When The Green Man's Away, 13. Unlucky for some

"Welcome to my home," Derec Vedder Jones went on. "Seize her!"
A dozen Welsh miners burst from the shadows. I drew my bullwhip and cracked it menacingly, hoping to keep them at bay. I kept my back against the wall, and so the miners formed a kind of semicircle in front of me.
"You won't get away with it, Jones," I warned him. "I know your plan. You want to rule Wales, and you're going to use the mainline denominations to do it!"
"Clever girl. But you won't live to use that information!" he laughed. "You fools! Rush her!"
The Welsh miners surged forward, inside the arc of my whip. I thrust it back into my belt and prepared to use my unarmed fighting skills.
The miners were almost as small as I am, but a lot more powerfully built. Still, I know techniques that turn an opponent's strength against him. I just hoped I could use them.
Vastly outnumbered, I fought with hands and feet, until someone punched me in the tummy, hard.
I folded up, and then someone hit me on the head, and the room was full of pretty stars.
"Take her and throw her to the pit beast!" Vedder Jones crowed. My arms were twisted behind my back, and I tried hard not to cry out.
"A shame," Vedder Jones said, "Valerie tells me that you are a rather pretty blonde."
"Get lost, creep," I answered.
"But you will be thrown to the pit beast! Take her!"
The Welsh supervillain led the way, strutting like a short, fat Welsh peacock. I was hurried along behind by a couple of sadists who seemed to be trying to make me scream in pain. I wasn't going to give them their fun.
"You see," Vedder Jones was monologuing again, "The mainline denominations are in crisis. They can't recruit enough ministerial students. There are practically no liberals going forward to train as ministers, only evangelicals. Now, I plan to send hundreds of my own paid men through the theological colleges and seminaries of the mainline denominations, until THEY are the majority! Then I will use the denominations as my armies in my conquest of Wales. I, Derec Vedder Jones, shall fulfill my destiny! I shall be Prince of Wales!!!"
"Dictator, you mean?"
"Prince, my dear Grey Girl. I shall be crowned in St. Davids Cathedral! I shall rule Wales with an iron fist! All shall bow down before me! And then we shall march into England! I shall recruit all the Celts to my cause! We shall conquer the world!!!"
Mad, I thought. Mad as a hatter. Mad as a whole meadow full of march hares!
And I was going to be thrown to the pit beast.
Derec Vedder Jones stopped beside an open pit.
"Throw her in," he ordered.
I was dragged, struggling, to the edge of the pit. Then the two sadists left me on the very edge. I tried to step back, but they pushed me, and I overbalanced and fell forward, into space...