The old mouse looked secretively to and fro as he whispered, “Naughty? Let me tell you, young un, I was known as Hollyberry the Horrible when I was a little mouse. Old Abbot Saxtus said that I was the reason he was gray and bent double. Listen now, I’ve got to go and tend my herbs in the garden. Do you think you can behave yourself while I’m gone?”

Arula draped a clean sheet over her head. “Gudd zurr, lookit oi, hurr hurr, a snow-whoit choild oi be.”

3

Pikkle Ffolger searched the corners of his knapsack and came up with a single wild oatscone, which he wagged in Mara’s face.

“The last bally scrap of tuck between two stout ’n’ starvin’ travelers, would y’ believe it, old chum!”

The sturdy young badger maid plucked the scone from his paws. “There were four oatscones in that bag before I went to sleep last night. You flop-eared glutton, you’ve scoffed ’em!”

Pikkle placed a paw over his heart, his face a picture of injured innocence. “Scoffed? Did I hear you use the expression scoffed, O boon companion and playmate of my younger days? Nibbled daintily, picked idly at, maybe even mouthed a morsel or so. But scoffed, never!”

Mara broke the scone in two and tossed half to him. “Listen here, Ffolger me old Pikkle, don’t try baffling me with flowery phrases. You’re a scoffer and you always have been, so there!”

Grinning from ear to ear, Pikkle scoffed his half. “Oh well, truth will out, old gel, wot? I say, it’s goin’ to take us until late night to get back to jolly old Salamawotsit. I bet we’re both in for some pretty stiff words when old Urthstripe catches up with us.”

Mara slumped moodily in the hollow of two dunes, her appetite suddenly gone at the thought of returning to face the badger Lord.

“Huh, Salamandastron—I wish I never had to go back to that dreary mountain, Pikkle. Day and night, dawn to dusk, it’s watch your manners, learn your badger lore, keep your room tidy, sit up straight, don’t slouch, do this, do that, don’t do this, don’t do that. I’m sick to the stripes of it all! Isn’t there somewhere young ones can do what they want, have fun all day, without elders and grownbeasts making you do silly boring things . . . ?”

“Then come with us—we do as we please!”

Mara and Pikkle looked around in surprise. A pair of young creatures, a weasel and a ferret, appeared around the dune.

The garrulous Pikkle winked and grinned cheekily at them. “What ho, chaps. Who are you?”

The weasel smiled back. He was a handsome-looking beast, with the brightest blue eyes Mara had ever seen. “Hello there! I’m Klitch and he’s Goffa. We’ve come up from the Southwest Lands.”