Ella and the Panther's Quest

by Lisa Anne Nisula

  Nathaniel cocked his head to the side and looked at me for a moment. “Not really.” He came over and lay down on the ground a few feet away. “I’ve been looking for signs of wood dragons. They sometimes live near trolls, but the signs are easy to spot. Wood dragons always leave burned patches in the forest, and they always leave broken branches and even uprooted trees when they run through the forest, always split right down the middle and hollowed out like a melon. They like the center wood.”

  He seemed so calm about the possibility of a wood dragon, I couldn’t be afraid of it. “What do they look like?”

  “They’re not proper dragons — in fact proper dragons are said to be offended that we call them that — but they are reptilian. They’re about four feet across, with thick bodies and long tails. And they have long teeth and small heads. They can’t talk like real dragons, or think in anything more than a lizard-like way, so even though they breathe fire, they aren’t nearly as dangerous as true dragons. They can’t plot out how to defeat you, just act on instinct. I remember in my youth, we encountered one in the valley between the palace and the mountain pass.”

  “Mountain pass?”

  Nathaniel nodded. “The palace, all of Greenhaven, is surrounded by mountains. My kingdom and Crawa’s lands both lie within a large valley. There are passes for traders and diplomats, but we are isolated and protected here, or we were before Crawa came.”

  I nodded. “Tell me about the wood dragon you encountered, if you don’t mind.”

  Nathaniel sat up. “Mind? It was one of my great victories, the way I won my spurs, as Father said.” Nathaniel moved closer to me. “We were journeying to the northern pass, on a diplomatic mission. Father wanted me to try and arrange for outside help in defeating Crawa.” Nathaniel’s voice took on a soft, sing-song quality. It reminded me of a bard. I settled in to listen, letting Nathaniel’s tale of an adventure that worked out in the end sweep my thoughts out of their rut.

  *

  When Nathaniel had finished his story, he went in search of food again. I tried imagining what he must have been like as a young man. I found myself wondering what he had looked like and regretting that there had not been a recent portrait of him at the manor house. I was tempted to ask him how old he was and what he looked like, but I couldn’t think of any non-embarrassing way to word either question. I amused myself imagining different possibilities until I felt the troll’s hot breath on my shoulder again. Nathaniel was not back yet. I held still, trying not to flinch away. The troll had been quiet, so I didn’t think I was in any danger and resisted the temptation to call out for Nathaniel. I suspected he would stay by me all day if he thought I was nervous and not get himself anything to eat. The troll’s knobby hand reached over my shoulder; his scaly wrist brushed against my cheek. I leaned out of the way.

  The troll stroked the sleeve I was working on. “It’s pretty.”

  “Thank you.” I was trying to edge away from the troll without hurting his feelings.

  The troll pulled his arm back, but hovered near me, watching my hands form the stitches.

  “It doesn’t look hard.”

  I felt the flicker of an idea in my mind, a way to make the job go much faster. “Would you like to learn how to knit?”

  I felt the ground tremble as he sat down behind me. “Yes.” He was quiet for a minute. I glanced over my shoulder and saw his brow was furrowed in thought. “I’ll need sticks, won’t I?”

  I didn’t bother to correct his terminology. “They need to be the same thickness, with a little bit of a point on the end.”

  The troll dragged himself to his feet and stomped into the forest. I could hear branches cracking and breaking and birds scrambling to get out of his way. There was a crunching of bushes from the other direction. I looked up, but it was only Nathaniel crashing through, tensed and ready to pounce.

  “You’re all right?”

  “Yes, the troll’s going to learn to knit.”

  “Oh.” Nathaniel stood still for a moment too long, batting at the grass, then wandered away toward the ravine. I half wished there’d been a wood dragon for him to fight.

  The troll returned with an armful of tree limbs, stripped of branches and bark. He sat a little ways away from me and chewed on the ends of the sticks until they were pointed. When he was satisfied with the points, he moved closer to me.

  “You’ll probably want to hold two strands together.”

  The troll picked up two balls of cloth and waited for instructions.

  *

  It took me two days to teach the troll to knit properly, but he did catch on. Once he could knit without dropping stitches or needles, the troll sat quietly for hours at the edge of the trees, hypnotized by the movement of the cloth over the needles, no longer hovering near me. He only stopped when he ran out of yarn, then he would enthusiastically start ripping and knotting the cloth, flinging bits everywhere. I kept an eye on his work, ready to show him how to shape the top.

  While I had been teaching the troll to knit, Nathaniel had kept himself busy scouting for food and planning our route. When Nathaniel saw I was alone again, he sat beside me and murmured, “This will save us time, won’t it?”

  “A lot. He’s got bigger needles and thicker yarn; he’ll knit much faster than I can, and we have two people working now.”

  Nathaniel’s tail brushed my leg. “That was good thinking on your part.” He stretched out on the ground by my feet, sphinx-like. “What about your world? Where do you come from?”

  I opened my mouth to answer, but there was too much to explain and no place to start. It was too different.

  Nathaniel seemed to understand my problem. “Do you have family there?”

  That I could answer. “My mother lives nearby.”

  Nathaniel nodded. “Anyone else?”

  “Not close. Cousins and all, of course.”

  “And what do you do there?”

  “I teach, I suppose.”

  “You suppose?”

  I shrugged as best I could while knitting. “I’m a sub.” Seeing his confusion, I added, “Substitute teacher.”

  “They substitute you for another?”

  Briefly, I had a vision of aliens beaming Ms Crawford out of room 218 and me down in her place. I supposed a wizard teleporting us would make more sense here. “You know, if another teacher is sick or something like that, they call me and I teach their classes, or more likely babysit the students.”

  “Ah.” I could see he didn’t really get it. Then it dawned on me; a prince must have had tutors as a child. Nathaniel kept trying. “And what do you teach them?”

  “Depends on the class.” I scrambled for an example he would understand. “English is what I’m trained in, literature mostly, and a little grammar,” I added just in case it wasn’t clear what the subject was.

  “Trained in? But that is not what you teach?” He sounded genuinely interested.

  “They call me for whatever they need, whether I know about it or not.”

  “And what was your most recent assignment?”

  If I’d been thinking I would have gone back two weeks and said American History, but I wasn’t thinking and answered honestly, “Computer Science,” and got the expected confused, blank look.

  “You’re going to have to explain that.” He laughed as he said it.

  I realized I was getting better at interpreting his expressions. “I suppose saying I teach students to use computers wouldn’t help.” I grinned at him, then started doing my best to explain.

  It quickly became clear that none of my classroom lectures would do, since those were all based on the assumption the audience actually knew what a computer was, or at least was in the same room as one. I struggled to explain what computer was, but somehow I ended up going back to explain typewriters and it all got very muddled.

  Nathaniel laughed. “I’m completely lost. And I am very impressed that you understand this world as well as you do. I’m confused just from your description.
”

  I smiled. “This world isn’t really that different. It’s a lot like our world was a long time ago, but we don’t have magic or wizards.”

  Nathaniel made himself more comfortable, watching me all the while. “Tell me more about it. Maybe I’ll begin to understand. Do you still have books? Of course, Feste says he found you in a huge building of books.”

  “A public library.” That was easy enough to explain to him, so I did.

  Chapter 25

  By the time I had explained to Nathaniel about public libraries, leading me to schools and a little bit of the internet, which was much easier for him to understand when I related it to reference books instead of typewriters, we had been with the troll for eight days, I had finished the second sleeve and set myself to the problem of joining them to the body. It was easier than I thought. With Nathaniel’s help, I was able to manipulate the large sticks the troll was using and demonstrate to him how to knit the sleeve stitches onto the body, reducing the stitches to accommodate the thicker doubled strips. Once everything was set up, it was easy enough to teach the troll what to do. I stayed near him, explaining when and how to reduce the stitches when he needed to on the way to the collar. It took a full day of prompting and reminding him what to do with the stitches; then I only had to watch and wait. The next day, the sweater was done. I taught him to bind off, quickly losing interest in teaching the troll now that the end was in sight. When the last stitch came off the needle, I spread the sweater on the ground to look at it.

  The finished sweater was lumpy and uneven, with patches of colors put next to each other with no thought to how they looked together. But it was also finished, and it held together when I pulled on it. Nathaniel and Feste came over to have a look.

  “Very nice,” Nathaniel said. His eyes darted toward the troll. “And it looks very warm.”

  “It’s mine!” The troll jumped forward. He grabbed the sweater and pulled it over his head. It took him a while to find the arm holes, his elbows pushing out of the front and back of the sweater, until one arm came out in the right place by accident.

  I watched, relieved that none of the stitches or knots popped.

  The troll ran his hand over the sleeves, stroking the stitches. “It’s pretty.”

  Nathaniel stepped forward. “Are you warm?”

  The troll stopped looking at his sleeve and looked over at Nathaniel. Then he drew himself up, puffed out his chest, licked his lips, and said, “Yes, the toll is paid. You may go.” I could tell they were ritual words, spoken many times.

  Nathaniel made a half-bow. “We thank you.” With his head still down, he murmured, “Get your things so we can leave quickly.”

  I smiled at the troll and walked briskly to my rock. I had everything packed up in a few moments, not that there was much to pack.

  Feste made a quick jog around the camp, knocking a knitting needle out from under a tree root and finding two uneaten apples by the edge of the forest. I gathered them up, wishing there were more apples, or anything edible. As I settled the apples in my bag, I felt the troll’s hot breath on my neck again. I took several steps forward, pretending I had seen something in the bushes. Once I was a few feet away, I turned quickly so he wouldn’t follow me. I saw Nathaniel creeping closer to us, his eyes fixed on the troll. I relaxed a little.

  “I give you a present.” The troll held out a rock and smiled, his craggy teeth showing.

  I didn’t want to hurt his feelings, and not just because he could crush me if he were upset. I reached out and took the rock he offered. “Thank you very much. It’s very sweet of you.”

  The troll beamed as he sat back, almost landing on Nathaniel.

  I put the rock in my bag and edged toward Nathaniel. Feste was already hiding behind him. As soon as I was beside him, Nathaniel stepped back. “We thank you for your hospitality, but we must continue our journey.”

  “Bye-bye.” The troll waved. Then he picked up a handful of the ragged clothes and started ripping them, sometimes with his hands, sometimes with his teeth.

  I smiled and waved back as we walked toward the bridge.

  Nathaniel was walking quickly, even more quickly than he had during our first trek through the woods. He was almost running as he reached the bridge, and I was just behind him. Nathaniel stopped at the end of the bridge and gestured for me to cross first. The bridge was rickety and swayed as I stepped on it. I didn’t give myself time to get used to the motion, just started walking as swiftly as I could while the bridge moved beneath me. Feste followed close behind me. Nathaniel waited until we had both made it safely to the other side, then ran across himself.

  Nathaniel didn’t stop at the end of the bridge, but kept up his brisk pace deeper into the trees. I kept walking quickly along side him, almost jogging, until Nathaniel said “It’s safe to slow down now, we’re well away.”

  I slowed immediately and tried to catch my breath.

  “You can throw the rock away, too.”

  I smiled. “It’s not that heavy. Anyway, it might have some special properties.”

  Nathaniel smiled a little. “I don’t believe it; you’re sentimental about a rock.”

  I was trying to think how to answer that, but Nathaniel went on in a different, more serious, tone.

  “How long do you think the cloth he has there will last him?”

  I tried to calculate while panting, but the best I could do was a vague guess. “A few months at least.”

  “Then my people should get through with the usual bribes. I’ll have to send out a proclamation that there is another way to placate the troll here.”

  *

  We walked in silence for rest of the afternoon. I recognized a few apple trees and realized this must have been close to the area Nathaniel had been exploring. As the sun was setting, Nathaniel spotted something and ran forward, bounding over the branches. I followed, keeping an eye on Feste so he wouldn’t fall behind.

  I found Nathaniel standing on the edge of a copse of thick pine trees, staring. He didn’t turn when I approached. “Look through these trees.”

  I stood beside him, looking where he’d nodded. The pine trees were arranged in a very straight line, so I guessed there was more magic in store for us. When I followed Nathaniel’s gaze, I could see the castle, its stone walls visible through the branches, the towers forming themselves as darker shadows against the black sky, now that I knew where to look.

  “We’re almost there.”

  Nathaniel nodded. “It looks better in daylight.”

  “You mean when I can actually see it?”

  Nathaniel turned and regarded me intently. “You mean you can’t see it clearly now?”

  I shrugged. “Not well, it’s a darker shadow against the darkness.” And then I understood, at least partially. I turned to Nathaniel. “What does it mean?”

  Nathaniel was smiling. “It means it’s real; you’re really seeing it, not the spell, not the illusion, which makes its outline clear against the darkness.”

  “But I saw it from the manor house and you weren’t there.”

  Nathaniel considered the question. “Was Feste near?”

  I thought back over every time I had looked at the castle from my room window. “Yes, he was.”

  “Then he must see it too, as part of the spell.”

  “So we’re really close this time?”

  Nathaniel nodded. He looked back at the castle. “Come on. Let’s finish this.” Nathaniel walked away from the castle and led the way along the edge of the pine trees. Feste bounded along beside him. I followed, not wanting to interfere. They were both going home.

  Nathaniel walked along the edge of the trees, looking for the way in. He stopped at a spot between two trees that looked just as overgrown with branches as any other spot. He pushed forward between the trees, batting at the branches blocking his way with his paw. I hurried forward to hold the branches back out of his way, and saw that there was a path there, half hidden by the brush, with more grass s
prouting up than paving stones, but still a clear and deliberate stone path.

  Nathaniel didn’t hesitate, but went forward as soon as I had cleared enough space to let him through. I don’t think he would have noticed if Feste and I hadn’t followed. He didn’t look back to see how we were getting on, even when I let go of a branch by accident and it slapped hard against a tree trunk. His eyes stayed fixed on the end of the path, where the castle would soon be visible. Feste entered the trees right behind him, almost as focused on the end as Nathaniel was. I ducked under the branches I couldn’t move and followed them.

  Outside this part of the forest, it had been dark, but there had been enough moonlight to let me make out shapes and forms. Once I was inside the pine trees, the dense branches blocked even the dim light the curse had let through. I had barely gone five paces when Nathaniel’s dark shape was absorbed into the shadows. The feeble light making its way in from the spot we’d broken through the trees sparked off the silver fringe of Feste’s cushions, but that was soon swallowed up as well.

  I could hear Nathaniel on the path ahead of me, brushing against leaves and cracking branches as he stepped on them. I tried to follow the sound, but this was a forest. Every breeze made the leaves rustle in a way that sounded very like Nathaniel passing by. Branches creaked and groaned on both sides of us, almost indistinguishable from the branches breaking under Nathaniel’s paws, and drowning out Nathaniel’s soft footfalls.

  I tried to keep on the path, trusting my feet to tell the difference between the brush on the sides of the road and the grass growing between the paving stones. To do that, I had to tap the ground with my foot every few steps, trying to feel the stones under my feet. It meant I couldn’t move very fast, even though I was afraid of losing Nathaniel completely in the darkness.

  Then there was silence. No footfalls, no rustling leaves, no breeze, and no sign of Nathaniel. I was completely alone, isolated by the darkness. With no sound to follow, I edged forward, trying to keep to the path. “As long as it’s straight,” I told myself, “I’ll be fine. Sooner or later I’ll make it to the castle and he’ll be there.”