The Urchin of the Riding Stars

by M. I. McAllister

  “Hm,” said Fir. “Bless them.” He raised a paw toward the distant boat.

  “Our animals are ready and at their posts,” said Padra, still whispering. “They all know what to do. We stay alert during the entertainment and the feast, then I just have to keep my nerve during the offerings and the speeches. Lugg, Arran, and a few of the faithful ones will be on the lookout, in case Husk and his claw thugs try anything. When I make my speech and show Husk for what he is, we count on the animals rallying to me. It all depends on that. The Anemone Wooders and the otters will be with me. But if it comes to a fight—and I hate the thought of Mistmantle animals shedding one another’s blood—Husk’s animals will be better armed.”

  “It should not come to that,” said Fir. He shook his ears. “That excellent otter in charge of food stores, does she look after the candles as well?”

  “Candles?” said Padra. “I’ve no idea.” From respect, he didn’t ask why Fir wanted candles when the whole future of the island was at stake, but he found the question irritating. “I’ll go down and see what Husk is up to. Don’t stop praying, Fir. And pray for Urchin: the Heart alone knows where he is and what’s happening to him. I still expect to find him two paces behind me, waiting for orders.”

  The sun rose higher on a fair, bright day. From their colonies all over the island, the animals gathered: families with their infants carried or led by the paw, little knots of young females whispering together about the males while the males showed off, and pretended not to notice them. Elderly creatures leaned on the shoulders of the young. Young tower animals, like Needle, who had been given the day off, ran out to meet their friends and families. Even the kitchen workers, who were still busy, popped out for a moment in their aprons to greet their friends. They would be allowed to join in the celebrations. Only adults worked in the kitchen on feast days, taking turns to join the fun.

  Emerging from the woods, they gasped. The young ones stared in breathtaken astonishment. The old stopped saying that feasts these days were nothing like feasts in the old days, and shook their heads slowly in wonder. All of them wondered and whispered about the great generosity of Captain Husk.

  From every turret of Mistmantle Tower, pennants fluttered in the wind. Banners hung from windows. A cloth of purple and gold had been spread over the throne, with a canopy high above it. All around it were splendid new Threadings. The feast had not yet been spread, but fresh, white cloths covered the tables, garlanded with spring flowers and branches. Most of the young squirrels ran into the treetops for a good view, and a few climbed onto the scaffolding and were sharply ordered down again. Then they all fell silent.

  The chattering stopped. There was no more wriggling, no more staring up at the pennants. The trumpeters—two hedgehogs, two squirrels, and two otters—all in red tunics, marched from the tower with silver trumpets flashing in the sunlight. They formed a guard of honor and played a fanfare. Two guard moles saluted.

  Four hedgehogs with gleaming fur led the procession. Then came Captain Granite and Captain Padra side by side, one in green and gold, one in sea-turquoise and silver. Sunlight shone from their circlets. But a moment later, nobody was watching them at all. The crowd gasped.

  The gasp could have been for Husk, or for Aspen. Aspen, with a pale gold cloak drifting from her shoulders and a ring of spring flowers on her head, looked even lovelier than on her wedding day, and Husk was magnificent. In his shining circlet and gleaming robe, striding out into the spring morning with his head high, his sword at one hip and a dagger at the other, he looked like a lord. He looked, the animals whispered to each other, as if he should be King of Mistmantle.

  At a signal from Husk, the captains and Lady Aspen turned and knelt. Everyone knelt. King Brushen appeared in the doorway, and Husk and Aspen rose quickly to take his paws before he could fall.

  The crowds cheered for their king, but it was a dull cheer. It was embarrassing to see him like this. His shoulders drooped, his feet shuffled, his spines stood out at all angles. His eyes were bloodshot beneath the crown, and his face bleary. His paws trembled. But Husk and Aspen, alert to his needs, held his paws and helped him gently to his throne. They were followed by Tay and Brother Fir, but hardly anyone noticed them. Closer to the animals, slumped in his throne, the king looked worse than ever. Then, to the great relief of all the animals, the entertainments began.

  And those entertainments were wonderful. Hedgehogs recited their poems with drama and tension. Comical hedgehogs fell over one another until the small otters were rolling over the grass laughing. Otters played on pipes and turned spectacular somersaults. Moles juggled with berries and gave glittering demonstrations of fencing. But the squirrels outshone the rest, singing, dancing, leaping, twisting, balancing, and somersaulting, all with dazzling speed and twirling of tails. Mole maids moved through the audience with little cups of wine and delicate biscuits, all with the compliments of Captain Husk and Lady Aspen, and all agreed that Husk and Aspen knew how to give a truly magnificent festival. Then, at a signal from Padra, a young squirrel took her place on the stage and sang so sweetly that the excited crowd calmed. Every creature listened in fascination, and some wiped away tears.

  “Enchanting!” exclaimed Aspen, leaning forward in her seat. “Who is she?”

  “Her name is Sepia, my lady,” said Padra. “An exceptional talent. I was lucky to find her.”

  “Sweet,” said Aspen. A choir of very small squirrels followed, and two or three of them danced.

  “Delightful little things,” said Aspen, putting out a paw to help the king, who had fallen asleep and was about to drop off the throne. Husk moved behind to heave him up. “His poor Majesty,” whispered Aspen to Padra. “He drinks too deeply. It helps him forget his grief.”

  As the animals watched the entertainment, Husk watched the audience. They were enjoying the festival enormously. It was good. The king had nodded off again. Let him be.

  Tay’s attention was not on the entertainment. It was not at all her sort of thing, and she still had vital work to complete before the speeches. Absolute living proof of what Padra was up to was still needed. She looked past the crowds to the shore where little boats were lined up. From her high seat on the dais, she could see all the way to a green boat upside down at the end.

  Something moved. It was a tiny movement far away, and she wasn’t sure what, but whatever it was, it was in the wrong place. Sometimes crabs or toads sheltered under the boats, but even a tiny glimpse told her that it was not a crab or a toad.

  She narrowed her eyes and looked more carefully. The boat had been propped up a little on stones at one end so that it did not quite touch the ground. Why leave a gap?

  She kept watching.

  The smaller animals were becoming restless, eyeing the tables hopefully. The sun was high. It was time for the king to announce the beginning of the feast, but he was slumped in his throne with a glazed look on his face.

  Padra stepped over to Husk. “One of us will have to announce the feast,” he said. “The king can’t.”

  “Of course His Majesty can!” said Husk indignantly. He rose, offered a paw, and led the king in tottering steps to the edge of the dais. Rage seethed in Padra.

  “Oh, the king’s mantle is too heavy!” said Aspen in concern. “Let me take it. Help me, Granite.”

  In view of the watching animals, Aspen and Granite lifted the robe from the king’s shoulders and straightened his crown. There he stood, a confused, disheveled hedgehog, with a crown and no robe; and everyone could see that he no longer carried a sword. He wore a silver flask at his hip instead.

  “Anmals of Mismannel,” slurred the king, “here we gather a…th…Summer Festfal.”

  “Spring Festival, Your Majesty,” whispered Husk.

  “…Heart brought safely through anerr win…winner. We praisa Heart, we give thangs. The feast is…begin!”

  Feebly, he clapped his paws. Husk helped him back to the throne, and the feast began.

  The animals, bustl
ing and chattering, found places at the long tables as servants processed from the tower with bowls and baskets, plates and platters. There were round cakes of nuts, pies and pastries, and every kind of bread the island could provide; vats of soup, bowls of crisped seaweed, whole fishes, honey cakes, biscuits, and cheeses from faraway islands; butter, cream, and berries. Fruit was piled high, glowing with color. Crumbs stuck to whiskers, paws grew sticky, juice dribbled onto fur.

  As loyal as a hedgehog, as determined as a mole, as bright as a squirrel, as valiant as on otter… Padra repeated the old saying to himself as he excused himself from the high table. He found Arran, who was giving orders to the serving moles.

  “Don’t let them give the hedgehogs too much wine,” he told her. “We’re depending on their support.”

  Arran snatched up empty flagons from the table, looked around, and saw Needle. “Needle!” she called. “Get a couple of friends and fill these at the spring.” She turned to Padra. “I’ll tell the staff to water down the pear wine.”

  Needle, with a flagon in each paw, waited until Arran was out of hearing range.

  “Captain Padra, sir,” she said, looking up a little shyly. “Excuse me, may I ask something about Arran, sir?”

  “Yes, what about her?” said Padra, surveying the crowd.

  “If she asked you to marry her, would you really laugh?”

  “What?” said Padra. He laughed, and stopped suddenly. “Why do you ask? Is that what she says?”

  “Um…” But Needle felt she had said enough. She found Crackle—they were friends now—and they scuttled off together. Padra sent for Lugg, and Tay watched the boat.

  The infants from the Old Palace had been moved, for the time being, to a place of safety on the shore. It was cramped, but they were happy to build sand castles, and a party was underway. Moth and Mother Huggen wore their best frilly aprons and flower necklaces. Arran had smuggled in generous supplies of food and drink from the feast, including soft puddings and mashed-up fruit for the very small ones, and a good supply of worms and grubs as many of the animals couldn’t manage anything richer. Moth, eating a dainty elderflower pastry, lay by the gap between boat and sand to see all she could of the festival. Mother Huggen, spooning lemon-cream porridge sideways into the mouth of a baby hedgehog, smiled kindly at her. Occasionally a small and inquisitive otter would wriggle free from the others and push its shiny black nose under the boat, only to be pushed firmly back by Moth or pulled by Mother Huggen.

  “You go out to the festival for a bit, young Moth,” said Mother Huggen. “They’ll all drop off to sleep, now we’ve fed them. You go and have a bit of fun.”

  “I’d like that,” said Moth. “I’ll go when I’ve finished this pastry.”

  Gleaner stood on duty behind Aspen’s chair. She wasn’t needed much, but she wanted to be seen with Lady Aspen.

  When Aspen gave her the king’s flask to fill from the decanter in the Throne Room, she scampered off with it at once. Lugg the mole popped up suddenly in front of her.

  “I’ll do that, miss, thank you, miss.”

  “But it’s…”

  “The king’s, miss, to fill up. Leave it to me, miss. Captain’s orders, miss.”

  Gleaner supposed it would be all right. Even empty, the flask was heavy. Now she had a chance to slip to the tower and style her ear tufts like Lady Aspen’s.

  Lugg hobbled away purposefully toward the spring and met Needle and Crackle staggering back with slopping flagons in their paws. “Is that fresh spring water?” he said. “Let’s have some.”

  Aspen hardly noticed the guard mole bringing the silver flask back. She was cleaning up the black-currant juice the king had dribbled down his chest.

  “Young squirrel asked me to bring this,” said Lugg. “Heavy for her.”

  “Poor little Gleaner,” said Aspen. She fastened the flask to the king’s belt, and went on cleaning him up.

  It would soon be time for the speeches. Tay slipped away. In law it was possible for a king to be replaced if he could no longer rule. King Brushen could be deposed, and Husk put in his place. But Padra would oppose it, so evidence against him was vital.

  Quickly and quietly, she loped across the rocks and scrambled down to the shore. The boat was completely unguarded. Wriggling low into the sand, Tay pushed her nose under the gap and saw what she had hoped to see.

  A hedgehog in an apron bent over a row of nests. Basins, blankets, balls of wool, and knitting needles were stacked neatly on the sand. A small squirrel wearing a bib sat up in a nest.

  “It’s Padra, Padra, Padra!” it squeaked, and Mother Huggen turned with a smile that changed to horror.

  “Oh, dear Heart!” she shrieked, and stammered desperately. “I—I—I wasn’t expecting company, Mistress Tay!”

  “No,” said Tay. “But you were expecting Captain Padra.” Before Mother Huggen could move, she shot out a paw and snatched the squirrel from its nest, holding it tightly by the paw. “So this is Padra’s nursery!”

  “No, mistress, it’s my nursery,” said Huggen firmly. “And excuse me, mistress, but if you don’t let that squirrel go at once, I’m afraid I’ll have to bite you.”

  “Bite an otter of the Circle?” said Tay. “This animal is evidence. So is this one,” she added, snatching Hope the hedgehog. “This boat is crawling with deformed creatures who were meant for the cull. You’re all under arrest. There’s no point in trying to escape. The guards will be here in two minutes. I’m taking these two as evidence.”

  She wriggled backward, but to her great surprise she found difficulty in moving. There was something the matter with her hind paws.

  Tay wriggled more, and turned her head, trying to crawl out from the boat with a squirrel in one paw and a hedgehog in the other. She just had time to see a small mole maid tying her hind paws together with a frilly apron before the baby squirrel bit her. A blanket was wedged between her teeth; another was over her head; and she was trapped.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  EEDLE, WHO HAD WORKED LATE INTO THE NIGHT, struggled to stay awake during the speeches. The offerings of gifts to the king had been made, and now Captain Granite was speaking in a boring drone as if he had learned his speech by heart and didn’t understand it. Hedgehogs had curled up to rest. Some of the moles had slipped away down tunnels. Otters basked in the sunshine, and even the squirrels were yawning. This wouldn’t do. Padra needed them to be wide awake.

  “King Brushen has been a great king…” droned on Captain Granite. Needle shuffled from her place and wriggled through the crowds.

  “Ouch!” said a mole.

  “Ooh!” said a hedgehog.

  “Sorry,” said Needle, but she wasn’t. It was useful to be so sharp. She wove her way through the animals, jostling and prickling everyone she met. They didn’t like it, but it kept them awake. Over a mole muttering “Tell that hedgehog to sit down” came the dull voice of Captain Granite.

  “When King Brushen can no longer bear the burden of being our king, we can rely on Captain Husk. Sadly, this time is very near.”

  Needle stared in astonishment and looked around to see if the other animals were as shocked as she was. Some were staring with open mouths as if they ought to protest, but didn’t know what to say. But others were nodding in agreement. They’d seen how ill the king was. It was only reasonable to let him abdicate. Husk would be a good king. Come to think of it, King Brushen hadn’t been all that good. He’d given them work parties and culling. He would have rationed the food if Captain Husk hadn’t stopped him. And wouldn’t Lady Aspen be a lovely queen?

  Many more animals seemed hardly to have noticed. They were too bored, or snoring on the tables.

  Granite sat down. There was some polite clapping of paws and a hiccup from a sleeping baby otter.

  A hedgehog stood up and announced, “Mistress Tay to speak next.”

  There was a long pause. “Mistress Tay?” he said again.

  Guards scuttled about, looking for Tay. Animals sudd
enly realized that something interesting was happening, and sat up. Someone was sent to the tower to find her, but Tay still did not appear.

  Needle stretched up on her hind paws to see the dais. Husk and Padra sat, absolutely calm, with nothing on their faces but polite interest.

  Inside, Husk seethed with anger. This was not what he had planned. Tay had promised evidence that would have Padra arrested for treason on the spot. The king would be distressed, so he would be taken gently back to the tower with Brother Fir to look after him. Then, with all of them out of the way, Husk only needed to claim the crown, and the animals would give it.

  Padra hoped he looked perfectly calm. He had no idea what had happened to Tay. He suspected that this was part of Husk’s plan, and that Tay would suddenly stride up to the dais claiming that he’d murdered somebody, or tried to burn down the tower. He remembered telling Crispin to keep his nerve. Now he told it to himself. Guards were reporting back to Husk, but none of them had news of Tay.

  “I see,” said Husk thoughtfully, and leaned over to talk to Padra. Granite moved in closer. So did Fir.

  “What can we do?” said Husk. “Padra can’t speak until Tay’s had her turn. I’m afraid we’ll have to cancel your speech, Padra.”

  “But, Captain Husk,” said Fir mildly. “You can’t speak until after Captain Padra. So it seems that none of you can make a speech.”

  “Perhaps we should send the animals home,” said Husk. He had looked forward to his triumph, but it could wait for another day.

  “Without your speech?” said Fir. “Dear, dear me! How could we? They’re looking forward so much to hearing you, Husk. Padra won’t take long, will you, Padra?”

  Padra had slipped down from his chair. He knelt at the king’s paws and looked up into the sad, puzzled face of the king he still loved, and still served.