Sagaria (4 page)

He wasn’t quite sure how he’d come to be on his feet, but he found himself leaning across the dish-laden trestle table and waving one fist in the air.

Tod paused mid-valiance, unnerved.

The voice that came out of Flip’s throat sounded a lot calmer and more reasonable than he had any right to expect. His heart was pounding as if it wanted to burst out of his chest and hide under the table.

“Tell us, Tod,” he said, “since you have ventured so far and wide, welcoming hazards and defying jeopardy at every turn, tell us what it’s like on the other side of the mountains.”

The storyteller let out a fake laugh of derision that turned into a genuine one as it was echoed from countless throats all around.

Flip might have had the sympathies of a large part of the crowd if he’d asked some other question, and he felt like kicking himself for his lack of forethought. Too late to take back the words now, though. He’d just have to persevere as best he could. At least Dodgem would still hopefully speak to him like someone who didn’t have to be pitied for his imbecility.

Once the laughter had subsided, Tod turned toward him and gave him a deep bow of even deeper insincerity. When he spoke, it was in the voice of a teacher being patient with a young and particularly stupid child.

“We all know there’s nothing beyond the mountains, Flip. Perhaps a surfeit of cider has loosened your tongue a little too much?”

Flip fought down his panic. He hated to be the focus of attention like this.

“So where,” he said as coldly as he could, “do the birds fly in fall then? Surely you’ve found that place in all your journeyings.”

He was perhaps the only person in the tent who could see the sudden flash of apprehension in Tod’s eyes. The sight made the blood run faster and easier in his veins.
The buffoon has never thought this one through.
Flip was exultant.

“Oh, they just,” – he gestured airily – “fly around for a while and then, um …” His voice petered away to nothing as the whispers started up. Soon the whispers
flowed together to become the buzzing of a swarm of bees. Where
did
the birds go? Why couldn’t Tod answer the question? He’d been everywhere and seen everything, or so he said. Surely he must have found where the birds went?

Flip held Tod’s nervous gaze with a firm stare. His lips silently formed the word, “where?”

But Flip had underestimated his foe. He underestimated the skill with which Tod knew how to control an audience.

The big storyteller turned toward the crowd and spread his arms, as if accepting his own ignorance. “And what does
Flip
think lies on the other side of the mountains?” he said. “Gooseberries bigger than watermelons, I have no doubt. Potatoes the size of houses?” He turned back abruptly and pointed a claw. “What do you think, Flip?”

All the confidence that had filled Flip just a moment ago fled.
How did Tod know that bit about the gooseberries? I’ve never told anybody that, not even Dodgem. I only had the thought myself this afternoon.

The laughter was rising again; once more, Flip was the object of derision. He had to think of some clever reply to make, and quickly, but he couldn’t.

Tod, knowing he had the advantage, pressed on. “What evidence do you have, Flip, that there’s anything
at all
beyond the mountains?” He gave another of those arrogant sweeps of the arm, this time indicating a corner table where a dozen old men and women sat clucking over the remnants of their meal. “Our most distinguished scientists, I say, have thought about this matter for more years than you and I have lived, and they have shown beyond all shadow of a doubt that the mountains are the edge of the world. On the far side of them is nothing but the void.”

It was a dramatically delivered speech, and Tod ended it with his fist in the air. He had the people on his side again.

“I’m saying they might be wrong,” said Flip, cursing the quaver he heard.

“How dare he?” bellowed a voice. There were a lot of other voices. Even though he couldn’t make out any of the words, Flip got the distinct impression that if he didn’t watch out he’d find himself kicked out of the tent, harvest festival or no harvest festival – and none too gently at that.

Even so, he spoke his next sentence more loudly, hoping to be heard above the hubbub. “After all, how can they
know
? None of them have ever tried to go there!”

Tod just stood in the middle of the floor, arms folded, grinning at him.

It was Luti Furfoot who finally took charge, banging his goblet thunderously on the table until even the most raucous voices shut up.

“Quiet, quiet, quiet!” yelled the chieftain, long after everyone had already
quietened. “It is my judgement as your leader,” he pronounced in the hush, “that the great abyss behind the mountains marks the end of the world, and this shall be the close of the matter.” He turned toward Flip, quite politely, a twinkle in his eyes. “I suggest that in future you go a bit easier on the cone cider, young man.”

“It’s not the cider, sir,” murmured Flip. “I’m convinced there is something more out there than just emptiness.”

His words would normally have been inaudible, but such was the silence in the wake of Luti’s proclamation that they sparked irate gasps from some of the crowd. Such impertinence! To flatly contradict their beloved leader. Was there ever such a rogue as this?

Luti had heard Flip’s words as well, but he didn’t look angry. Quite the opposite: a smile was twitching at the corner of his mouth. He held up his paw to the room for calm.

Moving in for the kill, Tod took a couple of paces in Flip’s direction. There was a smile on his lips too, but the kind that made small children wake screaming in the night.

“I dare you,” he said in a stage whisper that seemed to seek out every last corner of the marquee, “I dare you to prove it, Flip. Prove it by going over the mountains and coming back with something none of us have ever seen before. Something we’ve never even heard of.”

“That I shall do,” said Flip deliberately, spacing the words carefully.
What am I saying?
his mind was shrieking at him, but he kept his face stony. “And when I do, what will you say then, brave Tod?”

Again, Tod’s supercilious expression wavered doubtfully, but he successfully hid it from the rest of the gathering.

Luti, who’d sat down, scratched his beard and got heavily to his feet again.

“We have all heard it,” he declared loudly, though Flip thought he could detect a certain weariness in the chieftain’s tone. “Tod has challenged Flip with a dare, and Flip has accepted the challenge. I hereby certify the legal standing of the challenge, and of the acceptance.” He turned toward the pair of them and his voice became less formal. “We’ll help you in any way we can with supplies and equipment, young fellow, and if you succeed in your quest – if you really do bring something from beyond the mountains that proves this fabulous land of yours exists – then I will give you anything it is in my power to give you as a reward. Within, harrumph, reason, of course. And if you don’t?” He let the question hang in the air for a few moments. “Why, then I should think you’ll be a laughing stock for the rest of your life, and we’ll all have plenty of good sport at your expense.”

This last was said to Flip, who was surprised to see the friendliness in his
chieftain’s eyes.
It’s not just Dodgem and those other guys who don’t like Tod
, Flip realized,
it’s Luti Furfoot as well.
He doesn’t want a puffchest like Tod to succeed him as chieftain, and he certainly doesn’t want Tod to marry his daughter. I have an ally whom I never expected.

Flip didn’t say any of this, of course. He just bowed his head demurely, accepting the ruling of his leader.

Tod saw something in Luti Furfoot’s gaze too, something he hadn’t wanted to see there, for he looked away abruptly.

“Now,” said Luti with a merry guffaw, “enough serious stuff. It’s time for the dancing to begin!”

Drums and pipes appeared all over the room as if they’d just suddenly dropped out of the sky, and within moments there was music everywhere, along with a great grating and scraping as the trestle tables were pushed to the sides. People found their partners, grown-ups and children mixing alike, and started twirling each other around in the traditional harvest dance.

The table on the dais was left where it was, though the plates were rapidly cleared away. For a long time, Flip continued sitting behind it, his head in his paws, staring dourly at the floor between his feet.

“You’re a brave lad, you know,” said a creaky voice beside him.

He looked up, startled. It was Old Cobb.

“I may be nearly blind, but I see a lot more and a lot clearer than people give me credit for. I don’t sleep as much as they think I do, either. I can see well enough to recognize a good and true heart when it’s there to be seen, young fellow, and yours is both.” He reached out a shaking paw and patted Flip on the shoulder. “For what it’s worth, an old fuzzlewits who’ll probably be long dead and gone by the time you get back wishes you good fortune on your quest.”

“Thank you,” breathed Flip. He was astonished to discover how much he meant it. “Oh,
thank
you.”

“And I’m not the only one,” said Old Cobb as if Flip hadn’t spoken. He cocked his head to one side. “Things here in Mishmash have stayed the same for far too long. We’re all falling asleep, even when we think we’re wide awake. It’s all the fault of the silly old fools we call scientists. When I was a young stripling, like you are today, those same doddering halfwits you see now were full of adventure, full of the thrill of discovery. They wanted to know the whole of the world, and it wasn’t their fault they couldn’t do that. But the passage of years has stiffened their minds just the same as it’s stiffened their limbs. Now they want nothing more than to go to their graves in peace, thinking they know it all just because no one’s had the gumption to tell them they don’t. 
You’re the best thing that’s happened to this village in a long while, young Flip, even should it turn out that you’re wrong as wrong can be, and don’t ever let anyone tell you otherwise.”

Then Old Cobb’s head seemed to drift off to one side, coming to rest on his shoulder once more. An easy snore trickled from him. The conversation – not really even a conversation, more like a monologue – was clearly at an end.

Flip decided it was time for him to go. He wasn’t in the mood for dancing; he hardly ever was, but never less so than tonight.

Except that one of Old Cobb’s hazy eyes popped open again.

“I can help you, you know,” Cobb wheezed. “And I’ve decided I’m going to. Don’t ask me how; you’ll know it when it happens.”

The eye closed and the snoring started once more. Flip leaned over. There was no doubt about it. This time the oldster really was soundly asleep.

Pushing back his chair with his legs, Flip stood up. No one was looking at him and no one would notice if he ducked quietly out under the tent-flap. The dance was getting wilder and wilder, the music more and more out of tune but all the better for it. He slowly eased himself down from the dais and made his way to the nearest wall of the tent.

There was a tap on his arm. He sensed who it was before he turned, as if he could feel her very existence.

Jinnia.

Her closeness blocked his throat.

“Mr. Flip,” she said shyly, dropping her gaze from his face to her paws. “I don’t know if you’ll find anything out there on the far side of the mountains when you go, but if you do, could you bring back something nice for me, please?”

She tugged the coronet of flowers from her head and plucked one of the blooms from it. Its petals were bright yellow and red, and at its heart was a ring of vivid blue dots.

“This is for you, Flip, and for the gift I hope you bring me.”

Before he knew what she was doing, she’d given him a light kiss on his cheek and disappeared among the dancers. He stared at the flower he was holding. The petals might curl and wither away, the stalk might darken and rot, but the flower Jinnia had given him would never die.

Flip didn’t sleep much that night. His bed seemed to have developed lumps in it, and whichever way he lay they dug into the most sensitive parts of his body – parts he hadn’t even realized were there until the mattress started poking
them. When he lay on his left side, he found his thoughts roved over the kiss and the flower Jinnia gave him, and the music of her voice as she so bashfully requested that he bring her some token of his adventuring. When he lay on his right side, by contrast, he found himself firstly cursing his own stupidity for falling so rashly into Tod’s trap and accepting the dare, then quivering with anxiety about the dangers that might await him on his foolhardy expedition beyond the mountains. The greatest danger of all was that he might find the scientists were right and that it really was the edge of the world, that there was nothing at all beyond the abyss.

Not surprisingly, he chose to lie on his left side most of the time, basking in Jinnia’s beauty. That was pleasant enough, but it still didn’t help him get to sleep.