They looked at each other in bewilderment.
“Is that all?” a sideem whispered to another.
“All?” cried out Lucerne with feigned rage. “This “all” shall be the very essence of the Stone’s destruction. The Word would know the strength of its enemy. The Word would know the places where its enemy dwells. The Word will know it all. You shall gain their trust; your trinities will be made welcome; the eldrenes and the guardmoles shall defer to you; you shall use every means at your command to find out the where and the what of the followers, except for this.”
Lucerne raised a paw and extended a single, shining, sharp, curved talon.
“There shall be no violence. Yet. There shall be no punishment. Yet. If you are mocked, or reviled, or threatened, you shall smile and not respond in kind. Yet. You shall only listen.
“But as the Word is mighty, as the Word is great, together we shall make such a scrivening of the systems that we shall know where the Stone is, and what it is, and how it shall be destroyed.
“This is your task. And it shall be done swiftly, for the Word is impatient to give its judgement on those moles that mock it by their belief. Remember this. For every blasphemous word you hear ten Stone followers shall die; for every sideem mocked or threatened shall one hundred followers die; for everymole that dares to turn his back on the Word to face the Stone, his mate, his pups, his kin, all his vile kind shall be judged eliminate, and punished to death.”
“When shall this be?” they cried.
“When?” whispered Lucerne, his eyes narrowing and black. “I wish to tell you when but I dare not for even here, among us now, the Stone lurks. Aye, moles! Here, it stays. You shall know when it is too late for the traitor Stone to turn and warn its spawn. But know this at least.” The darkness seemed to gather into Lucerne’s face. His talons rasped the ground and a whisper of dark sound encircled them all. He hunched forward and they all moved a little closer, as if what he had to say was the darkest secret yet.
“By virtue of the tasks your trinities shall now fulfil, the Word will have the darkness of justice and vengeance fall upon the Stone. That shall be the night I am ordained. Then shall we all be celebrants of the Word, then shall we all be ordained in the power of its judgement.”
This was what Lucerne said and it was enough, with the more detailed briefings Terce and Slighe then gave, for Cannock to buzz with excitement and for the sideem to set off across moledom in their sinister trinities, with purpose and intent.
All the day following, moles left Cannock, hastening away to fulfil their tasks. Many came to say their farewells to Lucerne. Others, who knew him less well, lingered for the chance to smile and simper at him in the hope of winning his notice and favour. Ginnell was briefed to hold the western front until Clowder sent new orders, and those would come before too long. Nor were small matters left forgotten. The three followers Drule had been keeping were released. “They shall instil trust and confidence,” said Lucerne, but these were words that Drule did not understand and so he frowned.
“Worry not, Drule, you shall have more work than you could dream of soon enough.”
Within a day Cannock was emptied of sideem and the infection of the Word began its remorseless progress across moledom once more.
It was in the days following, when Lucerne began to be restless and uneasy once more, that Mallice at last returned from Beechenhill.
“You have been long gone,” he said.
Mallice smiled and caressed his flanks.
“Where I have been are pleasant and surprising things,” she said.
“Beechenhill?”
She nodded.
“Pleasant?”
“Mmm, my dear. Very, very pleasant. You will be pleased.”
“Tell me, mole,” he growled.
“At length, or briefly and most sweet?”
“Briefly.”
“Your kin live there.”
“My kin? You mean Henbane?” There was terrible hope and terrible anger in his voice.
Mallice laughed.
“No, no, my dear, much better than her. Your kin, your lost siblings.”
“My siblings?” repeated Lucerne faintly, as if he did not understand the meaning of the word. She nodded slowly, taking her time. As Lucerne could twist a mob about his paw, so could Mallice play with him.
“Yes, yes, my love. Sweet Harebell and strong Wharfe. Your sister. Your brother.”
“In Beechenhill?” he said, aghast. “Oh yes, yes it is indeed so. And something more, though since you said I must tell you only briefly...” Mallice giggled.
“Tell me,” he ordered impatiently. “You will not be proud of them. They are both, it seems, such worthy followers of the Stone.”
“If this is true....”
“It is, Master mine, it is most true. And since it is, what will you do?” she asked, mouth moist but eyes wide and innocent.
“Something moledom shall never forget,” said Lucerne most grimly.
“Good, oh good,” purred Mallice. “I know it will be good.”
Chapter Nineteen
Those moles who have never been to Beechenhill may wonder how it was that this system held out so long against the Word. But moles who have been that way, and lingered to stare at the running streams, or been beguiled by the light mists that make the same elusive valleys seem different each time they are travelled, will understand. Beechenhill is not an easy place to find, let alone invade.
Even if a force of moles made their way towards its higher parts, and negotiated its labyrinthine and confusing limestone tunnels to reach the point where the system’s modest Stone rises and looks on the hills and vales all about, their coming would have been long observed, and the moles they sought long gone.
It is indeed a blessed place, and upon its surface and its tunnels the Stone must have cast some very special light in that early time when the Stone created moledom and Balagan, the first White Mole, came.
Not that Beechenhill had in times past avoided its share of plague and trouble, or more recently not felt a warning of the darkness coming. Indeed, ever since that strange day in June when Wharfe had so suddenly left his sister and companions and been driven by a kind of madness to rush and touch the Stone, it might be said that Beechenhill had been on its guard.
Beechenhill moles, always close to the Stone and its auguries, took such things seriously, and they did so then all the more because Wharfe’s touching of the Stone had been followed by rearing storm clouds in the northern sky, and a dreadful downpour of rain so violent that it drove dangerous torrents of water into the tunnels and killed seven moles – four drowned in their chambers before they made a move, two dashed by torrents against protruding rocks and one more, though nomole knew how she died, Squeezebelly himself found her staring at the raging sodden sky, dead as if she had seen something that made her want to live no more.
The rain stopped, the ground soon dried, but that storm left a pall in all moles’ hearts that seemed to blight the summer and left a warning all about. Great Squeezebelly became a thinking, planning mole, sensing trouble ahead, bad trouble, trouble worse than anything he had known before.
But for that, at least, his system’s long and noble history of dissent had prepared him well. In his younger days his father had taught the lower routes of tunnels and surface to Squeezebelly intimately, and shown him all the likely routes an invader might take, and the options of retreat and hiding which Beechenhill moles could exercise to confuse and demoralise even a persistent invader.
Despite his girth he made sure he knew his system still and it was knowledge that Squeezebelly had used well and wisely in the difficult years it was his fate to live through as leader of the only system of significance in the north which successfully held out against the grikes.
Rune was already dominant in Squeezebelly’s youth and the evil potency of the Word and its moles’ ways well known to the Beechenhill moles who made forays down to the lower slopes of the Dales and saw th
e terror, destruction and cruelty that followed in the wake of Henbane’s long drive south.
It was through this dangerous and fraught period Squeezebelly matured, and few moles were as indomitable as he in defending the Stone, the system, and the moles in his care, against the evil Word. By making it easy for invaders to lose their way in the alluring slopes and vales that lie below Beechenhill, and difficult for them to gain access to the higher ground, the Beechenhill moles preserved their sacred autonomy.
But more than that, through some happy mixture of topography and climate, of aspect and geology, of history and living tradition, the Stone had blessed that happy place and, despite all, its moles remained open-hearted yet not easily fooled; cunning, yet not secretive or sly; physically strong, yet not aggressive and bullying in their ways; realistic and yet never forgetful of the love they felt for the place in which they lived and the sense of faith to which they had been reared.
All these great attributes Squeezebelly personified, and added to them a humour and rough good nature which sometimes hid other qualities he had: intelligence and common sense, and an ability to see that nomole must ever for a moment stance back into laziness nor forget that if the Stone is to be properly served then it demands never-ending attention and self-honesty.
These were the qualities which made him the mole he was, and built for Beechenhill a reputation that went wherever moles went, whether friends or foes, for all spoke alike of it in awe.
As the years of Henbane’s rule had gone by, and Beechenhill had become more and more solitary in its resistance to the grikes – who rationalised their failure to subdue it by talk of its unimportance – those few moles remaining who held fast to the Stone in their hearts, and loved liberty of spirit even before their own life, were drawn to Beechenhill as an afflicted mole will always go where warmth and welcome is, and shelter too.
It was through such fugitives that the moles of Beechenhill and the one who led it so ably, despite their isolation, were able to keep in touch with moledom’s strifes and troubles, and to know much of what went on.
It was always a surprise to visitors that while grikes had so far found it hard to penetrate the higher tunnels of Beechenhill, wandering strangers and followers of the Stone usually succeeded in doing so in safety, despite the grike patrols about it.
One reason was that Beechenhill maintained good relations and contacts with moles in neighbouring systems that, outwardly at least, were of the Word. Such moles were used to spotting vagrants of the Stone and guiding them into safety in Beechenhill. At the same time, the system had developed an effective network of watchers, mainly young moles, male and female, who knew the tunnels and were deputed to hide themselves around the periphery of the system, keep in touch with friendly neighbours and guide newcomers upslope if they were adjudged to be safe and not spies.
But watching was a dangerous task and so, knowing that at any time one might be taken by the grikes and tortured for his knowledge of the system, Squeezebelly ordained that each watcher knew only a limited section of the tunnels into Beechenhill. Sadly, watchers were taken from time to time, but this policy had contained the knowledge they revealed and the Beechenhill moles were able to counter any information the grikes gained by rapid adjustments to tunnel alignments and seals.
As for friendly moles, they were vetted on their way upslope, and none would have got through without experienced moles knowing about it. Since watching was a service that all Beechenhill moles must perform for a period, Wharfe and Harebell had both done their turn, though Squeezebelly had been much concerned for them when they did; but he judged they would be better for it and through May they had both performed their duties well.
In all the time of Squeezebelly’s rule only one group of moles had ever succeeded in evading all the grikes and watchers around Beechenhill to make their way unnoticed to the very heart of the system, indeed to the Stone itself. They were Tryfan and Spindle, guided most of the way by the mole Mayweed.
When Squeezebelly heard that a mole had reached the Stone and was talking to Bramble and Betony, his own youngsters, he had laughed in his deep and cheerful way and said, “Then by the Stone this is a visit that shall bring great blessing on us. It was meant to be, and ordains the coming of some change to moledom I cannot foretell.”
In this open spirit Squeezebelly had listened on that never to be forgotten day when Tryfan had preached of the way of non-violence before their humble Stone, and he had sensed that somehow here the future for Beechenhill surely lay. He began then to believe it might be possible that in Beechenhill, a system never aggressive but one which raised its collective talons only in its own defence, and that more by retreat and cunning than confrontation, here was the embodiment of how all moles of the Stone should be. For if Tryfan’s words had been right, and nonviolence was the way, the way forward must be for moles to learn to defend themselves when needs must without hurting others. But how can a mole defend himself from moles who seek to kill him and destroy his faith without hurting another?
It was this great and difficult paradox with which Squeezebelly had wrestled since Tryfan’s visit. And if others said there was no answer to it, and where would they be if their fathers before them had not sometimes had to kill the grikes to survive, Squeezebelly found comfort and indirect confirmation that there was a solution to the paradox in the fact that the Stone delivered to him and his system, of all the moles and places in moledom, Tryfan’s two young by Henbane.
When strange Mayweed and dark Sleekit brought those young moles to him and told him the truth of their parentage, Squeezebelly felt he saw at once the significance of it. Few moles would in future be better placed to resolve the conflicts of moledom and find a middle way between the Stone and the Word – between life’s paradoxes indeed – than a mole or moles who had been born of the union of the Mistress of the Word, Henbane of Whern, and great Tryfan of Duncton Wood, the first mole who dared take the light of the Stone into Whern itself.
So he watched over Wharfe and Harebell well, put them under the care of his own two young, and was not in the least surprised that it was Wharfe who, of that happy quartet of friends, emerged as natural leader, a mole who might one day take over the leadership of Beechenhill too.
Of his own pups he was proud, but had no illusions: Bramble was a dreamy mole, whose love and skill was the history of Beechenhill, and who learned and recounted all the tales Squeezebelly told, and knew by heart the names of all the many moles who had over the moleyears visited the system from outside. Betony, on the other paw, was as sweet and loving a female as ever lived, and his only grief for her was that though he watched her love for Wharfe grow and mature over the years, he was wise enough to see it was not returned. Wharfe was made of sterner stuff than Betony, and would only ever see her as a friend.
As for the last of the four, Harebell, she was more graceful, more alive, more alert than any female Squeezebelly could remember, and he hoped that when her time came she would find a mate worthy of her, and her young would be a credit to the system that had adopted her.
In the moleyears of these four youngsters’ maturing, Squeezebelly was often moved to take stance at places he loved in high Beechenhill, and harbour the innocent hope that perhaps Beechenhill was the place which, secret and protected, sacred and much loved, the Stone had set aside to be a last bastion in its hour of greatest need, the place perhaps of its redemption. Here, believed Squeezebelly, great things would be, and he prayed that its moles would be worthy, and those four young ones would be especially so.
It was Squeezebelly who best understood the significance of Wharfe’s extraordinary rush to touch the Stone that June, and guessed that with the torrential drowning of the moles afterwards in tunnels never yet bloodied by the Word’s dark talons, Beechenhill’s trial was beginning; and perhaps moledom’s too.
In the moleyears of summer that followed June Squeezebelly noticed that Wharfe became preoccupied, even sullen, and was inclined to wander off by himself.
At first he put it down to that normal change that comes to a mole when, matured, he or she begins to feel the restraints of the home system and, at the same time, to look more seriously for a mate. In Squeezebelly’s younger days such thoughts arose in the dark snug winter years of January, not at the height of summer. But he was a wise and philosophical mole and had observed that the stresses of the plague years and the grikes had made moles, even sensible ones, behave in most curious and untraditional ways.
But neither Bramble nor Harebell seemed to think that was it at all, and the older mole eventually got a better and more significant explanation from his daughter Betony.
“Something happened when he touched the Stone, but he won’t say exactly what. It’s upset him more than he admits. Do you know what he does when he goes off by himself?”
Squeezebelly shook his head and scratched his ample flank. No he didn’t and his bulk was now so great that he was disinclined to follow younger moles about and try to hide behind thistles to see what they were doing by themselves!
“Well, I’ll tell you. He’s looking for a mole or moles unknown. He stares into everymole’s face that comes along hoping he’s going to see what he’s looking for.”
“Which is what, Betony?” said Squeezebelly, much puzzled.
“He won’t say. All I know is he’s not looking for a mate because I asked him outright and he said he wasn’t and Wharfe never lies, which is a relief. I think it’s got to do with the Stone.”
“Ah!” said Squeezebelly, and decided to wait for Wharfe to tell him in his own good time which, since the mole was looking uncharacteristically miserable, in sharp contrast to the glorious summer, would be sooner than later.
Meanwhile Squeezebelly kept him and the others busy with training and watching tasks designed to strengthen the system’s defences and retreats, and made them develop, as a final safety measure, one or two special routes out to the north and west, in case a full-scale evacuation should ever become necessary. It was not an option Squeezebelly himself would ever take, but perhaps there could be a case for some of the younger moles to be got out one day.