Life Stinks! (8 page)

“This isn’t Bubo!’ he roared. “I can’t possibly fight without Bubo. Walter!”

The king stood up. “Sir Roland, will you please hurry up and begin the joust?”

“I will, Your Majesty,” spluttered Roland. “Just as soon as I find my mascot. WALTER!”

“Nonsense,” said the king. “I’m not hanging about in this rain while you hunt for some silly rat. I declare Sir Percy the winner!”

He then nodded at me and said, “Well done, old chap. Tonight you shall have a place of honour at the royal table. Double helpings of peacock pie for you.”

And with that, the king and queen swept from the royal box.

The crowd cheered as I rode from the lists. The moment I reached our pavilion I dismounted and dived inside.

Sir Percy was delighted when I told him what had happened.

“Splendid!” he cried. “Now hurry up and get that armour off. I need you to help me dress for dinner. A victorious knight must look his best for his admirers!”

“Yes, Sir Percy,” I said. “Otherwise they might think you
hadn’t
just won a joust.”

Sir Percy
, I thought,
you owe me one. Big time.

Just then Patchcoat came running in. He was covered in rotten fruit and vegetables.

“Hello, Patchcoat,” I said. “I’m guessing you didn’t win the joke contest.”

“Well, no,” said Patchcoat. “But I got a great reaction from the crowd.”

“So Walter must have caught a
normal
brown rat and dyed it black,” said Patchcoat. “Quite clever, really.”

“Yeah,” I said. “If it hadn’t nearly got me half killed.”

We were on the way back to Castle Bombast and just approaching the
turn-off for Blackstone Fort. Patchcoat and I sat in the mule cart behind a beaming Sir Percy, while a royal herald trumpeted my master’s ‘victory’ in every village we passed through.
Hmmph
.

“Mind you, I do feel just a teensy-weensy bit sorry for Walter,” said Patchcoat. “Sir Roland was SO cross with him for losing Bubo! One of the other jesters heard him giving Walter a month’s toilet-cleaning duty. Apparently he’ll be working with our old friend Stinky Pugh.”

I took Bubo out of his bag and gave him a stroke. I was actually growing quite fond of the little feller.

“Talking of Stinky Pugh,” I said.
“I’m definitely having a bath as soon as we – OW!”

I yelped as the rat sank its yellow teeth into my finger, then leaped off the cart and scuttled off in the direction of Blackstone Fort. As I watched, Bubo turned and gave me one last look.

I could have sworn he was smiling.

Take a peek at the first chapter of Cedric’s next adventure:

SWISH!

“
Eeek
!”

THUNK! TWOINNNG!!!!

“Ah, I think we’ll call that a warm-up shot, Cedric,” said Sir Percy, lowering his bow. “Now be a good fellow and fetch the arrow.”

“Y-yes, Sir Percy.”

I picked myself up out of the mud, walked shakily to the large oak tree and pulled out
Sir Percy’s arrow. It was
exactly
where I’d been standing just a few seconds earlier.

“Shift the target a bit to the left,” he said. “Those trees are spoiling my line of sight.”

“Yes, Sir Percy,” I sighed. For the zillionth time that morning I lugged the target to a new spot. Sooner or later he might actually hit it. Just as long as he didn’t hit me first.

“That’s better,” said Sir Percy. “And don’t stand so close to it. It puts me off my aim.”

I
hadn’t
been standing close the last time. I’d been sheltering somewhere nice and safe – or so I’d thought. If I hadn’t dived out of the way, Sir Percy would have needed a new squire for the second time in three months.

A knight is supposed to teach his squire
proper knighting skills. But somehow my master – known to his many fans as Sir Percy the Proud – never quite gets round to it. Just like that morning, when he’d said he
might
let me have a go with the bow once he’d ‘warmed up’. Two hours of ‘warm-up shots’ later, I obviously wasn’t going to be firing my first arrow any time soon. I can safely say that Sir Percy couldn’t hit a castle gate if it was right in front of his nose. Actually, make that a
castle
.

Could this really be the same famous knight who once shot a secret message tied to an arrow through the arrow-slit of a besieged castle? From half a mile away? At night? Blindfolded? It’s one of the
best bits of
The Song of Percy
, Sir Percy’s wildly popular account of his knightly deeds. Hmmm. It wasn’t the first time I’d wondered whether
The Song of Percy
might be a bit … exaggerated.

He notched another arrow to his bow and I quickly checked for a safe place to fling myself the moment he fired.

“Ready, Cedric?”

“Ready, Sir Percy.”

All of a sudden I heard the sound of hooves among the trees. But before I could say anything, a gust of wind blew Sir Percy’s dashing new green and orange velvet hunting cap over his eyes.

TWANGGG!

“Bother!”

Sir Percy fired blindly into the air. I leaped for cover but luckily his arrow flew high over the trees.

“Blasted breeze!” said Sir Percy, pushing the cap off his eyes. “Ah well. No harm d—”

“Aargh!!”

There was a startled yell and a whinny. Then a grandly dressed man rode out of the trees looking alarmed – and very cross. Sir Percy’s arrow was sticking out of his saddle, right between his legs. A couple of inches the wrong way and … ouch!

“This is an outrage!” roared the rider, who looked vaguely familiar. “Raining arrows on me! I could have been cut off
in my prime!”

“My sincerest apologies,” said Sir Percy. “It was the wind.”

“I don’t care about your personal problems,” said the man. He yanked the arrow out of his saddle and flung it at Sir Percy’s feet. “Next time, mind where you’re shooting, you careless twerp!”

“Now, look here,” scowled Sir Percy, puffing out his chest. “I will have you know that I, Sir Percy Piers Peregrine de Bluster de Bombast, will not be spoken to in that tone by the likes of-of—”

“Fitztightly,” fumed the man. “Baron Buskin Fitztightly. Chief Herald of His Majesty the King.”