Jgorga dragged his hood shut with his nailed paw, but the passing caravan was so deep in cross-conversation, its merchants and drivers bantering across heaped wagons, that he went unnoticed, as if he was only an unusually squat and wide traveler wearing the most garish of all Ghulmarquean robes. Not that the garment was intentionally dyed with its multitude of colors, but streaked with reeking grease, flatulence, and beer, not only nauseating the raccoon, but so disquieting his craving stomach that he forgot his raging hunger, though its burbles and gurgles earned frightened stares from the children.
"What was that?" A note of anxious astonishment and a shift of his feet said that Conrad wished to be far away from the monstrous hunger pangs.
"That was raccoon, Conrad," said Jgorga peevishly. "Remember, I don't eat talking animals."
"I'm not a talking animal!" Conrad said indignantly.
"Really?" Jgorga's eyes darted to the rude boy. "Then I'll make room for you on the menu."
"What menu!" shouted Lucien. "What food! Don't even joke about eating Conrad when I'm starving!"
"Like you'd eat me, Lucien." Conrad's scoff was not convincing.
"No offense, but I like you the least, and one of you equals two of us."
"The raccoon has more meat on him," grumbled Conrad.
"I'll pretend I didn't hear you say that," said Jgorga. "While I cracked the same joke about you, and I'm no hypocrite, that's a loaded word to talking animals."
"What word? Raccoon?" Conrad sniggered.
"No." Jgorga frowned. "Meat. As that word turns a living, breathing creature into food, it's one of the cruelest slurs invented. A human word, of course."
"Do you mean to tell me that talking lions don't have the word meat in their language?"
"While I won't pretend to know the language of lions, I was taught that meat is a human word, and there's no equivalent in raccoon, bear, wolf, or deer."
"You know all those languages?"
"Why is that surprising? Shouldn't I want to talk to my neighbors?"
"How old are you, Jgorga?"
Jgorga hated it when humans asked that question, for being so slow to develop and mature, they saw their great age as a superiority, and not as compensation for numerous natural handicaps, the worst of which were not their thin, naked skins and pathetic nails but an utter lack of instinct and their abominable inability to learn faster than a kit no matter how old. Jgorga had learned Alsantian in two weeks, then gone on to master Ephremian in two more days because he wanted to read a noncirculating book in the Ameridian library. "Older than you, Conrad. So you had better listen."
When the raccoon's voice took a vehement upturn, Conrad returned a startled look. "Don't be so serious, Jgorga."
"Shh. All of you, just sshhh!" As their babbling didn't stop for his dramatic two-fingered shush, Jgorga squeezed his eyes shut in a see-no-evil mask he instantly regretted, for it frightened the daylights out of all the children.
"The army." It was the tiniest squeak his deep bass could muster. For although Jgorga had led them off road to a dirt path ranging through the dark parts of the Luskveld, this concealed route brought them so near the army that they heard sergeants barking to the marching ranks and smelled smoke and the lingering scent of beef, beans, and bacon.
Having dropped to a grassy promontory, they took in an awed eyeful of endless tent rows, and the tramped and trampled meadow where hundreds drilled with sword, spear, and shield.
"Why are we being so quiet?" asked Akachi. It was a good point. Even if their voices carried downhill, they would not be heard over the clash of weapons.
"We can talk. Quietly," admonished Jgorga. "We're unlikely to be heard over the drilling troops, and if there were scouts nearby, we'd see them from this overlook. But when we start down the path, we'll err on the side of caution, and ghost our way as silently as possible. Armies have whiskers." Seeing their confused expressions, Jgorga asked, "you don't know that proverb? It's because armies send out feelers." While their befuddlement cleared up, the children kept their skeptical looks. "This ancient saying shows we've known violent humans for as long as we've been talking animals."
"You make it sound like it's in our nature," said Akachi.
"Isn't it?" asked Jgorga. "Forgive me, my lady. I presume much upon human nature in even the best of your kind."
"As long as we can talk," said Conrad, "why are soldiers massing outside Ghulmarque? Is Queen Suvani waging war on her own kingdom?"
"It's a territory, not a state," interrupted Isola.
"I don't see the difference," confessed Jgorga. "You know the saying, Conrad—humans are humans."
"Don't you mean 'people are people?'"
"That one's completely different."
"Yes," agreed Isola, then went on to show she had completely mistook Jgorga. "Ghulmarque's ugly outside, nasty inside, and not even a good place to live."
"We're getting off the subject," said Jgorga. "Conrad, this isn't a war. It's a dinner bell." At their blank looks, the raccoon wearily elaborated. "One of those diabolical contraptions you use to signal to your captive animals."
Akachi said, "aside from Oji, rats, and alley cats, the first animal I saw in Draden was you."
Isola said, "Daddy would have been cross with you, Jgorga. You're supposed to call them domesticated."
"That was for your mother's sake, Isola. Your dad knew what they were, and in my hearing, never called them domesticated, or 'livestock,' but only animals. He would want you to learn how talking animals talk and think."
"You think so?" Isola sounded skeptical. "While he would want me to think the right things, we never discussed this subject."
"Given our change of destination, I think he would find it sensible."
"Aren't we going to Gaona?" asked Conrad.
"You don't miss a trick, do you Conrad? Not transformation into a worm, fairy sleep darts, or my subtle transitions. No, we're not going there. Not yet. The harbors are no longer safe."
"How do you know? I don't see any oceans."
"Where there are armies, navies aren't far behind, and youi don't want to get conscripted into Her Majesty's service, Conrad."
"So they are armies? I thought this wasn't a war."
Jgorga stared intently at Conrad. "How much of this is an act, boy?"
"That isn't fair, Jgorga," said Chiyo. "He's never seen an army."
"Conrad isn't unintelligent," said Lucien. "He's just a little thick."
"Hey!"
"Yes, Lucien," agreed Jgorga. "That was crass. Implication and insinuation is one thing, but blatant insults go too far." The raccoon sighed, turned from the vista, and dropped to all fours. "If all armies did was march, they'd be sleepwalkers or zombies, Conrad. They also camp, for the purposes of eating, drinking, sleeping, and massing. This is massing." Jgorga swept his paw behind him. "And we'll see the marching if we don't leave now."
"Where are we going?"
"To the Enclave."
"Is that like a city?"
"No. There are few humans in the Enclave. But more people."
"Is it fun?" asked Conrad.
Jgorga sighed. "I'm looking forward to the Enclave, but I doubt you'll like it, Conrad."
"Then why are we going?"
"They'll want to speak with you."
"With me?"
"All of you."
"You mean those of us from Earth?" clarified Aito.
"No. Isola too." Jgorga turned to the Alsantian girl. "I think we should consult it again."
Thanks to the Albatron, their journey through Ghulmarque, and into the Marquessa's castle, was relatively easy, for Isola had read its many wise reflections. As it was a recognizable artifact, depicted in illustrated books and folk art, Isola could not frequently consult it in Ghulmarque, so they huddled in alleys and back streets to determine the sagest routes around stationed soldiers, then such a subtle way into the castle that few in the Marquessa's employ could be aware of it.
While both the castle and the attached servant's keep were heavily policed, and without vulnerability in their architectural design, the Albatron was not confined to spatial analysis, and could presage openings in time, having an encylopediac knowledge of every window and door to be opened not only on the day of their arrival, but to the second. It steered them by degrees to the door to the offal pit, having revealed Vemulus would leave it hanging open, then continued this vision to show the Prince accost Akachi violently, then fall to their own assault.
Upon arrival at the offal pit, they covered their noses, then boldly rushed the door, charged down the dark corridor, and, although the dim light was not as jewel clear as the Albatron, bowled over the shadowy musclebound figure, though none knew with a certainty that it was Vemulus they had knocked down, save Jgorga, who had scented that vile bully once before.
Now that vile bully reeked in their company as he fumed about his capture; his hands were tied in front, and Jgorga held the other end of the rope.
While they planned to release Vemulus once clear of Ghulmarque, the vast Alsantian army made this unlikely for the time being, as the prince would no doubt order them hounded and trampled on rejoining his soldiers.
Although neither their presence nor the prince's absence appeared to have been discovered, habits even a few days old are hard to break, and moreover, they were intensely curious to behold a new revelation from the Albatron. As Isola tugged it from her backpack, they huddled around the artifact.
"Not so close," said Isola. "Not so tight. I need light." When Conrad took advantage of the situation to press entirely too close to her, Jgorga elbowed him aside.
"Ow!"
"I slipped," lied the raccoon. "It's your fault for having so many ribs."
"Like I have more than anyone else!"
"Really? Yours seem more crowded--pushier." Jgorga leaned over to murmur, "give the girl space, Conrad. She doesn't like you."
Conrad glared at Jgorga, then his angry eyes flickered to Lucien, who was holding Isola's hand. Their fingers found each other in escaping Ghulmarque, and hadn't shown any interest in escaping the clasp. In the journey from the Luskveld, their friendship progressed by such natural and obvious stages that only one willfully blind could not see it. If Conrad had succumbed to jealousy, that passionate defect of the soul, Jgorga had underestimated the boy, who until that moment he had believed too petty to rise above egotism.
"Your parents already have suitors lined up, Conrad. When you come of age, the line will wrap around the castle."
"None of them are her."
"That's true. They'll be like her, though."
"I doubt that," scoffed Conrad. "She's beautiful."
"She's a good specimen, isn't she? Two legs, two arms, and the usual complement of eyes, ears, and teeth, topped off with a nose and that blonde tangle of hair. Can't your parents find another moppet like her?"
"Can't you see she's beautiful, Jgorga?"
"Frankly, no. I'm a raccoon. But remember, Conrad. You're not just a lord--you're a prince. Isola was born far beneath you. And this will make you feel better--so was Lucien. As the Architects' son, he's an important person, but he's no king. He's not even a lord, if you don't count honorary titles. He won't inherit a castle or land, only a name and reknown."
While Conrad still had a rueful expression, a smile streaked across it. "That shouldn't make me feel better, but it does."
"I know, Conrad. That's why I told you. Don't think it makes you a bad person."
"Think it? I know it, Jgorga."
"Nonsense. You simply have a strong animal nature. You're like a hairless boar."
Conrad's smile fell. "Thanks."
"Don't mention it."
When the others uttered dismayed cries, Jgorga squeezed between Aito and Lucien for a look at the Albatron, where their future selves struggled to outmarch the machine-like goosestep of the advancing armies. While the army was insensible of following the children in their wake, the Alabtron's eye receded to an aerial view that showed but a few hundred yards between them, and they were nearly overtaken in several instances.
Jgorga realized he was being sloppy in his thinking. These were not only not their true selves, they were not even true images, since not reflected from a definite future, but a possibility; just as hindsight wasn't the clearest sort of sight, foreshadows were the dimmest of shadows.
"Does the Albatron expect us to let them dog our steps," said Chiyo," or does it show us this so that we might pick a different way?"
"If an all-knowing artifact can't find a better suggestion, we're toast. We can't outrun them all that way," said Aito.
"She always pictures my next steps," said Isola. "This is what we must do."
"She?"
Isola blushed. "Of course she's a she."
"Always? You stole it from Queen Suvani." Conrad's resentful tone showed he hadn't forgiven anyone. Not even Isola, the beautiful girl he couldn't stop staring at. Especially not Isola.
"Since we became friends."
"Oh, we're friends now?"
"Not you, Conrad." Isola's sarcasm drowned out Conrad's. "The Albatron and me. Not only does it feel like I've always been able to look into her, but I can barely tell the difference between what I've seen with my own eyes and what I've seen in the glass."
"Don't look in it so much," cautioned Jgorga. "It's not good to confuse now and then, here and there, or real and imagined. You'll become a wizard if you keep that up."
"And how is that a bad thing?" asked Isola.
"I'm not hearing a negative either," said Lucien. "I'd love to be a wizard."
"There are no schools or houses of wizardry in this world, Lucien.
No house elves or wands either, or any kind of fandom."
When the clamor in the field increased, Jgorga glanced down to see the drilling troops mill back into the army. Most of the tents had disappeared, and the rest were folded while the soldiers formed ranks.
"There are schools of wizardry, Jgorga" said Isola. "But they're very selective, and we're too old to enroll. The gifted are recruited very young."
"Let's table this for later," said Jgorga. "We must..."
"They're moving!" shouted Conrad.
"Keep it down!" hissed the raccoon.
"They can't hear us! We have to go! Now!"
"Yes," snipped Jgorga. "We do. But you have to be quiet. We all must be quiet. If we stumble into their advance scouts, we want surprise to be on our side. I'll go first, and the rest of you follow two by two, starting with Lucien and Isola."
"What about me?" said Vemulus sourly. All heads turned as one. This was the prince's first utterance since Ghulmarque.
"As I'm holding the rope, you're following me for the time being."
"Shouldn't you let me go? Or will you drag me all the way to your dirty den, you filthy animal?"
"Remember, I'm the one holding the rope."
"So?" spat Vemulus. "Were you offended? Should I care, when you deny me my rightful honorific? I'm still 'your highness' in these ropes."
"I would never insult you by pretense, Vemulus. I'm not your subject. Not only do I deny your sovereignity, but your sister rules only humans and their lapdogs and toadies. Those are metaphors, of course, for I have nothing against real lapdogs or toads, just the bootlicking animals that sided with a tyrant for a taste of power, or worse, a taste of flesh. Now, as I prefer you silent, you will keep dumb as a stone, or I will pierce your lip with this rope and drag you to my dirty den."
Vemulus trudged behind Jgorga with the most sarcastic stomp, plopping each foot as resentfully as possible, until Jgorga yanked the rope, jerking the prince's arms up, his chin forward, and his footfalls into a more earnest stumble to find his footing and not plant his face in the ground.
After Lucien and Isola, Chiyo walked with Conrad, and Aito walked with Akachi. Within the hour, they were hauling their bodies faster than they could ever go without thousands of killers dogging them; the soles of their feet were bruised by the insistent tread; their knees ached from their constant churn; their arms were leaden and numb from pumping and swinging; and, their gasping lungs burned, so that the searing air was no sooner inhaled than it was consumed in the furnace of their gruelling march.
This constant slogging shredded thongs from sandal soles, while those barefoot fared better, their heels and toes already inured to the thick, root-threaded Luskveld soil. Despite the Albatron's forecast of their escape, their fears were not allayed, for a million tons of marching armor clutched spearpoints a stone's throw away,
Though neither vanguard, scouts, nor cavalry had lucked into their oblique path along the ridge, they flinched at every clash or jangle, and ducked at every whistle in the leafy canopies, dreading that arrows would sprout from their bodies.
When the army turned west, at first they did not believe it, and scrambled ahead until it was evident the soldiers pursued only their mission of destruction. When the marching ranks picked up their pace to double time, clanged their shields with spear points, and chanted a singsong but unintelligible refrain to the slurred bellowing of their sergeants, the children were so alarmed that, despite their relief at not being hunted, they sprinted until their joy was exhausted--Conrad pumping his fists overhead like a quarterback's victory dance; Aito, too tired to lift his hands more than waist high, bubbled over with an elated, winded gibbering; Akachi panted "Praise the Prince" over and over, her crises of faith forgotten; Chiyo wept, tackled, and embraced the grounded and indignant Conrad; Isola dragged on Lucien's arm as the others sprinted by, then planted a tiny kiss. Though Jgorga turned his head from their euphoric puppy love, his embarrassment was not diminished in being ignored or forgotten by the delirious kits.
When Lucien disengaged from Isola's kiss to pretend an amused interest in Chiyo and Conrad's antics, Isola's face contracted wrathfully, and she struck Lucien on the chest before running into the woods.
Lucien stared dumbstruck until Jgorga cleared his throat with an unassuming growl.
"You saw that?"
"Do potatoes have eyes? So do raccoons. Mine see."
"So do Princes," snorted Vemulus. "Why you dally with that one is beyond me, Architect."
"Quiet, you. Don't go after her, Lucien." When Jgorga tied Vemulus's rope to a tree root, the Prince had to stoop, then fall to his knees from the raccoon's cruel tightening of the knots.
"What about the scouts?"
"You're not going after her because I am. She already knows what I think of her, and better than that, she doesn't care."
As Jgorga scampered in the bushes, Conrad sprang to his feet without a thought for Chiyo, and she rolled away, bowling over Akachi. "Where's your pet princess, Lucien?" Lucien's retort to the older boy's taunting was drowned out by the rustle of the thick woods.
Raccoon curses are untranslatable for many reasons, not only the way they mash curse words until no sensible interpretation is possible, but also due to the sensibilities of translators, whose ears have been known to blister in rendering the meaning. Taking this opportunity of being alone in the woods, Jgorga vented a nonstop stream of inventive curses until it became clear not only that Isola was moving very quickly, but, gauging by her widely spaced tracks, running. When her tracks were spaced even further, and interspersed with a tread of running paws, he vomited anotehr stream of profanities, then hunkered into his fastest scurry, tearing the wet earth so fast that anyone who thought to follow would see only a raccoon-dug furrow.
If he had little hope of outrunning a wolf, Isola had no hope, so he bent himself to his grim pursuit, hoping he might arrive in the moments before it mauled the girl.
Even swearing the Friendship Oath with her father, Sir Fafahite, hadn't earned the friendship of this spoiled girl, who went from pulling his tail and pinching his whiskers to teasing the two friends by mistaking one for the other, a two-edged sarcasm that cut both Jgorga and her father, whose face was buried in such long brown hair and beard that he seemed to peer from a bush in autumn. While Jgorga had never bothered to learn why Isola had never accepted him, he had done much to deserve her respect, for this was not the first time he chased the brat on her whimsical flights, once running under her rearing horse to cow the gigantic bully into a tamer attitude, not only shrinking the stallion's fury, but awing it until it acted as tame as a pony.
Whether or not Isola thought well of him, he would sooner be dead than let down Fafahite's noble ghost; when this thought of the old knight lent him strength and a longer stride, the savage and costly burst of speed left him with flagging spirits and sapped vitality, and just when his pace sagged, he saw Isola, treed like a cat, and the wolf elongated to a half-human stance, leaning on and snarling up the trunk. While Isola had chosen a mighty Luskveld tree for her perch, she could not reach the higher branches, and the werewolf would soon gain traction and clamber beside Isola.
Jgorga less charged than swayed in the momentum of lumbering, full-body exhaustion compounded by enfeebled forequarters, aching hindquarters, and suffering lungs, already squeezed to an excruciating pinch from escaping Suvani's army.
Not only didn't he know where he found the strength, but he was entirely ignorant of how he got from here to the werewolf's back, tumbling through the crisp, autumn leaves, his paws curled into gouging and gashing hooks.
As Isola leaped from the bough, its brittle leaves broke and fluttered on the grappling animals, clinging to their sweaty fur.
When Jgorga gripped the werewolf's neck in both paws, its muscular neck doubled as it both flexed and stretched its magic skin by constant transitions from wolf to man, so that the raccoon could barely keep a secure grip.
Raking the raccoon's shoulders with its claws, the werewolf snarled, "kill...I'll kill you! Smoke you into jerky and tan you for boots!" But with a massive heave, which coiled magic threads with ropy muscle in a rangy, enraged monster that was no longer wolf nor man, but only shifting were-, the beast rolled Jgorga aside, and lunged through the foliage, toward Isola.
When Jgorga bolted in pursuit, a drunken wooziness slammed into him, and it was only by great presence of mind that this dizzy momentum turned in the right direction, making it to the road a few seconds behind the werewolf.
Arriving to the road to see the beast hunkered down, all wolf, and wringing his head side to side like a dog worrying a bone, and Akachi and Conrad thrashing it with branches and fearfully shouting, Jgorga thought his worst fear was realized: having overtook Isola, it was rending her limb from limb.
Just as he was about to barrel into the beast, there was a snap, the beast's rapid stream from full wolf to half-man, and the outthrust hairy paw, which stiffarmed his chest and sent him sprawling and gasping. As his lungs were already wrecked from running, Jgorga rasped and rasped before his lungs gained traction on a tiny squeal of a breath.
"Save him!" Through his blurry eyes, Isola scrounged for rocks, then raised into a half-crouch with a stony missile gripped in each hand.
If Isola was alive, what had it done? Jgorga rolled to all fours, and hunching his head between his shoulders with an attitude of both caution and tenacity, stumbled towards the werewolf. When Vemulus rose to his feet behind the beast, Jgorga stepped back. The rope was bit clean through.
"If you will not stand aside, you mangy beast," said Prince Vemulus, "you will make me wage war on children. I prefer not to, but don't think I won't."
"Go. We were going to free you anyway."
"We can take them!" shouted Conrad.
Vemulus scoffed. "If it was only the raccoon, he might have a chance. You're liabilities, boy. You don't outnumber us."
When the werewolf snickered and flowed into wolf form, it seemed that it oozed transformation magic to spare, for its fangs and paws swelled larger and sharper, glinting in the sparse light trickling through the Luskveld trees.
"You're wrong, Vemulus. They're not liabilities," said Jgorga. "In fact, they've proven so resourceful that I think the boy is right about our chances. That said, we're not murderers, so you may leave with my permission, if not my blessing."
"Keep your blessing," scowled Vemulus.
"You'll be sneezing blood when I'm through with you, raccoon." When the Alsantian prince brushed past Jgorga, the werewolf turned his snout to train his eyes on Jgorga, then turned tail to follow the boastful prince, who hastened away with a speed that belied his swagger.
When they were gone, Jgorga said, "We should have killed him"
"Why!" said Lucien. "We're not murderers."
"We're not dumb either. What do you think he'll do first? Send mounted assassins? A whole contingent? Will that be enough to salvage his wounded pride? If he's calmed down by then, it would be more sensible to dispatch messages by horse, pigeon, or magic, and trust his allies to do his bidding."
"What do we do?"
"We're going to Teriana."
"What's Teriana?"
"It's another territory outlying Alsantia, like Ghulmarque, except still beholden to the old ways. Their statues celebrate a close friendship with talking animals, assuming Suvani hasn't pulled them down or the Terianians haven't squirreled them away."
"Can we get there before Vemulus gets us?"
"No."
"I'm sorry--did you say no?" said Isola. "You said this was our only choice."
"Since we're not the only ones heading for the Enclave, we might catch a ride. Otherwise, we don't have a prayer."
"You mean on a coach?" asked Isola.
Jgorga snorted. "You should know better, Isola. Something faster, and hopefully friendlier. Follow me."
When Jgorga ducked into the foliage, the children followed, except for Conrad, who stayed on the road, dumbstruck.
"How will we catch a ride in the woods?"
While he kept trundling through the underbrush, Jgorga turned his head to say, "this mode of transport travels off road."
"I don't like the sound of that." Conrad crashed through the brush and grabbed Chiyo's hand.
"What about my feelings?" said Jgorga. "I don't like riding anything, whether it has feet, hooves, wheels, rudders, or wings. I've crossed Alsantia many times with nothing but my paws."
"If it's not a turtle or a giant slug," said Chiyo,"and we reach Teriana before Vemulus, I'll ride it. I'd even ride the turtle if it had super speed, or the slug if it was a time traveler."
Jgorga tilted his head as he considered it. "That doesn't sound so bad. If only I knew some time-traveling slugs or winged turtles."
"What are we looking for?" asked Conrad.
"You'll know it when you see it."
"Why aren't you telling us?" said Lucien.
"It's a shot in the dark as it is, so there's no use getting everyone uneasy about what might not happen when we're already anxious about Vemulus."
"So it is bad! I don't know how it is on Alsantia, but fear of the unknown is our strongest fear on Earth."
"Fear of the unknown!" Jgorga sputtered with laughter. "That's the euphemism humans use for feeling that they are in a perpetual state of fear--all the time, every day, and in every situation. Have you heard the fable about human fear?"
"I haven't heard that one," said Akachi. "Please."
"What if I don't want to hear any more lies?" grumped Conrad.
"Then fall back to Isola and Lucien. Keep an eye on them for me."
Conrad sighed. "Is it a funny story?"
"'The Hairless Apprentice?' It's a hoot."
"I've heard that one before," said Akachi, "but not that it says anything about fear."
Jgorga chortled. "That was the monkey version. Since monkeys' minds are nearly as polluted as humans, all they can do is copy and water down the lore of wiser animals. While monkey myths are usually plagiarized from bears or rats, they stole this one from the raccoons. Although in a way it did come from the bears, since we claim it was handed down by Ramedra."
"Pretend I've never heard it," said Conrad. "Start from the beginning."
"Conrad snoozed through Worlds class," said Akachi.
"Worlds class? Is that what Njall called it?"
"Do you know Elderlich Njall?"
"Elderlich?" Jgorga snickered, composed his face with a visible effort, cleared his throat, then smiled shrewdly. "The Hairless Apprentice," he said, his voice dipping so deep that it seemed to darken the room.
"As Ramedra was the wisest, knowingest, and witchingest bear that ever lived, and Iliea a foundling, an orphaned baby girl, one could call this a tale of opposites: wisdom and ignorance; age and youth; power and helplessness; and, goodness and cunning."
"Babies aren't cunning."
"Of course they are. But I guess that was a spoiler, wasn't it?" Jgorga again deepened his voice to indicate that he was returning to the fable. "By the time Ramedra had become the wisest, most powerful wizard in the woods, she was also the oldest creature, and though she was now deathless, having forgotten how to die, she realized the prudence of choosing her successor, an heir not only to her knowledge, but her philosophy. Having shapeshifted to see how stags, rats, raccoons, owls, fish, spiders, and even humans, lived--she found that goodness only ever took one shape, and her apprentice must follow her on that most natural, most peaceful, and most contented path, so that if Ramedra ever remembered how to die, the moral reality she glimpsed would live on. This is why she chose a foundling, for she hoped an orphaned beast would see her not only as teacher, but as parent and lord, and do whatever she bid, even after death."
"A proud wizard, Ramedra liked to say she chose the human foundling to test what goodness beat in the human breast, but the truth was Iliea's wretched parents abandoned her in the woods, and Ramedra pitied the squalling infant. No sooner had she taken Iliea home than she fell in love with the human girl, and mothered her so well that Iliea believed herself a bear cub. On first glance, you would not have recognized her as a human toddler, for she grew twice as fast in nature as weaklings do in cities, and by the age of three, was as large as a citybred six year old. But no matter how much she behaved as a bear, and thrived believing herself a bear, her human tongue and hands, and most of all, her human ears, would soon undo Ramedra's teachings."
"While humans have only three natural gifts--Lies, Manipulation, and Eavesdropping--Iliea was soon tempted by those powerful and cunning attributes of her human nature despite thinking she was a bear. When Ramedra asked where the rabbit meat was,
Iliea's tongue lied as easily as her eyes blinked, saying, with a full stomach, that it had spoiled; when she came across Ramedra's snares in the woods, she untied the kills for her own enjoyment as if her hands had minds of their own; worst of all, just as flying comes naturally to birds and spinning webs comes naturally to spiders, eavesdropping came naturally to the human girl, and Iliea learned Ramedra's mightiest spells before she had sufficient wisdom."
"In these days, only Bears knew the names for things, and could speak as we do today, while beasts could only babble of moods and feelings, or sing of love and joy, and were simpler and happier than the bears, who no sooner had they learned naming, than they took to brooding in their dens.
While Ramedra wanted to impart naming to her apprentice, her plan was to teach Iliea deathlessness first, so that in a hundred years, the girl might acquire the wisdom to learn naming. These good intentions were spoiled when, shortly after Iliea's third birthday, she came into her human cunning and eavesdropped the names of things."
"Once the mystery of naming was revealed, the world opened to Iliea like a flower, whispering all names, and she soon had her own private language, which she hoarded greedily from her master. As Ramedra did not know these new words, and Iliea kept what she had overheard unspoken, the wizard only thought Iliea chattered human gibberish, and paid little attention to this new behavior in her pupil."
"By the time Iliea was four, she had spooled this long thread of words into a mimic world, each Alsantian thing corresponding to a new word in an enlarging core of knowledge that frayed every strand of instinct, not only the righteousness her teacher had braided, but the cunning the girl herself had knotted.
As Iliea only had eyes for her expanding consciousness, she was blind to Ramedra, who having lived with a human cub for four years, tricked out her pupil's secret by a very human trick: eavesdropping.
"The slash of Ramedra's nailed paw unraveled only the Naming from Iliea's mind, and left her skull, brain, and memories whole, a gray lair in which the Names Iliea learned, and the Names she created, coiled, slithered, and brooded venomous ideas. While Names without Naming is only a dead mind, Iliea retained the ghost of her former consciousness. Had Ramedra taken even one Name, that web of Names would have unraveled irrevocably, and while Iliea might have remained innocent, she would be neither bear nor human, but a half-thing, a hungry shadow."
"As it was, a terrible fate befell Iliea. Just as in the material and immaterial worlds, in the magical world, one thing cannot be taken without another thing rushing in to take its place, and when Naming was torn out, Fear poured in, making a curse of her knowledge. No longer suitable as the bear's apprentice, Ramedra cast the thief out, and Iliea trundled back to her people.
While reluctant to live under a curse, the humans were awed when Iliea bent nature to her will through the power of Names wielded by fear; when she slew a wolf for a cloak and two rats for shoes, they bowed to her, and to this day, humans know fear thanks to Iliea."
"That's darker than the version I know," said Akachi. "It sounds like the author hates humans."
"The myth is attributed to Ramedra, although our version is said to be much different from the lost original. If it is written by her, it's unsurprising that it reflects contempt for humans."
"Unsurprising?" sneered Conrad. "Why unsurprising?"
"Were you listening? Iliea's betrayal robbed her not only of her apprentice and years of effort, but of her adopted daughter."
"She could have forgiven Iliea."
"Forgiveness is very human," admitted Jgorga. "But it isn't always the animal way. Forgiveness is a remedy the stronger recommend to the weaker, as the strong want to enjoy what they've stolen without the bitterness of resentment. In the animal kingdom, only hypocritical animals preach forgiveness. 'Your eggs looked good, so I ate them. Please forgive me.' Don't you hear how that sounds?"
Akachi protested, "that isn't right! Forgiveness is powerful and divine."
"So the Prince will say, speak the prophecies. If they are prophecies. Are there prophecies anymore?"
"The Albatron prophesies," said Isola.
"That it does," said Jgorga. "Have you checked it recently?"
"You didn't tell me who we're meeting."
"You have a better chance of getting the answer out of the Albatron than me, Isola. I already told you—I won't say."
"Will you tell us if she sees it?"
"She?"
"The Albatron."
"I thought of it as male," said Lucien.
"Of course you did," said Isola. "You haven't held it." Having reached into her backpack, Isola handed the artifact towards Lucien.
"No thank you," said Lucien. "It might show me something I don't want to see."
"Stay in bed then," said Akachi. "Especially in Alsantia. Every day I see what I don't want to see."
"Bed?" asked Chiyo. "What bed? Show me the bed, and I'll sleep in it."
"I see...us," said Isola. "From far away, as if someone is looking down from a hilltop."
"What are we doing?"
"We're talking...and I'm looking in The Albatron. Wait! This is now!" Startled, Isola looked up from the glass to stare toward the mirror's perspective.
"They can be quiet when they want," growled Jgorga.
Glancing back to the Albatron, Isola became flustered, then stammered, "we're getting nearer! I mean they're coming. I think they're running!"
"Who?" asked Aito.
"I don't know!"
"Who?" This time, Aito glared at Jgorga.
"I don't know for sure, but if you want to escape Vemulus, don't take cover. We can't sneak if we hope to catch a ride."
Just as Isola, Conrad, and Chiyo looked like they were about to break for cover, Lucien, Jgorga, and Aito grabbed them and held them fast.
As whoever or whatever snorted, stampled, crashed, and smashed through the foliage, Isola, Conrad, and Chiyo darted for the bushes, but Lucien, Jgorga, and Aito clutched them and held them fast.
"We'll be run over!"
"In Alsantia, we say trampled," said Jgorga. "But don't you dare move."
Bursting through the bushes, flashing hooves reared up, and barbed, bristling crowns crashed down, to circle the children with a proud, majestic stride, in a cage of haughty, condescending stares and enormous antlers. While the seven stags were the most inhospitable creatures imaginable--all frost and sharp corners, and nothing like Bambi--the tallest stag, whose black coat's golden spots outshone any coin, had hard green eyes flecked with blood red.
"You have no right to this hallowed path."
Lucien pushed to the head of their group and arced his back in a perfect imitation of the strutting stag. "We have every right! We're headed to the Enclave, same as you!"
Jgorga cleared his throat and stepped to Lucien's side. "my friends..."
"We're not your friends, raccoon!" While the deer bit this off with more rancor than was necessary, Jgorga knew the deer tribes resented animals of equal status, not only bears, rats, foxes, owls, and wolves, but raccoons.
"Allies, then. If your people are not friends with mine, are we not friends of the architects?"
"What of it?" the stag admitted grudgingly.
"This is their son."
The stag's eyes widened. "Then that would make the rest..."
"That's right."
"What would you have us do?"
"Vemulus stalks us. You must take us to Teriana."
"Why Teriana, deceiver?"
"Now that's just rude. I've only ever stolen a fish. You don't even eat fish, do you?"
"The entire Luskveld knows raccoons stole preference and privilege from the stags."
"If you mean we're good company and fun to be around, I don't deny it."
The stag snorted and stamped uncomfortably near to Jgorga.
"Anyway," Jgorga continued, "we're off to Teriana to reunite Lucien with the Architects. If you take us with you, we'll owe you not only our gratitude, but our lives."
"As I won't be known for vouching for a raccoon, or bringing a foul wind to the Enclave, I'd rather you spend your measly gratitude and your paltry lives elsewhere."
"Foul wind?" Jgorga's eyes narrowed. "That's low, even for a stag."
The stag stamped his hoof. "If my fellows are willing, we might take you to Teriana. If we're not too low for you, that is."
"If we're not too foul a wind to breathe, we would appreciate that."
"We would be more willing to shoulder your burden for you, raccoon."
"I'm sure you would," mumbled Jgorga, "but I'm honor bound to see them to safety."
"At least entrust to us the Daikonians and the Architect."
"We'll stay with our friends," said Aito. "But thank you."
Isola still clutched the Albatron by its golden handles. Her eyes fall to its glass, then flicked up."We don't have time! They're coming." Her outhrust hand pointed to a troop of mailed horsemen trotting into the shade of the Luskveld. While horses or stags might gallop under the high canopies of the titanic trees, their riders occasionally cursed low branches, then sliced them with their swords. It was as if the horses were unmindful of their riders, or aimed for the massive boughs--as if the dumb animals were secretly on the side of their talking kin. Despite this instinctive conspiracy of the reluctant steeds against their knights, the cavalry would overtake them in moments.
Flicking his antlers with a dexterous twist, the lead stag scooped Lucien and Isola onto its back, while the other stags bowed their majestic racks. Once the children had mounted, Jgorga clambered on nervously, wobbled, then clutched the deer's spotted skin as if the raccoon hoped to find finger holes.
It was not a gentle ride. To the stags' hurtling, turbulent glide, the slopes seemed to bounce, as if up and down were equally elastic to bounding hooves that alighted where they willed. Their surefooted sprint was a complement of their natural grace but a clamorous nuisance to the raccoon, who thrashed and flopped like an ungainly flag when the stag descended, but hung on for dear life by aching forearms in its ascent. Even the stag carrying Jgorga expended less effort than a housefly as it sprang from hill to vale and back again, its meditative gaze spearing ahead, as if to say, "space and time matter not when I am already where I see."
For Jgorga, and Conrad saddled in front of him, the deer's melding gallop over shifting ground seemed less transportation than mutation of the distance, and Jgorga soon became so blind to everything that in his grey years he would come to remember the journey only by his forearms, which ached so much that they seemed to glower.
The warhorses' booming hooves became a persistent roar, then a murmuring thrum, then like the crackle of a creeping storm lingering far longer than any animal ought to persevere, and setting a gruelling necessity to their pace that soon weathered even the tireless stags.
Jgorga hoped the children wouldn't have the presence of mind to ask why the knights followed so grimly, for even guilt for an enemy is a terrible burden to bear. Vemulus surely had threatened his warriors with decimation in the event of their failure, if not with making an example out of every one.
But while horses might have the advantage on grasslands or a road, they were not so well equipped for the Luskveld as deer born and bred to it, not only having lither bodies to pass through bursts of foliage, but knowing where all those thickets were, and having the uncanny ability to fly over slopes as if they were flatlands.
"I think you've lost them," growled Jgorga.
The stag underneath him snorted. "Audren will be the judge of that."
"My forelegs are falling off!"
"Can't you take human shape?" said the stag with a caustic hint of sarcasm.
"You're well aware raccoons don't learn that trick."
"Such a shame. It would be amusing."
"As if talking deer swanning about in human guise wouldn't be the spectacle that left my head half-tilted in a permanent eyeroll for the rest of my life."
The deer snickered. "That's a mighty 'as if,' raccoon. Worthy of a deer."
"Quiet the chatter!" bellowed Audren. Having slumped on the mighty stag's back, Isola clung to Lucien, who cluched Audren's neck.
"I'm told this isn't a proper raccoon pace, my liege." While the stag's tone was scornful, his merry eyes jounced as he took more care in his steps, so that Jgorga could sit up. Having slid so far over the animal's hindquarters that his calves wagged in time with the deer's tail, Conrad only righted himself by clutching Jgorga's back and dragging himself upright.
"Is that so?" mused Audren. "If it wouldn't be an imposition on the good knights, we might leave him to try the horses' slovenly gait."
Conrad asked, "where is Teriana?" As the stags snorted and squealed, and Jgorga and Isola stifled chuckles, Conrad's face whitened, then splotched with red, looking as colorful as a plate of spaghetti. "Why is that funny?"
"While we are very fast, Teriana is not so near as that, my lord."
"That's 'your highness' to you." Conrad was steamed. "You're speaking to the Prince of Gaona."
"I allow your authority, for Gaona was always good to its dumb beasts" said Audren, "but not your sovereignity. Even if your father had not honored Suvani's reign, Gaona is many miles away by land and sea, and these hooves will never rest in your kingdom."
"Honored her?" said Conrad. "How did he honor her?"
When Isola spoke, she looked not to Conrad, but to the regal stag. "Gaona sent the Queen a kingly gift: teas and tinctures from herbs grown only on that isle, as well as casks of wine and tons of fish and shellfish."
"What's wrong with giving gifts? It's nice to give to your friends, and noble to give to your enemies."
Jgorga looked at Conrad shrewdly; was the boy only hamming up to his new title, or truly filling the role of the Prince of Gaona? In either case, such a line was nearly too sanctimonious to be borne. The raccoon sighed heavily. He was not asked to school the boy in manners, only to deliver him to his father.
"Is that so?" Isola's gaze darted to Conrad, then flicked to Jgorga. "What would you give to one who slaughtered your family, then made their bones into a tea service? I'm asking for a friend."
"What?" Conrad said, his eyes suddenly vacant of any pretense toward sagacity or nobility. "That didn't really happen, did it?"
"Don't be stupid, Conrad," said Lucien. "You believe in the talking raccoon and the fairies, but not the evil queen?"
"Maybe Conrad shouldn't believe in me," said Jgorga. "It isn't doing me any good--I've got so much motionsickness from bouncing on this stag that maybe doing without Conrad's belief would suit me better." The raccoon turned to glare facetiously at Conrad. "Don't believe in me, Conrad. Just for a little while. I want to try something new."
When the stags' rollicking laughter indicated their resentment for the raccoon had relaxed into a gentler distaste, Audren cut them off with his booming decree. "Maintain a rapid clip for now, but take the river path for our guests' sake." The deer having nickered their assent, he continued. "In an hour, we'll see if we can sustain our lead at a more reasonable pace."
Cold spray and mist rolled from the vast, glassy surface of the Andocorun River, inspiring in Jgorga an instant regret that he could not linger there, fish along its banks, and watch schools of fish and the fleet wafting of sailboats.
As Audren promised, their journey became evener, as while the Andocorun meandered, there were no tree roots to overleap, branches to duck, or thickets and overgrowth to crash, but only the flat black shells of mussels, stones polished to a glazed sheen by the lapping waves, and an occasional rotting fish to dodge.
After an hour, they slowed to a nimble trot, then a sprightly walk, at times seeming like they pranced to amuse their passengers.
"My lord," said Jgorga's stag, "we had best return to the woods."
Lucien and Isola clung tight as mighty Audren turned his vast crown of antlers, tramped a full circle, reared, and gazed at the sunlit horizon. "No one follows us, Ondrei."
Ondrei said, "look to the Andocorun."
For the sailboats were parting, some cleaving to the nearest shore and the rest sticking to the farthest, to admit a teeming fleet of triremes that so burned the golden glare of their painted hulls into the gleaming, gilded river that the warships seemed double their vast number. Hundreds of oars clapped the river, churning waves aside and in the wake of the galley fleet.
"To the woods!" bade Audren, and the stags vaulted the bushes fringing the river path, then shot up the nearly vertical incline, so that Jgorga, in his flailing, face first ascent, learned what it felt like to fall upward.
When the first arrow sprouted in Ondrei's foreleg, that noble deer channeled the painful spasm into a muscular jerk that catapulted Jgorga and Conrad to the cliff's edge, then he spilled downslope, his antlers clawing soil already crumbled by trampling hooves.
Jgorga's left paw fell to the nape of Conrad's neck, and his right clutched the frayed roots of a tattered stalk, by which he dangled for a moment before scampering up, dragging the leaden Conrad by his already numb paw, until he heaved the boy beside him on the ledge.
By stiffening his hindlegs, Ondrei broke his slide and dug a long trench, but his antlers, having been dragged along the cliff, now dangled in splinters and shreds over the arrow in his shoulder.
Either they were spotted on the river path or the archers volleyed blind into the trees, for that was the only arrow to find its mark, while others clattered, skidded down the slopes, or sailed over the ridge.
Ondrei shook his head, then called up to Audren. "No farther for me, my lord. We'll meet in Teirana."
"Take the leeward side, Ondrei. The Queen's scouts will swarm the breezy side."
"The arrow hit my shoulder, not my head. My lord."
When Audren snorted, turned, then led the deer along the ridgeward path, another deer—older but no gentler, despite the soft gray tangle drooping from his chin—stooped for Jgorga and Conrad to climb on his back. If just as gruff as Ondrei, he was more placid, and their ride so smooth that Jgorga relaxed his white-knuckled grip.
The white clouds soon billowed black storms, and as rain streaked the rocks, rivulets ran down the slope, and the stags slowed to a cautious gait. By the time they overlooked the other side of the crag, the downward slope was awash with runnels of mud, hurtling stones, weeds, snakes, bugs, and one lonely arrow, in its engorged, slimy flow.
When Audren bolted down the slope, Isola and Lucien's faces froze in shock as their hair streamed behind them and their eyes swam with vertigo. One by one, the stags bounded after, each leap followed so quickly that the tumbling stags seemed to be on the heels of their own images.
They rode for hours before stopping for the night. As their dark, dolorous camp had no fire, the children huddled in odd groups: Chiyo and Conrad, who seemed less happy than uncomfortable with the situation (how would he act if he knew who she really was, Jgorga wondered); Isola clung to Lucien, who faced Aito, as the boys talked half the night about their Alsantian adventures; and, Akachi leaned against the deer that had carried her, a robust doe with red fur and mottled peach spots.
In one moment, Jgorga wondered what he had missed in The Good Cop, his favorite Earth television drama, and in the next, blaring daylight seared his eyes, so that he didn't know whether he was blind or deaf in that moment of pristine synesthesia
"I'm awake," he muttered. "How long did I sleep?"
"Not long," muttered the stag elder, "although your leaden head has rested overlong on my haunches. For your noble consideration, raccoon," the stag continued gravely, "I have not passed wind all night, and I'm beginning to feel stopped up."
"Don't wait on my account. I smell so bad that I can barely breathe, and my mind is blasted out of body." Nonetheless, the raccoon scrabbled to his feet.
As breakfast was only a long breath of fresh air and some minty roots kicked up by the stags' hooves, Jgorga dearly wished to backtrack to the Andocorun for some fish, but even if the triremes had passed, they were now half a day's journey from the river. If their scanty breakfast was unsuitable for raccoons or growing human children, falling back or foraging in these foothills would squander their lead on Vemulus.
The next day's journey was like the first, except the stags stopped frequently to graze on twigs and tender shoots, and camped earlier for the sake of their weary passengers. During these stops, and prior to bedding down for the night, Jgorga foraged berries, tiny clusters of eltreia nuts, and a horde of silvery bugs that were crunchy, delicious, and unwanted by the gagging children, so he hogged them all to himself, and gorged himself until bug juice wet his furry jowls.
By nightfall of the third day, the children tottered like woozy ancients, and even the stags' gait began to falter, while Jgorga had just hit his stride, having come to enjoy the trip as a vacation. Although he longed for his mate and kits over meals and before turning in, when the lonely titans of the Luskveld yielded to the stately trees of Teriana, which clumped in tangled copses, making the path meander around the wooded clusters, everything seemed subtler; the light trickling through the leaf canopies was less a monotonous glare and more a dappled shining; the air was crisper; even their hoofbeats echoed tinnily on the glinting tree trunks.
"Are they trees?" asked Conrad.
Because there were half again as many stags as children, the stags rotated their burdens, and they now rode not the stag elder, but Audren himself, the most constant, majestic mount of all, if also the most supercilious, his haughtiness even scorning the passengers he deigned to help.
After turning to transfix Conrad with a stare, Audren harumphed, then turned back to their path. "What else would they be?" he snorted.
"They're metallic."
"Not fully. There's iron in the soil."
At the children's murmurs of awe, dropped jaws, and outstretched fingers, Jgorga shifted on the stag's back to face a slate gray wall running between two hillocks excavated into towers, the earthworkers having taken the time to shape not only windows, but crennelations crowning the mounds. On the facing wall, an owl, a squirrel, and a serpent stared down at them from an embrasure sill, while a human in a green helm leaned over the talking animals.
Teriana's outer wall was so in tune with naturethat its stones alternated with the natural ramparts formed by the earth's upswells, and while the tops of stone towers were barely visible on the far western wall, as they approached its east flank, they saw that other than the two fresh earthworks, that side mingled with artifacts from the Luskveld--titanic trees long dead, but firmly rooted, burned black and iron hard, an hollowed into natural towers. Jgorga supposed that mighty forest once claimed Teriana as well. That these vegetal towers possessed man-made stairs and floors was marked by faces watching from the embedded windows: a wolf leaning frrom the third floor window, another owl clinging to the sill on the ninth, and three humans manning a catapult on the tower top.
"My lord," called the grizzled elder. "Heed Ondrei."
The wounded stag crashed through the overgrowth lining the ridge, and so vaulted, bounded and sprang, scrabbling over rocks and gravel rolling down the incline, that he no longer ran like one with a jagged arrow shaft protruding from his foreleg.
The galloping cause crashed through the brush to skid down the incline: a mounted regiment clad in Suvani's orange and violet, which now glimpsed the forest fortress, dug in their hooves and strove to turn their steeds."Fall back!"
By an impossibly elastic movement, Audren rolled his head back, scooped Jgorga and Conrad with his rack, and tossed them none too gently upon the ground, then, in lieu of a battlecry, sprang in a charge that drew the unladen deer in his wake, all of whom mirrored his eloquent grace with the ferocity of their resolve. This left three stags, two of which stooped to unlimber their human burdens, then rose into such an abrupt charge that it seemed they hadn't first taken time to stand, but ran for an instant on their knees. Only the stag elder remained.
Only the stag elder remained. "Come with me, young Architect." Lucien looked up. Despite his great age, the towering deer was a fearsome creature with antlers that showed signs of constant use. Jgorga had to respect a creature that fought so much in so short a time, for while talking deer keep their antlers longer than mundane deer, they nonetheless grew rapidly like hair and fingernails, and for that much wear and tear to be on display, this elder deer no doubt fought more than he spoke.
"Don't," said Isola.
"I won't leave them," said Lucien.
"I don't ask." After a nimble flick of its hoary antlers, Lucien was astride the ancient stag's back.
Before Jgorga could open his mouth, the elder deer was twenty yards away, and the raccoon muddled through his gelatinous confusion in slow-motion: "get...what?...no!...let's go!"
Ignoring the thunder of hooves on the slope, the screeching clash of antler on armor at their backs, and cries from guards ensconced in the towers, Jgorga led them in a mad dash for the sprightly deer, who tripled his lead with every passing second, and within a minute, pranced to the gate, which creaked open.
"Stop!" said Jgorga.The children breathlessly gathered around the raccoon. With her hands on her knees, Chiyo panted so hard that she started coughing, while Isola's jagged breaths were interspersed with angry shouts.
"Don't stop! We're going after Lucien."
"Isn't this where we wanted to go?" asked Conrad.
"Something's wrong," said Jgorga. "Why take him and not us? Have we escaped the prince's spears only to fall into his net?"
Aito said, "this is Teriana, Jgorga. It's still a good place. Isn't it?"
"I thought so," said Jgorga. "But I don't know. I smell rats."
"The phrase is 'I smell a rat,'" said Conrad.
"No, I mean I literally smell rats. While Teriana has always had a good smell, like flowers and fir and fruit trees, now it wafts on an undercurrent of trash--lots and lots of garbage, and rat hair."
"We're all ripe," said Chiyo. "It might be Conrad, or your own sweaty fur."
"Hey!" said Conrad.
"I rarely concur with the prince," said Jgorga stiffly, "but I take exception to your insinuation that I smell like a rat."
"What if he's right?" asked Aito. "Lucien and I saw a swarm of talking rats on Earth. Whatever Suvani's game is, the rats are in on it. Maybe Teriana is part of the spoils."
"Or she wants to raze it," agreed Jgorga.
"I know this is like a storybook world," said Conrad, "but should we assume ALL rats are bad? Things aren't always that black and white."
"Why not?" Jgorga scowled. "They are on your world."
"No they're not!"
"That's not what I saw. Your television reduces everything to warring opinions."
"Just how long did you live in our mansion?"
"Before the Holy Foyer was destroyed, I used to be sent back and forth, and often would prolong my stay, raid your pantry, then sample what was on television with the volume down and the subtitles on."
"You know how to use subtitles?"
"And a television. I wish we had television in Alsantia. There are more opportunities for actors on your world. I would like that." Jgorga's wistful expression was meant to suggest that his own acting career might have taken off with such opportunities. "But I always made time for the news, on which I watched what passes for justice on Earth."
"It's better than here!"
"That's a very low bar, Conrad. If Alsantia has greedy eyes and rapacious clutches, your world is a blind groper. Your people don't even know what they want, and who can blame them when life flashes by so quickly on screens advertising not only images and idols, but other screens, those handfuls of vanity you call cell phones."
Isola screamed, and having vented the shriek to its tail end, began hyperventilating. "What are you doing?"
"I'm sorry, Isola," said Jgorga. "I had to mention the rats. You heard the lady. Less talking and more walking."
While Lucien and the elder stag had long passed from view, they half-ran until they sagged with exhaustion, then slacked off to a brisk stagger until they reached the gate, which remained expectantly open.
"Remember..." started Jgorga.
"No more reminders!" seethed Isola.
"I only meant to say that it's not only a gate, but a gatehouse. If you run, you're likely to be speared by the guards in the murder holes above."
"Murder holes?" asked Akachi.
"Slits in the ceiling through which invaders are killed at leisure. While we're not invaders, if we look like them, they'll have cause to run us through. Especially with rats on the Terianan horizon."
Upon reaching the gate, four guards armored in green armor of layered, lacquered wood descended a stairwell concealed by the left wall.
"Strange garb," said one. "What's left of it." While his smile was warm and his tone friendlier than you would expect from one mocking ragamuffins, a brutal stare transfixed his eyes, and his unshaven chin was spiky as a morning-star.
"They're friends of the Architects," said Jgorga.
"Do the Architects know that?"
"The boy on deerback who trotted through your gate is not only the Architects' son, but our friend."
"Teriana is a free place, and you're welcome to enter. Aside for troublemakers, which I have the discretion to distinguish as such and bar from the city."
Jgorga resisted the temptation to roll his eyes. "We're not troublemakers. What's the opposite of a troublemaker?"
"I don't know—goodness-makers?"
"Cooperation-makers?" suggested Chiyo. That the girl loved word and number games could be seen in the dogeared, crinkled puzzle book jutting from her robe pocket.
"Yes," said Jgorga. "We're that."
"Well then, cooperation-makers. Teriana has room for you at present." The guard's eyes glazed over like one about to recite from memory, which of course he was, for it was his duty to disseminate information to whoever entered Teriana. "While Teriana is a free city, it is governed in the name of the Noble Pelt by Steward Audren." As even Jgorga had not known they were escorted to the free lands by its steward, his eyes widened as much as the children's. "Whether you are immigrant, tourist, or diplomat, no one gets a free pass in Teriana. Anyone within these walls is subject to the Noble Pelt and Terianan law. All forms of theft and violence are prohbited, from stealing eggs to butting horns, and theft of food is punishable by death, a sentence which our grim steward rarely commutes, and will happily execute. Moreover, while you are in Teriana, you are Audren's deputies, and beholden to uphold our laws. Not helping others is criminal, so heed the call. The hungry are fed twice daily at the fountains, one of which adjoins this gatehouse. If you're looking for work, stay by the fountain after breakfast to be recruited for public works. If you're applying for citizenship, be warned: we have a labor surplus crisis, which is the reason for the busy work comissioned by the Steward." Relaxing his monotonously strident tone, he added, "if you ask me, we have a surplus of everything, even the citizens."
When they lingered, the roughhewn guard added, "haven't I helped you yet, friends?"
When Jgorga nodded and scurried in the gatehouse tunnel, the children followed. When the raccoon slowed to a patter, then pointed to the murder holes in the ceiling, the children slowed to a tiptoe, except under those grave slits, where they would dart aside and forward.
"What does he mean," said Conrad. "A surplus of everything?"
"It's the curse of good fortune," said Jgorga. "Teriana has rich natural resources, not only rivers, lakes, and an underground reservoir not far from the city, but fertile soil sprouting an abundance of crops, not to mention generously laden fruit trees, an assortment of university scholars sowing and reaping the blessings of science and magic, and an enlightened government harvesting the goodwill of its citizens. Not to mention Teriana is the only land where talking animals and humans are coequal, which makes it an example to the whole world. Everyone who's sane wants to immigrate here."
"If it's an example to the whole world," said Isola, "it's a target to Queen Suvani."
"I agree. That's why I haven't settled in Teriana. Not only do I enjoy the life of an Alsantian rebel, but such a graceful and beautiful edifice of enlightenment is begging to be conquered in a world where the wicked believe their ignorance as good as knowledge, and that only the arrogant want to live better."
The gatehouse tunnel emerged into a kind of twofold illusion. While Teriana from the human perspective might have seemed a city wreathed in nature, Jgorga saw a woodland studded with society, thickly urbanized less by human houses than luxuriant trees and grassy hillocks carved into talking animal dens. If the wooden human dwellings were also woodsy in character, finished in the natural almond color of their wood grain, then garnlanded with flowers, tree-blossoms, and orchids, their talking animal neighbors burrowed in living soil, nested along branches profuse with leafage and berry blossoms, or curled in the niches of vibrant tree boles, which thrived all the more despite their hollows, as if they were proud ladies and the animal families their living ornaments.
"It's amazing," said Akachi. "Why isn't all of Alsantia like this."
"Hey Jgorga," said Conrad.
"What is it?"
"I don't see any rats."
"I don't smell them anymore, either," said Jgorga. "All I smell are flowers."
"Where's Lucien?" Isola stomped her foot.
While Teriana was not paved, the earthen concourse facing the gatehouse was wide, mighty, and so well-trodden by hooves, paws, and boots that it took a moment for Jgorga to pick out the elder stag's cloven tread.
"What are you doing?" said Isola in a scathing tone, shaking her hands in the air.
"That sly buck went in front of a pack of wolves, and his prints were nearly stamped out by a half-dozen frisky wolf cubs."
"Do you have it?" When Isola groaned, then slumped against Conrad, the boy prince could not help a smile before falling back into his sullen funk.
"He went this way." The tracks were so spaced out that Jgorga could only assume the stag's commission was one of great haste. "Quickly, or we'll lose the trail."
"Can we even catch up to a deer?" said Conrad.
"Perhaps," said Jgorga. "He is faster, but also larger, and when the crowds turn out for lunch, he will be handicapped by a living obstacle course." The wide thoroughfare was already pooling with humans and beasts of all stripes and spots, not only wolves, badgers, rabbits, cats, mice, and stags, but also owls and other talking birds, plying the streets aerially, as if they too followed traffic in Teriana.
As they hustled through the crowd, the milling people were alternately jovial and combative, at times smiling and stepping aside, but at others shoving with elbows or hindquarters before glancing back, then mustering an insincere but abject apology upon discovering the children they had jostled and nearly trampled.
Jgorga would have got into scraps were they not in pursuit of Lucien, but he nonetheless made time to hunker down into his darkest growl before continuing the chase.
"Stupid sow," panted Jgorga crossly, after their third collision. As jogging in the free city was an exercise made even more difficult by the surging passers-by, they were short of breath.
"That isn't very nice," puffed Akachi.
"It's no insult if a matter of fact," said Jgorga with vehement heat, "as she backed into Aito without looking, she's stupid, and as she's a talking pig, she's a sow."
"Still," said Akachi. "I thought talking animals pretended to be better than humans."
"I would only be half a raccoon if I settled for being better than human, Akachi."
"What?"
"It's the same for you. If you spent your life trying to outdo the animal kingdom, you'd know nothing but failure while missing out on whatever is distinctly and uniquely human. Not that I pretend to know what that is. But if you measure talking animals against humans, your yardstick is not only defective, it's cracked. Speaking of broken measures, this cursed stag took Lucien in the wrong direction."
"Is there a right direction?" cried out Isola. Of all the children, Isola was the most beaten down and bedraggled, having fallen from being the spoiled daughter of a high-ranking Lord to the Queen's captive handmaiden, a duty more mortifying than laborious, leaving her ill-prepared for the Luskveld, the Ghulmarque, the advancing army, and now a city chase. Her hair lay in lank streamers, her face was pale, her lips were white, and her eyes quivered when she stood still, not that she'd stopped running for over an hour. While she was hot to keep going, when she clutched a wall until her pinched fingers whitened, it was as if her body rebelled against the thought of rescuing Lucien if it meant any more exercise.
Looking at Isola made Jgorga feel more travelworn than he was, as if she was the last stray thread to pull before his threadbare soul unraveled. "While the architects are said to dwell near the western wall overlooking the Culsera Mountains, he leads us towards a river."
"I don't see a river."
"You will. Since these tracks are flecked with mud and the ground is damp, I'd say we draw near the Beora River, which bisects eastern and western Teriana."
"What's at the river?"
"I don't know Teriana. If I say boats and fish, it's only my raccoon mind foraging ahead. But it stands to reason there are wharfs for fishing, boating, and shipping."
"Shipping companies," said Aito. "There may be Daikonians."
"If it's possible, it's not only useless to speculate, but we don't have time for chatter." Too exhausted to raise a paw or turn his head, the weary raccoon simply drifted into the milling throng and trusted the children would be there at the next intersection.
"Where are all the coaches?" came Conrad's curious grumble. "These are all pedestrians."
"Is that so surprising? How would you feel if you saw a team of tongueless humans, or even monkeys, pulling a coach?"
"What kind of question is that?"
"One to highlight your prejudices." Jgorga shrugged. "Not that there are no coaches here. I hear one coming now. It's different than you're used to--no, I forgot my audience. Actually, the Architect's special project might look a little backward to you." As if to underscore his point, a strange car motored towards them, blaring a tinny horn.
"What is that?" shrieked Isola.
The skeletal brass automobile had dull pistons chuffing iron legs that creaked backwards like a bird's, and in place of both hood and engine, its only wheel, horizontal to the ground, rotated rapidly, casting sparks that blazed ahead of its tyrannosaur gait.
This dynamo-driven dinosaur veered very near the children.
"Was that a car?" asked Chiyo. "The Architect did all that since we left?"
"And more," said Jgorga.
"Is that..." whispered Conrad with undertones of awe, "a magic car?"
"Were you expecting gasoline?" Jgorga snickered. "We call it a walker."
"Stop!" screeched Isola. When this had no effect, she screamed, "Help! Murder!"
When the walker rattled to a dead halt, Isola stumbled to its right side,where a badger in a tiny cubby performed the offices of chauffeur; of his employer, only angry yellow eyes showed through the mesh that served as both rear door and window.
"Forgive her, my lords..." said Jgorga.
Isola blurted out, "I may not look the part, but I am the future Lady Fafahite of Alsantia. Please help me."
"Stand clear." The badger's dour scowl was so deep and dark it nearly cleaved his forehead in two.
"Wait, Agassus. Young Lady Fafahite, what would you have me do?"
"She requests nothing, your grace." Although the Free City was known for the unusual and bizarre, Jgorga was bemused by the strange happenings at its gate; whether the gray stag was a henchman acting on Audren's scheme, or a confederate of a more sinister stripe, he had stolen Lucien from under their noses in broad daylight. If war was at work in Teriana, this machinist might be another agent.
"We will be on our way."
But having once blurted, Isola continued to bleat like the spoiled lamb she was: "a stag took my friend!"
"The stags are Audren's knights, young Alsantian. Your friend is in good hands..."
"He was kidnapped! Lucien is not in good hands!"
"Did you say Lucien?" Starting at a top track, the mesh slid around the edge and to the bottom of the door, furling as it went into a tight roll along the side.
The dark complexioned woman had a tight coif of black hair streaked with white locks, like sparks striking upward from the scalp, so that the escaping frazzled ends, curling above, fanning behind, and streaming into her bangs, looked less like a hairstyle than an electrical storm. Leaning forward in her seat, she regarded Isola and Jgorga with a cold glare, though the corners of her mouth quivered, suggesting a warmer emotion, when she asked, "where is your friend?"
"You're the Architect!" gasped Jgorga.
"One of," she nodded. "My husband also lays claim..."
"There's no time!" This time Jgorga did the blurting. "Lucien is your son!"