Duncton Wood (64 page)

“Look at the Duncton Stone! It should stand straight and tall like the trees around it. But see how it tilts over toward the west, where Uffington lies! The system of which it is so much a part is decayed, and it tilts for weakness at the knowledge, seeking the help of Uffington. I tell you all that the day will come when by our strength this Stone will stand aright again, proud of the system from whose strength it will soar to the sky and whose power we will not question or, like Rune, try to corrupt. It will stand as straight as the mighty Ballagan set it and when it does all moles shall know that our system has been healed.

“This is not a night for fighting and Midsummer is not the time for blood. But I tell you that until the time comes when the Stone is the true center of our system once more, then those who know that there is nothing without the Stone must fight for their belief. I, who have run so often in fear from the talons of death, will run no more, but stand and face what comes with talons of my own. Their strength comes from the power and the silence that lies within the Stone and which each of us may hear and feel.

“It is no sin to run, and if any want to go, then let them go in peace. But the hour has finally come when everymole, whether from Duncton Wood or the pastures, or Uffington itself, must stand and fight if their belief is in the Stone. Let each one of you look at it now and decide.” Bracken pointed again at the Stone and everymole there, including the youngsters, looked at the Stone in the light of his words. Not a single mole moved until, one by one, they turned back to look again at Bracken. The night was stirring now with wind and around them in the wood were heavy movements in the undergrowth first on one side and then on another. The sound of henchmoles closing in. It was too. late for anymole there to escape.

“Let the youngsters gather round the flanks of the Stone, which will protect them, and let the rest range themselves closely about the clearing, for soon Rune will be here. Let pasture mole mingle with Duncton mole and let us all fight as one.”

Then around them, in the darkness beyond the clearing, there were creepings and peerings, whisperings and plottings, slinkings and dark talons massing for attack. Somewhere in the darkness Rune crouched, listening to the sounds about him, waiting for his forces to mass themselves completely around the Stone clearing. He was smiling. There
had
been a moment when they should have attacked him – when he was coming up the slopes and feared an ambush – but now the advantage was his. Why, the fools were gathered in the moonlight by the Stone where they could be seen clearly and smelled. The sniveling little Marsh End youngsters were gathered round the Stone with them, waiting to be comfortably killed by his henchmoles, who would take pleasure in catching up with moles who had escaped them down at the Marsh End. Henchmoles do not like being made to feel foolish.

Near Rune, Nightshade slipped her body among the contorted and twisted shadows of the smaller roots of a beech tree – shapes it fitted perfectly. Her talons wound and wove with continuous movement as if she were caressing the night air into dangerous shapes as she snouted out the Stone beyond the darkness. She was casting spells for victory.

“When the moon is at its peak, Rune, I want to be free with the Stone, yes... mm... to wipe the blood of the young into its holes and crevices and make a curse on all the marshenders unfortunate enough to survive. What a pity if they all died. Yes... mm...”

Her voice was slimy, like a dying worm, but it clung to the mind of any who heard it, suffocating any thought of love or light or color that might already be there and aborting any about to be born. Rune, however, wallowed in its sound. Nightshade had waited a long time for this night, as had the dark and treacherous generations whose dark endeavors had produced her, and other moles like her who had lived on the edge of the system until the darkness of Rune sucked them inside it and to the very heart of Barrow Vale. Yes... mm...

The first attack was swift, sudden and very deadly. Five henchmoles broke cover into the clearing, ran straight across to where a group of marshender males stood ready, and with swift and fatal lunges killed four moles where they crouched. Just like that. The blood had barely started to flow before they were gone again, and as the natural movement of the defenders of the Stone swayed toward the shadows into which they had disappeared, another attack was launched from a different direction, this time to where Stonecrop and Bracken stood, side by side. Perhaps sensing how dangerous these two were, the attackers sidestepped them and two more moles went down before Bracken, with a relaxed lunge, felled one where it stood and so injured another that it took only a quick kick from Stonecrop to finish him off.

Rebecca stood to one side of them, facing the darkness, while around the base of the Stone, among the beech roots gathered there, the youngsters huddled, their mothers forming a final protective rank around them.

The battle was sporadic at first as one quick thrust of attack followed another – a technique already rehearsed by Rune. But it was effective, for the moles of the Stone lost more with each attack than they were able to kill and, the light of the full moon being on them and the attackers coming out of darkness, the advantage was with Rune.

It was to Rune’s credit as a leader that this series of attacks lasted as long as it did before finally breaking down into a concerted onslaught onto the besieged moles of the Stone at two different points. On one side, Stonecrop and Bracken, Rebecca and Brome headed the defense; on the other Mekkins and Mullion stood the main ground. All fought differently – Stonecrop with a massive slow soberness that was utterly ruthless – taking blows that would be fatal to other moles as if they were nothing and then launching his own devastating lunges; Bracken was quicker and more subtle, parrying here, cutting there, and killing whenever he could; Mekkins, as usual, swore aloud with every blow, roaring “Take that, you bastard” and “Oh, no you don’t, brother” with every lunge, and “Sod it” when he missed. Brome fought more like Stonecrop but a little less effectively, for he lacked the total concentration Stonecrop had learned; Rebecca was fast, vicious and magnificent, shouting and screaming with anger, snarling at the biggest moles, cutting and thrusting where she could, fearing none. While somewhere just behind Brome and Bracken, Boswell stood firm as well, striking when he could but most useful for the cries of warning he calmly gave to each of the stronger fighters in front of him who were so preoccupied with their individual struggles that they often did not see a threat from another angle.

But one by one they suffered cuts and injuries that slowed them, as around them their colleagues began to fall. Some dead, some too injured to fight, a few too tired to raise their paws and defend themselves. Oxlip, the female who had escaped to the Marsh End, fell and died by Mekkins’ side. Mullion, too, was grimly wounded and fell back behind his own lines, life leaving him.

The moon shone on, its light cold on the terrible scene of carnage it lit so clearly. It reached a peak and then began its waning descent, and still the battle went on with no word of Midsummer blessing said.

The moles around the Stone began to retreat back toward it, leaving their dead and wounded before them as the henchmoles, black and tough as ever, climbed over the stricken bodies and pressed forward.

Then Rune appeared out of the night, the twisted shape of Nightshade at his side waiting by the clearing edge with glee in her eyes, while he pressed forward suddenly into the bloodiest of the melee, leading his henchmoles on for the last part of the fight. There always seemed to be more henchmoles coming, and more, and always fewer and fewer moles able to stand and face their onslaught. They slowly retreated, back toward the Stone, and as the retreat set in, Rebecca instinctively went behind the front line to rally the mothers of the youngsters behind her so that, if necessary, they could put up a last defense.

The youngsters, seeing now the great floodtide of henchmoles bearing down on them, stopped only by Bracken, Stonecrop, Brome, Mekkins and a few others who stood their ground, began to whimper, their sound a pathetic addition to the screams of triumph and death that rose and fell in the clearing.

Then Brome staggered and fell, lost under a torrent of terrible lunges, and with his death the resolution of the other pasture moles began to weaken and they all retreated even farther back. Seeing his advantage. Rune pressed even harder on them, his black talons cutting and stabbing before him, shiny with blood in the moonlight. Behind him, beyond the mass of murderous henchmoles that backed him up. Bracken could see for a moment the sinister shape of Nightshade, whom he did not recognize, slinking gleefully about the clearing’s edge as if waiting to take her pickings of the dead.

Rebecca rose up magnificently behind him, eyes flashing with anger and determination, the youngsters huddled behind her, the Stone soaring up above them, almost hanging over them all as it tilted over toward the west.

“Trust in the Stone!” she shouted, her voice carrying to them all. “Trust in Bracken and the Stone!” Her words carried even to Rune, who until then had not seen her clearly, and he faltered, as if uncertain whether she was really living or come back from the dead. Then he heard that it
was
her and she was shouting the name of Bracken. His eyes narrowed, he wondered whether he was fighting an army of ghost moles, for he remembered Bracken now; then, as ever, coolness returned and he fought on even more strongly, eager to get to the mole who must be Bracken – the tough one who stood fighting between the great mole from the pastures and Mekkins. That was him. He was the one to kill, before the massacre.

His talons razed through the face fur of Bracken, and other henchmoles, sensing his intent, pressed toward Bracken as well, each trying to get their talons in his fur or snout.

The noise was terrible. Screams. Roaring. But then another roaring. The sound came through like sudden winds in trees, a roaring louder than any they had yet heard. A monstrous roaring, accompanied by blunderings and crashings in the wood beyond the clearing, a sound made by no henchmole that had ever lived.

Rune and his moles ignored it, fighting on to kill Bracken and the others. But facing the darkness of the wood as they were. Bracken and Stonecrop and Mekkins, blood flowing freely from their tired limbs, could not but see the sudden huge shadow that appeared at the wood’s edge, ten times bigger it seemed than the slinking form of Nightshade over which it loomed.

It surged forward, caught the moonlight and became clear, a sight more fearful than a thousand henchmoles poised to kill.

It was Mandrake – and he had not looked more terrifying since that spring day, so many moleyears before, when he had appeared at the wood’s edge and slaughtered his way into Duncton.

“It’s Mandrake!” cried Bracken, his voice suddenly clear and strong in the night.

Rune and his moles stepped back for a moment, turning back to see what it was. Mandrake stood facing them all, his eyes black and impenetrable as the most savage night, fur hanging in great folds about his massive body, his snout as ever like a talon before him.

Nightshade turned round to look as well, but with one single blow of his right paw he swept her bloodily away, her body lifeless before it touched the ground. Mandrake was back.

If days of destiny lead to a final hour and that hour reaches a last minute in whose seconds decisions that form life are made, this was it. Rune tried to grab it.

“Here is the Stone Mole,” he shouted, pointing his talons at Bracken. “He is the Stone Mole. Help us kill him. Mandrake.” He turned back to complete the onslaught on Bracken, a cunning and brave maneuver by Rune.

Mandrake said no word and only a vibrating growl came from him as he looked at them all. His gaze settled not on Bracken but on Rebecca behind him, and behind her to the youngsters gathered, terrified, around her.

“Rebecca!” he roared suddenly, moving forward like a black storm cloud across a windy, moonlit sky. “Rebecca!” And his huge paws began to flay right and left, taking with each blow one or two or three henchmoles out of his path. Rune’s forces fell around him at Mandrake’s advance, and at last Rune himself, seeing his support going and his ploy failing, slunk to one side as Mandrake continued his advance, not on Bracken, not on Mekkins, not on Stonecrop, but toward Rebecca beyond them. “Rebecca!” he cried. “Rebecca!”

There came from him a smell so rank, so disgusting in its anger and wretched rage, that Mekkins and Bracken fell back before it, closing in front of Rebecca and raising their talons to protect her. But its effect on Stonecrop was just the opposite. He had smelled that odor before – in a temporary burrow where Rebecca and his brother. Cairn, had mated.
This
was the odor on which he had sworn to take revenge. He moved his own great body forward, his fur lighter and his muscles tauter than Mandrake’s, and with one massive lunge stopped Mandrake in his tracks.

It was the first time since Mandrake had left the frozen slopes of Siabod so many long and cruel moleyears before that anymole had stood so solid in his path. He reared up, looking at Stonecrop as if he was in some way surprised to see him, as if he expected no mole at all to be there. As if the very nature of the world itself had suddenly changed.

Every lesson Stonecrop had learned from Medlar now came into play. Sensing Mandrake’s surprise, Stonecrop acted immediately, lunging forward with a talon cut that scored another wound on Mandrake’s lined and pitted face.

Then Mandrake did a strange thing. Instead of immediately counterattacking, he seemed to try to peer round Stonecrop as if baffled by an obstruction on a path that had once been clear; trying to get a better look at Rebecca and calling, crying “Rebecca! Rebecca!” And still he did not try to strike Stonecrop back.

Behind Stonecrop, Bracken turned to Rebecca, who was trying to come forward toward Mandrake as she herself called out from some terrible distance “Oh Mandrake, Mandrake!”