Pirates of the Carob-bean
Out of the dark hills and across the plains rode Aromagorn and his friends. They were followed close by the grey-featured ghosts and gibbering ghouls of the Big Spooky Mountain, driven by an undying passion for donuts. They swept across the lands and scoured it of naughty beasts, eating all the strudel and cupcakes that could be found. They then came swiftly to the harbour of Pelagir and saw many black ships there, crewed by pirates that Sour'on had bribed with long johns and cappuccino to sail upriver and steal the patronage of the Cafés of Gondaroma.
It was an awful scene: The ghosts of the Spooky mountain seemed to run across the very water, sweeping the unwashed and amoral pirates into the sea, after ransacking their holds and pantries for anything with sugar in it. Soon they had an entire fleet of empty ships. Men from the lands they had ridden across came up behind and crewed the vessels, eager to get to Minas Teabag now that all the Ding-dongs and Ho-hos in their own lands had been consumed.
Aromagorn chose the largest ship to be his own flagship. It was a majestic edifice with great towering black sails. He leapt aboard, followed closely by Legolatté, Gemli, and Boromocha. But they found that the ship was not abandoned completely.
There were two men still onboard. One was a dark man; a short, slender character in flamboyant pirate garb, red sash, beaded beard; the whole nine yards. His eyes were lined with dark kohl, and he had several teeth capped in glittering gold. The other man was tall and well-built, with a youthful face and the callused hands of a candy-chef. Other than his dark-chocolate eyes and long brown hair, he was the mirror image of a certain Elf from Milkwood Forest.
"Welcome aboard the Black Beryl, gentlemen!" said the dark man, removing his hat and sweeping a bow. "My name is Captain Joe Sparrow, and this is my apprentice privateer Will Turnover."
Legolatté and Will approached each other cautiously, eyeing his twin as if they expected the other to evaporate suddenly.
"Nice hair," said the Elf reluctantly, trying to broaden his chest and look beefy.
"Nice ears," responded Will, touching his own as if in selfconscious envy.
Gemli looked back and forth between the two and said, "O my Mahar... please don't say there are two of them! Leggo, why didn't you tell me you had a brother?"
"I don't?" answered Legolatté, more a question to Will than an answer to the Dwarf.
Will shrugged, an innocent look on his face. Legolatté rubbed his smooth chin, then he reached forward and tugged gently on Will's trim goatee. Will slapped his hand away.
Boromocha and Aromagorn confronted the captain of the vessel, ignoring the Elf and his look-alike.
"Why did the hungry ghosts not frighten you away, as they did the other pirates?" asked Boromocha. "And where did you get that hat, Joe Sparrow? I want one like that!"
"Captain Joe Sparrow, if you please," sighed the pirate. He sauntered over to Boromocha and Aromagorn and looked them up and down. "We have no chocolate or pastries on board the Black Beryl, so they did not attack us, you see. And where do you think you're going to, eh mates? What's the hurry?"
Aromagorn raised his chin and tried to will his beard to grow long enough to braid and string with beads. "We are bound upriver to break the siege of Minas Teabag, and we need a fast ship."
"The Black Beryl is the fastest ship ever built! But why should we sail you upriver? What's in it for me? I see no profit in it for me."
Gemli hefted his axe and looked at Captain Joe. "He'd look better if he were a few feet shorter. Can I trim his sails, Aromagorn?"
"Not yet, Gemli. I think I know how to pursuade our friend the Captain." Aromagorn said to Sparrow, "What do you seek in these waters, you Pirates?"
"We seek a treasure in chocolate! I have a compass that points in the direction of a land that is full of sweetness and caffeine, pure silken cocoa and cream. Have you heard of this place? I must find it!
"We have been hunting this treasure for many years, you see. We are under a curse, Will and I, that we must find a great wealth of cocoa beans and return them to a secret island in the West. I had found this map, you see, and we followed it to the Island of Isle a de Milquchocolaté, where we discovered a great golden chest full of beans of unusual properties, the purest and most magical beans ever grown! They reportedly contained no calories and we could eat all we wanted and never get corpulent and flabby!
"Find it, we did. There be the chest; inside be the beans. And we took them all! We roasted them and we ground them, and we used them just like chocolate, making sweets and delicious-looking candies.
"The more we cooked with them and ate them, the more we came to realize: These were not cocoa beans, but carob beans! The carob would not satisfy; the candy tasted like ashes in our mouths; and all the pleasurable of caffeine and sugar had been removed from our diets. We are men that crave chocolate, Missy."
"Don't call me that. My name is Aromagorn; I am the king of Gondaroma! I am not a girl." The pirate cut his eyes toward Legolatté, with his long blonde hair and willowy build. "Neither is he. I think."
Sparrow continued his interrupted monologue: "Obsessed we were before, but now we are consumed by lust for real chocolate! There is only one way to end our curse; we have gathered all the carob-treats and destroyed them, and now we search for the land Real Chocolate."
Gemli elbowed Aromagorn in the knee and the man bent down so that the Dwarf could whisper into his ear. Aromagorn grinned and patted Gemli on his helmet. "Friend pirate, have you ever heard of Lady Godivariel?"
Captain Joe snatched off his hat at the mention of her name. "So there is a Queen of Chocolate, as old tales tell! Few escape her fondue, they say. These are strange days! But if you have traveled through that land, then perhaps you could tell us where this place lies, eh? Pretty please with sucralose on top?"
"Well," said Aromagorn, with a wink at his companions, "it just happens that the road to Loriandadanish runs right past Minas Teabag... if you were to give us a lift, we could see our way to writing you a letter of introduction...
"... what say you to that, Captain Sparrow?"