Mossflower

Brian Jacques

TSARMINA THE RUTHLESS

The mouse struggled against his captors, shouting out in a loud, angry voice, “Tell your guards to take their claws off and release me. You have no right to imprison a freeborn creature.”

Verdauga could not help but admire the obvious courage of the prisoner. He was about to speak, when Tsarmina grasped the battered sword and stood over the captive with the point at his throat. “You insolent scum! Quick now, what is your name? Where did you steal this rusty relic?”

As the guards pinned the struggling mouse down, his voice shook with fury. “My name is Martin the Warrior. That sword was once my father’s, now it is mine. I come and go as I please, cat. Is this the welcome you show travelers?”

Tsarmina forced Martin’s head back with the swordpoint. “You are in Mossflower country now; all the land you see on a clear day’s march belongs to us by right of conquest. My father’s law says that none are allowed to go armed save his soldiers. The penalty for those who break the law is death.”

She beckoned the guards with a sleek, catlike movement. “Take him away and execute him.”

THE REDWALL BOOKS

Redwall

Mossflower

Mattimeo

Mariel of Redwall

Salamandastron

Martin the Warrior

The Bellmaker

Outcast of Redwall

The Pearls of Lutra

The Long Patrol

Marlfox

The Legend of Luke

Lord Brocktree

Taggerung

Triss

Loamhedge

Rakkety Tam

High Rhulain

Eulalia!

Doomwyte

The Sable Quean

The Great Redwall Feast (picture book)

A Redwall Winter’s Tale (picture book)

OTHER BOOKS

Seven Strange and Ghostly Tales

Castaways of the Flying Dutchman

The Angel’s Command

The Tale of Urso Brunov (picture book)

The Ribbajack and Other Curious Yarns Voyage of Slaves

Urso Brunov and the White Emperor (picture book)

FIREBIRD

Published by the Penguin Group

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Registered Offices: Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

Originally published in Great Britain by Hutchinson Children’s Books Ltd, an imprint of Century Hutchinson Ltd, 1988

First published in the United States of America by Philomel Books, a division of the Putnam & Grosset Group, 1988

Published by Firebird, an imprint of Penguin Putnam Inc., 2002

THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS HAS CATALOGED THE PHILOMEL EDITION AS FOLLOWS:

Jacques, Brian.

Mossflower / Brian Jacques.

p. cm.

Summary: Martin the warrior mouse and Gonff the mousethief set out to find the missing ruler of Mossflower, while the other animal inhabitants of the woodland prepare to rebel against the evil wildcat who has seized power.

[1. Animals—Fiction. 2. Fantasy.] I. Title.

PZ7.J15317Mo 1988 [Fic]—dc19 88-17921 CIP AC

ISBN: 978-1-101-66599-2

Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.

Version_4

Contents

Tsarmina the Ruthless

Other Books

Title Page

Copyright

Map

Introduction

Book One
Kotir

Book Two
Salamandastron

Book Three
Of Water and Warriors

Late autumn winds sighed fitfully around the open gatehouse door, rustling brown gold leaves in the fading afternoon.

Bella of Brockhall snuggled deeper into her old armchair by the fire. Through half-closed eyes she watched the small mouse peering around the doorway at her.

“Come in, little one, and close the door.”

The small mouse did as he was bidden. Encouraged by the badger’s friendly smile, he clambered up onto the arm of the chair and settled himself against a cushion.

“You said that you would tell me a story, Miz Bella.”

The badger nodded slowly.

“Everything you see about you, the harvest that has been gathered, from the russet apples to the golden honey, is yours to enjoy in freedom. Listen now, as the breeze sweeps the last autumn leaves off into the world of winter. I will tell you of the time long ago before Redwall Abbey was built in Mossflower. In those days there was no freedom for woodlanders; we were oppressed cruelly under the harsh rule of Verdauga Greeneyes and his daughter Tsarmina. It was a mouse like yourself who saved Mossflower. His name is known to all: Martin the Warrior.

“Ah, my little friend, I am grown old. So are my comrades; their sons and daughters are fathers and mothers now. But that is life. The seasons still look new to young eyes, the food tastes fresher in the mouths of the young ones than it does in my own. As I sit here in the warmth and peace it all lives again in my memory, a strange tale of love and war, friend and foe, great happenings and mighty deeds.

“Gaze into the fire, young one. Listen to me and I will tell you the story.”

BOOK ONE

Kotir

Mossflower lay deep in the grip of midwinter beneath a sky of leaden gray that showed tinges of scarlet and orange on the horizon. A cold mantle of snow draped the landscape, covering the flatlands to the west. Snow was everywhere, filling ditches, drifting high against hedgerows, making paths invisible, smoothing the contours of earth in its white embrace. The gaunt, leafless ceiling of Mossflower Wood was penetrated by constant snowfall, which carpeted the sprawling woodland floor, building canopies on evergreen shrubs and bushes. Winter had muted the earth; the muffled stillness was broken only by a traveler’s paws.

A sturdily built young mouse with quick dark eyes was moving confidently across the snowbound country. Looking back, he could see his tracks disappearing northward into the distance. Farther south the flatlands rolled off endlessly, flanked to the west by the faint shape of distant hills, while to the east stood the long ragged fringe marking the marches of Mossflower. His nose twitched at the elusive smell of burning wood and turf from some hearthfire. Cold wind soughed from the treetops, causing whorls of snow to dance in icy spirals. The traveler gathered his ragged cloak tighter, adjusted an old rusting sword that was slung across his back, and trudged steadily forward, away from the wilderness, to where other creatures lived.

It was a forbidding place made mean by poverty. Here and there he saw signs of habitation. The dwellings, ravaged and demolished, made pitiful shapes under snowdrifts. Rearing high against the forest, a curious building dominated the ruined settlement. A fortress, crumbling, dark and brooding, it was a symbol of fear to the woodland creatures of Mossflower.

This was how Martin the Warrior first came to Kotir, place of the wildcats.

* * *

In a mean hovel on the south side of Kotir, the Stickle family crouched around a low turf fire. It gusted fitfully as the night winds pierced the slatted timbers where mud chinking had not been replaced. A timid scratch at the door caused them to jump nervously. Ben Stickle picked up a billet of firewood, motioning his wife Goody to keep their four little ones well back in the shadows.

As the Goodwife Stickle covered her brood with coarse burlap blankets, Ben took a firmer grip on the wood and called out harshly in his gruffest voice, “Be off with you and leave us alone. There’s not enough food in here to go around a decent hedgehog family. You’ve already taken half of all we have to swell the larders in Kotir.”

“Ben, Ben, ’tis oi, Urthclaw! Open up, burr. ’Tis freezen out yurr.”

As Ben Stickle opened the door, a homely-faced mole trundled by him and hurried across to the fire, where he stood rubbing his digging claws together in front of the flames.

The little ones peeped out from the blankets. Ben and Goody turned anxious faces toward their visitor.

Urthclaw rubbed warmth into his cold nose as he talked in the curious rustic molespeech.

“Vurmin patrols be out, burr, weasels ’n’ stoats an’ the loik. They’m a lukken fer more vittles.”

Goody shook her head as she wiped a little one’s snout on her apron. “I knew it! We should have run off and left this place, like the others. Where in the name of spikes’ll we find food to pay their tolls?”

Ben Stickle threw down the piece of firewood despairingly. “Where can we run in midwinter with four little ’uns? They’d perish long afore spring.”

Urthclaw produced a narrow strip of silver birch bark and held a paw to his mouth, indicating silence. Scratched on the bark in charcoal was a single word: Corim. Beneath it was a simple picture map showing a route into Mossflower Woods, far from Kotir.

Ben studied the map, torn between the chance of escape and his family’s predicament. The frustration was clear on his face.

Bang! Bang!

“Open up in there! Come on, get this door open. This is an official Kotir patrol.”

Soldiers!

Ben took one last hasty glance at the strip of bark and threw it on the fire. As Goody lifted the latch the door was thrust forcefully inward. She was swept to one side as the soldiers packed into the room, out of the winter night chill. They pushed and shoved at each other roughly. A ferret named Blacktooth and a stoat called Splitnose seemed to be in charge of the patrol. Ben Stickle sighed with relief as they turned away from the burning strip of bark and stood with their backs to the fire.

“Well now, dozyspikes, where are you hiding all the bread and cheese and October ale?”

Ben could scarce keep the hatred from his voice as he answered the sneering Blacktooth. “It’s many a long season since I tasted cheese or October ale. There’s bread on the shelf, but only enough for my family.”

Splitnose spat into the fire and reached for the bread. Ben Stickle was blocked from stopping the stoat by a barrier of spear hafts as he tried to push forward.

Goody placed a restraining paw on her husband’s spikes. “Please, Ben, don’t fight ’em, the great bullies.”

Urthclaw chimed in, “Yurr, baint much ’ee c’n do agin spears, Ben.”

Blacktooth turned to the mole as if seeing him for the first time. “Huh, what’re you doing here, blinkeye?”

One of the little hedgehogs threw the sacking aside and faced the stoat boldly. “He came in for a warm by our fire. You leave him alone!” Splitnose burst out laughing, spraying crumbs from the bread he was eating. “Look out, Blackie. There’s more of ’em under that blanket. I’d watch ’em, if I were you.”

A nearby weasel threw back the covering, exposing the other three young ones.

Blacktooth sized them up. “Hmm, they look big enough to do a day’s work.”

Goodwife Stickle sprang fiercely in front of them. “You let my liddle ones be. They ain’t harmed nobody.”

Blacktooth seemed to ignore her. He knocked the loaves from Splitnose’s paws, then turning to a weasel he issued orders. “Pick that bread up, and no sly munching. Deliver it to the stores when we get back to the garrison.”

Waving his spear he signaled the patrol out of the hut. As Blacktooth left he called back to Ben and Goody, “I want to see those four hogs out in the fields tomorrow. Either that, or you can all spend the rest of the winter safe and warm in Kotir dungeons.”

* * *

Urthclaw kept an eye to a crack in the door, watching the patrol make its way toward Kotir. Ben wasted no time; he began wrapping the young ones in all the blankets they possessed. “Right, that’s it! Enough is enough. We go tonight. You’re right, old girl, we should have left to live in the woods with the rest long ago. What d’you say, Urthclaw?”

The mole stood with his eye pressed against the crack in the door. “Yurr, cumm ’ere, lookit thiz!”

While Ben shared the crack with his friend, Goody continued swathing her young ones with blankets. “What is it, Ben? They’re not comin’ back, are they?”

“No, wife. Hohoho, lookit that, by hokey! See the punch he landed on that weasel’s nose? Go on, give it to ’em, laddo!”

Ferdy, the little one who had spoken up, scuttled over and tugged at Ben’s paw. “Punch? Who punched a weasel? What’s happening?”

Ben described the scene as he watched it. “It’s a mouse—big strong feller too, he is. They’re tryin’ to capture him . . . That’s it! Now kick him again, mouse. Go on! Hahaha, you’d think a full patrol of soldiers could handle a mouse, but not this one. He must be a real trained warrior. Phew! Lookit that, he’s knocked Blacktooth flat on his back. Pity they’re hangin’ on to his sword like that. By the spikes, he’d cause some damage if he had that blade between his paws, rusty as it is.”

Ferdy jumped up and down. “Let me see, I want a look!”

Urthclaw turned slowly away from the door. “Baint much use, liddle ’edgepig. They’m gorrim down now, aye, an’ roped up too. Hurr, worra pity, they be too many fer ’im to foight, ee’m a gurt brave wurrier tho.”

Ben was momentarily crestfallen, then he clapped his paws together. “Now is the time, while the patrol’s busy with the fighter. They’ve got a job on their paws, draggin’ him back to the cats’ castle. Come on, let’s get a-goin’ while the goin’s good.”

* * *

A short while later, the fire was burning to embers in an empty hut as the little band trudged into the vast woodland sprawl of Mossflower, blinking water from their eyes as they kept their heads down against the keen wind. Urthclaw followed up the rear, obliterating the pawtracks from the snowy ground.

Mossflower

BOOK ONE

Kotir

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