“Sturne...” said Pumpkin softly, understanding everything, and imagining in a flash how all of it had been – Sturne’s worry, Sturne’s determination, and Sturne’s solution. At that moment Pumpkin’s affection for his oldest companion turned to abiding love: never could a mole have a truer friend than he. Pumpkin felt his limbs begin to tremble, he felt the cold thrust of the wind, he felt his whole body tired and broken, and he knew that if he did not go now, he never would be gone!
“Sturne,” he said affectionately, “you fooled even me!”
“Fooled myself!” said Sturne wryly. “Now, go with Cluniac and he will know where to take you. Head for the Stone and from there enter the Ancient System by the tunnel that leads from the Chamber of Roots, which you already know. It is the only hope for you all. Now, I too must go,” and Sturne retreated back into the Marsh, and where he had been only reeds fretted and freezing water splashed.
Pumpkin ran and staggered and stumbled upslope to Cluniac, who reached out a paw from the cover of the wood and guided him quickly and with barely a word in among the trees, and away.
While across the Pastures where the moles had been murdered the first harsh streaks of blizzard snow came down and raced over the grass, and lost themselves in the killing ground that was the Marsh.
Chapter Thirty-Three
Snow of a different kind fell at the coppice where Privet and the others had gathered hushed and worried at the trees’ edge. Light, tiny flecks from out of the still night air, and but momentarily.
“It’s going to be a bitter night,” observed Weeth, eyeing the branches of the trees above them, which now stirred occasionally, and uneasily. “But if a wind gets up there’ll be a blizzard yet.”
“Duncton’s troubled,” whispered Whillan, who had said little since his first declaration that his home system was in need. “We must be able to help, somehow.”
“What to do? We must wait,” said Rooster. “Stone knows.”
“Stone does know,” exclaimed Weeth ironically, “even if I don’t. This place is strange, but what you moles are saying is stranger still.”
“Not strange,” said Rooster.
“Waiting,” whispered Whillan.
Rooster nodded and said, “Yes. Stone is waiting here. We wait, it decides.”
“Decides what?” asked Weeth, exasperated, and looking at Maple for some support. The moonlight touched Maple’s face and he shrugged as if to say, “Don’t ask me! Leave it to them!”
Weeth sighed and settled down for what looked like a long wait for something nomole could name.
“Was Longest Night, the night you took me from Caer Caradoc. Wasn’t it!” said Rooster suddenly, turning to Maple.
“For some,” said Maple grimly.
“All the spring years, all the summer years, all the autumn years I thought of that Longest Night. I looked towards it thinking, “Rooster will try to be free by then. Of darkness. Of need. Rooster will not run more. Rooster will be free.” Never thought I would be needed on Longest Night. But now not sure.”
He was silent, the deep furrows on his face like rockfalls down a snowy void in the moonlight, and his eyes rugged impenetrable caverns of darkness. Maple and Weeth exchanged a glance, and Privet moved closer to him. It was clear he wanted to talk.
“But not to be. Newborns’ journey to Caradoc was journey into new darkness. Caught and put into captivity. My friends, because of me. What friends? Most dead. All gone. Hamble, Hamble.”
“He’s
safe.
Rooster, I told you that. He wanted no more violence so he is going to Duncton Wood. It has always been a sanctuary for moles like us who have lost their home burrow and cannot return. It was for me. It will be for him. It could be for you.”
“But Longest Night! You lost that because of me. It went by and we never knew. That day I confessed to all those moles, but did they hear? Now is second chance.”
“
We
heard,” said Weeth with a grin. This kind of talk made more sense to him.
“You’re good, you are,” said Rooster, laughing suddenly and buffeting Weeth in a rough way.
“You did confess, my dear, and many more moles heard you than you might think. I was not the only one to hear your... despair.”
“It is that,” said Rooster. “Confusion, like when you’re searching for the right delving line but cannot find it, or hear it. Only in your mind. There it’s beautiful, there it’s clear, there it’s everything. Then your paw tries to find it and cannot and makes something less, and something dies. In you. In here!” He thumped his huge chest and looked disappointed in himself.
“But what’s it feel like when you get the delving right?” asked Maple. They all looked at Rooster with interest, and he stared at the ghostly ground, and then ran the talons of his right paw into the grass.
“Haven’t delved for long time and said I never would again. But now, tonight, here, may have to. The need’s growing all the time. Whillan feels it. All may need us.”
“But you remember how to delve?” said Weeth.
Rooster nodded and said slowly, his face softening a little, “Once travelling with Hamble I woke at dawn. Went out. On a valley side looking down at the river that was there the evening before but was gone now, the water, the banks, the pasture, gone beneath a layer of mist. There was sun and in the distance there were trees. Thought, “I’m glad I’ve left the Moors, glad to see this, glad to be alive to know this beauty.” Then out of the mist, slowly, came the wings of a heron flap-flapping up towards me. Grey wings out of white, slow but sure, power out of strength. Out of that white nothing it came beneath which was the river I could not see but knew was there, and the grass I journeyed across the day before, and all the earth, which was lost that morning. Up and out came the heron, its great wings stirring the mist and then rising into sun, and then it was clear into the day and going forward, going on, certain, sure, a flight from a nothing I knew existed to a future I had to believe was there. That is what a delving is, that is what it feels like when it’s true. Only the Stone could make it be, for delving begins and ends in the Stone’s Silence, which begins in the past, is in the now, and will be in the future. And tonight. Whillan?”
Whillan looked at him expectantly.
“Tonight you must obey. Know you don’t like me. Know you don’t like love of Privet and me. Know anger when I see it. But tonight moledom’s more important than you or me. Tonight you obey. Understand?”
“But to do what?” asked Whillan.
Rooster shrugged. “Don’t know. Delve, probably.”
“I can’t delve,” said Whillan, “but I can scribe!”
Rooster laughed. “Oh yes, you
can
delve. Good that you don’t know how, will do it better. First time can delve out of innocence. After that it’s difficult. You must obey. Tell him. Privet.”
“I think he understands. Rooster.”
Rooster growled, frowned and fell silent, but the others did not speak for it was plain enough he wanted to say more.
“That was spring I saw the heron. And that was the day I started to look forward to Longest Night, praying to the Stone to bring me to it free of what I was in, which was darkness. But was not to be. We were escaping on Longest Night. Didn’t pause for thought or prayer. The Longest Night when all would change went past without a thought. Stone did not hear my prayer.”
“Didn’t it, my love?” said Privet, reaching her paw without embarrassment to his.
“She knew me before,” said Rooster. “Privet saw me delve when I could. Do you remember those days, long, long ago?”
Privet nodded but could say nothing.
“She came to Hilbert’s Top, and that was the Stone’s answer to my prayer too. The Stone
does
answer prayers but a mole cannot say when or where or how. He must wait. He must go into the darkness where no answers are. He must wait. I prayed for her up on Hilbert’s Top and she came. Like I prayed for Longest Night but the Stone did not answer. I have sinned. Now the Stone begins to answer. It says it needs me to delve, but I need another. Whillan will help.”
“Are you so sure you’ll delve again, and tonight?” whispered Privet.
“Longest Night was a time of
missing.
But with you there was Longest Night. Up on Hilbert’s Top before darkness of my killing Ratcher, before that. Do you remember what we did. Privet?”
“You held me all night my love, so close.”
“You remember?”
“I remember everything.”
“We were happy then. But now...”
“I’m here. And Longest Night...”
“I remember it like yesterday. Cannot forget, not ever.”
“It can be again.”
He shook his great head and said, “A mole can’t delve today what he didn’t delve yesterday.”
Privet said, “Not the same, no, but maybe better! Look at the trees behind us! Look at the stars above! Look at moledom stretching away beyond us in the moonlight. If we had been here on Longest Night what would we have seen? Not as much as now!”
“Some,” growled Rooster unconvinced. “Would have seen you. Privet!” He grinned.
“Not so clearly,” responded Privet, laughing.
“Sshh...” said Maple softly.
“Yes...” whispered Weeth, turning round sharply and peering into the wood. “Sshh... it seems to be...”
“Mole,” said Rooster.
“Yes,” said Whillan with sudden eagerness, “it sounds like mole. Need... we need...”
“The seventh you said,” said Rooster, “yes?”
Whillan nodded though he did not quite know why. But he felt suddenly relieved and wondered why Weeth and Maple looked so concerned. Couldn’t they tell what they could hear heralded completion, not danger? And if they could not, how could he? He looked at Madoc in wonder and she came closer.
“What is it, my love?” she asked.
“Don’t know,” said Whillan. “Something. Something important’s beginning. Here and now.”
“You sound like Rooster!” she whispered with a giggle. Whillan nodded seriously, unsurprised. He felt something like him too. He wondered where his anger had gone.
The sounds, which had faded for a few moments, were suddenly louder and they all turned towards them. What they heard were snatches of a song, and a cheerful one too. The voice, though cracked, was tuneful, and it was getting nearer.
“Humph!” said Maple, irritated to have their evening disturbed, but not overly concerned. This did not seem like a patrol of Newborns advancing to attack.
“There’s probably an isolated community here,” he whispered, “though why they are out singing on a night like this Stone knows. Not much point all of us hiding. Privet, you and Rooster had best keep out of sight.”
Rooster laughed and shook his head. “Said it was a good place and it is. One mole won’t harm us.”
“Might be more.”
“Not moving,” said Rooster firmly. “Stopped running when we got here.” Privet nodded her agreement and Maple sighed and began to wish he had a force of disciplined moles to command, not these individualists.
The voice fell silent and they heard the rustle of undergrowth as the mole – if there were more than one they were very quiet – moved from inside the wood to its edge, some way south of them. Then there was complete silence for a time and then the muttering of the voice before it broke into what was evidently the same song again, and began moving steadily nearer. The words were now quite clear, the melody lively and rhythmic, the voice now quite obviously that of a mature male.
“Followers awake, salute this happy night,
Wherein the seasons’ turn does turn again!
Rise to adore the mystery of the Stone,
Which waits now to hear your voice join mine.
Hark to its call, sing out our song,
For now is the glorious time of Longest Night.
Followers awake, salute...”
As this last repetition began the singer finally came into view, and since, for no obvious reason, he was moving backwards, he naturally did not see the six moles looming in the moonlight. He simply continued for a line or two more, and while singing he beat the ground with one or other of his front paws: “... this happy night (bang!), Wherein the seasons’ (bang!) turn does turn again (bang bang!).”
At this natural break he paused, glanced behind him to see where he was going, and found himself peering first at Maple’s paws, then at his chest, and then up into his eyes. The mole froze, looked away, shook his head as if he did not believe what he had seen, and repeating the last words he had sung simply as speech he said, “Does turn again – was that a mole I saw? A large mole? Let us turn like the seasons and look.”
He slowly turned once more and looked first at Maple, then one by one at the others, his eyes growing ever wider in astonishment as he did so, though otherwise he appeared absolutely calm.
Finally, just as Maple was about to greet him, he said with considerable aplomb, “Tell me, do you wish to be within or without?”
They stared at him blankly.
“Within what?” asked Privet.
“The stomp,” said the mole.
“The stomp?” repeated Maple and Weeth with one breath.
“Oh... “began Privet, her expression and voice conveying dawning understanding, “so that’s what you’re doing. Stomping.”
“Well yes, of course,” said the mole. “Sensible moles like me do not normally go backwards through a wood at night singing an unfamiliar song and stomping the ground with their paws. One must, however, maintain the traditions. Evidently, madam,
you
at least are aware of them.”
“You’re stomping the bounds,” said Privet with some excitement. “I have only heard of the custom from my kenning of Rhymes and Tales – but I thought it was a northeastern tradition.”
“So it may have been, so it may!” said the mole, who spoke in a quick, light voice, which matched the way his eyes danced here and there among them. He was thin of far and body but sprightly enough, his face being lined and fall of expression, mainly benign. He had seen perhaps four Longest Nights through, or five with the one just past, but he was young of mind and spirit.