Aidan nodded, humbled by Steren’s words. “The Aidanites may be right,” Steren continued. “I know they may be right. The time of the Wilderking may be upon us. It may not be the purpose of the living God that I should ever be king.” There was evident pain on his face when he spoke. “But I will say this: If you are ever to be king”-he pointed a finger at Aidan, not in accusation but for emphasis-“you’ve got a lot to learn yet-things you can learn only on this side of the river.”
Aidan had the strange feeling Steren had outgrown him in the past three years. Steren, who had looked up to Aidan when they were younger, had grown into a man, into someone very like a king. Aidan, on the other hand, felt he was much the same person he had been when he took to the Feechiefen.
At last Aidan spoke. “Steren, I am as loyal to the House of Darrow as I have ever been. And when you inherit the kingdom of Corenwald, God willing, I will be proud to follow you.”
“If there is any kingdom left to inherit,” Steren said absently, staring across the treetops. Then, with a slight shudder, he came back to the present. “We should be going,” he said. “Which way are you headed?”
“West,” Aidan answered. “Up the Overland Trail.”
“Then I’ll go east. I’ll circle around and come into Last Camp from the east side, tell the men you escaped that way. That should give you a head start.”
Aidan embraced his old friend before they parted ways. “I don’t reckon we’ll ever talk again like this, will we?”
Steren looked down through the treetops. “No, I don’t suppose so. Not so long as my father is king of Corenwald.” Looking into his friend’s face, he added, “But, Aidan, you’ll never have a more devoted friend than I.”
Chapter Seven
Dobro was showing Percy basic tactics of feechie fighting when Aidan got back to the moss bed where he had left them. Given the head start Steren had provided, they agreed they no longer required the secrecy afforded by treetop travel. They could safely use the Overland Trail, and they would make much better time. Hustingreen was the nearest village. There they could buy supplies, even horses, for the rest of their journey to Sinking Canyons.
They hit the River Road just below Longleaf Manor, Errol’s lands, which now belonged to Lord Fershal of the Hill Country. The front fields, once so robust with wheat or sometimes corn, had gone to broomsedge and thistle. Even from the road, they could see that one of the shutters on the front of the manor house was hanging askew.
“Fershal doesn’t even live there,” Percy remarked. “Spends all his time in Tambluff.”
“What about all the farmhands?” Aidan asked. “How do they make a living now?”
Percy shrugged.
“And who’s growing food for the villagers in Hustingreen?”
Percy shrugged again. They quickened their pace, eager to put the sad sight of their old home behind them.
The travelers were almost in sight of Hustingreen when they saw the first of the Aidanites’ posters. Tacked to a tree on the side of the road, it read in thick, black letters, WHEN FEAR OF GOD HAS LEFT THE LAND, TO BE REPLACED BY FEAR OF MAN; WHEN CORENWALDERS FREE AND TRUE ENSLAVE THEMSELVES AND OTHERS TOO;
“These foolish people,” Aidan grumbled. “They don’t know what they’re talking about. They don’t know what they’re doing to Corenwald.”
A few steps farther down the road, a second poster was tacked to a tree on the other side: WHEN JUSTICE AND MERCY DISAPPEAR, WHEN LIFE IS CHEAP AND GOLD IS DEAR,
Aidan snatched the sheet of palmetto paper from the tree and ripped it in half, then half and half again. “How I’d like to rip the man who put these up,” he growled.
Dobro watched Aidan carefully, not sure what to make of his behavior. He couldn’t read and wouldn’t have recognized the Wilderking Chant even if he could read. He assumed this was a strange civilizer custom.
Aidan snatched the next poster: TO THE PALACE HE COMES FROM FORESTS AND SWAMPS. WATCH FOR THE WILDERKING!
And the next: LEADING HIS TROOPS OF WILD MEN AND BRUTES. WATCH FOR THE WILDERKING!
Aidan was furious. These meddlers, these Aidanites, couldn’t leave well enough alone, could they? They had to stir up trouble, had to force themselves on the ancient prophecies. Now Aidan’s family was outlawed and living in the most godforsaken patch of ground in all of Corenwald; the civilizers had narrowly missed all-out war with the feechies; Aidan was running for his life and would never see his beloved Feechiefen again-all because of his so-called followers and their posters. HE WILL SILENCE THE BRAGGART, ENNOBLE THE COWARD. WATCH FOR THE WILDERKING!
Aidan snatched it down and stomped on it. “I’d like to silence a braggart or two,” he observed. JUSTICE WILL ROLL, AND MERCY WILL TOLL. WATCH FOR THE WILDERKING!
“Let me do this one,” Dobro suggested. He was eager to adopt the ways of the civilizers, however strange they seemed. He contorted his face into a fierce scowl, imitating Aidan’s expression. He ripped the paper from the tree, balled it up, and jumped up and down on it, bringing his knees almost up to his chin with each jump and flailing his arms. “I’ll bragger the silence,” he snarled. “I’ll fool the folks what don’t know what they’re doing.” Percy doubled over laughing at Dobro’s bad imitation of Aidan’s outbursts. “Looks like the Aidanites have a new enemy,” he said. Aidan couldn’t help smiling himself, in spite of his irritation.
Dobro was still jumping up and down on the Aidanites’ poster when three men emerged from the forest. They were older than the three travelers, well into their forties. Each wore a tunic of green homespun and a flattened black hat adorned with an egret feather. All three wore swords, though the swords looked like something they might have found in a grandfather’s old trunk. They looked familiar to Aidan; they were villagers he had seen at the Hustingreen market growing up, but he had never known their names. A red-bearded fellow appeared to be the leader of the trio. When he swaggered up to Dobro, the feechie stopped what he was doing and looked curiously at the red beard thrust within a foot of his face.
The villager looked Dobro up and down, from his matted hair (it hadn’t come clean during his bath in the Tam) to his one black eyebrow, to his gap-toothed mouth, receding chin, and prominent Adam’s apple to his thin, hard arms and legs and bare feet, and finally to the crumpled wad of palmetto paper beneath them. He had never seen anyone like this scrawny, pinch-faced lunatic defacing the poster he had hand lettered himself. “Just what do you think you’re doing?” he asked.
Dobro looked down at his feet, a little surprised that the fellow had to ask. “I think I’m stompin’ on a piece of paper I snatched offa that there tree,” he answered, pointing a black-nailed finger toward the tree he spoke of. “Now that I think about it,” he clarified, “I know that’s what I’m doin’. And when I find the fool what tacked it to the tree, I’m gonna tear him into little pieces.”
“Well, you’re in luck, stranger,” said the red-bearded man. “’Cause you just found the man who put that poster up.”
“Haa-wee!” Dobro shouted, clapping joyfully. “That was a heap easier than I figured on!” He felt sure he would fit in fine among the civilizers if they were all like this red-bearded fellow. He hopped a circle around the Hustingreener with his fists raised. “Come on, civilizer,” he called, “let’s mix it!”
Dobro’s opponent looked at him with astonishment. “Who are you?” he asked. Dobro stopped hopping. Of course! A feechie fight had to start off with a rudeswap. A civilizer fight, apparently, had to start off with introductions. He was still learning civilizer ways. “I’m Dobro Turtlebane,” he said, “from Bug Neck.” He jerked a thumb over his shoulder, pointing southwest toward the swamp he called home.