North! Or Be Eaten

by Andrew Peterson

  With a deep sigh, Podo turned away from the sea and shook his head as if waking from a dream. “Tink, how many arrows do you have left?”

  “Twenty, maybe twenty-five.”

  Podo squinted at the Fangs crossing the span. “Aye. That’ll help, for a little while at least. What about you, Janner?”

  “Sir?”

  “Arrows. Have ye got any?”

  “Yes sir. I had thirty-two when we left.” Janner loosed the cords that bound his bow to the pack and nocked an arrow.

  “Don’t waste any time, lads. They’ve no place to hide, and ye might give us time to get across. When those lizards are close enough to make you nervous, turn an’ run like mad. I’d tell ye that it’s time to be men,” Podo said, “but I can see you already know that.”

  Janner drew his bow and aimed at the nearest Fang.

  Podo and the others moved across the narrow bridge to the next tower. The bridge wasn’t long, but with the Dark Sea yawning thousands of feet below them, the going was slow. Nia tugged at Nugget’s collar while Podo and Oskar followed, wind whipping their hair and clothes.

  The Fangs were halfway across the span to where the boys stood. Tink released his bowstring and sent an arrow whizzing through the air.

  14

  The Last Tower

  The first Fang in the long line jerked and tumbled from the bridge. Janner shot next and watched with disgust as his arrow arced through the air and disappeared into a fall of water. When Tink’s second shot felled another Fang, he looked sideways at Janner with a hint of a smile.

  Janner took careful aim and missed again. On the third shot he finally hit his target. Twenty-nine arrows left, he thought, wondering how many Fangs were strung along the ledge and back up to the riverbank. Hundreds?

  Thanks to Tink, the Fangs fell steadily from the stair bridge and the line advanced no farther. The Fangs were agitated, but they had to know that sooner or later the arrows would run out, and they weren’t shooting back. The Fangs wanted them alive. As long as the lizards didn’t change their minds, the boys were the safest defense against the creatures. Janner glanced back at the rest of the company and saw that they had reached the second tower and were edging onto the next bridge.

  Tink’s bow twanged, and another Fang tumbled into the roiling water. To his surprise, Janner saw that the front of the line was farther away than it was before.

  “It’s working!” Tink cried.

  The Fang in front waved its sword and shouted at the line, trying, Janner guessed, to get them to move back. Two Fangs tripped in the clumsy retreat and fell screaming into the water.

  “Why are they retreating?” Tink asked.

  The Fang in charge beckoned to the trolls, but the trolls shook their heads. The Fang pointed at Janner and Tink and brandished its sword at one of the trolls. The troll shook its head again, but with less certainty. Finally the other troll nodded and released its grip on the wall. The other followed suit, and the two beasts stepped to the edge of the long stair bridge that led directly to where Janner and Tink knelt.

  Janner gulped. Surely the bridge was too old, too fragile to support the weight of the giant creatures.

  But the ancients knew what they were doing when they constructed Miller’s Bridge. The two trolls inched their way to the center. Janner prayed the bridge would collapse, but it didn’t. When they saw the bridge would hold, the trolls grinned stupidly and picked up their pace.

  Tink loosed a shot at the first troll, but the arrow glanced off its skin.

  “Come on!” Janner said, pulling Tink to his feet. The Igiby boys fled, and the trolls bounded after them. The beasts closed the distance with every stride while the Fangs followed at their heels.

  Far ahead, the others neared the bridge that led to the fifth and final tower. And what then? Janner wondered. What happens when there’s nowhere left to run?

  Just as the boys reached the bridge to the third tower, the ground shook. The trolls were only a few feet behind, and one of the beasts had pounded its fist on the tower floor.

  Tink sped ahead of Janner, arms and legs pumping, but with the awful sound of the trolls’ huffing and puffing so close behind, Janner was able to keep up with his brother for the first time in his life. Podo stood at the edge of the farthest tower and frantically waved the boys on. Janner saw fear on his grandfather’s face. Podo drew his sword and sprinted toward them with a scream stretched across his leathery face.

  The distance whizzed by in a blur of slick stone, white water, and slate sea. Janner could feel the thud-thud-thud of the trolls’ footsteps just behind him. He felt a distant sense of relief at the sight of Nia and Oskar picking their way up the slope of the north riverbank. At least they had made it. If only there were a way to stop the trolls and Fangs from crossing, they’d be safe—for a while anyway.

  Podo stopped in the center of the final bridge as the boys approached him, but he wasn’t looking at them. His fiery eyes were trained on the troll at their backs. Podo raised his sword and arched his back, straining every muscle in his barrel chest.

  “Tink, duck!” Janner screamed.

  In midstep, both Igiby boys hunkered over and sped past their grandfather on opposite sides. Janner felt his right foot slip from the edge of the bridge and saw the dizzying surface of the sea directly below, but his momentum carried him to the tower, where he stumbled and fell. Janner turned in time to see the sword leave Podo’s hand and spin through the air toward the oncoming troll.

  The sword buried itself in the beast’s neck. The troll widened its tiny eyes in surprise and tumbled forward as it clawed at the sword hilt with clumsy hands. Podo danced backward on the bridge to dodge the beast as it collapsed. When it slammed into the bridge, the skill of the ancient builders was put to its final test—and failed.

  A mighty shudder sent rocks plummeting to the water below. The dead troll lay motionless, the blade of the sword peeking out from between its shoulders. The other troll, standing just behind its dead companion, howled and beat its chest. In its anger it was unaware of what became immediately clear to Janner, Tink, and Podo: the bridge was about to fall.

  A thrill shot through Janner like a bolt of lightning. We might make it! If the bridge collapses, we just might make it!

  More rocks broke loose from the quaking bridge. The second troll cut its roar short when it realized at last what was happening. Fangs congregated on the tower behind the troll, growling and peeking around it to see what was wrong.

  Janner got back to his feet and ran with Podo and Tink across the last tower. On the far side, Nugget carried Leeli down the steps from the tower to the gentle north bank, where Nia and Oskar waited. Leeli dismounted into Nia’s embrace.

  Janner’s heart rose at the sight of his family, then sank when he turned to see that the bridge had not yet fallen. The troll stepped over its dead companion and made its way across the damaged bridge. It roared and flexed its mighty arms.

  Please, thought Janner. Please let it fall.

  With a great crunch, the bridge shifted and sank a few hands lower. The Fangs that congregated on the tower grew agitated as more stones tumbled away.

  Podo shook his fist at the troll. “Come on, ye monster! Take another step!”

  The ground trembled again, and the troll’s little eyes shifted from the bridge to the sea. But again, the rocks settled.

  The troll’s fearful look became a wicked grin. The Fangs snarled and clanged their swords. To Janner’s horror, the troll leapt the final distance and landed on the tower only a few feet in front of them. It raised itself to its full height and roared so loud that the falls themselves were shamed.

  Janner felt a tug at his pack.

  “I’ll be needing this, laddie,” Podo said as he drew Janner’s sword. “Though I don’t think me sword-throwin’ trick will work twice in one day.” He looked down at Janner with sad eyes. “Now you be a good man. You lead this family to safety, like I know you can.” He kissed Janner on the top of his head. �
�Never stop fightin’ for ‘em, hear?”

  The troll took another step forward. With a heavy sigh, Podo raised his sword and strode to meet it.

  Tears filled Janner’s eyes, and he thought about protesting, joining Podo in his final stand—but he had no sword. Podo had taken it. He thought about using his bow but knew it would do no damage. All he could do was obey his grandfather’s final command: “You lead this family to safety.” Podo would only last moments against the troll, but it was all he could give.

  Janner blinked away his tears and turned. He had to honor his grandfather’s sacrifice by getting his family away and keeping them free from harm for as long as he could.

  Leeli screamed. Her shrill voice cut through the air like a thousand silver arrows. Janner just had time to leap out of the way as Nugget, no longer carrying Leeli, bounded up the steps.

  The giant dog gave a bone-rattling bark when it reached the tower, then sprang through the air, past a bewildered Podo, and slammed into the troll like a boulder into a barn door.

  The troll staggered back, trying in vain to shield itself from Nugget’s teeth, which snapped and bit and tore at the troll’s arms and neck and face. The troll lost its balance and teetered, slow and heavy like a felled tree.

  It crashed into the bridge with such force that the towers on either side trembled, and Janner saw one of the Fangs lose its footing and fall. The bridge that had stood for a thousand years crumbled into a thousand pieces.

  Nugget sprang off the troll as it fell and landed with his upper half on the opposite tower where the Fangs gathered. His back legs scrabbled at the side of the rock but found no purchase, while above him the Fangs battered his face and front paws with their swords and spears. Nugget bit and barked and growled. Fang after Fang screamed and fell from the wall as the dog struggled, but more Fangs appeared, with more weapons and more determination to push the dog from the tower.

  Janner felt a sob rise from his gut and tear from his lips, and then came the sound of Leeli somewhere behind him, screaming Nugget’s name. She had crawled up the steps to the tower with a look of pale shock on her face.

  Nugget twisted a Fang’s leg in his mouth and pulled the creature from the wall. Wounds covered his face and forelegs. He turned his great, shaggy, bleeding head and looked at Leeli. She crawled past Janner, sobbing, reaching for her dearest friend across the empty space where the bridge had been.

  Nugget barked one last time, a big, gentle sound that echoed off the stone and water of Fingap Falls. Janner saw a change in Nugget’s face at the last jab from a Fang spear, a tired but contented look that made him believe the brave dog would fall to the sea happy, knowing he had saved Leeli from harm one last time.

  And then Nugget was gone.

  15

  A Song for Nugget the Brave

  Janner didn’t watch him fall. His eyes closed so that the wet stone beneath his hands, the cold wind, the howls of triumph from the Fangs, his little sister’s wailing were all he knew.

  Podo lifted Leeli over his shoulder and carried his granddaughter away, dragging Janner by the shirt collar as he went. Janner’s eyes opened, his vision blurred with tears. He ran down the steps behind Podo, noting with detachment the looks of confusion and surprise on Nia’s, Tink’s, and Oskar’s faces.

  They climbed the bank slowly, dragging heavy hearts. No one uttered a word, no one looked back to see if the Fangs had found a way to cross the gap.

  After a long, winding climb over gravel and boulder, the Igibys, Podo, and Oskar reached level ground. Soft green grass stretched before them for a short distance before the trees of the forest gathered into a green wall. They stood in a clearing roughly the size of the Glipwood Township, an oasis of open space surrounded by glipwood trees.

  The area was littered with large stones, but they weren’t the rounded boulders of the falls. They were squared, stacked in places, and overgrown with weeds. Beneath the grass, the trail they followed up from the river became a cobbled roadway, the stones the ruins of a cluster of buildings.

  Leeli fell to the grass and wept.

  “I’m afraid to say it,” Podo said hoarsely, “but we might be safe. Look.”

  Janner and Tink stood beside Podo and looked down. From their vantage point they saw all of Fingap Falls arrayed before them. To the right flowed the white water of the Mighty Blapp, snaking into the mist of the upper falls. Below it jutted the shelf that caught the waters in its giant palm. The bridges spanning the five towers looked as thin as ribbons. At the fourth, of course, there was no longer a bridge, and the surface of the tower was clogged with the tiny movements of Fangs in retreat.

  Janner could hardly believe he had just crossed such a precarious distance; in fact, he could hardly believe such a place existed at all.

  He turned to see Oskar and Nia lift Leeli and walk her to a stone bench. Nia held Leeli’s head to her chest and rocked to and fro while Oskar patted her back. Leeli cried.

  Janner remembered the day at the cottage when she thought the Fangs had killed Nugget. She had cried little and soon grown silent. That had been far more worrisome to him than the way Leeli now wept. She seemed older, no longer shocked that such a thing could happen in the world but heartbroken because it had. Her tears struck Janner as the right kind of tears.

  Tink sat on the ground with his back to the stone bench and absentmindedly pulled weeds from the cracks between cobbles. Podo knelt in front of Leeli on his good knee.

  “Leeli,” he said gently.

  Hair stuck to her wet face. Her cheeks were splotchy red, and her chin quivered. She reached for her grandfather and hugged his neck, crying harder than before. Podo lifted her and carried her some distance away, whispering and patting her back with his big, callused hands.

  Janner plopped to the ground beside Tink, and the weariness of the day fell on him like a blanket. He leaned his head back on the stone and looked at the sky. White clouds slid across the deep blue dome, peaceful as a sigh. His eyes drooped shut, and wind tickled his face and the hairs on his forearms. The rockroach den, then the trolls, Peet’s capture, the foggy despair of the flat beside the river, the dizzy sight of the Dark Sea, the troll breathing at Janner’s back—and Nugget.

  He opened his eyes and looked at the sky again. Where was Peet now? Janner was afraid for him but felt sure Peet was still alive. He had survived terrible things for years, and something about the way Zouzab watched him from the troll’s shoulder made Janner believe Gnag wanted the Sock Man alive for some reason.

  For a long time they sat among the ruins. Podo and Leeli finally came back to where the others rested, and though her face still bore the weight of her sorrow, Janner could see that his sister was present. Her eyes didn’t stare into nothing. They saw the situation, grieved for it, and faced it.

  As Janner drifted to sleep, he was aware of Nugget’s absence; no giggles from Leeli; no big, whiny yawns; no sense of safety knowing that, whatever lay in wait for them in the shadows, at least this huge, happy monster was on their side.

  Janner woke with a start. Dusk approached, and the clearing lay in cool shadow. Leeli slept on Nia’s lap. Oskar lay on his back, hissing with pain while Podo worked to remove the old fellow’s bandages. Tink assisted Podo with a sick look on his face. Janner wondered for a moment where Nugget and Peet were, until he remembered with a shiver that the day hadn’t been some awful dream.

  “Hold on now,” Podo said. “I’m almost finished. Tink, hand me the knife, eh?”

  Tink passed a small knife to his grandfather, who used it to cut away the clotted bandage.

  “There,” Podo said, eying Oskar’s wound. “It’s not as bad as I thought. Hardly a scratch, ye big baby! We’ll get you wrapped up again, and in a few days I wager you’ll be good as before.”

  “Which wasn’t all that good, if you remember,” said Oskar. “In the words of Izikk the Slapped, ‘I’m round as the moon and just as big—ouch! That hurt!’” Oskar laughed and turned his tired eyes on Janner. “Miller�
�s Bridge, my boy! Can you believe it? A legend proved true. A lot of that going on these days, it seems. Lost jewels, heroic deeds. I tell you, seeing the way you Igibys—Wingfeathers, rather—manage to survive makes me dare to believe the old stories are true after all. All those epics about mighty victories and brave kings. If I live long enough to sit at a desk again with a quill and parchment, I’ll tell about this day. I’ll put it down so that a thousand years hence some lad will read of the day Janner Wingfeather charged the Fangs of Dang beside his stout grandfather or how young King Kalmar’s skill with the bow drove an army of Fangs to retreat.”

  Janner and Tink blushed.

  “Don’t forget Nugget,” said Leeli. She was awake now, leaning against Nia.

  “Of course, my dear,” said Oskar. “I’ll write of brave Nugget, whose bark shook the trees, Nugget, whose love for Leeli Wingfeather sent him flying to meet a troll twice his size, whose might shattered Miller’s Bridge and saved the Wingfeathers from a Fang horde.”

  Janner braced himself for more of Leeli’s tears, but she didn’t cry. She worked her way to her feet and rummaged around in her pack for her ancient whistleharp. “Mama, will you get my crutch? I want to see the ocean.”

  Leeli limped to the precipice above the bank and sat. She took a deep breath and looked out over the Dark Sea of Darkness with a smile. The sky in the east blushed at the coming darkness. Leeli brought the whistleharp to her lips and played.

  Janner and Tink joined her and stared out at the sea, her song conjuring images of Anniera, feelings of home, of fire in the hearth. Then the song changed. It took on a sad tone, the notes bending upward like the croon of a lonely bird, and Janner knew Leeli was playing for Nugget. She poured her heart into the song and filled it with everything she felt.

  Suddenly, like a dream hovering at the front of his mind, Janner could see Nugget. The image swirled like a reflection in a pot of stirred water, gathering itself into clear, moving pictures of little Nugget running through the pasture, fetching a ball, wagging his tail as Leeli stooped to hand him a hogpig bone. The images hovered like smoke from a pipe, scene after beautiful scene of Nugget in all the stages of his life.