A/N: Welcome again, lovelies! Thanks to all readers, reviewers, followers, etc. Happy reading! (...and reviewing...)

P.S. I mentioned in the original that Link is currently about 25-27, Martin is about 35, and Gonff is about 32.


Chapter Two: Awakening

Link moaned, coming alive under the touch of a cool cloth to his forehead. His mouth was dry, his tongue thick and heavy, and every rasping breath he took tickled the roughness of his throat. The rag graced his head again, bringing respite from the pain the plagued him. The cloth moved gently over his face, his neck, bathing his burning skin. A distant voice hummed distantly over him, a warm hand enveloping his own as he grasped about. The muffled voice transformed into a merry giggle, and he sought it, squeezing the hand, struggling to open his eyes. One eye broke open, then another, the picture a blur of soft earthy colors lacking shape and form. As the fog left Link's mind, and his vision cleared, the young warrior bit back a scream.

"What's the matter?" asked the mouse lady, retreating as Link leapt from the bed.

Link stared wide-eyed at the female, her ears slanted in confusion and large brown eyes wide with alarm. It had been a dream, a dream, all a corrupt dream, he had told himself. He was wrong. The mouse was clad in a green dress, of a fashion not too far different than that of Hylian women, but his fevered mind didn't hold onto that detail. No, it was her fur, her twitching nose, the dainty claws that touched her lips in shock, the tail that twitched beneath the dress that caught his attention.

"A mouse- a mouse… A talking mouse…" he stammered.

She narrowed her eyes at him, crossed her arms. "Of course I'm a mouse- and so are you! Why are you so startled?"

A mouse. No, no, no, he shook his head and tumbled off the bed, onto the floor, and scrambled to a tall looking glass that hung on the wall. Link stood with the wall's support, staring at the alien reflection. The blue eyes he sought out first, his own blue eyes that he had seen and known for the twenty-seven stolen years of his life. Nothing more could he recognize, from the golden fur that spread across his body, to the tail that twitched instinctively in terror, to the muzzle and the whiskers and the ears that were all so very human despite themselves. He reached a hand- a paw, he corrected, to the reflection of his shell-like ears; and with the other he touched the real thing, claws ghosting over the dangling blue earring.

"You must be delusional," the maiden murmured behind him, taking a furry arm gently, "lie back down. You've been in and out of consciousness for several days now. Let me fetch the Abbess- she'll know what to do with you."

Link allowed her to guide him, stumbling, back to the cot, his eyes fearfully wide and limbs trembling. The strength of terror was fading away, leaving him feeling hollow and weak. The mouse woman pushed him down to sit and slid from the room, and he was alone with his shock.

"Where am I?" His voice was small in the empty room.

He wasn't alone long before the door swung open again, the mouse woman from before now accompanied by a frail and ancient creature. He repeated his question, gazing up at the strangers with hollow eyes.

"You're in Redwall Abbey," the younger beast replied with pride,"it was just completed last summer."

An Abbey. Since when were mice capable of worship? Since when were mice capable of walking and talking? His mind grumbled.

"What is your name, child?" Asked the old mouse, putting a gnarled paw to his head.

"Link," he shrank under the paw, away from the creature that caressed him.

"A strange name for a strange mouse," quipped the younger, smiling at him. "My name's Columbine, and this is Abbess Germaine."

Talking mouse maidens, and abbeys with mousy abbesses, where was he? How had he come? The desert, he remembered it. He remembered wandering, searching vainly, searching, searching for what? The desert, with its shifting wastes and promises of death, and Epona struggling to climb the dunes, what had happened? The mice were speaking, but could not be heard above the roaring of indignant voices in his head that demanded to know how and why and where. The fear he had been living on settled into his heart, chilling him from within.

Are we dead?

Reality collapsed around his tense shoulders. Link stared unseeing into the eyes of the abbess and was lost.

"I'm dead," he whispered. All motion around him ceased. The kindly creatures bade him quiet and accept their ministrations, but he grabbed their paws and held them at arm's length. "I'm dead. I died in the desert…"

His chest heaved, the mice about him begged him to lie, no, to sit, as he stood and took a trembling step.

"He's panicking!" He heard, but failed to understand, was pushed back onto the bed to thrash and scream in his distress.

"Hold him down!"

"Get Martin!"

A weight dropped off his chest. How long had they been atop him? Link shuddered and threw the second away, blinded by fear and rage and bleak despair. Visions of monsters, of demon kings, and his own bitter downfall replaced the homey infirmary he was surrounded by. The young warrior saw flames in the corners, a beast in place of the harmless little abbess. He advanced, uncertain and afraid, mind collapsing under his burden of stress.

The door flew open. His advance was halted by the mouse warrior from before. The stranger's mouth moved, but Link was deaf to his words and rushed on him. Stars exploded behind Link's eyes when the older fighter slammed a sword hilt down over his skull, and hit his knees when the pommel sharply jabbed his stomach. The warriormouse might well have been Death for all the stoic judgement he bore down on Link. He struggled on the floor, was lifted carefully into the cot, and finally succumbed to the savage pain in his head.

"Are you alright, Mother Abbess?" Martin asked, helping the elderly creature to her paws.

Germaine nodded, grinning weakly through her fear. "I'm fine, Martin, but our friend has had more than his share of trouble."

"Our friend has almost overstayed his welcome," he would have continued but for the wrinkled paw that halted his thoughts.

"He was only frightened," Germaine mopped the sweating youth's brow, and bent to pick up a flask that had fallen to the ground during his panic attack. "He isn't the only one who reacts negatively to terror , you know."

Martin nodded, sheathed the sword he still held with a white knuckled grip, and watched his abbess trickle a pungent liquid from the flask and into the sick beast's slack jaws.

"I don't know what was wrong with him," Martin looked toward the doorway, where a worried a Columbine was wringing her paws. "He was fine when he woke- a little nervous, but fine. Then he starts muttering about talking mice and loses it!"

She took a few hesitant steps into the room, eased up to the bedside. "His name is Link."

"What else did he say?" Martin asked, observing the sleeping lad.

Columbine had summoned the courage to approach the mouse directly, and touched a tender paw to his still arm. "He murmured something about a desert…. Dying in a desert."

Martin frowned. He and Gonff had discovered the stranger on the River Moss, north of the abbey in Mossflower Woods. The desert stretched along the southwestern beach, leagues from the abbey; and the River Moss ran directly from the coast inland, a traveler's natural guide to the forest. Martin remembered the creature's swollen tongue, his pleas for water. The warriormouse gazed at the sick stranger with new intensity. He was several seasons Martin's junior, as many as ten or as few as five, and his gold-hued fur was marred with scars to rival the Champion's own. The fur about his neck and ears had been gritty- supposedly with sand from the banks of the river. Martin hadn't peered too close at Link's clothing, and with them washed and dried in the days since his arrival, it was too late to investigate.

"Martin?"

His eyes were drawn to Link's left paw.

"Martin, are you listening?"

Martin backed off a pace and palmed the hilt of his sword. Link's paw was glowing. Before the warrior could call attention to the supernatural occurrence, the golden glow faded, leaving behind a triangular glyph.

"Oh my, what a strange tattoo," remarked Columbine, following her friend's gaze. "Is there one on the other paw?"

The trio conducted a hasty search of the golden mouse, finding nothing more than grisly scars that impeded the growth of his fur. Germaine had been quiet since the violent incident, her eyes narrowed in thought. She pulled a blanket from Link's waist up under his chin, sparing him the indecency of waking up uncovered in little more than a night gown.

"Columbine, I would like you to recruit a few maids the help you care for this Link. Martin, show me everything that you and Gonff found on his person. I want to know the whole story. There's a mystery here, and you young creatures are going to help me solve it."


Germaine, Gonff, and Martin had retreated to the sanctity of the gatehouse, seated about a heavy oaken table strewn with Link's belongings, and the leftovers of a hasty snack. Martin slid the tray of oat scones away, clearing a place for the great blade that the foreign mouse had possessed. Its sheathe, an intricate object of black leather and burnished steel supports was removed carefully. The mice at the table marveled at the beauty of the blade, from the deep blue stone of its hilt to the deadly tip of the long, patterned steel.

"I've never seen such a metal," Martin murmured, tracing the intricate swirling patterns of dark and light that caressed the steel. He ran a callused thumb across the edge, and shivered at its keenness.

"And the glyph," Germaine was drawn to it, staring intently at the four triangles embossed in gold on the blue cross-piece.

Gonff lifted the weapon, grumbling about its weight and slid Link's shield into its place on the table.

"Do you know anything about the symbol, Abbess?" the rogue asked, tracing it where it appeared for a third time on the crest of the shield.

The old mouse ran a clawtip down the shield's surface; the metal had been scoured by desert sands, scratched and dented and beaten, but still the delicate painting was mostly unharmed, adding depth to the embossment. The same symbol, supported by a crimson eagle in a field of blue.

"There have been rumors, for several seasons now…." the males recognized the glint in her old eyes and waited patiently through her thoughtful pause. "But until we have more evidence, it would do little for us to gossip in here like frilly little maidens."

The males chuckled at her wit, but remained uneasy.

"The crest of his homeland, no doubt," Germaine still had a paw on the shield. "Was there anything else?"

Gonff shrugged, " there was little in his belt pouches of interest- a dagger, some foreign coins," he was digging through the pockets of his own belt, and produced a dainty blue object. "And this; a pretty ocarina. In much better shape than anything else of his."

Again, the glyph, engraved into the mouthpiece of the delicate instrument.

"I'm sensing a pattern here," Martin remarked dryly. "You think our friend has woken yet?"

"It would be a good time to ask some questions," stated the abbess, rising with creaking bones from her chair. "If my suspicions are correct, he will have much to tell us; allow me to find the document…"

The rest of her ramblings were to herself as she paced away, leaving the males to look at one another in confusion. They shrugged, knowing that whatever the wise old abbess might find would be beneficial to them, and set off themselves for the infirmary.