“You can’t stay here, weevils!”
The inspections dragged on into the afternoon. Little by little the line of wagons and carts shortened. Being one of the last in line, Breister and Helga took time to shift gear and baggage to better balance their load.
On top of the load was Helga’s favorite family possession—the Root Teaching—a collection of Wood Cow wisdom that embodied their philosophy of life. Helga, like every Wood Cow, had her favorites:
Tossing crickets in another beast’s drink does not make a friend.
Throwing knives in the dark rarely fixes a problem.
A beast who sees for herself is not a slave to what she is told.
Justice considers small beasts before big plans.
Listen where others say there is nothing to hear, and learn.
Knowledge is bread, wisdom is coffee, and work is fire.
In the happy times before Helbara went missing amidst Wrackshee slavers ten years before, Helga’s mother had read the Root Teaching to her and Emil every night. They also talked about how the Teaching applied in this or that situation. Helga missed those wonderful times. With Emil also now lost, and the entire Wood Cow clan scattered to the winds, for Helga, the Root Teaching seemed to hold the sense of her family together.
After this precious belonging in importance, were essential practical items: fishing line and the flicker-pole. The fishing line served both to catch fish for food, and as a weapon for defense. In the hands of a skilled Wood Cow, the line weighted with a stone sinker could immobilize an attacker in a massive tangle. The flicker-pole’s flexible strength made it a very useful tool and weapon also. The most versatile tools they would have on the journey, the Wood Cows could wield both with power and skill.
Following this, several precious items of household furniture: the chest, lovingly handmade by her mother, that held the family’s woodworking tools; Breister’s reading rocker and Helga’s carving table; the woodshop tables and benches; the kitchen stools and breadbox; the clothes cabinets...and so on.
And, of course, the food: sacks of dried, pounded fish; baskets of pine nuts; dried apples and pears; rosehips for making tea; pouches of honey nut butter; and chunks of course, leathery trout jerky.
Uniquely among the exiles, Helga and Breister did not have a cart or wagon. Instead, they pulled a homemade boat behind them on a sled. A great river was said to be just beyond the Hedgewall to the east. Old stories told of a time when the Hedgeland folk had eaten fish from a great eastern river, said to be within a day’s walk. If they could make the river, they hoped to sail into the unknown lands toward the rising sun. Bad Bone’s intelligence about routes to the east had given them even more hope.
By the time Breister and Helga got through the gap in the Hedge, a long line of wagons stretched toward the western horizon. A relatively gentle slope led off in that direction around the mountainside, and virtually all the exiles headed that way. As they turned in a different direction—almost with a sense of reassuring himself of the decision to go it alone—Breister observed, “We are a family of the rising sun! We go toward the new light, not the sunset. We may die, just as the others may die. Let us die, then, going toward the new day, not the past one.” And so, following the directions Bad Bone had provided, they headed down the mountainside.
The wild and unfamiliar terrain was far more rugged than they had expected. A confusion of creeks and ravines cut through the steep mountainside, making it difficult to tell which way to go. Breister was obliged to cut a path through tangled briar thickets and brush. Rocky hillsides shot up at sharp angles, to dizzying heights.
Several times, they slipped on the steep slopes. Other times, fallen trees and rocks had to be moved. They struggled on like this until the sun began to set.
“It’s time to find a campsite for the night,” Helga said as dusk was falling. “Where should we stop?”
“Perhaps that may be a cabin up ahead,” Breister replied, pointing to a wisp of smoke catching final rays of sun above a rise. Peering through the deepening twilight, the outline of a chimney was visible.
“Yes, there’s a sort of farmstead,” Helga agreed, as they walked closer. Several more buildings and other signs of habitation appeared as they continued their approach.
Perched on a plateau of level ground, several stone cabins were scattered amongst an intricate network of pens enclosed by low rock walls. Large numbers of tortoises with huge, high-domed shells crawled around in the corrals.
Amazed and baffled, Breister and Helga proceeded down the path toward the first cabin. A tall, lanky Opossum, cracking a long whip at some of the dome-shelled creatures he was herding from one pen to another, noticed them. He looked over the newcomers suspiciously, his head completely hidden by a white bandana wrapped tightly over his head and knotted at the back.
Closing the gate behind the last tortoise, he stepped toward the travelers with a fearsome look in the eyes that glinted just under the edge of the headwrap. Stepping toward them, he cracked the whip sharply on the rock path—an obvious command that they halt.
“I am Matsu,” he said, “Who are you, strangers?”
Breister introduced himself and Helga. “We are very glad to meet you, Matsu,” he said calmly. “We’d like to draw up a chair at your table tonight, and sleep by the fire if we could.”
“Ayah!” Matsu replied angrily. Slashing his whip once more, he shouted. “Begger weevils! Begger weevils! Why should I let you stay? What’s your business in Shell Kral?”
“Ah! You take us wrong!” Breister cried. “Two weary travelers, with all our worldly goods, only stopping to rest and talk with Bost Ony...”
As Breister uttered these words, the Opossum’s dark eyes flashed with fire. “What do you want with Bost Ony?” he asked. “What do you come to her for? Why are you here?”
“We have lost our way,” Helga explained. “We don’t know which way to go. A friend told us that Bost Ony knew safe routes to the east.”
“A friend sent you here?” Matsu repeated. “Milky Joe—did he send you?”
“No,” Helga answered slowly, tingling with unease at once again encountering the name. “We’re not friends with anyone called Milky Joe. We’re just lost beasts looking for a place to stay the night and then a safe path east in the morning. That’s all we want. We’re very sorry if we’ve disturbed you, Matsu.”
“You can’t stay here any longer, weevils,” replied Matsu, staring at them with a stone-faced scowl. “No one but friends of Milky Joe can be in Shell Kral when he is coming to trade.”
“If we can’t stay, where shall we go?” asked Breister. “We’d not trouble good beasts such as yourself if we knew where else to go.”
“Ayah!” the Opossum snarled, pointing toward the east, “them’s as want to go to the east, should go that direction. You’ve nothing to lose that you will not lose anyway if you stay here. I do you this one mercy. Now, be off with you!” he snapped the whip in their direction again. Ha! Ha! Ha-Ho!”
“If you please, Matsu,” Breister began, “if we can’t see Bost Ony, can you tell us a safe path to follow?”
“So, you’d like to be able to go easy as you please, is that it, weevils?” he replied. “All the routes to the east are safe—if you survive! Ha! Ha! Ha-Ho! Any safety you might find in Bost Ony’s advice is lost if you stay here one more instant!” the Opossum cried, slashing viciously with his whip. “Leave! Be gone, weevils! Be thankful I show you this mercy before Milky Joe and his Wrackshees arrive. I could trade you for many tortoises!”
“Trade us for tortoises!” cried Helga.
“Both of you weevils together,” replied Matsu, “might bring 3-4 nice high-grade trallés.”
“Trallés?” asked Breister.
“Trallés are the currency of slaving around here,” the Opossum replied in an evil tone, flicking his whip lightly for emphasis. “Racing tortoises. There’s lots of fancy beasts all over that love their classy clothes, princely titles...and, racing trallés...Some fancy beasts favor the laces of Matuch and Framm, or the brocades of Sonivad and velvets of Potwigg, or Rotter crystal and wine, but almost anywhere, the fancies covet racing trallés.” Matsu’s eyes narrowed to dangerous slits. “Mercy’s not much more than a word around here—and it don’t last long,” he hissed. “Unless you’ve a will to be sold for a few trallés, take that bit o’ timber you’re dragging behind you and beat it!” Ferociously cracking his whip in all directions, he advanced slowly toward the unfortunate travelers. “Be off wi’ya, weevils!”
Saying nothing more, the Wood Cows turned away from Shell Kral and set their course for the brow of a distant hill.