Jem looked over the rim of an oatmeal bowl at Brooky. “You could do yoreself a nastiness, gigglin’ an’ vittlin’ like that, marm!”
Breakfast was taken in leisurely fashion, chatting, laughing and gossiping. Wandering Walt tapped his digging claws on the bench impatiently. “Yurr, b’aint us’n’s apposed t’be solven ee riggle t’day?”
Sister Screeve spread her parchment upon the ground. “Thank you kindly, sir. If Miss Brookflow can stop her merriment for just a moment, I’ll read the rhyme. Are you finished, miss?”
The jolly ottermaid stifled her mouth with both paws. “Whoohoohoo . . . Oops! Sorry, Sister, just once more. Whoohoohaha! There, that’s better. Right, let’s get on with unpuzzling the riddle, or unrizzling the puddle. Whoohaha. . . .”
Brooky looked about at the stern faces. “Sorry.”
Screeve took up where she had left off. “As I said, I’ll read the poem, er rhyme. Right!
Where the sun falls from the sky,
and dances at a pebble’s drop,
where little leaves slay big leaves,
where wood meets earth I stop.
Safe from the savage son of Dramz,
here the secret lies alone,
the symbol of all power, the mighty Walking Stone!”
Brother Gordale scratched behind his ear. “Well, where do we start with all that jumble?”
“At the beginning, I suppose. Hahahaha. . . .” Humble silenced Brooky with a stern glance over his glasses.
Then, suddenly, he mellowed. “An excellent idea. Very logical, too, miss. Where the sun falls from the sky. Anybeast got an idea where that may be?”
Walt answered. “Hurr that bee’s in ee west, whurr ee sun be a-setten every h’evenin’, zurr.”
Demple swept the horizon westward. “That’s a massive area. Any way we could narrow it down?”
Whilst they sat thinking about this, Gordale quoted the second line. “And dances at a pebble’s drop.”
Armel fidgeted with her apron strings. “Maybe it carries on to link up. What’s the next line?”
Sister Screeve supplied it in her precise tones. “Where little leaves slay big leaves. Dearie me, I’m really puzzled now!”
Brooky interrupted her. “Well, if the entire thing is a puzzle, yore supposed to be puzzled—that’s why puzzlers write ’em. Haha, we’re looking for a Walking Stone, and nobeast’s ever seen one. I wouldn’t recognise a Walking Stone if it fell out of a tree and hit me over the head. Oh, hahahahoohoo!”
Screeve wagged her paw severely. “Really, Brookflow, you aren’t helping the situation by sitting there laughing!”
Armel, very fond of her ottermaid friend, spoke up in her defence. “Don’t be too hard on Brooky, Sister. She has a point, you know.”
Gordale shrugged. “Right then, Sister Armel. Perhaps you’d like to tell us—just what is her point, eh?”
Armel’s pretty face creased in a frown of concentration. “Er, we, hmm, er . . . Maybe if Walt and Jem described the area where they found the dying beast, we might gain a clue from it.”
Humble agreed. “Sounds reasonable to me. This Askor, the beast who died, it’s likely he may have concealed the Walking Stone not far from where the tree fell on him. Jem, Walt, could you recall anything special about the place?”
Wandering Walt wrinkled his nose. “Nay, zurr, it bee’d loike many bits o’ furrest we’m parssed throo t’gether. B’aint that so, Jem?”
The old hedgehog shook his grizzled spikes. “Gettin’ old ain’t no fun. I fergits a lot o’ things now’days. It were someplace in sou’west Mossflower Woodlands, I’m sure o’ that. Aye, an’ there was a big ole rotten sycamore a-layin’ there, that was the one wot fell on Askor. More’n that I’m a-feared I can’t say, friends.”
Sister Screeve pushed the written rhyme under Jem’s snout. “Mayhap this’ll jog your mind. Try to recall if you noticed any of these things—a place where the sun falls from the sky, where it dances at a pebble’s drop, where little leaves slay big leaves. . . .”
Brother Demple suddenly exclaimed, “That’s it . . . ivy!”
Jem stared at him curiously. “What’s that supposed t’mean, ivy?”
Demple’s explanation shed the first tiny ray of hope on the riddle. “Plants and growing things are both my hobby and my life as a gardener. So I ignored the rest of the puzzle and concentrated on the one line, ‘Where little leaves slay big leaves.’ Father, do you remember that old willow tree, down by our Abbey pond, on the south side? The tree I had to chop down about ten seasons back? It was an ancient, weak old thing, with ivy growing all over it—right from the ground, around the trunk, through the branches, until the whole willow tree was covered thickly in ivy vines and creepers. Not a single leaf could grow there as a result of that ivy. It had been strangled.”
Humble remembered. “Ah yes, poor thing. Nobeast likes to see a tree felled, but it was becoming a danger, especially to our Dibbuns. I recall I took some of the branches to use as caulking for small casks. There was a lot of ivy, though.”
Demple smiled triumphantly. “You see, a clear case of little leaves slaying big leaves. Jem, can you or Walt recall seeing such a tree near the scene, one all choked by ivy?”
Hitheryon Jem pondered a moment, then laughed aloud. “Hohoho! The wasp, Walt, remember the wasp?”
The old mole rubbed his stubby tail ruefully. “Bo urr, oi b’aint likely to furget ee likkle villyun!”
Jem warmed to an account of the incident. “ ’Twas the day we found Askor, but earlier on. We’d just sat down to take a bite o’ brekkist. I sat on the cart shaft, but ole Walt, he sat down with his back agin a tree. Aye, ’twas a big sycamore, there’s quite a few in that neck o’ the woods. But this’n ’ad been gripped by the ivy, just as you described, Brother Demple. From root to crown that tree was wrapped thick in the stuff. Walt should’ve knowed better, ’cos ’tis a common fact that wasps are very partial to ivy, somethin’ in the scent of the leaves I’ve been told. Well, he’d no sooner sat down when out buzzes a wasp an’ stings pore ole Walt right on the tail!”
Brooky could not resist breaking in. “That’s a story with a sting in the tail! Oh heeheehee!”
Walt glared at the jovial ottermaid. “Et wurn’t funny, marm. Waspers are vurry ’urtful beasts. Oi ’ad to bathe moi tail in ee pond an’ rub et wi’ dockleaves!”
Gordale spoke. “You mean there was a pond close by?”
Jem’s memory began coming back. “Not a pond—it were more of a lake, bigger’n yore Abbey pond, a peaceful stretch o’ water. We filled our canteens there.”
Sister Armel had enjoyed her breakfast in the orchard. She sat back in a sun-dappled corner, surrounded by friends, listening to Jem and the others discussing the problem. Though she had risen bright and alert that morning, her eyelids began to droop. A feeling of warm tranquility enveloped her, the voices receding into a soothing hum. A different voice was calling to her, echoing along the corridors of her mind, gentle but firm.
“Armel, listen to me. Do you know who I am?”
A golden haze stole into her imagination. Through it drifted a figure she recognised immediately. “I know you, sir. You are Martin the Warrior!”
The warrior’s face was strong and kind as he smiled. “And I know you, Sister Armel. That is why I choose you. Hear me now.
My sword must be carried by maidens two:
one who sees laughter in all, and you.
Bear it southwest through Mossflower Wood,
to he who pursues the vermin Lord.
The Borderer who is a force for good,
that warrior who sold and lost his sword.”
The image of Martin began to fade, but Armel heard his parting words quite clearly.
“Wake now, Armel. Tell them of the Abbey pond.”
Though she was not aware of it, her meeting with the warrior had lasted a mere moment. Jem was still speaking of the lake he had recalled.