8. Redwall: The New Name.
Twenty eight seasons ago
Snowpaw remembered little of what happened after the fight, and what he did remember was jumbled. When he came back to his senses, he was lying on his stomach, under a heavy, warm blanket, and judging by dim light, illuminating his room through the mica window, it was early morning. He tried to move weakly and regretted the idea – pain that flashed along his neck and upper back felt as if somebeast flayed those parts.
"You should not move, if you don't need to. Do you want something to drink? To eat?"
The voice was very familiar to Smalltooth, and the ermine immediately turned his head to look at the speaker, ignoring all the agony. "Ewalt! You're alive and back!"
The mouse, who was apparently sleeping in a big, comfy chair next to Snowpaw's bed, if the blanket and the warm robe were any indication, but instantly woke up as soon as Snowpaw moved, shrugged. "Since yesterday. I guess I had my turn to worry. But now you will be all right."
"And Foxfur?"
"Hide slashed in a couple of places, she will heal just fine. But…"
"Good to know. You know, she spoke to me. She is not mute after all!"
Ewalt responded without certainty in his voice. "Yes, she started to speak. But Reed told me she had a fit for half a day after the attack, and tried to wash blood out of her fur until she almost scrubbed fur itself off her paws. They had to feed her half the soothing herbs in the Infirmary, before she finally fell asleep."
"I need to talk with her."
"You need to rest quietly, unless you want your wounds to open. I'd bring her here if I find her in her right mind today."
Snowpaw signed very quietly. "And what happened to you Ewalt? Why you were away for so long? Are your companions fine?"
"All alive, and not that much worse for the wear," Ewalt shrugged. "There is something foul brewing to the south. Cubs are disappearing without a trace in some places. Things like that happen from time to time, of course, but they should not happen this often. Beasts, both woodlanders, and… well, vermin, are growing restless, blaming and fighting each other more than before. We barely escaped from a rat tribe that allowed Abbeydwellers to visit before. I'm not a beast prone to acting on suspicion and instinct alone, but I don't believe that all is just a string of coincidences. There must be a villain behind all this, perhaps the very villain we're searching for, and I thought I found a trail that might lead us somewhere. But I was wrong. I'm sorry for making you and others worry so much. I'm sorry…"
"If you try to blame yourself for what the big owl did, I'd bite you as soon as I can move!"
"No, no, perish the thought." Snowpaw was not sure, but for a moment it almost seemed as if Ewalt smiled.
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Foxfur came to visit Snowpaw late that day. She looked shy and nervous, a bearing quite unfitting for the creature of her size. Her neck and left shoulder were bandaged.
"So, how are you feeling?" the ermine asked.
Foxfur made a helpless gesture, then produced a strange, coughing sound, and finally spoke: "F-fine."
"Don't speak if that's difficult. I just wanted to thank you for saving my life, Foxfur. I know what a peaceful creature you are. I'm… I just want you to know that I know how much you did for my sake. Oh, look, I'm babbling. Look, I just want you to know that you did the right thing, okay? And that I'm really glad you finally can speak, too."
Foxfur sat on the edge of Snowpaw's bed and put her large paw over his. "Thanks."
For a time there was silence. Then Snowpaw spoke again: "Do you want a story? Not like I have anything to do anyway, hardly can lift my neck high enough to even read."
Foxfur nodded enthusiastically, then paused, as if remembering something, and answered: "Yeah. Yes".
"All right. I've told you many fibs and fables before, but this story, I swear, is true. I just don't remember much of it, because my father told it to me, when I was very little, and then I tried to forget it, when I was a bit older, but foolish. So, listen. Once upon a time there was a female ermine named Myrai. Her father was from a faraway land under the sunrise, beyond the eastern sea and endless dark forest, but he eventually settled in the Land of Ice and Snow, and had a family. Unlike many families in that harsh, war-torn land, theirs was a loving family, where everybeast helped and protected each other. Myrai was strong and beautiful, but she did not like to fight, picked no quarrels with other beasts, and was honest in all her dealings, never threatening others with might of her father and brothers. Then her father died from old age. One of their neighboring ermines saw that their family no longer has a beast of renowned strength and wisdom to lead them, and so he tricked Myrai's brothers, inviting them under his roof, and capturing them treacherously. He expected Myrai would come to surrender once she learns that there's nobeast left to defend her and her old mother. And Myrai did come, but under her clothes she hid a knife, and knocked him down when he was least expecting it, and threatened to cut his throat, unless he commands to set her brothers free and return their weapons. Thus Myrai, who was not an experienced warrior or ruthless slayer, managed to save her brothers without spilling blood. The feud did not end there, I think, but I'm afraid I forgot, what happened later. But what I remember is true, because Myrai was my father's mother, and my own grandmother."
"M-Myrai," Foxfur said slowly. "Good. Good name."
"Yeah. By the way, I wanted to ask you for a very long time, so I'll ask it now, before some other owl gets me: how about your name? "Foxfur" is what we call a horde name, after all. Just like I was named "Smalltooth" before. Horde names, well… you know that I prefer to rather go by my cub name. You sure you weren't…" Snowpaw realized what he was saying and almost hit himself over the head, for he remembered well, that Foxfur reacted with obvious fear whenever somebeast tried to ask her anything about her parents, even questions simple enough to be answered by nodding. "Well, you sure you don't have any other name?"
"Myrai?" the young wildcat repeated, now in a pleading tone.
Snowpaw breathed a silent sigh of relief: "You mean, you like the name "Myrai"?"
When the wildcat nodded, he was glad to say: "Then why wouldn't I want you to take it for yourself?"
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Leriann the Abbey Champion lowered the heavy wooden sword, with which he practiced in the large room that served as the winter training hall for him and the more warlike of the Redwall otters, and looked at his son, as Wilfrid walked up to him. The young squirrel was a rare guest here. He had no enthusiasm for something as grueling, repetitive, and, overall, boring, as warrior's training. Though, to be fair to him, he just recently reached the age when starting such training was considered proper. Now Wilfrid had the most serious expression Leriann ever saw on his face.
"Do you want something, Wilfrid?"
"Yes," Wilfrid looked up, right into his father's eyes. "I want to learn everything you know about fighting, so that the next time my friends are in danger, I'd be able to protect them."
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The winter forest in the evening was utterly silent, no branch creaking anywhere, no voice of a bird or beast. Unartu the horned owl wouldn't have broken the silence with a single sound, as he flew, if not for the fact that something was very wrong with his left wing, and pain pulsated through his chest, where the accursed wildcat hit him. Through the night the agony of injuries abated slightly, but pangs of hunger came. Hunting was out of the question in this state. Unartu barely managed to keep himself in the air, but he could not fly quietly and gracefully, like before.
He shouldn't have tried a second pass, after the first surprise attack missed, and his intended victim did not panic, that was not the way of owls. In fact, he should have aborted his attack as soon as his intended prey was joined by others – when hunting any birds or beasts remotely associated with the Redwall Abbey before, Unartu was meticulous about only picking off lonely travelers, and disposing of their remains carefully. But the horned owl's patience ran short this time. The ermine whom he needed to kill had practically supernatural luck. This feeble groundcrawler hardly ever left the Abbey, but still seemed like an easy mark, given the habit of walking around the battlements every day. Yet whenever Unartu watched from the cover of tree boughs, either other denizens of Redwall joined the ermine just in time, or something else kept the horned owl from attacking – one day strong wind rose, blowing right into his face, another day a falcon flew right over Unartu's head and went on to visit the Abbey just as he was preparing to swoop on his unsuspecting victim. One who asked Unartu to slay the ermine was showing signs of impatience. He dreaded to think of her reaction to this failure, but had nowhere else to go. Maybe if he feigned a honest mistake right away, he could have fooled soft and stupid Redwallers into helping him, but now it was too late for that.
The grove where she waited was pretty far away by groundwalkers' standards. Not so by standards of a healthy big bird, but Unartu was no longer healthy. When he, hungry and exhausted, finally saw it, sun was already inching towards the treetops. Crow sentries, watching from the outer trees, did not react to his approach or grievous condition. Collecting the last of his strength, Unartu propelled himself higher into the air to glide towards the big three at the center of the grove, and land on one of the thicker branches.
At least two or three dozens of smaller birds – crows and magpies – were perching here and there across the grove. But none dared as much as disturb soft snow on the branches of the great gnarled oak, which was reserved for the two who waited for Unartu. One of these two birds was a big, somberly regal raven, named Gale. The other was the reason why Unartu was here and why he spent the last nine days trying and failing to murder the ermine in Redwall.
Laugu was a female horned owl, a bit smaller than Unartu, but equally fierce looking, with richly colored feathers and bright orange eyes. Her easy grace in flight made her even more beautiful in Unartu's eyes, not that he met many other female owls with whom he could compare her. Great birds like horned owls were long-lived but very few in numbers, and Unartu was aware that he might never encounter another female horned owl interested in him for the rest of his life. Particularly one as pretty as Laugu. So he was willing to tolerate her strange habits, like surrounding herself with a retinue of worthless carrion birds, and even run pointless errands in all likelihood meant only to test his mettle.
Now she watched impassively, as Unartu landed, almost missing the branch next to her. But she spoke softly. "You look quite awful. What disastrous misfortune befell you?"
Her pose did not change, as she listed to Unartu's story, but the raven, Gale, hopped and flapped closer, so that he could hear everything better.
"I'm so very sad," said Laugu after Unartu finished his story. "Shush, my dear Unartu, don't be alarmed. I see that you've done your absolute best. Worry not, we will provide you a relief from your suffering. But all of this is still sad. Sad and… disappointing."
Unartu was normally a cautious, alert bird, as any solitary hunter had to be. But right now Laugu was all that he saw and heard. So he noticed nothing, right until the savage blow at the back that knocked him off his perch. The big owl cried out once as his body spun in the air, once-mighty wings flapping uselessly, unable to arrest his fall. Mayhaps he would have died a quick and merciful death upon hitting the ground in another season, but snow cushioned the impact, so he was still alive and conscious – but in no shape to put a real fight – when seemingly all the carrion birds in the grove fell upon him all at once.
"And thus the horned owl who attacked the Redwall Abbey, perhaps out of senility or madness, encountered a murder of crows and magpies, while wounded and unable to fight, and that was the end of his story, with no need for further investigation by Abbeydwellers. Such a sad and lamentable waste of a life. And for what end?" Laugu commented without moving from her own branch or even looking at the grisly scene.
Gale tilted his head, pointing the bloodied beak at Laugu: "I believe you are called Laugu the Thunderbolt, not Laugu the Wise. And commands of our King are to be obeyed, not questioned or discussed, for the sightless should not bicker and argue about direction with the sighted. Unartu was fated to fail, yet even in his failure he must have accomplished something of importance, of that much I'm certain."