“No! No!” cried out Privet, sensing the young mole nearing a place from which Rooster’s delvings could not save him. For the delving was unfinished there.
“Listen, listen!” cried out Whillan in reply, for all the delving made him see was the light, broken and wonderful, a light alluring which nomole would deny; a light before which even the deepest void seems surmountable.
Then from out of the deep came the thunderous running of a mole, louder and greater and more formidable the nearer it came. So that as Whillan’s paw reached the last of the delvings the mole erupted from the void their journey had reached.
“No!” roared Rooster. “Not here, not see, not sound this delving never, never make it be. Must not make it be.”
It was a cry of despair, the plea of one who is afraid for another he loves, the warning of one who knows he cannot help.
“No!” said Rooster, putting his great paw out to stop Whillan sounding, but too late, too late – all was done. That young mole was gone out into the void, and he was calling for help that could not seem to reach him.
“No,” shouted Rooster again, his face contorting into a pathetic self-loathing as he stared at his paws and talons as if to accuse them, and so himself, for what he had created. Then he raised his great paws and did what Privet had once seen him do all those long years ago at Hilbert’s Top: he began to destroy the delving he had just made.
Never in the time he had known Rooster had Whillan ever confronted him directly, despite all the anger and annoyance he engendered. But now, Privet saw, a confrontation was in the making, for Whillan was plainly outraged by Rooster’s actions.
“You cannot destroy it!” he shouted – or rather roared, for Whillan seemed to be overtaken by a spirit more powerful than his youthful self This was rage, and unequal though he might be to stopping so large and unpredictable a mole as Rooster from doing what he wished it looked as if he intended to have a good try. He rushed over to him and pushed between the flailing paws and the wall they were destroying. Rooster hurled him to one side and continued to rip at the delving, bringing down showers of dust and soil. To Privet, who was on the far side of the chamber, it seemed that the struggle between the two – for no sooner had Whillan recovered himself than he sprang back, only to be hurled aside once more – was conducted in a storm of dust, or the haze of fog: vaguely, and in a seeming slow-motion. All the time Whillan raged, and Rooster roared.
Privet did try to intervene at last, but both turned on her, forgetting their dispute for an instant, and shoved her away again, their eyes seeming to see her not as Privet but rather as a puny irritation that had stumbled across their mutual wish to struggle with each other.
All this time, to add to the confusion, the delving sounded out the dying cries of the mole whose life Rooster had created, and who now retreated, as Whillan did, before Rooster s onslaught, until the cries faded into the terrible darkness of the void. Bruised and battered by Rooster’s buffets, Whillan did not respond with violence, but only stayed his ground as best he could as Rooster beat him back, until he was cornered in the darkest place, and the young mole’s cries faded far behind him into darkness. Rooster, with nothing left to destroy of what he had made, could only stance up hugely, and stay his taloned paws before they struck down on Whillan’s body.
“No more!” And there was command in Whillan’s voice, and a sense of right. “You cannot destroy the delvings —”
“Made them. Can destroy them. No good, no more,” cried out Rooster. “Have destroyed them.”
“The delving was beautiful,” said Whillan quietly, “the most beautiful thing I ever saw, or touched. You had no right.”
“Made it,” whispered Rooster brokenly.
“Yes, you made it. And you destroyed it. A delving is a thing for ever, or until the Stone decides its day is done. A delving is like kin. Does a father have the right to kill his son?”
“Father? Son?” repeated Rooster wildly, much distressed. He turned to Privet and looked at her with terrible appeal.
Whillan had fallen silent before his own words and all that could be heard was the panting of his breath as he stared at Rooster, mole to mole.
“Anyway,” muttered Rooster, suddenly contrite and reaching out his paws as if to embrace Whillan in the gentlest of ways, “delvings not all destroyed. That was only the beginning. Mole left home. Moles always do. Listen, Whillan, there’s silence after the void of journeying. Didn’t mean to hurt nothing and nomole, never ever. Didn’t know what to say. Don’t know now...”
“No!” cried out Whillan as Rooster drew him closer. “Never...” and he suddenly pushed past Rooster from the dark void he had reached, and past Privet, and ran from the chamber down the tunnel to the surface as if from his worst enemy. The sound of his paws receded from them as if to a place from which they could never return.
“Know what mole he is,” said Rooster. “You know,” he added savagely, looking at Privet.
“I know what Weeth suggested,” said Privet judiciously.
“Know,” said Rooster. “Know it now. Certain now. Not just son in body. In spirit too.”
The chamber hummed with the dark sounds of loss and uncertainty. And suddenly overhead there was the patter of many paws.
“Rooster!” gasped Privet. “There are other moles about.”
“Yes,” growled Rooster, “they have been coming all my life. Found me now.”
“Rooster...”
But there was the sudden running of paws at the entrance, and another mole than Whillan came down.
“Yes,” said Rooster, whose delving had been his way of working out the truth he sensed – that he had discovered his son when it was too late to help him as he entered adulthood. Too late.
The rush of paws approached the chamber.
“It’s Madoc, know her sound,” said Rooster, moving to Privet’s flank.
Madoc came into the chamber, blood on her flank and her eyes full of fear and distress.
“The Newborns have come,” she said urgently. “They’ve got Whillan, and have sent me here to get you.”
“Newborns?” said Privet faintly.
“How many?” said Rooster grimly.
“Too many,” replied Madoc. “You must come now or they say they’ll kill Whillan.”
“We’ll come,” said Rooster quietly, “now we’re ready to come. End is beginning now.” His voice was soft with the relief of it. “End is here so we can live again.”
Chapter Four
The ugly shouts that met Rooster as he emerged from the tunnel with Privet and Madoc up on the east side of Wenlock Edge were accusatory, and very menacing, and the scene was altogether grim. More than ten moles surrounded them, mostly young and powerful, with paws jabbing, and faces sneering and triumphant.
“It’s him! It is him! By the righteous Stone, it is the miscreant Rooster!” they cried.
More moles were gathered some way off downslope with Whillan prostrate on the ground between them, bloodied and still.
“Don’t even try,” said an older guardmole with weary authority, as Rooster tried to go to Whillan’s aid, “don’t even think about it.”
Rooster struggled for a moment or two, and more so when one of the moles grabbed Privet and another Madoc – but all were quickly overpowered.
“Very wise. Brother Rooster, very sensible,” said a thin, unpleasant mole, who seemed in command.
He turned to another behind him and said with evident satisfaction, “So you were right; it is the mole we have been searching for in the holy name of Elder Senior Brother Quail and at the command of the Convocation of Caer Caradoc.”
“I thought it was. Brother Adviser Fagg,” replied the other in a smug and unctuous voice. “When I saw the party pass over our system four days ago, I said, ‘They’re fugitives they are and that great ugly one looks like Rooster, the one the worthy brothers have been looking for...’”
“Yes, yes, Brother, you have done well – your name and that of you
r system will be commended to the Elder Brothers,” said the “Brother Adviser’, a title which Privet and the others had not heard before. “But you said you observed six moles in the party and so far I see only four. You others, search the tunnel below.”
Three guardmoles were about to do Fagg’s bidding, though with some reluctance it seemed, when a forceful-looking mole detached himself from those surrounding Whillan and said, “A moment, if you will!”
The guardmoles stopped obediently, and Fagg looked annoyed.
“I really think, Brother Commander Thorne —”
“I really think, Brother Adviser Fagg, that we should not waste effort or risk lives unnecessarily. I am happy to leave matters spiritual to yourself, but kindly leave matters military to me. Searching burrows that may contain enemies is not always as easy or safe as it looks...”
Thorne nodded to two quite different guardmoles, older than the ones Fagg had deputed for the task. “There are tricks and traps for the unwary,” he said dispassionately. “From what this mole says, or does not say, I doubt that there are moles below, but it pays to be careful.”
A respectful hush had fallen over all the moles. Brother Commander Thorne knew how to impose his authority, and Fagg, as was clear from the narrowing of his eyes and the petulance of his mouth, did not like it.
Everymole waited while the search was made. Eventually the two guardmoles re-emerged. “Nothing, sir, nothing at all”
“Humph!” said Thorne, signalling for Whillan to be brought to him. When he came the others saw there was something angry and determined in his eyes which suggested he might not be quite so badly hurt as at first it seemed.
When the Brother Commander said quietly, “Well, Brother, it seems you were telling the truth,” Whillan obliged with an impressive lie.
“As I tried to tell you, they left us two days ago,” he whispered falteringly, “to head for their home system.”
“Which is?”
“Munslow,” he replied promptly, naming a system Hobsley had mentioned which lay to the south.
“Their names?”
“Lakin and Cripps,” he said, almost too quietly.
“Lakin and who? – And don’t you reply!” roared Thorne, pointing his paw at Whillan but addressing his question to Madoc.
His eyes glinted darkly and it was plain he was not entirely convinced by Whillan’s willingness to talk. But had Madoc heard the name Whillan had made up clearly enough to maintain the lie?
“Well, Sister, share the name of your other former travelling companion with us.”
“Why should I?” said Madoc stoutly, seemingly playing for time. “I won’t.”
“Oh, you will!” said the Brother Commander grimly. He nodded at the moles holding Whillan, one of whom raised his talons and set them but a thrust away from Whillan’s eyes.
“No!” cried Whillan pitiably as Rooster roared and struggled, and Privet simply stared in horror.
“Well now, I think you had better tell us, or we will assume your friend here was making up the names and trying to be clever.”
“He’s not my friend!” shouted Madoc dramatically. “But Cripps was... oh... I loved him!” It sounded frantic and hysterical, but as Madoc began to weep, apparently for revealing her beloved’s name, the Brother Commander broke into a roar of laughter.
“Well, well. Brother Whillan, it seems you told the truth after all.” The raised talons were lowered and the look of relief on Whillan’s face was genuine. “We will send word for guards to catch up with your friends in due course – there is a Crusade apaw across moledom now from which no follower will escape, nor any blasphemer go unpunished. But, Sister...” he turned suddenly on Madoc again, “... why did you not go with the mole you say you loved?”
“He does not love me,” wailed Madoc.
Thorne seemed convinced, and switched his attention to Rooster, whom he contemplated for a time. Madoc moved closer to Privet, while Whillan was allowed to stance down and attend to his wounds. They had won some kind of victory in protecting Maple and Weeth, but it was obvious that their position was serious, and possibly fatal, with Rooster’s surely the worst of all. Perhaps in those moments of silence all of them were wondering what other untruths they might get away with, and if there was any point in trying. But the same thought seemed to have occurred to the Brother Commander.
“Now we have established that you are all our prisoners, and that we wish you to tell us the truth, I had better say that I do not want to waste further time trying to tease information out of you. The moles Lakin and Cripps may be so named, and may have parted from you two days ago – or they may not. I am inclined to believe you. But it is not of great consequence in the light of the capture of Rooster – a mole who has led the Caradocian Order a pretty dance and whom Elder Senior Brother Quail will be well pleased to have secure again.”
Thorne said this with respect in his voice – and the manner in which he looked at Rooster was serious but not unpleasant. Indeed, in other circumstances he might almost have seemed a reasonable mole, an impression strengthened by the way he turned to Whillan and said, “I personally have no wish to harm you, or punish you – I leave that to the brethren of the Stone whose task it is.”
He looked at Fagg and the three moles nearest him with some distaste, and Privet and the others concluded from the smooth and glossy appearance of these three, and the familiar cold look in their eyes, that these were guardmoles on the religious side, while the others were military moles under the leadership of Thorne.
“However, the fact that we find you in company with one so notorious as Rooster bodes ill for all of you, I fear – but again that is not my concern. Indeed my only interest until yesterday was getting to Cannock and assuming command of the defences there – but acting on information received we heard of your passage up to the Edge and diverted our own journey in pursuit. Enough of explanations... my name is Brother Commander Thorne. Whatmoles are you, and whither are you bound?”
It was Privet who answered. “You won’t have any need to detain the two youngsters,” she said.
“I’ll be the judge of that,” said Thorne, again not unpleasantly. It seemed that he expected them to try to protect each other.
“Well, anyway... my name is Privet and I was delegate to the Convocation and claim its protection for myself and those with me.”
“And whither were you bound?”
“Are we bound,” said Privet sharply. “To Duncton Wood.”
“Ah! Privet of Duncton Wood, and in the company of Rooster!” declared Fagg with evident satisfaction. “Sister Privet’s reputation precedes her. A Whernish scholar, corrupted by her ancestry and studies. A mole reared to sin and lusts, and concubine to Rooster. Yes, a most useful catch, Brother Commander, and one that will enhance all our reputations. This is a matter for the Elder Senior Brother himself
“And you other two?” said Thorne quietly, looking as if he doubted Privet had been – or was ever likely to be – anymole’s concubine.
“Whillan of Duncton!” growled Whillan.
“Madoc of Gwynanst,” said Madoc.
“Brother Adviser Fagg, we had better talk of this privately,” said Thorne.
The two Newborns drew to one side and had an animated and not entirely amicable discussion about what to do with their captives. At first the Duncton moles could not understand why such an authoritative mole as Thorne should even listen to one like Fagg, let alone be swayed by him – and for a time it seemed he would not be: as the argument grew more serious Thorne’s voice became deeper and more resolute, and Fagg’s became thinner and more annoyed. But finally, when he began to refer to “the Elder Council shall hear of it if you do not...” and “Elder Brother Quail expressly asked allmole to watch out for the mole Rooster and would not be pleased if...’, Thorne fell silent and attentive. At last the discussion ended, and Thorne approached them.
“I am persuaded that it will be in all our interests for us to make quite sure that we d
eliver you into the paws of the Elder Council alive, in one piece, and complete. The Brother Adviser here, who is the spiritual mentor deputed to travel with my command, has clear authority in this matter and he is naturally concerned that since the mole Rooster escaped so dramatically from the Convocation he might try to do so again. He feels in need of support if he is to get you moles back into custody. So be it. My guardmoles will do their duty, and so will I. But I am reluctant to take you all the way to Caer Caradoc and have therefore agreed to see you safely to Wildenhope where you may be easily held until instructions are received as to what to do with you.” As he spoke the name “Wildenhope” a curious unease showed on the faces of his subordinates, which was in contrast to the pleasure on Fagg’s; judging from the horrified expression on Madoc’s face, all this reflected something of the reputation of the place.
Thorne ignored the reaction and continued: “It will make all our lives easier if you do not try to escape or anything of that kind – and I hope I make myself quite clear when I say that if you do then my guards will take extreme measures to stop you. In this I will be acting within my powers as Brother Commander – even though my good friend and Brother Adviser would prefer it if you all reached Wildenhope alive.”
Here he smiled wickedly and some of his guards grinned at the discomfiture of Fagg and his two colleagues. Clearly there was no love lost between the military and religious wings of Newborn authority.
“To discourage you from thoughts of escape I shall instruct my guards to split into four groups, each of which will be assigned to one of you. You will travel apart from each other and be given no opportunity for conferring. If one of you even tries to escape the other three will suffer punishment. I hope I make myself quite clear – I have no wish at all for any unpleasantness, and nor do I want any delay. While you are in my paws you will be well cared for and treated with respect. I have no doubt that if when I pass you over at Wildenhope, I can report you have behaved well, it will be taken into favourable consideration.”
Duncton Stone Page 5
