Epic Tale - Chapter 13 - Part 1

Lady Riddle took a deep breath and looked around again.
“No more bets, please…”, she thought with a smile on her painted face.
The cave she was in looked more luxurious than some of the castles or palaces the trickster had been in. It was huge, yet every area of the cave surface was sculptured. The ceiling was another of the strange bubble like construction looking like the cap of a giant jellyfish. Next to her was a deep pool. When she had challenged Genoveva, both agreed on a race. Of course the Selkie would ensure to have the advantage on her side, but who would have guessed that would turn out to be an obstacle course? Lady Riddle had trained the past week as hard as she could and as her sparring partner Leith had allowed.
“I hope you have a long breath. You’ll need it”, Genoveva hissed, standing next to the pirate before smiling sweetly and taking her hands.
“Good luck and may the best one win”
Riddle forced herself to return the smile. If she hadn’t years of experience to mask her true emotions, Genoveva might have ended up with a red imprint of a hand on her cheek.
Both woman were waiting to be announced by the queen yet, who just had arrived at her loge.The other spectators were sitting or standing on a tribune. In the center of the cave or better, the hall, was an oval shaped and very deep pool. Floating buoys of different colours marked the obstacle path.
Lady Riddle took another deep breath to calm the nervousness inside her. It had been far too long since she had performed in front of such a huge crowd. Her idle hands clung to the baggy old robe the trickster was wearing.
The queen waved her hand and the murmuring of the spectators died down. The cave  became even more impressive, since Queen Murdina only needed to raise her voice slightly to be heard everywhere loud and clear.
“Welcome! Welcome to this long awaited race. As you all will know, our Lady Genoveva has been challenged by the officer of the famous Black Fedora Pirates, Lady Riddle”, she began and earned applause.
“The rules of this event are as follows: For the first round, each contestant has to keep their face over the water surface. The second round is to dive between the red marks. In the third round, each contestant has to follow the yellow markings, pick up one of the two white clams and return to the starting point. Whoever finishes first, wins.”
Genoveva was smiling and waving and the cheering crowd, but still Riddle heard her whispering:
“You stand no chance against me. Give up now and spare yourself the embarrassment of losing.”
The trickster simply smiled back as sweetly as possible.
“Where would be the fun in that?”, she answered and earned a glare of deep hatred.
Both women stepped forward and onto a carved rock, serving as the starting point.
“Ready… Set… Go!”, the queen announced and the selkie lady darted into the water. Lady Riddle carefully put her hat down and cast away the robe. Laughter and shouts of disbelief filled the cave as she pulled forth a red and blue jester’s hat from within her fedora. The new hat matched the costume she was wearing perfectly. Little bells were everywhere and jingled mockingly as the trickster finally jumped into the water. But oh, had nobody told that ridiculous woman how races work? She was swimming incredibly slow, clumsy and odd, everybody couldn’t help but laugh.
Eventually the second contestant noticed the laughter she had believed to be cheering. She turned around to look at the pirate and could not believe what she saw.
“Enough!”, she shouted, swam to the border of the pool and climbed out.
“My queen! You have to stop this! That person is mocking us!”, she shouted out. Though Queen Murdina could understand her perfectly, it took some time for her to answer. She was too busy laughing.
The present Black Fedora Pirates had anticipated a trick the whole time. But most of them thought the trickster would simply find a way to outrun the selkie. Nobody had expected to see this and couldn’t help but laugh.
“I believe the person is not mocking anybody, just a really bad swimmer”, Queen Murdina finally answered, glancing at the laughing pirates.
“Even her friends are not mad at her, so why are you, Lady Genoveva?”
The addressed selkie was about to answer, when a guard approached the queen. her face became stern again.
“There was a theft”, she announced and the audience became quiet immediately.
“Someone managed to steal a royal ruby, but thankfully, we could capture the thief”, the guard said and stepped aside, so the thief could enter.
There was the silence of surprise. The selkies could not believe this girl had been able to steal one of their treasures and the pirates couldn’t believe Sparky could get caught. The queen of thieves tried to look abashed, but the bright grin always fought its way back onto her face.
“Can I has shiny?”, she asked as innocent as a notorious snatcher as her could. Which was not very much, especially since the grin refused to disappear.
“The gem is brought back to where it belongs?”, Sparky heard the selkie queen asking and the guard nodded. Sparky bit her lip, so she wouldn’t burst into laughter.

Lady Genoveva had watched the scene and, believing the race would be cancelled now, she left. Lady Riddle however, kept on swimming. She really needed to thank Leelu for the costume and Donovan for the water-proof face paint.

The majority of the audience was discussing this unexpected event. The pirates were on their way to the queen.
“Captain Chenbeard, Sir,”, Leith began, running up to the captain.
“Aye?”
“Please, let me try to negotiate with the queen”, the selkie said. Chenbeard gave him a long look.
“Ye be an outcast. Why would she listen t’ye?, he wondered. Leith showed a grin that had some similarities to Riddle.
“Because I can prove Sparky is innocent”, he answered.
“Me be the captain, me should be the one doin’ the talkin’”, Chenbeard said after a while. Leith nodded.
“Very well Sir. Then let me tell you what I know”

A black rat was hurrying through the hallways, followed by a girl with two crossed scars on her lips.
“For all that’s holy and all that’s not, Allana, where are we?”, Elena hissed.
The shape-changer stopped and turned hallway around. The tiny arms were moving, but Elena couldn’t make out everything.
“Whatever…”, the rogue muttered and both pirates continued. Eventually they reached a small cave with one of those windows that looked like jellyfishes. On the other side, there was a diving bell.
Instead of a black rat, an otter jumped into the small pond in the center of the cave.
“This was almost too easy…”, Elena thought. this would be the perfect moment for things to go wrong. she quickly turned around, one hand readying a dagger. But there was no one behind her and no foot steps coming nearer. But Elena wasn’t satisfied. There was always another possibility. Holding the dagger in her hand, she jumped into the water and swam into the bell. It was dark inside, but over the slight rippling of water dropping down, the pirate could hear someone breathing.
“Elena?”, the voice of Allana asked.
“Aye”, the rogue answered and took a seat. Maybe she was a little paranoid, but this whole thing just went too smoothly in her opinion. Something had to be wrong. No plan, no matter how much thoughts were put into it, would work that nicely.
Elena’s eyes tried to pierce the darkness of the diving bell, but if was of no use. Not even when the two pirates reached the surface, she eased.
“Is everything alright?”, Allana wondered, looking at the rogue.
“Aye”, she simply answered and tried to push the anxiety aside. “Stay calm”,she told herself before leaving the bell and returning to the ship.

Meanwhile, Lady Riddle was still swimming. The cave was almost empty, but she was still in the water, taking all the time she needed to finish without getting too exhausted. She grinned as she thought of the face the selkie lady would make. It was amazing how people still expected a fair game when dealing with a trickster.

Sparky tired to display a stern face, but it just wouldn’t work. It had been such fun! Finally she had been able to steal something without receiving a “SPAAAAAAARKS! GIVE! IT! BACK!” for once. She hadn’t really like the part where she had to force the guards to detect and arrest her, but then, it wasn’t even bad. It was funny to see their confusion and disbelief that someone was able to sneak past them, pick all seven locks and get past the sea lion without making a single sound. It wasn’t even hard. So far, all creatures loved cookies. While Chenbeard and the selkie queen were debating if Sparky could be accused of stealing if she hadn’t the loot with her, the thief had found herself a challenge to keep her busy. How fast could she lock and unlock her handcuffs without making them clink?
“Aye, I was lost and simply asked for the way”, she joined the conversation and thought: “‘Till now: 23”
“It just so happened that behind me the door was open. It’s not my fault the guards didn’t see me earlier”, she added.
It was obvious the queen had a hard time believing that. Maybe Sparky had sounded way too happy. But then, Queen Murdina had no evidence. The stolen ruby was not found in any of Sparky’s pocket and the guards swore they saw nobody else.

“I won!”, the trickster announced, her voice echoing in the cave. To her surprise, there was an answer.
“I doubt it”, a cold voice hissed.