Part 12 (1/2)
Rawnblade allowed himself a fleeting smile. ”Thank you, Clary. Move your patrol out whenever you wish.”
The badger Lord watched them go from his high window. The three hares swiftly bounded across the beach, sometimes skipping in and out of the small wavelets at the water's edge. Rawnblade turned back to his forge and quenched a red-hot spearhead in water. He remembered, long seasons back, three similar hares, young carefree fighters, their bodies washed up on the tideline after Gabool's searats had finished with them.
Rawnblade set the spearhead on the anvil and began beating it with mighty blows. His heavy hammer rose and fell; sweat mixed with tears and sizzled into the 134.
embers of the forges as the ruler of the fire mountain renewed his vow.
”I cannot leave my mountain and these sh.o.r.es undefended, but one day, Gabool, one day you will sail back to here and I will be waiting. Oho, Gabool, all the seas of the world cannot keep us apart -it is written that we will meet again. We will meet! We will meet! We will meet!”
Rawnblade repeated the phrase over and over with each hammer blow upon the spearhead, releasing his pent-up frustrations. When he finally stopped, the spearblade had been battered to four times its size and was thin as a leaf!
From the western flatlands fronting the Abbey, a chorus of larks wakened Mariel. She stood stretching and rubbing her eyes for a brief moment until realization hit her-it was almost an hour after dawn. The mousemaid slung Gullwhacker around her neck and opened the door carefully, listening for familiar sounds of Abbey bustle. Thankfully she noted silence from outside and inside the building. Stealing quietly down the corridor, Mariel could not help a slight sense of bewilderment. Usually Redwall was alive and humming by this time. Tip-pawing through Great Hall, she retrieved the knapsack of supplies she had hidden behind a column before supper. Thanking her lucky stars, she dashed across the lawn toward a small wicker gate in the north wall and unbolted it. Taking one last backward look at the sleeping Abbey, the mousemaid sniffed, wiped her eyes, took a deep breath and left Redwall with its happy memories behind her.
Flatlands to the left, woodlands to the right, Mariel strode the brown dusty path that wound northward. Early dew was drying from the lea already; it was going to be a hot day. She stayed on the side of the path where Mossflower provided treeshade. Strange that the Redwallers should sleep so late, she thought. Still, it 135.
was far better, in a way. Mariel had been dreading any long tearful farewells; it would be far easier this way, even though she felt rather guilty, stealing off like a thief in the early dawn. ”I, Mariel,” the mousemaid called aloud to Mossflower country, ”swear by this honorable weapon known as the Gullwhacker that one day I will return to Redwall Abbey and all my true friends and dear companions I leave there. Always providing that I live through the dangers of the task ahead of me, that is. Oh, and providing of course that I can find the way back. No, that's nonsense-I'd find my way back if I had only one leg and the snows were as high as the treetops. But what if I'm slain or I fail in my quest? Well, in that case I solemnly swear that my spirit will find its way back to Redwall Abbey. There! That's that. I feel much better now, even hungry enough for a spot of breakfast.”
Without stopping her march, she munched bread and cheese from the knapsack. A stroke of luck provided a gnarled apple tree hanging its boughs low over the path, so she plucked an early russet apple and bit into it, noting her find as a lucky omen for the journey ahead.
Woodpigeons cooed within the dimness of woodland depths, bees hummed and gra.s.shoppers chafed out on the sunlit flatlands. Mariel began skipping, twirling Gullwhacker at her side, suddenly filled with a sense of freedom and adventure. What better than to travel alone, eat when you please, rest when you feel the need, camp by your own little fire at night and sleep snug in some forest glade! The feeling flooded through her with such force that it made her light-headed, and she began singing aloud an old playsong, known to mice everywhere.
”The winter O, the winter O, With cold and dark and driving snow, O not for me the winter O, 136.
My friend I tell you so.
In spring the winds do sport and play, And rain can teem down anyday, While autumn oft is misty gray, My friend hear what I say.
When summer sunlight comes each morn, The birds sing sweet each golden dawn, And flow'rs get kissed by every bee, While shady stands the tree.
The summer O, the summer O, Amid its golden peace I go, From noon to lazy evening glow.
My friend I told you so.”
Mariel held the final note, leaping high in the air and twirling. She came down on the far side of the path, stumbled and fell. Rolling over, the mousemaid slipped down the side of the ditch bordering the flatlands.
”Tut tut, dearie me-leapin' mice, what next? Though I must say, old gel, you held that last note gracefully. Hon Rosie couldn't have done better. Bear in mind, though, she wouldn't have dived nose first into the ditch. Not the done sort o' thing for young fillies. Wot?”
Tarquin lent a paw to pull Mariel from the ditch. She was completely taken aback at the appearance of the hare.
”Where did you come from, Tarquin? I never even heard you following me.”
Tarquin L. Woodsorrel adopted a pose of comical outrage. ”Following? Did I hear you say following, marm? Boggle me ears, I wasn't followin' you, snub-nose, I was right alongside you, mousy miss. Oh yes, seasons of trainin' y'know. Camouflage an' all that- dodge an' bob, duck an' weave, disguises too. D'you want to see me become a daisy or a bally b.u.t.tercup?”
Mariel was smiling as she dusted herself off on the pathside, but she chided the garrulous hare.
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”Very clever, Tarquin, but you can't come with melt's far too dangerous.”
Tarquin adjusted the fastenings of an oversized haversack filled to bursting with food. ”Balderdash, young 'un. Absolute piffle and gillyswoggle! I'm goin' my own way, just keepin' you company on the road to see you don't practice any more ditch divin'. Come on, step out lively now, leftrightleftrightleitright an' all that.”
Mariel kept pace with him, jogging to match his lanky stride. ”Well, as long as you know you can't come all the way with me ... but why are we walking so fast?”
Tarquin kept on, pawing it out at the double. ”Goin' to be late for lunch if we don't move smartly. Come on now, keep up.”
It was about lunchtime that they rounded a bend in the path to find Dandin awaiting them with a wild summer salad he had gathered to garnish the bread and cheese, together with a flask of elderberry cordial he was cooling beneath an overhanging willow. The young mouse waved to them.
”Hi there. Good job you made it- another moment or two and I was going to start without you.”
Mariel placed her paws on her hips, chin jutting out angrily. ”What in the name of fur are you doing here?”
Dandin smiled disarmingly. ”Oh, it's all a bit of a mystery really.”
The mousemaid turned on Tarquin. ”And you, how did you know he was here, you great lolloping flopear? It's a plot, that's what it is. You set this up between you!”
Tarquin sprawled on the gra.s.s and began constructing a giant cheese and salad sandwich. ”Steady on there, missy, I was waitin' outside the north wicker gate for you to appear right through the bally night. Then about an hour before dawn young Dandin here pops out, so I merely told him to get a move on an'
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we'd meet him further up the road for a spot of lunch. Rather civilized, don't y'think?”
Mariel was fuming with temper, but she plumped herself down and began eating because the walk had given her an appet.i.te. Through mouthfuls of food she berated the smiling duo.
”You can wipe those silly smiles off your whiskers. You are not coming with me, either of you. Is that crystal clear?”
They both munched away, smiling and winking at each other as they nodded agreement with the furious mousemaid.
When lunch was finished Dandin repacked his knapsack and thrust the marvelous scabbarded sword into his cord girdle.
”Rightyo, Tarkers. Let's get moving. I wonder if this pretty mousemaid is going our way. D'you think she'd like to walk with us?”
”Doubtless, old lad. We'll string along with her a piece. D'y'know, she's an excellent ditch diver-you should've seen her this mornin', looped the loop graceful as y'please, straight into the jolly old ditch on her snout.”
Stone-faced and in high dudgeon, Mariel marched on between them.
Tarquin and Dandin made perilously light of the situation.
”I say, Mr. Woodsorrel, that's a strange noise those gra.s.shoppers are making.”
”Not the confounded gra.s.shoppers, laddie buck. Sounds like some wild creature nearby grindin' their teeth.”
”Hmm, not very good for the old molars, that. Temper, temper! . . . Look out, she's swinging that knotty rope thing.”
By midafternoon Mariel had simmered down somewhat. She even let slip the odd smile or giggle at the 139.
antics of her comical traveling companions, and at one point deigned to talk to them.
”It's getting very hot. What do you say we take a rest in the shade, have a snack and then push on until dark?”
The suggestion was well received. They flopped down gratefully with their backs against a tree-topped oak. When they had eaten, all three napped for a while, but the long summer day took its toll; what was meant to be a short rest for hot dusty eyes turned into quite a lengthy sleep.