Brian Jacques - Redwall #09 - Salamandastron

The King of the toads wobbled and hopped through the swamps. Toad warriors less ponderous than himself passed him on both sides as they fled from the wrath of the Guosssom fighters.

"Krrruk! Worms, deserters, come back and help your King!" Glagweb spat at the toads. Chancing a look back, he saw Mara coming after him. The Toadking's throat bulged with terror as he tried to go faster. The badger maid was a frightening sight, her eyes red with rage, foam flecking her jaws as she hurtled forward regardless of brush or sapling. Glagweb froze with horror, the strength draining from his flabby limbs as the young badger threw herself through the air and pounced upon him.

The Log-a-log and several of his crew came dashing up as Mara lifted Glagweb from the ground bodily, both her paws locked around his throat. He dangled helplessly, croaking feebly as his legs tried to reach the ground.

Mara found herself suddenly borne down beneath the weight of half a dozen shrews. Blinded by her warlike badger

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spirit, she turned to fight with them as her prisoner was wrested out of her grasp. Log-a-log's rapier touched her throat.

"Be still, young badger. Leave this one to us. He is our longtime enemy, and we will deal with him. Come and watch!"

The toad camp had been destroyed, and those who had not fled were slain. Pikkle, Nordo and the others were hauled up out of the pit. Shrew warriors gathered round the pit edge as Glagweb was dragged forward. He snarled and spat at all about him. Log-a-log took little notice of Glagweb's anger as he unceremoniously kicked the Toadking down into the pit. Two shrews nearby loosed the mouth of a sack and something flashed down to join the toad in the pit. The shrew leader smiled.

"So then, Toadking, you end up in your own pitthe same pit that you kept my shrews in so that you could eat them. Other creatures are flesh-eaters too. Take, for instance, the pike that has just been thrown in there with you. He is only half-grown, but fierce. Why don't you try to eat him, Glagweb? Once he is hungry enough he is going to try to eat you. I call that justice, Toadkingeat or be eaten. Goodbye."

Glagweb recoiled to the side of the pit, trying to avoid the ominous dorsal fin that stuck out of the muddy water as the pike cruised the pit bottom. Looking for food.

Farther down from the toad camp lay the South Stream. Moored on the bank were fifteen huge logs, each one hollowed into a long dugout. The shrews sat in pairs along the length of each log; Mara and Pikkle were seated in the prow of the leading log with Nordo and his father. The dugouts pushed out from the bank and the shrews paddled them out into the center of the broad stream which meandered to the southeast.

"Where are you from, Mara?" Log-a-log questioned Mara as they rode the stream.

"From the mountain called Salamandastron, sir. Do you

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know how we can get back to there?"

The shrew nodded. "It is a long journey, but I know the way. I am Log-a-log of all these waters. The South Stream has many tributaries, and I know them all like the back of my paw. I will take you to the mountain, but first you must come with me. I have other plans for you at the moment."

Pikkle smiled coyly. "Other plans, eh? Give us a hint, Log-a-thing."

The grim expression on Log-a-log's face wilted Pikkle. He turned aside muttering, "Hmph. Only asked. No harm in jolly well askin', is there? Wonder what shrew tucker tastes like. I could eat a toad."

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Dingeye got over the loss of his comrade Thura with surprising speed. At first he had grown nostalgic and even wept a bit, but then he remembered how stupid and insulting Thura could be, all the times Thura had stolen food from him, and the arguments that invariably ended up in fighting. As he traveled south and west under the canopy of Mossflower, Dingeye reconciled and justified himself aloud to the lonely thicknesses of the silent green forest.

"Yah, serves 'im right. Anyhow, maybe Thura's got better and gone off on his own. That stoat never really liked me,'e weren't no proper mucker. Bad luck to him, I says. Besides all that, who needs a mucker wi' a sword like this'n?"

He swung the fabulous blade and chopped off an overhanging branch. It fell, tangling his paws and tripping him. Growling curses, he slashed and hacked at the offending branch.

"Yowhoo! Yaha! Owch, that 'urt!"

Dingeye's clumsy attack on the harmless foliage had caused him to wound himself on the left footpaw with the razor-keen sword. He dropped the weapon and sat rocking back and forth as he tried to bend double and lick his injured limb.

"Urgh! That'll be Thura, wherever 'e is, wishin' bad luck

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on me, 'is old mucker who never did 'im any wrong nor wished him ill, not once. That Thura was allus a nasty one!"

Casting about, he found a large dockleaf and improvised a dressing for the paw. Staunching the blood with a pawful of leaf mold, he bound the lot with a thin weed stem. Using the sword as a walking stick, he set off again, gnawing on a wrinkled apple and feeling sorry for himself.

"Just fancy, bein' wished bad fortune by me mucker who's deserted me. Life's *ard an' cruel fer a pore stoat who's all alone an' wounded."

Samkim and Arula had also encountered an unlucky setback. Tracking steadily, the pair were making good progress when they came to an area that Dingeye had not chopped at with his sword. Casting about this way and that, they hunted for signs that would help them to pick up the stoat's trail. Arula rummaged about in a yew thicket until Samkim gave an excited shout:

"Over here, Arula. Look, blood!"

The young mole scurried across to find her friend sitting among a heap of slashed twigs and branches. He pointed to the scarlet stains on the leaves.

"He's been here, all right. See the stoat pawprintswho else could it be? I suspect this is his blood too. Yes, Dingeye's passed this way. What d'you think?"

Arula turned the leaves over with heavy digging claws. "Yurr, so 'e 'as. Oi wunner wot yon stoater wurr a-bleedin' for, Sanken?"

The young squirrel wiped his paws on the ground. "Who .knows? Dingeye can't be too far ahead now, though. What d'you say we rest here awhile and have a meal, then we can put on a good forced march and catch him up?"

Arula agreed readily at the mention of food. "Ho urr, gudd idea. Oi'm fair famishered. But us'ns sit o'er thurr, away from -all this stoater bludd."

They sat in a sunlit patch between a lilac clump and a ythicket of lupins. Samkim allowed Arula to choose the fare. |.She unpacked strawberry jam turnovers and blackcurrant cor-

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dial from the haversacks. Spreading a napkin, she laid the food out. "Thurr, that do look noice."

First one wasp came. It settled on Samkim's turnover until he brushed it away. Soon there were several wasps trying to light on the sweet jammy turnovers. Others buzzed and hummed around the little flask of cordial. Arula flicked one of the insects as it went for the jam around her mouth. "Gur-roff, 'ee pesky wosper!"

The wasp attacked and stung her.

"Burrhoo! 'Ee wosper stungen oi!"

Samkim flailed about at the wasps with his bow, thwacking about as he punctuated each swing with angry words. "Go away, little nuisances! Be off with youscoot!"

Unwittingly the bow whipped into the lupins, demolishing the wasp nest that was built in the forks of three stems. In a trice the air was filled with maddened wasps. They hummed and buzzed about the young ones' heads in a maddened frenzy. The two friends leapt up, beating frantically at the stinging cloud of insects.

"Quick, run for it before we're stung to death!"

"Whoohurr, they'm all o'er the place. Leave oi alone, wos-pers!"