Wild Boy by Nancy Springer Read Free Book Online Page B

patted by that proud brat—
    Brat? Who was being proud now?
    Rook blinked, then shakily reached for the dagger. He fumbled his fingers onto the filigree handle and lifted the blade to his hair, but his hands wavered so much, he knew he was as likely to cut off an ear as not. He lowered his hand and passed the dagger to Rowan. “You do it,” he mumbled.
    He noticed that she said nothing either to scold him or praise him. Silently he thanked her for her silence as she started to shear away the long tangles. Her touch could not have been more gentle.
    Bracing himself with both hands to stay upright, Rook found it difficult to remind himself that a creature of the wild does not need friends.

Nine

    R ook awoke to find himself lying at ease in a bed of piled furs, looking up at sunlit treetops—but not hemlock. Feathery fronds of rowan whispered overhead, and from somewhere close by, a murmur of living water answered them. Even before he sat up, Rook knew where he was: the rowan hollow.
    Sitting up was more of a task than it should have been. Rook had to hoist himself with both hands. He felt as feeble as a mouse. Vaguely he remembered the sickening stench as Rowan had opened the wound to clean the poison out, the sickening pain that had made him fall over in a faint—but there was no pain now. He remembered lying half dead with fever—but there was no fever in him now. Breeze on his shorn head felt fresh and cool. He was wearing somebody’s jerkin, and a blanket covered his legs, and he actually felt as if he needed the warmth of them.
    “Hungry?” asked the voice he expected. He turned to find Rowan’s warm, grave gaze on him.
    Rook shook his head. He felt more muddled than hungry. “How am I here?”
    “Lionel carried you. I thought you would do better here.” Sitting in the shelter of the rocks with her wolf-dog by her side, Rowan tilted her head toward the ever-running spring that welled at the heart of the rowan hollow. And yes, Rook knew with a bone-deep instinct, it was Rowan’s spring that had soothed the fever out of him. That and Rowan herself, her touch. Which was almost the same thing. Rowan was at one with this place, the rowan grove.
    “Tod’s all right without me now, I hope,” Rowan added, stroking Tykell.
    To his wonder, Rook found that he hoped so too.
    “
Sacre bleu
toads,” called a glad voice from the rocks, “
mon cher frère
, my twin brother, he awakes!”
    Rook sighed and rolled his eyes as Beau thumped down to land on booted feet beside him, with Runkling in her arms.
    “Put him down,” Rook grumbled. “Let him root.”
    “
Mais non
, he root up the whole forest and plough it into a field for the, what you call it, the turnips!” Beau flashed her most wicked grin. “I take him to Fountain Dale, let him root there. Next year we grow parsnips.”
    From behind Rook, a familiar peevish voice said, “Belle has found her calling.”
    “No call me Belle!” Beau flared. “No ding-dong!”
    Rook looked around to find Lionel towering over him, a whole dead fallow deer on his shoulders. Lionel would kill meat and bring it home, but somebody else had to butcher it; Lionel had a tremendous stomach for eating, but no stomach at all for gutting and skinning.
    “Belle has become a paragon among piggy-sitters,” Lionel told Rook.
    Beau yelled, “So Tykell no eat Runkling!”
    Fear jolted Rook. He shot a look at the wolf-dog, and yes, Tykell was eyeing the young pig hungrily. Rowan’s hand lay on his back to restrain him.
    “You stop it to call me Belle,” Beau ordered Lionel.
    “When you stop it to speak that phony accent,” Lionel mimicked, easing the dead deer from his shoulders to the ground. “My dear little Belle.”
    Belle set Runkling down and drew her dagger, wagged it like a scolding finger at Lionel, then bent to skin the deer. Snorting happily, Runkling trotted to Rook, and he hugged the piglet, all bristles and sharp trotters, in his arms. Something swelled inside his