The Rightful Heir (14 page)

Belshak shook his head. “You think you can take over this land?” Siloam's rattle shook loudly and the other snakes joined him. “Many wild creatures wouldn't bow down to your master!”

“I am more powerful than my massster!” Siloam's voice grew higher and louder.

Belshak thought for a moment. “We will wait for our food to come through the pastures.”

“If you sssee travelersss from the kingdom going
toward
Persssly'sss Woodsss, let them through. They mussst find the othersss to bring them back. Then you can eat them all!”

Belshak gritted his sharp, yellow teeth. “If I find out this is a trick, we will come and eat all of you!”

Siloam laughed evilly at the rabid coyote. “You will be bowing down to me sssoon…friend!” He shook his rattle and the other snakes followed him into the weeds.

Belshak smelled the beginning of the morning air, but no living thing. “A
thousand
of them…” He said in anticipation. His mouth watered more than ever. Soon he would be eating.

“Owwwwwww, owww, owwwwwww!”

All of the coyotes back in the pasture heard Belshak's call from inside Persly's Woods. They joined in the howling, anxious to hear what news their leader had.

CHAPTER TWELVE

J
ONAH'S NEWLY CLEANSED BODY
stirred early, before the first sunlight peeked through the dark purple sky. Despite having been rained on all night, the little pug had gotten one of the best
night's sleep he had ever had. Usually he slept under the old lady's porch. Unbeknownst to him, his body was allergic to the mold coated underneath. Now he felt alive, the grease and grime washed away, the sleepy gunk stuck to his eyes for as long as he could remember gone. He felt he could breathe better through his squashed-in nose.

He stood in the dark, tall grass, turning a slight yellow from the new sunrise. It was almost twice as high as his head and he was ready for some new scenery. He took a leap high over the grass. For the split second he was above the bluestem, he saw he was close to a forest. The orange and red leaves looked beautiful in the early morning light.
The kingdom must be in there!
He took off running into the woods, unaware of the news that, for well over the past month, some
thing
had been terrifying the forest.

J
ONAH WANDERED A WHILE
in Persly's Woods, all unfamiliar territory. With every step through towering trees and tall weeds he noticed something strange about the new world he was in—it was dead quiet. “Golly, there should be
someone
living in this place,” he whispered, looking all around.

He came upon a large, fallen cottonwood tree that had been chewed away by beavers. It was old and rotted-out, and his
curiosity made him look inside.
Sniff, sniff
. He smelled something sour, then spotted blackberries that some other animal had stored inside for later eating. He was starving, and although he had never eaten a blackberry, he chewed and swallowed some quickly, salivating at the sweet taste.
Hmmm, I could get used to these… maybe
. Jonah was too busy eating to hear the sound of slithering. His head and shoulders were inside the hollow log, his back end sticking out, when a loud rattling startled him. He spun around, then froze. Three large rattlesnakes hissed at him from only a few feet away.

“Well, what have we here?” the middle one said.

“You don't sssuppossse thisss isss the heir?” another asked, rattling loudly.

Jonah wanted to scoot deeper into the log but couldn't. He was trapped.

“The massster sssaid to
kill
any creature we sssee!”

Jonah gasped as they poised to strike. As they pulled back their diamond heads, a blur passed through Jonah's peripheral vision and something scratched the top of log above him. Two of the rattlesnakes fell immediately, their guts hanging out from long slits down their sides. Dying in agony, their rattles shook uncontrollably. The remaining snake's brown diamond-head darted around, then looked right at Jonah. It angrily slithered away from its two dead partners and went right toward the pug, causing Jonah to curl up with fear. The snake slithered over the fallen log and hissed loudly. Jonah trembled, listening to the snake and something growling angrily back. Then he heard the rustling of dead leaves, and all went quiet.

The pug didn't know what to do. He couldn't wait in that fallen tree for whatever was out there to come and kill him. He decided to run and jumped out of the log. He heard another hiss behind the log and his curiosity got the best of him. He cautiously
moved farther down the rotted log, stood on his hind legs, and looked over the faded, dark-green bark. He wasn't prepared to see the rattlesnake squirming as it hissed at its captor. A small gray hand squeezed the snake tightly around its neck. The fierce little raccoon stared into the snake's evil eyes for a long moment, growling. Then, in an instant, the raccoon freed one of his hands and slashed his claws down the belly of his squirming victim. The rattle shook loudly as guts fell out of its yellow-scaled belly.

Jonah's eyes bulged in amazement. The raccoon threw the still-squirming snake onto the leafy ground, looked at Jonah through his black mask, and growled softly. The pug took off running, stumbling over a few dead tree branches that lay across his path.

The raccoon needed a few seconds to cool down from the killing he'd just made, then realized the dog he'd saved was running away. “Wait a minute! Get back here!” he called.

Jonah heard him yelling as he raced through the trees. “Stop! I'm on your side!” Jonah kept running. “Ah,
great!”
The raccoon dashed after him, racing through the leaves. He yelped in horror as his aggressor came up behind him.
“Stop!”
He tried to pull away, but the raccoon leaped in the air and landed on top of him.

“Helllllp!” Jonah shouted at the empty forest. “Help! Someone, please help!” The raccoon pinned him firmly as he squirmed.

“Someone just
did
help! What's the matter with you?” the raccoon panted.

“Get off me!” Jonah yelled, wriggling underneath.

“Okay, but if I let you go, you have to tell me why you're out here.”

“Why do you want to know?”

The raccoon released him. “Do you realize where you're headed, guy?!”

“I'm not
sure…” Jonah stared at the black mask.

“So you don't know you were headed right for the old barn where…” He sighed in frustration. “What's a dog like you doing out here, anyway?”

“I'm searching for my kingdom.” Jonah cleared his throat. “I'm a king!”

“Y-you're a
what?!”
The raccoon flapped his arms.

“I'm a king. King Jonah. Only…I don't know exactly where my kingdom is.” He looked down, embarrassed. “So, who are you?”

The raccoon noticed the pug's black foot and his mouth hung open. “Malcolm. My name's Mal.… Are you by any chance King Pugsly's—”

“Pugsly!
Yes, yes! He was my dad!” His tail sprung up and wagged happily.

Malcolm sighed in relief. “Oh, wow! King Jonah, you…you wouldn't believe how honored I am to meet you.” The raccoon bowed.

“Thank you, Malcolm. And thank you for saving my life back there. You handled those snakes quite impressively.”

Malcolm's face changed from joy to anger as he thought about the rattlesnakes. “I…hate…snakes!” The raccoon breathed furiously through his little nose.

“Um…okay. Well, I hate ‘em, too. They even killed my owner and her—”

“They killed my brother.” Malcolm turned around to collect himself.

“Oh, I'm sorry to hear that, Malcolm.” Jonah bowed his head in respect.

“Sorry to hear about your owner, King Jonah.” Malcolm's back was still turned.

“Well
, she was kind of a—Thank you, Malcolm.” Jonah faintly
smiled.

“So, you're
looking for your kingdom,” Malcolm put his hands together, “yet you don't know where it is?”

“It's a little more complicated than it sounds.” Jonah tried to sound sincere. “See, yesterday a human boy came— Actually, let me go back further than that. Several days ago my owner gave me a collar, which I guess was a very special collar—”

“Did it have a silvery-blue tag hanging from it?” Malcolm's eyes were wide.

“Yes! That's the one! How did you know?!”

“Because my brother and I got it back from the crows that stole it from…King Benjamin!”

“King Benjamin? Who's that?”

“You're the king of this kingdom and you don't know who King Benjamin is? Geez, I must've been gone longer than I thought!” Malcolm shook his head.

“Well, okay let me continue. So I was confronted by a buzzard who asked me if I was the king and I said I was. He then flew—”

“Psh,
buzzards…”
Malcolm coolly interrupted.

“—off. Yesterday I was outside cooling in the shade by my owner's house and I heard her cat—”

“I hate cats…”

“Yeah, me too.” Jonah tried to remember where he was in his story. “Oh, and I heard her cat scream! I ran up on the porch and looked in, but I could only see my owner sitting in her chair. The screen on her door was hanging off. Then I heard rattling and knew that a snake had gotten inside the house. A buzzard flew overhead and I jumped into my hiding hole under the porch and stayed there. I heard the buzzard ask the snake, ‘Did you find the heir?' But the other said, ‘He's already gone.' What's crazier is once I knew they were leaving I peeked out from the hole and saw the buzzard flying off with the snake in its claws!”

“Whoa! The snakes must be using the buzzards to move around!” Malcolm was amazed, then whispered to himself, “Hmmm, I bet they stole that idea from me!”

“So I got back up on the porch and barked at my owner. She never turned around. I knew she was already dead, so I went back under the porch and stayed, just in case the snake came back for me.”