Foremole smote the wall with a heavy digging claw. “Boi ’okey we’m cudd, they’m udd know wot to do abowt ee varmints. But thurr bee’s h’only us’n’s, yurr!”
Toran could sense that the Abbot was waiting for him to take charge. He waved down to Martha, waiting in her chair on the lawn, then spoke. “Father, maybe ye an’ Martha could get a few helpers an’ search around for anythin’ that would be useful as a weapon. I’ve got a feelin’ they won’t make a move ’til tomorrow. We should be ready for ’em by then, though it prob’ly won’t come to that. I’ll stay up here with Junty, Weld an’ Foremole on watch.”
The Abbot went down to the lawn and pushed Martha back to the Abbey, explaining what was happening and what he had seen. The young haremaid could tell by Abbot Carrul’s face that he was very worried.
Wirga was long past her best seasons, a wrinkled, toothless old Searat, yet Raga Bol kept her with his crew. She was useless as a fighter or a forager, but she possessed other skills. There was little that Wirga did not know about wounds and the treatment of injuries. Her powers as a healer and her knowledge of herbs, nostrums and remedies made the old vermin invaluable to the ignorant crewrats. But there was yet another art Wirga practiced—that of a Seer. Raga Bol, as captain, was the only one she allowed to consult her, and then only in times of crisis.
Wirga crouched by the fire, watching Bol. They were camped among some wooded hills where the red sandstone rocks of Mossflower jutted out in shelflike formation. It was twilight. The Searat crew had slain a small colony of woodmice, and were leisurely plundering their shattered dwellings. Raga Bol and Wirga sat on a hilltop, isolated from the noisy rabble below.
The old Searat knew that her captain wished to consult her. He had given her half a roasted dove and a goblet of his personal grog—this was always a sign that she was needed. Wirga took out her pouch of charms and selected half a large musselshell. It was edged with yellow on the inside, glistening grey at the centre, with three partially grown purple mussel’s pearls protruding from its broad end.
Filling the shell with water, she gazed into it. “Thy appetite is not good of late?”
Raga Bol licked the sharp tip of his silver pawhook in silence as Wirga continued.
“Sleep eludes thee, thou are weary. None can rest easy in thy presence. Even I fear to speak of certain things—aye, things that trouble thee.”
With a curt nod, the Searat captain dismissed the four guards who attended him from twilight to dawn. When they had gone off to join the others, he took a furtive glance over his shoulder.
Drawing close to the Seer, Raga Bol dropped his voice to a hoarse whisper. “Fear not, speak openly to me, ye won’t be harmed.”
Keeping her eyes on the water-filled shell, the old Seer proceeded, her voice now a sibilant hiss. “If thine enemy lives, he must die. Only then can Raga Bol find peace of mind. Thy foe’s death will release thee.”
The Searat captain’s eyes shone feverishly. “Does the stripedog still live? Tell me!”
Wirga turned away from the shell, confronting him. “When did thou last see this stripedog?”
Bol’s red-rimmed eyes stared back at her. “This very noon, aye, in full sunlight. ’Twas when we stopped to rest. I was so tired that I dozed off awhile. The sun beat through my closed lids, makin’ everythin’ go red. That’s when I saw the stripedog. Gettin’ off a strange craft he was, where that broadstream from the nor’east bends away from the trees an’ woodlands. Ye recall the spot, ’twas where we slayed those two shrews. The stripedog pointed to the bodies an’ looked straight at me. ‘They will be avenged, I am coming for ye, Raga Bol!’ Those were his very words.”
Wirga went back to contemplating the water in the shell, then continued. “Thee told him to go away and join the deadbeasts at Hellgates, because he was already slain by thee. But the giant stripedog kept coming. He was frightening to look upon, with his face cleaved wide, but scarred an’ stitched together by somebeast. Do I not speak truly?”
Raga Bol gasped, in awe of the Seer and her powers. “Aye, true, but how did ye know? Did ye see the beast, too?”
She smiled. “Wirga sees many things unknown to others.”
What she did not say was that she had been observing her captain for days—listening, watching, taking all in. Every nightmare, every time Raga Bol called out, in the brief times he did sleep, were memorised by Wirga. She had a complete picture of it all—from the moment Raga Bol had struck the badger to every event since.
The Searat captain brought his face even closer to the Seer. His breath was hot on her jaw, his voice half threat and half plea. “I can’t fight a dream, so I’m waitin’ on yore word. Tell me wot t’do, I must be rid of the stripedog!”
Wirga replied. “Knowest thou my three sons?”
Bol knew the ones she spoke of, though not too well. They were a furtive trio, a bit undersized for Searats, always last to fight but first to grab the plunder. He was not impressed with them, and saw the three as background vermin who never put themselves forward or appeared bold, like proper Searats often do.
The captain shrugged. “Aye, I know ’em, they ain’t no great shakes as fighters. That big stripedog could eat the three of ’em!”
Wirga rocked back and forth on her haunches, chuckling. “Heehee, well said. But give ’em a skilled tracker, one who could lead ’em to the place of thy dream, an’ my sons will make an end of thy stripedog, believe me!”
Raga Bol drew his scimitar, allowing the firelight to gleam across its lethal blade. “If’n’ I never finished the bigbeast with a blow o’ this, how could three runts like that do the job?”
Wirga drew from her pouch a section of bamboo, cut off near the joint and sealed at one end with beeswax. Carefully, she broke away the wax and upended the cylinder. Six long thorns spilled out, each one tipped with crimson dye and plumed with the short feathers of some exotic bird. She stayed Raga Bol’s paw as he reached to pick one up.
“Keep away from such things. They can kill ten times more swiftly than the most venomous snake!”
The Searat captain pulled back his paw. “Poison?”
Using her long pawnails, the Seer divided the thorns into three groups of two. “Once one of these little beauties pricks the skin, even the greatest warrior cannot stand. Poison, from far isles across the southern seas. My three sons know how to use these darts. Warriors they may not be, but assassins they surely are. Give ’em a tracker to lead ’em to the streambend. They will seek out thy stripedog an’ slay ’im.”
Raga Bol stood abruptly, peering over the hilltop rocks at his crew below until he saw the one he required. “Ahoy, Jibsnout!”
A big, competent-looking Searat saluted. “Cap’n?”
Raga Bol called back to him. “Bring Wirga’s three sons up ’ere. I’ve got a task for the four of ye.”
Night had fallen as the sons of Wirga left the hilltop, following Jibsnout. The tracker had a blanket with some food rolled into it thrown over his shoulder, and a well-honed dagger dangling from a cord around his neck.
Once they were off the hill and bound back along the trail, Jibsnout halted and glared contemptuously at the three smaller rats. It was obvious he did not enjoy their company. He pointed the dagger at each of them in turn.
“Lissen t’me, slimesnouts. I don’t like yew three one liddle bit. But I gotta do the job wot Cap’n Bol gave me—to take ye back to where the broadstream bends at the edge o’ this forest. Wot ye do then is carry out the cap’n’s orders. ’Tis up to ye how y’do that, an’ nought t’do wid me. But get this straight: Ye do yore job an’ I’ll do mine. So stay outta my way an’ mind yore manners around me. Step on my paws or look the wrong way at me an’ I’ll gut all three o’ ye wid this blade o’ mine! Unnerstood?”