Terrible Beast of Zor (8 page)

They reached the edge of the Deep Forest late in the day, just as the sun was starting down over the hills. They unsaddled their horses, and Josh said in the hearing of everyone, “Well, Prince, are you going to join us and do a little of the work?”

“No!”

“Very well. It’s your choice. You may be a little overweight, but you won’t be if you keep this up.”

The others, accustomed to working together, quickly made a camp and cooked what was left of the meat. Once again the frying bacon made a sizzling
noise, and the odor was irresistible. Reb had gone off and caught some small fish, and the frying fish smelled good, too.

Prince Alex sat by himself while the others ate and laughed and talked. Josh was sure that the prince was miserable but would not admit it. No doubt he felt lonely and left out. Besides, he would know that the Sleepers had risked their lives for him. In fact, Josh decided, Alex was likely ready to give up and do whatever they asked, but his pride kept him from it.

After they had eaten supper, the little group sat around the campfire. It was a rather cheerful time. The fire made a pleasant crackling sound, and from time to time one of them would poke at the burning logs, sending showers of fiery sparks upward to mingle with the stars. Or so it seemed. The evening was cool, and all but Alexander hugged the fire and drew their blankets around them.

Reb began telling stories of his hunting days back in Arkansas in OldWorld. He was a natural-born storyteller and soon had them all hanging onto his words, sometimes laughing and sometimes commenting on the excitement of those days.

Sarah did not join in very often. She sat back from the fire just a little, and her glance went to Prince Alex. He was sitting with his back to a tree and a blanket around him. His head drooped, so that she could not see his face. But she could imagine he was lonely.
It’s a shame
, she thought.
It’s a shame that he has to learn in such a hard way. But he’s got to learn how other people feel, and he’s got to learn that he can’t always have his own way. Not even a king can do that
.

At last Josh said, “Better turn in. We’ll have a busy day tomorrow.”

Soon they were rolled in their blankets and quiet, but for a long time Sarah lay awake, watching the glow of the fire. When she finally did doze off, she was abruptly awakened by a loud noise and a yell almost by her head. She came out of her blanket, grasping for a weapon.

“What’s going on here?” Josh demanded.

Reb was standing next to the prince and holding onto his right arm. “Why, we’ve got us a grub thief here. The prince of Madria was stealing food!”

“Turn me loose,” Alexander said, and he tried to free himself from Reb’s grasp.

“You know it’s not good to steal from your friends,” Reb said.

The remark infuriated the prince. He turned and drove a blow at Reb’s head.

Reb was younger but faster. He caught Alex’s fist and flipped the prince over his shoulder. Alexander struck the ground hard, and Sarah heard a
whoof as
his breath was expelled.

“Let him alone, Reb. That’s enough,” Josh said. As the prince struggled to his feet, Josh helped him. “I’m sorry this happened, Prince Alex.”

Prince Alexander stood as humiliated as surely he had ever been. “I’ll leave,” he said. “You don’t want me here.”

“You mustn’t do that, Prince,” Josh said.

“You don’t want me here.”

“We do want you here. We’ve gone to great trouble to get you here. The only thing is that you’ve been brought up in a different way, and now it’s time for you to learn that there are other people to consider besides yourself.”

This time Prince Alex took Josh’s lecture without saying another word.

“I think you’ve said enough, Josh,” Sarah said quietly. “Prince Alex, please try not to be too discouraged. I know your world’s fallen down, but we’re really your friends, and we want to help you. Won’t you just join us and let us be your friends?”

Maybe Prince Alex finally realized that he had been refusing to do a simple bit of work for people who were risking their lives for him. In any case, he straightened up, looked straight at Josh, and said, “It’s all right. I’ll chop the firewood and do anything else that you order.”

“Why, that’s wonderful, Prince. And I think you deserve something to eat. Let’s all have a midnight snack.”

While the prince watched, the Sleepers scurried around to find some food. Sarah gave him a piece of good, leftover fish, and Jake urged on him a piece of bacon that he had been saving. The talk was cheerful.

Then Alex abruptly turned to Sarah. “You were right,” he said. “I’ve been a spoiled brat.”

“It’s not altogether your fault,” she said gently. “It must be hard for anyone who has everything to learn how to live with others. But, Alex, you know that most of the subjects in your country are poor people. How can you govern them if you don’t know anything about them? You’ve got to learn to understand them and what they need, and I think this is a good opportunity. Don’t you?”

The prince said quietly, “I don’t know if I can learn, Sarah.”

Impulsively she put her hand on his arm. “Yes, you can, and we’ll help you.”

“You will?”

“Yes. That’s what we came for.” She smiled and said, “Now, let’s all go to sleep, and tomorrow will be a new day.”

Rondel was in a rage. He looked as if he wanted to put his hands around Count Ferrod’s throat and choke him. “You let the prince
escape?”

“It’s not our fault!” the countess cried. “I tried to do away with him as you said, but somehow he avoided the trap.”

“And I know how. The Seven Sleepers,” Rondel said.

The count tried to calm him down. “We’ll find him,” he said quietly. “I have men out searching.”

“Well, you’ve been fools, but all is not lost.”

“What are you thinking, Rondel?” the countess asked.

“The prince may have escaped our trap, but he will never be king of Madria.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because the weapon that the Zorians have been waiting for is almost ready.”

“What is this weapon?” Ferrod asked. “Is it a new kind of bow?”

“Something much better than that. You will find out when it comes—which will not be long.”

“So our country will be taken over by the Zorians?”

“The king will have to abdicate—he’s too ill to serve, anyway. With some … guidance … the Council will choose a new ruler. And we know who that ruler will be, don’t we?”

Count Ferrod understood, but rather than feeling happy, he felt he had been drawn into a trap and there
was no way out. He did not like what was happening. He said hopefully, “The prince is gone. There will be no need to hunt him down and kill him.”

“A prince is always a danger to a man like yourself. He must die, and the Sleepers and Dethenor must die with him.”

J
osh and his friends were so well hidden from the busy, inhabited parts of the kingdom that they had ceased to be fearful of discovery. They were aware of patrols that came out from time to time, but the Sleepers had their own guard system. When an alert was sounded, they quickly retreated to a deeper part of the woods. They spent most of their time getting ready for the battle to come. Josh, especially, wanted to see the prince develop into a first-class soldier.

“We’ll have to be like top sergeants back in the old days,” he told Reb. “You don’t make good soldiers by sitting down and eating ice cream sundaes.”

“You mean,” Reb said, “you want me to pour it on him.”

“That’s right. He’s got to learn to fight, he’s got to learn to endure hardships, and I’m putting you in charge of seeing that it gets done.”

Reb went at the business of training the prince with a vengeance. He rousted him out before daylight every morning and took him on hard treks through the deep woods and up and down the mountainside. He completely ignored Alexander’s protests.

One Thursday morning, Sarah was up early enough to talk with Reb about the prince’s progress. “How is he doing, Reb?”

“He’s not doing bad at all,” Reb admitted. “He’s strong and quick, and when he gets in shape, he’ll be a
first-rate soldier. All that easy living has made him soft, but I’ll take care of that.”

“Don’t be too hard on him, Reb,” she warned. “You don’t want to get him out of the notion of serving.”

“Don’t worry. He’ll be as good as one of Stonewall Jackson’s boys.” It was the highest praise he could give.

He roughly roused the prince by shaking his shoulder. “Get up, Prince. Time to go to work.”

Alex came out of a deep sleep and sat up. If his muscles ached from yesterday’s longer-than-usual hike up steep mountain trails, he refused to show it. “Then let’s get at it,” he said cheerfully.

“That’s the way to talk. Come along. We’ll cook us breakfast and be on our way.”

They did their cooking in the semidarkness, and Alexander ate heartily. Reb noticed that the prince washed his own plate, and he thought,
He wouldn’t have done that before. We’re getting somewhere
.

“We’ll take some sword practice before we do anything else,” Reb told him.

They picked up their weapons, and Reb led Alex far out from the camp where the noise would not awaken the others. “All right,” he said, turning to face the prince, “let’s see what you got.”

Alexander advanced. These were broadswords, not fencing foils, and it took a strong arm to wield them. The prince was the stronger of the two and Reb the quicker. Time and time again, Alexander would shower blows down, but Reb quickly parried them. Several times Reb could have touched the prince, but he did not. Finally, however, Reb called out, “That’s enough! I’m out of breath.”

The prince was breathing hard, too, but he seemed
pleased with the exercise. “This is a lot of fun, Reb. It never was before.”

“It’s fun, but it’s more than that,” Reb said. “When a battle starts and you cross swords with someone, which one of you wins probably will be the one that’s practiced the most.” He rested against a tree and broke off a weed. He held the stem between his teeth and nodded approvingly. “Practice makes perfect,” he said. “You’ve come a long way.”

Alex looked pleased at the praise. They stood talking until Reb said, “Now let’s do some fast walking today.”

They hiked along, carrying nothing but their weapons, and Reb was pleased that Alex was able to keep up with him. He had not been able to do that at first, but now he matched him step for step.

“What was it like back in your world? What you call OldWorld, Reb.”

“What was it like? Well, it was a lot different from this.”

“Who ruled your world?”

“Well, nobody ruled the
world
. Every country had its own king or its own president.”

“Did your country have a king?”

“For a while. Then we fought a war to get rid of our king.”

Alex stared at him with surprise. “You were traitors?”

Reb shook his head. “No, no. You don’t understand. Let me try to give you a quick history lesson. It was because our people thought they were not treated fairly, and they tried everything they could to get fair treatment. Finally, when they couldn’t, they declared their independence. It was called the American Revolution.”

“Then who ruled after you got your independence?”

Reb broke into a trot. “Let’s speed it up.” He tried to think of the best way to explain. “They had elections back in OldWorld America. People would vote, and the man that got the most votes was the president.”

“So who voted?”

“Well, just the men at first, but after a while the women too.”

As they flew swiftly along the trail, the prince kept asking questions. When they stopped for a break and a drink of water at a small brook, he said, “I don’t see how it would work. What if the wrong man was elected?”

“Sometimes that happened,” Reb said, “but sometimes the wrong man gets to be king. Isn’t that right?”

“I guess so. Still, I don’t think our people would want a president. They like a king.”

After the two hiked all morning, Reb said, “Time to go back, but I’m sure hungry.”

“Too bad we didn’t bring along something to eat.”

“I’ll tell you what. Let’s catch a fish out of this stream. We could start a fire, skin him, and have fish for lunch.”

“We didn’t bring any hooks or …”

Reb laughed. “I’ll show you how to get a fish without a hook. It’s called
noodling
.”

“Noodling?” The prince’s brow furrowed. “What’s noodling?”

“I’ll show you.” Reb walked slowly along the brook until he found a spot he liked. “You see that log over there? I just saw something move in the water beside it.”

The prince looked at the old log lying half underwater. He watched a moment, then nodded. “Something’s in there, all right.”

“Probably a big catfish. You just stay and watch your Uncle Reb do his stuff.”

“Could I help you?”

“If you want to,” Reb said. “Not everybody likes it. Some people are afraid to do it.”

“I’m not afraid,” Prince Alex said quickly.

“OK. Come on.”

Reb stepped into the water, and they waded out to the log, where the water was waist deep. He said, “Now we’re going to be real still, and what you do is you put your hand under this log.”