The Wilder World

by Jeff Hook

  Ishū’s first task was to figure out why the creature avoided certain sections of the field.

  “I don’t get it,” said Seth. “Alfalfa is the strongest creature I’ve ever seen. He’s got bones of iron. Literally. They’re half iron. He can plow through trees and not get hurt. But those small sections of the field he won’t touch.”

  The earth there is repellant, Alfalfa said unhelpfully.

  Ishū walked on the earth and didn’t feel repelled. Was it the earth or the location? He dug up a couple of rocks and started walking toward Alfalfa. As he got closer, the rocks started acting weird; they were almost pushing him back! One slipped out of his hands and flew away, back toward where he had come.

  Why are you bringing it here? I thought you were a friend.

  Can we try something really quick? I’m trying to make the field better for you.

  Alfalfa reluctantly agreed. Ishū walked around the creature, trying to figure out whether the rocks were trying to go toward where they had been picked up or away from Alfalfa. As he circled around he carefully kept his body between the rocks and where they wanted to go.

  He got his answer… the rocks and Alfalfa really did repel each other! He dropped all but the smallest rock and watched the others slide away, quickly at first but then more slowly as they gained distance.

  One last thing, Ishū assured the creature. He gripped the small rock carefully and walked toward Alfalfa. The pressure increased, pushing against him, getting stronger and stronger the closer he got. The last few steps were horribly difficult.

  Sorry for this. I want to test this last thing, then we’ll be done.

  Oh, you do have a repellant rock with you. It is small enough and I am big enough that it is little bother.

  Interesting. It certainly didn’t seem small to Ishū, especially as he pushed harder and harder to gain even an inch. Then again, he wasn’t a tenth as heavy as Alfalfa.

  Eventually it was too much and he tilted his body out of the way. The small stone shot away at incredible speed into a nearby wood. Several branches crashed to the ground with a surprising amount of sound — had that stone really knocked down a large tree branch? That was some repellant earth! He was glad he hadn’t accidentally aimed toward the vineyard or the house.

  Ishū spent an hour carrying rocks away from the site and putting them in the wood.

  Is that spot better?

  It’s less repellant than before…

  He spent the rest of the day digging up even more and carrying them away.

  It’s so much better, Alfalfa said at last. He was unabashedly happy, a simple and pure emotion. Now Seth won’t be frustrated with me.

  Ishū was happy as well. A hard day’s work. A happy companion. A problem solved. This was how life was supposed to be.

  He went to find Seth and share the good news.

  Seth was picking grapes with his two eldest, a surly boy named John and a worried girl named Anna who reminded Ishū of Hishano. When Seth heard that the field problem was solved his face split into a grin almost as wide as when he’d been playing with Audrey, his youngest daughter. Anna’s mouth turned from a frown to a weak smile, and John’s shoulders untensed just a little bit.

  “That’s thirty percent more wheat, isn’t it?” asked Anna.

  “In three months,” said John tersely. “Useless until then.”

  “Come on, John,” said Seth. “This is huge. That field is a quarter of our income. For every mezsil we’ve been making, now we’ll be making an extra seven or eight mezcops.”

  “Not if the Knyn takes it first,” said John.

  Seth’s face fell. Worry crept back into Anna’s posture. John was about Karugo’s age, Anna a couple of years younger. Old enough that reassuring words couldn’t protect them from the depth of Seth’s troubles.

  “She doesn’t make anything if she takes the farm,” said Anna with a hopeful smile. “It’s the smart move to let us keep it.”

  Seth hurried to agree with a smile, while John just shook his head.

  “Well, it’s just about dark,” said Seth. “Time to pack it in. Your mother should have dinner almost ready.”

  Audrey was playing out front again, this time pretending to sword-fight with a tree. When she saw the adults (and almost-adults) approaching she dropped her stick and ran to meet them. It made Ishū’s heart glad. This was Karugo’s spirit, unrepressed, channeled into joy instead of rebellion.

  Anna put on a happy face. Even John broke from his usual demeanor for the little girl, relaxing as much as possible and speaking nothing of the Knyn.

  They weren’t even out of their teens, and they were already performing the role of Elders.

  Inside, Martha and the two middle children were busy making dinner. This production was utterly unlike the bland, boring meals of the Tandoku. There were three separate dishes, one of which was a rich stew. This family didn’t have much, but they did have both food and love in abundance, and Martha seemed proud of what she was making.

  “That smell is glorious,” announced Seth as he went over to greet his wife. They kissed, which made the youngest boy make an ‘ew’ face, which in turn made the other kids laugh. Even John; he had almost turned into a different person now that he was around the younger children.

  “We’re close,” said Martha. “Fifteen minutes. Everyone wash their hands.”

  Ishū did so, then went to the porch to say goodbye to the sun. He found a nice rocking chair, one that made a comforting groaning sound as it moved back and forth rhythmically across the porch’s wooden beams.

  The sun set slowly and Ishū could hear the younger children playing inside while the older children helped Martha finish cooking. The worry seemed to melt away from them, now that they were in the world of family, not in the world of the fields. It was a strange medley of sounds where each found joy in their own manner.

  The Tandoku, they were like trees planted in an orchard, row upon perfect row of the same tree. Anything different — like Karugo, or even Hishano and himself — caused a disturbance that made the others anxious. But in this family, the wildness was pleasant, harmonious; contained but not squelched. It was what he liked about the animals; as tamed as they were on Tandoku Island, they weren’t quite as tamed as the people.

  He jumped into a bird’s view as soon as the sun dipped below the horizon, getting one more glimpse of the big fiery ball in the sky. It was more intense than it had been on the island, now that they were free of the shield, and each day his skin got a tiny shade darker, becoming a new and interesting hue of green.

  From the bird he could see the shore of the island a couple miles away, the mountain on the other side, the town to the south, the river that cut between them. He thought of learning to draw, so that he could share this wonderful sight, this magnificent view of the world that only birds had known before. After they helped this family and after they got the crystal, maybe that was what he would do.

  His thoughts were interrupted by a throat clearing roughly beside him. Looking down from the bird he saw himself, relaxed in a chair, and a strange cat-like creature towering over his body. He snapped to himself and opened his eyes.

  “Hello?”

  The cat stood on two legs, almost like a human, and despite being a different species he could tell she was a female trying desperately to appear masculine. She had rich, orange fur peppered with white around her belly, paws, and snout. Aside from the snout and whiskers her face was almost human-like, down to the vicious sneer that was plastered across it.

  “So he’s taking in bums, cooking gourmet meals, going to all sorts of extravagance… but denying me my due,” she said huffily. Then, as she looked closer, a smile spread across her snout and she licked her lips. “Where are you from, green-skin?”

  Ishū had a sick feeling in his stomach, the same one he’d gotten watching the pirates the day before they attacked. “Around,” he said weakly.

  She raised her eyebrows and let out a yelping laugh that made hi
m shrink away. “Exotic features, a skin color from the other side of the world, and you’re just ‘around’? I think you’re going to tell me.” The smile on her face widened into an exaggerated horror. “Say, how well do you like this family?”

  Ishū’s breath caught in his throat. He didn’t answer, but his hand trembled a bit.

  “I see.” The cat grabbed his arm, claws extended just enough for a threat, and yanked him up to pull him inside. She didn’t even knock, as was the custom here… she just barged right in with Ishū crashing after her.

  Audrey gasped and cowered behind Martha’s apron. The scowl returned to John’s face while he tightened every one of his muscles and set himself between the cat and the other children. Seth breathed deeply, deliberately, and his eyes turned to stone.

  “You’re behind on your payments, Seth,” said the cat icily. This must be the Knyn that the family kept talking about. The one they feared and despised so much. She seemed to relax as she saw their fear and hatred. She was in her element. “I’ll give you one week to catch up. One week, then I’m taking it all.”

  8

  Limits

  Hishano moved his leg frantically, trying to dodge the wolf’s hungry, vengeful jaws. Why’d Karugo had to go and accidentally threaten this wolf couple’s pups?

  He tried to gently nudge the female wolf back with his foot, but in his panic he ended up kicking it in the jaw. It squealed in pain and reared back. He didn’t have time to feel bad; he flipped over and started his wild, desperate retreat.

  The colorful male wolf was between him and the rock where Karugo waited. He would have to go around it somehow in order to reach safety. He veered to the right, hoping to avoid its notice for long enough to make his move. Karugo, for his part, did his best to distract the thing, yelling and screaming and waving his arms. But it wasn’t enough. The wolf saw him and started edging around the rock.

  Suddenly the male wolf’s legs were caught up from under it and it started spinning rapidly as it was wrapped up by the tongue of a snapping frog. The frog saw that it had caught something too large, so it expertly hopped up and turned itself and the incoming mass of rainbow fur into one wild spinning unit, then let its tongue unravel to toss the wolf at high speed straight into a tree. The tree shook and there was a loud crack, but the trunk didn’t break.

  The female wolf bolted past Hishano, her priorities suddenly changed.

  Along the trunk of the tree, slithering down with reptilian excitement, were four of the three-tailed snakes.

  The male wolf pulled itself into a defensive crouch, preparing to protect itself as best it could with an injured front leg. Hishano turned to Karugo, but the boy wasn’t on the rock as he was supposed to be.

  Instead, Karugo turned up right beside him.

  The first tri-snake hurled itself at the male wolf’s front leg, sensing that it would be easier than normal to trip it and bring it to the ground. The female wolf slapped down that snake, which left her open to its companions.

  “They’re going to fight!” Karugo said excitedly.

  “And we,” said Hishano, “are going to run.”

  Karugo didn’t argue, but he did keep looking back to see what was happening and offered sporadic narration. It seemed that four tri-snakes against two wolves was pretty unfair to the snakes; either they’d been very hungry or they might have thought the male wolf would be more injured than he was. Or maybe they thought that he and Karugo would stick around and keep the female wolf busy.

  Whatever the reason, the last they heard from the fight was a chorus of unhappy hissing.

  ——

  Although they had long since left the wolves and snakes behind, Hishano felt relief when they finally saw the row of grey boulders that ringed Havlam Town. They had maybe an hour of daylight left before the sun dipped below the horizon, and aside from wanting to get more of Martha’s delicious food, he was also very glad to be out of the woods before nightfall. He didn’t want to imagine what trouble they would get into if they couldn’t see where they were going.

  As he stepped through the gap in the boulder wall, he checked to make sure there were no frog tongues lying in wait. It seemed that there weren’t any frogs around the town’s boulder wall, possibly because there weren’t as many insects around here for them to eat. One lone guard with a spear stood leaning against the boulder; across from him were a pair of stacked boulders, the top of which could be pushed down to block the gate at a moment’s notice. It wouldn’t keep out determined pirates, but it would keep the town safe from marauding animals. Hishano thought that a wooden gate might have been easier, but they probably had their reasons.

  Finding Hoppin’ Harry’s shop was a little quicker this time, but they still had a couple of adventures wandering down the wrong street or into a dead end. Havlam had nothing like Tandoku Island’s clear, rational grid of streets.

  Hishano knocked.

  Then knocked again.

  And again.

  Finally he yelled into the door: “It’s us! We have the Haverwort flowers!”

  The door opened, quickly at first and then pulled by momentum. By the time it opened all the way, the nervous Lapine was already teleported to another corner of the room holding a shuriken ready to throw. “You survived!” he said in surprise.

  “Barely!” exclaimed Karugo. “It was awesome!”

  They emptied their pockets and found between them eleven remaining flowers. Good thing they’d taken extras!

  H’raldri teleported to his desk, falling an inch or so into his seat, and motioned to them. “Bring the flowers here. And close the door. You never know who might be sneaking around, gathering intelligence.”

  “H’raldri,” Hishano said as they walked closer. The Lapine looked up, surprised, perking his ears up in joy for a moment before narrowing his eyes.

  “What’s your game?” he asked. “Why are you trying to butter me up?”

  Hishano didn’t know quite what to make of that. “I was just wondering… did you really not expect us to live?”

  “Today? Maybe, maybe not.” H’raldri got serious. “But probably not tomorrow. I’ll give you the mission, because I really do need the ingredients, but I don’t expect you to succeed. I hope you survive.”

  The Lapine grabbed ten copper-colored metal disks from inside his desk, pushing aside his crutches in order to reach them.

  “What are the ingredients for?” asked Hishano. He didn’t really need to know, as long as the money got them passage closer to an Adiamite Crystal, but he was curious.

  “Healing potions,” said H’raldri. “I sell them to the villagers, who keep them on hand for emergencies. It’s how I survive and get what I need to live.”

  That made Hishano happy to hear. They were, indirectly, helping even more people than they thought.

  “Will you be going to get the stuff yourself again after your leg heals?” asked Karugo.

  H’raldri’s ears went back, spreading out and tilting left. “Are you kidding? Me? Go out? This leg’s been broke for years. Besides, it’s dangerous out there!”

  “But you can teleport!”

  “I’ve only got so much distance I can teleport in an hour!” exclaimed the Lapine, who then caught himself and looked side to side nervously. “You can’t tell anyone that. I can teleport however far I want. If you tell people anything about limits I’ll find you, wherever you are, and kill you. We Lapine have mysterious unlimited powers like that.”

  He then teleported to the door and held it open, with himself hidden behind the door so no one on the outside could see him. “Now, go. Come back tomorrow and I’ll tell you all about your next mission.”

  What a strange rabbit.

  He held out a hand with ten coins. Hishano grabbed them on the way out.

  Money.

  It looked rather unspectacular, but if everyone made a big deal out of it then it must be worth something. And they had ten of them, while they only needed three for the night! This morning, when the
complications arose, he’d had his doubts, but now Hishano knew that they really were going to save their island!

  They thanked the Lapine, walked back out of the city and past its boulder wall, crossed the river, and found their way to the farm. The farmhouse came into view and Hishano’s belly started rumbling. He knew Martha’s cooking awaited them — of the many new and unfamiliar things they’d experienced this journey, Martha’s cooking was the second best, only after the genuine laughter and joy he’d heard from Seth’s little girl. Or seeing Karugo enjoying himself for the first time.

  As they drew closer to the house, they saw a strange orange creature by the entryway. It was dragging Ishū through the door.

  Hishano sprinted toward the house and burst through the doorway.

  The entire family was on the defensive, squared as if for combat toward the orange cat-like creature, with their eyes shifting only briefly toward the new intrusion.

  “More bums?” sneered the creature. Hishano didn’t know the word, but the cat’s tone of voice and the flash of greed in its eyes instantly repulsed him. It was the way Jack had looked at Karugo. It casually turned its back on Seth’s family so that it could survey the two new arrivals more closely. “Ah, more people from this mysterious island of ‘Around’… you may have a way to save your farm yet.”

  9

  An Offer

  Karugo felt a chill go up his spine. The way this family looked at the orange-and-white-furred creature in their kitchen was like an exaggerated version of how the Tandoku had always looked at him. Instead of shifting their gaze away, the children hid. The adults barely concealed their fear and disgust.

  Martha, so kind and genial this morning, gripped her stirring spoon so hard her knuckles turned white. Audrey, who had laughed and clapped for joy at seeing Karugo’s power, hid behind her mother’s skirts. Seth and John looked as if they were ready for combat.

  It was just one cat.