“Put it down,” Hobnob urged.
“Didn’t you say the key was in one of the acorns? This acorn’s magnetic.” He tapped it a few times to the lodestone, each time feeling the connection. Then he gave the acorn a little shake. “There’s something inside it.”
“How do you know?”
Ray began squeezing the acorn in his palm.
Hobnob leaped to his feet in alarm. “No, you tarnal idiot!”
Ray felt the acorn crack.
Hobnob winced. “Once you open your palms you got about two seconds. I give myself three.”
Ray held his breath as he unfolded his fingers. Lying in his palm, along with the broken shell of the acorn, was a tiny iron key. He held it up for Hobnob to see. Hobnob’s face broke into an amazed smile.
“Can’t believe it! That’s luck.”
Ray palmed the key and swiveled his arm back. “I’ll throw it to you.”
“No!” Hobnob pleaded. “No. You en’t going to make it. Just … just put it on the stone and swing it over on the rope.”
Sticking the key to the lodestone and tucking the tiny handle beneath the knot for good measure, Ray swung the key across the acorns to Hobnob. Hobnob grabbed it and took the key from the lodestone.
“Don’t much like iron,” he muttered as he put the key in the lock at his ankle. “Got a bit of an allergy, you see.” With a click, Hobnob pulled the lock off the leather fetter encircling his leg, while Ray pulled back the lodestone.
“Oh, that feels good,” Hobnob groaned with pleasure. “Yes, sweet freedom. Ha, ha!” He hopped up quickly, and they both heard the sharp crack under his heel.
Ray froze. Hobnob turned to look at Ray, the mirth melting from his face. As soon as Hobnob lifted his foot, the poisonous fumes would be set free.
“You’ll want to hold your breath,” Hobnob whimpered. “And of course … run!”
Ray took great galloping leaps as he propelled himself up the hill. He looked back for a moment to see Hobnob running, one hand tightly clamped over his nose and mouth, the other snatching the dandelion hat, and all the way crushing and smashing the poisonous acorns as he escaped. The two didn’t stop until they put a vast distance between them and the Devil’s oak.
* * *
“Can’t thank you enough, lad. Really I can’t,” Peter Hobnob said as he led Ray through the woods. Ray had to jog to keep up with the tiny thief’s brisk pace.
“Where are we going?” he panted.
“Bit further, see. En’t going to forget this. No, sir. Peter Hobnob never forgets … what did you say your name was again?”
“Ray.”
“En’t going to forget this, Ray.”
“Are you going back to the Pirate Queen?”
“Gracious, no,” Hobnob said, ducking under a fallen tree. “She’d have my nose.”
Ray pulled aside branches as he followed. “Will you look for her silver dagger, then?”
“And incriminate myself further?” Hobnob clicked his tongue and then said, “You should seriously consider the larcenous arts as an occupation, by the way. Good business in thieving. Especially these days with the Ramblers all but gone.”
“Ramblers?” Ray asked, his pants snagged on a bramble. He heard a little tear as he pulled them loose. “Who are they?”
Hobnob looked over his shoulder. “Can’t be more than a handful scattered about. They’s protectors. Heroes of the Wild. No, en’t seen none of them around since the day John Henry fought the Machine. They was all killed after that, by the Gog. Heard tell that the Gog is building a new Machine. Hope it en’t true of course, but you never know. No, thieving’s never been so good. Booming. Ah, here we are.”
Ray stopped short and nearly stumbled into Hobnob standing before a thicket. A tangle of wild shrubs spread out before him, covered in dark fruit.
“Gooseberries.” Hobnob smiled. “Said you was hungry. Here you go.”
“They’re not … poisonous?” His mouth watered.
“Gracious, no!”
Ray rushed forward and pulled handfuls of the currant-like berries from the vines. With one hand he stuffed the gooseberries into his mouth. With the other he filled the pockets of his coat. He had never tasted anything so delicious, and for a moment he forgot that the thief was standing with him.
“Well, best be off,” Hobnob called.
Ray turned, his lips stained with the juice. “You’re leaving?”
“Don’t worry. Just keep going that way”—Hobnob waved his hand—“and you’ll find your way out before nightfall.” Then he added, “But be careful. Lost Wood is full of bandits and the like.”
Ray frowned. “I haven’t seen another person besides you for days.”
“Well, you never know. Bound to be someone from the Snapdragon along to check on me any day now. Don’t want to get caught by one of them, unless it’s Big Jimmie. He’s a nice sort. You’d get along fine with him, unless he’s tired. Gets right cranky when he en’t had a nap. Good luck.”
Hobnob gave him a wave and stuck the dandelion hat on his wild jumble of hair—the yellow of the dandelions matching hue for hue with his yellow hair. The golden color began to drain away instantly, wilting to a gray-white. “Won’t forget that good turn you done me, Jay.”
“It’s Ray,” he said.
As the dandelions turned to puffy wisps, Hobnob’s body grew misty and began to scatter slowly like smoke. His fading face gave one last merry smile before he disappeared into a million tiny white seedpods, drifting away in the breeze.
RAY STARED WITH BEWILDERMENT AS THE LAST DANDELION pods disappeared up into the canopy of leaves. Had that really happened? Hobnob had flown away, just as he said he could!
Ray took the lodestone from his pocket. As his fingers wrapped around the stone, he felt its pull return. He screwed up his brow and then looked at the shadowy forest. Putting the lodestone back, Ray took out a handful of gooseberries and set off again.
As he journeyed, he took out the lodestone from time to time to check his direction. His thoughts drifted back to what Hobnob had said about John Henry and some wicked machine and Ramblers. He certainly knew about John Henry—everybody had heard that legend. But a wicked machine? In the story Ray remembered, John Henry had beaten a steam drill before dying at the end of the competition. Nothing about—what was it?—a Gog!
After another hour, the forest began to change again, decorated now more frequently with wildflowers. The trees were not so close together or as menacing. Ray felt emboldened that he might at last be coming to the edge of the Lost Wood.
Voices echoed through the trees. Ray froze. The pirates from the Snapdragon! They were coming for Hobnob. Or had they heard Ray and begun following him?
Ray spun around and saw an enormous tree. Long ago, it must have been a titan among the other oaks and hickories, but at some point the tree had broken about twelve feet from the ground. It reminded Ray of a severed column from a picture book on the ancient empires. If he could get up there, it might be the best hiding spot.
Ray pulled himself up on the pegs of old limbs. As he reached the place where the tree had broken off, he saw an opening in the trunk where the tree’s interior had become hollow with rot and age. It seemed almost like a giant well.
Something sparkled from the shadows just inside the opening. Reaching in, his finger touched something metal and sharp. He flinched back and then leaned down to peer closer.
A few feet into the opening, there was a small ledge of rotten wood, before the opening descended deep into the trunk. The silver handle of a stiletto protruded from the rotten ledge, its blade sunk several inches straight in. Ray threw his legs over the opening. Reaching down once more, he gave the handle a jerk, releasing it. It was the Pirate Queen’s dagger. It had to be! What were the odds of discovering it?
A voice drifted, close enough now for Ray to make out the words. “Just a little farther.”
Not wanting to risk being spied, Ray lowered himself into the opening, squat
ting with his heels on the ledge where he had removed the silver dagger. He was there only a moment before the rotten wood of the ledge broke, plunging him headfirst into the dark belly of the tree.
He was surprised to find that his shoulders didn’t land on rotten wood, and he was more surprised that he was lying on warm, coarse fur, which gave a squeal and began moving from under him.
Ray pushed and pulled his way around, backing as far against the interior wall of the trunk as he could. He inhaled sharply on the acidic stench that filled the dark. Something—or some things—were moving about the interior of the tree. A wet nose pressed into his cheek, sniffing. He touched a finger to the muzzle and felt something akin to a dog snout. He may have lived in the city nearly his whole life but he knew this wasn’t a dog. And it was too big to be a raccoon.
It was a bear. Probably just a cub, but a cub has a mother and she would come home sometime.
The bear cub mewed and was answered by another, which sniffed at Ray’s hands. He tightened his grip on the dagger and said, “It’s all right. Not going to hurt you.” One answered with a lick at his forearm. “Yeah, nice bear. We’re friends, right? Thanks for the licks. When’s mama coming home?”
He squeezed himself around the cubs and felt the sides of the trunk, trying to find a handhold to climb out. A gruff snort from outside stilled Ray’s scrambling. It felt as if a cold stone slipped down his throat. The tree then shook down to the roots with the clambering weight of the she-bear climbing up. Ray fell back into the two cubs, which were snorting with anticipation at the return of their mother. The circle of bright sunlight at the top of the tree darkened into shadow. The she-bear sniffed at her den.
What was he going to do? Ray’s mind raced. He could think of only one way out. But it was going to be a rough ride.
The great she-bear turned around atop the tree and backed into the hole. All the light was sucked from overhead as the bear inched into her den. She slid down toward the bottom, her claws scraping the sides to slow her descent. As she backed up nearly onto Ray, he gave the she-bear a quick jab in her rear with the dagger, not enough to harm her but enough to give her alarm. She gave a howl that rattled Ray through his bones. Like a cannonball she launched out of the top of the tree and dropped onto the ground below—with Ray clinging to her back.
* * *
Not far away from Ray, two figures passed into the Lost Wood, searching. The first was small—a Chinese girl with a long braid of sleek black hair extending from the crown of her head to the small of her back. The other was enormous—a young black man who stood a full eight feet.
The girl held out her hand, which, unlike the rest of her pale skin, was solid midnight black but for tiny luminous markings moving slowly to and fro. “Just a little farther,” she said after examining the markings. She returned her hand to rest on the hilt of her knife. The girl wore a mandarin-orange silk tunic and loose black pants. On her feet were tattered slippers in need of restitching at the toes.
“You been saying that all day,” the giant said, wiping his hand across his head of short black curls. He wore denim overalls, plain and sun-faded, over a simple cotton shirt. Burlap sacks in various states from empty to bulging dangled from a thick leather belt cinched about his waist.
The girl looked once more at the markings on the back of her tattooed hand and then scowled. “Should be here …”
The giant gave a wild smile. “Ah, I spy them.”
He strode forward into a sun-speckled glade thick with colorful wildflowers. The giant took a wistful sniff as he gathered handfuls of Solomon’s seal and monkshood, rolled them in damp cloth, and placed them in one of the sacks tied to his wide belt.
The girl followed him into the glade and settled against the trunk of a willow. “Why are you picking those yellow ones?” she asked. “Nel didn’t say anything about any yellow flowers.”
“They’re pretty,” the giant said.
The girl rolled her eyes and placed her hands behind her head.
“You remember what that root was Nel told us to get?” the giant called after a moment of contemplation.
“Of course not, he told you what to get, not me. I don’t know why I keep going with you on these expeditions.”
The giant caught her teasing smile from the corner of his eye. “Because I’d never find the train again.”
“Why don’t you write down what herbs Nel wants gathered?” the girl asked.
“I hate making lists. Puts too much pressure on me. I don’t like being anxious.”
“But see, you get to have the satisfaction of checking off your progress as—Hey! What’s that?”
There was a roar and a snapping of underbrush and shrubs. The girl leaped to her feet, whipping the bowie knife from her belt as the she-bear burst into the clearing. The enormity of the beast alone would have given them pause, but what shocked them most was the boy riding on her back like a rodeo cowboy. The bear-rider was straddling her tightly with his knees and held thick folds of loose fur with both his hands.
The giant toppled out of the way. The bear turned and charged again, but the girl jumped between it and her friend, raising her knife. The she-bear reared back on her hind legs, her claws ready to rake into the small girl.
The giant lunged, bracing his head low and plowing into the bear’s stomach with his massive shoulders. The bear tumbled over several times, quickly clambered back to her feet. The rider was thrown into the air, his head striking the trunk of the willow where the girl had been sitting moments before. He collapsed.
The she-bear hesitated before the giant. She sidled around in an arc, baring her teeth and growling. The giant reached up and broke a stout limb from a tree, taking a few swings to measure the weight of his club. The girl eased around to the side of the bear, ready to leap, ready with her knife. The she-bear turned her head back and forth between the two.
From the roots of the willow, the rider lifted his head and extended an arm. “Don’t … she’s just protecting her cubs.”
The girl and the giant looked at one another and then at the strange rider.
“Is she yours?” the girl called. “Are you one of those gypsy bear-tamers?”
The rider’s eyes were drifting as he fought to stay conscious. “Just … protecting her cubs. … ” Blood trickled from below his cap across his brow.
The giant lowered the club and backed up a few steps. The girl looked less comfortable with lowering her defenses, but when the giant waved her back, she did so. The she-bear snorted a few times, watching the three. Then she turned and loped toward the rider. She stopped above him and gave his forehead a lick before galloping off into the thickets.
Ray drifted in and out of consciousness. His skull felt inches too thick and pulsed painfully. The world seemed muted and hazy. He forced an eyelid open and saw the forest floor bouncing below him. He closed his eye and tried not to be sick.
“… and I don’t think we should be taking him with us,” someone said.
“He’s hurt. We have to.” Ray could feel the rumble of the voice reverberate through his body. He was being carried over someone’s shoulder, and whoever it was must have been huge because the ground looked a long ways down. The other voice sounded like a girl, but Ray felt too nauseated to turn his head and check.
“But Nel sent us to collect herbs. He didn’t say anything—”
“He’d say the same as me. The boy’s hurt. He needs help.”
“Pirates?” Ray whispered.
“What did he say?” the girl asked.
“Not sure.”
Ray mumbled, “Are you … Big Jimmie? You taking me … to the Snapdragon?”
“I think he’s knocked squirrelly,” the giant said.
Ray’s vision swirled, and he passed out.
* * *
When Ray next came to, he was lying on the grass. He squinted at the rosy halo of a sunset. The trees were gone from overhead; he was out of the woods. The giant was wiping Ray’s forehead with a wet h
andkerchief.
“I think he’s got a fever,” the giant said in a voice so low that it rumbled and vibrated more out from his body than from his mouth.
The girl snorted. Ray turned to look at her. She was sitting in the grass looking away from him, down a stretch of railroad track.
In certain neighborhoods of the cities where Ray had grown up, there had been Chinese immigrants, many running groceries or employed as laborers. It seemed strange to Ray that he should find someone Chinese out here in the middle of nowhere, and without the slightest tinge of an accent.
Ray looked up at the giant’s earthy brown face. His jaw was wide and his features chiseled, but his curly eyelashes and friendly dark eyes eased Ray’s worries.
“Where are you taking me?” Ray asked.
“To our train,” the giant said. He spoke in a slow, calculating drawl, as if his mouth were full of sticky sweet molasses.
Ray listened for the sound of a train, a whistle or a rattling of the track. But the world was quiet except for a chorus of katydids. There was no train coming, and they must have been miles from a depot.
“Where is it?” He was growing dizzy again. He struggled to keep his attention on the giant and the girl.
The giant chuckled and looked at the girl.
Ray followed his gaze. The girl gave a scowl either to Ray or to the giant or to both and tucked her hand into the fold of her tunic.
For a moment, Ray thought her hand had been black. Or was it a tattoo? He thought he saw on the dark skin of her hand an unearthly glittering, a shimmering and swirling cosmos of faint sparkles. But Ray decided—before he slipped into unconsciousness again—that he must have been addled from the fall.
RAY WOKE WITH THE GAUZY MORNING SUNLIGHT ON HIS face. The straw-tick mattress beneath him was soft, but the threadbare sheets were wet with perspiration. A woman leaned over him. She was pleasantly plump with small, pinched features. Her misty-brown hair was pulled into a knot at her nape, with loose strands dangling about her face.
Gently she slid an arm under Ray’s neck and lifted his head. Something cool and wet touched his lips. “Take a bit more, dear,” she said. “Fever’s near broke, but you need rest. Drink and sleep.”
The Nine Pound Hammer Page 3
