Bamboo kingdom 4, p.1
Bamboo Kingdom #4, page 1
Acknowledgments
Special thanks to Rosie Best
Special thanks to CCPPG for their inspiration and creativity, and for enabling Erin Hunter to bring Bamboo Kingdom to the world.
Map
One moon has passed since Leaf, Ghost, and Rain became the new Dragon Speakers of the Bamboo Kingdom.
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Acknowledgments
Map
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Epilogue
About the Author
Books by Erin Hunter
Back Ads
Copyright
About the Publisher
Prologue
CROOKEDCLAW SAT ON THE sloping trunk of a tree, leaning against the splintered stump of one of the branches, watching the vast troop gather around the crack in the earth. This was the dark place at the heart of the Broken Forest, where the rocks were black and strange, and wisps of steam still occasionally rose from the caverns far below. Whatever long-ago event had split the earth, it had also crumbled rock columns into heaps of stone and blown over most of the trees, so that even the ones that had survived now grew at odd angles.
Brawnshanks, leader of the golden monkeys, had called his troop to gather in this place, and they had come—more than three hundred of them, by Crookedclaw’s reckoning, swarming along the ground and swinging over the leaning trees.
She knew them all. Nothing went on in the Broken Forest that escaped Crookedclaw’s keen eye. She knew which bands were strong, bonded families, and which were fractious groups of monkeys who would throw each other into the crevice for a single cherry. She knew which monkeys had long-running feuds, which had mated against their bands’ wishes. In any troop, there were always twice as many petty dramas and disagreements as there were monkeys, and Crookedclaw knew them all.
Brawnshanks sat beside the crevice in the ground, watching with satisfaction as his troop assembled around him. Golden monkeys from all over the Bamboo Kingdom had come to join him in the last few months, hearing of brave, clever Brawnshanks and his secret plan to put the kingdom back into the paws of the monkeys. And Crookedclaw suspected they were about to find out just what their leader was planning.
A ripple of excitement ran through the assembled monkeys, hoots and jeers rising as the Strong Arms pushed their way through the bands, elbowing and puffing out their chests. They were led by Silvermane, the head of the Strong Arms, with her lieutenants following behind her. Jitterpaws still walked with one arm dangling, useless, after it had been broken in the fight with the white panda.
Between them, something was staggering along, prodded every few steps with a stick to keep it moving. As they pushed through to the open space where Brawnshanks sat, the Strong Arms parted to reveal their prisoner: a pangolin. She shuffled forward on her back legs, the claws of her front paws clasped nervously in front of her chest. Crookedclaw nodded to herself. The Strong Arms had done their thuggish job well. The pangolin was terrified.
“Welcome,” said Brawnshanks, with an expansive gesture. “Thank you for coming. May I know your name?”
The pangolin looked confused. Of course she did—Crookedclaw knew she hadn’t come here willingly.
“C-curling Star,” said the pangolin.
“What a lovely name,” said Brawnshanks. In the tree next to Crookedclaw, a band of monkeys sniggered to each other, and Curling Star looked up, her beady eyes scanning the tree branches. Crookedclaw shot the band a fierce look, and they fell silent.
Brawnshanks went on, still speaking in a soft, reassuring tone. “I asked you to come because I know that the pangolins know more about the Great Dragon than any creature—apart from the Dragon Speakers, of course—and I need to ask you some questions. Come, sit near me.”
Curling Star hesitated, but eventually took a few steps toward Brawnshanks and sat down.
“Tell me, Curling Star,” said Brawnshanks. “How was the Great Dragon created?”
Curling Star let out a soft gasp, then hesitated. “I don’t know,” she said. “I—I thought the Great Dragon always existed. But . . . but . . . even if I did know the story, I wouldn’t tell you!” she gabbled, and then curled up into a ball with a frightened squeak.
“Why on earth not?” said Brawnshanks, putting his face close to the pangolin’s armored surface.
The pangolin didn’t uncurl, so her reply was muffled, her head completely covered by her scaly tail. “You—you’ll do something bad with it!” she yelped.
Crookedclaw slipped down the sloping tree and walked up behind the curled pangolin. She bent down to whisper between the interlocking scales.
“You know more than you’re saying,” she said, and Curling Star jumped, uncurling slightly in her surprise. Crookedclaw stamped her paw down on the pangolin’s tail, so she couldn’t completely re-curl. “And you will tell us what you know, or the other pangolins we’re watching will suffer for it.”
The pangolin yelped. Crookedclaw smirked. These creatures were so gullible. Curling Star was the first pangolin they had caught, but it seemed she completely believed Crookedclaw’s bluff.
“All right,” the pangolin squeaked. “All right, I’ll tell you the story.” She cleared her throat nervously and scratched at the ashy rock. “Well, long ago, there wasn’t one dragon—there were two. The Light Dragon who ruled over the day, and fire, and the truth, and things like that. And the Dark Dragon who ruled over the night and shadows and stories and caves, and suchlike. But one day . . . a m-monkey brought them together.”
“How?” Brawnshanks demanded, slapping his hands down on the rock in front of Curling Star’s nose. She recoiled, and tried to curl up again, but Crookedclaw was too fast for her and pressed down on her back so she couldn’t move.
“I don’t know!” Curling Star gasped. “I swear on the Dragon, nobody knows except for—”
She broke off with a tiny, angry growl, and put her claws over her eyes.
We have her, Crookedclaw thought, giving Brawnshanks a sly nod.
“Go,” she said, turning to Silvermane. “And pull scales off those other pangolins until Curling Star tells us who knows how the monkey did it.”
Silvermane chuckled, nodded, and started to walk off in a random direction.
“No, please, it’s the Children,” Curling Star spluttered. “All right? It’s the Children of the Dragon, they’re the ones that know.”
“And who are these Children of the Dragon?” Brawnshanks asked, scratching his chin.
“They . . . they’re an order of pangolins,” said Curling Star, in a small voice. “They’re descended from the pangolins who were there, when the Great Dragon was created. But they keep their secrets to themselves. They don’t speak much, and when they do, it’s all in riddles. They don’t even tell their secrets to other pangolins. You can pull my scales off,” she added, raising her head in shaky defiance. “There’s nothing more I can tell you.”
“These Children of the Dragon will tell us their secrets,” Crookedclaw told Brawnshanks.
“Whatever you’re up to, the new Dragon Speakers will stop you!” Curling Star said.
Brawnshanks chortled. “Three panda cubs, who’ve been Dragon Speakers for a month? They think they’re strong, because they defeated the fool Dusk, but they’ll learn their place if they try to cross me.”
Crookedclaw shoved Curling Star into the arms of Silvermane. “Take her away,” she said. “Keep her under guard. She may be useful again.”
The pangolin protested and cried out as the Strong Arms dragged her away, but Crookedclaw wasn’t listening. Brawnshanks had risen and was climbing to the top of the closest broken tree, high above the gathered monkeys. He gestured to her to follow, and Crookedclaw did, using the splintered wood for her paw holds. Brawnshanks stopped where the tree had bent and then broken in two, at the peak of what was now a giant arch of blackened wood.
“Good work, Crookedclaw,” he said. “I will need your skills more than ever before, if we are to succeed.”
“We will,” said Crookedclaw.
“And once we have the pangolins’ secrets,” Brawnshanks went on, his eyes glinting as he looked out over his enormous troop, the greatest fighting force the Bamboo Kingdom had ever seen, “then every last leaf and stone of this kingdom will be mine.”
Chapter One
LEAF SAT IN THE branches of a tall gingko tree, looking out over the lush bamboo-filled Southern Forest. She held the green Dragon Speaker stone tucked in her paw, next to her white grip pad, and listened to the wind in the leaves. She watched the round black-and-white shapes of her fellow pandas—some lounging in patches of sunlight, some climbing trees, many collecting bamboo for the Feast of High Sun. A few walked the panda path, the flattened grass trail that wound its way down the side of one steep hill and up the next. The river glittered through the trees to her right, and to her left lay the flat-to pped feast clearing hill. Beyond it, the sharp rock columns and steep, forested slopes rolled on until they were lost in pale mist.
Leaf saw Rain down below, sitting with a group of smaller creatures, mostly mice and flying squirrels, gathered around her. She couldn’t hear them, but she could tell that they were asking for Rain’s advice about something. Rain nodded as she listened, and then held up her blue stone. It caught the light and glinted for a moment.
It was just like Rain to call to the Great Dragon then and there. She always wanted to answer creatures’ questions as soon as possible, even if that meant disappointing them if the Dragon had no advice to share. It was sort of admirable.
Or it would be, Leaf thought, if she was only doing it to be helpful, and not so she can spend more time napping and splashing in the river.
Leaf preferred to get petitioners to wait a while, so that if the Dragon didn’t have anything to say she could at least give their problem some thought. And Ghost . . . well, he was trying to adjust to life away from the mountains and his leopard upbringing, but his advice still seemed to work for plenty of creatures.
She felt an odd burst of pride as she spotted him too, his pure white fur standing out among the throng of ordinary pandas. He was walking and talking seriously with the old panda Mist.
She could hardly believe that she’d only known the two of them for a bit more than a month. They were so different, but she knew that if she ever needed help, they would be there. Each of them had been tasked with the care of a different part of the kingdom—Rain the river and the moon, Ghost the mountains and the stars, and Leaf the trees and the sun. They were still working out just what that meant, but every time one of them felt something new and ran to the others to share it, she felt the euphoria of that first meeting in the snow all over again. She loved them as dearly as if they’d grown up together as cubs. Possibly even more so.
A rustling and cracking of leaves and a flurry of movement down below caught Leaf’s attention, and she leaned over to see what was going on.
“Dragon Speaker Rain, a word?” some panda cried, loud enough for their voice to carry up into the branches of Leaf’s tree. She sighed as she saw the pandas who had stomped into the clearing, scattering the small creatures who’d gathered around Rain. It was Azalea and Granite, looking annoyed, and trailing reluctantly behind them were Blossom and Ginseng.
Leaf slipped off her perch and down the trunk of the tree, moving in more of a controlled tumble than a climb. She landed on her behind and rolled to her paws to hurry to the clearing.
It had been a shock when Blossom and Ginseng had returned to the Prosperhill a few days ago. Rain, Leaf, and Ghost had prepared themselves for a fight as soon as they’d seen them trudging up the panda path, remembering their faces snarling down from the side of the Dragon Mountain, goaded to attack the Dragon Speakers by the impostor Dusk Deepwood. All three siblings still bore the scars from that fight. And for Rain and Ghost it was worse, because they’d had to live with Blossom and Ginseng under Dusk’s reign, enduring their bullying and their lies.
But perhaps the most shocking thing about Blossom and Ginseng’s return to the Prosperhill had been that they weren’t looking for a fight.
Leaf made it to the clearing just as Rain was facing off with Ginseng—at least, Rain was facing off. Ginseng was standing back, a worried look on his face. Leaf didn’t blame him. Rain looked furious, as if she might be about to do something very un-Speaker-like.
“I’ll take care of this one,” Leaf panted, running up beside her sister. “You were busy with the squirrels, right?”
“Yes,” Rain snarled. “Before these four scared half of them off.”
“Well, why don’t you go and find them?” Leaf said. Come on, she willed her sister. You know you can’t be impartial about these two. Just let me handle it.
Rain looked at her, and sighed. “Fine, I will. Granite, tell Leaf what you told me.” She turned and stomped away, casting angry glances back at Blossom and Ginseng.
“Leaf,” Granite said, “these two are causing trouble again. They’ve taken much more than their share of the bamboo; they’re guarding that good patch over in the shade of the big rock column like it belongs to them!”
“We can sit and eat where we want,” Granite grumbled. “That bamboo doesn’t belong to you, either!”
“Last time I looked, we were still living together, and that means we should be sharing everything,” Azalea put in, with a sharp sneer. Leaf tried to hide her sigh.
Not this again.
Some of the pandas wanted to split up now and find their own territories, to live the way pandas had before the Great Flood had driven so many creatures from their old homes. But others wanted to stick together, the same way they’d lived ever since. Azalea was one of the keenest to leave, although Leaf noted she hadn’t actually left—she just liked to complain about it.
“In the old days that would have been our bamboo,” Blossom grumbled. “If we weren’t all living crammed into this territory together, there wouldn’t be a problem here.”
“But we are living together,” said Leaf, trying to be as patient as she could. “You two chose to come back here, and we all gave you that second chance—but you have to realize that means sharing with the others.”
“We know,” Ginseng said. Blossom threw him a slightly grumpy look, but then she sighed and nodded.
“Yes, we know. Sorry,” she said. “We’re just not used to living like this anymore. Sorry, Azalea.”
Leaf blinked, pleased but surprised. Rain had told her what Blossom had been like even before Dusk came to the Prosperhill, so she hadn’t expected getting an apology out of her to be this easy.
They really are trying, she thought.
Azalea didn’t look entirely convinced.
“Why don’t you two go and fetch those tender young stems from that patch?” Leaf said. “We can share them around at the next feast.”
“That’s fair,” said Ginseng. “Come on.” He nudged Blossom and the two of them left the clearing.
“I still don’t trust them,” Azalea said quietly.
“I know, but we have to give them a chance,” Leaf said. “They’re a bit selfish, but if they want to make things right, we should let them.”
Azalea just shook her head and stomped off, with Granite on her heels.
It was almost time for the Feast of High Sun. Leaf was gathering her own mouthful of bamboo stems for the feast when there was a rustling on the other side of the patch. She looked up to see Pebble breaking through, his jaws full of thick bamboo. He dropped it and sat down.
“Hello, Leaf,” he said.
“Hello,” she said. She clamped her teeth down on a bamboo cane and snapped it off with a satisfying cracking sound.
Pebble sat and watched her.
She sighed as she added the cane to the pile between her paws. “How are you doing, Pebble?” she asked.
“Oh, fine,” said Pebble. He rolled one of his bamboo canes under his front paw. “I mean . . . I’m fine. It’s just . . .”
It’s Rain, Leaf thought.
“It’s Rain,” said Pebble.
Leaf nodded sympathetically. “She still won’t talk to you?”
“It’s not that she won’t talk to me,” Pebble said, flopping down to sit beside the bamboo. “It’s just that she . . . she doesn’t. She’ll answer if I ask her a question or speak to her directly, but she never talks to me first, and it’s just not the same. I’ve told her I’m sorry, and she said she understood, but . . . what if we can never be friends again? What if I’ve let her down so badly that I’ve ruined our friendship forever?”
Leaf sighed. In a lot of ways, she could hardly blame Rain for holding a grudge against the panda who’d been her best friend, when he had sided with Dusk and the others. He hadn’t helped Rain when she and her adopted mother Peony had been trapped in a pit by Dusk and the monkeys. He’d even turned her in to Dusk when she tried to escape. He said it had all happened in a flash of confusion and panic, but if Dasher had done something like that, Leaf wasn’t sure she’d forgive him easily, either.
“Rain just needs time,” she told Pebble. “It’s obvious that you’re truly sorry. I’m sure she’ll come around, but you can’t rush her.”
