The Swiss Family RobinZOM (Book 5) (3 page)

For a moment Ernest considered taking the other flags down and tossing them aside, but he doubted it was worth the time he’d spend in carrying out such a tactic, and didn’t even know if the other family members would even be heading in this direction.

A branch came out of nowhere. Ernest barely managed to duck before it sailed overhead. Clementine lowered her head as another branch swiped at her. The overhead branches became thicker and pressed lower. Clementine
gwek
ed and lowered her head, parallel to the ground, slowing to a walk.

Ernest had forgotten how low the trees were along this part of the track. He checked over his shoulder but saw no sign of the others, unless they had taken the other route and were now powering ahead of him. His stomach twisted at the thought.

Ernest leaned forward in his saddle, shifting aside to see the canopy roof didn’t get any lower, but that it carried on at least until the end of the current path. He turned to look back, and found he was still alone on the route.

He climbed off Clementine, held her reins with one hand, and led her under the canopy. She stayed in the centre of the path, head bowed down low, her giant eyes peering at the greenery around them. Occasionally she paused, surveyed her surroundings, and then carried on.

Then the ground began to rumble.

Clementine
gwek
ed, her eyes shifting from one wall of green to another, pulling against her reins, looking for what was causing this disturbing behaviour.

“Out of the way!” a voice shouted.

Ernest spun around to find Valiant bearing down on him. He let go of Clementine’s harness and threw himself aside. Valiant’s horns caught in the low canopy, but tore through it, the branches snapping beneath his awesome strength, tearing through it like it were tissue paper.

Ernest sat up, watching as Francis’s back disappeared around a corner. Ernest ran to Clementine, who had run to the other side of the path, and seized her harness. She tried to run, jerking Ernest forward, but he dug in his heels and skidded along the path.

“Clementine!” Ernest said. “Clementine, stop!”

Gwek!

“Stop!” Ernest said, and now that the rumbling had dissipated, Clementine calmed down, still wary and peering around at the foliage around them. “Calm down, girl. We’re going to catch up with them and get through this.”

Ernest climbed onto Clementine’s back and took her through the trail of destruction left by Francis and his runaway bull. Valiant had scythed a path through the low canopy, which Ernest was more than willing to take advantage of.

Clementine ran hard, sensing the end of the low ceilinged jungle, and when it finally came, she raised her head up high like an Olympic athlete finishing a race. She picked up the pace and powered along the track, the final corner of the island up ahead. Ernest pulled up alongside Francis, who held onto the rolls of fat at the back of Valiant’s neck, bouncing up and down, barely making contact with the saddle.

“Hi Ernest!” Francis said.

“Have you seen any of the others?” Ernest said.

“No,” Francis said. “I thought they were ahead of us?”

“It’s really not fair that you’re riding a pair of horns with legs,” Ernest said.

“You’re just a sore loser,” Francis said.

“You haven’t won yet,” Ernest said.

“No, but I will!” Francis said.

“Pride before the fall,” Ernest said.

“What?” Francis said.

“Never mind,” Ernest said.

“Bet you regret swapping with me now!” Francis said.

“Not really,” Ernest said. “I don’t really enjoy the taste of dust.”

“What?” Francis said.

Ernest burst forward, Clementine’s large feet kicking up a cloud of dust into Francis’s face.

“See you at the finish line!” Ernest said.

Ernest leaned in low and turned Clementine off the beach path and across a short stretch of marshland. Clementine sped up and leapt over a fallen tree trunk, and then cut across the corner of the beach. When Ernest pulled back onto the wet sand where Clementine could run at full speed, he looked back and saw that Francis had only just rounded the corner, having been unable to jump, nor punch through, the log.

“Haha!” Ernest said.

“Hello there!” a voice from a tree called.

Jack swung through the trees on vines, leaping from branch to branch with ease. He stopped on a trunk, whispered something to Nips, and waited. Nips climbed down from the tree, ran along a fallen tree trunk and picked up Jack’s flag. Then he began to make his way back.

“That has got to be against the rules,” Ernest shouted to Jack.

“We have to go around the track collecting our flags,” Jack said. “There’s nothing in the rules that says we have to be riding our animals.”

“Where’s Herdy?” Ernest said.

“She found a pool of water and wouldn’t get out of it!” Jack said.

“What happened to loyalty?” Ernest said.

“It’s in a dirty puddle about twenty minutes back,” Jack said. “Ta-ra! See you at the finish line!”

Clementine continued to run, and within minutes Ernest saw a pair of figures ahead, on the track that ran parallel to his own. Bill and Liz had taken the short route. Their path joined up with Ernest’s about two hundred yards down.

Ernest didn’t know what had happened for Bill to now be in the lead, but Liz had a halo of shrubbery around her temples and a look of pure murder on her face. A thick white froth covered Lightning’s neck and haunches. Horses were known to run themselves to death. Ernest wasn’t sure if the same was true of zebras.

The thought of losing made Ernest push Clementine harder, rocking back and forth like a world class jockey, driving the ostrich to take longer strides that ate the road before them. She raised her neck up to its full height, her powerful legs pushing them down the path.

The two roads converged a dozen yards ahead, and unless Ernest had missed his guess, he and Liz were on a collision course the moment the two paths became one. Liz had to pull onto Ernest’s path like a slip road onto a motorway. Ernest pushed Clementine hard, refusing to yield to Liz.

Liz turned her head at the last moment, surprise registering on her face. She hadn’t noticed him there before. But she didn’t slow down either. She pushed Lightning harder.

The two animals bumped against one another, mostly due to Ernest’s own attempt to knock Liz off course. Clementine was ahead of Lightning by a beak. Lightning grunted with the effort, legs pumping as hard as they could.

“Don’t push Lightning so hard!” Ernest said.

“You’d like that, wouldn’t you?” Liz said.

“Lightning isn’t going to make it!” Ernest said.

Liz looked down at the froth spreading across the zebra’s back.

“She can take it,” Liz said.

“I hope so,” Ernest said, and he stood up in his stirrups and rocked Clementine’s bodyweight into Lightning. The bump knocked Lightning off her stride, losing her rhythm.

“You’re a worse cheat than your father!” Liz said as she slipped behind him.

“From the woman who benefited from a false start!” Ernest said.

He turned to look ahead. Bill was right in front of him. In the far distance, hazy like a mirage, Ernest could make out the finish line. Bill pushed the goats hard. He had a length of wood like a fishing rod held in front of him, hanging just out of reach of the goats. The goats seemed to covet it more than their own lives as they drove the chariot faster than Ernest thought they were capable of.

Ernest pulled up behind Bill’s chariot, the dirt and muck kicked up by the wheels. Clementine
gwek
ed in outrage, causing Bill to turn his head slightly. Now he knew they were there. Ernest swung Clementine out from behind the chariot and alongside Bill. Ernest leaned in as low as he could. The ostrich’s head was two feet higher than Bill’s.

The rod had a thick wedge of grass, roots and leaves on the end of it. The goats, incensed by the luscious prize, powered their legs as fast as they could go, barely touching the ground before striding again. But they were hindered by their physiology. As fast as they might be able to run, they were no match for an ostrich. One of Clementine’s strides was worth five of the little goats’.

“You can’t fight evolution!” Ernest said. “Clementine was built for speed!”

“You’re right,” Bill said with a sly smile. “But one thing trumps evolution.”

Ernest held his breath. He couldn’t bring himself to ask what.

“Cunning,” Bill said, and he moved the clutch of foliage at the end of his rod over to one side, in front of Clementine’s beak.

She caught the scent of it. Her eyes widened, her tongue poking out. She pecked at the grass. The goats caught the blades that flittered down to them. Then Bill made thrusting motions, and a handful of grass and roots fell onto the racetrack.

Ernest’s eyebrows rose in alarm.

“No!” he gasped.

“Ta-ta!” Bill said, pulling ahead.

Clementine’s strides shrank as she slowed. Ernest jerked forward, smacking into Clementine’s thick neck. She spun and turned on the spot, feet kicking up dust. Liz ran past as Clementine headed in the opposite direction. Clementine bent down and pecked at the roots and leaves on the ground, guzzling it down. Ernest pulled on the reins to no avail.

“Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!” Jack said as he swung overhead in the vines. “That’ll teach you!”

“Teach me what?” Ernest said. “There’s nothing to learn from this!”

His eyes returned to Clementine, who was busy snapping up the roots.

“Except to never trust Father,” Ernest said. He turned to Clementine. “You might as well eat all of it. We’ve got no chance of winning now anyway.”

There was a loud roar, like a dinosaur on the loose, somewhere down the straight. The foliage erupted, and a loud crack like a cannon exploding echoed over the island. A dozen flocks of birds took flight. A tree that had been precariously leaning over fell and broke across the beach, the leafy top slamming into the sea. Bill and Liz skidded to a stop before it.

There was a clip-clopping sound behind Ernest. He turned to find Fritz on Lightfoot’s back, making slow but steady progress. He didn’t even look tired.

“That was pretty dramatic, wasn’t it?” Fritz said as he trotted up to Ernest.

“You’ve only just caught up?” Ernest said.

“It seemed pointless trying to win on the back of Lightfoot,” Fritz said. “So I decided just to take a nice stroll. Enjoy the view.”

Francis burst from the foliage ahead of the fallen tree on Valiant’s back. The bull shook his giant horns, dislodging the tree bark and detritus. He reared up, snorted, and ran up the track toward the finish line.

“Valiant,” Fritz said. “The great tree destroyer.”

He looked at the food on the floor that Clementine was pecking at.

“Father?” he said.

“Who else?” Ernest said.

“You know how much he likes to win,” Fritz said.

“He hasn’t won yet,” Ernest said.

“What do you mean?” Fritz said.

“No one has finished yet,” Ernest said. “Looks like Francis will be the first one to the finish line though.”

“Wait,” Fritz said. “You’re telling me no one has crossed the finished line yet?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying,” Ernest said.

“And to get ahead like that, Francis must have skipped a large part of the course, failing to pick up all his flags…” Fritz said.

He shared a look with his brother, the same thought passing through both their brains. Even Lightfoot could travel faster than Valiant.

“Ya!” Fritz said, snapping Lightfoot’s reins and making him run.

Ernest pulled on Clementine’s harness. She resisted once, and then relented, letting Ernest lead her in a trot in the direction of the finish line. Fritz slowed Lightfoot down as he approached the fallen tree. He let Lightfoot take him over it, the animal’s naturally cautious sense now paying dividends as it carefully climbed over the tree trunk and emerged on the other side.

“Haha!” Fritz said, turning back and waving at the others. “See you at the finish line!”

The tree was massive – over seven feet tall with huge arm-like protruding limbs. The goats and Lightning snapped at the leaves on the tree, and no matter how hard they tried, Bill and Liz couldn’t get them to stop chomping.

Clementine powered up a tree branch, her broad feet good at scaling such objects. She flapped her wings as if she were about to try and fly, but really she was just balancing herself to come down the opposite side with grace.

Despite Francis’s long head start, he was only halfway to the finish line. If it wasn’t for Valiant’s powerful hooves kicking up sand Ernest was certain he’d be able to see the finish line. Fritz had already closed half the distance to Francis. Lightfoot was fast, but not the most graceful of creatures. Fritz bounced all over the place on his saddle. There was enough straight for Clementine to catch up.

“Ya!” Ernest said, spurring Clementine on.

It didn’t take long for her to reach full speed, powering along the beach. They were on the home straight now, down the short length of the east coast.