Return the blackberry Valley Chap 4 (work in progress, unedited)

Chapter 4

As they walked through the woods, and the conversation lagged, Riley took a moment to look around at his new surroundings. The more he looked the more he realized why his great-grandfather had never really said much about the Valley’s landscape. It was eerily like the mountain and flatlands where he and Riley had come from. The trees seemed to be mostly older growth; Riley figured most were at least 100 years old, maybe more. Every once in a while they would come across a massive oak or poplar that had fallen. New trees already had started to establish themselves in the shadow of the fallen giants.

But for the most part they walked under tall leafy canopy with little undergrowth. The floor was littered with dead leaves, fallen branches and all sort of fungus and mushrooms. Dotted here and there were smaller holly bushes or under a break in the canopy, wild rose bushes. Birds and squirrels mostly played in the forest. Every so often the path would meet up with a small stream that pleasantly burbled along.

Riley felt at ease in the familiar looking woods. He had a feeling as if he could have found a little cabin somewhere in them and lived there quit happily.

As the day got long they stopped in a small clearing they had found by following a path that shot off the main one. The sun was very low. Riley could sense dusk was coming. Walter sat down, sighing heavily.

“Not built for this like I once was. Oh to be young again heh Eric?” he nodded towards the twins, who were roughhousing and then fixed a steady eye back onto Eric. Eric nodded but said nothing.

“We’ll camp here. I figure we have about five or six days left before Mayblossom.”

Eric looked up in surprise. “That far? Is there a short cut?”

“That is with the short cut Eric. We need to be careful.”

“Couldn’t we just get horses?” Riley asked, “I mean for Eric and Jet and I?”

The twins stopped roughhousing and looked up.

“What are Horses?” Adam asked.

“No horses here Riley,” Grunted Path. “Glad of it too, I’ve seen how big they are over there, scary huge beasts” said the six foot tall rabbit who brushed past Riley.

Walter chuckled. “No way around it lads, we’ve got a walk ahead of us.”

 

The air was warm enough that night that they did not need to build a fire. Path produced the famous splints that Riley had heard about and they all enjoyed a dinner of the wrapped vegetable rolls and hard cider. Riley fell asleep with a warm, full and satisfied feeling.

After some bread and more cider, when the sun came up the next morning, the party began walking again. 

As the party ambled along Walter fell back to talk to Riley.

“So, I spoke to Eric last night. Strange tale he tells me. Is he really that old?”

Riley looked up briefly at Eric, who was ahead, now talking to Path and Jet. The twins were hopping further ahead, talking animatedly.

“Older than dirt, has been all my life” Riley replied.

Walter huffed a series of small huffs. Riley looked at him.

“What was that?”

“What?” asked Walter.

“The sound you just made… were you … swearing?”

Walter laughed and clapped his heavy paw on Riley’s back.

“Well, I see that unlike your grandfather-“

“Great-grandfather.”

“Really? Ha! Even worse than I thought. Well, unlike... .Eric, you don’t miss much. Yes, I was swearing, sort of. Not a bad one, more of an oath.”

“Um, so, you mean the Lepus have their own language? I remember Paw- Eric telling me about that…”

“Yes we do. But we try not to speak it in front of people too much.”

“Could I learn it you think?”

Walter turned and looked directly at Riley. “Hmmm, hard to say. Precious few have. Most don’t care too, but the real issue is that it is devilishly hard if you don’t have whiskers.  People use their sounds mostly, but we Lepus also use lots of snorts, twitches and whisker moves. But we’ll see. Maybe you should grow a beard.”

Riley laughed. “Been trying to for years. I’m only 16 you know.”

Walter laughed too, but then grew silent for a moment. He appeared to be thinking about how to talk about something Riley sensed.

“Walter… what did you and Eric decide about… well, letting other people know, you know, about what he went through on the other side?” He asked Walter. Riley saw a look of relief come over Walter’s face.

“Well, we thought it would be best to play it down as much as possible. It’s a bit tricky to explain how time passes by more slowly here than someplace else.”

“15 times” Riley said.

“What?”

“15 times for slowly or where I’m from it goes 15 times faster. Either way, for every year that went by here 15 went by back home.  75 years Walter. That’s how long Eric’s been gone. I figured it out yesterday. I know he’s a little edgy, but can you blame him? To tell you the truth I really have only known him as an old man, and a right ornery one at that.”

Walter sighed. “Yes, he seemed downright angry last night, kept asking why we didn’t come sooner.”

“Well, see it from his point of view. He nearly died waiting, not many people live to be 96, least not where we’re from. I guess you guys here had no idea about the difference?”

“No, well, not that I know of. We Lepus can hop into your world, but we only go for very short times, usually an hour or so at the most. Too many dogs and…other beasts. Makes us twitchy, makes me twitchy just to talk about it.”  

As they had been walking the landscape began to subtly change. The stream, now on their left, began to drop faster. Soon it was ensconced in a valley of sorts. The region became rockier.  The path split into two and Walter gave a short whistle. The party stopped. Riley noticed the twins were nowhere to be seen.

Then, seemingly from underneath the leaves, the twins appeared, slightly out of breath. Riley had not noticed them until they were practically on top of them.

“We went ahead Path” Richard reported, “The split goes up and down. The right goes to the floor of the valley. It’s not big but looks tight. The left goes up fairways, but we think it levels off. We can probably get around using it, but it’s longer. Also-“

“Also we found men!” chimed in Adam.  Richard tossed him a dirty look.

“I was just about to say that!”

“Ok guys” Path put up a paw “what sort of men.”

“Guards!” both of the cousins said at about the same time, both looking eager and slightly proud at their news.

“How many?”

“Well, I saw about four, but Adam thought he saw six or seven, but definitely four.”

Path looked at Walter and Jet, who both nodded.

“Okay, we go around, quietly.”

“Wait.” Eric spoke up. “King’s guards? Why go around? I bet we could take them, even if there are a dozen.

“Yeah!” Said both the cousins at the same time again.

“Eric, now is not the time to risk a fight.”

“It’s a perfect time Walter. We need to put the fear of god in these people!”

“And to what end” Jet said quietly, as if to not tread on Eric’s obvious passion. “If we attack and say we win, then what? The whole country will know you are back. We won’t be able to go a mile without the entire guard looking for us.”

“So we just slink away?”

“No,” Walter said “we slink along. We make it to see Karn.” Walter put gentle paw on Eric’s shoulder.

Riley came forward and stood beside Eric.

“Plus you’re without your bow Pawpaw.” Riley said. “Maybe it would be better to get you one and let you brush up first?” Riley had not even finished the sentence when he realized his error. Eric shot him the darkest of looks.

No one said anything; they all stood around for an awkward moment, until Walter broke the silence.

“Alright then, we’ll go single file, and go as quiet as we can. I doubt they’ll hear us, but in case they do, keep quiet.”