would be the first to pin his opponent’s shoulders to the ground for a count of three. At the last minute, however, Pobo thought of a new rule, a second way to win the match: If either competitor could stuff his opponent’s head into a tortoise burrow, he would be declared the winner.
The combatants locked up for the start of their match, face to face, arm on arm, hands on one another’s shoulders. They circled one another once, then twice, looking for any advantage to press. Aidan was much bigger than Hyko, even though Hyko was quite big for a feechie, but Aidan knew better than to put too much stock in a size advantage. Feechies could whip a bigger man out of pure caginess and meanness, and they were much stronger than they looked.
“Stop dancing and start rassling,” called Orlo, who had been named the referee.
“You look just like a couple of civilizers,” jeered Pobo, but he looked a little sheepish when Orlo elbowed him and reminded him that one of the wrestlers was a civilizer.
Hyko made the first move. He lunged to butt Aidan on the bridge of the nose. But Aidan was too quick. He bobbed his head out of the way, then lurched backward, pulling the off-balance Hyko on top of him. He grabbed the wiry feechie and easily twisted him in a knot. It was Aidan’s signature move, the one with which he had won the kingdomwide wrestling tournament. Hyko’s arms and legs were bent back in a contortion that had always caused Aidan’s opponents to surrender in tears. But Hyko was so limber, he seemed not to be bothered in the least. Aidan clamped down harder, determined to break the feechie’s stubbornness. But Hyko paid him little mind. In fact, the strain of the difficult hold seemed to be greater on Aidan than on his supposed victim. His forehead glistened with sweat, and his grip grew slippery. Hyko, on the other hand, actually smiled as Aidan wrenched his limbs into ever more strenuous contortions.
Aidan hoped Hyko was about to beg for mercy when the feechie twisted his head around so that his nose was a mere inch from Aidan’s. And when the feechie opened his mouth to speak, the word he spoke sounded at first like a cry for mercy: “Hhhhhelp!” It was a cruel trick. Hyko’s breath amounted, really, to an unfair advantage. The long, breathy “Hhhhhelp!” was like the opening of a furnace in Aidan’s face, except that it wasn’t just heat that blasted forth, but the nose-stinging, eye-burning vapor of old fish and wild onion that was the defining characteristic of feechie breath. Aidan reeled backward in horror, clutching his mouth and nose, trying to get his wits about him.
Hyko wasted no time. He mounted a fallen log, leaped from it, and laid his staggering opponent low with a smart elbow to the back of the head. But as Aidan fell, he grabbed Hyko’s ankle and by sheer strength spun the feechie to the ground beside him. He flopped onto Hyko and pinned his shoulders to the ground.
Though Orlo was supposed to be the referee of the match, he was so enthralled with the rough-and-tumble action that a couple of seconds passed before it dawned on him to start counting. And when he did start, he counted very, very slowly: “Ooooooooonnnnne…” The truth was, Orlo wanted to see one of the wrestlers stick the other’s head in a tortoise hole. To Orlo, that seemed like a wrestling match with real style. He didn’t want to see the match end with a pin. That was boring, unimaginative. And he certainly didn’t want to see the match end so soon. So he slowed the count even more: “Twoooooooooooooooo…”
Meanwhile, Hyko broke free and scrambled to his feet. He bulled Aidan to the ground, and the two of them writhed and rolled on the ground like a pair of fighting snakes. Orlo and Pobo cheered the match. Reluctant to take sides, they shouted words of encouragement without specifying whom they were intended to encourage.
“You get him, boy!”
“Stuff him down a turtle hole!”
“I saw that!”
The wrestlers migrated dangerously close to the cooking fire, which was still burning. Hyko’s flying leg scattered hot coals and burning sticks well beyond the banked sand that formed the boundary of the fire. But soon they flopped away from the fire. Hyko was getting the better of Aidan now and was having some success cramming the civilizer’s head into a tortoise hole. By Pobo’s rule, a head-cram was deemed complete-and the match over- when both of the losing wrestler’s ears were completely in the hole and not visible above ground. Hyko’s head- cramming task was complicated because the tortoise hole wasn’t as big around as Aidan’s head.
Aidan’s ears, like his mouth and nose, were full of sand, so it was hard to understand the chant Orlo and Pobo had struck up while he was being stuffed into a small hole in the ground. But when Hyko suddenly let go of his hair, Aidan raised his head and saw a broad sweep of wire grass being consumed by an orange flame, just a few feet from the cooking fire. Now he understood what Orlo and Pobo had been chanting: “Fire! Fire! Fire!”
Chapter Thirteen
Aidan scrambled to his feet and ran toward the licking flames. He stomped at the burning grass, smothering the fire in boot-sized patches. The feechies joined, too, stomping as best they could. But even feechies aren’t tough enough to stomp out a wildfire with bare feet.
A steady breeze from the west fanned the fire and it grew, carrying flames from one tuft of wire grass to the next. Aidan fetched his extra tunic from his backpack and used it to smother flames, but it was too late for that. The fire had stretched itself into a long line marching eastward before the prevailing wind. A small holly tree had already caught fire and sent popping cinders out ahead of the fire line. Little troops of flames licked around the bases of the big pine trees, looking to burst into magnificent flame among the long straw of the overstory. But the old trees resisted, and the ground fires died at their feet.
The vanguard of the fire kept marching onward. Rabbits fled before it, as did pine voles, little ground sparrows, and other animals that depended on the high, thick grass for cover. Rat snakes and cotton mice, normally predators and prey, entered a truce born of emergency and sought refuge together in the dark coolness of the tortoise burrows, deep below the crackling fire.
Behind the fire line a swath of charred and smoking ground expanded. But the fire was insatiable. It pushed eastward, devouring every blade of grass, every bush, every little sapling in its path. Aidan looked past the fire to the forest beyond. Dry wire grass waved as far as he could see-leagues and leagues of fuel for a fire that looked as if it might never stop.
The feechies were running in every direction, yelling and waving their arms but not doing anything helpful. They soon lost what little self-control they had and began crying and moaning, heartbroken at the prospect of their beautiful forest going up in flame. Hyko took it especially hard; his leg, after all, had kicked the burning log into the grass to set this conflagration in motion.
But they all snapped to attention when Aidan announced, “I know what to do.”
Hyko wiped his eyes and sniffed a long, wet sniffle. “You do?”
They didn’t understand what Aidan was doing when he pulled burning limbs out of the fire and handed one to each of them. But they were encouraged by the apparent sense of purpose with which he shouldered his pack and raised his own firebrand like a cavalry officer’s sword. “Follow me!” he ordered, and as he ran across the smoking ground toward the fire line, the three feechies followed.
“Ow! Ow! Ooooh! Ow!”
“Hooo! Hooo! Hot! Hot!”
The poor feechies didn’t have the benefit of a layer of boot leather between their feet and the hot ground, and the closer they came to the fire, the hotter it was.
“I’m ’bout to burn up!” complained Hyko above the crackle of flames. But neither he nor the other two feechies turned back.
“It’s cooler on the other side!” shouted Aidan. And with that, he leaped into the chest-high hedge of flame. The feechies closed their eyes and followed him.
“Haa-wee!” Aidan shouted exultantly when he made it through the flames. He turned around just in time to see Hyko throw down his firebrand and barrel into him. Civilizer and feechie fell to the ground.
“Stop it!” yelled Aidan. “Stop it!” But Hyko didn’t stop. He rolled Aidan over on his back as if to pin him. These feechies don’t know when to stop! thought Aidan as he struggled to get away. Then Orlo and Pobo jumped into the fracas and started slapping at him.
