Duncton Found (54 page)

Squeezebelly spoke slowly and with such a sense of concern and tenderness for them all that the atmosphere in the burrow quietened.

“Sleekit said that as Henbane grew with pup her feelings for her pups – for you – changed from indifference to love; when she felt your movements inside her it was as if she understood something about the nature of a light she had glimpsed long before, and known again only when she and Tryfan had made love. The more these feelings grew, the more afraid she was of the threats to you – not only from the dark intent of Rune and the sideem around him, but from herself, for she knew she had been corrupted.

“She asked – she begged – Sleekit to take you from her once you were born, even though she knew she would not want it and might resist. She felt she would not have sufficient love for you to fight the corruption she had suffered; she felt she would be unworthy of you. This was a most courageous thing for her to ask, and one that Sleekit said caused her much suffering as the time for your birth came. Yet she said it again and again. Through her contact with your father, Tryfan, she had for the first time seen something of the light, and she wanted her pups to know it too, even though she felt she could not have it in her own life.

“Be angry with her if you will, but she did more to show her love for you than many parents ever do. And at the end, when you were born and helpless, she fought with her whole strength for you, and made it possible for Sleekit and Mayweed to rescue two of you at least, and bring you out of Whern. Be proud of her as well. As for your grey fur, Harebell, which you think may be as Henbane’s was, well, mole, that tells me only that your mother must have been most beautiful. And if such as Tryfan loved her, and made you in union with her, why then I am sure the Stone in some way blessed their union, and that one day moledom will also see that it was blessed.”

Squeezebelly fell silent then, and not a mole in that deep burrow doubted that each was much loved by the other, and in some strange way much loved by the Stone.

“But... this Lucerne,” whispered Harebell at last, “he is our brother. The Master of the Word is our
brother
.”

Squeezebelly stared at them, and at his Bramble and Betony, and he said, “We live in times I do not always understand. Since Tryfan came here I have felt that the Stone has chosen Beechenhill for something no other system will know. All these years, all these decades, since long before I was born, since the coming of the first mole himself, perhaps, the Stone has blessed this system and kept its moles in health and faith, as if it knew that one day it would need a place most fitting to the light it casts, and the Silence that is all its own. More and more I believe this great event is near. I believe it has been nearer ever since the Stone Mole’s star first showed. I believe your strange birth of parents supremely of the Stone and of the Word is part of this event.

“And if I had to look into the future and say what might be, I would say to both of you that if the day should ever come when you meet your brother Lucerne then more than your own lives will depend on how you conduct yourselves with him. I believe all of moledom will tremble in that hour, and in time all moledom will know of it, for better or for worse.

“Your father preached before our Stone, and spoke of the non-violent way. I do not know what that way may be, yet always I strive to find it. Where he is now or what happened to him I cannot tell. Your mother was the very head of the violence that the Word wreaked across moledom, yet she gave you the chance of life before the Stone, and now she has power no more, but more than that I do not know.

“What I do know is that I, and through me Beechenhill, was entrusted with your lives. We have reared you here as best we could, in a community which knows the Stone’s light. Why, if either of your parents could see you now, as I can, then I think they would be as proud of you as you should feel of them.”

So Squeezebelly spoke, and nomole could doubt that he had fulfilled his task in those two moles. They looked at him with love, as Bramble and Betony did, and though they did not think it then, they one day would: that they may have lost first their parents, and then the two moles who saved and reared them, but in Squeezebelly they had found a mole who had ever showed them as much of love and faith and honour as the truest parents ever could.

“And now,” he said, “I think you must decide if you are to keep this secret or tell other moles. We shall all do as you wish.”

“Secret,” said Wharfe, “though I hate to take that way.”

“Secret for now,” said Harebell, “though I hate it too. But moles might not understand....”

“For now only,” said Wharfe. “But one day we must tell.”

“So be it,” said Squeezebelly. “Bramble? Betony?”

“We shall not tell,” said Bramble.

“I shall never say,” said Betony with a smile towards Wharfe.

The number of visitors to Beechenhill had been declining since news of the changes at Whern had come into the system and by mid-September no visitors at all were seen, and few even heard of.

The weather had worsened, and as autumn came across the southern Peak, grike patrols increased in the peripheral areas, not only in the east and south, but more ominously in the less populated west and north as well.

Then, like shadows gathering, the news filtering into Beechenhill became more grim. A watcher went missing on the eastern side; two vagrants who, it seemed, had been trying to reach Beechenhill from the normally safe west were found slain by grikes.

Then in the last third of September news came from followers in Ashbourne that a great massing of moles was taking place, and soon after that an account of the snouting of the eldrene of Ashbourne, and three of her guardmoles, one of whom Squeezebelly knew to be a brave and secret supporter of the Stone. It was a great blow, for Ashbourne was a system that was traditionally friendly towards moles of Beechenhill and it seemed that the new regime of the Word was being thorough in its job if it was killing its own when they were deemed to go astray.

It was against this darkening background that Squeezebelly ordered a retreat into the more central and safer part of the system of moles who lived around its edges, while moles like Wharfe were sent out on missions to watch for grike movement and change. There was a sense of fear about the tunnels now, and all knew that the dangers Squeezebelly had warned about for so long might be soon upon them.

But for several days, and then a week, and then two weeks nothing happened. Several of those out on missions returned and reported no grike moves against Stone followers. The tension eased and there came that dangerous sense that the danger was past, and soon surely the Stone would send them better news. And so at first it seemed.

Wharfe had been sent to the north-west with three other moles including Bramble, and they had ventured a good many miles beyond Beechenhill itself and seen some evidence of grikes and even patrols up the Manifold Valley, which is the complex western boundary of Beechenhill. But beyond it, on Grindon Moor and north to Revidge Heath, there were no grikes.

It was as they turned back to make the long trek home, and were seeking a safe passage across the Manifold at Ecton, always a grike outpost, when Wharfe had turned a corner among the rough grasses above Ecton that he found himself face to face with a greying tough-looking mole. He seemed alone and regarded them gravely and kept utterly still, appraising them without fear or aggression. Wharfe had rarely seen a mole in such circumstances so self-assured, and asked with typical Beechenhill calm, “What is your name, mole, and whither are you bound?”

The manner of the mole’s reply, as much as its content, took them by surprise, for though he was one to their four he spoke quite without fear and indeed with considerable authority. He had a strong northern accent, and had he not spoken slowly they might have had trouble understanding him.

“Neither my name nor my destination need concern you yet. Where
are you
from?”

“Ours is the power to ask,” said Wharfe with a smile.

“’Tis of no consequence,” he said coolly, settling down and smiling back in a way that they found disconcerting. Wharfe had a most uncomfortable feeling that he was out of his depth, and certainly he did not know quite how to proceed. The mole, who though a good deal older than him was evidently fit and powerful, eventually said after the silence had grown uncomfortable, “We could stance here facing each other all day and learn nothing.”

“Or you could respond to our greeting and give us your name and destination,” said Wharfe.

The mole said nothing.

“Or at least where you are from,” added Bramble.

The mole seemed to think about this and finally made a positive decision to reply. But it was clear he felt neither threatened nor under duress.

“I’m from Mallerstang,” he said, watching Wharfe for a reaction.

Mallerstang... a name a mole would not easily forget, and one that stirred a memory in Wharfe of something told him once. Mallerstang! Aye, a memory of something Squeezebelly once said.

“You know the name, or have been told it,” said the mole matter-of-factly, as if he could read Wharfe’s mind. “Then let me speak another name: Medlar. Mallerstang and Medlar. What stirs in your memory now?”

Bramble, whose love of legend and history was well known, whispered something to Wharfe who listened, nodded, asked a question, and looked at the Mallerstang mole with surprise.

“I see the names mean something to
you,”
said the mole to Bramble.

“They do,” said Bramble. “Medlar was a mole from your system who came this way long ago. He came with another whose name we cannot remember.”

“Roke,” said the mole.

“That’s it!” said Bramble. “Roke!”

At the mention of this name the mole’s look softened and he smiled with pleasure. He turned from them and called out, “Come, it is safe, these moles shall not harm us.”

To the surprise of Wharfe and the others, all used to trekking and the arts of hiding, two moles who had seemed but shadows in the grass rose up and came forward and stanced one on each side of the mole’s firm flanks.

“My name is Skelder,” said the mole. “This is Ghyll,” he said of the mole on his right, a younger male of two Longest Nights. “And this is Quince.”

Though little smaller than the other two, she was more slight, and like them had about her a peaceful air and open, honest look combined with purpose and intelligence. She was about Wharfe’s age.

“Roke was my kinsmole,” said Skelder, “and as your friend may know he travelled south with Medlar as far as a system called Beechenhill. There they stayed for a time before Medlar travelled on and Roke returned to Mallerstang. He had good memories of Beechenhill and said it was a blessed place and worshipped the Stone most truly.”

“What is it you want?” asked Wharfe.

It was Quince who spoke, her eyes on Wharfe’s.

“Sanctuary,” she said. “Do you know where Beechenhill is?”

“We are of Beechenhill,” said Wharfe not moving. “Why do you seek sanctuary?”

“The grikes have destroyed our system,” said Ghyll, “and we are the last survivors.” Wharfe stared at them horrified, a horror made all the worse by the resignation in their eyes.

“We have travelled far to get to you,” said Skelder. “We knew of no other system to go to. We thought your system might be safe. We thought...” He spoke with such sincerity and lack of self-pity that Wharfe knew he spoke the truth and was deeply of the Stone. Indeed, all of them were moles for whom faith had put into their faces, and into their stances, all that was noble in moles, all that anymole might trust. He had been doubtful and kept them talking while he assessed them, but neither he nor his companions would question them more.

“Come, we shall guide you to Beechenhill,” he said. “It is two days from here by the route we shall take to avoid grikes.”

But luck was not with them, for though they passed Ecton and the river safely, on the slopes of Ecton Hill they ran into a patrol of grikes. It was an ambush and well planned and Wharfe thought ruefully that perhaps they had talked too long in the open when they first met these moles and had been seen.

The grikes, five in all, followed their normal strategy and charged suddenly and violently. Strike first, ask questions after was their usual tactic and one before which Beechenhill moles were inclined to retreat if they could, and if they could not then to act stupid and escape later. Each was a tactic that had worked for generations, but on this occasion it could not work. The grikes were large and fearsome to a mole, and perhaps because they were outnumbered seemed intent on causing injury. When the questions came, if they ever did, it might be too late. On the other paw the only route for fleeing was downslope back towards Ecton, and Wharfe knew that there were plenty of moles there he would not like to meet.

But as all these thoughts flashed through his mind and he prepared to meet the onslaught of the approaching grikes, the three Mallerstang moles, as if impelled by a common mind, began to move as one. The effect was, Wharfe afterwards remembered, most odd, as if he and all the other moles but those three were not moving at all, while the Mallerstang moles seemed to drift forward in a movement so fluid that between its beginning and its end there seemed barely nothing at all, but for a paw striking a grike here, a talon caressing a grike snout there, and a shoulder buffeting a grike over there. All in silence. Then normality returned, and everything was still but for the sound of the breeze in the moorland grass, and the heavy, pained breathing of grikes.