“Is she well?” asked Terce. “The Mistress Henbane, I mean.”
“Elderly and fit, just as you always said Rune used to be. Just as one day I shall be.”
“I hope so, Master, though I shall not live to see it.”
“No, you won’t,” said Lucerne, and laughed. Somewhere here in Beechenhill, somehow for reasons neither fully understood, the relationship of the Twelfth Keeper and the Master of the Word had turned a corner into hatred.
“Oh, and Terce,” said the Master, so gently. “Summon Mallice. She shall come with us.”
“But Master, she is near....”
“Near her time? Ah, yes. But then she always wanted to meet Henbane, and – who knows? – my mother may not live too long.”
“Yes, Master,” hissed Terce.
“We shall simply have to wait,” said Sleekit firmly, frowning.
Holm frowned back, jerked his head about a bit, looked around the running muddy tunnel they were in and sighed.
“Wait,” he echoed faintly.
“Yes, wait. I thought you liked this kind of place. You like being grubby.”
“With Lorren, not you. You’re Sleekit, not my mate. Not nice with you. Nice with her.” Holm was indeed grubby, the grit and wet sand on the walls and floor of the limestone tunnel he had finally brought them up was thick in his fur and between his talons.
Sleekit, on the other paw, contrived to look surprisingly clean, but then at the first opportunity she was inclined to wash herself in any running water she could find, and if that was not available then drips of water were nearly as good. And failing even that, then if there was a current of air she would dry herself and shake her fur clean.
“Gets dirty again,” Holm would say.
“Lorren would love you more if you were clean,” Sleekit would respond.
But it was only friendly banter between two moles who were now living on the very edge of disaster, and needed all the lightness they could find.
Holm had led them on a fur-raising journey back through the Castern Chambers, which had involved wading, swimming, and diving through sumps and emerging in lightless pockets of air, until, miraculously as it had seemed to Sleekit, he had got them to the torrent beyond which Harebell and the others had been captured.
The water level was much lower than when they were last there, though dangerous still, and Holm had explained and then demonstrated how Sleekit must swim across, and somehow they had made it.
After that it had been a relatively simple matter of following clues and probabilities until they had found a place along the Manifold Valley where a small grike garrison was stationed. They had lain in wait and watched, and Sleekit had recognised two guardmoles she had seen during the flood in Castern.
“I hope they will not recognise me,” said Sleekit.
After that Holm had lain low, while Sleekit used her former sideem ways and risked direct contact with the grikes, claiming she was journeying northwards on the Master’s business. She felt safe enough, for the spot was isolated and unlikely to have another sideem there who might have identified her as false.
She was with them a few hours, and the fact that she was female and the grikes all male was helpful, for they soon revealed they had taken five female prisoners from the rabble who had escaped from Beechenhill and they were not certain what to do with them.
“Pupping, aren’t they?”
“All of them?” asked Sleekit.
“All but one.”
They said this oddly and she soon found out why. They knew, and this explained their caution and their doubt, that the odd one out was Henbane, former Mistress of the Word. Or that was who she said she was.
“The sideem would not by any chance know what Mistress Henbane looks like?”
“I saw her once,” said Sleekit, realising that this was at least a way to contact the captive moles. She prayed they would not reveal that they recognised her.
“What will you do with this mole if she is the Mistress?” asked “sideem” Sleekit as they went into the tunnels to see the prisoners.
“Keep her and tell sideem Merrick double quick. The others are a useful source of pups and could be used for breeding. Not many fertile females about these days...” The grikes grinned and laughed and nudged each other at the prospect. But they went serious again: sideem never laughed at such things.
Sleekit was taken to the captive moles and was able to establish where they were hidden so that Holm might find a route through limestone tunnels to it. A slim chance, but just possible.
She was careful to talk loudly just before she reached them, making clear by what she said that she was here as a sideem and, therefore, not to be recognised. She found them all being kept together in a cramped burrow, and well guarded too. Along with Harebell and Henbane was Quince and two pregnant females she did not know.
At the sight of Sleekit, Henbane, more used to hiding her feelings, stayed expressionless and, as best they could, the others took their cue from that. But even so it was all Harebell could do not to express her joy at seeing Sleekit so unexpectedly.
“Well, sideem,” said the senior guardmole, “you tell me which you think is Mistress Henbane, if, that is, any of them is.” It was a tense moment, for whatever she said would sentence Henbane to punishment and death.
Sleekit thought quickly and decided what to do. She lowered her snout towards Henbane, and said, “Mistress, I am grieved to see thee thus.”
“So she is who she says she is?”
“She is.”
“Yet you greet her deferentially.”
“A long word for a guardmole,” said Sleekit haughtily. “I hope you know its meaning, and remember that Mistress Henbane did much for moledom before her apostasy, so treat her well.”
This was the best Sleekit could do for Henbane. As she looked at them she guessed that the moles had realised when they were caught that the grikes were only keeping those who were with pup alive and Henbane had decided to give her real name rather than be drowned with the others in the stream.
Quince stared at her and Sleekit realised that she must have claimed she was with pup to survive as well....
“These others, sideem, I don’t suppose you know their names!”
It was said more as a joke than anything for before she had even framed a reply the grike guardmole said. “Don’t worry. That’s Harebell there, and that’s Quince, and...” And he gave all their names correctly and with an unpleasant proprietorial leer, as if the pups they carried were his own.
“They seem near their time.”
A look of minor alarm came over the grike’s face.
“Well, I’ve already sent a couple of moles down to Ashbourne – one via the valley, one over the hill by way of Beechenhill – to tell them who we’ve caught. They should be pleased. But we don’t want pups here. It’s a garrison, not a bloody birth burrow.”
“You’d better find them more suitable quarters then, hadn’t you?” said Sleekit, seeing an opportunity for getting them out of here to somewhere from where it might be easier to help them escape.
“Well... maybe,” said the grike.
“Do you know what happened to the Beechenhill moles?” said Sleekit, trying to mask any hint she may have given that she had the captives” interest in mind.
“Drowned, we thought. Drowned in Castern.”
Sleekit shook her head, and though she hated to give her friends information in such a way she felt it was for the best.
“No, killed. I heard they escaped from the chambers and most died by guardmole talons down by the Beechenhill Stone. I doubt if any got away at all.”
“Blest be the Word!” said the grike.
“Aye, blessed be the Word!” agreed Sleekit.
Sleekit emerged from the garrison and went on her way northward, being very cautious about deviating back lest the grikes were watching. It was therefore some time before she found Holm again, and they were able to seek out an alternative way into the garrison t
unnels. Though they were not able to get to the chamber where Harebell, Henbane and the others were being kept they did at least succeed in reaching a point where, with a squeeze and a slide, they could see down into the main tunnel into the garrison, and overhear some of what the grikes’ guardmoles said when they were at rest.
“We must wait patiently, and an opportunity for doing something will come along,” said Sleekit. “The Master Lucerne will send moles here to get Henbane and the others, or perhaps even come himself for Henbane must matter to him. And if he realises who Harebell really is she will matter too and, I fear, need all the help we can give if she is to be saved. But at least Henbane and Harebell now know that I am here nearby and that may give them courage to try to escape.”
Holm sighed again.
“I like route-finding, not waiting,” he said. “Waiting drags.”
“Then use the time to clean yourself, but do it quietly. And while you’re doing it consider ways of getting moles out of here under pressure, for we may need to.”
Holm sighed some more, dejectedly looked at his fur, and wondered where to start.
Lucerne, Terce, a few guardmoles and a very pregnant Mallice reached the garrison as dusk fell, and while Mallice was close-guarded in a quite separate tunnel and burrows – against her will but “for her own protection” – Lucerne and Terce went immediately to see Henbane and Harebell.
“See” was the word, for just as he had with Wharfe, Lucerne preferred to spy on them from a distance first and then retreat, delaying direct contact until it best suited him. He stared at them unseen for an hour or more before he left.
“I shall speak with them later,” he said, and Terce saw that he looked excited and cruelly pleased, “but now I will visit Mallice.”
“Master, I should like to come too,” said Terce carefully. So far he had made no comment about Lucerne’s rough treatment of Mallice, feeling, perhaps rightly, that his loyalty was being tested.
“No, but be ready this night.”
Lucerne found Mallice out of sorts, irritable, and tired. She was in a high, rough, damp chamber, and it was cold. What little nesting material there was was mouldy and lank.
“Master mine,” she whispered, “send Terce to me, I am near my time. I cannot have my pups in here. Send him to help me.”
“He is engaged,” lied Lucerne, “and I have need of thee alone.”
“But I am near my time, my dear.”
“I said I have need of thee, and I will have thee.” His eyes were full of hate.
“But... no!”
“I have seen my mother and my sister this night.”
“And, my love?” said Mallice, hoping for a diversion.
“I hated to see them close. I hated to see them talk. I hated all of it, Mallice, and now... I have need of thee.”
His voice had become thin and strange, almost pleading. She knew him well. Seeing Henbane had not agreed with him. Seeing Henbane with Harebell had agreed with him even less.
“Gently then, my dear,” she said, and near her time and heavy though she was, she proffered herself to him.
Then that perverse mole took her one last time, and for a moment forgot his mother, and for a moment more forgot his sister, and for a brief moment forgot even himself.
“Master mine,” she tried to sigh as if she had enjoyed herself.
“Now have your pups,” he said, “have them well.”
“I shall, my dear, I shall, but send Terce to me.”
“He does not want to come. He says you disgust him now.” Lucerne laughed, a laugh to put fear into another’s heart. “Your fat body disgusts him. And it disgusts me too.”
“My... dear... please send him.”
“It’s company you want, is it, mole? I’ll send you moles to keep you company, oh yes I shall!” He laughed again. “When your pupping starts I want to know so tell the guardmole.”
“Am I captive then, my love?”
“Are not thy pups captive of thy body? Not for long perhaps, but certainly they are victims.”
“Of what?” she said sharply.
“Of thine infidelity.” His eyes narrowed as hers widened.
“Infidelity to thee?” whispered Mallice.
Lucerne only laughed and left with no word more, while she, uncertain, shrank back with a paw to her flank and wondered how long she could delay before she must say that her pupping was begun.
Lucerne instructed the guardmoles, who were moles of Terce’s choice, to admit nomole to those tunnels, nomole, on pain of death and then went and summoned the senior guardmole of the garrison, who was plainly a mole of purpose and ambition. Yet he wished once more he had Drule here. He was the mole for this.
“Master?”
“Senior guardmole... I need two moles obedient to the Word and to their Master.”
“We all are here.”
“Obedient and unquestioning.”
“What must they do, Master?”
“Obey me only.”
“I am one, and I can find another. Tell me what we must do.”
“If I asked you to kill your own mother would you do it?”
“If the Master asked it, yes I would.”
“And pups?”
“My own...?” The grike faltered at this.
“Not thine. A follower’s brood, and bastards.”
“I would, and another here would too.”
“Be ready for a summons from me this night. Speak to nomole of this, for it is business of the Word. Do it well and the Word shall be pleased.”
“Yes, Master,” said the grike guardmole, eyes purposeful.
Such opportunity for advancement might come but once in a lifetime and he intended to take it with all paws.
Darkness falls in the deep, incised valley of the Manifold like a close and clinging dankness that catches at a mole’s throat. Things move muffled, the hazed moon moves slow, stars seem too far away, the night crawls; screams are barely heard.
Terce did not sleep, but lay angry and thinking. The Master had ordered him not to see Mallice and then said, “Be ready this night!” But for what he did not know, and so he did not sleep. Something with Mallice?
What was plain to Terce was that from the time the Master had spied on Henbane and his sister Harebell he was cold with sibling envy. And Mallice was in danger, that was plain as well.
How hard the Word tested him! How small the difference between triumph and disaster yet might be. But how sweet and divine the triumph when it came. So Terce was restless, waiting, expecting his summons.
A scream, barely heard in the distance, sometime in the night. Mallice’s? Perhaps. Terce had never felt so ready for new life as he did now. “I shall be the grandfather of the new Master of the Word, and his name shall be divine. I shall...” Terce waited, ready for it all.
Henbane was awake, listening to Harebell and knowing her time was very near. Her movements were heavy now, her breathing shallow and a little desperate.
“I am afraid,” whispered Harebell in the dark. “What will they do to my pups?”
“I was afraid, my dear, when it was my time, yet here you are. I shall see that they will live. I am here.”
“I am glad you are,...”
In the cloying darkness Henbane heard her daughter, and shed tears for her. She knew her fear.
“Help us,” she prayed to that great unknown to which she gave no name, neither Word nor Stone, “help us all. I shall be their grandmother, show me what best to do.”
“Mother,” whispered Harebell again, “I think my pupping will soon start.”
“I am here, my love, I am close.”
In the distance, down the tunnels, muffled, they heard a scream.
“Holm!”
Holm stanced up in the dark.
“The scream is from where that Mallice went. She’s pupping. Something will happen now. Be ready.”
Holm’s eyes were wide open, and they stared unblinking at a murky tunnel wall.
; “Very ready,” he said.
Yes, the screams were Mallice’s and hearing them the guardmole came.
“Have you begun?” he said. “The Master....”
“I have, mole,” she sighed between the pains, “tell him.”
Running paws in the dark, another scream. “Oh yes,” whispered Lucerne, Master of the Word, all to himself. “Mallice has begun and soon they shall all be punished of the Word, and all Atone. Eldrene Wort, you would be proud of me!” He was laughing aloud when the guardmole came.
“Master....”
“I heard. Summon the senior guardmole. He will be ready. And Terce as well. Get him.”
Quickly the guardmole came with a companion and they waited hushed and silent.
Then Terce arrived, a little slower, a good deal older. They heard Mallice scream again.
“Mallice has begun,” said Lucerne calmly, moving not at all.
Terce was watchful, and silent.
“What would you say, Twelfth Keeper, if I told you that the pups she is about to pup were bastards all? Eh? What would you have me do?” Lucerne’s voice was cold, his eyes black, his fur glossy with night.
Terce said nothing.
“Well, Twelfth Keeper, father of this bitch, you shall hear what I shall do and we will know your loyalty then.”
“My loyalty is to the Master and the Word,” said Terce.
Lucerne laughed at this and, turning to the guardmoles, said, “Go to your prisoners. Take the moles Henbane and Harebell to the entrance of the tunnels where the sideem Mallice is held. Brook no argument with them, use force if need be. Do it now.”
Lucerne turned to Terce and loomed over him in a posture that was almost bullying, and certainly insolent.
“Come with me,” he said. It was an order, not a request.
“Yes, Master,” said Terce softly, and they went. But the eyes of Terce were not those of an abject mole, but of one who awaited his time.
The surface was chill and damp, the clouds above were lit up with the equinoctial moon, off below them down the slopes the Manifold, still full with the rain of the day before, flowed and roared in the gloom.
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