Deedero had caught up with them and stepped on Kolun’s rudder. “Quick march there, dumblepaws, step out lively. An’ you two, Zillo an’ Shellhound, stop skylarkin’ about an’ move yourselves. If’n we don’t get these little ’uns someplace safe by dark, with good hot vittles in ’em an’ a pillow to lay down their heads on, it ain’t no wildcat ye’ll have to worry about. It’ll be me. Understood?”
They stepped out smartly, saluting all the way.
“Aye, marm, very good marm!”
“We’re kickin’ up a bit o’ dust now, marm!”
“Now don’t ye fret, me liddle apple dumplin’, everythin’s goin’ right to plan. Ouch! Will ye stop stampin’ on me rudder like that, er, my sweet honeybee.”
Riggu Felis would have stamped his paw with rage had it not been for the broken blackthorn spike embedded in it. He roared up at the first guard he saw passing a window inside the fortress.
“Open the main gate! Get Atunra and Pitru down here! What in the name of slaughter’n’fangs is going on here? Why are all these otterslaves camped outside in the open? Get that gate open on the double, or I’ll rip ye in half with my own two paws!”
Weilmark Scaut assisted the limping warlord up onto the pier. There was a wild scurry of paws from inside. Then the main gates creaked open.
The wildcat howled at the clutter of catguards milling about within, “You, you, you and you! Get those otterslaves locked back in their compound right now. You, scorecat, attend me!”
The feral cat in question marched up and came to rigid attention. “Lord!”
Hot, angry eyes glared through the chain mail at her. “What do they call you?”
She gulped. “Scorecat Rinat, Sire.”
Her face was sprayed with spittle as Felis thrust aside his face mask and yelled at her, “Get these guards back inside their barracks immediately! Where is my counsellor, Atunra? Where’s that useless son of mine? Why isn’t he here to meet me, eh?”
Rinat’s voice trembled nervously as she replied, “The Fortress Commander is with Lady Kaltag in her chamber, Sire.”
The wildcat shoved her roughly aside. Limping toward the stairs, he struck out at catguards with his axe handle. “Out! Out all of ye, back to your barracks!”
Balur and his sister Hinso were on guard outside of the chamber. Acting on Pitru’s orders, they challenged Riggu Felis. “Halt there, we must announce you!”
Grabbing both guards, the enraged warlord hurled them headfirst down the stairs. With his axe, he dealt the door a blow that left it toppled on one hinge. Scorecat Yund was inside the chamber with Kaltag and Pitru, who signalled him with a sideways glance. He turned, holding his spear horizontally at chest height, barring the wildcat’s path. Without breaking his limping stride, the warlord wrenched the weapon from Yund’s grasp and smashed it in two halves on his head. Lifting the scorecat bodily, Riggu flung him down the stairs also. Now, with no guards left to block him, Riggu confronted his son. His breath from behind the chain mail mask hissed viciously.
Pitru had never seen his father so wrathful. He moved swiftly behind his mother’s chair, crying out, “Stop him, he means to kill me, just like he slew Jeefra!”
The Lady Kaltag faced Riggu fearlessly, her voice calm and slightly ironical. “I stood at my window and watched your arrival. There was no sign of captive otters, bound tightly, being dragged back here for punishment. What happened to your footpaw? Were you wounded doing battle with the foe?”
Riggu Felis stumped over to a table and perched upon its edge. He took a knife from a plate of half-eaten fish and began probing at his footpaw with it. “This is nothing, a broken thorn. Where is Atunra? I need to consult with her.”
Kaltag ignored the question, wrinkling her nose in distaste as she sniffed the air. “What is that horrible smell you bring into my chamber?”
The warlord continued digging at his footpaw, sweeping aside his cloak, which was getting in the way. “Where, what foolishness is this, what smell?”
Pitru pointed at his father. “It’s all over the back of his cloak. Some kind of slop, that’s causing the smell!”
Kaltag’s smile was humourless and icy. “Did those who wounded you also do that—plaster you with filth?”
Riggu Felis grunted as he pulled out the broken blackthorn spike. “A thorn, that’s all it was, a thorn I stepped on!” Skirting the question of his cloak, he pursued his former enquiry. “Where is Atunra? Send her to me now.”
Kaltag shrugged carelessly. “She is of no consequence to me. I have not seen her since you marched away from here to destroy your enemies.”
The wildcat’s blazing eyes sought out his son. “What have you done with Atunra, you little worm?”
Pitru could not meet his father’s gaze, but he was regaining his confidence. He stared at his mother, addressing her in wide-eyed innocence. “Tell him I know nought of his pine marten lackey. As Fortress Commander, I was far too busy organising the defences against the enemies he was supposed to have defeated. I am not Atunra’s nursemaid. Why should I watch over her?”
There was a clatter of dishes as Riggu drove the knifepoint deep into the tabletop. “You stupid young brat! Is that what you call organising defences—allowing half the otterslaves to wander about outside the walls and letting a load of guards idle their time away indoors, eating and sleeping? Hah, Commander! All you’ll ever be is a silk-clad kitten, cringing behind your mother’s skirts!”
Kaltag’s voice dripped scorn as she came to Pitru’s defence. “Well, I hope he never becomes a warlord like you, skulking back here with a wounded paw and a stinking cloak! Where are all the prisoners you vowed to bring back? Scorecat Yund noticed you returned twenty-one guards short. What happened to them, O Mighty One, eh? At least we weren’t attacked, thanks to Pitru’s defence plans!”
Her words stung the wildcat worse than blackthorn spikes. He knew he had lost the argument and was not prepared to bandy further. However, he was determined to have the final word as he swept out of the chamber.
“I’ve ordered the guards back to their barracks and the slaves back to their compound. It is my command that they stay there. I will seek out Atunra now. If any harm has befallen her by either of your doings, then you will see just how merciless a warlord can be!”
Riggu Felis found Weilmark Scaut awaiting him alone on the pier. He barraged him with orders. “Search my fortress from top to bottom, and all the surrounding area. Use all your guards to do it. Find Atunra and bring her to me, dead or alive. I’ll be in my chambers. As of tomorrow, we will no longer seek out the otters.”
Scaut looked puzzled. “Lord?”
The wildcat ripped off his muddied cloak and threw it into the lake, watching the water carry it under. “Why chase about after a bunch of outlaws? I’ll make them come here to me. Don’t look so blank, Scaut. I have what they want—this fortress and a whole lot of otterslaves. Mark my words, they’ll come. Fortunately for me, otters are noble creatures. They won’t leave their own kind in slavery. They’ll make an attempt to liberate them.”
16
Happy sounds of Dibbuns laughing and playing drifted up through the open library window at Redwall Abbey. Old Quelt, Snowdrop and the three young puzzle solvers sat around the long, polished table. The Sister had one paw on Tiria’s farewell letter and the other on the Geminya Tome.
“I think the answers lie somewhere twixt these two. First we need to study the clues Tiria left for us. Then we can look up any references to them in the Tome.”
Girry stifled a yawn. “Is it nearly lunchtime yet?”
Old Quelt looked over his glasses at the young squirrel. “Bored with study already, are we, young sir?”