Brian Jacques - Redwall #09 - Salamandastron

Dingeye and Thura headed south through Mossflower Woods. They had a good head start and made the most of it, knowing that once Brother Hal's body was discovered, together with the loss of the sword, pursuit by the creatures of Redwall would be inevitable. The forest was tall, green and silent, save for the rustle of leaves and trill of birdsong.

Dingeye had been forging ahead, slashing and chopping at fem and nettle with his newly acquired weapon. As midday drew near, Thura was lagging noticeably. His companion wiped the blade of the wondrous sword on his sleeve as he waited impatiently for him, calling back through the serried columns of treetrunks, "Move yerself, mucker. Cummon, stir yer stumps, stoatnose!"

Thura wiped his brow. Leaning against an oak, he breathed heavily. "I've got t' rest, Ding. Don't know wot's wrong wi' roe. I feels all done in. Must've been that bath they made me take."

Dingeye sneered and took a swipe at a passing butterfly with the sword, admiring the flashing green lights as its blade glinted in the sunlight filtering through the emerald canopy. "Gam! I got bathed, too, an' it didn't 'urt me. Now get yer paws a-movin', or I'll leave yer be'ind. 'Urry up!"

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Thura's face was an unhealthy grayish pallor, his limbs trembled and sweat beaded on his nosetip as he stumbled to keep up, calling out to his comrade, "Slow down, mucker. You wouldn't leave me 'ere ter be catchered by that lot from Redhall. 'Ere, carry the vittles an' I'll be able to get along a mite better."

"Carry vittles?" Dingeye pulled a lip and slashed moodily at a young rowan tree. "Huh, not likely. You took 'em, you carry 'em. I've got me paws full luggin' this 'ere sword around. Tell yer wot, though, we'll stop awhile an' 'ave lunch. That'll make less food ter carry."

Gratefully Thura let the sack of provisions drop as he collapsed in a heap at the edge of a small clearing. Dingeye immediately set about stuffing himself with honey, bread and nuts from the sack, ignoring Thura's pitiful state.

"Lissen, we can't stop 'ere too long, they'll be on our trail by now. Still, we've escaped before an' we c'n do it again. We'll stick to this forestit's better'n flatlands, more cover."

Thura curled into a ball, shivering uncontrollably, his teeth chattering and his tail quivering fitfully. Dingeye stopped eating and prodded him.

"Hah, yer wobblin' about like a baldy beetle there. Just look at yer, mucker. Wot's the matter?"

Thura's head went up and down as he stammered a reply. "S-s-sick! I-I-I'm s-s-sick, feel b-b-b-bad!"

Instinctively Dingeye drew away from him. "Is it a fever? 'Ave yer got a fever? Huh, you look awful!"

"H-h-h-elp me!" Thura stretched out a trembling paw.

Dingeye shouldered the sack. "Oh, come on then, I'll carry the vittles. But I'm not carryin' you, stoat. I don't wanna catch no fever." He took a few paces and looked back angrily at Thura curled up on the woodland floor. "Well, are yer comin' or aren't yer, 'cos I'm not 'angin' round 'ere waitin' for yer!"

Thura made no reply. Dingeye sniffed moodily. "All right then, you stop 'ere awhile till yer feelin' better. I won't go too fast so that y'can catch up with me."

Still receiving no reply from his companion, he set off into the forest, traveling south and slightly west, talking aloud to

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reassure himself. "Must be somethin' he's et, greedy oF toad. Prob'Iy catch me up ter night when 'e gets hungry again."

The trial of the two stoats was not difficult to follow. Samkim and Arula could see plainly the slashed and damaged vegetation which Dingeye had hacked at with the sword. Despite the urgency of their mission, neither of the two young ones could help noticing the beauty of Mossflower, draped in summer green and studded with small islands of color from flowering bush and shrub. Their paws made little or no sound as they padded along over the carpet of soft brown leaf loam. Samkim pointed ahead to where a strip of bark had been wantonly sliced from the trunk of a white willow, exposing the pale sapped wood beneath.

"Easy to see which way they went. Look at that." Arula nodded. "Urr, Foremole'd tan thurr 'ides for doen that to a livin' tree. Ho urr, they'm surely two nastybeasts." Samkim touched the trunk, noting the dampness of sap on his paw. "If we travel a little faster we may catch them up by late afternoon. They can't be too far ahead. Come on, Arula."

"No need to worry, young Redwallers, hen heh heh!" The thin reedy voice had come from nowhere. Samkim and Arula halted, staring at the leafy screen about them.

The voice spoke again. "Worry, hurry, that's all some creatures do. No time to live to a ripe old age. Look at meI can't count the summers I've seen and I'm fit as a flea. Heh heh heh!"

Samkim fitted an arrow to his bowstring. "Show yourself!" A bed of tall ferns stirred and a woodvole stepped into view. He was small and thin, dressed in a long smock of brown barkcloth, and his face was framed by the biggest white beard they had ever beheld on any creatureit fuzzed out like a cloud, and only his bright black eyes were visible through it. The woodvole laughed and cut a little caper. He was astonishingly agile for such an ancient creature.

"Heh heh heh! You can put the bow down. I'm not going to hurt you, Redwaller. How do I know you're a Redwaller?

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Easy! You talk with the accent of an Abbeydweller. I'm Fur-gle the Hermit. I live here all alonealways have done, can't stand the company of any creature for too long, prefer my own. I suppose you're tracking the two stoats who came by here earlier?''

"You'm seen 'em then, zurr?"

Furgle did an angry little dance around Arula. "Why can't moles ever learn to speak properly? Seen them! Of course I did, two evil smelly vermin, slashing away at my woods as if they owned them. You don't need to hurry to catch tho.-i two, though."

Samkim bowed politely to the hermit. "My name is Sam-kim. This is Arula. You are right, of coursewe are both from Redwall Abbey. Why do you say that we have no need to hurry?"

Furgle waited until Samkim had unnotched his arrow. "Because one of them is very ill. He won't go much further. I've never been ill a day in my life. Come on then, Redwallers. I'll go along with youI know Mossflower better than you ever will. By the oak and the ash, I'll give that stoat a piece of my mind when I meet him. How dare he go about chopping up my woodlands!"

Without further ado the woodvole set off. In a short while both Samkim and Arula were having difficulty keeping up with the energetic pace he set.

An hour's swift journey found them on the edge of a clearing.

Arula sighted Thura lying curled up. "Lookum o'er thurr. 'Ee must be the sick un!"

"Wait!" Furgle restrained them both from running over to Thura. "You can never tell with vermin. Give me an arrow, Samkim. We'll see if he's sick or shammingbetter careful than careless I always say, generally to myself though."

Furgle snapped the point from the arrow and tied a pad of leaves in its place, then returned it to Samkim. "Fire that at the creature, young squirrel."

Samkim shot the shaft perfectly. It thudded against Thura's back and bounced off onto the grass. The stoat made no move.

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"As I thought, he's finished." The hermit nodded knowingly.

The two young ones dashed over to the body. Furgle was right: Thura was freshly dead. Samkim rolled the stoat over. "Dead? I can't believe it. Only yesterday he was as lively as you or I."

"Humm, ee'm dead aroight. Deader'n 'ee black acorn." Arula scratched her head with a huge digging claw.

Furgle pulled them away from the body. "Don't get too closethat stoat died of some form of fever or ague. Well, it was nice meeting you, but now I must go about my business. If you are going to bury him then do it quickly, but try not to touch him. Er, sorry, there's some urgent business I must attend to. See you later. Goodbye."