The Sable Quean (Redwall)

by Brian Jacques

  Zwilt made his report. “As I was bringing the river rats back, I came across what looked like a small farm. These were the babes of the two hares who were working the land there. I slew the father and wounded the mother, but left her alive to tell the tale.”

  Vilaya’s manner changed, her voice became silky. “You did well, my faithful Zwilt. I see you are carrying a new blade. Show me—and the medallion, too.”

  Zwilt swept aside his cloak. “Majesty, there is nothing I could hide from one so keen as you.” He took the medallion from his neck, passing it over by the scarlet and black woven cord.

  The Sable Quean inspected it, reading the engraved word, Blademaster, noting the picture of a paw holding a sword aloft. “ ’Tis of little use to me. Blademaster, eh? Do you consider yourself a Blademaster, Zwilt?”

  The Shade drew the broadsword. He twirled it, allowing the lantern light to reflect along its length. “I was always the best with a broadsword, Majesty. Though only now do I truly feel like a Blademaster. My former weapon was nought but a crude lump of metal compared to this wonderful blade. Whoever forged this sword was an expert with steel. Look at the quality of it, the balance, the edge, the length. Truly wonderful!”

  Vilaya placed the cord over Zwilt’s blade, letting the medallion slide back down to him. “Keep the trinket. How will you use your new sword?”

  Zwilt saluted skilfully with the blade. “Only in the service of Vilaya, my Sable Quean!”

  She nodded. “Well spoke, Zwilt. You may go, but I will soon use you and the sword when I make my move.”

  BOOK TWO

  Go Find the Babes!

  10

  One thing was certain, the Flitcheye had never faced two battle-crazed Salamandastron hares before. It soon became clear that the furtive vermin had bitten off far more than they could chew. The Guosim shrews, headed by Jango Bigboat, were fearless. They waded into the ragged, prancing enemy with rage and vigour, yodelling, “Logalogalogaloooooog!”

  Not to be outdone, Oakheart Witherspyk seized a blazing log from the fire, laying about him like a madbeast, whilst being joined by the rest of his troupe. What they lacked in warrior’s skill they made up for in energy and enthusiasm—they invented their own war cries.

  “Haharr, strewth an’ have at ye, stinky vermin!”

  “Zounds an’ batter pudden, ye rascally snivellers!”

  “Raxilly snivvers!” (That was baby Dubdub’s contribution.)

  Diggs got to the truth of the matter when he walloped a loaded sling over a Flitcheye head. He shook his quarry like a rag doll, until all the trailing weeds, clinging vines, leaves and a barkcloth mask fell from the beast, exposing it for what it really was.

  Diggs shouted, “What’n the name o’ raggedy trousers is this? I say, you chaps, these cads are nought but runty little weasels. You impudent rogues, c’mere, tatty bum!”

  In a remarkably short time, the Flitcheye found themselves being soundly trounced by hares, shrews and hedgehogs. None of their assailants seemed the least scared of them. Even Trajidia found herself throttling one of them and declaiming, “For shame, you dreadful scruffy midget—trying to pass yourself off as an ambushing warrior, eh? Take that, you snotnosed impostor, and that, an’ that’n’that’n’that! Now, are you ready for another walloping?”

  Caught twixt the blazing campfire and the stream, the would-be ambushers found themselves severely punished. Their numbers were swelled when Sniffy and his band drove in the Flitcheye from the woodlands. These were the beasts who had been creating the noxious smoke.

  The travellers had battled so wildly that all the fight had been knocked out of their enemies. Surrender was total.

  The defeated vermin fell down, grovelling for mercy amidst agonised sobs.

  “Yowwwooooow! Spare us, kind gennelbeasts!”

  “Ye wouldn’t ’ave me kil’t, would ye, sirs? I gotta pore mother an’ ten liddle uns ter look arter!”

  Young Rambuculus pointed the pleader out to his sister. “Hah, ye could take lessons from that rascal, Trajidia!”

  Buckler restored order, bawling out in fine parade-ground manner, “Silence, you horrible lot! Next beast to make a sound gets slain forthwith. Now shut up!”

  This had the desired effect. The Flitcheye fell quiet, apart from the odd groan, sob or sniffle.

  Dymphnia Witherspyk glanced fearfully at Buckler. “What do you plan on doing with these unfortunate wretches?”

  Baby Dubdub echoed her—“Affortunate wrenches!”—and went back to sucking his paw.

  Diggs twirled his loaded sling nonchalantly. “Aye, thought up any blinkin’ dreadful fate yet, old lad?”

  Jango Bigboat interrupted, with the age-old solution: “Wipe ’em all out, mate. They’d have murdered us—aye, an’ not swiftly either. I’ve ’eard tales o’ Flitcheye deeds that don’t bear thinkin’ about. Right, Sniffy?”

  The Guosim scout tested the point of his rapier. “Right, Chief. The only good vermin’s a dead un!”

  Oakheart protested, “ ’Pon me spikes, sirrah, you don’t mean that we should slaughter them all? It’s unthinkable!”

  Oakheart’s mother, Crumfiss, a shrewd old hedgehog, looked to Buckler, who was obviously in command. “What’s your opinion, Longblade?”

  The young hare stared at the quivering, prostrate vermin. “I’m with Oakheart. It’s one thing slaying a foebeast in the heat of battle, but defeating ’em then killing the survivors isn’t right. That’d make us murderers, an’ no better than the Flitcheye. Where I come from, that sort o’ thing just ain’t done. It’s against any true warrior ’s code.”

  Jango nodded. “Ye may have a point there, Buck. But wot are ye goin’ t’do, eh? We can’t just turn ’em loose.”

  A sudden idea came to Buckler. “Give the Flitcheye a taste of their own medicine.”

  Rainbow, the only mole in the Witherspyk troupe, chuckled gruffly. “Ahurrhurr, you’m mean to make ee vurrmints sniffen they’m own narsty smoke, zurr?”

  Diggs backed his friend up to the hilt. “I say, what a super wheeze, Buck. Send the filthy blighters off for a jolly long snooze, wot. That’ll teach the little rotters. Hawhawhaw!”

  The plan seemed to catch the approval of everybeast, even Jango and Sniffy. Buckler set the scheme into action, calling out orders. “Take all their weapons and chuck ’em in the stream. Get them all out of those scary rags an’ face masks—burn the lot! Sniffy, scout along the streambank. See if you can spot a couple of willows near the edge. Jango, Oakie, get all their supplies of those herbs they use to create the knockout fumes!”

  It took a while, but finally everything was in position. Stripped of all their barbarous apparel, the Flitcheye were exposed for what they really were, a pathetic, primitive tribe of stunted weasels. They stood in sullen silence as Guosim logboat crewbeasts bound them securely, neck to neck, tail to tail and paw to paw.

  Both hares and the Witherspyks escorted the hobbling gang along the bank. Sniffy had chosen well. Three big weeping willows growing side by side spread their leafy canopy down to touch the stream current. To both sides and the rear of the willows, Jango and his Guosim were piling up mounds of dried brush, dead leaves and damp loam.

  The Flitcheye wailed and moaned as they were bound to the trunks and branches of the willows.

  “Ayaaaaah! No, no, please, sirs. Mercy!”

  Diggs wrinkled his nose at them. “Oh, stop blubberin’. A few days’ sleep an’ a bloomin’ big headache when ye wake should do you rotters the flippin’ world o’ good, wot, wot. Cheer up now, chaps!”

  The entire supply of the dreaded herbs was spread on the mounds. Jango was allowed the privilege of setting light to the fires. The Guosim Log a Log was in jovial spirits as he tossed lighted brands onto the heaps of combustibles, grinning from ear to ear.

  “Sweet dreams, ye stinkin’ villains! C’mon, now, all together, breathe deeply. . . . In an’ hold, an’ slowly out! There, that’s the style, an’ I hope ye’ll wake with a headache that’ll las
t ye a half season, ye scurvy vermin. Now, how does that feel, mateys?”

  Standing clear of the fumes, everybeast waded into the shallows to watch what would happen. The overhanging willows acted like an enveloping canopy, catching the smoke and holding it as it grew more dense. Dimly, they could see the Flitcheye being punished for their misdeeds. With eyes streaming, the vermin stood bound to the willows, some trying to hold their breath, others weeping and moaning as they slumped into a nightmarish pit of dreams.

  Buckler shouldered his blade. “Justice done, eh, Jango?”

  The Shrew Chieftain clasped his paw warmly. “Aye, done, an’ seen t’be done, matey!”

  Diggs winked at Sniffy. “Y’see, old scout, there’s more ways to skinnin’ a frog than feedin’ it ’til it bursts, wot. Come on, let’s go, but quietly, please—don’t want to disturb those chaps from their snooze!”

  The rest of the night passed uneventfully. They took a quick breakfast in the dawnlight and set off upstream with the flotilla of logboats and the raft. The woodlands were still enclosed in the gloomy green-tinged half-light as they turned off down the sidestream.

  The water was foul and stagnant, because it terminated, further up, in a dead end. Much to the relief of everybeast, the tree foliage thinned out, exposing blue sky and sunlight overhead.

  Log a Log Jango called a halt, whilst one of the Guosim produced an earthenware jar full of an evil-smelling unction.

  Diggs sniffed it and gagged. “Phwaw, what a bloomin’ pong! Is it some sort of secret weapon for chuckin’ at the blinkin’ enemy?”

  Taking a pawful, Sniffy began smearing it on his face. “This is shrewgoo, mate. Ain’t you ever ’eard of it? Lissen, we’re goin’ t’be sailin’ through all sorts of stingy insecks soon. Wasps’n’ornets, zingers’n’biters. The blighters’ll eat ye alive if’n you ain’t got shrewgoo on yore face.”

  Jango began daubing the stuff on his head. “Sniffy’s right. Those insecks don’t like the ole shrewgoo—they won’t bother ye if’n ye smear some on.”

  Taking the Guosims’ advice, all the travellers applied the anti-insect unction to their faces, though not with any great relish.

  Trajidia wailed pitifully, “Alas, this fair maid will never again smell like a dawn-dewed rose. Creatures will run a mile from me!”

  Auroria, Oakheart’s other daughter, leaned over the rail of the raft. “Whooohoops! I think I’m going t’be sick, dreadful pongy shrewgoo!”

  “Shooey pongroo!” was baby Dubdub’s comment.

  Diggs watched in horror as Buckler smeared his face. “Good grief, Buck! You ain’t actually puttin’ that confounded stuff on your han’some young fizzgog, wot? Keep it well away from me, chaps. I’d sooner put up with the jolly old zingers. Hah, I ain’t smellin’ like a mouldy old toad’s midden on a rainy day. Not me!”

  Jango’s wife, Furm, shook her head at Diggs. “We’ll see, my friend. We’ll see!”

  Though the trees had thinned out, the reeds, bulrushes and waterweed thickened up drastically. Travelling in single file, the logboats had to force a passage through for Streamlass.

  Then the insects struck. The still, hot air buzzed and thrummed as they attacked in myriads. Clouds of winged tormentors rose from the disturbed waters of the sidestream.

  Dymphnia, carrying baby Dubdub, urged her daughters, Furm, Crumfiss and the other ladies into the blockhouse on the raft. They slammed the door and let down the shutters. It worked rather well, so they lit a smoky fire, which poured out of the little chimney, giving some relief to the paddlers. Diggs was in a pitiful condition, his whole head, from eartips to throat, covered in angry swellings.

  Buckler assisted Jango to push him into the blockhouse, even though Diggs was protesting.

  “Ab aw bwight, chabs—lee me balone!”

  Jango hustled him roughly inside, calling to the ladies, “Take care o’ this young idjit. His mouth is so badly stung he can’t even talk proper!”

  It was midnoon before they lost the insects, owing to the tall trees closing in on them again.

  Buckler sat down on the raft deck, sighing with relief as he stared up into the green-tinged gloom. “I’d sooner face a vermin horde than have t’go through that again. We’d best go an’ see how our wounded warrior’s doing, eh, Oakie?”

  The irrepressible Diggs was surrounded by females dabbing him with soothing salves of dockleaf, sanicle and fox-glove. He gave them a lumpy smile, winking one swollen eyelid as he supped up warm vegetable soup through a hollow reed.

  “Hewwo, chapth. I bee alwight thoon, woth woth!”

  A shudder shook the raft as Jango called from outside, “That’s as far as we goes. Make fast all vessels, fore an’ aft. Sniffy, see everythin’ is well covered with branches’n’bush. Form up on the bankside. We’ll be movin’ out soon!”

  They sat on the banks of the cul-de-sac making their last meal that day. Buckler thanked Dymphnia and her daughters as he tucked into vegetable soup, a hazelnut bake and some cold plum duff.

  Trajidia fluttered her eyelashes furiously as she giggled. “Think nothing of it, sir. ’Tis the least we could do after the way you steered us through that pestilence!”

  Dymphnia chided her daughter. “Stop that outrageous flirting and get busy serving vittles to these hungry beasts!”

  “Vikkles to ’ungry beaks!” Dubdub echoed.

  Packing all they needed, the travellers set off at a leisurely pace into the woodlands. Jango walked up front with Buckler.

  “I don’t reckon we’ll make Redwall Abbey tonight. Still, no hurry—we’ll take brekkist in the Abbey tomorrow mornin’, if’n we gets an early start. Then we’ll talk to Abbess Marjoram an’ her elders about the problem of our young uns. I’m sure she’ll be able to ’elp us.”

  Buckler ducked an overhanging yew branch. “You seem to have confidence in Redwall an’ its creatures, Jango.”

  The Guosim Chieftain smiled. “Aye, an’ so would you, if you’d ever visited the Abbey afore, mate.”

  They trudged steadily onward. In his mind, Buckler was going over all that had happened to him and Diggs since they had left Salamandastron. Lord Brang was right, travel was an adventure, and there was more to come!

  Much more.

  11

  The two fox jailers, Thwip and Binta, usually struck fear into the hearts of their little prisoners at Althier. Wielding whip and rod, they would swagger about, snarling and threatening the young creatures, reducing them to quivering wrecks.

  However, this was not the case with the shrewmaid, Petunia Rosebud—or Flib, as she had named herself. The instant she was unbound from the spearhaft she had been carried on, she flew at her captors, attacking them savagely.

  “Ya scrinjee-gobbed babe robbers, git yer filfy paws off a me or I’ll rip yore ’eads off!”

  Thwip cracked his lash. “Hoho, a tough un, eh?”

  Binta came at Flib, swishing her cane. “Get in there with the others afore I beat the hide from yore back. . . . Eeeyah, she bit me!”

  The shrewmaid had her teeth into Binta’s ear. She hung on, growling like a wild beast. Thwip could not use his whip for fear of striking Binta. He grabbed Flib, trying to pry her loose from the other fox’s ear.

  “Right, I’m goin’ to teach ye a lesson yer won’t forget missy . . . gnnarrrrgh!”

  Two well-aimed kicks from Flib smashed into his mouth.

  “Yeeeh yeeh! Guards! ’Elp us . . . ’eeeeelp!”

  It took four other Ravagers to subdue Flib. Swiftly binding her paws, they managed to fling her into the gloomy holding cavern.

  Thwip held three broken teeth out to the guards. “Look wot she did ter me! That un’s crazy mad, I tell yer!”

  One of the guards passed Binta a pawful of dried moss. “Git that on yore lug, afore ye bleeds t’death.”

  The vixen could taste her own blood—it was running down the side of her muzzle. She spat out spitefully, “No vittles or drink for two days—that goes for ’em all! Maybe that’ll calm ’er down
, when the others see it’s ’er fault they ain’t gettin’ fed!”

  One of the guards, a stern-faced ferret, spoke. “That ain’t fer you t’say, Binta. Our orders come from the Sable Quean, not from you. Now go an’ get their grub ready.”

  Flib stared at her younger brother and sister in the badly lit cave. “Midda, Borti, wot are youse two doin’ in ’ere?”

  Borti began crying. Midda covered his mouth. “Shush, baby—look, it’s our big sister!”

  Flib was simmering with rage. She gnawed at the cord binding her paws, snapping at her younger sister, “Why’d ye let ’em capture Borti, eh?”

  Midda snapped back at her, “If I’d run off an’ left Borti, I might have got away. You were on yore own—why did you let ’em capture you?”

  Flib never answered. She bit away madly at her bonds, staring around at the pitiful groups of young beasts who cowered in the wall shadows. As she did, her temper became more unreasonable. She snarled at them, “Wot are yew lot starin’ at? Why don’t ye all try to escape, instead of jus’ mopin’ round?”

  Flandor, the young male otter, gave her the answer. “Right, we charge the vermin without a weapon twixt us. A pile of young uns, some who can just about toddle, an’ some with little uns to look after, like yore sister. Have ye got any more bright ideas, shrew?”

  Flib finished chewing through her bonds. She flung the cord away angrily. “No, riverdog—have yew?”

  Flandor dropped his voice. “I’m rackin’ my brain for a way out of here, but it ain’t that simple. Most of ’em in here are too hungry t’think of plans. They’re more worried about where their next meal is comin’ from an’ if it’s goin’ to be enough t’live on.”

  Tura the squirrelmaid sided with Flandor. “Aye, we heard the way you fought Thwip an’ Binta out there. Very brave of ye, I’m sure. But think about this—they’ll prob’ly stop our vittles as a punishment.”

  Even Midda was in agreement with Flandor and Tura. “Us older ones can stand a few days’ hunger, but what about these poor babes? There’s not just Borti. Infant mice, squirrels, hedgehogs, moles, even two little hares arrived just afore you did. How long d’ye think any of those can last without vittles?”