Roderick sank back deeper into the crevice. His rescue had failed, which meant that a war was about to start that would kill and injure hundreds, maybe thousands, of people.
And it was all his fault. If he had just listened to Ruby at the Circle of Mountains when she had tried to warn him that there was something not right about his mission . . . but he had ignored her because he had wanted to be a hero. And even when he had finally woken up and tried to fix things by rescuing Sonya, he had failed. He was useless. He was better off just staying in the crack and not doing any more damage to anyone.
Perhaps this was the end. Perhaps he was going to die wedged hopelessly in this crevice.
Unconsciousness was inviting itself back into his head. He welcomed it. His eyes fluttered shut, his awareness of the world dimmed, and he embraced the quieting peace that was cloaking his world in silence and darkness. It was time to give up, and to die alone and useless.
He let go. His breathing slowed, and the cold, empty void reached out to him.
Suddenly a desperate, powerful thought entered his mind. Keep going! it demanded. He wanted to ignore it, but its power pushed him to do something.
Furious at the interruption, he kicked his legs down and around, ignoring the stabbing bolts of pain. He pushed, pulled and fought until his legs were below his body; then, with one foot either side of the crack, he pushed up. Pain flooded his left knee, forcing him to cry out. He shoved his hand up and groped about until he found a handhold. He grabbed it and pulled, pushing with his good leg until he was able to grab the top of the crack. One more shove and his head was out. He looked around. There was no sign of anyone. He pulled himself out of the crack, crawled off the rock and into some trees and collapsed, panting, in a heap.
When he had sufficiently recovered he assessed the damage. His knee looked like it belonged to someone twice his size, his head throbbed, and one ear was tender and bloody. His ribs hurt, and there was a deep cut on his shoulder. But he was alive.
He heaved himself to his feet. His bad knee hurt to walk on, but he could manage. He limped to a tree, broke off a low-hanging branch to serve as a walking stick, and then slowly, painfully began to hobble up the hill.
He needed food and water desperately, so he headed back towards the cottage where Sonya had been kept. He approached it warily, limping across the clearing to the back wall as quickly as he could. He inched around, listening hard. Silence inside. The window they had climbed out of was still open and, with great difficulty and lots of pain, he hoisted himself through. He then cautiously crept through, checking the rooms. The cottage was empty.
In the kitchen he greedily stuffed bread, cheese, dates and cold meat into his mouth. Whatever was left he put in a bag. He found two water flasks, filled them at a nearby stream, and then set off unsteadily but determinedly in the direction he was sure the soldiers would have gone: towards the Nareea–Baronia highway to meet up with the Queen’s forces.
As he limped onwards he tried to hone in on Sonya, and got a weak sense of her somewhere ahead of him. Then he tried to sense Ruby, but got nothing. He had a horrible thought. They needed to keep Sonya alive to use as leverage on Banfor, but if Ruby had been captured, what would they do with her? He increased his speed from a slow to a medium hobble.
After a few steps he stopped, cursed himself for being so stupid, shut his eyes and tried to find his horse.
He sensed Fruitcake wandering slowly back down the winding hilly track they had come up. He remembered how he had communicated with the cockroaches, and sent out as strong a message as he could to his horse: ‘COME!’
Next he focused on Chester. He sensed the bear in the forest somewhere near the cottage and tried to summon him as well.
The efforts exhausted him. He gathered some leaves into a pile, laid his head down and slept.
He was awakened some time later by a very long tongue licking his nose. Fruitcake!
‘Good boy,’ he said, patting him.
‘I am not a boy!’
Roderick sat up. Chester was sitting across from them, pulling bugs out of his fur. ‘Even if I was younger than I am,’ he continued, ‘which I am not, because I am exactly as old as I am, but even if I was, I would not still be a boy. I would be a cub, because that is what things like you, which are humans, call young versions of things like me, which is a bear.’
‘Chester!’
‘That’s a much better name for me. Because my name is Chester.’
‘Are you all right?’
‘It depends on what you mean by all right. I am lost. I am tired. I am hungry. I am confused. I have a cut on my shoulder where one of those sharp swordy-swords said hello to it. And I have bugs in my fur. But on the other side of things, I am alive, it is not raining, I have found you, and when I pick the bugs out of my fur, I can eat them.’ To illustrate, he picked a bug off his chest and shoved it into his mouth. ‘Yummy yum yum!’
‘What happened to you?’
‘I ran out of the cottage using my feet, and as I did, one of those soldiers whacked me with his sword. I ran into the forest where there were lots of trees made of wood, and there I did some hiding and some bleeding from my shoulder. Then some time passed and I saw the men who like to carry swords bring Ruby and Sonya back to the cottage. I wanted to un-prisoner them, but there were too many swords, and too many men holding the too many swords, and my sore shoulder was very sore, and it was still doing some bleeding. More time passed and then they all headed off towards the big road and I did more bleeding and then I went to sleep. And then I woke up and heard you calling in my head, so I came.’
Roderick examined Chester’s cut. It was deep, but the bleeding had stopped. He ripped a strip off his saddle blanket and bound it as best he could, and then while the bear rested, he gave Fruitcake some water and let him graze nearby.
He did nothing else for a while, and then for a while longer. He couldn’t seem to find the motivation to get going. He knew what he had to do: find Sonya and free her, and then prevent the war. But how?
Roderick punched the ground in frustration. He had no plan. He may as well just go back to the crevice and slide in again. He punched the ground again, harder. It hurt but somehow that was a good thing, so he did it again. He was almost beginning to enjoy it in a sort of pathetic, self-pitying way.
‘If you are a person who wants to punch things,’ said Chester, ‘and I think that at the moment you are exactly that sort of person, then maybe you could come over to me and punch all the big bugs that seem to think that my fur is actually their very own home.’
Roderick rose slowly to his feet, staring at Chester. ‘What did you say?’
‘I said, if you . . .’
‘No. What’s in your fur?’
‘Big bugs. That is, bugs that are big.’
‘That’s it! Chester, you’re a genius!’ He ran over and hugged the bear. ‘This is what you need to do. Head to the Nareea–Baronia highway, a big road.’ He pointed south, down the hill. ‘Go that way and you should reach it in a few hours. Turn left at the road and find the Queen and her army. They’ll be on the road somewhere. Don’t let them see you. Hide in the trees and keep watch on Mister Banfor and Ruby and Sonya. They’ll all be there.’
‘So I will be a watching bear.’
‘Yes! But if anyone tries to harm them . . .’
‘Then I will act like an angry bear. Because I will be an angry bear!’
‘Exactly.’
‘And while I am being a watching bear or an angry bear, what sort of a non-bear will you be being?’
Roderick walked over to Fruitcake and climbed onto his back, pulling him around so they were facing up the hill Roderick had earlier staggered down – the opposite direction to where his sister, the Queen, Ruby, the Baronian army, the Nareean army and the oncoming war all were. He kicked his heels into Fruitcake’s sides. ‘I’m going bug-catching!’
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br /> For much of the day Roderick and Fruitcake followed their noses through the bush, keeping a general direction north. Progress was slow until early afternoon when they reached a track that headed in more or less the right direction, based on the sun’s position. In the late afternoon the track joined a wider dirt road. Roderick had little idea of where they were, but at every intersection he chose the option that took them closest to north.
As evening crept in he stopped, and fed and watered the exhausted Fruitcake and himself. Every part of Roderick wanted to lie down and sleep but instead he reached into his pocket for his spell book, then cursed when he realised he didn’t have it. Instead, he searched his memory for the recipe for Vigourama.
Vigourama was a sleep-banishing, energy-giving potion. Luckily carrane, the ingredient that banished sleep, and leedlepick, which supplied the energy, were both relatively common, and he soon found both. He was pretty sure it was a simple mixture of three parts carrane to four parts leedlepick, so he measured out the portions, crushed them up, and then mixed them with water in his saucepan. He made a fire and boiled the mixture, impatiently waited for it to cool, and then tipped some into a small scoop of bark and held it under Fruitcake’s mouth. The horse sniffed suspiciously and then lapped it up. Roderick emptied one of his flasks, poured the rest of the mixture into it, and then took a swig himself. He hoped he hadn’t got the recipe wrong, or else he and Fruitcake might be about to turn into toads! But almost immediately he felt a burst of energy shoot through him. He mounted Fruitcake and set off again, hoping that it worked just as well on horses.
A few minutes later it was clear that it did. Fruitcake, who would normally be spent after riding so many miles, was surging forward as if he was in a race. They kept up a steady pace as darkness fell, and soon after joined the main road north.
The night passed in a blur of travel until the potion abruptly wore off, Roderick’s head started to nod and then, in slow motion, he slid off the horse and the ground hit him in the face. He staggered to his feet and, leading Fruitcake, stumbled off the road into some grass where they both fell straight to sleep.
It seemed seconds later that the rising sun prised open his eyes. His mouth felt as if it was full of dirt. He realised that was because it was. During the night his slightly blocked nose had caused him to keep his mouth open and he had taken a few involuntary bites of ground. He swigged and spat water to wash it out, and then ate some bread and gave both himself and Fruitcake another dose of Vigourama.
Several more hours riding, and a wide detour around the home of the cave-dwellers, brought them to the clearing in front of the tunnel that led into the Circle of Mountains. It was just as he had last seen it, except the cockroach was gone. Of course. Banfor had widened her cage.
Roderick dismounted, shut his eyes and opened his mind. Almost immediately, he sensed the cockroach close by. He tried to project friendliness and a need for help. After a few moments, he sensed she was coming and opened his eyes. The cockroach was strolling up the valley. Roderick gulped. If she wanted to, she could kill him in an instant. He tried to summon some courage, but it had all scuttled off to somewhere less dangerous.
He projected the thought, Need help. He remembered the bargain he had struck with the cockroach; that in return for safe passage into the mountains, he would set her free. Banfor had set her free, or at least free-er by making her cage much bigger, and he had tried to make it appear to the cockroach as if it had been Roderick who had done it. But what had the cockroach made of it?
I helped you. Now I need help, thought Roderick.
NOT YOU. SORCERER, came the angry reply.
Rats!
I asked him to, Roderick thought. That wasn’t strictly true, but the cockroach didn’t object.
STILL IN CAGE, thought the roach.
Bigger cage, thought Roderick, smiling in as friendly a fashion as he could.
STILL CAGE!!
Suddenly, Roderick realised the fatal flaw in his plan. He had come all this way to try to enlist the aid of the cockroach, but even if he could get her to agree to help him, she was trapped. She couldn’t get out of the cage Banfor had made. Why hadn’t he thought of that before? He had raced up here as war beckoned, far away from his sister, for nothing.
Unless he could break the cage.
Surely he wouldn’t be able to. But at least he could try.
Try break cage, he thought. Yes?
A strong thought straight back. YES!
If break cage, you help me. Yes?
Roderick sensed uncertainty. If we break cage, you help me, he thought again.
The cockroach paused, and then nodded its huge head.
Roderick sat on the ground and closed his eyes, and together the knight and the giant cockroach extended their thoughts out to the cage. Roderick tried to feel the cage, understand it. He sensed the power that had gone into making it. The cage was invisible and, to all but the cockroach it held, undetectable. To her, however, it was stronger than a brick wall. It needed to be, because a brick wall wouldn’t have held her.
He felt the cockroach’s thoughts and tried to join with them. They needed to keep it simple, and he tried to focus all his energy on the idea of freedom. As their thoughts merged and focused, their power increased.
But not enough. Even together they were nowhere near strong enough to break the cage. It was as if they were throwing buckets of water against a metal door. Roderick knew with absolute certainty that they would not, could not, succeed. The magic Banfor had used to create the cage was simply too strong.
He was just about to open his eyes when he felt the glimmer of another presence. It was outside the cage, far away. Banfor! Wherever he was, he had detected their attempt and was trying to help. Roderick redoubled his efforts and felt the cockroach’s thoughts also refocus. Now there were three thoughts merging and Roderick had a delicious feeling of belonging, of shared power, of three becoming one and the one being greater than the three. He felt safe, warm and powerful.
Time passed – he didn’t know how much – until the third power gradually withdrew and disappeared. He realised their attempt to open the cage was over. He didn’t know whether it had succeeded or failed, but it was over.
He opened his eyes. He was trembling, and sweating. Even the cockroach looked shaky.
Then he felt its triumphant mental shout of joy: FRRREEEEEEE!!!
Roderick smiled. It was his first one in a long time.
CHAPTER 22
THE STORM APPROACHES
Fromley looked down into the valley to the road that ran along it, and followed it as far into Nareea as he could. He and Sir Ulmer had been sent ahead of the main Baronian force to look for the Nareean army. They had climbed a steep rocky hill to the top and followed a thin, neglected track along the ridge. It offered good views of the road below, and there was enough cover provided by trees and rock to hide behind if needed. He guessed they had probably already crossed into Nareea.
Fromley had been picked for his sharp eyes and he squinted into the distance. A glint caught his eye. He stared. There it was again. Sun on metal. He motioned Ulmer down and they both dismounted and pulled their horses behind trees. Away to the east he could now make out a moving swarm. The Nareean army was coming.
He swallowed. ‘Here we go,’ he said. Ulmer was pulling at his straggly beard and chewing his lip. Fromley wondered if his own nervousness was as obvious. ‘You keep watching,’ he said. ‘I’ll report back.’
He carefully led his horse back along the track and then, once he was out of sight of the advancing force, leapt on and raced back the way he had come.
The cockroach’s joy was filling the thought waves.
FFFRRREEEEEEEEEE!!!
Now you help me, Roderick thought.
FREEE. WHAT I WANT.
You promised to help me.
The cockroach paused, paw
ing the ground. Roderick sensed unwillingness. Her muscles were tense, eager to be away.
Cage could come back, thought Roderick.
Now he sensed uncertainty.
Help me free sorcerer. Then you free forever.
The cockroach raised her front legs and flicked them about. She turned her head this way and that, and then eventually, with something that looked suspiciously like a sigh, came to rest. HELP HOW?
Not all cockroaches can fly. In fact, most cannot. However, most giant cockroaches can and Grynaldeen – for that, Roderick discovered, was her name – could. Getting on was tricky. Eventually he climbed a tree, slid out along a branch and lowered himself down between her wings. Her back was broad and level, but also smooth, which meant that there was nothing to hold on to. That was fine while they sat on the ground, but he was worried that once her great wings started flapping he might get blown off. He moved forward to where her neck would have been if she had had one. Instead there was just a crack where head met body. Roderick wedged his legs along the crack, and held on as firmly as he could to the back of her head.
Grynaldeen began to flap her wings so fast that they were virtually invisible. Instead of the force pushing Roderick off her back as he had feared, the wind they generated squeezed him from both sides and pushed him forward against the back of her head. He could hardly move, much less fall.
They took off, rising into the air and moving forward at what quickly became a tremendous pace. Roderick remembered Fruitcake, and sent a thought command to him: Follow. He hoped it was enough.
Roderick had hoped to use the time they were in the air to work out what he was actually going to do when they reached their destination, but that wasn’t going to happen. The wings made a deafening noise, he was squashed against the head of a giant cockroach and he had to keep giving Grynaldeen directions. There was no room to think about anything else.
Fromley was back in Baronia, his horse picking its way between rocks down the steep slope to the road at the bottom of the valley. When they reached it, he urged it into a gallop. Before long he rounded a bend and saw the Baronian army. He hurried his horse towards the front and centre where the Queen rode. As he approached he dipped his head respectfully. She nodded acknowledgement and motioned for him to fall in beside her.
The Adventures of Sir Roderick, the Not-Very Brave Page 21
