Chapter XXXVI
The night passed and dawn broke. Theodoric and Franken awoke quite happy, after having slept in a tree platform like their own, though many groonits from home.
“The rats had a good night,” commented Theodoric, looking toward Artur’s tree. The others saw what he meant: Tiny rodent teeth had reduced the thylak to a skeleton, dangling loosely from Kylie’s amoral blade.
Dungo had found the night strictly disagreeable, having rolled off his platform a couple of times and quickly becoming prey to the rats, and his humor showed no improvement over the previous evening. Indeed, nobody had heard clicking from him since leaving his cart behind. Immediately he began to press that they make their way back to the Alluvia.
“Such inhospitable lands, they make the deserts seem gracious. That gluttonous Gravidas, stealing away our goods, even the accursed Alluvia would do no such thing. And what despicable hosts! Nothing to offer us for breakfast but more arrows, no doubt! Wolven would shred my flesh if I treated visitors in such abominable fashion, if I gave him the chance. I insist, we must be heading back today, back to our own friendly lands. My fellows, do you not wish to visit your families again, and taste of the abundance of your own peoples? My mouth waters at the thought of cheese! Come, let us give up this doomed quest for friendliness in this wasteland!”
“We have come for a reason, have we not?” asked Theodoric. “Would it not be wise to exhaust our efforts before retreating? The songbird has many notes.”
“I’m not going anywhere until I see a Raspar face,” said Artur gruffly. “I’ll either hear one speak or I’ll have one to spit at.”
Dungo turned his attention to the Koinoni, each spinning in turn, carefully trying to avoid rats. “Good fellows, perhaps you will hear the reason in my words. These forests are untenable, filled with fearsome animals large and small. The food is scarce and distasteful. The sleeping is impossible, not a single comfort to be had, dreadful all the night long. And what about Moss and Scree? And these people, these Raspars as you call them, may not be people at all. What kind of humanity would leave so small and vulnerable a band as we out in the elements without shelter or sustenance? What good could these beasts ever be to us anyway? Come, let us be quit of this place.”
“We have been here often,” said a Koinoni, probably Yarrow. “Many times we have had arrows fired upon us. Never have we seen a Raspar man, nor have they ever spoken to us. Raspars will not trade.”
“You see?” Dungo appealed to the others. “Even Yarrow — Yarrow? — concedes that our purpose is futile here. Even the Koinoni are ready to return.”
“Quite the opposite,” said Yarrow. “We must stay. We have traveled all over the wide world. Only here have we never seen. This city may be our last chance. Perhaps here we will trade for the better thing.”
Dungo at last saw he was defeated, and he retreated to one of the tall trees, sitting among the roots with Sylva. Quietly they drew signs to each other in the dust, and in time the Bedoua vizier seemed mollified.
“What do you suggest we do?” Artur asked Theodoric, and glanced at Geoffrey as well.
“We never spoke a word yesterday. Perhaps if we approach quickly, we can catch their ear before they can fire upon us again.”
“Let’s go then,” said Artur, and made for the glade between the city and the wood. His patience, such as it was, had abandoned him. He wrenched Kylie out of the tree, sending the thylak bones skittering across the forest floor.
“One moment,” said Theodoric. “Best to send one. One man will appear less threatening, and one death will reduce us but little.”
“Yes, I can see that.”
“I’ll go,” said Geoffrey.
“I’ll go,” said Artur, not kindly, and he pushed his father to the ground.
“You’d best leave your sword,” said Theodoric. “You will appear less threatening, and it wouldn’t do you any good in any event.”
“Right,” said Artur. “At least give me that shield,” and he grabbed a sturdy Rufoux buckler of wood and leather.
Cautiously he made his way to the edge of the forest. He surveyed the huge height of the stone walls before them, they offered no evidence of any habitation. The windows that dotted the towers stared back in empty mocking. Not a sound nor movement did Artur perceive, and so he edged out of the forest with due prudence.
A shrill whistle came from high above. Artur heard the word “Aye!” and instinctively crouched behind his shield, as quickly and as compact as he could, and a fusillade of arrows rained down upon him.
“Stop! Stop it!” he screamed, a poor night’s sleep and skimpy breakfast leaving him in no temper to be shot at. He peeked over the top of the shield. “I am Artur of the Rufoux! I come without arms, to speak to your leader!”
Another stream of arrows pummeled him from above. “Mog’s goblins!” erupted Artur, as he fell behind his shield again. The impact of the arrows knocked him to the ground. “These damn fools must not have ears!”
Artur stumbled back into the wood, his shield heavy with the arrows stuck in it. He scurried behind one of the giant trees, making sure no part of him was visible to the city. Quickly he made his way back to the others.
“Here, I brought you something,” he said to a Koinoni as he passed, and he handed over the shield. “Pick these out; they’re yours. Well, Theodoric — how’d I do?” Artur was hot, and he didn’t care who knew.
“Did you see anything? A face through a window? Anything?”
“I saw the back of my shield.”
“Well, a worthwhile attempt, anyway,” said Theodoric. “We have a second plan, but time is required, and one of us will face grave danger.” And he looked to Franken, gripping his axe. “We must build a platform as high as their windows. We must see their faces and look them in the eye, and they must see our faces, to know we are men like them. The deviltooth will kill a herd of therium, but still will love its wife.”
“How will you go about such a thing?” asked Geoffrey. “To construct a platform that high would require first building at least two others lower to the ground. And you will have to build upon a tree at the edge of the glade. No doubt that would mean working under a hailstorm of arrows.”
“Yes, that is the trick, is it not? Franken?”
“I’ll devise such a plan as you wish,” replied Franken. “But first I must swim Gravidas.”
The Melic woodsman slung his axe over his shoulder and marched to the west, toward the rushing currents of the River Gravidas. Unconvinced and confused, the others followed, except Dungo and Sylva, but once the Bedoua leader noticed the others leaving he hastened to catch up. Once to the river Franken walked in up to his knees and carefully extended both hands into the current. The others looked on blankly as Franken waded about on all fours, but soon he stood erect and triumphantly shouted, “These will do nicely, I say, to be sure!”
His hands held two perfectly round stones, made smooth by the onrushing water over the course of centuries. Franken laid them on the bank and continued his search. Theodoric, understanding what his man needed, joined the hunt, and soon Dungo and Sylva waded into the water too, frolicking in the rare stuff more than finding rocks, but helping nonetheless. Rufoux and Koinoni gathered onto shields and into robes the rocks that accumulated, and hauled them back to camp. After an hour or two of searching, Franken allowed that he had found enough.
Once back in the forest, Franken began work on the backside of a tree close to the glade’s edge. He quickly had the first platform in place, upon which he stood to build the second. Then upon the second he began work on the third, the one that would be level with the lowest Raspar windows.
First he set to girdling the tree, a deep hollow not all the way around but as far upon each side as he could reach without bringing an attack upon his head. Slinging a barkstring rope around the trunk, he tied the ends together so the noose hung loosely. Using the pliable wood of a sapling, Franken wedged split planks between the rope and the tree
, all around, placing the round rocks within the groove he had cut in the tree’s bark. The more planks he inserted, the more pressure the noose applied, until all neatly curved around the tree, securing the rocks. Only then did he build the platform, sticking out toward the back of the tree, two supports coming down from the bottom but not attached to the tree. If the Raspars watched, or even cared about the construction, they gave no hint of it.
“There is the platform you asked for,” said Franken, so pleased with himself he sang in truth. “Sit down upon it and then spin around.”
And then the rest understood what Franken had done. The platform was built, and could be mounted, on the safe side of the tree, then turned around as the stones rolled like oversized ball bearings, until it faced the city.
“Will it be me?” asked Artur.
“Let it be me,” said Theodoric. “Even the sun makes only one trip each day.”
“Whatever you say. But take a shield with you,” offered Artur. “And good luck.”
“Drueed give you wisdom, my king,” said Franken.
Theodoric climbed aboard the platform, and with much effort the others used poles to turn it around to face the Raspar city. The Melic chief gazed directly into the nearest window, and laughed at the astonished faces.
“Greetings!” he said. “A bird is never more vulnerable than when safe in its nest!”