Chapter 4.

The atmosphere between the three of them wasn't exactly friendly when they finally reached Lorry, but it lightened notably as they entered. The air was cloudy with cigarette and cigar smoke, which made Niklaus cough descreetly while the other two took a deep breath.

When Darwin spotted the barrel hanging on a rope from the ceiling, his mouth dropped open in horrified disbelief. "Not this again!"

Kol put a hand on his shoulder. "Relax, "he said reassuringly. "I've asked around. No one actually puts a cat in the barrel, anymore."

Darwin frowned. "Then what?"

Niklaus was rubbing his eyes with growing irritation. "Babies."

"What?!"

Kol snickered. "Candies and oranges."

"Oh, right." Darwin took a look around. "I'll catch up with you later, "he said not unkindly, when he spotted a couple of young men smoking cannabis in the back.

"I'll get some beers, "Kol said, and Niklaus suddenly found himself alone with an itchy throat and watering eyes. If not used to it, vampires were extremely sensitive to smoke and to make matters much, much worse, he was almost immediately surrounded by a group of colourfully costumed children.

An about six-year-old girl in a white lace princess dress blinked her big blue eyes at him. "Hvorfor er du ikke klædt ud?*"

(*'Why are you not in costume?')

"Eh ... , "he took a couple of steps away, but unfortunately his crowd followed. "Look, what do you want?"

The children stared at him and a toddler in a clown costume with one thumb in his mouth reached up and grabbed Niklaus' hand. The boy's fingers were wet.

The Original grimaced and tried to shake the child off without actually hurting him, but the small fingers tightened their hold in a death grip. Klaus cursed and looked desperately around the room.

Where the Hell was Kol? Or the weird kid, ... what was his name? ... Darwin! He could really use either of them right now!

He tried to escape once more, hoping that the children would lose interest in him if he ignored them, but the crowd moved along with him and if anything, it seemed to be growing.

The little girl in the white dress had taken hold of his black coat and was looking up at him with overt adoration. "Du er pæn.**"

(**'You are handsome')

Niklaus pried her hand off. He didn't like small children, he hadn't even liked his younger siblings when they were small children. Small children were loud and clingy and smelled funny.

He was just about to show them his teeth and then make a run for it, when Kol finally returned with two bottles in his hands.

"What do we have here?" he said, handing the bottles to Klaus. He grabbed the toddler and swung him around easily, making the child squeal with delighted surprise. And when he started to walk over to the play area away from the drunken adults at the rows of tables, the crowd of no less than sixteen children eagerly followed him instead of Klaus.

Niklaus drew a breath of relief and immediately choked on the air, coughing uncontrollably. A couple of men with fat cigars in their hands, halted their conversation and sent him suspicious looks while slowly edging away.

Klaus sent them a tight smile. "You look at me like that again, I swear; I'll kill you much faster than a cough."

Then he nodded politely at them and they nodded back, looking puzzled.

(Break)

It was almost four o'clock, when Laurentius Feilberg took the stage in his expensice suit and called for order. "Welcome all to the Knight Hall here at Lorry!"

Thorstar snickered. He had been eating his way through almost ten of the sweet shrovetide buns and still had five more in front of him. A young girl sitting at his side tried to take one, and he gave her a warning, predatory growl.

"Excuse me!" she snapped.

"I hope you are all having a wonderful time, "Feilberg continued.

Here a couple of drunks raised there voices in an incoherent yell. Kol was among them and Thorstar snickered again. Niklaus sat between them and lowered his head and shoulders to make himself as inconspicuous as possible.

"Now it is time for the children to 'hit the cat out of the barrel', "Feilberg sent an ear-to-ear smile around the room, "if you will please form a line ..."

The toddler in the clown costume was second at the barrel but to his dismay, the older children kept pushing him back until he was the last in line. And there he stood, bouncing up and down with his thumb in his mouth and frustrated tears in his eyes.

Feilberg handed the bat to the first child, a rather tall and sturdy ten-year-old dressed as a pirate, and went back up on the stage. The boy hit the barrel with all his might, but only a few splinters chipped off. He went to the back of the line with an angry scowl on his face.

When it was finally the toddler's turn, he could barely lift the bat. He desperately tried to swing at the barrel (now with a few loose boards), but came nowhere near it.

A room full of adults in various states of drunk let out an amused laughter.

Feilberg smiled overbearingly. "No, you have to hit the barrel. Try again."

Apparently, that was the last straw for Kol. He slammed his beer down on the table and got to his feet. "I'll help him!" he stated.

Thorstar finally stopped snickering and his smile dropped. He grabbed for Kol, who had moved out of his reach. "Kol, don't!"

Niklaus frowned. "What is he doing?" he asked, but Thorstar just shook his head, a look of mixed horror and expectation on his face.

Kol took hold of the bat, just above the little boy's hands and gave him a brilliant smile. Then he swung it with deceitful casualness.

The barrel flew across the room and slammed into the wall breaking into pieces. Half the oranges were smashed into pulp, the other half flew about the room, one hitting a middle-aged woman, too drunk to duck, in the face.

The room went deadly silent. Feilberg was standing on the stage with an eyebrow raised as his only sign of surprise.

"Well, "he finally said, picking up the crown of golden paper from the stage floor. "I guess, we found our 'King of Cats'."

He jumped down from the stage and handed the crown to Kol, who picked up the boy and placed the much too big crown on his head. The child smiled at him around the thumb in his mouth.

There was a much scattered round of applause, while Niklaus put his head down on the table, hiding his face in his arms.

AN: In the old days, cats were perceived as evil, and up until the middle of the 18 hundreds there was an actual live cat in the barrel. If the cat survived it was allowed to run away, not that I think it makes it any less barbaric.

Anyways, hope to update 'Descent' tomorrow or Sunday.