Kingdom In The Clouds

by SaraG

From the vantage point on the early rainbow, we saw them coming to the Kingdom-In-The-Clouds. The pirates climbed the cliff silently, hearts warmed with tequila, knives gripped firmly between their teeth.

We didn’t shout for fear of startling them and breaking the silent rhythm of their climb. Instead, we sent the children to greet them with instructions to choose a pirate each, grab him by the hand and take him home. The mothers were waiting in the houses with food on the fire and warm water for baths. The pirates ate hungrily, slobbering juices down their beards, eyes darting up as their mouths worked, all thoughts of violence startled out of them. They were so surprised, they even thanked us for the food.

We were patient with them, patient with their hunger and their need for warmth in the night. And in the morning, we’d completed our spells and took them to work in the fields with our other husbands, to suffer
a slavery without whip, a slavery enforced only by their pitiful devotion to us.

We set some of them free, like we always do. Your people have heard them, drinking their lives away in your taverns. After seeing our Kingdom, after falling in our thrall, how can their lives be happy? So they drink, and you hear them mutter to all who will hear: “There is a country past the Rainbow. It’s hard to reach and hard to conquer, but oh, lucky is the man who lives in the Kingdom-In-The-Clouds.

From the vantage point on the early rainbow, we wait for our new husbands to come to us. We instruct the children, butcher the lambs and warm the water.

We spring our trap.