‘But they did escape. No thanks to you, I caught them again. There’s no room in my band for blunderers, Wedgeback. You’ll have to go.’
Wedgeback’s eyes rolled wildly. ‘I’ll go, Slagar. I promise I’ll never come back again. Please don’t hurt me, just let me go.’
‘As you wish my friend. Goodbye!’
Slagar let go of the stoat, at the same time giving him a slight push. The luckless Wedgeback vanished over the edge of the heights with a scream of despair.
Dumbstruck at the horror of the callous killing he had just witnessed, Mattimeo shuddered. Turning his head aside, he clasped Tess and Cynthia, who buried their faces in his robe.
Slagar peered over the cliff edge at the broken carcass on the rocks below. Stonefleck joined him, his face still impassive as he pointed to a small group making their way through the foothills.
‘Look, fox, shrews. Do you know them?’
Slagar peered hard at the group. They were just arriving at the rope ladders. Momentarily they recoiled with horror at the sight of Wedgeback’s corpse. Cupping his paws round his muzzle, Slagar called down to them. ‘Who are you and what do you want?’
The answer came floating faintly up on the warm afternoon air. ‘I am Skan and these are my followers. I have information for Slagar.’
‘I am Slagar,’ the fox called back down. ‘Bring your friends up here, Skan. Use the rope ladders.’
While the shrews made their way up the cliff face, Slagar held a silent conference with his band. They nodded at his plan. The masked fox laughed quietly.
Skan and his followers were panting with exertion as they pulled themselves on to the plateau. At a signal from Slagar, the slavers pulled the rope ladders up.
While his followers sat about on the clifftop regaining their breath, Skan spoke to Slagar.
‘Whew! What a time we’ve had. We ran all the way, following your trail through the woods. We haven’t stopped or eaten a thing today. Listen, there’s a whole army coming after you: Log-a-Log and his shrews. They rescued Matthias and those others from the cave, dug ’em out. . . .’
Slagar was surprised. ‘What? You mean to tell me those Redwall creatures are still alive?’
Skan wiped sweat from his brow. ‘Phew! Oh yes, very much so. In fact, they’ve joined up with the Guosim, that’s the shrews you know, and together they’ve vowed to track you and your band down and slay the lot of you.’
The fox stroked his silken mask pensively. ‘Hmmm, well, that’s nothing new. There’s lots of creatures would like to slay me. By the teeth of hell! I thought I’d buried those Redwallers for good. But why should you dash all the way here to tell me this?’
‘Because I want my revenge on Log-a-Log and his stupid Guosim, and you can help me.’
‘Oh, I see,’ Slagar nodded. ‘You and your friends have broken away from the shrews due to some sort of bad blood, is that it?’
Skan narrowed his eyes. ‘Something like that, but that’s my worry, not yours. The thing is now for us to join together and defeat them. Together we can be a strong force.’
Slagar helped Skan up and put a friendly paw about his shoulders.
‘What a good idea, Skan. However, I have no need to fight with anybeast following us. See, the ladders have been pulled up. There’s no way we can be attacked, we’re completely safe up here.’
Skan looked angry and puzzled. ‘But what about me and my followers?’
Slagar chuckled. ‘Well, you can climb down and fight them yourself if you wish, or you can stay up here with us.’
The shrew was crestfallen. ‘I thought you’d want to fight them and be rid of them. I suppose we’ll have to stay here and join up with your band. We’re too few to face them alone.’
Slagar signalled to his crew and they began forming a semicircle around the shrews, who were standing with their backs to the cliff edge. The slavers were heavily armed. ‘Right, it’s a deal then, Skan,’ Slagar said. ‘We’ll let you join up with us. Not with my band, of course, but with my slave line.’
The fox suddenly grasped Skan in a headlock, relieving him of his short sword, which he held at the shrew’s neck. ‘Surrender your weapons, or he dies and you lot go over the edge!’
‘You traitor, you scum! We came here to warn you,’ Skan spluttered.
‘So you did,’ Slagar laughed scornfully. ‘You were prepared to sell your own kind out. Let me tell you, Skan, when it comes to double-dealing, there’s nobeast better at it than Slagar the Cruel. Chain ’em up!’
Weeping with frustration, the shrews were disarmed and chained to the slave line.
Reaching across, Auma pinned Skan to the ground with a hefty paw at his throat.
‘Give me the right answers, turncoat, or you’re dead. My father is Orlando the Axe, that mouse’s father is Matthias of Redwall, the squirrel has a mother named Jess and the young hedgehog there, his father’s name is Jabez. Are they alive and well?’
Skan gurgled and spluttered until Auma released him.
‘Yes, yes, they’re alive, and an old hare named Basil and a young otter too, though I didn’t get his name.’
Mattimeo and his friends laughed with delight and relief. Auma gave Skan a mighty pat on the head that completely stunned him.
‘Haha, they’re alive. Oh, I do feel better now!’
28
THE EVENING BELLS tolled out across the countryside at Redwall. It was a windless summer twilight; not a leaf stirred on branch or bough, the earth and grass were still warm from the hot afternoon. The Abbey dwellers ceased their daily tasks and went indoors for the evening meal. Mole cooks had baked a traditional tater-’n’turnip-’n’beetroot deeper’n’ever pie, there was fresh fruit and cream, mint wafers and cider. A garland of yellow flowers graced the table centre in honour of the season.
None of them knew that murder had been done that day.
When the sun was at its zenith, General Ironbeak and his raiders had flown up as high as they could, hovering on the high thermals far above Redwall, then they quietly plummeted down. Four by four they came, each bird entering under the high eaves from a different point. The General led the secret attack, swiftly and silently dealing death to the few old sparrows and late nestlings who were unable to fly. The dreadful deed was accomplished with quiet efficiency; Ironbeak and his birds were seasoned warriors.
Mangiz perched in the crossbeams next to his General while the rooks searched through the pitifully empty sparrow nests. One cackled harshly. Ironbeak swooped down and felled him with a savage peck.
‘Silence! The great redstone house is not yet ours. I do not want those creatures below to know we are here. Quickbill and his brothers will bring in food soon, when night falls. Until then you must all be still and make no noise.’
He flew back to perch with Mangiz, but the crow seemed somewhat disturbed. Ironbeak noticed his seer was not his usual self.
‘What is it, my Mangiz? Are you having more visions?’ he asked.
‘No, the strange thing is that my vision is clouded. The eye within my mind has been blurred since we came here today. Whatever I try to see becomes difficult. It is an earthcrawler, a mouse dressed strangely; he carries a sword and seems to bar all my visions.’
Ironbeak closed his eyes. ‘Do not worry, Mangiz. Maybe it is a good omen.’
Mangiz clacked his beak doubtfully. ‘We will see, my General.’
‘Come on. Oops a daisy! Up the stairs to bed with you, little Rollo.’
Mrs Churchmouse chased after baby Rollo, but he ducked beneath the table and began singing.
‘I wrestle a fish upon a dish,
Cut off his ’ead while he’s in bed,
an’ take a rat an’ make him dead,
for goooooood ooooooold cideeeeeeerrrrrrr!’
Sister May and Cornflower helped Mrs Churchmouse. They scrambled under the table and chased Rollo out into her waiting paws.
‘Gotcha, you little monster. Now off to bed with you.’
‘No no,
dowannago! Dowannagorrabed!’
‘Please, Rollo, be a good fellow. Tell you what, if I come up with Cornflower and Sister May and we sing songs, then will you go?’
Rollo chuckled until his little fat body shook. ‘Yep, yep. Singa singa song f’ Rollo.’
The three mouse ladies took the infant bankvole up to the dormitory on the floor above Great Hall, where he was dutifully put into a cot.
After several songs, Cornflower held a paw to her lips. ‘Ssshhh, he’s asleep. Come on, quietly now.’
Rollo opened one eye. He watched them tip-paw out. As soon as the door was closed, he pulled his nightshirt above his paws and scrambled out of the cot.
Halfway down the stairs, Sister May heard the dormitory door slam. ‘Mercy me, the little rogue has escaped. Quickly!’
They bounded back up the spiral staircase, reaching the landing in time to see Rollo climb another curving flight of stairs.
Cornflower stamped her paw down hard. ‘Back to bed, baby Rollo, this instant!’
Rollo turned and giggled, then he waved to them. Mrs Churchmouse heard a slight noise on the stairs above Rollo, and was about to call out to him. Suddenly a large raven poked its villainous black head round the spiral and seized Rollo by the nightshirt in its wicked beak.
The little bankvole screamed aloud as he was dragged backwards up the stairs.
Darkness had fallen when Matthias and his new-found army reached the foothills. They were forced to camp there for the night until morning light revealed their position. Shrew fires glimmered, and the chatter and noise of the argumentative little beasts made Matthias wish Log-a-Log had never offered the help of the Guosim. The warrior mouse sat alone on the brow of a small rise, then he was joined by Orlando and Jabez Stump.
The hedgehog nodded towards the cliffs rearing high overhead. ‘Puzzles me as to ’ow any creature ’ceptin’ a bird could get to the top of there. You’re sure they went this way?’
Basil Stag Hare sauntered up out of the darkness. ‘Sure? You could bet your summer spikes on it, old lad. They’ve scaled the bally heights all right, though how they did it beats me. One clue though, I’ve just stumbled over the carcass of one of those stoat fellers. Either he thought he could fly or he missed his paw hold. Ugh! Nearly put me off m’supper, it did.’
‘It must have been pretty grim to banish thoughts of food from your mind, Basil,’ Matthias chuckled. ‘The question is, how do we get up there tomorrow?’
Orlando tested his axe blade against his paw. ‘And when we do get up there, d’you think they’ll have laid some sort of trap? Maybe the fox is waiting until we’re halfway up to start hurling rocks and boulders down on us.’
‘That’s a chance we’ll have to take,’ Matthias shrugged, ‘though I don’t think Slagar knows we’re alive. He’ll probably press on to get his captives to their destination, wherever that is.’
The old hare squatted down beside Matthias. ‘I picked up the tracks of that young shrew Skan and his cronies this afternoon. They were making for this point well ahead of us. I think the bally old fox knows we’re still alive and kickin’, one way or another.’
The warrior mouse unbuckled his sword and lay down in the grass.
‘We’ll know tomorrow. Rest now.’
Mattimeo and his companions on the slave line were being driven hard and fast. Evidently there was to be little rest that night. Slagar and Stonefleck led the column. Before they set out, the masked fox had addressed them:
‘Tonight you must move swiftly and silently. I tell you this because there is no other way. Stonefleck here will guide us, he knows the paths to take. When we reach the forest, there is danger, so be silent, travel fast, and you will come out unharmed. Now get moving!’
It was difficult going. They were forced into a stumbling dogtrot; the chain manacles and the heavy slave line were a great handicap for the prisoners. Surprisingly, the slavers helped them all they could. Sam was baffled.
‘Matti, Tess, why haven’t they got the canes swinging? Usually we get beaten and bullied, but all of a sudden they’re being almost nice to us.’
Auma caught Tim as he stumbled. ‘They’re not shouting and yelling at us either. I’d say they look pretty frightened themselves.’
‘There’s a forest up ahead,’ Jube called back to them in a loud voice. ‘D’you suppose that has something to do with it?’
‘Please, don’t shout or you’ll get us all killed!’ Drynose the weasel guard had an almost pleading whine to his voice.
The forest, when they reached it, looked eerie and forlorn in the dim light. Old gnarled trees spread their knotted branches wide and low, there was little grass on the floor, and no flowers were to be seen anywhere. Mattimeo saw the withered and bleached skeleton of a rat dangling from a bough halfway up a tree, and there were other bones too, scattered here and there throughout the branches. The young mouse decided to keep quiet about them; no sense in panicking his friends, chained up as they were.
‘I’ve noticed those bones too,’ Auma whispered in his ear. ‘We’d best keep quiet. If anybeast gets attacked it’ll probably be us, who have no chance of making a run for it.’
Bending low to avoid hanging branches, they pushed onward as fast as possible, following Slagar and Stonefleck. Occasionally Mattimeo could hear guttural noises up in the trees, and now it seemed that everyone had spotted grisly remains hanging in the boughs, though no creature made mention of it.
Tess Churchmouse shuddered. She had never been in such a sinister place. Catching up with Mattimeo, she grasped the back of his robe and clutched it tight. The young mouse patted her paw in the darkness.
‘Don’t be frightened, Tess,’ he whispered. ‘We’ll make it. There’s nothing to be afraid of. Hold tight and look straight ahead.’
Tess was comforted by his quiet confidence.
Marching half the night, pawsore and exhausted, they carried on, driven by fear of the unknown. Stonefleck nudged Slagar. He pointed ahead to a break in the trees. The forest was thinning.
At that very moment, Browntooth the stoat, who was marching on the left flank of the slave line, received a sharp jab in the eye from an overhanging branch which Halftail had brushed to one side. The springy branch swished back into place just as the unfortunate stoat drew level with it. The spell of silence was broken by his screams.
‘Arrrgh! Owow! Me eye, me eye!’
Slagar broke into a fast sprint, shouting as he went, ‘Run for it, follow me, to the shore, to the shore!’
The slavers dashed off, leaving the captives to fend for themselves. They ran, tripping and stumbling, scrambling over their fallen comrades in an effort to get out of the woods.
‘Pick up the rope, keep in line, run as fast as you can,’ Mattimeo shouted to the slave line. ‘Help the others, if one of us falls we’re all done for!’
They went pell-mell, pulling their stumbling comrades up with the line as they ran, and the back runners were virtually dragged along. Suddenly the air was full of harsh cries, and a number of dark shapes descended upon them. It was a fierce onslaught on slaves and slavers alike. The screams of the injured echoed round in the forest. Auma felt sharp claws strike at her back. She bared her teeth, snapping at the thing that was attacking her.
‘Help, help! Eeee!’
Caught by several of the strange attackers, Skan the shrew began to rise into the air. He screamed and kicked for dear life. Tim and Mattimeo felt the slaveline straining and dragging them back as Skan was pulled upwards. Auma turned and grasped the rope in her teeth. Aided by Tim and Mattimeo, she tugged sharply. Skan fell to earth with a bump, but even this quick action had not saved him.
Rushing from the forest, they found themselves on the broad shores of a wide river, it glimmered and waved in the starlight. Slagar stood by a trench covered with boughs urging them on.
‘Come on, in here, hurry!’
Gratefully they threw themselves under its protection. Most of the slavers had already arrived, and they sat
shivering and breathless. Slagar was the last to enter. ‘Scringe, Vitch, cover each end of this trench,’ he ordered. ‘Keep yourselves awake, and keep an eye on those woods. Threeclaws, did all the slaves make it?’
‘All except Skan the shrew. He’s had it, Chief.’
‘Then unchain him and sling his worthless hide out. What about you lot, are you all right? Anybeast missing, Halftail?’
‘Two of ours, Chief; Browntooth and Badrag. I saw ’em go meself. It was ’orrible, screamin’ an’ kickin’ they were. By the daw! What are those things that attacked us?’
Stonefleck squatted impassively. ‘The painted ones,’ he said, his voice flat and matter of fact.
Slagar moved aside as two slavers carried the dead Skan out. ‘Look at that, a good slave lost to those devils out there. It’s just as well Browntooth got taken. I’d gut him myself if he was here, screaming and yelling like that.’
Auma rubbed a paw across her bleeding back. ‘Painted ones, I’ve never heard of them before.’
‘Quiet back there!’
Slagar paced the slave line. ‘You lot can have a long rest. It’s too late to cross the river now, we’ll have to wait until tomorrow night. Right, Stonefleck?’
The rat strung his bow. Selecting an arrow from his quiver, he poked it through a gap in the boughs which covered the trench and fired straight up into the night sky. The arrow gave a shrieking whistle as it sped upward.
There was a moment’s silence, then an answering whistle from an arrow fired on the other side of the river. Stonefleck unstrung his bow.
‘Tommorrow night, Slagar, my rats will be waiting.’
29
Mattimeo (Redwall) Page 18