“I was asking those ghosts if they were chasing after the witches,” Willowmina explained.
“Now why would they be chasing after witches, and how is it your concern,” he slowly drawled, as he took a decanter and glass from inside his top hat and poured himself a drink. The liquid was a misty amber color, and small clouds seemed to gather above it. He stirred it with the tail of his snake.
Willowmina took a deep breath, and then replied, “There’s a coven of witches in this wood that believe that their spell-casting and hex-making and general witchery has somehow awakened the dead from their graves, and those restless dead are the ghosts who just passed by. The reason we care is that in order to keep these ghosts at bay, the witches have taken to riding on hyenas and hypnotizing the animals into laughing and shrieking, figuring that this would scare the ghosts away. The problem with that is that these hyena hysterics have had an unfortunate effect on the raccoon population; the raccoons become anxious and afraid, and take refuge in the branches of the weeping willow trees, such as myself, and while immersed in our green boughs they nibble on our leaves out of hunger.”
She waved a branch with tattered leaves in the Baron’s face to prove her point. The Baron took her branch in his hand and took a close look with his eye and a deep whiff with his nose, which was pierced with an iron ring turned red with rust. “Yes, I do see what you mean.”
Slub Glub tugged on the Baron’s pants-leg, eager to contribute his part of the story. “And then when the willows get all bitten, they start crying a great deal, which starts a great flood, reaching all the way to the ocean, and then sharks get carried in and start eating my tail when I’m trying to have breakfast.”
“I see,” mused the Baron thoughtfully.
To be continued.
Table of Contents: “Slub Glub in the Weird World of the Weeping Willows”
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Illustration & text copyright (c) Andrew Goldfarb