigi’s cheeks now, and he didn’t care that bandits weren’t supposed to cry unless they were about to be hanged. He would need to revise that part of the code.

  “Can we find Bolt and fight with him now?” asked Annika.

  “Of course,” said Vigi. He embraced Annika and added, “You’ll make a wonderful bandit someday.”

  “I know,” said Annika, returning her father’s hug.

  49.

  The Return of the Whale

  Back at the beach, the Baron was very, very, very angry.

  The air around him seemed to ripple, and the foamy mist from the Blacker Sea popped like squeezed blemishes.

  The Baron’s penguin head vibrated from side to side, faster and faster, until his features blurred, and then it did three complete turns on his neck.

  When his head stopped spinning, steam erupted from his ears.

  The Baron’s beak grew and enlarged by four inches. From his mouth, razor-sharp twin fangs sprouted.

  His tuxedo shredded into pieces as the Baron grew larger, taller, wider. He now stood a foot taller than Bolt, his eyes blazed red, and his beak twisted into a diabolical sneer.

  The Baron-penguin monster opened his mouth, and the loudest bark Bolt had ever heard rang out, so loud that Bolt would not have been surprised if the orphans all the way back at Oak Wilt could hear it.

  But even more horrifying were the new, even darker evil thoughts erupting from the Baron-penguin’s mind like an angry volcano, spreading a cloud of hate and violence through the shoreline with such force that Bolt staggered back.

  The Baron-penguin plodded forward. Bolt held the tooth by his side like a dagger. He dug his webbed feet into the snow.

  The moon peeked out from behind a cloud, and Bolt felt his ears shrink and the webbing on his feet expand. His mind grew dizzy. He couldn’t concentrate. He was going to lose his chance. All was lost.

  But then the moon ducked behind a cloud, and Bolt’s brain snapped back awake. Bolt clenched the daggerlike tooth tighter. He had to stab the Baron now, before the moon danced out again. Even one more moon peek might be too much for Bolt to overcome.

  The Baron-penguin flung himself at Bolt, who lifted the tooth up. But Bolt hadn’t expected the partly transformed Baron to be so fast, or so powerful. The creature rammed into Bolt before the tooth was in position.

  Bolt fell back onto the sand. The Baron-penguin stood next to him, and slapped Bolt’s hea
d with a wing.

  “You don’t have a chance,” snarled the beast, slapping Bolt again and again. “I’m stronger than you.” He smiled and flashed his terrible fangs. “You will make a wonderful dinner.” A drop of saliva dripped onto Bolt’s eye.

  “Gross,” said Bolt.

  Lightning lit up the sea. The killer whale gnashed its teeth within the rolling, crashing waves. The penguins on the beach squawked with fear, their fright slicing through the dark thoughts emanating from the Baron-penguin.

  Distracted, the Baron-penguin looked back at the mighty orca.

  Bolt rolled out from under his enemy and scrambled to his webbed feet.

  A loud shout blared from the woods and then the entire Mystical Brotherhood, or Sisterhood, or whatever they were called, emerged from the forest, Günter and Franz in the lead. One side of the tree line was filled with penguins, and the opposite side was filled with torch-waving whale lovers.

  The penguins stared at them, some with evil snarls but others smiling, their thoughts free of the Baron’s hate-filled cloud, their minds singing, We are family.

  The songs stirred within Bolt. The chants grew inside him, fueling him with hope and determination.

  More sounds blared from the forest, and the Brugarian Forest Bandits emerged, led by Annika and Vigi Lambda.

  “We’re here to help!” shouted Annika.

  “I was wrong,” called Vigi Lambda. “Annika’s wisdom has convinced me. We will stand with you against the Baron.” He held an apple. “I’m even ready to waltz, if needed.”

  The Baron-penguin hissed at Vigi Lambda. “You and the bandits will pay dearly for this. Once I dispose of the boy, you are next. You will cry for mercy.”

  Vigi Lambda raised his chin. “Actually, crying is strictly prohibited by the Code of the Bandit, although I am planning on changing that part.”

  Then another shout rang out from the woods, and another group emerged, men, women, and children, one hundred people deep. The witch hat and black wedding dress–clad Fortune Teller, Blazenda, led them. “We shall protect Brugaria!” she shouted, and then cackled. “Sorry about the cackling, it is a bad habit but not really appropriate right now.”