Villager, 9

Threats Not Being Quite What They Seem Doesn’t Make Them Any Less Threatening

Ao3 Link

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“Wait!” Odin said, holding up his hand for a second before realizing that was exactly what the boy wanted. “Don’t cut our fingers off!”

“Yeah, you can’t!” said Murph, getting up onto his elbows. Odin’s dick was still inside him. “We need them, because we’re boyfriends.”

Right, that was the plan they’d come up with. Odin tried to remember that and not take Murph so seriously that he would cum inside him again, but seriously enough that the boy would believe them. “Yeah, we need fingers so we can hold hands.”

“And give each other handjobs,” Murph added. “It’s really hard to give someone a handjob without fingers.”

Odin nodded, agreeing with that. “And also my sister is deaf, so I need my fingers to speak sign language to her, and it would be really mean of you to prevent her from ever understanding me again. So don’t cut our fingers off, please.”

The boy rolled his eyes. “Fine, we’ll cut your balls off instead.”

“Wait…”

“Oh my God, will you get the fuck up? I knew we shouldn’t have fucking taken you. Not that anyone ever fucking listens to me.”

Odin looked at Murph, very reluctantly pulling his dick out of him, and helped him sit up properly. “We should go with him,” Odin said. He probably knew where Pierre was.

Murph nodded. “Yeah, definitely.”

“Honestly,” the boy muttered, arms crossed. “What kind of people wake up after being kidnapped and start fucking right away?”

“We were preserving warmth,” Murph said, defensively. “Since you didn’t give us any clothes in this cold dungeon.”

The boy looked pointedly beside them, where there was a pile of clothes.

“Oh,” said Odin. “Well, how were we supposed to see that when it was completely dark?”

The boy just sighed, dramatically picking up the lantern that Odin had knocked over when he’d woken up.

Odin crossed his arms. “Well, it was still dark. You should have lit the lantern. Just because it’s a dungeon doesn’t mean you have to treat us like prisoners.”

“It’s literally not a dungeon, oh my God you guys are annoying. You think we had time to dig out and decorate a whole-ass dungeon? It’s just a fucking cellar.” He held the lantern up. He was squatting so he didn’t bang his head on the low ceiling, instead banging his hand on it as he brought the lantern high. “Ow, fuck,” he said, jerking back. The lantern hit him in the face. “Fuck!”

“Are you okay?” Odin asked, struck by the weird feeling that he’d been naked in this cellar before.

“I’m fine. Just fucking go up the ladder.”

“Can we get dressed first?” Murph asked.

“Fucking no. You had your chance and you used it to fuck. Go or I’ll stab you.”

“But you’re going to stab us anyway,” Odin protested, as Murph ushered him to the ladder.

The boy just sighed as Odin went up, Murph’s hand on his butt. Up above, instead of a castle or a cave, it was a normal house, one big room with a half wall in one corner to lead around to a slightly more secluded area. It was familiar in the way that all houses were familiar, but Odin’s eyes were drawn towards the middle of the house, where Pierre was tied to a chair. “Pierre!” Odin hurried over to him, grabbing the knots. “Are you okay? Did they hurt you?”

“No,” Pierre said. “I’m fine. Are you okay?”

Odin shook his head. “Yeah, I’m fine, they just hit me in the head again but joke’s on them because Owen already dropped me there forever ago. Murph is here too.” He was trying to untie the knots as he spoke.

“Hey,” said a guy, grabbing Odin’s arm. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Uh…” Odin looked at him. He was also young, half his head shaved to show off a skull tattoo on his scalp, probably to help remind him what was under his skin. “I was untying my brother.”

“Well, don’t. We tied him there on purpose. He’s a hostage? You’re all hostages?”

“Oh,” said Odin, looking at the guy, who also had a sickle sewn on his shirt. There were three other guys, all with ominous things like piercings or tattoos, all with sickles on their shirts. “You guys are the Brotherhood of the Twinkle,” Odin realized.

“The…what?”

“I don’t think there’s any point in keeping these two as hostages, Crossbones,” said the boy from the basement. “Nobody with any brains is going to want them back.”

“Fortunately, nobody in this town has any brains,” Crossbones said with a smile.

“Hey,” said Murph, crossing his arms. “Great Scar is a really nice place. You can be all bandity if you really want to, but you don’t need to be assholes.”

“Uh. Well, that’s actually part of being a bandit,” said another bandit, who had a painful-looking nose piercing.

“I don’t think it really is,” said Pierre. “Or maybe it’s that only assholes become bandits? Whatever. I think it’s mostly just raping and pillaging. The other stuff is optional. You’re not going to rape us, right?”

“What? No, of course we’re not going to rape you, holy shit,” said Crossbones. He was the oldest boy here, maybe Odin’s age, if he was short for his age. Maybe. “We’re just going to hold you hostage and ransom you for a bunch of money.”

Odin looked around the house. Maybe the other bandits were in that secluded area in the back? He wandered over there. “Hey, stay still!”

There was nobody back there. “Where’s your leader?” Odin asked. “There’s just five of you?”

“No, there’s like fifty of us,” said the guy from the basement. “The rest of our crew has your stupid village surrounded and is ready to burn it down if you three misbehave!”

“But…why?” asked Murph. “I thought you were going to ransom us for a bunch of money. Why are you threatening the town if we don’t behave?”

“Also how come I’m the only one tied up?” Pierre pouted. “I’m not scary. Odin’s the one who likes to knock things over.”

“Accidentally,” Odin muttered.

“We didn’t have enough rope to tie you all up, now will you all shut up?” Crossbones asked, pulling out a knife. It was a kitchen knife, actually, and even Odin could see it was dull, which was a relief. Everyone knew dull knives didn’t hurt as much. “Just sit down together and you’re going to write us a ransom note. Then we’re going to cut off one of your fingers to send with it so they know we’re serious.”

“Wait, I thought we agreed that was a bad idea,” Odin protested.

“Yeah,” said Pierre, shaking his head. “Just cut off some of Odin’s hair.”

“Hey, don’t sacrifice my hair!” Pierre gave him a look. Odin pouted. “Fine, cut off my hair.”

“You guys don’t get to decide what we do, you’re not in charge here,” said Crossbones, sounding angry now. “We already decided what we’re doing.”

“You did?” asked Murph, eyeing one of the other guys. “Not your bosses?”

Crossbones went red. “I meant we like, all of us! The whole Brotherhood!”

“You…you are the whole Brotherhood, aren’t you?” Odin asked, realizing what was happening. “Oh my God, it’s actually just the five of you? You’re just a bunch of kids.”

“We’re bandits,” said the basement boy. “And we’re going to kill you just like we killed the guy who lived in this house if you don’t do as we say!”

That sounded scary, but before Odin could say that, Pierre frowned. “But this is Tommy’s house,” he said. Oh, thought Odin. That was why it looked so familiar. It had been a while since he’d been here. “You didn’t kill him though? He’s staying at the inn.”

The boy went red. “You shut up!”

“Why are you doing this?” asked Murph, confused. “Why would you do this to such a nice town?”

“What else are we supposed to do?” Crossbones asked. “We need food and money. Nobody cares about us. Nobody’s taking care of us. So we have to take care of ourselves, and this is how we’re doing it.”

“But…did you ask?” Odin asked. “I mean maybe you asked in other places and people were shitty to you and I’m sorry for that, but did you ask in Great Scar? My uncle and aunt run the inn I work at…If they let Tommy in, we would have definitely just let you stay there too. You didn’t have to do all this.” Why hadn’t they just come and asked for help?

Crossbones looked sullen now, looking away. “Whatever. It’s too late now, we’re committed to this. Now sit down and start writing, or…”

A horn blew outside. “What the fuck?” asked one of the bandits, looking out the window. “Oh, shit!”

“Brotherhood of the Sickle!” called a loud voice. “You have five minutes to let our boys go before we come in there and get them!”

Murph beamed, lighting up the whole room. “That’s my dad!”

“You’d better not have hurt them,” called another voice. “Otherwise we’ll have no choice but to hurt you worse.”

“And that’s Grandpa Lionel!” Pierre said, beaming and wriggling in the chair. He looked really cute tied up like that. “Oh, they’re going to beat you guys up so bad. You should really let us go.”

Crossbones exhaled deeply, glaring at Pierre. “I’m not afraid of some random fucking villagers,” he growled. He moved fast, and suddenly he was behind Odin, knife to his throat. “Bloodrune. Open the window. Tell them if they take one step towards this house, we’ll start killing hostages.”

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