Nurk, page 4
"What's a dragonfly nymph?"
"One of our people who live in the water instead of the air," said Scatterwings, and pointed. "There!"
Unfortunately, she pointed with both sets of arms, and in opposite directions, so Nurk turned around in place twice, trying to figure out what she was pointing at. At last he spotted a pair of ripples that seemed to be coming toward the Snailboat.
Two heads broke the water on opposite sides of the Snailboat's prow. Nurk squeaked.
The dragonfly nymphs were both much larger than Scatterwings and thus much larger than Nurk. They had the same reptilian faces as the dragonfly princess, although their eyes were liquid green and gold, and their throats and bellies were brilliant orange, more like newts than dragons. Instead of the dragonfly's wild halo of hair, the nymphs had great fluttering manes of gills. They also had four arms, but the fingers were broad and webbed. Nurk glanced stealthily from hand to hand, but none of them had purple nail polish.
One of the nymphs put both right hands on the prow and smiled up at Nurk. "Is this your ship?" he asked.
Nurk's whiskers curled with pride at the Snailboat being called a ship. "Yes, it is!"
"It's a sweet little craft," said the nymph, bobbing his head. Nurk's whiskers practically tied themselves in knots. "We'll see what we can do to get it unstuck."
He ducked under the water again.
"They seem nice," said Nurk to Scatterwings.
Scatterwings nodded vigorously.
A few minutes later, the nymphs reappeared, frowning. They shook their heavy heads, and drops of water flew from their gills like jewels.
"The ship is stuck tight underneath," the first one said.
"We can't back it up—there are too many branches in the way," said the second one. "We might knock a hole in the bottom, and that won't do at all."
"It's not stuck forever, is it?" asked Nurk, horrified.
The nymphs grinned. "Naw," said one, patting the hull of the Snailboat as if to reassure the little ship. "We'll just need a little more help is all."
"We'll be right back," the second nymph assured them. "Princess." He saluted Scatterwings with two fingers across his forehead. The other one followed suit, and they both dived and swam away.
Nurk tried to be reassured, but it wasn't easy. Anxiety felt like a small, nervous animal climbing around inside his chest. He paced back and forth, the few steps one could pace in a snail shell.
"Stop that," ordered Scatterwings.
"I'm nervous!"
"Some hero you are. You're going to wear a hole in the bottom, and then we'll sink."
"I doubt it," grumbled Nurk, but he sat down, anyway. Being called a hero gave him something else to worry about.
What if Scatterwings expected him to do something noble? The letter had been a call for help—what if she was expecting Nurk to help her?
He felt queasy. The thought of doing something heroic was terrifying, and the thought of having Scatterwings cry again was even worse. He wanted to ask her what she expected him to do, but he didn't quite dare.
"Look," said Scatterwings. "I brought a deck of cards. Let's play something."
They played a couple of hands of old maid, during which Nurk kept staring in the direction the nymphs had gone, until Scatterwings threatened to dump him in the river if he didn't hurry up and draw a card.
"Sorry," muttered Nurk. "Um, go fish."
"We're playing old maid."
"Oh, right." He stared at his cards. They seemed vastly unimportant.
"Oh, never mind—look there!" cried Scatterwings, throwing down her hand of cards. Nurk looked up again.
Now there were even more black specks in the sky—ten or twenty of them, a whole swarm. As they came closer, they were no longer black but green and gold and orange, and then they were dragonflies. The smallest of them was twice the size of Scatterwings, with huge, buzzing wings.
"Princess!" the leader cried, and all of them saluted Scatterwings in unison, who tossed her head and pretended not to care, then snuck a look at Nurk to see if he'd noticed.
Nurk was tongue-tied. He didn't know if he should introduce himself to the leader of the dragonflies, who was every shade of gold and orange imaginable, or sit quietly and hope nobody noticed him at all.
"Is that the king?" he whispered.
Scatterwings snorted. "No. That's just Amberskeins. He's the Captain of the Guard."
Several of the biggest dragonflies were carrying ropes of thin spider silk slung over their shoulders. At Amberskeins's direction, they uncoiled them and dropped them into the water. Nurk looked over and saw the nymphs had returned and had brought even more of their kind with them. Six nymphs grabbed the ropes and dived under the Snailboat. A moment later they emerged on the other side and handed the ropes up to hovering dragonflies.
Nurk was mystified. "What are they doing?" he asked.
"I'm not sure," Scatterwings admitted. "But the nymphs usually know what they're doing when it comes to boats and water."
Suddenly the Snailboat shuddered, as if something enormous had struck it from under the water. Nurk and Scatterwings both squealed and clutched at each other to keep from falling over. There was a splashing from below, and they could hear one of the nymphs laughing.
"Careful!" cried the nymph. "There's passengers on board!"
"Oh-oh-oh?" replied a deep, watery voice.
Nurk peered over the edge, and his eyes went very wide. Travel broadened the mind, but he hadn't known his mind could get this broad.
The owner of the voice was an immense carp, his head lifting just clear of the surface of the water. He was three times the size of the Snailboat, scales glistening milky white, with a broad red patch across the surface of his head. As Nurk watched, the great carp fanned his fins lazily and turned his head so that one round eye looked up at Nurk.
"Oho!" said the carp. "A shrew, is it? Is this your ship, little shrew?"
"Yes, Mister Carp," said Nurk, feeling that it would be a very good idea to be polite to the giant fish. (Ordinarily, he might have objected to being called "little shrew," but compared to the fish, anything short of a live cow would probably be little.)
"Then I shall be very careful," said the fish. He slid back down into the water and thumped one of the dragonfly nymphs with a huge fin. "Mister Carp!" he whispered, highly delighted. Even his whisper was a booming baritone that could probably be heard halfway back to Nurk's tree.
"Yes, yes," said the dragonfly nymph, rolling his eyes. "There'll be no living with you now..."
While Nurk and Scatterwings watched, and tried to stay out of the way, the operation was set. The ropes were tied off, and the carp dived under the Snailboat. The nymphs stationed themselves around the boat, and the dragonflies lined up overhead, three to a rope, gripping each line in both sets of powerful hands.
Nurk looked from rope to rope but couldn't see any purple nail polish on any of them. He was starting to think Scatterwings was just weird that way.
"On three," called Amberskeins. "One—two—THREE!"
The dragonflies heaved. The Snailboat shuddered and lifted halfway out of the water. Nurk and Scatterwings fell in a heap at the bottom of the boat, along with the deck of cards, the blanket, and Nurk's cooking pot.
There was a whumping, bumping noise from under-water, as the carp got his head under the Snailboat and pushed. The Snailboat rose even farther out of the water.
Nurk and Scatterwings tried to get untangled. This proved impossible, so then they just tried to get up. The dragonfly princess had cards stuck in her hair, and Nurk couldn't get the blanket unwrapped from his left foot, but they staggered to the prow together, anyway. This wasn't something either one wanted to miss.
It could not be said that the flight of the Snailboat was majestic. It was slow and awkward and moved in limping lurches, as the carp pushed and the dragonflies heaved and the nymphs steered it through the tangle of branches. But majestic or not, the Snailboat was coming free.
Nurk was delighted to see this and more than a little awed by the efforts of everyone involved. It seemed incredible to him that so many individuals could be working so hard, just because he'd fallen asleep in the Snailboat. He had no idea how he would make it up to them.
At last the dragonflies gave one last heave and the carp gave one last push, and the Snailboat slid over one last tangle and was free in the current once more. The nymphs cheered. Scatterwings whooped and danced around, shedding cards so wildly out of her mane that it looked as if she had developed a very unusual case of dandruff.
Before the boat could get swept back into the logjam, the great carp had the lead rope in his mouth and was pulling it out of danger.
"Thank you, Mister Carp!" Nurk called from the prow.
"Ymmf llkmm!" said the carp, through a mouthful of spider silk.
He pulled it in a broad circle, away from the logs, and in toward the western bank of the river. Where the water grew shallow, the carp relinquished the rope to the two burly nymphs, who hauled it in the rest of the way and tied the rope neatly up to a tree root.
Amberskeins landed on the root and, reaching down to the Snailboat, politely offered his arm to Scatterwings, who tossed her mane and said, "I can get out myself!" Which she did, with a few flicks of her bright wings and a lot of teenaged muttering.
Apparently unbothered by the princess's rudeness, Amberskeins reached several hands down to Nurk, who did appreciate the help. The shrew scrambled up the bank. "Where to now?" he asked the tall golden Captain of the Guard.
"Now," said Amberskeins, "we see the king."
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE KING OF DRAGONFLIES lived under a dog-rose bush, in a large papery lodge rather like a wasp's nest—but no wasp had ever had such a beautiful door, of carved and polished wood set with panels of abalone shell, and such soaring columns of rose stems twining around the walls of the palace; nor did any wasp ever paint the papery sides with such elaborate decorations, coils and spirals and shimmery swirls, in subtle tones of white and gray and silver.
Other dragonfly dwellings hung at various heights throughout the rose thicket, but they were much smaller and had simple doors with little projecting balconies to launch their owners into flight.
Nurk looked nervously around as Amberskeins led him into the corridor of rose stems leading to the palace. The passageway was cool and green and rustled with the movement of the rose leaves in the wind, but it also had wickedly curving thorns as thick as Nurk's arm. The shrew caught his tail up in his paws and carried it carefully out of the way of the whispering thorns.
Amberskeins paused before the door and turned to Nurk.
"Yes?" said Nurk, when the Captain of the Guard had looked down at him for a moment without saying anything.
"The king is not unkind," said Amberskeins slowly, "but he is very unhappy. We are all being ... careful."
Nurk gulped.
"There is no danger," said Amberskeins hurriedly. "Only—be kind." And with that he struck the door with both left fists, and it swung open before him.
Me? Nurk thought. Be kind to a king? Who am I to be anything to a king, kind or otherwise?
The throne room was—well, it was really rather gloomy, Nurk thought. The papery walls let in light well enough, in a pattern of dappled light and green shadow, but it still seemed dark inside. If there were any lamps, they were unlit. Dragonfly warriors stood ringed around the walls, carrying needlelike spears, as quiet as four-armed statues. They glittered like cut gems even in the shadows.
At the far end of the room, in a backless throne framed by his enormous wings, sat the King of Dragonflies.
He was huge.
Easily half again as big as Amberskeins, probably three times the size of Nurk, the king was every color of the rainbow, with a few shades extracted from shellfish for good measure. Even in the gloom, his mane blazed scarlet and violet and gold, and his skin, the same sea-foam green as Scatterwings's, gleamed like mother-of-pearl.
His eyes were huge and fiery gold, and surely it was only the darkness of the room that made those eyes seem shadowed.
"Go forward and address him," murmured Amberskeins, and gave Nurk a little push between the shoulder blades when it became obvious the shrew would not be moving on his own.
Nurk walked unsteadily across the room. How close should he go to the king? Was he supposed to kneel or bow or salute? He wished Scatterwings were here, but she had flitted off as soon as the Snailboat had docked.
There were lines drawn on the floor, in colored earth, and he looked at them to make sure he was walking straight. He was concentrating so carefully on not drifting to one side or the other that he didn't realize how close he was to the throne until the king cleared his throat.
Nurk looked up with a squeak. He was nearly at the king's feet.
The King of Dragonflies looked at him with those huge, shadowed, golden eyes.
"I—um—hi—Your Majesty—?" said Nurk, and made a small, careful shrew bow.
"Hello, shrew," said the king. His voice was deep but quiet. It sounded like water running underground. "Your boat has been freed, has it not?"
"Yes, sir. Thank you very much, sir." Nurk clasped his paws together nervously. "Be kind," Amberskeins had said. "I don't know what I can do to repay you for your help. It was very nice of you. Um. Very, very nice of you. Wonderful. Um. Very nice. Um. Yes."
He stopped. There was probably a line between being kind and babbling, and Nurk was afraid he'd crossed it a few ums back.
The king studied him for a few minutes. The silence grew heavy and awful, and Nurk tried not to fidget.
"Are you brave, shrew?" asked the king, finally.
Nurk had no idea how to answer this question. It wasn't something he'd ever been asked. He thought desperately for some particularly brave moment from his past to hold up as an example but finally settled on the truth. "I don't know, sir."
"That is a fair answer," said the king, and lapsed into that heavy silence again.
Nurk wasn't sure if he was supposed to leave, or stay, or do anything at all. He twisted his tail nervously in his paws and looked at the floor. It was rather pretty and had small stones set in it. He tapped one of his toenails against a stone. It was a stone, all right. He wondered what he should do next.
"There is something I would like you to do," said the king.
"Yes, sir?" asked Nurk, looking up hopefully.
"It is dangerous," said the king.
At this point, Nurk felt any danger might be preferable to the crushing weight of the king's silence and the gaze of those gold eyes. "Yes?" he said.
"My son, the Prince of Dragonflies, has been captured by the Grizzlemole," said the king.
This statement meant very little to Nurk. "I see. Errr, what's a Grizzlemole, sir?"
"A blind mole the size of half a mountain. He lives underground and is a powerful enchanter and a creator of terrible things. And when my son strayed into his territory on an errant wind, the Grizzlemole took him prisoner."
"He's awful," said Scatterwings from behind Nurk, making the shrew jump with a squeak.
Wonderful, Nurk thought, trying to smooth his fur down. That should certainly convince the king that I'm brave.
Scatterwings grinned at Nurk, then skipped up to her father. One of the large green hands that gripped the arm of the throne loosened, reached out, and stroked the princess's hair.
"Daughter," said the king. "It was well done to help this shrew."
"I couldn't just leave him," she said, tossing her mane. "He was stuck."
Nurk felt that this omitted a few key details, like Scatterwings being waterlogged and clinging to the branches, but thought it wouldn't be polite to mention it in front of the king. Be kind, he told himself. Whether being kind included Scatterwings as well as the king, he wasn't sure, but he figured better safe than sorry.
"Besides—," Scatterwings said, more quietly, "I wanted to rescue somebody."
This seemed like an odd thing to say, but the king reached out with both left arms and pulled her close. Nurk looked down at his feet again.
"You were telling him about Flicker?" asked Scatterwings.
"Yes." The king turned back to Nurk. "My son, Prince Flicker, is being held by the Grizzlemole in his lair."
"Why would the Grizzlemole do that?" asked Nurk.
The King of Dragonflies sighed. His brilliant hair waved and wavered like windblown grass on a hillside, if grass ever came in such blinding gemstone colors. "The moles are creatures of Earth," he said, "of deep places and darkness. And we dragonflies are creatures of air and light and open sky. We've never been friends, really, since the world began, but mostly we stayed out of one another's way. There have been some noble moles whom my ancestors were proud to know.
"But the Grizzlemole—the Grizzlemole is old and wicked, and he hates the sky and the glare of the sun. And he hates us for being flighty, frivolous creatures of air and sunshine. I don't think he planned to take my son, but once he had him, he saw no reason to give him up, either."
"I'm sorry," said Nurk. "You must miss him very much." No wonder the king looked so sad, the shrew thought.
"I feel like my heart is hollow," said the King of Dragonflies, "and the wind blows straight through it. It is very hard. But I hope—with your help—to get him back."
"My help?" squeaked Nurk, standing up very straight. "But what can I do, sir? I'm—I'm a shrew—I'm small—" It seemed very strange to him that the enormous king, who blazed like a sunset in the dark throne room, and all the powerful dragonfly warriors of his court, any one of whom could have knocked Nurk tail over teakettle with a flick of his wrist, could possibly think that a shrew could help them.
"Exactly," said the king. "The Grizzlemole has guarded his lair with strange magic, and he keeps close watch for dragonflies. No creature can get anywhere near his den by the air. If I or my warriors—and many of my warriors tried!—fly in, terrible winds come up and blow us in all directions."
Scatterwings coughed.
"In fact, unless I miss my guess, when you found her, my daughter Scatterwings had tried to fly to the rescue herself and gotten blown clear into the river!" said the king, glaring sternly at Scatterwings.
