The Battle of the Werepenguins Read online

  Biting people was what the Stranger did. And the Baron. They were evil creatures, turning people into werepenguins to conquer the world and join their horrible army. But Bolt was different. He didn’t want to conquer anyone. How could Bolt bite someone, cursing them to live forever as a monster?

  He couldn’t. He wouldn’t. Even if it meant flunking a test. “Ask me anything else.”

  Grom pounded his fist onto his knee. The slap! of fist against bone was surprisingly loud, and looked painful, although Grom didn’t grimace. He did it again, harder. Slap! This time he grimaced a little. “Just think what I could do! I could find worms. I could fight penguin guards instead of hiding from them. I could feel the power of being a penguin!”

  “It’s mostly just craving fish all the time,” said Bolt. “And wanting to rule the world. A lot of ruling.”

  “One bite,” Grom growled. “Even if you fail the test, they won’t execute you right away. I’ll get you out in the morning.”

  “No.”

  “Oh, come on,” said Grom. “Just think how wonderful it would be!”

  “It wouldn’t be wonderful. It would be terrible.”

  Grom flexed his fingers and then curled them into fists again, snarling. “I’d hate to have to hurt you.”

  “It really doesn’t look that way to me.”

  Grom moved toward Bolt. If it had been midnight, and Bolt were a werepenguin, he might have been able to fight Grom. But now? No way. If only a penguin were here to help!

  Wait a moment. Grom wasn’t a penguin, but he had a penguin birthmark. Didn’t that mean he had some penguin blood inside him? Didn’t that mean he and Bolt were already linked, and that they shared the same penguin-verse?

  Bolt wasn’t close to understanding how the penguin-verse worked, but he reached into Grom’s head anyway, trying to grab hold of whatever small amount of penguin-ism might be inside there. Stop. Don’t do this, he thought. He hoped whatever fuzziness had kept him from reaching into the heads of the PEWD penguin guards was gone. He couldn’t feel the haze down in this mole hole.

  Grom jumped, slightly. Bolt felt the words burrowing their way into Grom’s head, much like the crawling earthworms Grom had caught earlier.

  You don’t want to hurt me, thought Bolt.

  Grom shook his head and pulled his earlobes. “What are you doing to me?” he yelped.

  We are family, in a way. Becoming a werepenguin is not a blessing, but a curse.

  “Get outta my head!” cried Grom, hitting his ears and then cocking a fist back. He was close enough to Bolt that one swing . . .

  Don’t move another muscle!

  Grom stopped. Bolt saw that he struggled to move his leg, but it seemed stuck to the ground. He could actually feel the spinal nerves that connected Grom’s brain to the rest of his body, suspending the older boy’s muscle control.

  “Let me go!” Grom howled, but since he couldn’t move his mouth it sounded like “Eh ee o!”

  A calm cascaded over Bolt, as a deep feeling of penguin-ism coursed through his body. He sensed a connection to the penguin-verse he hadn’t before. The radio waves of fishiness that existed in the molecules of the earth were his to command. This was true power! Why, with those waves of fishiness, Bolt could control the world!

  Suddenly, the door swung open and Topo stood in the doorway, snipping his scissors. Bolt came to his senses—control the world? Never!—and released his hold on Grom, who staggered back, gasping for air. Bolt’s connection to the penguin-verse was gone, too, evaporated as quickly as an ice cube in a hot tub.

  “What’s going on here?” Topo demanded.

  Grom glowered but said nothing.

  “We are ready,” Topo hissed, jabbing his rubber scissors up. “It’s time for the Test of the Mole.” Snip, snip, snip!

  13.

  A Break in the Action

  A roar echoed across the ship’s deck. The seals had been playing foosball—I had thoughtfully put a foosball table in their cage to help them pass the time during the sea voyage—but the little ball kept bouncing out of their cages. Seals can be temperamental sorts, and they honked loudly until one of the deckhands retrieved the sphere and tossed it back to them.

  “Perhaps this is a good time to catch our breath,” said the penguin caretaker.

  “A breath?” I asked, dismayed. “Don’t be absurd. Did Bolt get a chance to take a breath while being imprisoned by those mole creatures? Go on. Please.”

  “Let’s at least take a detour and check on Annika and Blackburn. The last time we left them they were also in a precarious situation. You haven’t forgotten about Annika and Blackburn, have you?”

  “Who? I mean, of course not,” I said, although I had. “They have been a constant source of worry for me,” I added, trying to remember who they were. Oh, right. The bandit girl and the pirate. “But must we leave Bolt now, at such a dangerous part of his story?”

  “Blackburn and Annika’s part of the story was equally dangerous, or soon would be.”

  “Fine. Go on then,” I said. “But tell me—do you enjoy pausing parts of the story and leaving me in continual but annoyed suspense?”

  “I . . .” he said, pausing. “I . . .”

  “Yes?” I asked, eagerly leaning in.

  “It’s just that . . .”

  “Yes?” I asked, the tension mounting.

  “I . . .”

  “Just tell me!” I screamed.

  “No. I don’t enjoy doing that at all.”

  “I didn’t think so,” I said, and then he continued his tale after another frustrating pause.

  14.

  The Hero Code

  Annika and Blackburn stopped running as soon as they realized they weren’t being followed by penguins anymore. How long had that been? A few seconds? A few minutes?

  Annika held her knife at the ready, and Blackburn his sword. Annika gritted her teeth, waiting. Maybe this was a trick? Were the penguins sneaking around the side to ambush them? Well, they’d be sorry! As a bandit, Annika was trained to fight. So was Blackburn. Plus, they had Bolt’s penguin mind powers. With all that, Annika felt their chances of victory were actually pretty decent, despite being outmanned more than one hundred to three.

  “Ready, Blackburn?” she asked.

  “Borscht!” he shouted, which Annika interpreted as a yes.

  “Ready, Bolt?” she asked. But after this inquiry, there was silence. “You must be thinking penguin thoughts, so just a grunt of acknowledgment is fine,” she said, mindful of Bolt’s spiritual, slightly peculiar penguin ways. Yet, again, she was met with silence.

  “Why, the boy is gone!” exclaimed Blackburn. Annika turned. Blackburn was right. Bolt was nowhere to be found. He’d been trailing them the whole time, running much slower than she and Blackburn, but Annika had made sure to check back every so often to see that he wasn’t too far behind. Now he wasn’t there at all. It was as if he had sprouted wings and flown away, but of course penguins couldn’t fly, and neither could Bolt.

  That penguin silence was now even more disturbing. Had the guards captured Bolt and left? Annika tried to retrace the chase in her mind. There had been a fork in the path, and she hadn’t thought to look behind her. Had Bolt made a mistake and turned the wrong way?

  Or had he chosen the other path on purpose?

  The realization that he might have drawn the penguins away to save her and Blackburn hit Annika like a brick. She staggered back.

  “Ye look like someone hit ye with a brick,” Blackburn observed.

  Annika nodded. “We have to help him!” She wanted to run down the path, back to where the road forked, but Blackburn grabbed her arm.

  “Whatever has happened has happened,” he said. “They either have him, or he’s dead, or he’s escaped. Hopefully that last one.”

  “But he’s my friend!” Annika
protested. “I have to go after him!” She wiggled her arm to break free from the pirate’s grip, but couldn’t. He wrapped her in a bear hug.

  “I can’t let ye go. It would be crazy, I’m tellin’ ye. The boy’s got powers, aye? He can control penguins. Maybe he’ll be fine.”

  Bolt had been getting stronger; that was impossible to argue. But still! Annika wasn’t the sort to leave someone behind. “He’s my best friend!” Again, she fought against Blackburn’s grasp. “Let go of me!”

  “Not until ye settle down and agree that running after that penguin horde would be pointless.”

  “Fine! Just let me go!”

  Blackburn did. For a moment, Annika thought about running down the path anyway, but she knew Blackburn was right. Besides, Bolt was powerful, in his own way. He was one with the penguins. At least, that’s what Bolt said he was trying to do with all that silent meditation on the boat.

  “We’ll go to the fortress then,” said Annika. “If he’s a prisoner, we’ll rescue him. I’m not just going to stand here twiddling my thumbs, are you?” She glanced over at Blackburn, who was twiddling his thumbs. When he saw Annika watching him, he stopped.

  “And if he’s not a prisoner?” Blackburn asked. “Then we’ve gone there and risked our necks for nothin’.”

  “If he’s not at the fortress, then where could he be?” asked Annika, panic mounting inside her. “He’s not dead.”

  “But if . . .”

  “He’s not!”

  Blackburn raised his hands in surrender. “No. He’s not. Of course he’s not.”

  Annika didn’t say anything, but the uncertainty spoke volumes. She shook her head. “Well, if something happened to Bolt—and I’m not saying anything did—we can still steal that tooth. I can sail to the South Pole and find the Stranger and free the world’s penguins myself.”

  “Ye’d never find the Stranger. Ye know that. Besides, ye think ye can fight the mightiest werepenguin in the world with a tooth? Maybe Bolt has faith that would work, but not me.”

  “Well, we have to do something.”

  “Shiver me timbers! I’m not about to risk me life just to do somethin’. If Bolt escaped, he’ll come lookin’ for us. We should head to the boat. That’s where I’d go if I had recently escaped a horde of dentist penguins.”

  Annika slowly nodded. “But what if he doesn’t show up?”

  “Then we can discuss our next move. In the meantime, we twiddle our thumbs, aye?” Blackburn once again began to twiddle in earnest.

  Annika didn’t like doing nothing, and she had never enjoyed thumb-twiddling, but she knew the pirate’s advice was good advice. At least for now. They walked back down the path, retracing their steps, staying in the shadows to avoid being spotted. Quickly, they found their way to the footpath that led down to their ship in the hidden cove below. It was a long walk, and they said nothing to each other the entire time. Annika was too filled with worry to speak.

  When they finally reached the cove, Bolt was not there. Annika plopped down on a rock near the boat. She would wait. For now.

  Unfortunately, thinking to yourself I will wait is much different than actually waiting. Waiting is very boring. Annika drummed her fingers. She counted to five thousand and then back down to one. She thought about thumb-twiddling but then decided against it.

  Blackburn soon abandoned his own twiddling and took out his sword to practice, swishing it this way and that. Annika was tempted to join him, but she was still angry. He was way too concerned about his own safety while their friend could be facing serious harm. Annika couldn’t help but think of Blackburn’s resistance to travel to Pingvingrad in the first place, unless promised treasure. She was still bitter about it, and maybe a little hurt. She was angry at herself, too—angry for doing nothing but sitting on a rock and not springing into action to find Bolt, despite the pirate’s sound advice. Every moment Bolt was away was another moment he could be in trouble.

  Annika needed to think about something else. Anything else. So she removed her bandit handbook and some spare pieces of blank paper she had crammed inside it. She gripped her quill and wrote.

  The Code of the Bandit, Chapter 112, Subsection 5

  On Being a Hero

  Don’t be a hero! A bandit must steal, rob, kidnap, and be extremely nasty. Bandits are also selfish, robbing and stealing for their clan, with total disregard for outsiders. Heroic deeds, which include rescuing people, freeing cities, stopping crime, saving lives (other than your own), putting out fires, cleaning used gum from under benches or school desks, and so on are strictly forbidden. Remember, you are a bandit! (And, BTW, pirates aren’t heroes either, in case you were wondering about that.) If you want to be a hero, then you are in the wrong profession.

  Let’s say, for example, you pass a burning building. You could run inside, save everyone, and be admired around the world for your bravery. But what if the house was set on fire by a giant bullfrog? It’s not worth the risk! Get out of there!

  The Code of the Bandit, Chapter 112, Subsection 5

  On Being a Hero—amended by Annika Lambda

  Bandits aren’t naturally heroic, sure. But bandits are clever. And fast. And stealthy. And they have lots of other talents that most people don’t have. Why should those talents only be used to rob and kidnap? Can’t they also be used to help others who are in trouble?

  The answer is yes!

  Just because bandits steal and plunder and things like that doesn’t mean they can’t also make the world a better place. Bandits should help the downtrodden, the poor, and the helpless. It’s everyone’s job to do that—whether you’re a bandit, or a pirate, or a Viking, or even a were-creature! What sort of world would this be if all anyone ever did was look out for themselves? Not a world I would want to live in, that’s for sure.

  Besides, what’s a hero, anyway?

  Yes, it’s someone who frees cities from werepenguins, but it is also a friend who keeps a promise, and goes on a voyage to save the world even if she didn’t get any treasure from doing it, even when she would rather be home with her father back in Brugaria. A hero can be someone who thinks about her friends before she thinks about herself, and will do anything to protect them.

  And why is this bandit book so worried about giant bullfrogs anyway?

  Annika Lambda

  Annika skimmed over what she wrote. She liked the idea of being a hero, even if bandits weren’t traditional sorts of heroes. But heroism wasn’t sitting around on a rock and writing in a book. Bolt was depending on them, wherever he was—and he was not dead. She had promised him she would help him steal that tooth and defeat the Stranger. And that’s exactly what she would do.

  She dropped her handbook back inside her pocket and found Blackburn, who was once again twiddling his thumbs, apparently having grown tired of practicing with his swordfish.

  “Bolt should have been back by now. I’m going into that fortress to find him, and if he’s not there, then I’ll still get the tooth. Even if I can’t find the Stranger, maybe I can use it on that werepenguin Dr. What’s-Her-Name.”

  “Dr. Walzanarz.”

  “Gesundheit.”

  “Sneakin’ into that fortress is a fool’s errand.”

  “You’ll get your treasure, don’t worry,” grunted Annika. “I know that’s what you’re thinking.”

  The pirate laughed. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep, missy.”

  “I’ll keep my end of the bargain.” She jabbed her finger at him. “You just keep yours. And I’ve told you before—stop calling me missy.”

  Blackburn sighed. “Fine. I’ll help ye find that tooth. But I have no intention of fightin’ any werepenguins. That was never part of our deal.”

  “But you will help me find Bolt, right?” Blackburn shrugged, as if disinterested in finding anyone. Annika felt her face turn red, and she
clenched her fists. “He’s your friend!”

  “Pirates don’t have friends.”

  “But—”

  “But what?”

  “Nothing.” Annika crossed her arms and turned away, her eyes watery. How could she convince her entire bandit gang back home to befriend more people if she couldn’t even convince Blackburn? Was he really so consumed with treasure that he wouldn’t help a friend in need?

  Bandits could be friendly! Pirates could be generous!

  Couldn’t they?

  If not, maybe her bandit code rewriting was a big waste of time.

  With all those thoughts swirling around her head, Annika marched back up the path and toward the fortress, Blackburn trudging behind.

  15.

  The Test of the Mole

  Bolt was barefoot, dressed in a black robe, like his captors. He knelt inside a cavernous chamber where enormous stone pillars with elaborate carvings of moles supported a ceiling so high it disappeared into darkness. Off to the side was a gigantic pile of dirt that also reached up into the darkness above, and was just as wide as it was tall.

  The place smelled mostly of earth and mud, but an incredible animal stink, like a stable or a barn gone bad, also permeated the room. Bolt sniffed deeply, and then immediately regretted it. He quickly exhaled, trying to blow out the stink molecules.

  Would this be where Bolt’s story would finally end? Was he about to fail some test and also fail the world’s penguins all at once? Bolt took a deep breath, hoping the penguin-verse might settle his nerves. All he did was choke on more animal stink.

  Zemya stood before him, with Topo, the elders, and a few others from their clan behind her. In addition to their black garments, they each now wore small golden tiaras, which, Bolt had to admit, were quite elegant. “We are set in our traditions,” said Zemya in a commanding but steady tone, “like always eating borscht on weekends. But we have a trespasser now among us. And as our laws state, no one is allowed in our burrow unless that person proves themselves to be a mole at heart. But it is not our place to decide such things. That is why we have the Test of the Mole.”