>>30789985The trip was quiet and enjoyable for the first day. Flim and Flam were there on business, but they certainly enjoyed themselves as much as they could. Flim spent his time with the crew, gambling and chatting the days away. Flam spent his time schmoozing with the passengers, learning all he could about their fears and playing into them.
Sadly, it appeared that not many of the passengers bought into the story of Mommy Pleasant and her curse upon the river. The foals were divided in their beliefs. Those that were young and impressionable believed it, but the older ones, ones that had received their cutie marks already, mostly didn’t believe it at all.
Flam wouldn’t let a little thing like that stop him. “Oh, but how do you explain the mechanical failures that plagued the first riverboats? They had some of the brightest minds and most powerful magicks working on them,” Flam said. “Then, without explanation or reasons why they might have failed, the engines would all just mysteriously shut down or break.”
“That’s not true. Not all of them,” somepony said.
“Not all, no, but enough that it couldn’t simply be called a coincidence. How about the time vines tangled the riverboat paddle? Or the occasion when the food stored for the voyage got infested? Or when the furnaces of every ship cracked in a single week?” Flam was running with the story. Nopony could disprove it, after all. He just needed them to believe him long enough for this week.
“Those didn’t all happen!” Somepony said.
“Oh, but they did! And do you know where these all happened?” Flam was on a roll, now. He could set this up perfectly.
“Where?” One scared pony said.
“Soon after they entered the Everfree Forest!” Flam said. Somepony gasped, and Flam knew he had them.
