“Tobble,” I whispered. “You have the crown? And the Far-Near?”
“Yes.”
“Put on the crown. You are now King Tobble, ruler of all wobbyks, and a close ally of Sg’drit. I am your dairne truth teller.”
“But I can’t. I’m just . . . me.”
“You remember how arrogant the Murdano was? Be like that.”
We stopped so Tobble could take the crown from his pack and balance it on his head. Were it not for his prominent ears, the thing would have fallen down over his neck like a massive necklace.
Tobble passed the Far-Near to me. “You should hold this. You’re my assistant, after all.”
We moved on, past the horrifying spectacle on the walls, until we reached a line of terramants blocking our route.
“You will approach the Foreman on your knees,” said the largest. “Or you will die.”
“Nonsense,” I said with far more confidence than I felt. “This is King Tobble of the Wobbyk Kingdom, a close ally of the Kazar Sg’drit. He grovels for no one!”
The terramant didn’t seem to know what to make of my declaration. We strode past with all the regal bearing we could manage and came face-to-face with a creature unlike any I had ever seen.
The Foreman was not a terramant. He was more insect than anything else, but not entirely so. He was large, twice the size of any of the terramants I had seen. His lower body was a chitinous shell, with thick, insect-like armor behind, and an exposed and more vulnerable front with a multitude of what looked like small legs. His midsection was a mass of writhing tentacles of different lengths and thicknesses, some no longer than a snake, others perhaps twenty feet long.
His head was covered by a chitin armor hood that shadowed his face, a face that at first looked like that of a natite. And in fact he seemed to be an aquatic creature, in part, for he sat on a throne in a shallow pool. Two streams of water poured continuously over him, draining from tubes in the mud walls. A rope harness kept his upper body upright, affording him a sitting position from which he could look down at us from an impressive height.
“He looks part lobster!” Tobble said.
This told me nothing, as I’d never heard of a lobster before. But I wasn’t concerning myself with what he was. I was focused on what he could do to us.
“Why have you come here?” he demanded. His voice was hard to understand, a grinding noise interrupted by insect clicks.
I swallowed my fear as well as I could. Our survival, and that of our friends, relied on how I replied.
Oh, to have had Khara’s courage, Renzo’s bravado, Gambler’s cunning at that moment!
I was the runt of my litter. Not a leader.
But at least I had King Tobble by my side.
22
A Gift for the Foreman
“Great Foreman,” I said, straightening to my full height, “this is King Tobble of the Wobbyks, senior adviser to and trusted ally of the great Kazar Sg’drit.”
I was just about to add “as you can see from the crown upon his head,” but stopped myself at the last minute. It would be a mistake to overexplain. The Foreman had seen the crown, and crowns were not something any ordinary person would have.
Tobble stood with all the easy arrogance of a creature entitled to wear the crown, plus a hint of the disrespectful in his pose.
After all, Tobble was a king, however small.
The Foreman turned blank red eyes on us. Two antennae rose in graceful arcs from his hooded head, and they twitched slightly. “I have not been informed of any visit,” he said. He clearly wasn’t convinced.
“There wouldn’t be much point in a surprise inspection, Foreman,” said Tobble, “if you were warned ahead of time, now, would there?”
It was all I could do not to applaud his performance.
“Inspection?” The Foreman could not frown, but doubt was in his voice.
“Yes,” Tobble said. “And courtesy compels me to reveal to you that this dairne of mine can instantly and unfailingly separate truth from lies.”
“I had heard . . .” The Foreman trailed off. “I had been told that dairnekind was no more.”
“Do you imagine that the Kazar Sg’drit reveals all his secrets to the likes of you?” Tobble’s incredulity was a thing to behold. “But before we begin, my friend the Kazar has sent a rare gift to you.”
Tobble snapped his fingers, and I hastily drew the Far-Near from my leather bag.
“Well?” Tobble snapped at me. “Present the Kazar’s gift before I have you whipped!”
I advanced, holding out the Far-Near. The monstrous being whipped it from my hand with a tentacle bigger than any snake I’d ever seen.
“If I may—” I began, but Tobble gave a dismissive wave. “Great Foreman, the Far-Near must be held to your eye. If you look through one end, all you see will seem very small. If you look through the other, it will make distant objects seem nearer.”
The Foreman held it tentatively to his right eye. He emitted a wet sound, which was probably a gasp. Then he reversed the Far-Near, scanning around the chamber.
“This is truly magnificent,” the Foreman said. “Please send the Kazar Sg’drit, all glory to him, my deep and endless gratitude.”
“What I wish to do now is hear of your progress on the work here,” Tobble said.
“Of course,” the big bug said. “I can report to you that the tunnel is ahead of schedule. We have established a means of feeding my thralls and—”
“Your thralls?” Tobble asked with a raised eyebrow.
The Foreman quickly amended, “They are, of course, the Kazar’s thralls, as I am his servant. His loyal servant.”
“No one doubts your loyalty,” Tobble said with a graceful wave of his paw.
The Foreman proceeded to fill us in on all the details, which took quite some time. I was exhausted and anxious, my knees trembling. I could only imagine how Tobble was feeling.
After the update, we were invited to a sit at an overloaded table and dine on a variety of dishes, all of which seemed to feature worm as the main ingredient. It was upon the arrival of the food that Tobble carried off his masterstroke.
“This is a glorious feast indeed, Foreman. But I dine almost exclusively on fresh human meat.” He patted his round tummy. “I find it is one of the few things that do not upset my digestion.”
An hour later, we were escorted to the surface by six terramants. And with us, shackled and bowed, were Khara, Renzo—our fresh meat—and Gambler. Poor Dog was attached to a heavy chain.
At first the Foreman had been suspicious when Tobble suggested sending them with us. But Tobble had quickly spun a convincing tale about our having pursued the two humans, along with a treasonous felivet the Kazar would dearly love to throw into his torture pit.
“Torture pit?” the Foreman had asked.
“Of course. Don’t you have one?” Tobble shot back.
We emerged back into sunlight with our friends, still very much alive, along with Khara’s sword and Renzo’s shield, and bade farewell to our escorts.
“Tobble,” I said as the Foreman’s lair receded in the distance, “I am quite certain you could join any traveling troupe of actors and be granted a starring role.”
Tobble’s whiskers quivered as he attempted not to smile. “That’s King Tobble, I’ll remind you.”
“I need no reminder,” I said, bowing low. “And I never will.”
23
Neither Doomed nor Pointless
We managed to use Khara’s sword and Tobble’s nimble paws to get rid of the chain tightly looped around Dog’s neck. The shackles on Khara, Renzo, and Gambler took longer to remove. All three seemed shaken and unsteady—more so after we shared what had happened to Luca.
But it was Khara who seemed to take their brush with death the hardest. She refused to speak, and when asked what we should do next, she merely trudged ahead. We followed in her wake.
We were exhausted and desperate for sleep, but we kept going until the s
un peeked over the horizon and the hideous Crimson Forest was far behind us.
The forest that had never been a forest at all.
Khara, Renzo, and Gambler had heard much while sealed in their prison of soil. The forest, it seemed, was nothing but a bizarre farm, created solely to generate food for the terramants. Somehow the Kazar Sg’drit had found a way to grow vast quantities of worms in treelike structures. Theurgy, Renzo suspected.
The terramants, desperately hungry after the Kazar’s poisoning of their main food source, had been easy to force into tunnel building.
When we were far past the forest, I approached Renzo. “Are you well?” I asked gently.
“No,” he said. His mouth was set in a tight line. After a moment, he added, “I thought I would die there, Byx.”
“When you were nearly roasted by the Knight of the Fire,” I said, “it barely seemed to faze you. I wonder why this was so much worse.”
Renzo said nothing. He quickened his pace until he was ahead of me, and I realized my curiosity was ill-timed, to say the least.
Beside me, Gambler said, “We all have our own particular fears, Byx. One can be brave nine times and be a coward the tenth time. This is true of all living things capable of thought.”
Fearless Gambler feared water. Renzo feared starvation. Tobble feared mudworms.
And what was I afraid of?
I feared dying as the last of my species, never to spend another hour with one of my own kind.
I feared . . . well, I feared being afraid. Lacking courage when I most needed it.
I feared, I supposed, myself.
What did Khara fear? I wondered, watching her walk along, deep in her own thoughts.
“I have not had occasion yet to thank you for rescuing us,” Gambler said.
“Tobble did most of the talking,” I admitted.
“I know. It was Tobble I was speaking to.”
“Me?” Tobble squeaked.
“You walked up and bluffed that great lobster creature,” Gambler said. “As heroic a performance as I can imagine. We all owe you our lives.”
Renzo came out of his sulk long enough to say, “Yes, we do. As a thief who has spent far too much time trying to con his way out of trouble, I would doff my hat, if I had a hat.”
Even Khara spoke, albeit in a tone so soft we could barely hear her. “Thank you, Tobble,” she said. “And you as well, Byx.”
Tobble seemed uncertain what to do with all the praise. He tried walking differently, with a wider stance and longer strides. He pulled back his shoulders and puffed out his chest.
But after a few minutes, he grew tired and went back to being regular old Tobble. “Don’t tell the others,” he whispered to me, “but I wasn’t brave. I was scared to death of those worms. The terramants weren’t too fun, either.”
Gambler overheard and uttered his felivet laugh, which was closer to the sound of a human clearing their throat. “If you’re not afraid, you’re a fool. If you are afraid, even scared to death, and keep your head? That is called courage. Now, friend wobbyk, I shall never be able to eat you.”
I was sure that last part was a felivet joke.
Pretty sure.
We took a brief, much-needed rest, then headed onward across rocky terrain. It seemed we were always either climbing or descending. At the crests we could look around, but most of the time our view was limited. It was a good thing we’d given Vallino up when we had. It would have been impossible for him to make it through.
Finally, we huffed and puffed our way up the tallest of the snowy ridges. When we looked to the east, we saw the vast grayness of a distant sea.
“Still a long way,” Renzo said. “But at least we can see our goal.”
Khara said nothing.
In the evening, cold and wet from a rain shower that turned to snow and covered our path with slush, we made camp in a small hollow in the side of a hill. We had nothing to burn for a fire, so we shivered beneath absurdly inadequate blankets, and felt the wet seep into our clothing.
I slept fitfully. At one point I woke and saw Khara standing by herself, looking away. I went to her. She made no acknowledgment.
“What troubles you, Khara?” I asked.
She took her time answering. “I was unjust, Byx,” she said at last, her voice muted. “I thought Luca had betrayed us. The last thing he heard was my voice calling him a traitor.”
“But Khara,” I said, “he had betrayed us before.”
“Yes, but this time I had a dairne telling me he was speaking the truth.” She looked past me, staring, it seemed, at nothing. “I didn’t trust him. And I didn’t trust you. And while we’re at it, I still don’t entirely trust Renzo.”
She fell silent but didn’t leave. I wasn’t sure what to say to make her feel better, so I simply stood beside her, hoping that was enough.
And after a while Khara spoke again. “I am the leader of this . . . this . . . doomed and pointless enterprise. I led us into that forest. I got Luca killed. I nearly got us all killed. I lay there, buried, helpless, believing I would have to remain there for days, hearing Renzo and Gambler weaken, knowing their hunger, knowing their fear. Knowing that it would take us a long time to die. Knowing I had led them to that.”
“Khara, you are only human. Human, felivet, dairne . . . we all make mistakes. We all fail at times.”
She nodded slowly, but I could tell she wasn’t convinced.
“When we were in the tunnel,” I said, “there was a moment when Tobble told me to take the lead.” I looked Khara in the eyes. “I have never been so frightened by a simple word. Lead.”
“The first time is the hardest.” Khara smiled, just a little. “But you may have to lead again before all this is done, Byx. You’d better get used to it.”
“Does it ever get easier?”
Khara gave a short laugh. “Well, it gets . . . different. More familiar. But easier? No.”
“We were talking before about what scares us. It was different for everyone.” I hesitated, recalling how my questioning had seemed to upset Renzo, then pressed on. “Are you ever afraid, Khara?”
She exhaled slowly, her breath clouding in the icy air. “I’m afraid of failing,” she said. “Of letting all of you down.”
“Listen, Khara,” I said, doing my best to adopt a wise, parental tone. “You can be uncertain, you can be angry at yourself, but we still need you. Take some time, if you need it, to think of how you might do better in the future. And then get back to the job of leading this doomed and pointless enterprise. Even if that means taking the risk of trusting others. There is one thing I know, Khara. You may fail sometimes. But you’ll never let us down.”
I thought I had offended her. But after a moment I felt her hand on my shoulder. “This is neither doomed nor pointless,” Khara said softly. “We will find your island. We will find your dairnes.”
I nodded. “You’re right,” I said, my voice catching. “This expedition isn’t pointless. And,with you leading us, it may not even be doomed.”
She laughed and gave me a hug. “Come back to sleep?” I asked, suppressing a yawn.
“In a while. I promise.”
I trudged back to my pitiful blanket and lay down on the freezing, damp ground as snowflakes settled on my face.
The last thing I heard before sleep took me was Renzo, lying nearby, in a whisper that may have been intended for his ears alone.
“I like that girl. I like that girl a lot.”
24
At Sea
In the morning the clouds hung low, at times sprinkling us with rain, and at other times dusting us with snow. At last we topped a steep embankment and saw the sea again. No longer was it a distant gray smudge. It was right before us, less than half a league away.
We no longer had our Far-Near, having gifted it to the Foreman. But even our natural eyes could see a fishing village just up the coast to the northeast. Beyond that, we could make out the masts and piers of a larger port city. To our right l
oomed the great massif that ran straight into the sea, forming the dividing line between Dreyland and Nedarra.
Just knowing how close we might be to the island—and to more dairnes—sent my heart racing. I tasted the wind, hoping, even though I knew it was unlikely, I might catch a trace of one of my own.
But no. I smelled no dairnes, just salt and sea.
“I don’t see Tarok,” Khara said, “but it may be beyond that curved spit of land, out of view.”
“Sentient islands move erratically,” Renzo said. “Depending on the food supply in the waters.”
“Do you think it’s really carnivorous?” Tobble asked nervously.
“Could just be rumors,” Khara said. “A story to keep others at bay.”
“After all, the worms in that tunnel turned out to be harmless,” I said. “Despite that wobbyk song of yours.”
“Those worms weren’t harmless,” Tobble said. He shivered. “I’ll be having nightmares about them forever.”
A road ran between us and the sea, full of marching soldiers and heavily laden wagons.
“How many soldiers does this Kazar Sg’drit have?” Renzo asked.
“No doubt more than the Murdano can muster,” Khara said darkly. “If the terramants succeed in digging a tunnel beneath the mountains, the Dreyland troops will flood into Nedarra. Our—” She stopped herself. “The Murdano’s troops are concentrated in the east, expecting an invasion by water. The tunnel will mean doom for them. Dreyland will push them into the sea.”
“Does the Murdano have so few soldiers?” Renzo asked.
Khara shrugged. “Many will not head into battle for him. They might fight to protect Nedarra—if they knew the danger—but they won’t rally to the Murdano.”
“What about the westerners, the once-great families in exile?” Renzo asked, turning to Khara. “Your own family, for example. Wouldn’t they work to save Nedarra?”
“My father would cut off his own hand before raising it in defense of the Murdano,” Khara replied. “And many others follow my father’s lead.”
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