Aidan still knew the River Road bend for bend. “Over this next rise,” he called to Dobro behind him, “we’ll get our first glimpse of Tambluff Castle.” He turned around in the saddle to look at his feechie friend. “Dobro!” he shouted, exasperation in his voice. “You have to sit down in the saddle. I mean it!” Dobro had ridden most of the way from Ryelan, standing up on his horse’s back.
“I can see more this way,” Dobro said.
“We’re trying not to draw attention to ourselves,” Aidan said.
“Ain’t that what these hoods is for? To keep folks from recognizin’ us?”
“Yes, Dobro, but if you’re carrying on like a trick rider…”
“It just don’t seem right to me, settin’ on a critter’s back,” said Dobro. “Don’t seem respectful to the critter.”
“Dobro, sit down!”
Dobro flopped into his horse’s saddle, slumping like a petulant child. “Yes, Your Majesty,” he said. Sarcasm was one of the civilizer habits he was starting to get the hang of.
“In an hour we’re going to be in Tambluff,” Aidan said. “It’s not like any place you’ve ever seen before. Busy streets, fine carriages. Guards everywhere. Soldiers. People whose job is to pay attention to who comes in and who goes out. If you don’t try a little harder to blend in with the civilizers, we’re going to be in a whole world of trouble, Dobro.”
“I’ll try harder, Aidan,” said Dobro. “But you folks is got such peculiar ways, it ain’t easy to blend in.”
“Just try to do what everybody else is doing.”
They approached the city at the south gate and merged with the steady flow of people threading under the teeth of the portcullis. Dobro pulled his hood further over his face, suddenly self-conscious among so many civilizers, aware of how different he was from them.
Before they reached the gate, the door to the gate-house swung open, and a round old man leaped in front of them holding a pikestaff across his body to block their way. “You!” he shouted. “You hooded horsemen. You’ll identify yourselves before you pass through my gate.”
The old man was Southporter, keeper of this gate since well before Aidan was born. How many times had Southporter welcomed Aidan to Tambluff when he was younger? King Darrow never had a more faithful servant. Perhaps he would not look so kindly on Aidan anymore. The armed guards at the gate looked alert, watching the confrontation, ready to get involved if need be.
Aidan had no choice but to identify himself and pray for the best. He could run if he had to; he knew every nook and cranny of Tambluff. And he had no cause to fear on Dobro’s account. The wily feechie could take care of himself. Aidan leaned down toward Southporter so the old gatekeeper could see his face under the hood. “I am Aidan Errolson,” he whispered.
Southporter’s face paled, and he staggered back a step. “Aidan,” he whispered. Then, after a quick glance at the armed guards, he opened his arms in a gesture of welcome to Aidan and Dobro. “Simon!” he said heartily. “Thurston! What took you so long? Come in! Come in!”
He turned back to the gate guards. “Can you keep an eye on things until I get my friends settled? It will only take a minute.” He herded Aidan and Dobro into the gatehouse and sat them down on a bench he used for questioning suspicious strangers (and sometimes used for taking afternoon naps).
“Aidan, what are you doing in Tambluff?” he whispered, his voice full of genuine concern. “This is the most dangerous place you could possibly be!”
“I’ve come to-” Aidan began, but Southporter was at it again.
“And who is this with you?” Southporter threw back Dobro’s hood and squinted at him, trying to remember if he had ever seen him, or even anybody like him, before.
“Southporter, this is Dobro Turtlebane,” Aidan began.
Southporter nodded his head and pointed at Dobro. “I know what you are,” he said. “Yes.” He kept looking at Dobro, kept nodding. Then he looked back at Aidan. “So it’s true. I thought it was just another wild rumor, you traipsing around the countryside with a feechie, but here he is, setting right here in my gate-house.” He stared another moment at Dobro. “He is a feechie, ain’t he?”
Aidan nodded.
“You’ve brung some astonishing things to this gatehouse,” Southporter said. “Six years ago, you brung the biggest alligator I ever seen before or since. And today, you have brung a feechie in the flesh.” He slapped his thighs. “I don’t know how you gonna top this one, Aidan!”
Dobro gave Southporter a greenish grin. Southporter shook his head in amazement. Then he grew suddenly serious. “Aidan, there’s another rumor about you, and every time I hear it I tell folks it’s a filthy lie.” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “Folks say you and your pap’s training a rebel army down in Sinking Canyons. And I tell them, ‘That’s a filthy lie, and I don’t care who knows it! Ain’t nobody,’ I tell them, ‘ain’t nobody truer to the House of Darrow than Lord Errol and his boys.’ I still call him ‘lord,’ even if King Darrow don’t. And I tell them, ‘Anybody cares to contradict me can have my pikestaff right across his skull bone.’”
Southporter had plenty more to say on that subject, and he meant to go on at some length, but he noticed a strange expression on Aidan’s face. Southporter tried to soldier on. “It’s like I tell them
…” He broke off. “Aidan, why ain’t you looking at my eyes? Aidan? Oh, dear me, no! Aidan? You are training a army in Sinking Canyons!”
“Southporter, it’s not what you think!”
Southporter’s face crumpled and tears stood in his eyes. “Traitor?” His tone of voice was halfway between an accusation and a question. “Aidan Errolson a traitor?” He put his hand on the bell pull that would summon the armed guards.
“No! Never!” Aidan looked into Southporter’s eyes, resisting the temptation to look at his hand on the bell pull. “Believe me, Southporter. Errol and his sons are no traitors. Yes, we are training an army, an army to place at the service of the House of Darrow. These men insist on following me, Southporter. I will lead them in service to Corenwald.”
Southporter was silent for a moment. He looked at his hand on the bell pull, then back at Aidan. “Why should I believe you?”
Aidan blinked slowly and said, “Do you even have to ask that?”
Southporter took his hand off the bell pull. He looked a little ashamed of himself. He also looked relieved. “No, Aidan, of course I don’t. But you have to admit it looks suspicious. The king outlaws a nobleman and his sons. The nobleman and his sons train an army of malcontents.”
“Father says we may be the only army Corenwald has.”
Southporter nodded his head. “He may be right. Darrow’s army was in terrible shape even before he tried to invade the Feechiefen. Since then, it’s been even worse. When the Pyrthens come…” Southporter broke off. He shook all over, as if from a sudden chill.
“So you think the Pyrthens are coming too?”
“How could they not be? The question isn’t if they’ll come; it’s when. And why they haven’t already is a mystery to me. I figured the two of you were Pyrthen spies or assassins when you rode up hooded. What are you doing in Tambluff anyway?”
“Seeing the sights,” said Dobro with admirable candor. “I ain’t never been to the city before, and I made Aidan bring me.”
“And I’m here,” Aidan began, “to meet with Lynwood Wertenson.”
A flicker of suspicion returned to Southporter’s eyes. “The rabble-rouser?”
Aidan raised an eyebrow.
“I got no use for that man,” said Southporter, “and I don’t care who knows it. What business do you have with him?”
“I’ve come to tell him that I don’t intend to lead his rebellion, Southporter.”
