Winter took it's toll on Whimper. Lack of sleep built bags around his eyes that seemed to grow bigger and bigger with each passing night. He had once mustered up the courage to walk all the way to the healer's room, but when he'd been asked what he was doing there a mad squirming in his chest had made him turn back around and leave. He spent many nights pacing along the cold floor, and it came as a surprise to everyone but him that he had caught a cold. He'd been unfortunate enough to sneeze on Bork, and after that the wolverine had been considerably more sour. His mind was wracked with a strange kind of obsession. He'd begun noticing things that did not match up, like the time he'd started ranting about an Abbot, as if he'd ever met one. Or the mouse he'd pushed into the waters below.

He hadn't seen the mouse drown, and in hindsight, it could have swum... but his head had conjured up vivid images of it, screaming the detestable word as water rushed into it's lungs. Fret. What did fret even mean? He'd searched every one of Clogg's dumb books and found no answer he liked. It was a kind of word called a verb and it meant 'to be worried' or 'in a state of whatever-anxiety-meant'. Then he'd searched endlessly for Anxiety. Perhaps it was a village somewhere in the Northlands. Instead it meant 'a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease about something with an uncertain outcome', or some other long and boring thing like that. But it gave him no clues as to what was being hidden from him.

And indeed something was being hidden. Nobeast in the castle recognized him, they knew him now of course for Bork had introduced him, but the first few days nobeast had any idea who he was. One rat had even had the audacity to call him a slave. Whimper had clawed his eye for that.

Answers would not come from the burly captain however, for much to Whimper's dismay, he would leave the following morning. And the ferret was not coming.

"It's not fair." He said, surprised at how familiar the words sounded on his lips. Surprisingly 'Whimper' still felt foreign. "Ye get to pillage and conquer and reap and murder, I have to stay behin' an' read all these daft books." He had found it a necessity to put on an accent. It had become a necessity once Bork had begun pointing out that he spoke like a rude version of a woodlander. Bork knew an awful lot about woodlanders, for the wolverine often visited the slavepits below. Whimper had decided not to go in the end. Bork had called him a coward and started doing his whimpering sounds, the ferret had lost his temper and insulted him, and it ended like most of their arguments did, with Bork pressing the smaller vermin into the ground and forcing him to apologize. He hated Bork.

The rat only laughed at his complaints. "Whimper, ye can hardly lift a sword, let alone swing it. Besides, why would you want ter come? It's me who should be envious. Ye get to stay here and read all these nice books all day long."

Whimper bared his fangs and the rat only laughed harder.

"Bork is going." The ferret continued complaining. Bork... stupid, slow and ugly, and the only reason Clogg was taking him was because the wolverine's stupid father was king of some stupid frozen rock. Stupidity seemed to be a common trait amongst them.

"Bork is going ter rule an empire when he's older. Moreover he's bigger and better than ye are." Whimper wanted to bite him for that, but Clogg had not said it harsh enough to deserve retaliation. "At pillaging anyways." The rat added as an afterthought.

"Ye said my dad was a conqueror. Ye said my mama was a conqueror. Yet ye act like I can't take care of meself." To be fair he was still small and sickly, and his arms were twig-like compared to pretty much everybeast in the Northlands.

"Yer not yer parents Whimper, try te understand." After roughly one minute of silent glaring from the ferret, it became apparent that he would, not nor would he ever, understand. Clogg withdrew the first book he'd ever shown the ferret. The one full of old drawings. He opened it to his father's portrait. "Ye don't look a thing like him." He flicked to his mother's portrait. "And ye certainly don't have any of her many talents." He seemed sombre for a moment, while he stared at the portrait in contemplation. He tossed the book in Whimper's direction. The ferret made no move to catch it and let it slide off the table and onto the floor. "I leave at first light Whimper. The next time I see ye, and I'm not talking about the feast, that doesn't count, I want ye to start acting more like 'em both, maybe then somebeast else will see the resemblance."

Ah yes... there was going to be a feast tonight... for some reason the thought filled him with dread. "Nobeast can see the resemblance coz they're both dead and nobeast else stares at their pictures as much as ye." He snapped in anger. Clogg glared viciously at him and Whimper stared at his feet in shame. "Sor-ry I-I-"

"Just go bother some-beast else."

The rat stomped away, clearly slightly grumpier. Whimper picked up the book and stared intently at the portraits of his mother and father. Day by day he resembled them less...

Momchillo felt the crack of the whip against his back.

He had cooked before. Many times in the warm kitchens of Redwall. Of course Grollo's father would always watch over them as they worked, and most of the food they made was entirely inedible. But it had been fun to watch the vegetables bubble into soup and watch scones swell in the fire. Of course having Grollo there with him was what made it so fun.

Here though? The kitchen was a swamp of slaves milling about, doing as they were told. He'd been hand-picked along with some others to help cook a massive feast. Of course the warmth of the kitchen was a welcome relief after the freezing caves. It had felt like a reward at the time, until he'd realized that everybeast not 'helping out' got a few days of respite, and that the slavemaster had picked him just so he could whip somebeast.

"Come on mouse! Stir it quicker! Don't spill!" He cracked the tip of the whip against the young mouse's ear. Momchillo flinched, but did not give him the satisfaction of watching him flinch.

Deathglare was in the other side of the kitchens, helping chop up the potatoes and fish. Momchillo was glad he'd been stuck to stirring. The temptation to stab and kill his tormentor would have been too great with a blade in paw.

"So mouse, where you from?" The whip came down again. "Somewhere warm? Somewhere cold? C'mon, talk ter me!" The slavemaster cackled and brought the whip down again.

His laughter turned to a loud bark for everyone to 'Get those inter the ovens or it'll be you going in them!' The sudden order had once made Momchillo jump, but nowadays he knew what it meant. That a higher ranking vermin was coming to see what was going on.

"Prince Bork." The slavemaster greeted, bowing so low his nose touched the ground. Momchillo was sorely tempted to kick his rump and make the vermin fall on his face. But he dared not attract the attention of the wolverine.

He'd heard of them prior to coming to the Northlands, in the Tale of Rakkety Tamm and Gulo the Savage. That story had given him many sleepless nights. It was probably because they were famous for being cannibals and leaving behind only the bones of their victims. The Prince looked very much like Gulo the Savage come to life. Tall as a badger, with arms wide and burly. He cast a large shadow over the kitchens, and suddenly everybeast was working twice as hard.

The Prince snorted. "It would be less work to just fry up the lot of you." Now the speed doubled again. Bork now grinned in satisfaction and strolled back out to torment somebeast else.

"The soup's done." Momchillo announced, turning to the slavemaster, his face as emotional as a stone.

"Well then put it on the side! Must I tell yer everything?" He gave a long fake sigh. Momchillo lifted the pot and walked away as quickly as he could, managing to avoid another lash of the whip.

The mouse found Deathglare at the side, slowly and meticulously slicing a potatoe into cubes. The marten gave him the smallest of waves before he continued with the work.

The rest of the Honest Bunch were there too. Sick-Eyes was measuring herbs. Silvertongue was rolling dough and glaring at the two hedgehogs that flanked him. The weasel noticed the mouse's gaze, grinned a little, and spat into the dough. His wife looked like she wanted to reprimand him, but was not about to bring the slavemaster's fury down upon him.

Momchillo placed the soup on the side, and as slowly as he could made his way back to the slavemaster's whip.

Such, was life.

Footnote: Okay, after almost a year of writing this I've figured out an ending. Not gonna say what it is... but I don't think it should be too hard to guess where this is going from now on. Just a note now regarding chapters. I'm going to try and localize them. So for example you'll get one chapter for stuff related to Momchillo and Fret and the Northlands, another chapter for Redwall stuff, another one for Sharpfur, Hawthorn and Grollo, and another-ish chapter for Matiya, Grey Claw and the characters surrounding them. So those are like the... 'point of views'? I was kind of already doing this but then it was getting muddled. So that's the new system.

Also another note is that a lot of the next few chapters will be set in the Northlands, up until something major happens (I don't think it's too hard to guess what will happen), then we'll go back to the others as well.

Final note is that the time-skip was short (so character ages are roughly the same). To give a rough idea of how much time has passed in-story. The Trip To The Otters was about mid-autumn, The Redwall Feast was early winter while the previous chapter was a bit before Mid-winter (all the other events took place in between those times) and now we're coming to Late Winter-Spring, though in the Northlands that still means piles and piles of snow and ice.

Hope you enjoy.