The Duke Read online

  Finn looked toward the bush and, on cue, the bush rustled and swayed. Suddenly, Jake jumped onto the road with a mask over his face.

  ‘WHAT’S GOING ON?’ Finn yelled, trying to sound alarmed.

  ‘Oh, did I come out too early?’ Jake wondered out loud.

  ‘What are you here to do, stranger?’ Finn asked, trying to cover up Jake’s slip-up with some bad acting.

  ‘I’ve come for the princess!’ Jake yelled out with glee. ‘I’m an assassin!’ Now he was getting into it. He turned one of his paws into a machete weapon. But Princess Bubblegum looked doubtful. She wasn’t buying this weird ruse.

  ‘Stand back!’ Finn yelled, trying to put more emotion into it to convince her. ‘I will stop him.’ Finn jumped up to attack Jake.

  ‘I will kill you and raise your children as my own!’ Jake shrieked, trying as best as he could to deliver a worthy performance. Finn and Jake swung at each other meekly while Princess Bubblegum looked on with boredom.

  Jake sensed that they needed to step it up. He clobbered Finn – sending him crashing into a rock.

  POW! SLAM!

  ‘OUCH!’ Finn yelled out in protest. ‘Remember, Jake, it’s just acting.’

  ‘Sorry, dude,’ Jake apologised. ‘I got carried away.’

  POP!

  Jake knocked Peppermint Butler out of the way and took his place at the head of Princess Bubblegum’s mobile milk bath.

  ‘Now to kill you up,’ Jake said as threateningly as possible. He then tried to seem surprised by the princess’s strange appearance. ‘But wait. Surely, this cannot be the fair Princess Bubblegum? Where are her pink, flush cheeks? The long, gooey hair?’

  BAM! UGH!

  Jake cried out as the princess’s knockout punch sent him flying off the carriage and crashing into the dirt.

  ‘Clearly, the princess travels elsewhere,’ Jake said, bowing like a lowly servant. ‘Later, Bubblegum,’ he murmured.

  With that, he exited the stage – and jumped back into the bush where the Duke of Nuts was waiting.

  ‘Get out there, man,’ Jake said in a loud, panicked whisper to the duke. But the duke had stage fright.

  ‘I don’t know if I can do this,’ the reluctant actor said.

  Jake threw him into the spotlight, shouting, ‘Go, go, go!’ The duke then stood up straight to deliver his lines.

  ‘And that is how I, the Duke of Nuts, by disfiguring you beyond all recognition, humbly saved your life,’ he said. He spread out his arms in a flourish, trying his best to appear like a professional thespian.

  ‘Yeah, all right!’ Jake yelled, coming out from behind the bush.

  ‘Yeah!’ Finn added, still lying by the rock where he’d landed minutes earlier. Victory was theirs! Oh, yeah! Their reputations were saved. No one had to go to the dungeon. And, most importantly, no one would be hated forever.

  ‘What was the point of this little play again?’ the princess asked with a yawn before getting angry. ‘And why isn’t the duke clapped in irons?’

  ‘She’s right,’ the mild-mannered duke said pathetically. ‘Innocent or not, I should accept what’s coming to me.’

  ‘Peppermint Butler, arrest him!’ Princess Bubblegum ordered. Peppermint Butler emerged with handcuffs.

  ‘Nuttin’s going my way today,’ the Duke of Nuts mumbled sadly.

  ‘NO!’ Finn called out defiantly.

  ‘Finn?’ Princess Bubblegum asked with confusion. Wasn’t he supposed to be happy? Hadn’t he pledged to arrest the duke himself? What could cause this outburst?

  ‘The duke didn’t throw that bottle!’ Finn blurted out. ‘Princess, I have something sucky to confess. I’m the one who threw the bottle. I’m sorry. But I knew if I told you, you’d hate me forever.’

  ‘Um,’ Princess Bubblegum said, thinking for a moment. ‘Well, I could never stay mad at you forever. And you seem genuinely penitent.’

  ‘I don’t even know what that means,’ Finn answered, ‘but thank you.’

  ‘But that doesn’t douse my hatred for the duke,’ the princess continued as her sweet smile once again turned into a malicious scowl.

  ‘Yeah, what’s up with that hate?’ Finn asked, terrified by this side of the princess.

  ‘That jerk always empties out my pudding pantry,’ Princess Bubblegum complained bitterly.

  ‘Aw, shucks,’ Finn began to explain. ‘He just can’t control himself around pudding. He goes nuts for it – because he has a pudding deficiency.’

  ‘It’s true, Your Majesty,’ the Duke of Nuts whined. ‘I’m…I’m sorry for my medical condition.’

  ‘Oh, my. You poor man. Of course, you’re forgiven,’ Princess Bubblegum answered. She then turned to Finn and whispered. ‘I don’t believe a word from him.’

  But there was nothing she could do. She couldn’t arrest the duke for her hideous appearance.

  ‘I’m really sorry about making you temporarily ugly, Princess,’ Finn told her. ‘Especially before the grand meeting of Ooo royalty. I wish there was some way to make it up to you.’

  ‘Maybe there is, Finn,’ the princess said. ‘Maybe there is.’

  Mere seconds later, Finn and Jake were headed to the Grand Meeting of Ooo Royalty, dressed all in pink, and ready to take her place as the representatives of the Candy Kingdom.

  This was, they agreed later, perhaps the bravest thing they had ever done in the Land of Ooo.

  The Duke

  published in 2014

  by Chirpy Bird, an imprint of Hardie Grant Egmont

  Ground Floor, Building 1, 658 Church Street

  Richmond, VIC 3121, Australia

  www.hardiegrantegmont.com.au

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  A TimeWarner Company.

  All rights reserved. (s14)

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  AS SEEN ON CARTOON NETWORK

  This ebook is also available as a print edition in all good bookstores.

  A CiP record for this title is available from the National Library of Australia.

  eISBN 9781743582497

  Text and design copyright © 2014 Hardie Grant Egmont

  Design by Ash Oswald @ Hey There’s Me

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