Chapter Five: Crossing the Lake
Blackskull marched his trackers until near midnight. He gave them several hours to sleep, and then got them moving again. The squirrels were harder to catch than he originally had thought. However, both times they had escaped through sheer luck. They would not be so lucky this time. The weather was changing. The wind would die down, and they would slow down considerably. When they did reach wherever they were going, he would be waiting for them.
When dawn arrived, the wind was still holding, and the vermin on the shore were mere specs in the distance. Lutran prepared a large breakfast, which he ate almost entirely by himself. It seemed that the horrific injury that caused him to think he was a hare also gave him the appetite of one.
After breakfast, Lutran showed Beechtail how to steer the raft, then he got some sleep.
However, at midmorning, the wind began to die down.
Maplefur was the first to notice, "At this rate, we'll be stuck out here until the wind comes back."
Lutran shook his head, and produced two paddles from somewhere, "We have to paddle, but, with a little luck, we might make it to the jolly old stream by evening."
Paddling was hard work, and they made very slow progress. Two would paddle while the other rested. The vermin began to gain on them again. However, when it was almost too dark to see, Maplefur saw the stream. Beechtail expected them to go ashore immediately, but Lutran cautioned him against it.
He gestured to a fire the vermin had built earlier that evening, "Best to sleep out here, where we won't have to keep watch, wot. We're nearly out of tucker, so we'll have to forage for breakfast tomorrow morning. In any case, it seems the blighters have turned in for the night too."
After eating the last of the supplies, all three creatures settled down to a long sleep.
Blackskull and his trackers, however, were still awake. They had rested for an hour or two at the fire, and then carried on marching under the cover of darkness.