It took quite a while for the laughter to subside, but it had worked wonders. Some of the little seal pups slid out of the pack and nuzzled up against Clecky. The king pointed a flipper at Grath and looked questioningly at the other seals as he barked out a single word, "Waaylumm!"
There was a moment's silence, then every seal began waving a flipper towards the otter and echoing the word, "Waaylumm! Waaylumm!"
Grath was mystified. She looked at Martin and shrugged. "I dunno wot they mean."
Further discussion was cut short as the friends found themselves lifted up bodily by the seals and tossed back into the logboat. Knowing the sealfolk meant them no harm, they sat in silence, watching the procedure. With a mighty smack from his flipper, the king broke the stake holding the headline of the logboat. Other seals came flapping up with cables made from thick rubbery seaweed. These they proceeded to attach to the vessel from stem to stern until the little craft was festooned with woven seaweed ropes. Half a dozen stout young seals slid the logboat off into the water.
Viola looked over the side. All the seaweed fastenings were held in the jaws of at least three seals to a cable; the king alone held the headrope in his teeth.
He let out a sharp bark. "Gittarra!"
The logboat's crew fell over backward as the craft sped off into the fog, sending up a great bow wave. Plogg and Welko scrambled up to the for'ard bowsprit. They watched, fascinated, as the sleek forms of the seal pack sped their boat through the seas at a breathtaking rate.
Clecky settled back, winking at Viola. "Just the ticket, m'gel. Beats sailin' an' rowin', wot? Absolutely top hole, hope these chaps know where they're jolly well goin'!"
Grath blinked spray from her eyes as they shot out free of the clinging fogbanks. "Oh, they seem t'know where they're bound, all right. Harr! 'tis good t'see clear day an' sunlight again, though!"
Martin agreed wholeheartedly. "It certainly is, friend. Well, at least we're out of trouble with icebergs and I'm sure the sealfolk mean us no harm. Only problem is, they don't know where we want to go and we don't know where they're taking us."
Clecky began rummaging about in the remainder of their supplies. "Well, wherever we're jolly well goin', I ain't travelin' on a bally empty tummy. Let's see what the tuck situation is, wot!"
"Yeeeek, look, look!" Viola was pointing out to sea. All eyes followed her paw.
Martin could not believe his eyes.
"Wh ... What are they?"
Grath had seen them once before in her lifetime. She took a deep breath. "On the far north coast where I was reared we saw those sea creatures once. It was spring an' they swam almost up to the beach. My mother said they were called whales an' no creature in all the seas is as big as 'em. They blow water out o' their heads, straight up like a big fountain. Their tails are like the spread o' two large oaks. See!"
They stared, stunned by the size of the creatures. One of the whales raised a mighty fluke and slammed it down on the face of the ocean, causing an enormous white explosion of water.
Martin watched the leviathans of the deep as they sported and played, each one like a black island rearing from the main. "Great seasons! I could imagine old Rollo laughing at me if I told him I had seen fishes as big as Redwall Abbey!"
Plogg and Welko were inclined to agree. "Hah! The Guo-sim'd say we'd been asleep an' seen the whales in our dreams, or they might say we'd eaten too much of Clecky's cooking."
The hare looked up, his face smudged from blowing on the ashes of the fire to get it rekindled again. "Oh, they would, would they? Base ingratitude! I've a jolly good mind to let you chaps get the scoff ready for that! I say, how about askin' old Hawmface to steer over that way, so's we can catch one of those whale type chaps. I wonder what they'd taste like cooked up. Hmmm, y'd need a blinkin' big pan ... Yagh!"
The hare shook himself as the rest of the crew shot water at him with their paws. He twisted his ears to wring them out. "Yah boo rotters, y've gone an' put me flippin' fire out!"
Toward evening the weather started to become mild and warm, though they were still feeling the breeze, owing to the fact that the tireless sealfolk never once slackened their breakneck pace. The logboat hissed through the water, bouncing across the waves like a runaway arrow.
Then Martin became worried. "See, the sun is setting in the west, over that way. We're being taken northward!"
Clecky had finally managed a small fire. He passed them each a slice of toasted shrewbread and some warm oat and barley cordial. "Nothing we c'n do about it at the moment, old lad. They're obviously takin' us someplace, though. Let's wait until we get there an' figure out our next move from where we land, wot?"
Grath stared out across the uncharted seas. "Aye, like as not the fates'll send us where they want."
On the western horizon the sun dipped beneath the sea like a crimson fireball, shooting rays of scarlet, pink and gold onto the underbellies of purple and cream cloudbanks. Viola snuggled down in the stern, nibbling a crust of shrewbread and thinking how different it all was from sitting in Great Hall and dining off the sumptuous fare commonplace to Redwall Abbey, far from the lonely sound of waves upon open sea.
Chapter 37
A full summer moon shone down on the path to Ninian's, casting pale flickering shadows upon three grim-faced creatures pounding through the woods purposefully at the head of a mixed band of shrews and otters, each one armed with sling, javelin, rapier or bow and arrows. Bravely Skipper kept pace with Log a Log and Rangapaw, bearing his injuries stoically. From between the trees they glimpsed the half-ruined spire of the ancient building.
Log a Log gritted his teeth, clasping his shrew rapier tight. "Soon be there now!" he said.
"Friend, is that you?"
Momentarily they halted and looked around. Again the voice sounded out into the night. "I'm in the ditch, friends. Help me!"
Throwing themselves flat at the pathside, Skipper and his burly daughter delved through nettles and reeds that grew up the bank.
"Got 'im. Git the other paw. Up y'come, Rollo sir!"
His face smeared with mud and his garments rent and torn, the old Recorder was hauled swiftly up onto the path, where he sat gasping out his story.
'We were attacked, or I should say the young maids were. It was jackdaws, a whole colony of the wicked birds. Gerul heard them screaming when we arrived at Ninian's; they were inside. Gerul told me to stay outside and charged inthere were awful sounds, screaming and cawing. Next thing I knew, Tansy and Craklyn were flung out through the door by Gerul, and he shouted for them to bring help from Redwall. So they could travel fast they lowered me into the ditch, telling me to hide and keep out of harm's way. I don't know what happened after that, until I heard one of you speak as you ran by."
Log a Log saw that Skipper was breathless and his wounds were bothering him; the shrew Chieftain sat the otter down on the path next to Rollo. "Stay here and guard him, Skip, you'll only slow us up. We've got enough here to do the job, me'n this big 'un of yores."
The Skipper of Otters nodded, he understood. "If'n our friends are hurt, then give those birds blood'n'vinegar. Go on, mate, git goin'!"
Without a backward glance they charged through the rotting doorframe of Ninian's. Jackdaws scattered everywhere as they tried to escape from the warriors who teemed in roaring the Abbey battle call.
''Redwaaaaaaallll!''
Scruvo their thieving leader and another of his band had Gerul on the floor, tearing savagely at him with their wicked beaks. Rangapaw hit Scruvo across the head with her otter javelin, the force of the blow shattering the weapon's haft and slaying Scruvo instantly. The other jackdaw gurgled its life out at the thrusting point of Log a Log's rapier. Other birds fell to the deadly nemesis of otters and shrews, though some of them fled, winging off into the night, never again to be seen in Mossflower.