Redwall: Book Three

He was scathingly critical of the small hole that had been gouged into the side of the ditch, roundly cursing any creature who dared to complain of difficult obstacles.

A thin plaited climbing rope rubbed with beeswax made an excellent bowstring.

Constance would only grunt brusquely at anyone inquiring what the strange contraption was for; only she and the beaver needed to know that.

He secretly hoped that it would start raining heavily, then the rest of the army would recognize his exalted position when they were outside getting soaked, while he was snug and dry inside the tent.

The cat stared back at Matthias in disgust. Disdainfully it wiped a fastidious paw across its soiled tongue and spat as if trying to rid itself of a horrible taste.

The cat’s voice, though cultured, was a high reedy tenor.

The marmalade cat prodded him with an indolent paw. “Oh get up, you disgusting little beast! I know you’re not dead.”

“At least you seem to lead a peaceful life,” he said hopefully.
“Oh, spare me your platitudes, mouse,” Julian replied in a world-weary voice.

When I barred Snow from here we had a dreadful quarrel. Things were said that cannot be rescinded.

You might also mention that if they must come to my barn, would they please desist from arguing and fighting so much?

The walls were lined with all types of fur, shrew, mouse, vole, even rat. The skulls and bones of small creatures were hung up as macabre decorations.

Again the owl had difficulty in controlling his unbridled hilarity. “Ha ha ha! The nerve of him! All right, my little warrior! It’s a bet. Name your promises.”

Captain Snow shifted from one foot to the other, muttering huffily, “Me, in the wrong? Never. I won’t apologize to that cat! I refuse to!”

Matthias walked onwards, ignoring the cruel jibes of the owl, through the farmyard and across the grassland, not stopping until he arrived at the fringe of Mossflower Wood.

Matthias held up the stone and tried shouting above the mêlée.

The struggling creature pointed a paw to the north-east before wriggling from Matthias’s grasp to dive headlong into the fray.

They trekked through the trees, leaving Mossflower Wood far behind, across open ground, giving the farmhouse a carefully wide berth, breeching hawthorn hedges and spanning dried-out ditches, through several fields that lay fallow in the summer stillness.

Cupping her paws around her mouth she called in a ululating voice: “Logalogalogalogalog!”

Throughout the long afternoon, Matthias lay hidden at the base of a lilac bush. He was within calling distance of shrews secreted a short distance away, as they were of their neighbors farther along.

They followed the trail with Matthias and Log-a-Log in the lead. It twisted and turned tortuously, over small hillocks, through hedges and across fields.

One of his three plans had reached fruition a lot earlier than he had expected.

Matthias bravely tried to quell the panic that welled up inside him.

Across the jumble of banded coils Matthias thought he could catch a glimpse of the tapering tail.

Like a seasoned fighter, the young mouse chose to nominate the time and place of combat.

Boiling water cascaded down over his head in a hissing, steaming deluge. The force of the rushing water sent his body plummeting back down the hole.

With a cry of dismay the fleeing pair saw the blank wall ahead. They had run into a cul-de-sac!

Log-a-Log was completely hypnotized. Matthias, too, felt overcome by an immense lethargy.

There was an immediate spate of loud, frightened chatter from the regiment of Guerrilla Shrews.

Squire Julian Gingivere merely nodded, and addressed them in a regal but distant manner: “Good afternoon. Very clement weather for the time of year, don’t you think?”

“Not at all, my dear friend. It is I that must apologize to you. The whole incident was entirely due to my priggishness and lack of manners.”

The members of the horde watched the way he strode purposefully about. The old glint was back in his single eye. His orders were crisp and concise.

Around the embers of each campfire, bundles of grass and twigs had been wrapped in blankets. To the unsuspecting sentries on the wall the bundles looked like sleeping forms: they sensed nothing amiss.

“Shrewmouse help you. How many warrior him got?” Warbeak chimed.
“A full complement,” Log-a-Log answered. “About five hundred shrews.”

Mounting the dais which had been set up for his use, he swirled the sinister cloak about him and sat down in the Abbot’s chair.

With two rats flanking him, the Father Abbot stepped forward in a slow, dignified manner. Even clad in his nightwear he radiated calm and fortitude.

Frogblood sprang forward, brandishing a spear. Before he could raise it, the ancient sword flashed in the warrior’s grip and hewed him lifeless to the ground.

They battled across the green Abbey lawns, right through the center of the maelstrom of warring creatures.

The Joseph Bell tolled its last, huge knell.

Constance knelt to cradle her old friend’s head, and Matthias gently clasped the wrinkled careworn paw.

Winifred the otter, and the beaver, in company with that reprobate Ambrose Spike, are testing the quality of the October nutbrown ale.