A Lion Among Men Part 3

Brrr had to keep from stealing a look to see if his thigh was all that mighty. "I haven't earned it," he said. "Jemmsy."

"It will be your pa.s.sport in Tenniken. No one will harm you if you come in aid of a soldier of the Wizard's army. If you deliver the news of my incapacity to my brothers-at-arms, they won't forsake me. Soldiers take care of their own. Low ranking though I am."

Brrr came forward and accepted the token by opening his mouth and gumming Jemmsy's hand almost up to the elbow. It tasted lettucy, watery, unwashed. The hand was limp on Brrr's tongue, and for a moment neither of them moved.

Then, extruding the hand through closed lips, and ejecting the badge onto the pile of books, Brrr said softly, "Pin it there on the belt, as you suggested. When I go, I'll take the books with me, too."

"Bless you," replied Jemmsy. "If I were not to survive, would you tell my fellows to remind my father I loved him until the end? And forgive me my crimes against you and your kind."

"I have no kind," said Lion. "But okay, sure. If it'll make you happy. What crimes might those be, Jemmsy?"

But Jemmsy had rolled over on his side, and he put the saliva-wet hand into his groin and drew his knees up, as far as the trap would allow. He didn't speak again.

Grat.i.tude, thought the Lion. He gripped the satchel belt in his mouth and left. He found, though, that the farther away he got, the less he could be confident of the small a.s.sociation that had sprouted between him and Jemmsy. Did a conversation const.i.tute a friendship? If so, this was his first friendship, and he wasn't sure how fragile it might prove to be. How could he abandon the fellow, just like that? What if Jemmsy fell asleep and had a bad dream, and cried out, as the Lion had so often done?

He circled back, then, but by old habit he settled out of sight in a shadowy clot of fallen and rotting tree limbs. He watched his friend sleep, and struggle against the trap, and grow still. Brrr reviewed the matter as best he could, inventing rhetorical forensics from the ground up.

On the one hand, Jemmsy and his companions had set set that very trap. Or things like it. They were hunting him, or his kind. His that very trap. Or things like it. They were hunting him, or his kind. His kind kind. Right? Right? So now the soldier had him. Jemmsy had caught himself a Lion, just perhaps not in the way he had intended.

On the other hand, maybe experience-of any sort-was only valid if it caused you to redefine your terms. Courage, Courage, for instance. The courage to go versus the courage to stay? Which was more very couragey? for instance. The courage to go versus the courage to stay? Which was more very couragey?

Any decision he made, Brrr realized, would affect his friend's future one way or the other.

His heart burned with affection when, in a fever, the man called out, "Lion. Friend Lion! Have you forsaken me?"

It's good that I am in your heart to give you hope, thought the Lion, hope unto death. He lay as close to the soldier as he dared, to keep the man warm at night until there was nothing left of him to warm. Even when Jemmsy died, and the smell grew worse, the Lion hated to leave the body.

"Now I'll go for help," he said to the carca.s.s. "You've been very patient."

Jemmsy didn't reply.

"What's the matter, cat got your tongue?" said Brrr, but his tone sounded off and he closed his mouth.

My first conversation, he thought, and his bound had a new spring to it. He was nearly giddy. Of course, the finish had been awkward-death is a real stifler of repartee-but on the whole he thought it had gone rather well.

A conversation and a friend. Jemmsy had called out "Friend Lion!" So the friendship had been short-lived but real; now that it was dead, it couldn't be revoked. It was preserved inviolable in his heart. And the medal shone like a portable compliment. The medal advertised Brrr's own courage as he headed to Tenniken to keep his promise. He would deliver the news of the fallen Jemmsy to those grieving companions-at-arms. And through them the news could go on to Jemmsy's father, that puzzle of a creature, for being capable of abandoning his son to the care of the army.

"THE HEART OF a Lion," murmured Yackle, almost purring herself. Brrr resisted the temptation to imagine she was being snide, but he couldn't resist the domino-patter of memories, one after another, that had concluded his childhood. The momentum of the mind can be vexingly, involuntarily capricious. a Lion," murmured Yackle, almost purring herself. Brrr resisted the temptation to imagine she was being snide, but he couldn't resist the domino-patter of memories, one after another, that had concluded his childhood. The momentum of the mind can be vexingly, involuntarily capricious.

- 3 -

SO THE next memory toppled forward, a tremor following upon a tremor. Jemmsy. His body seeping into the ground like a pudding at room temperature. How long had it been since Brrr had thought of Jemmsy? The scab torn off, after all this time; a smell of earth leaching from that opened wound. The smell of those childhood woods from as far back as his mind could pick its way. next memory toppled forward, a tremor following upon a tremor. Jemmsy. His body seeping into the ground like a pudding at room temperature. How long had it been since Brrr had thought of Jemmsy? The scab torn off, after all this time; a smell of earth leaching from that opened wound. The smell of those childhood woods from as far back as his mind could pick its way.

When was his unspoken pledge to Jemmsy hijacked by ambition? How soon was his hope to deliver the news of Jemmsy's death superseded by his hunger for the reward of grat.i.tude? Or had it not happened as baldly as all that?

He couldn't now remember. Only the terror and giddy release at having a destination at all. Tenniken. Tenniken, a garrison town, and nearby, a soldier's grieving father. A brick hearthside where Brrr might curl up like a house cat, like a surrogate son, purring, domesticated, basking in the warmth of approval.

He felt perverse and new, flayed by raw luck. For the first time, he felt naked. He felt he could outrun his timidity just by doing the job right.

Getting to Tenniken. Returning Jemmsy's medal of honor. Exchanging the tin ikon for the real thing: a sensation of righteous bravery he could own for himself.

It was going to take a while, though. He had to venture beyond the paced edges of his territory. Like all creatures who mark their boundaries, he could tell when he pa.s.sed into the treacherous unknown. The musk of the undergrowth seemed foreboding.

The pictures in his mind grew more lovely, perhaps to distract him from the fear of being afraid. The cozy garrison settlement, and a place to eat. With any luck it would be a beer garden. Flowers, stripped of their nettles and thorns, madly fomented in pots set on window ledges and stoops. Candy-colored birds in silver cages, birds who didn't threaten like forest vultures with those nerve-jangling cries, but who actually sang. On pitch. And trilling maidens at the town well, picking up the melody and embellishing it. That sort of thing.

It would have been hard to say just how this picture came into his head. It must have been cobbled together from bits and pieces of things he had heard in the woods, long before he could understand them. Though what a pretty picture! The maidens with their scuttles and pails, and every cobblestone glistening, and every windowsill laden with fresh fruit pies cooling, and every housewife generous with her pies, and every schoolchild blithe and gay. And every father appreciative, especially Jemmsy's father. Brrr could hardly wait to get there.

He rehea.r.s.ed these visions to put himself to sleep at night, troubled upon a bed of foreign moss.

He'd gone six days or more, practicing conversational gambits aloud-"h.e.l.lo, I'm very new in town"-"h.e.l.lo, are you very in need of a new friend, one with prior experience?"-when he crossed through a thicket to the edge of a blueberry patch. The fruit hung heavy, cobalt and black and pink, and a small creature, perhaps the size of a human cub, was driving its snout through the offerings.

Brrr couldn't help himself. "You must be very brave out here all alone in the woods," he began. The cub froze and turned an eye like a blueberry upon the Lion. Brrr straightened his shoulders and tossed his head to aerate his mane into magnificence, whereupon the cub fell to the ground on its back, its small stained paws cupped below its furry chin.

"Sweet Lurlina," said Brrr, "I'm slaying them right and left with my conversational wit." He went up to look closely. The cub wasn't dead, but shamming: Brrr could see it shaking like a b.u.t.terfly in a draft. "What are you doing? I won't hurt you."

"Just my luck," said the Bear cub, for that's what he had turned out to be. "I break the rules and go off on my own, and the King of the Forest arrives to devour me."

Brrr almost turned around to see the King approaching. "You don't mean me? How very droll. Get up, I won't hurt you. Rise. Why are you lying there as if you've had a very cardiac episode? It's unsettling."

The Bear cub sat up. "If you insist. You promise you won't hurt me?"

"I'm very promising. Why did you collapse like that? Do I look like a hunter to you?" Brrr was more curious than offended.

"It's what you do if you're facing long odds," said the Bear. "You play meek and helpless in front of a sterner foe, and that kick-starts a sense of n.o.ble mercy in them. That's the theory anyway. I never had need to practice it before, but it seems to have worked. My name is Cubbins."

His placid delivery sounded mature, though his voice strayed trebleward. Brrr replied hopefully, "Lost and alone and very abandoned by your clan?"

"Just taking a break from the endless hilarity of it all. They're downslope a ways at the stream's edge. You're not here to scatter us to kingdom come?"

"Hardly. I need some directions."

"The King of Beasts needs directions?"

"Will you stop with that?" said Brrr. "I'm not even a very local celebrity. Just pa.s.sing through and minding my own very business."

"Well, with that medal and all," said Cubbins. "You look official. Is that why you say very very so very often?" so very often?"

Young as he was, he was ribbing the Lion. "Take me to your leader," said Brrr, exerting very very control. "Please." control. "Please."

"Such as she is," said Cubbins obligingly. "Actually, I'm the boy-sheriff of our group, but since you stumbled upon me and showed me mercy, I'll oblige. Follow me." The Bear cub led Brrr along a ridge and down a trail to the edge of a broad, shallow stream. "Look who found me when I was lost in the woods," called out Cubbins.

"Liar, liar, pants on fire," said the others. There were five or six of them, full grown: some burly companions at play and an aging old thing resting in kind of a shabby bath chair, half-in, half-out of a pool.

"Don't mind them. They've spent the afternoon with a comb of fermented honey," said Cubbins.

Brrr picked his pa.s.sage on stones across the stream, taking care not to let the pads of his paws get damp.

"Oooh, a toady right from the git-go," said one of the older Bears. "I oughta known it, a sissy missy, the way she goes mincing across those stones like she's afraid of ruining her mother's silk stockings."

"Enough, Bruner O'Bruin," said Cubbins. "This creature was kind to me."

"What's your name, Lord Lion?" asked Bruner O'Bruin.

"Brrr," replied the Lion, shaking his mane, trying to make a theatrical shimmer out of word and name alike. "Who are you lot?"

"The last, best hope for Oz. Movers and shakers," said Bruner O'Bruin mockingly. He got up and shimmied, his rump poking out. The others guffawed. Cubbins rolled his eyes and offered the Lion a sip of water from a battered iron ladle.

"We're what remains of the court of Ursaless, the Queen of the North," said Cubbins. "Fallen on hard times, but good at heart, I hope. That's Ursaless over there." He indicated the oldest one, who was getting up from her chair to stretch. She was immensely tall. Even at her apparent age, white whiskers and all, she towered over her companions. "Ursaless, say h.e.l.lo to our guest."

The Queen had a ratty sort of coat, and no clothes to speak of but a tiara three sizes too small. A sash that read QUALITY LIQUORS AT INSANELY LOW PRICES QUALITY LIQUORS AT INSANELY LOW PRICES rode from one shoulder to the opposite hip. She grimaced. Perhaps she was troubled by arthritis. rode from one shoulder to the opposite hip. She grimaced. Perhaps she was troubled by arthritis.

"Queen of the North?" asked Brrr.

"Queen of the Northern Bears," Cubbins amended. "Not that there are many of us left in the wild. Our kin and cousins are easily seduced by the lure of human comforts-beds, running hot water, whist championships, you name it. Still, some of us hold on to the old folkways, and Ursaless is our leader."

The Queen lumbered over on all fours. "The Lion comes to pay his respects," she observed, looking him over through mild eyes. "It's been some years since I've seen Lions in these parts."

"You've seen a Lion around here before?" Brrr found a new reason for conversation: the examination of history. "How very marvelous! I've never met another Lion. Who was it? Where did they go? Did they happen to misplace a Lion cub, do you know? Did they look like me?"

"Don't be tedious; I have no head for details," said Ursaless. She examined her nails and frowned.

"Oh, but if you could remember a sc.r.a.p!" he insisted. "A very sc.r.a.p!"

She turned her head so only one eye rested on him. It looked cold. "Your Highness," he added.

This relaxed her. "Sometimes I recall oddments without even trying. We'll see what happens. Meanwhile, what brings you to our encampment?"

"I'm headed for Tenniken," he replied. "The human settlement, where I understand soldiers are stationed. Soldiers loyal to the Wizard of Oz."

"Tenniken," she repeated, hummingly. "Do we know Tenniken?"

"Tenniken's not to be worth knowing," said Bruner O'Bruin, "if we're not there making it worth the while to know." His voice was confident but he turned his head away as he spoke, as if not wanting to meet the Queen's glance.

The Queen continued. "Caraway Coyle? Bungler MiGrory? Shaveen Brioyne? Anyone remember Tenniken?"

"There's so much past," said the one called Shaveen, a female who sat picking nits from her armpits. "I don't think Tenniken was worth remembering, if we ever knew of it. Otherwise we'd remember it."

"She's right as usual, our Shaveen," said the males. The concert of their agreement seemed to satisfy the Queen.

Ursaless turned back to the Lion. "We can't help you in this, either, I'm afraid. Tenniken means nothing to us."

"Didn't we go on a scavengey romp there?" asked Cubbins. "I was only a mite of a thing last spring, but isn't Tenniken where the train engine scared us, racing by?"

"Don't listen to yourself," said Ursaless fondly. "You're too young to have learned to forget what isn't needed. If we can't corroborate your a.s.sertions, there can be no useful truth to them." She c.o.c.ked an eyebrow at Brrr. "Would you care for some honey?"

The Lion shook his head. Their lopsided version of conversation was unnerving, and he was losing the confidence he'd been struggling to maintain. "I'll just help myself to another sip of water and be on my way, then."

"What way is that?" asked Ursaless.

"I'm going to Tenniken."

"Never heard of the place," she stated firmly. "Any of you bruisers heard of Tenniken?"

"Not I," said Caraway Coyle. Bungler MiGrory put his head in his paws and began to snore. Shaveen Brioyne said, "I think we talked about this once before, but maybe I'm thinking of someplace else. Or that we talked about something else." She absentmindedly ate a nit. "I like to talk," she said, almost to herself.

Ursaless turned back to the Lion and asked, "What's your name?"

"I thought I'd mentioned it," said the Lion. "It is Brrr."

"That's a nice name," said Ursaless. "Brrr sounds like a Bear. Do you have Bears in your background?"

"I very much doubt it," said Brrr. "I may be mocked by some for the way that I walk, but I believe I am very much Lion."

"Why did your parents give you a name so like a Bear, then?"

"I had no parents," he replied. "Unless you've remembered seeing any around here? A pride of Lions on a march of some sort?"

"Someone gave you a name, or did you name yourself?"

This question hadn't occurred to him before. He hadn't named himself-so where had had his name come from? "I don't remember that I had parents," he replied. his name come from? "I don't remember that I had parents," he replied.

"All Bears Bears have parents," said Ursaless. "Caraway, you have a father and a mother, don't you?" have parents," said Ursaless. "Caraway, you have a father and a mother, don't you?"

"You're my mother. No?" Caraway sounded dubious. It was Ursaless's turn to cough and change the subject; she couldn't answer authoritatively.

"Were I you, I would find my parents and ask them why they named me something like a Bear." Ursaless hurried on. "Then you can come back and tell us."

"Though chances are we won't recognize you," said Shaveen.

"Except Cubbins," said Ursaless fondly. "You will, won't you, fondness?"

Cubbins turned his head so she couldn't see him rolling his eyes at her.

"I can't find my parents, I don't even know who they are," said Brrr. "For all I know, they're dead. Besides, I am on my way to Tenniken. A human town to the south."

"Oh. Humans. Hmmm. I've never been convinced they exist, humans."

"Of course they do," inserted Bruner O'Bruin. "That's where all our cousins go when they can't stand their cousins anymore."

"They go to be humans?"