Skipper had worms in his stomach, but he couldn't explain why.
"Merrill, that might not be a good idea," he said.
Merrill tisked at him. She was the same as always: a tiny, bespectacled ball of determination covered in a heap of shawls. She looked frailer than usual, and her whiskers were more quivery and her fur more grey, but she was still Merrill. Outside, Tamar continued stacking firewood and carrying water from the river in. Merrill had been less up to tasks than usual, and she had eventually acquiesced to giving her grandson the chores.
"I don't think so," she said. "I just met a nice traveler from there, if not the most polite one, and it reminded me. Tamar needs a chance to see it."
"Takin' Tamar to Redwall could backfire," Skipper said, and the desperation in the pit of his chest grew when Merrill waved him off.
"Nonsense, Skipper," she said. "Redwall is a lovely place, devoted to taking all beasts in regardless of their place in life, and I can't think of anyone who would have an objection to my grandson and I visiting."
"My uncle, for one," Skipper said. "Bella. Abbess Bryony. Half the older folks."
"Don't be silly, Skipper," Merrill said. "I know beasts tend to run their mouths and say unnecessarily cruel things to my grandson, but I wouldn't expect that to occur at Redwall, especially not from the Abbess. As for your uncle and Bella-well. Other Skipper or badger or not, if they acted unfairly towards Tamar, I would be having a word with them. What reason do they have to treat him badly?"
"Merrill," Skipper said, leaning forward, "you remember what happened thirty seasons ago. They had the Veil young'un, they had the exile-it's been a while but some scars last. Takin' Tamar there would not be a good idea."
"I do recall the exiling. My memory was much sharper, then, and I could get around better," Merrill said. "What does the poor Sixclaw child have to do with this?"
"Because he was a ferret," Skipper said. "A vermin babe that had Redwall up in arms. And Tamar is a-"
"Don't even say it, Skipper," Merrill said. She quivered in indignation and thumped her cane. Outside, Tamar put down another load of firewood. "If you do, I'll send you out straightaway," and Skipper raised his paws defensively. "I've gotten quite tired of hearing beasts say that about my Tamar. Do they not have something better to do with their snipping?"
"I'm sorry, m'am," Skipper said, keeping his paws raised until Merrill loosened her grip on her cane. "I don't mean any ill against you or Tamar. But the fact is, Redwall is not goin' t' be a welcoming place for him, or at least not as welcoming of a place as yore expectin' it to be, and I'm sorry you're settin' him and yourself up for this. Loggy and I can provide some escorts and guides there, if you want."
"Hmph," Merrill said. "I believed my grandson and I can navigate there just fine on our own. I may have forgotten things in my age, but I certainly haven't forgotten my sense of direction."
"If that's what you want, m'am," Skipper said.
When Skipper emerged from the cottage, Tamar was still working on the wood pile. He looked up as Skipper approached. Skipper put a paw on his shoulder.
"Brace yoreself," he said.
xxx
"Guests at the gate! Make way!"
The call echoed down from the upper rampart, and Tanna Bankvole looked up from her garden-weeding. Dying rings of the Matthias and Methuselah bells floated through the courtyard.
"What do you know," she said, standing, "more company." Plucked weeds and clovers fell off her apron. "And just in time for lunch, too."
"Beasts are always turning up in time for Redwall's lunch," her friend Lacebell said with a laugh. She shook out her own apron.
Both Tanna and Lacebell had been working since morning to pick bouquets for the summer table, and flecks of grass and dirt covered bankvole and mouse alike. Redwall's summer was humming along well, and with the sun shining, breeze blowing across the green lawns, and a flower crown perched on her friend's head and a flower chain hanging around her neck, Tanna was in a particularly good mood. She brushed a stray petal off Lacebell's whiskers.
"C'mon," she said, "let's go see who it is."
As they trotted down to the gates, passing and waving to other abbeybeasts along the way, Tanna eyed Lacebell in crafty amusement.
"What's with that look on your face?"
"Hm? Oh, nothing," Lacebell said. She adjusted the pansy crown on her head. "I'm trying to think of how many bouquets we need to make. One for Abbess Bryony, definitely, and one for Bella, and Skipperjo, and Togget… I don't know if Redfarl is coming. I don't think she is."
"I'm sure."
Lacebell gave Tanna a look. "What?"
"You don't ever scrunch up your nose that way when you're thinking of flowers." Tanna leaned closer and bumped shoulders with Lacebell. "I heard the visitor is Miss Merrill coming back for the first time in seasons–and her grandson. You haven't met him yet, have you?"
"No. Tanna Bankvole, get that look off your face!" Lacebell shoved her, and Tanna laughed. Lacebell huffed. "I am not thinking of Miss Merrill's grandson!"
"He'd be your age," Tanna said, "if a little older. I haven't met him yet. But I've heard he's strong. And tall."
"You shush. You know for a fact that Merrill always says things that, whether they're true or not. They're the truth as much as Sumin's silly stories are," Lacebell said. She crossed her arms, face burning, and pointedly looked away from Tanna. After several sulky steps, she hesitated. "Have you really not met him yet?"
"No," Tanna said. "No one at Redwall has. Skipper Floret and his holt have, though."
"I see." After a moment, Lacebell fiddled with her flower crown again, and inhaled. "…do I look alright?"
"You look wonderful." Tanna grabbed Lacebell's paw. "Come on. Let's beat the crowd there and see them first."
Bankvole and mouse ran across the lawn to the gate, aprons and robes billowing. When they reached it, they stood back, catching their breath, and watched Sumin and another squirrel open the door.
Lacebell took a deep breath and folded her paws over her apron as the gate swung open.
xxx
Tamar was not accustomed to big buildings. He'd heard stories, but the only home he'd ever stepped foot into was his and Merrill's cottage, and once, one of the holt's seasonal huts. Redwall seemed massive enough from a distance. Tamar had lifted his head and watched it grow bigger and bigger the closer he and Merrill came, and took in the sight of twisting brick lines up turrets and the many scattered windows. While the bells rang and they waited in the abbey's all-engulfing shadow, Tamar felt the reverberations in his whiskers.
He was, however, used to this.
"Sumin, dear! How nice to see you again!" Merrill shook the squirrel's paw, already making herself comfortable. Hundreds of abbeybeasts flowed across the rolling lawns from place to place. Tamar could see the horrified, frozen looks on the bankvole and mouse's faces.
"Nice to see you again too, Merrill," Sumin said. He shook her paw back. The squirrel's red tail twitched in a plumey arch behind him, and Tamar knew he hadn't noticed him yet. "It's been a while. What brings you here?"
"Visiting. Coming back to see everyone, you know how it is." Merrill waved a paw.
Sumin's forthcoming grin faded when his gaze moved back to Tamar and stopped.
"Oh! I forgot to mention." Merrill's voice sheared through the silence. "My grandson, Tamar, is along for the visit this time. If you could tell him where to put the flour and jam rolls, that'd be lovely. Tamar, this is Sumin. Sumin, Tamar."
"It's a pleasure," Tamar said.
Sumin stared. Tamar saw him begin to slowly bristle. "He's a–"
"I can take him to the cellars." The bankvole interrupted first. The mouse next to her visibly cringed and shrank.
"Tanna, what are you doing?" she said, shrill. Sumin's gaze snapped to her. Tamar waited in the entrance, hunched slightly under the weight of two flour bags and a basket of rolls. He still loomed over Tanna and Lacebell.
"Tanna, are you sure?"
"Positive." The bankvole had looked shocked before, but now, she looked stubborn and determined. Anyone who made that expression, Tamar thought, was unlikely to be talked out of anything. "We can handle it, Sumin. It'll be fine. You might want to talk to Skipperjo and Abbess Bryony, though."
"That'd be fine with me," Merrill said. She pushed up her spectacles. "I wanted to speak to Miss Bryony while I was hereabouts anyway, so the sooner, the better. If it's not a trouble."
"Not at all, m'am," Sumin said. Tension lined his bristling fur. As Tanna grabbed the jam roll basket from Tamar and lead him along, Tamar felt the squirrel's gaze boring into his back.
"–and the cellar is this way–Tamar? It is Tamar, isn't it?"
The grass flattened slick and warm beneath Tamar's feet as they crossed the lawn. Sunshine and the chattering of Redwallers tickled his ears. The longer they walked, the more chattering morphed into hushed whispers and eyes on Tamar's back. He ignored all of them.
"Yes," he said. "And you are?"
"Tanna," Tanna said. She gestured at the small, sick-looking mouse next to her. "This is my friend, Lacebell. Welcome to Redwall."
"Pleased to meet you," Lacebell said. She didn't sound pleased at all.
The silence between them stretched on, even as the murmurs behind them didn't. Redwall abbey bustled with beasts. Every now and then, a few or a pair would trot up to speak to Tanna or Lacebell and introduce themselves to Tamar. They all spoke cheerily, and Tamar shook five paws before they had crossed the lawn. No one seemed inhibited by anything.
All the same, after their introductions, they hung back. Most of their words were directed at Tanna or Lacebell, and their gazes passed through Tamar as if he were thin air. While some were brave, and spoke to Tamar directly-and left after bidding him goodbye along with Tanna and Lacebell-many that tried to exchange Tamar in conversations spoke hesitantly, unsure of what to do or say. Tamar's height and curt replies didn't aid their walking on eggshells. Nor did the sight of his incisors whenever he spoke.
Tanna coughed whenever another Redwaller tried to include him in a conversation, but felt too meek to address him. Tamar was too fascinated by the many interconnected entrances and the vast scale of the abbey to catch the hint, though he wouldn't have taken it to start with. If someone wanted to speak to him, they would look at his face or say his name, and the abbey got bigger the more and more he saw.
It was no wonder so many vermin had tried taking it or getting in, Tamar thought, hefting the flour bags higher on his shoulder. He disregarded more of the whispers. When someone splurged so much on something, it was all too obvious they had food and protection to spare.
Lacebell's eyes caught the flour bags stacked on his shoulder.
"Did you carry those by yourself all the way here?" she said.
"Yes," Tamar said. "Grandma's back isn't doing well, and we don't have a wagon. I carry most of our things."
Lacebell's eyebrows rose, but she gulped soundlessly and shrank when she saw Tamar's teeth. Tanna didn't bat an eye.
"So, Tamar, how are you liking Redwall?" she said.
Everyone is staring and whispering but too afraid to do anything but stand back and hiss or hide their friends behind them.
"It's beautiful," Tamar said. "And very big. You could fit hundreds of Merrill's cottage in here."
Tanna laughed. "More than that, probably. It takes a lot to get used to, I know. Here. This way. The cellar is down these stairs."
Tamar received a respite from the sun when they crossed a threshold and stepped beneath an overhanging arch. Cool shadows draped across his back. He followed Lacebell and Tanna through an open door and down a flight of stairs–after Lacebell had made sure to take the lead and put Tanna between them–and darkness swallowed them. Tamar blinked at the sudden rush of cool air on his face. Next to them, a torch flame wavered on the wall.
"It's always a relief to come here during the summer," Lacebell said. She exhaled. Tamar could see the flowers on her and Tanna glowing in soft specks of white and blue. "It's one way to escape the heat."
Their feet padded down cool stairs.
"Your flowers are pretty," Tamar said. He didn't know how else to convince the mouse he wasn't going to eat her, even if she didn't flinch whenever he spoke now. Woodlanders always reacted like this.
Lacebell started and almost missed a step. Tanna's eyes widened briefly, but then, she smiled. "Thank you!"
Tamar was about to reply when abruptly found a chain of flowers around his neck. He blinked.
"There you go," Tanna said. "You fit right in, now. We've spent all afternoon weaving them; I'm getting a bit tired of flowers. You wear them better."
"Thank you," Lacebell echoed. Her paw drifted up to touch her flower crown. "That's… very kind of you."
They reached the basement. Tamar unloaded his bags of flour onto an already formidable heap of them. A maze of ale barrels, piled sacks of flour and dried fruit, and delicate spiderwebs and dust stretched onwards into the dark basement. The darkness smelled like dried ale and the back corners of Merrill's pantry, Tamar thought. Like home.
On the way up, Lacebell appeared more confident. She strode up the stairs without hesitation or fear of shrinking.
"I'm glad you came to visit, Tamar," she said. Her tail slithered behind her in a pale ribbon. It shone pink as she opened the door and let them out of the cellar. "We haven't had a decent vermin in the abbey here for a while. Not since–well."
'Well,' Tamar thought, much like 'him,' 'it,' or 'shame,' must've meant Veil.
"Veil wasn't a bad sort," Tanna said. "I think he was more spoiled than a cuckoo in a robin's nest, if you'll excuse the awful comparison, and he made some awful choices, but he wasn't bad. Just lonely. I knew him," she explained, looking at Tamar. "I grew up playing with him. Sure, he had a temper whenever things didn't go his way, and he blamed other children for his mistakes, but he never hurt anyone. Then. He played hide and seek, wrestling, and find the flag with the rest of us. I don't ever remember feeling scared of him until–"
"He poisoned someone," Tamar said. "It's hard to trust a beast after they've tried to kill one of your friends."
"You sound very different from other vermin I've heard," Lacebell said, trying to steer the conversation in a different direction. "You have a very nice voice, Tamar." Tamar swore her ears turned a shade redder.
"…thank you," he said.
"It's very smooth," Tanna agreed. "And easy to understand. It's not all what I expected when I saw you, really; well, excluding the husk and deepness, but that's a given." They cut across the lawn towards Redwall's inner courtyard.
Something in Tamar itched.
"Easy to understand?" he said. He'd never been told his voice was smooth, either. The way it rolled, perhaps, but definitely not how he sounded. Then, it registered. "You're saying I don't have a vermin accent, and you like that I don't."
"Well, that's… not how I'd put it," Tanna said.
"It's what you mean, isn't it?" Tamar said. Less eyes followed them. A quiet commotion built in the hall ahead.
"Yes and no," Tanna said.
"I mean, you do talk like a vermin, kind of." Lacebell hopped into the conversation again, matching strides with Tamar and Tanna. She toyed with a loose apron string. "It's just how you word things. You're more eloquent, really. I'm not sure if I'd call you a vermin if I just heard your voice. Or a rat, either. I meant it when I said it was nice."
"You mean I sound like a woodlander," Tamar said. "Because I don't have an accent."
Both Tanna and Lacebell squirmed. Tanna's movements were stiffer, somehow, and Lacebell wound the apron string in her fingers. She kept glancing at Tamar's face, but her gaze couldn't stay there. Tamar made eye contact with her. Her gaze flitted away.
"I suppose I do," Tanna said. She laughed. It was small, and flew quickly from her mouth, and it was the sort of laugh that Tamar knew spat discomfort out of beasts' mouths. Tanna looked relieved afterwards, as if she'd cleared a slug from her throat. "But that isn't a bad thing, is it? Sounding like a vermin isn't bad, and nor is sounding like a woodlander."
"–iron out any accents if they've got 'em–" A flash of stoat fang.
"No," Tamar said. "It isn't."
Lacebell couldn't look him in the face again.
The commotion ahead grew louder. Tamar saw the greyed face of an otter arguing with the squirrel from earlier, and a pudgy old mole attempting to intervene while the crowd around them deepened. He felt tentative or glaring eyes on his back before they even noticed him.
"–can't have a vermin in Redwall, not after Veil–"
"Skipperjo, doin't be jumpin' to conclusions. We haven't met ee rat yet. Ee's Miz Merrill's grandyoung'un, too, and yon nephew knows him. Oi'd gurtly like toi met him before oi makes any decisions. Miz Merrill wouldn't raise any villyun."
"Miss Merrill is gettin' up there in seasons," Skipperjo said grimly, "and my nephew needs a talkin' to. We saw what happened the last time somebeast tried raising a vermin. It doesn't matter how kind he looks, even if from what I've heard, he doesn't look it at all. He needs to go. I won't hurt him. But he needs to go."
"Merrill is senile, Togget." Sumin's tone rang as tense as the rest of them. Tamar felt glad none of them were armed yet. "I'm happy to see her, and I'm glad she's at Redwall again, but she is. She can barely see, even with those spectacles. I don't think she'd know if Tamar stole the house out from under her bit by bit!"
A murmur rippled through the group.
"I'm going to find grandma," Tamar said. "It's getting crowded here. I don't want to lose her."
Lacebell and Tanna's sympathetic glances slid off of him.
"The west halls should be clear today," Lacebell said. "Abbess Bryony's room is there. We'll hold them off."
"We can show you the way, if you want," Tanna offered.
"I can find it," Tamar said. "Thank you."
Tanna patted his shoulder. For a moment, Tamar thought Lacebell was about to do the same, or readied to touch his paw, but her fingers tasted the air and stilled. Her paw never left her side.
"See you later, Tamar," Tanna said. She twirled the basket of rolls.
Tamar didn't need another excuse to depart.
xxx
"He needs a family."
Tamar stopped in front of the door. Though it was thick, it only muffled sound, and his hearing stayed sharp. Compared to other parts of Redwall, the Abbess' room–with vines and rosebuds carved into the doorway arch–waited in a soft, less active corner of Redwall.
"I love him. I love him dearly. But I'm getting old, Bryony. I won't be around forever, or for too much longer. He doesn't have many friends his age, and I want that for him. When Tamar was younger, he hid in the house and refused to go outside. I couldn't get him to pay attention to a single soul but me. All the words they called him; rat, vermin, thief, cuckoo–they hurt him."
Rustling and soft clanking followed. Tamar could picture Merrill fixing her spectacles and settling deeper into her chair, shawls spilling over her shoulders.
"He's older now, and it seems like nothing can faze him. I know that. But things still get to him. My grandson is very quiet, Bryony. He wouldn't tell a soul he was burning if he didn't have to. When I pass, I don't want him to be alone. He needs to grow up, like the rest of my children, and realize there's more in the world than me. That's why I need Redwall to open their gates for him. He needs a family there for him after I'm gone."
Tamar wanted to run.
Instead, he numbly knocked on the door, and waited.
The talking died down, and a chair scooted. "Enter," a voice called. Tamar pushed the door. It slid open, unlocked.
First, he saw Merrill perched on a chair, wearing her mountain of shawls. Her spectacles balanced on her whitening muzzle, and her walking stick leaned on the chair. Her slender fingers gripped it like tiny, dried bird feet.
The second thing he saw was the mouse sitting behind the desk across from her. She wasn't as old as Merrill–not even close–but grey lined her fur behind her habit hood, and crow's feet branched from the corners of her eyes. Her habit cascaded down her shoulders neatly. A tail curled from the side of her chair. While her eyes were big and deep, and her face must've been young, once, she didn't look full of welcome. She looked like someone soft, Tamar thought, that had aged into someone harder.
"Tamar!" Merrill swung down her cane and shuffled to her feet the instant she realized who it was, as enthusiastic as always. "How were the cellars? Did you get acquainted with those young ladies? Oh, silly me, I almost forgot. Tamar, this is Abbess Bryony. Bryony, this is Tamar," Merrill said proudly, "the grandson I've been telling you so much about."
Bryony unfroze.
"It's nice to meet you, Tamar," she said. She didn't move from behind her desk, but Tamar didn't know if it was because she didn't want to, or she couldn't.
"Bryony was a little one when I still lived here," Merrill said. "I was so proud to see her become Abbess, even if I was gone when she did. She had an adopted son, too. A bit on the spoiled side, and more of a troublemaker then you–a little less polite, too–but still a good boy. I wish you could've got to meet him."
Bryony's exhale sounded as if a pin had been driven into her belly.
"I heard about him," Tamar said, and he watched the stiffening ice spread up Bryony's spine. "I got a tour of Redwall and talked to Tanna and Lacebell, too."
"Did you make sure to thank them for their hospitality?"
"Yes, grandma."
"Good. That's my boy." Merrill hummed and reached up to adjust his flower necklace. Her grab missed by a mile. Tamar knelt to let her fix it, and her fumbling paws shook the necklace and knocked petals onto the floor.
Bryony watched Merrill hen and fuss over Tamar. Her eyes didn't leave Tamar once. She looked as if she were in a dream, witnessing far off and far past events, and Tamar wasn't sure whether bitterness or remembrance twisted her mouth. He got the sudden impression his presence was drowning her.
"Redwall is nice, grandma," Tamar said. "But I talked to plenty of abbeybeasts, and I'm worn out. I'm ready to go home."
"We can't go home yet, grandson," Merrill said. She stopped fumbling with his flower necklace. Petals littered the floor, and one stuck to Tamar's foot. "We just got here. But I'm feeling more tired than usual. We'll head back after lunch."
She creaked forward, and Tamar almost grabbed her arm before he stopped himself. Abbess Bryony still sat behind the desk, slowly snapping out of her hypnosis. An ocean of space stretched between her Merrill and Tamar.
"It was nice talking to you again, Bryony," Merrill said. "Young'uns grow up so fast. Do you mind if we leave early? I know I promised I'd stay a day, and I'm sure Tamar would love to, but these old bones are aching."
"No," Bryony said. She snapped out of her spell. "That's fine, Merrill. I hope you get some rest. I wish you and your grandson luck."
Bryony stood as Merrill walked towards the door. "Tamar."
Tamar looked back from where he held the door open. Abbess Bryony held out her paw. "Since I didn't get the pleasure earlier."
Tamar shook her paw. She released his a second too late, and he felt her fingers tremble.
He didn't linger in the room.