13 Fury!

13. FURY! Captain Horatio Rattus kicked open the doors to the Town Hall. Rats swarmed around him, running between the benches and across people's feet. He had stormed back to town in a haze of fury and gone straight to his ship to release the rats. They had followed his furious piping from the wharves to the Town Hall in a blur of fur and frantic squealing.

"Where is that CURSED boy?" he yelled, purple blood pumping through the veins on his forehead. "Where are my childrrren?" The children were all there, in the Town Hall, where they had been led by Nugget. An hour earlier, Matilda had cycled slowly into town with Nugget standing across her back wheel playing her fiddle. Behind them was a great swaying mass of children. Matilda had phoned the mayor and told him to gather the worried parents. She had cycled right into the Town Hall, with Nugget's music leading the children all the way into their sobbing parents' arms.

Matilda's mom had hugged her so tight she thought she was about to burst. But now, with the Pirate Piper's appearance, the children were really clinging to their parents. Or were their parents clinging to them? It was hard to tell, but there was a lot of clinging going on. And there were a LOT of rats. "You have 'em now," grumbled the piper, scanning the room and peering into the townspeople's frightened eyes. "But hold 'em close, squeeze 'em tight, don't let 'em sleep. I can take 'em again, whenever I choose." "Well, I'm glad we didn't pay! You are a con man, sir!" said the mayor, unaware of the rat that was munching on his

ceremonial hat. "You brought the rats to Dull-on-Sea! And then you had the nerve to ask for money to take them away!" "Ye'll wish ye had paid!" snarled the piper. "Ye'll be wantin' to pay me, and pay me tonight! Twenty thousand dollars. By sunrise. Delivered to my ship. Or ye'll all be payin' a FAR heavier price!" "A far heavier price?"

inquired the mayor, noticeably rattled. "You don't scare me!" "I'll be takin' them ALL. Away to sea. Beyond the reach of yer pirate girl's magic." The piper eyed Nugget and her fiddle suspiciously. He played a couple of bars on his pipe, and parents gasped as their children tried to pull away toward him, eyes rolling back in their heads. "And I'll be leavin' these RATS 'ere for good! Twenty thousand dollars," the piper repeated. "That's only a few hundred dollars per child, by my count. Surely yer little darlings are worth that." And he turned and went out the door, leaving a Town Hall full of rats, confused children, and worried parents.