The Yggyssey (18 page)

"It would not need a violent revolution. It would take an act of courage by as few as three—but in the whole valley there is only one willing to do it. Can you believe that?"

"That one is you, isn't it?" I asked.

"Yes, cat-whiskered maiden," Viknik said. "I would go this minute and face every danger to retrieve the sacred amulet of which our legends tell."

"There's a sacred amulet?" Neddie asked.

"There is. And if we were in possession of it, the power of the helpers would melt away. But to get it would require entering the dark forest, seeking permission from the king of the ravens who live there, and then going through the quivering bog, which no one in living memory has survived. Also, it would be necessary to get a corn muffin to give the king of the ravens, but that part is fairly simple."

"So, you get a corn muffin, go to the dark forest, find the king of the ravens, give him the corn muffin, get permission to continue, go through the quivering bog, whatever that is..."

"It's very bad," Viknik said.

"...and get hold of the sacred amulet, is that all?"

"More or less. If the sacred amulet was in possession of the people, the evil witches would lose their powers."

"How do you know it would work?" Big Audrey asked.

"Do I question your beliefs?" Viknik asked.

"Tell me about this sacred amulet," Neddie said.

"It is very ancient. No one knows where it comes from. It is believed that the person who has it can defeat the forces of evil."

"This sounds oddly familiar," Seamus said. "Tell us more."

"Well, long ago, Shmoonik, a great wizard, hid it in the quivering bog. Only the ravens know where to find it. He put it there so it would be safe, and if there was ever the need, if the people of the valley were in deep trouble, some heroes could go and find it. It is believed that no one person can do this—it would take at least three. And as I have told you, I am the only one willing to try."

"What does the amulet look like?" Neddie asked.

"It is a small carved turtle," Viknik said.

"Did you say a turtle?" Neddie asked.

"A turtle." Neddie and Seamus looked at each other.

"Carved turtle made out of...?"

"Stone."

"Really."

"Yes, why?"

"Prepare yourself," Neddie said. "I may have a big surprise for you."

Neddie dug in his pocket and then pulled out a closed fist. He held his fist out to Viknik, fingers up, then opened the fingers, revealing his little stone turtle and said, "Voilà!"

"Voilà?" Viknik said.

"Look at that!" Neddie said.

"At that? What is it?"

"It's the sacred turtle!" Neddie said, smiling triumphantly.

"No, it's not."

"Is too!"

"Do you mock Viknik?" Viknik said. "That is not the sacred turtle."

"I assure you, it is," Neddie said. "Big as life and twice as magical."

"Look," Viknik said. "Give a born Shlermentaler credit for knowing what the sacred turtle looks like. First of all, that is not even a turtle."

"It isn't?"

"Of course not! A turtle is fuzzy and cute, with long hind legs and long ears."

"Then what do you call this, a bunny?"

"If you knew what it was, why did you try to tell me it was a turtle?" Viknik asked.

"Well, where we come from, this is what we call a turtle, and it is sacred and very magical," Neddie mumbled, looking crestfallen.

"You are a foreigner, so I will not insult you by going on about how you don't know a turtle from a bunny," Viknik said. "But your ... object will not be of any help. If you want to help me, come with me to the dark forest."

"Excellent idea!" Seamus said. "We will!"

"You will?" Viknik asked.

"We will?" we all asked.

"Certainly," Seamus said. "It sounds like swashbuckling fun."

His father's influence. Every now and then, Seamus feels the need to swashbuckle.

"If you're serious," Viknik said, "I happen to have a corn muffin in my leathern bag."

"Everybody here has a leathern bag," I whispered to Big Audrey.

"And foot rags," Big Audrey whispered back. "They all have foot rags. I'm going to get some."

"Are you both with me? We can start out right away," Viknik said.

"Both? Don't you mean all four of us?" I asked Viknik.

"Well, naturally the females will not be coming with us," Viknik said. "You girls can stay and guard the garlic patch, and feed the skunks."

"He's not as cute as I thought," Big Audrey whispered to me.

"Nothing doing, Garlic Boy," I said. "We all go or nobody goes. Take it or leave it."

"It's irregular. It's against our ancient traditions," Viknik said.

"Blow it out your leathern bag," I said. "That's our ancient Los Angeles tradition."

"Well, if it is your custom," Viknik said. "But I warn you, there may be scary things."

"Ha!" I said.

"Ha ha!" Big Audrey said.

Viknik was not a good planner. If he had been, we would have waited until morning to start out for the dark forest. As it was, we arrived there a little before dark, and when it did get dark, we were already in it. There was a full moon, but only a little light made its way through the leaves. Now and then we came to a clearing, bathed in moonlight—but somehow those felt scarier than the thick trees. And we tripped on roots a lot, and stepped in holes.

"This is ridiculous," Neddie said. "We should just settle somewhere and wait for it to get light. Viknik, what have you got that's edible in your leathern bag, besides the corn muffin?"

"I have some garlic," Viknik said. "And a small fish."

"It keeps getting better and better," Big Audrey said. We all snuggled down between the roots of a big tree and tried to fall asleep.

"Maybe we can find some berries or something in the morning," Neddie said.

"Anybody want some garlic?" Viknik said. "It's first-class garlic. Besides, it keeps vampires away, and werewolves."

"There are vampires?"

"There are werewolves?"

"Sure," Viknik said. "Why do you think people are afraid to come here? See that dark shadow, sort of like a blob over there?"

We all saw it.

"Werewolf," Viknik said. The shadow moved a bit. "Pass some of that garlic over here," Seamus said.

"I'll have some."

"Yes, me too."

"Save some for me."

Trying to sleep in the dark forest was a joke. It was like rush hour. There were werewolves—we got a good look at some of them—and vampires wandering all around, making noise. There were huge black, fire-breathing horses crashing through the forest, various nameless shrieking creatures, and the well-known things that go bump in the night. Also, we were kept awake by floating lights, strange, evil-feeling cold breezes that were like a hand stroking your face, and little skittering things, like crabs, that made a kind of horrible gibbering sound.

"It gets better in the daytime, right?" I asked Viknik.

"Never having been here before, I can't say," Viknik said. "But I imagine it does ... somewhat."

"Who besides me is sorry he came?" I asked.

"Not me," Seamus Finn said. "This is great fun."

"Shut up, Seamus," we all said.

I never thought I could fall asleep while being haunted and surrounded by noisy ghosts, monsters, and werewolves, but I found myself waking up—we all did—when the dawn filtered down through the leaves. I have to say, I felt pretty good. "I'm so hungry," I said, stretching.

Everybody else was hungry too. We found a little stream that was clean and cold, and drank, washed, and managed to get ourselves tidied up, but we didn't see anything that looked edible.

It was hard not to think about the corn muffin in Viknik's leathern bag—but, of course, we needed that to give to the king of the ravens. We were about to split Viknik's little fish five ways—it was not an appealing little fish, even to very hungry people—when we smelled something marvelous.

"What is that?" Seamus asked.

"Smells like doughnuts," Neddie said. We pushed our noses up in the air and sniffed deeply.

"Smells better than doughnuts," Big Audrey said. We were walking, almost without knowing it, in the direction of the delicious smell. In a clearing, we found a little guy of remarkable appearance frying up crullers or fritters of some sort in a big skillet, over a charcoal fire. The little guy was maybe four feet high, and it seemed like a third of that was his high-domed bald head. He had weird, large, round dark eyes that gave him a surprised or frightened expression—and there were three flashing lights in his midsection! The lights appeared to be part of him, not something he was wearing.

"You want to buy sfingi?" the little guy asked us.

"Sfingi? Those are sfingi?"

"Yes. Good. You want to buy?"

This presented a problem.

"What do you suppose they use for money around here?" I asked.

"Let's try some American coins and see if he'll accept them," Seamus said. He pulled a handful of change out of his pocket and offered it to the little guy. The little guy studied the coins, selected a nickel, sliced open five sfingi, slathered them with what turned out to be butter and honey, dusted them with powdered sugar, wrapped each in a large leaf, and handed them to us.

"Oh my goodness!" Neddie said. "I am never going to be able to go back to the Rolling Doughnut when we get home."

The rest of us said things like "Mmmph!" and "Yum!"

"This is the best thing I have ever tasted in my life," Viknik said. "And I have had the Shlermentaler fig-and-garlic pastry."

"Give him more nickels!" I said to Seamus. We ate five more sfingi. Each.

After getting to the point of not being able to think of eating another sfingi, we felt perfectly ready to continue our quest. "Let's ask the little guy where to find the king of the ravens," Seamus said.

"King of ravens? Ask giant head," the little guy told us.

"Giant head?"

The little guy jerked his thumb over his shoulder. "I guess giant head, whatever that may be, is in that direction," Big Audrey said. We left the clearing and started through the forest, going the way the little sfingi guy had pointed.

"I suppose 'giant head' refers to some local with an outsize head," I said.

"Not exactly," Seamus said. "It refers to a huge head of stupendous size."

"Why do you think that?" I asked Seamus.

"Because I can see it through the leaves. Look!"

"Holy tamales!"

It was a head as big as a house. Just a head, in the middle of a clearing. Obviously it was some kind of idol, a statue, made of stone. Only it wasn't. It was alive! "What are you looking at?" the head said, in a voice that made the ground shake.

We stood there, our mouths open.

"What? You never saw a giant head before?" the giant head asked.

Viknik got control of himself. "We need to talk to the king of the ravens," he said.

"The ravens rule this forest," the giant head said, making the ground shake. "And the king of the ravens rules the ravens. It had better be something pretty important for you to talk to the king."