Bigfang subsided into sullen silence while Greypatch continued.
‘Cut up all those lengths of rope we used for grapnels, tie rocks to the ends, all wrapped in dead grass an’ soaked with lamp oil. That’ll make good fire-swingers. Now, we sneaks along that there ditch so’s those Redwallers don’t see us a-comin’. Then we gets out on the flatland, lights up our fire-swingers an’ twirls ’em an’ hurls ’em. Think of it, mates – a good fire-swinger has more range than any weapon, so they won’t be able to touch us with bows or lances or spears. We can stand around all season flingin’ fire into their precious Abbey, an’ they can’t do a thing about it. Sooner or later some part of the buildin’ will take flame. Haharr, then they’ll be ready to talk terms, or be roasted alive. Well, what d’ye say, shipmates?’
The scheme was not greeted too enthusiastically, but Greypatch worked upon them, painting pictures of the good life to come when they would be masters of Redwall. His eloquence finally won, and they set about making large numbers of fire-swingers.
Mid-morning at the Abbey found a repair crew clearing away the debris from the previous night’s battle. The front gates had been made good and piles of green branches and rubble stacked in front to prevent them being set alight again. Because the normal Abbey routine had been disturbed, a large late breakfast was being served upon the southern wallsteps. Friar Alder and his young assistant, Cockleburr, had made crusty country pasties, and these were being served with melted yellow cheese and rough hazelnut bread. There was new cider, strawberry cordial and a number of latticed pear and redberry tarts to follow. Bagg, Runn and Grubb were the heroes of the hour, regaled with outsize portions of everything as they related their feats of derring-do, embroidering and expanding as they pleased.
‘Hohurr, oi cloimed down ’ee roaps an’ foighted with they’ns awhoil, then oi clambers back oop an’ cuts a few more o’ they roaps.’
‘That’s true, I let some of ’em climb right over the top, ’cos I’m not afeared o’ searats, then I jabbed ’em in their bottoms with my big sharp knife, so they screamed an’ jumped back over the wall. Eek! they went. I’ll bet there’s a few sore be’inds ’mongst ’em today!’
‘As fer me, I went choppo choppo with my sharp knife, though I let some of ’em climb right up on the battlements so I could stand on Grubb’s shoulders an’ punch ’em in the nose. Puncho! Ain’t that right, Grubb me old warrior pal?’
‘Aye ’t were so. They was a-cryen an’ a-wailen. Oh mercy me, spare oi, they was moanen. Hurhurr, we’ns spared they aroight – more like splattered they all over t’ woodlands. Burrhurr, us’n’s the boys aroight.’
Friar Alder squinted vindictively at the heroic trio. ‘Yes, and you used my best vegetable knives to do it with. I think you must have been chopping stones with those knives. I’ve been up since an hour before dawn, trying to sharpen new edges on them.’
Ignoring the caustic remarks, Bagg and Runn propounded new ideas.
‘We could have a Dibbuns army, y’know.’
‘Good idea, mate. An’ we could fight lots of battles an’ all that.’
‘Aye, that’d show some o’these old fogies.’
‘Haha, we’d send them all t’ bed early.’
‘Burr, wi’ no supper or brakkist on the morrow.’
‘Heehee, I’d scrub ’em all be’ind their ears, twice a day.’
‘Hoo urr, oi’d spank a few o’ they, just fer nuthin’ ’t all!’
They froze at the sound of Sister Serena’s voice behind them.
‘Personally I’ve never spanked any creature for nothing at all. But I hear there were three of our Dibbuns missing from their beds in the dormitory last night. Sister Sage said that they were out on the east walltop, playing with Friar Alder’s sharp knives. Now, if I found out who they were I’d give them a real good hide-tanning for being naughty little creatures. But I don’t suppose you three would know who they were, would you?’
‘Us, er, phwaw, er, oh no, not us, Sister!’
‘We were in bed fast asleep, all night!’
‘Burr aye, a-snoren like hinfant ’ogs us’n’s wuz, marm!’
Saxtus was coming from the dormitory with a scroll he had been studying. As he crossed the Abbey lawn he witnessed a strange incident. A whooshing noise in the air caused him to look up. He saw what looked like a small comet of fire with a rope tail. It soared upwards, mounting high into the blue, then dropped towards earth, plummeting like a stone. The young mouse mentally charted its course and yelled aloud:
‘Sister Serena, look out!’
Saxtus was rushing towards the south steps as he shouted. Serena, not knowing what the alarm, was immediately did the thing closest to her dutiful instinct: she flung herself upon the three Dibbuns sitting on the lower step, shielding them with her body. Hurtling through the air, the blazing rock, bound around with oil-soaked grass, shattered on the step where Serena had been sitting. Friar Alder gasped with shock as a sliver of rock cut his face and a heap of burning material landed on his spotless white apron. Creatures disturbed from their meal dived for cover, beating at smouldering garments and ducking the flying shards of rock that ricocheted from the stone wallstairs.
Saxtus beat at Sister Serena’s habit. Luckily it was only scorched, and the Dibbuns she had protected were shocked but unharmed. Further over to the centre of the Abbey grounds, another fire-swinger shot out of the sky and burst on the winding gravel path, showering splintered rock and flame across the lawn. Saxtus, Flagg and the Abbot dashed about, roaring out warnings at the top of their lungs.
‘Under cover, everybeast. Quick!’
‘Inside the Abbey. Hurry!’
‘Get those Dibbuns inside!’
Saxtus and Flagg ran upstairs. Rufe Brush was already there. Notching an arrow to his bow, he aimed in the general direction of the grinning, jeering crew of searats standing on the flatlands around a fire. Rufe gritted his teeth, drawing the bowstring back to its limit.
‘Scum, I’ll wipe the smiles off your dirty faces!’
The arrow fell miserably short, causing further merriment among Greypatch and his crew. Saxtus, Flagg and Rufe stood watching as Deadglim dipped a fire-swinger into the fire; it flared up instantly. The searat began swinging it in clockwise circles alongside his body. Faster and faster it swung until it was like a blur of light. He let it go and off it sped like a rocket, out and upwards.
Flagg could only stand and watch as it whooshed by overhead. He followed its course. Luckily it shot straight into the Abbey pond, extinguishing with a splash and a hiss. The big otter took the bow and arrows from Rufe.
‘Here, matey. I’ll put one across their bows!’
Flagg was a powerful fully grown male otter. He drew back the shaft to its point and let fly at Greypatch.
Again the arrow fell woefully short. Flagg grabbed a spear and hurled it with all his considerable strength. It did not even go as far as the arrow. Saxtus tried his slingshot. It went further than either the spear or the arrow, but still not far enough. On the flatlands the searat crew howled their derision, dancing and jigging as they screamed out insults at the Redwallers.
‘Yah country bumpkins, what’s up? Can’t y’throw?’
‘Here, mousy, fire an arrow at me. Haharr!’
‘Couldn’t hit a crab in a pail. Hohoho!’
The three defenders watched helplessly as another fire-swinger came roaring over. This one had been thrown by Bigfang. It hit the partially finished belltower, setting light to the woodenframe scaffolding.
Saxtus hurried from the wall. ‘We’ll have to organize fire-fighting crews!’
‘Aye,’ Flagg agreed miserably. ‘Those things they’re chuckin’ have twice the range of any of our weaponry.’
It was mid-afternoon. The Dibbuns would normally have been playing outside, racing round the orchard, paddling at the pond’s edge, or frolicking on the lawns. Now they had to stay inside the Abbey building. It was a hot dusty afternoon and they were becoming fractious.
‘Wanna go ou’side. Gonna play inna pond!’
‘You come back here this instant, young squirrel!’
‘Oi wants to sit in ’ee orchar’. ’Tis wurm in yurr!’
‘You’d be a lot warmer if one of those flaming things hit you. Now lie down and take a nap. That’ll cool you off if you lie still.’
‘I’m lyin’ down, an’ I’m still roastin’. When’s teatime?’
‘Not for a while yet. Now be good!’
‘Burr, oi wantser be naughty, oi loiks ’aven a liddle naughty now ’n’ agin. ’Tis noice.’
A fire-swinger hit the main Abbey door with a loud crash, and the Dibbuns broke into startled squeaking. Mellus distributed candied chestnuts as she reassured them.
‘Hush now. It’s nothing. Saxtus and Flagg will deal with it.’
Greypatch tore at the roasted meat from the fire. Grinning wolfishly at Kybo, he winked.
‘This is the life, eh, messmate! A whole Abbey at our mercy an’ nobeast to stop us. Ahoy, Ranzo. Any more of these skylarks skylarkin’ round?’
Ranzo fitted an arrow to his bow, squinting upwards. ‘Leave it till evenin’ Cap’n, they start to come down then.’
The searat sprawled on the grass in the warm summer noon. ‘Aharr, this is a land of plenty, not like those cold northern isles.’ He stuck an apple on a stick and began toasting it.
Bigfang came to the fire to light another fire-swinger. Greypatch leaned close and whispered in his ear, ‘Brains, Bigfang. That’s what it takes – brains. You leave the thinkin’ to old Greypatch, matey. I’ll guarantee they’ll want to talk terms by this time tomorrow.’
Bigfang held his silence, determined not to rise to Greypatch’s bait. He would wait to settle their score.
Evening brought no change in the situation. The fire-swingers poured in with perilous regularity, each one coming from a different angle to land in an unexpected place, according to the mood of the searat that hurled it. Tired and red-eyed from fighting conflagrations which had sprung up all over the Abbey grounds, Saxtus and Flagg with their fire crews sat drinking cold mint tea, awaiting the next fire-swinger attack. Rufe Brush and his sentries on the west wall shouted warnings at the approach of each missile.
‘Hiyo the grounds, fire coming in high and north!’
They dashed over as the incendiary missile appeared at the north end, Sister Sage calling out, ‘It’s hit the north wall wicker gate. Quick!’ Stumbling and tripping in the dark, they reached the blaze and began beating the flames down with wet sacking and green boughs. It took a while to defeat the blaze as they were bone-weary and dog-tired.
‘Hiyo the grounds,’ Rufe Brush’s voice called out once more. ‘One coming in dead centre, right over me!’
The fire-fighters hitched up their habits and began dashing off in the direction of the main gateway. Saxtus tripped and fell flat. He rested a moment with his scorched face against the grass. A rapping sound caused the young mouse to look up. He gazed around in the darkness quizzically. There it was again. Saxtus stood up and investigated the noise further. It was coming from the wicker gate. Now there were voices.
‘Y’don’t suppose they’ve bally well gone to bed, wot?’
‘Hardly, old chap. After all, they are under invasion, y’know.’
‘Imagine sleepin’ through a fire-swinger attack. Whoohahahahooh!’
‘Please, Rosie, don’t laugh so dose to me poor old ear, it’s jolly well deafenin’. In fact, don’t gurgle at all if y’can help it, old gel. Just think happy thoughts, eh.’
‘Oh come off it, Clary you old bodger. If I didn’t have a good hoot now and again I’d prob’ly swell up an’ burst!’
‘Hmm, no such blinkin’ luck, wot?’
‘Oh, whoohahahahooh! You are a card, Brig Thyme.’
Saxtus unbolted the wicker door, searats didn’t laugh like that!
26
IN THE FADING eventide light the four travellers breasted the big hills to find themselves confronted by a breathtaking sight. A long rocky beach lay beneath them. Lapping up to the shore, the rippling waves broke in a dark blue cascade, glittering red as the setting sun caught the sea, turning it to an irridescent green midway, which faded to purply black on the horizon. The huge crimson half-circle sank slowly in the west, throwing up gold and umber shadows on the undersides of long cloud layers with cream tops. Dandin and Durry had never seen the great waters before. They stared at the magnificent spectacle, awestruck by the immensity of sky and sea.
Durry sat down on the hilltop, spreading his arms wide. ‘I’ve seen the Abbey pond and that stream wi’ the pikes a-swimmin’ in it, but this . . . ’tis too much fer one poor lad’s eyes to take all in.’
Dandin could add nothing to the truth in his friend’s simple words.
They descended to the shore and found that what looked like a rocky beach from above was a mass of tall stone outcrops which gave them the sensation of wandering through a maze-like canyon.
Tarquin glanced up at the huge blockform monoliths. ‘We’ll camp somewhere hereabouts for the night, wot?’
‘Ye’ll be washed away by the night tides if ye do!’
A fat old dormouse had appeared from nowhere. He stood smiling at them over the top of his quaint square eyeglasses. ‘My name’s Bobbo.’
Tarquin bowed with the old-fashioned elegance common to hares. ‘Pleasant evenin’, Bobbo. Allow me to introduce us . . .’
As Tarquin went through the formalities, Mariel quietly assessed their new acquaintance. The dormouse was quite old and plump; he carried a knobbly stick which he leaned heavily upon; his garb consisted of a faded velveteen longcoat, tied about the middle with tough dried seaweed; all in all a curious character. His homely eyes twinkled behind the glasses as he wagged his stick up at a towering rock dose by.
‘Weary travellers all, come ye up to my abode. Follow Bobbo, if ye please.’
He was such a friendly, harmless-looking old character that they followed, feeling instinctively that somehow they could trust him.
The dormouse’s house was a sizeable cave set high in the rock, and they made their way to it up natural ledges which formed a stairway in the stone.
A cheerful sea-coal fire illuminated Bobbo’s home, the walls were hung with home-made fishnets and odd shaped pieces of driftwood sculpted by sand and tide, rush mats scattered about served as seats, and delicious odours wafted from a black stockpot set on a tripod over the fire. Bobbo took a ladle and stirred the contents of the pot.
‘It’s only shrimp and sea-cabbage stew with a few turnips thrown in, but ye be welcome to share it.’
He issued them with deep scallop shells and bade them help themselves.
Durry nearly sat on a small yellow-throated newt, which scampered fearfully away to a ledge at the back of the cave. It sat watching them, eyes blinking, throat pulsating. Bobbo strained some of the cooked shrimp from the pot and placed it on the ledge beside the newt.
‘Take ye no heed to him, wayfarers. He fell from yon hilltops at high tide and was washed here by the seawaters. I named him Firl. Though he never speaks to me, he’s a grand listener, aren’t ye, Firl?’
The small newt blinked and began eating. Bobbo drew them each a drink of cloudy liquid from a gourd he kept hanging near the entrance, where night breezes kept it cool.
‘’Tis dandelion flower and wild-barley water. The plants grow plentiful on the hillside. Do ye like it?’
Durry took a long draught from his shell bowl. ‘By ’ecky! Most afreshin’. My old nuncle Gabe would dearly like t’ know how you brew this, Mr Bobbo. Would y’tell me how to make it?’
The dormouse added more sea-coal to his fire. ‘All in good time, Master Durry. ’Tis a long night and I’ve sat alone here many a season, longing for the sound of another voice. But first, let me tell you how I came to this place, then you can tell me all about yourselves and your long journeys from the good homes you left.’
Outside, the tide washed in through the rock cany
ons, swishing and hissing as it threw spray against the walls of sea-scoured stone. The wind made a hollow moaning dirge of its night passage through the flooded maze. High in the safety of the dormouse’s den the four travellers sat in comfort, listening to him. The high-toned singsong voice causing them to blink and nod around the fire as Bobbo’s uncomplicated tale unfolded.
‘Ah me, ’twas more seasons ago now than I do remember, a winter’s night, and there was I, chained to a galley bench in a searat ship. They had taken me captive when I was very young, do you see. I had no memory of parents, home or even my name; the galley bench was all I knew. Well now, didn’t an awful storm spring up, a fearful thing! Waves washed over the side and flooded the galleys where we poor wretches were chained to the oars, pulling until our backs were nigh broken, whipped, starved and ill-treated. Myself was chained next to a poor weak creature, a vole who just gave up life and died, right next to me, there on the galley bench. Listen now, for I tell you true, the master of this ship was a searat, the blackest-hearted scoundrel who ever stepped aboard ship – Gabool the Wild was his name!’
Mariel’s eyes came wide open, but she did not interrupt Bobbo, who by now was in full flow.
‘Ah well, there was I, chained to an oar and a dead creature, trying to pull my weight with the others as we battled against wave, storm and the slavedriver’s lash. Gabool came down into the galleys.
“Why isn’t that oar workin’?” says he. “Because one of ’em’s dead,” says the slavedriver. Then Gabool says; “The way that oar isn’t pullin’, it looks like they’re both dead. Throw ’em overboard an’ get two more in their place!” Now before I could call out, the slavemaster bashes me over the head and I’m in the sea, chained to the poor dead vole. What took place next I cannot be telling you for I must have passed out. But the chains and the body of my dead oar partner saved my life, as I awoke next morning, high up on these rocks where the tide had thrown the two of us. The body of the vole was caught in a crevice. Without him I would have been washed back into the sea again, for I was hanging in my chains by both paws, high up on top of this very rock, with the shore far below me. When I could muster the strength, I climbed up to my dead partner. His paws were so thin and wasted that I found little difficulty slipping the manacles and chains from them. Do you know, I often wish that he had lived, for then I would have had some creature to talk with. Be that as it may, ’twas in climbing down these rocks that I found this cave.
Mariel Of Redwall Page 22