The Obsidian Key ✔️

CHAPTER TWELVE

"So where did the name 'Mark' come from? Did you make it up?"

"No, it is the name of my half-brother, who died before I was born, and as a babe," She laid the cards down on the table. Another round began. "Hit me," I said.

She put a card down, it was now 19.

She put it down on her side, she got a 21. Right on the spot.

I sighed, then laughed. "You're counting, aren't you?"

She just smiled, shrugging, "Only since the last six rounds, lass." She drank out a bottle of rum that stood beside her, when she offered it to me I denied it. With a shrug she took another sip.

After forever through the voyage, and as I stood on the deck talking to both Amul and Mary, I could see the island in the distance. Madman Willy's island.

It had been a month already?

"Do we still have the plate?" At Amul's nod, a sense of excitement filled me. So close to the next key, so very close. We stopped near the island, and like the first time we used rowboats to get to the island. Amul, Caspian, Mary and I had went. Amul rowed the oars with his large arms, we made it there in no time.

"Hopefully the man will not ask for anything else," I said as Amul helped me out of the rowboat and onto the sand.

"He won't," muttered Mark. "He better not."

"Watch out, Darlin'," Caspian said to me, holding the golden plate firmly. "Yer wouldn't want to be thrown a rock at again."

"I'll just hide behind you then," I smiled.

Mark chuckled.

The camp was now in sight, and stepping through the last of the small bushes.

There was Madman Willy, who was at the top of a palm tree, hugging it. He was trying to look for coconuts.

"Um.... Willy?" I called out his name.

"What are yer doin' yer crazy loon?"

"I'm lookin' for my coconuts!" Madman Willy shouted. "I knew I saw one-"

The poor man slipped, and he fell right out of the palm tree and into a bush. All of us stood by and watched as he poked his head out. He turned to look at us, "You again!" He shouted in anger. "I thought you will stay gone!"

"What?" I said angrily, "It was a wild goose chase!"

"I wanted you off my island!" He grabbed a stone and threw it. "Go away!"

Luckily it didn't hit anyone, but his behavior enraged Caspian. He walked up to the man and snatched him out of the bushed, throwing him on the ground. he threw the gold plate on the ground next to Willy for him to see. "We got that plate yer want, yer fool. Now give the lass what she wants. That was the deal."

Suddenly full of fear of Caspian, Willy stuttered and stood up from the ground. "A-Alright! You guys win!" He walked to the tent but tripped on a stick that was laying around, and he fell. Seeing Caspian's anger boiling, he once again stumbled onto his feet and into the tent. He grabbed a map and planted it on the table, using charcoal to draw on it. "Anythin' to get that woman off my island! She's cursed, I tells ya. Cursed!"

"Shut up and give us the location," Now Mark was getting annoyed. "We'll be gone."

After he drawn on the map, he rolled it up and threw it at Caspian's feel. "Now leave me with the plate! Take that woman with you!" He hid in the corner now like an animal.

How messed up was this man's mind??

"Come, Darlin'," Caspian grabbed the map from the ground and urged me away from the camp along with Mark and Amul. "We got what we came for, now let's leave the fool to rot away on this island."