"How did you come here?" The words escaped Martin before he could think better of it. Perigold sighed. A worry-line appeared across her brow.
"It's a long story," she sighed again. The warrior placed a paw around her narrow shoulders.
"We have time," he urged her. Perigold filled her lungs sufficiently before she spoke.
"It all started when I was very young, it must have been five or six seasons ago.................
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I woke up early in the morning, before the sun had even begun to show. It was still dark, but I could hear yelling and fighting outside our cave. I yelled for my mother, but I couldn't even hear myself above the din that the fighting was causing. I wanted dearly to find my mother, even though I was only a few seasons, so I wandered out of the cave.
What I saw was horrible...rats and corsairs were everywhere, ferrets and stoats crowded our shore. My tribe's warriors were being cut down quickly. The sand was littered with dead bodies, mostly of mice. Good mice who hadn't murdered coldly in their life. And here were these vermin, murdering them in cold blood. I tried to look away, but a vermin fox caught my chin and turned me towards the violence.
'D'ya see that, m'pretty? Arrharrharr!' he laughed. He laughed. He laughed as mice were killed and brutally murdered. He laughed. He laughed at the dead. Scorned them. I hated him for laughing. I wanted him to stop.
That was when I bit into his paw. He howled and sucked on his paw, cursing something awful. I ran away, uphill, as fast as I could go, I could hear him chasing him. Him and a group of other vermin, as cold as himself. I knew I had to run.
I knew if I got away, he wouldn't be able to laugh about me being dead. So I ran. I ran until I was so tired I couldn't run anymore. But they were still coming after me. I ran to the left and climbed up a tree, sitting on the highest branch I could manage, which, I suppose now, would have been very low. I held my breath...I could hear them coming.
They ran under me, not one of them looking up. Idiots. They never look up. Once I couldn't hear them anymore, I climbed down. Then I realized that they may come back this way, back to their corsair ship, when they decided they couldn't catch me. And if I was caught standing there, the fox would laugh.
I climbed into a different tree, a little farther away. I found the widest branch I could, and fell asleep, waiting for day.
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It was full light when I woke up, I woke up to hearing that fox laughing again.
I looked down to see the vermin beneath my branch, quarreling with each other. The fox weilded a scimitar, a fallen stoat lay beneath it. His throat was slit. I tried to turn away, but thee dead stoat didn't bother me as much as dead mice. He had murdered. And maybe, he had laughed.
'Arhahahrrr! That'll teach yer ter tell me we're losted! I'm the h'ossifer 'round 'ere an' you'll do's I say, y'hear me? Well, me buckoes, yer lucky cause'n t'wasn't you I hear done an' killed.' He laughed more and he stalked away, the group of quivering vermin followed him. They were all sniveling cowards. Only made brave by sheer numbers.
After they left I walked. I don't think I knew where I was going, I still don't. All I know is that I ended up with a mole family. But I suppose they lived too close to the shore as well, because the vermin got them too. Luckily, I was out picking berries and the vermin were long gone by the time I got back. After that I journeyed inland, and south, to get away from the shores.
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And that's how I came here."
