Rufe Brush looked up from a plate of hazelnut cream and apple pie.
‘Not on a night like this you won’t, Simeon. Listen to that rainstorm. Any creature out on a night like this must be drowned by now.’
Simeon was about to answer when he suddenly turned his face aside and clasped a table napkin to his nose.
‘Whaaaw! Somebeast’s eating wild garlic!’
A fat mole named Burgo several places down with a clothes peg fitted snugly upon his nose was tucking into a big basin with a spoon. He waved a paw at Simeon.
‘Burr, nor c’n oi stan’ the smell o’ garleck. Oi do dearly luvs the taste of it tho’. ‘At’s whoi oi keeps moi snowt pegged! Garleck woild soup! nuthin’ loik et, zurr.’
Amid the laughter that followed, Dandin turned to Rufe Brush.
‘By the fur, Rufe, that rain sounds as if it were trying to knock our Abbey down. You were right, anybeast out in this must be well drowned by now!’
3
FORT BLADEGIRT STOOD at the edge of the high rocks which towered above Terramort cove, the big window of its banqueting hall facing out to sea. It had a courtyard and a high wall which ran around its perimeter where the ground was open, though part of the actual fort building integrated with the outer wall where it overhung the cove. The entire structure was built from solid rock with heavy wooden doors at the entrances both to the fort and courtyard. On three sides it was overlooked by hills. Gabool the Wild had taken it as his by right; indeed whoever owned Bladegirt was absolute King of Searats, as long as he could hold it. Inside the fort chaos and misrule were the order of the day. Corsair rats left their ships to come ashore after long plundering voyages. They made their way to Bladegirt in droves, leaving their ships at anchor in the cove. Roistering, fighting, gambling and drinking, the searats enjoyed their shore leave after the hardships of a life at sea.
In the high banqueting chamber Gabool sprawled on a carved rock throne, which he had made more comfortable by covering it with the skins of his slain enemies. He stared with loving fascination at a great bell dominating the centre of the floor; monumental in its size the prize stood, reflecting the torchlights and revelry through its burnished sheen. Copper, silver, brass and gold had been used in its casting. Heaving himself up, Gabool strode forward, sword in one claw, a chalice of wine in the other as he traversed the perimeter of his greatest prize. Grinning like a child with a new toy, he tapped his swordblade against the marvellous bell; the soft musical note vibrated gently like a giant harp strummed by the wind. As he walked, Gabool’s restless eyes roved up and down, from the strange figures embossed around the top to the intricate words ranging round the wide base of the great bell.
Gabool was puzzled as to their meaning, but they were pretty decorations which made his prize all the more fascinating to look upon.
‘Blood ’n’ thunder, Cap’n. Give it a good belt an’ let’s hear it ring out!’ A burly drunken searat named Halfnose pulled a wooden cudgel from his belt and thrust it towards Gabool. With lightning speed the Warlord grabbed the club and crashed it down on Halfnose’s skull, at the same time landing a thrusting kick into the drunkard’s belly, which sent him reeling into an open cask of wine. Halfnose slumped across the wine, his head submerged. Gabool roared with laughter.
‘Drink or drown, seascum. Nobeast comes near Gabool’s bell!’
The carousing searats shrieked their appreciation at his joke. Gabool pointed at Halfnose with his sword.
‘If he ever gets out o’ there, give him a cup of wine t’ revive him.’
This caused further merriment, except from the table where Bludrigg, Captain of the ship Greenfang, sat with his mates. Though Gabool laughed as heartily as the others, Bludrigg had not escaped his notice. Everyone was laughing, but not Bludrigg – Bludrigg the surly, Bludrigg the argumentative, Bludrigg the trouble-causer, the seadeck lawyer. Gabool watched him closely. Bludrigg, who could sense the scheming mind behind his King’s false merriment.
Things between the King of Searats and his Captain had been building to a head for a long time; Gabool decided to settle accounts with Bludrigg now. Gulping wine from the chalice and allowing it to spill freely into his beard, Gabool pretended to stagger drunkenly. He winked in a friendly manner and thrust his sword point down into a chest of booty. Tottering over to the table, Gabool banged the half-empty chalice down in front of the Greenfang’s Captain.
‘Bludrigg, me old matey, c’mon, drink up!’
Bludrigg’s face was sullen as he thrust the chalice aside.
‘Don’t want no wine. I can drink all I want aboard me ship.’
All around the hall they stopped drinking, singing and gambling; an air of expectancy settled over the searats. Gabool blinked, as if trying to shake off the effects of the wine, and swayed slightly.
‘Food then. Can’t have my Captain starvin’. Roast meat, fruit, fish, sugared preserves? Here, bring m’ friend Bludrigg some vittles.’
Bludrigg’s swordclaw fondled the hilt of his sheathed scimitar.
‘Leave the food, Gabool. I eat well enough.’
Gabool sighed, shaking his head as if in puzzlement. He sat next to Bludrigg and threw a comradely claw about his shoulders.
‘Hmmm, no wine, no food, no smile on me old shipmate’s face. What d’you want then, bucko?’
Bludrigg shook Gabool’s claw off. He stood upright, knocking the chair over behind him, his eyes blazing with suppressed rage at the drunken Warlord.
‘I want my share of the plunder. There’s been none from the last three sailings. I’m tellin’ you, Gabool, I want my portion of the booty – an’ I’ll have it tonight; come hell or high water!’
From around the packed hall there were murmurs of agreement. Gabool spread his arms wide and smiled.
‘Blow me down! Is that all? Why didn’t you say so sooner?’
Bludrigg was lost for words; the expected clash had not come. Now he felt slightly foolish in front of his crew. He shrugged, mumbling half-heartedly; he tried excusing himself as if he were complaining on behalf of his searats.
‘Well, I never thought. . . . It’s just that my crew were startin’ to complain, they thought you’d forgotten us . . .’
Gabool looked injured. He went over to the chest of booty, where his sword stood upright amid a heap of armlets, goblets, baubles and shiny stones. Drawing forth the sword, he turned one or two items over with its point until he found what he sought. Gabool flicked the sword up as a shiny gold coronet studded with gems slid along its blade.
‘Aharr, friend Bludrigg, the best for you. A crown fit for a King!’
Bludrigg felt a sudden rush of confidence; he had done it! Gabool was notoriously mean with plunder, but he, Bludrigg, Captain of the Greenfang, had actually got the better of Gabool. The King of Searats had backed down before him. Bludrigg’s chest swelled as he accepted the beautiful coronet from Gabool’s swordblade and placed it on his head. A cheer rose from the company as Gabool spread his arms wide. Extending the sword away from Bludrigg, he addressed them.
‘See, yer scurvy wave-riders. Pay attention, you jetsam of the oceans, I am Gabool the Wild, this is how I repay me friends. . . .’ Without warning Gabool swung a powerfully savage blow with his sword. ‘And reward my enemies!’
Even the hardened searats moaned in horror as the head of Bludrigg thudded to the floor. The coronet rolled in front of Gabool. He picked it up on the dripping swordblade and held it forth to the assembly.
‘Would anyone else like to wear the crown, mateys?’
Heralded by the call of seabirds, eastern sunrays flooded warm and golden into a sky of calm blue reflected in the millpond sea below. The angry storm has passed, leaving summer serenity in its wake. The sun warmed the wet bundle on the flotsam-strewn tideline until it stirred. Seawater and bile flooded from the mousemaid’s mouth as she coughed feebly. The damp paw set tiny flies buzzing as it reached for her throat and began weakly grappling with the knotted rope. The wooden spar lay across her back.
A seabird landed upon it; the added weight caused the mousemaid to vomit more salt water forth with a gurgling groan. Startled, the bird rose noisily into the air, cheated of the carcass it had taken for dead. Other seabirds began to wheel and circle overhead. A tiny crab tried nibbling at the maid’s rough wet burlap dress, gave up and scuttled away.
Finally undone, the rope fell away from her bruised neck. Painfully she shifted the spar and rolled over on to her back. The mousemaid lay still awhile; some of the more venturesome seabirds spiralled lower. Rubbing sand and grit from her face with the back of a paw, she opened both eyes, immediately shutting them again against the glare of sunlight. Small wavelets trickled and lapped gently away from the shore; the tide was ebbing. The mousemaid ventured to explore the wound that the spar had inflicted upon her head. She winced and left it alone. Turning over again, she shielded her eyes with her paws and rested on the firm damp sand, soaking up the life-giving rays of the comforting sun. A large speckled gull landed close to her. Readying its dangerous beak it stalked slowly forward; the mousemaid watched it from between her paws. Within a necklength of her prostrate body the seagull stood upon one webbed foot and began bringing its beak down in an exploratory peck.
Thwack!
She swung the wet-sand-weighted end of the rope. It was knotted and her aim was good. The rope’s end thudded solidly into the bird’s right eye. With a squawk of pain and distress the seagull did an awkward running takeoff, flopping into the air and dispersing its alarmed companions.
The little mousemaid began dragging herself laboriously up the beach, her throat parched, mouth dry, head aching, limbs battered almost numb by the pounding seas. She reached a tussock of reedgrass in the dry sand above the tideline. Pulling the grass about her, she lay down in the safety of its shelter. As sleep descended upon her weary body, strange thoughts flooded her mind. She could not remember who she was, she had no name she could recall; apart from the stormy seas that had tossed her up, there was no memory of anything – it was all a cloudy grey void. Where had she come from? Where was she now? What was she doing here? Where was she going? Her last thought before sleep enveloped her brain was that she was a fighter. She could beat off a large seagull with a rope’s end, even lying stranded and half-dead from exhaustion, and she had survived the sea.
She was alive!
4
DAWN ARRIVED CLAD in hushed rosiness upon the wake of storm-torn night. Abbot Bernard had not lain abed, he was up and about. Concern for his beloved Redwall had driven sleep from his mind; the ravages of gale-force winds and rain would need repairing. He made a swift tour of inspection, finishing up on the east battlements. Leaning back upon the strongly hewn stones, Bernard allowed himself a sigh of relief. There was not much that any weather conditions, no matter how severe, could do to the Abbey. However, there were broken branches and wrecked tree limbs overhanging the ramparts to the east and north, with here and there some ill-fated sapling or hollow woodland monarch toppled against the walls. Inside, the grounds had largely been protected by the outer structure – a few crops flattened, fruit bushes in disarray and a loose window shutter on the gatehouse blown awry. The Father Abbot descended the wallsteps thankfully and went to summon Foremole to head a repair crew. They could attend to the damage after breakfast.
The calm after the storm also had its effect upon the inmates of Redwall Abbey. Young creatures tumbled out of the Abbey building into the sunlit morning. Whooping and shouting, they teemed into the orchard to gather fruit brought down by the winds of the gale. The otter twins Bagg and Runn frisked and bounded round the apple and pear trees to the strawberry patch, then lay on their backs, squeaking with laughter as they gobbled up the juicy fruit, inventing fictitious reasons as to why the berries were lying there.
‘Heehee, look what was blown down from the strawberry trees by the wind last night. Heeheehee!’
Durry Quill, Gabe Quill’s little nephew, joined them. He sat in the strawberry patch, trying to dedde which was the biggest berry, eating all the possible candidates as he listened to the otters. Durry was not at all sure whether he should believe they had come from a strawberry tree.
‘Strawb’rry trees, I don’t see no strawb’rry trees. Where be they?’
Bagg coughed hard to stop himself tittering. He put on a serious face as he explained the logic of fictitious strawberry trees to the puzzled little Durry.
‘Teehee, er harumph! What? You never see’d a strawb’rry tree. Dear oh dear. Why, they’re great giant things with blue speckly leaves, very light of course, only weigh as much as two goosefeathers. That’s why the wind blowed ’em all away. Whoosh! Straight o’er the top of the Abbey walls.’
The gullible Durry looked from one to the other, half convinced.
Runn nodded serious agreement and continued the story. ‘Sright, I see’d it meself from the dormitory window. Way away they blowed, all those poor old great strawb’rry trees, carried off by the wind to the Gongleboo mountains where the Grunglypodds live.’
A half-eaten strawberry dropped from Durry’s open mouth. ‘Grunglyboo’s mountain where Gronglepodds live, where be that?’
Under a nearby pear tree Dandin stood paws on hips with his friend, young Saxtus the harvest mouse. Both smiled as they listened to the two otters leading Durry Quill astray with their tall tales. Saxtus bit into a windfall pear and grimaced.
‘Don’t know why we came out here to eat fruit. Most of these windfalls aren’t even ripe yet. Taste this pear, hard as a rock.’
Dandin sat down with the otters and Durry. ‘No thanks, I’ll try my luck with all these berries that fell from the strawberry trees.’ He looked over the top of a large strawberry at Bagg and Runn. ‘Strawberry trees indeed! You two should be ashamed of yourselves, telling a poor little hedgehog such whopping great fibs.’
Saxtus sat down with them, keeping his normally solemn face quite straight. ‘Dandin’s right, y’know. Otters that tell lies get carried off by the big pink Waterbogle.’
Bagg tossed a strawberry in the air. It missed his mouth and bounced off his nose as he remarked airily, ‘Oh the pink Waterbogle. We’ve been carried off twice this summer by him, haven’t we, Runn?’
Runn giggled. ‘Teeheehee! I’ll say we have. We told him that many whoppers he said he’s not carrying us off any more.’
From the direction of the damson and plum trees Simeon’s voice interrupted.
‘Saxtus! Dandin! Brother Hubert wants you for your Redwall history and recording lessons. He is not getting any younger, and someday we will need a new recorder; traditions must be upheld. Come on, young scamps, I know you’re there!’
The two young mice dropped flat in the strawberry patch, Dandin holding a paw to his lips.
‘Shush! It’s Simeon. Lie low – he might go away.’
The steady pawsteps of the blind herbalist came nearer. Simeon called again.
‘Come on, you two. I know you’re hiding in the strawberry patch.’
Saxtus tugged Bagg’s tail and winked at the young otter. Bagg winked back as he called out, ‘It’s Bagg and Runn, Simeon. We’re the only ones here.’
Simeon appeared, chuckling. ‘I’m going to count to three, and if you two otters and that nephew of Quill’s aren’t off to the Abbey kitchen to help with the chores, I’ll tell Mother Mellus to come and fetch you with a hazel twig. As for Saxtus and Dandin, unless you want me to give you an extra lecture on the value of nightshade and campion as herbs, you’ll come out now and stop lying there trying to breathe lightly. I may not have eyesight but my ears and nose have never deceived me yet.’
Saxtus and Dandin stood up ruefully, wiping away dew from their novices’ habits. Wordlessly they followed Simeon to the gatehouse at the entrance to the outer walls. Simeon strode boldly ahead, a smile hovering about his lips.
‘Hmm, pity the strawberry trees got blown away in the storm. You could have climbed up one and hidden in its branches.’
Brother Hubert sat at his desk in the gatehouse.
Though Redwall Abbey was of no great age, he was surrounded by old books, parchments and scrolls. Dust was everywhere. It settled in layers on furniture and shelf alike, providing a fine patina to the tomes and volumes piled willy-nilly, coating the yellowed parchments and writing materials, lazily drifting in a slow swirl around the morning sunlight shafts flooding through the window. Hubert kept his head bent to the task of recording the Abbey’s daily life, the long feathered quill pen waving back and forth as he wrote. Saxtus and Dandin stood in front of him, listening to the scratch of quill on parchment, keeping a respectful silence until Brother Hubert spoke to them. Looking over the top of his spectacles, Hubert blinked severely.
‘What is punctuality?’
Saxtus spoke out. ‘The respect we show other creatures by being on time.’
‘Hmm, you two young Brothers have more respect for strawberries than you do for me, is that not right?’
Saxtus and Dandin stood in silence. Brother Hubert put aside his pen.
‘Tell me in turn our Abbey charter. Dandin, you may begin.’
Dandin swallowed hard, looked at the ceiling for inspiration, shuffled his paws and began hesitantly.
‘Er, to be Brothers and Sisters of peace and goodwill, er, living together in harmony under the protection of Redwall Abbey, er, er, forsaking all unnecessary forms of violence, not only to Mossflower, its trees, grasses, flowers and insects, but to all living creatures . . .’
Brother Hubert nodded at Saxtus to continue. He did so with much more confidence and less hesitancy than Dandin.
Mariel Of Redwall Page 2
