Thanks a whole bunch to JudeDeluca for helping me get over my writers’ block!

--

The next evening, Louise awaited Kell in their living quarters. When he arrived there, it was obvious he was not in a good mood. He sat down with his grim expression.

“What’s the matter, Your Highness?” Louise asked.

“None of your business. This better be good if you wish to see the sun tomorrow,” the Sultan replied emotionlessly.

Louise panicked. Had he forgotten what had happened between them the night before? Was this going to be the end for her?

Louise swallowed her fear and cleared her throat. “I have a story I’m sure you’ll like, My Sultan,” Louise started.

“Continue,” Sultan Kell flicked his wrist.

“Once, there was a man named Garth-” Louise started.

“Hold. You've told me this story already,” Kell said, unamused.

“No, I haven't, your highness,” Louise said innocently.

“Don't you lie to me, you slut. I've already heard the story of Garth Ranzz,” Kell replied, his anger growing.

“No no, this is a different Garth Ranzz. You see, this Garth, he had both a twin sister, named Ayla, and an older brother,” Louise explained.

“Brother?” Kell asked.

“Yes. His name was Mekt. Compared to his siblings, Mekt was a rather lazy and selfish. Never worked a day in his life unless he was forced to. And of course, the siblings had to work. They were poor. Imagine having to share food between three grown people and living in a tiny hovel. Not to mention they had a donkey to feed,” Louise continued.

“You're depressing me,” Kell stated.

“But I haven't even told of how their luck changed,” Louise said in a pleading tone.

“How?” Kell looked at her.

“Thieves. About forty of them,” her mouth curved upward into a thin smile.

--

In a small village, far from any trade capital or major city, there lived two brothers who lived two very different lifestyles.

The older one, Mekt Ranzz had married a prosperous merchant’s daughter, Esper, and carried a very lavish life. The younger brother, Garth, on the other hand had married a poor farmer’s daughter and though he loved his Imra dearly, she was dirt poor. Imra was a beautiful, charming, cunning and almost telepathic woman. She had the uncanny ability to sense what others were thinking or feeling. Sometimes living with a woman who knew what you were thinking wasn’t always easy.

Needless to say, Garth’s life was anything but easy.

The two brothers had a little sister, Ayla, who lived with Garth. She loved both of her brothers, but she was always closer to Garth. Ayla did her part to bring food to the family table in return for bunking with the ‘happy’ couple.

One day, when Garth’s hard day of cutting wood to sell at the market had come to close, he loaded it onto the back of his trusty donkey. He led the donkey towards the market, but was alarmed at the sound of horses approaching.

Click. Clack.

Click. Clack.

Click Clack.

This frightened Garth, but instead of fleeing, he hid his steed and himself behind a bush nearby. Garth’s curiosity had piqued and he wasn’t leaving anytime soon.

After the cloud of dust subsided, there were thirty –no, forty- richly dressed… merchants, maybe? Their steeds where brightly clad and they carried many riches with them.

The leader of the group stepped off of his mare and onto the ground. He walked over to a tree and carefully examined it by staring, listening, caressing, sniffing and licking it.

“Do you have to do that every time?” one of his men grumbled.

“Quiet, Ron-Karr,” the leader growled.

“Yes, Tyr,” Ron-Karr bowed his head.

“This is it!” Tyr exclaimed. “It’s been so long…” Tyr caressed the tree lovingly again.

“Can we get on with it?” another groaned.

“Know your place, Hunter!” Tyr stared him down. Tyr took a deep breath in and chanted the words, Open Sesame.

No sooner did he open his mouth that the tree trunk opened and the forty men rushed inside. The aromas of powerful spices filled Garth’s nostrils as the door slammed shut. Even though there was no one, Garth couldn’t bring himself to leave as the merchants may exit at anytime. Thinking that he was a spy, they would have murdered him in an instant.

Hours went by before the forty men exited. Garth waited for the clacking hooves to be completely gone before he moved an inch. Curiosity got the better of him and Garth chanted the same words, Open Sesameto the tree trunk and it opened. He stepped inside and the door slammed shut. Garth was in pure awe of the riches the storeroom held. Gold, jewels, spices, rugs, and anything else the mind could think of were in the vast piles of the treasure storeroom.

“Thieves,” Garth whispered. There was no human way to collect all this wealth honestly. Those forty men must have been thieves.

Garth debated whether or not he should take some of the riches for himself and his family and soon decided that stealing from thieves was plausible. He carefully took a little bit of gold and jewels so that when the forty thieves returned, they wouldn’t notice what was missing.

“Open Sesame,” Garth said and the door open with a creak. Garth tip-toed to his donkey and with the cloth he had wrapped his wood around, he wrapped the treasures. He discarded of the wood and returned to town discreetly, not to arouse anyone’s attention.

--

“Oh, Garth!” his beautiful blonde wife Imra threw her arms around him. “I was so worried when you didn’t return by sundown…”

“I’m okay, Imra,” Garth kissed her softly. He had led the family donkey inside the house. Imra raised an eyebrow at this, since it was usually kept outside.

“What’s with-” before she could finish, Garth unraveled the bundles on the donkey’s back to reveal silks, gold coins and priceless jewels. “Wha? How?”

“Shh,” Garth picked out a pink and white necklace and wrapped it around Imra’s swan neck. He held a jewel encrusted mirror to her.

“Wow,” she whispered. She took it off and gave it back to him. “Where did you get it?”

“Why don’t you wear it? And I’ll tell you in a moment,” Garth replied.

“I can’t wear this… Wouldn’t the townspeople question why a peasant woman is wearing jewelry fit for royalty?” Imra questioned.

“Well…” Garth sighed.

After he brought Ayla into the room, he explained everything that had happened from when the thieves first arrived, to when they said the magic words to when Garth himself managed to take some of the riches for himself.

“Wow!” Ayla exclaimed. “That really happened? That’s so cool!”

“Really?” Imra trusted her husband, but his story seemed slightly obscure.

“Yeah, scout’s honor,” Garth swore.

“… So what do we do with all of this?” Ayla asked.

“I think we should count it first,” Garth suggested. “If we know how much we have, then we can use it wisely.”

“There’s too much to count by hand though,” Imra countered.

“I think Mekt has a weight thing,” Ayla suggested. “I was there earlier. Why don’t you borrow his?”

--

After Garth had left to sell some of the gold (only a little, or else the townspeople would raise eyebrows of where the poor farmer was getting riches) at the market, Imra visited her brother-in-law’s abode. Since Mekt was out, she talked to Esper.

“Sure,” Esper said, suspicious of what the penniless woman needed to weigh. “Wait here,” Esper fetched her scale, but not before attaching some wax to the bottom of it. When Imra finished weighing whatever it was she was weighing, some of it would stick to the bottom of the scale, where Esper had attached the wax.

Esper walked back to Imra and handed the scale to her.

“Thanks,” Imra smiled and went to her own shack next door. She placed the gold onto the scale and took note of how much of everything they had. When Imra returned it to her sister-in-law, Esper was furious. After Imra left, Esper screamed.

How the sprock could the poorest couple in town have so much gold that they had to WEIGH it all!?! Maybe… Maybe they weren’t as poor as they let on. Maybe, they were pretending to be poor so people would give them stuff. Those bitches.

When Mekt finally returned home, Epser told him of what she had discovered. Mekt too was green with envy and set out to address his brother.

--

“Brother!” Mekt bellowed as he slammed the door of Garth’s humble abode open. “Where is all this gold coming from?”

“… What gold?” Garth looked up from his meal.

“Don’t play dumb with me,” Mekt lifted Garth by the collar. “I know about your sudden wealth.”

Garth, being the kind-hearted man he was, told Mekt the story of the thieves as he had done with his wife and sister.

“Open Sesame?” Mekt scoffed. “That’s really… stupid.”

“Yeah,” Garth said slowly. “Can I finish my dinner now?”

“By all means,” Mekt was suddenly kind to him. “Why don’t you tell me where this hoard of riches is?”

“Why should I?”

“Because I can out you to the whole town,” Mekt replied simply. Garth sighed. The next day, he took Mekt to the exact spot where he had been before.

“Don’t forget the code word,” was all Garth warned as he left to cut more wood.

Mekt greedily uttered Open Sesame and crept inside the vast, treasure filled room where piles of riches never seemed to end. Mekt shoved anything and everything into his many knapsacks and finally, when he had stolen everything his heart desired, he returned to the entrance.

“Open Barley!” Mekt declared.

Nothing happened.

“Uh… That wasn’t it… Open Oats!” Mekt said.

Again, nothing happened.

Mekt started to panic, “Open… Open… Open Carrots!” he said frantically. He tried many other code words, but none seemed to work. Not long after, horses could be heard.

Click. Clack.

Click. Clack.

Click Clack.

They all moved together. Outside, the leader hopped off his horse and said, “Open Sesame!”

“Open Sesame! That was it!” Mekt said under his breath. He hid behind a pile of gold, hoping the thieves wouldn’t spot him. The forty men filed into the secret room

“… Someone’s been here,” Tyr growled. “Something’s missing.”

Tyr sniffed at the air and walked towards Mekt. He lifted the cowering, craven man. “Well, well. Looks like we’ve got a thief on our hands. What should we do with him, men?”

“Burn him!”

“Stab him!”

“Molest him!”

“Pluck his eyelashes off one by one!”

“…”

“Shrink his head!”

“I know exactly what to do with you,” Tyr laughed evilly. Soon the whole room was full of raucous laughter.

--

When Mekt didn’t come home that night, Esper was worried. Garth told her to calm down and that he’d look into it the next day.

The next morning, when Imra went to the market to get some groceries, she passed by the northern gate of town. Her blood froze when she saw a quarter of a bloody dead body with no eyelashes up on the gate post. There was a message scribbled into the wood there. ‘This is what happens to trespassers’ was what it read. She walked closer for a better view and dropped her basket when she saw it was Mekt. Imra quickly looked around, seeing that no one could see her, she wrapped the body in her scarf and tossed it over her back.

When she was making her way back to the house, one of her friends, Lulu spotted her.

“Hey Imra! Whatcha got there?” Lulu giggled.

“Just some… hay. For the donkey,” Imra told her friend. “I’ve got to go, but we’ll catch up later, Lu.”

She almost ran back to the house and laid the body inside. Quick-thinking Imra emptied her basket and filled it with cloth scarves and visited the East, West and South gates of town, just to make sure the rest of Mekt wasn’t there.

He was.

She wrapped the three quarters up and carried them back to house, trying her best to look inconspicuous. When Imra returned with the rest of the body, she quickly put the pieces together and tucked some blankets over him, so he looked asleep.

That night, when Garth returned, Imra broke the news to him and Esper. Surprisingly, Esper didn’t really look as miserable as poor little Ayla did.

“What do we do with him?” Garth asked.

“Sew up the body, give him a proper funeral,” Imra replied. “There’s not much else we can do…”

“Where do we get someone who’s willing to sew up a dead body and keep quiet about it?” Ayla asked.

“Well…” Imra thought about it.

--

Later on that week, after most suspicion had winded down, Imra visited the local cobbler, Chuck Taine. She smiled sweetly as she approached his shop.

“Mr. Taine?” Imra asked.

“Yes?” he looked up at her.

“I need you to make a house call,” she continued.

“I don’t do those, sorry,” he gave her an apologetic smile. Imra slipped a gold-foil covered chocolate onto the booth table.

“Hmm… Well I can’t leave me shop unattended for so long,” Chuck replied. Imra pulled out a whole bag of gold-foil chocolate coins and tossed them onto the table. Chuck perked up and took a coin, unpeeling it and tasting it.

“That’s just an advance,” Imra said. “Do the job and there’s more where that came from.”

--

“Hold it. Hold it,” Kell interrupted her. “This is implausible. You can’t sew up a decaying body.”

“I didn’t make up the story, Your Highness,” Louise replied. “Now, as I saying-”

“I’m tired,” Kell declared. “I don’t want to listen to your silly stories right now.”

Louise swallowed, “Excuse me?”

“You heard me. Shut your trap and go to sleep,” Kell said rudely.

“You can’t talk to me like that!” Louise exclaimed. “I’m not some dog or something!”

“I’m Sultan,” Kell growled.

“And I’m Sultana,” Louise stuck her nose in his face. “I refuse to respond to a comment like that.”

“Are you just asking to get your head severed?” Kell growled.

“Fine. Do what you want,” Louise shook her head. “I thought you could be changed. I guess I was wrong…”

Kell softened when he heard this.

“No wonder your first wife left you,” she spat.

Kell turned red with anger, “Take that back!”

“Yeah… No,” Louise looked him in the eye. “If you’re gonna kill me, at least let me say what I think of you chauvinist asshole son of a bitch.”

Kell glared. “At least I’m not a slutty whore bitch like you.”

“Oh yeah, because sleeping with thousands of wives like you have, isn’t slutty at all!” Louise yelled.

“That’s what you really think of me?” Kell asked honestly.

“I’ll leave that up to you,” Louise shook her head. Kell took her hands with his and kissed her gingerly.

“I’ve always loved a woman who spoke her mind,” Kell said in between kisses. Louise wrapped her arms around his neck, he wrapped his arms around her waist.

That night, Louise never got the chance to tell Kell the rest of the story, and he wouldn’t have listened either way. The ‘happy’ couple was indulging in other sensual pleasures.

The next morning, when they woke up in each others’ arms, Kell whispered to Louise, “Can you tell me the rest tonight?”

--

Kell is very bipolar. Yup, yup.

Thanks a whole bunch for reading. Cookies for reviewers!