Chapter Twenty-Five

Skipper closed his eyes as he dropped another foot with his footpaws dangling from the wall. He heard Abbess Song's cry of pain from inside before he really started losing height. His friends must be getting dragged closer to the window.

"Skipper!" called Sister Bianca's voice from above him. "Are there any pawholds that you can reach?"

"No," he said. "Maybe the others can try to lower me back to the ledge and I can try to climb up on my own or wait for you below."

"That sounds like a great idea, Skipper," yelled Dippler's voice. "We'll start lowering you…."

The shrew's voice was cut off by a loud crash and screams from up above. Skipper plummeted downward, passing the ledge in a blur and dangling far out of range of the window.

Skipper could hear Sinon screaming for Song to cut the rope and Song weeping from up above.

"Song, we'll all get pulled out of the window if you don't cut him loose. Do you want him to kill us all?"

"I can't cut him loose! I can't send him to his death!"

Dippler yelled down to the otter. "Skipper, hang on mate. We'll figure out something," his voice cracked at the last word.

Right in front of him embedded in the wall, Skipper saw a rusty knife, stuck in the mortar between two bricks. He grabbed it and was able steady himself. He reached behind him onto his belt and pulled out a knife. That was a good idea – to make his own pawholds.

"I've got an idea, mates. I'm steady now and think I can get myself up. Cut me loose, Abbess. I'll see you soon."

"No!" came her cry from above him.

Skipper used his knife and free hand to cut the rope, while holding onto the old rusty knife with the other to steady himself. Now he was on his own.

When the others realized that he was no longer attached to the rope, they ran to the window and looked down as he pulled out his own knife from his belt and used the two to scale the wall. He swung himself up over the ledge and onto the floor and was promptly set upon by Song who was alternately whacking him with one of her sandals and hugging him tightly.

"Skipper. I've got half a mind to throw you out the window after all!" she scolded.

He only winked roguishly at her. Then he glanced around the attic for the first time. "This place is an utter mess! Look at all those ceiling beams strewn across the floor. It looks like a hurricane swept through this place or something."

Song just shook her head and walked toward the wreckage. Skipper's weight had pulled down the beam that the rope had been tossed over, causing a chain reaction. She heaved against a particularly large piece of seemed to be obscuring something interesting under it.

Skipper came over with Dippler and moved it for her. Sinon was looking around at some of the old armor and weapons in one corner. There was a particularly fine set of knives and sword ideal for a traveling warrior. The small knives were suspended across the scabbard of the sword. Sister Bianca looked at them with him talking about who they might have belonged to.

Dippler sat on top of a desk that they had uncovered under the debris and wiped a bit of sweat of his forehead. "This is a really beautiful piece of craftsmanship," he said.

"There's a pretty design of willows on the corners too," said Skipper.

Sister Bianca drifted over to them and then gasped out loud. "I don't believe it! It's Abbess Germaine's writing desk! This is priceless. It was crafted by Skipper Tungro and his holt for the Abbey along with the rest of their furniture. Would you look at the inlays around the edges! These are of Martin the Warrior by a creature who knew him personally! How amazing!"

Dippler jumped off the desk, looking horrified that he might have damaged it in some way. Skipper was looking at the piece reverently. Bianca pulled back the chair at the table. It was a beautiful chair upholstered with a depiction of a willow.

Skipper ran a paw along the beautiful inlays along the top depicting a mouse battling a Wildcat. "This is the only piece that Tungro himself made. It's said that he and his brother Folgrim made it together."

Skipper picked up a large book that was keeping the chair balanced because one of the front legs had broken off. He brushed dust off the cover and peered down at the title embossed on the leather. The Great Wildcat War: a War for an Independent Mossflower.

"Mother Abbess, please can we bring the desk down from the attic? I long to show it to all the creatures of Redwall. This is a piece of such historical significance," begged Bianca.

"Beg pardon, marm," said Skipper, "I'm not even sure how we will get down."

"We could lower it to the room where we climbed up from and then have the moles help us move it down from there," said Dippler. "The hardest part will be getting it down from the attic, we'll have to rig some sort of pulley system. It's a shame we don't have more squirrels at Redwall."

"Why don't we bring it down the way it came up," said Sinon. "How did the Redwallers bring it up here in the first place? And when? How was anything brought up to the attic?"

"The attics haven't been used in such a long time that it's fallen out of memory of how they were used in the first place. I think we should speak to Foremole first about moving the desk. It looks awfully heavy and delicate from age." Abbess Song reasoned. "We can take all the papers and books out of it first and come for the desk itself later."

Dippler pulled out the basket he had brought to put the manuscripts in and they started to empty the desk and put any and all interesting material into it.

"I can't wait to get my paws on this!" exclaimed Sister Bianca.

Sinon was keenly examining the carvings around the edges of the desk. "It's all pictures. Aren't there any words or poems?"

Sister Bianca put another book in the basket and looked over the desk. "That is curious. I'll have to examine it thoroughly when we get it down from here. I'm sure I have a book in the gatehouse about the furniture made by Holt Tungro. I'll have to read over it again."

"Holt Tungro. I've never heard of it before," said Sinon.

"I keep forgetting that you didn't grow up in the Abbey and hear all these stories from the time you were a dibbun. Holt Tungro were friends with the founders of Redwall. They didn't fight in the Wildcat War, because they were elsewhere during that period, but they were a great help to Martin and Germaine when they were building and furnishing the Abbey. Tungro's brother Folgrim even traveled with Martin the Warrior and Gonff the Mousethief and their companions to find the place of Martin's birth. He was a great friend to Martin and Gonff. I read in one of Germaine's memoirs that Folgrim was mad before he befriended the travelers, engaging in the worst kind of savagery– I can't even bear to describe it. However Gonff and Martin and his companions had a calming influence on him and for the rest of his days he lived in peace and free from madness in the Abbey."

"That's a remarkable story," said Sinon. "I'd very much like to see where it's written."

"You would!"

Skipper, Dippler and Song laughed at the two, not really believing that Sinon had very much interest in the subject.