“Listen to me,” said Richard calmly. “This is no place for a young girl to be out alone. And an Outsider one at that. Those animals will catch your scent from a mile away. I don’t know how you got this far on your own but I can tell you, your luck wouldn’t likely last much longer. If the coyotes didn’t get you, the bandits who camp in these parts would. In the cab of this van is the safest place you could be right now. I’ve got to take you straight to the Governor-Regent. It’s protocol.”
“Who is the Governor-Regent?” asked Prue. “And why does everyone keep calling this place Wildwood? I heard the coyotes say that too.”
Richard pulled a half-chewed cigar from the ashtray and put it between his teeth, leaning out the window to spit a few flecks of tobacco onto the road. “The Governor-Regent,” he said, talking around the stogie in his mouth, “is the leader of South Wood. His name is Lars Svik.” He suddenly lowered his voice. “Though, between you and me, he’s got enough snakes around him hissing advice into his ears to populate a sultan’s salon.” He glanced at Prue. “Figurative snakes, that is. Bureaucrats and the like.
“Wildwood,” Richard continued, “is the uncivilized country.” Using the dashboard as a map, he traced his finger along the vinyl. “It stretches from the northernmost border of the Avian Principality all the way to the border of North Wood. I found you about halfway in the middle of nowhere, right smack in the center of Wildwood where there ain’t nothing but wolves and coyotes and thieves living off what they can scavenge from the ground or loot from the occasional passing supply truck. Or mail truck—which is why I carry that piece of iron down there.” He pointed at the shotgun. “Being the postmaster general, it’s my job to deliver mail and supplies and whatnot from the folks in South Wood to the country folk in North Wood and vice versa, and I do that by driving this blasted road—it’s called the Long Road, which is a no-brainer of a name—back and forth between the two places, braving this madness and putting my life and limb at great risk every week. And I tell you one thing, Port-Land Prue, being a state employee is not a pathway to wealth and riches.”
“You can just call me Prue,” was all she could think to say. She was dumbstruck by Richard’s monologue. She had so many questions swirling around her head, begging to be asked, she was barely able to sort them out. “So there are other people. Living here. In these woods. Where I come from, this place is called the Impassable Wilderness.”
This made Richard laugh so hard his cigar flew out of his mouth, and he had to fumble around at his feet to find it again. “Impassable Wilderness? Oh boy, would that it were. I might have a little more time at home. Nah, I don’t know who told you that, but you Outside folk have got it all wrong. ’Course, you’re the first of your kind I’ve ever seen here, so it stands to reason that no one ever made an effort to find out about the Wood—Wild, North, or South.” He looked at Prue and smiled. “Seems like you just might be our first pioneer, Port-Land Prue.”
CHAPTER 6
The Warren of the Dowager;
A Kingdom of Birds
The ropes stung Curtis’s wrists, and his chest ached from being bounced against the coyote’s bony spine. The pack moved quickly through the forest, undaunted by each sword fern and low-hanging tree branch that lashed at Curtis’s face. The forest floor was a blur below the feet of his coyote captor, but Curtis kept his eyes open, trying to register any change in the environment that might allow him to retrace their tracks. This endeavor seemed hopeless until the pack broke through a particularly dense patch of brush onto what appeared to be a wide dirt road. The coyotes picked up speed here over the level ground, and Curtis looked sideways at the oncoming terrain. The pack was approaching what appeared to be a ve
ry large wooden bridge. They hit the bridge at breakneck speed, and Curtis gave a little yelp as he looked down over the edge, through the ornate railings of the bridge: A massive chasm yawned below them, stretching downward into blackness. Just as quickly as they’d arrived at the bridge, they made the other side and scrambled back off the road and into the trees. Curtis strained to see behind him, to catch another sight of this awesome gap they’d crossed, but the towering firs swallowed up the landscape, and he returned to staring down at the forest floor.
He wasn’t sure how long they’d traveled, but the afternoon was waning when finally the pack emerged into a wide glade in the woods. In the center of the glade was a small hill, covered in ivy and deadfall, where a man-sized hole had been burrowed into the earth. Without a word, the party hustled through the hole and began following a long, dark tunnel down into the ground. Twines of ivy and tree roots supported the roof of the tunnel as it descended, and here and there, burning torches affixed to the dirt walls provided a hazy light. The unmistakable smell of wet dog was everywhere, though Curtis thought he smelled something like cooked food and gunpowder as well. Finally, the tunnel opened into a massive chamber bustling with activity. He was in the coyotes’ warren.
A group of soldiers in the center of the room made a tight phalanx and were being commanded in a drill by a menacing sergeant. A host of aproned coyotes were preparing a dinner in a black iron cauldron resting on a raging fire, where a line of eager soldiers waited patiently with tin plates extended in their paws. A crude stone chimney carried the smoke from the fire upward into the central trunk of a giant tree, whose roots provided the structural bones for the room. The winding root tendrils of the gargantuan tree framed the openings to a myriad of grottos and tunnels leading off this main room. The walls were lined with wooden racks where rested a massive arsenal of weapons: rifles, halberds, and sabers. Upended crates, their packing hay spilling out, littered a corner of the room, and a small troop of soldiers was busily checking their contents. Ancient-looking muskets were being inspected; sacks of gunpowder were unloaded and safely stowed in a nearby hollow.
A line of tattered banners on pikes led to a large, circular door at the far end of the room, made of a single wide slice of a giant cedar tree. In front of the door stood two rifle-bearing coyotes. It was to this doorway that Curtis was finally dragged, his bound wrists freed with a swik of the Commandant’s sword.
“Hold him fast,” ordered the commander as he stepped forward and spoke to the guards in front of the door. Two coyotes wrangled Curtis to his feet, holding his arms in their clammy paws. One of the door guards nodded to the Commandant and heaved the door open, disappearing within. After a short time, the guard returned and gestured for the commander and his prisoner to enter. Curtis was shoved forward, and he stepped over the threshold into the room.
The light was very dim inside, the only visible sources being a few flickering braziers and what little light was allowed inside via several crude skylights dug into the ceiling leading to the ground above. Dark woody roots snaked across the ceiling and walls; the white tendrils of plant roots dangled above their heads, and the room smelled distinctly of onions. At the far end of the chamber was an elaborate dais, decorated with long vines of ivy and plush cushions of gathered moss. In the center of the dais was a chair unlike any Curtis had seen before: Seemingly hand carved from a single massive tree trunk, it looked as if it had grown from the earth itself. The armrests snaked around the cushioned seat and were capped by carved talons; the legs were clawed at the bottom with what looked to be coyote paws. The seat back towered over the room, and the two posts on either side of the back rose to meet at the top, where the wood had been carved into the ominous shape of a single spiked crown. Curtis stared in wonder at the scene until he heard a voice behind him ask:
“What do you think?” It was a woman’s voice, and Curtis found himself soothed by its sonorous music. “A marvel of craftsmanship, yes? I had it made especially for the room. Took ages.”
Curtis turned and clapped eyes on the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen in his life. Her face was ovoid and pale, though her lips shone red like the freshest late summer apples. Her hair was an electric copper-red and it hung in braided tresses, brocaded with mottled eagle feathers. She wore a simple floor-length gown of tawny leather, and a heavy stole was draped over her shoulders. She was discernibly human, yet she struck Curtis as being entirely otherworldly, as if she’d been pulled from the face of some cathedral’s faded, ancient fresco. She towered over her court of coyotes, and they scurried in her wake as she moved toward Curtis.
“It’s very nice,” he said.
“We’ve done our best here,” she continued, waving at her surroundings. “It was difficult at first to gather the basic comforts—those creature comforts—but we managed. It’s miraculous, really, considering that we started from nothing.” She smiled in thought and let her slender hand caress Curtis’s cheek. “An Outsider,” she said thoughtfully. “An Outsider child. How beautiful you are. What’s your name, child?”
“C-Curtis, ma’am,” he stammered. He’d never called anyone ma’am before. It just seemed appropriate now.
“Curtis,” said the woman, retracting her hand, “welcome to our warren. My name is Alexandra, though most call me the Dowager Governess.” She stepped up to the dais and draped herself over the seat of the throne. “Are you hungry? Thirsty? You must have traveled far today. Our stores are meager, but you are welcome to whatever we can offer.”
“Sure,” said Curtis. “I am pretty thirsty.”
“Borya! Carpus!” she said loudly as she snapped her fingers at two loitering coyotes. “A bottle of blackberry wine for our guest. And greens! Dandelion and fern fiddles. And a bowl of the venison stew for the Outsider child Curtis! Quickly!” She flashed a broad smile at Curtis and gestured at the pile of freshly gathered moss that surrounded the throne. “Please, have a seat,” she said.
Curtis, surprised to be treated with such hospitality, settled himself into the deep cushion of the moss.
“We’re simple folk, Curtis,” began the Governess. “We protect our own, and we ask little of the forest. You might call us the wardens of Wildwood. We’ve made this untamed wilderness our own and imposed an order on it that was it was sorely lacking. Our intent is to cultivate a beautiful flower from this stark and infertile ground. For example, when I arrived here in Wildwood, these coyotes you see were a hardscrabble, desperate lot. Practically anarchistic in their organization, they were constantly at war with one another and reduced to the lowest form of forest dweller: the scavenger. But I brought them to order.”
A coyote attendant appeared at the door and made his way to Curtis, carrying a wide tin plate heaped with fresh greens, a bowl of stew, and a wooden mug of a dark purple liquid. He set it in front of Curtis. The attendant then produced a corked bottle from underneath his arm and placed it next to the tray. The Governess nodded, and the coyote bowed deeply and walked from the room.
“Please, eat,” said the Dowager Governess, and Curtis dove into the food, slurping down the venison stew with relish. He took a healthy gulp from the wooden mug, and his face flushed as the warm liquid rolled down the back of his throat.
The Governess was watching him intently. “You remind me of a boy I knew,” she said thoughtfully. “He must’ve been not much older than you. How old are you, Curtis?”
“I’ll be twelve in November,” said Curtis between bites.