Bursting over the brow of a humpbacked ridge, the wild charging hares crashed through a grove of rowans down into a narrow rocky defile and flung themselves like madbeasts into the fray. Major Perigord was backed into a small cave; beset by yelling vermin, he held the entrance gallantly. A broken javelin tip protruded from his right shoulder, and he was slashed in several places, but still he wielded his saber like a drum major’s staff, fighting gamely against overwhelming odds, which threatened to bring him down and get at whoever was behind him inside the cave. Smashing into the rear of the vermin and scattering them like ninepins, the Long Patrol hares arrived to their officer’s rescue.

“Eulaliaaaa! Give ’em blood’n’vinegar! Eulaliaaaa!”

Tammo’s dirk, Twayblade’s rapier, and Riffle’s dagger claimed the first three foebeasts. Rockjaw Grang slew two with ferocious kicks from his mighty hindpaws. Lieutenant Morio had his face laid open by a cutlass slash as he brought down another with his lance. Perigord flung his saber after the remainder, who were scrabbling off up the far side of the small ravine. He fell on all fours, shouting hoarsely, “Run ’em to earth, keep after the scum!”

More than a score of the remaining vermin ran off through the woodlands, with the hares hard on their heels. Sergeant Torgoch ran alongside Twayblade, trying to keep his eye on the escapers as they fled into the deep tree cover. “They’re splittin’ up, Cap’n. What now, marm?” he shouted.

Twayblade kept running, watching the vermin starting to fan out, issuing orders as she went. “Lieutenant Morio stayed behind with the Major, so with Russa that makes us eleven. Torgoch, you take Rubbadub and Midge . . .”

Tammo interrupted, his face full of concern. “But where is Russa?” he said. “Has anyone seen her?”

“Probably off somewheres finishing off a few dozen vermin with that stick of hers,” said Twayblade, sounding more confident than she felt. “Torgoch, Rubbadub, Midge, keep after those to the left. Riffle, go after those who’ve gone right—Tare’n’Turry, go with him. Tammo, Pasque, Rockjaw, stay with me, there’s about ten of ’em bunched together keepin’ straight ahead. We’ll stick with them, and everyone keep your eyes skinned for Russa.”

Knowing they were running for their lives, the fleeing vermin dashed helter-skelter, south into Mossflower. Tammo was beginning to feel weariness weighting his paws, owing to the headlong dash to the defile and the subsequent fighting. However, he was running with the famed Long Patrol, so he tried hard not to show signs of fatigue. Keeping his mouth closed, he breathed hard through his nostrils and whacked both footpaws down resolutely.

As Twayblade shot ahead, a rat tripped over some protruding tree roots in front of her. Before the creature could recover, she was upon him, dispatching him as he tried to rise. Tammo noted a weasel breaking off from the main body and slipping behind a hornbeam. Shooting off to one side, he watched the tree as his companions raced past it. Slowing his pace, Tammo came around the hornbeam. The weasel was smiling, thinking he had shaken off his pursuers. Turning to head east, he ran straight into Tammo. A look of surprise crossed the vermin’s ugly face and he grabbed for the hatchet shoved through his belt, but too late. Tammo slew him with a single thrust. The chilling feeling took control of Tammo as he dashed to join the others, teeth chattering and limbs trembling uncontrollably. He sighted them up ahead; they were halted, retreating slowly. Rockjaw Grang saw him and called, “Stay where thee are, Tamm, ’tis bad swampland ’ereabouts!”

Tammo walked forward another few paces until the ground became squishy, where he joined his companions. Farther out in the swamp the remaining vermin had rushed heedlessly into a dangerous quagmire.

Twayblade nodded in their direction. “Nothin’ we can do about ’em now, chaps. Put up y’weapons.”

Horrified, Tammo stood watching. Nearly all eight of the vermin were in over their waists. They shrieked and struggled, making the position worse for themselves, grabbing at one another as the bottomless ooze sucked them remorselessly down. One, a nimble ferret, pulled himself up onto a rotting log and managed to scramble along its length as his weight pushed it down. Behind him, his comrades, who had only their heads showing above the treacherous surface, yelled piteously to him.

“Rinkul, ’elp us, mate, do somethin’, ’elp us!”

But the ferret was intent on saving only his own skin. Hauling himself upright, he streaked the length of the sinking trunk, flinging his body forward in an amazing leap. He landed in some bushes where the ground became firmer and ran off, hop-skipping wildly until he was clear of the main swamp. Turning, he watched, as did the hares, the remaining vermin gurgle horribly as the muddy depths claimed them for its own. Seconds later there was nought but a smooth gray-brown patch amid the green rotting vegetation to indicate where they had gone down. The ferret, Rinkul, turned and shrugged. As he squelched his way off over the swamp’s far side, Tammo noticed that he was twirling something.

A sick feeling swept over the already trembling young hare, and he fell down on all fours. Pasque was right beside him, wiping his face with some damp grass.

“Tamm, what is it? Are you wounded?”

Tammo’s face seemed to have aged several seasons as he fought to stop shaking, muttering words at the ground in front of him.

Captain Twayblade assisted Pasque to pull the shivering hare upright. She cocked an eyebrow at the younger creature. “I say, can y’make out what he’s chunnerin’ on about, wot?”

Tears began brimming in Pasque Valerian’s soft brown eyes. “Oh, Cap’n, he said that the ferret was carryin’ Russa’s stick!”

Twayblade sheathed her rapier, grim-faced. “Come on, Rock, we’d best get back to the Major, post haste. Stay with Tammo, young gel, take y’time bringin’ him back, we’ll go ahead. If y’see the others, tell ’em where we are.”

The kindly Rockjaw Grang took off his tunic and draped it about Tammo’s quivering shoulders. It was so large that it lapped his footpaws, but it was thick and warm. “There thou goes, sunshine, thee tek it easy now!” he said, patting Tammo’s face.

*

It was full noontide when Pasque and Tammo made it back to the defile, accompanied by Sergeant Torgoch, Rubbadub, and Midge, whom they had met up with on the way. Perigord was seated in front of a fire, his right paw in a sling that held a large herbal pad to the shoulder. On seeing the Major, Tammo was able to say only one word.

“Russa?”

Perigord’s normally languid face was pale and drawn as he nodded toward the cave. Breaking free of Torgoch and Pasque, the young hare staggered into the little chamber. A strange scene confronted him. Lieutenant Morio, with a bandage ’round his face that ran beneath his chin and ended in a bow between his ears, was nursing a tiny badger. Looking for all the world like an old harewife, he placed a paw to his lips.

“Sshh! I’ve just got him t’sleep!”

In a corner there was a still form, covered by a ragged homespun blanket. Close to it, Russa, also wrapped in a cloak, was sitting with her back against the sandstone wall. Tammo gave a deep sigh as he sat down next to his squirrel friend.

“Whew! Thank the seasons you’re alive, mate!”

Russa blinked slowly through clouded eyes. “Not for long, young ’un. They hit me good this time—two arrows an’ a spear. But I gave good as I got, sent a few of ’em along in front t’pave the way for me.”

Tammo put a paw around the squirrel’s narrow shoulders. “Russa, don’t talk like that. You’ll be all right, honest, you will!”

Russa Nodrey smiled, coughed a little, then swallowed as if clearing her throat. She took Tammo’s free paw, saying, “None o’ your nonsense now, sit still an’ lissen t’me, Tamm. Tell yore mama I did the best I could, an’ if y’see Osmunda again, tell ’er I sent my regards. Make yore family proud of you, Tamello De Fformelo Tussock, never do anythin’ you’d be ashamed to tell ’em. One other thing: you don’t ’ave to be a Long Patroller if’n y’don’t want to. Mebbe there’s other things y’do better.”

Russa stayed Tammo’s reply by squeezing his paw feebly. “Oh, I’ve seen you fight, Tamm, yore one o’ the best, but you’ve ’ad a different upbringin’. You ain’t no slayer like those hares out there—at Salamandastron they’re brought up to it.”

Tammo tried to choke back the tears that fell on Russa’s paw. “You’ll be fine, matey. I’ll tell Pasque to get all her medicines an’ herbs an’ we’ll . . .”

Russa managed to wink at him. “Medicines an’ herbs won’t do me no good now, Tamm. I wish you’d stop soakin’ me paws an’ carryin’ on like that. I’ve got other places t’go, I’ve always been a wanderer, so I wants t’see what ’tis like on the sunny hillsides by the still meadows. . . .”

Outside the hares sat listening as Major Perigord related what had happened.

“Russa an’ meself were scoutin’ ahead when we heard roarin’ an’ screamin’. Of course it wasn’t the vermin doin’ the noisemakin’. We reckoned ’twould be innocent creatures captured by those villains, so we’d no choice except to try an’ rescue ’em. On m’word, we ran straight into it! Thirty-odd assorted blackguards, tormentin’ an’ torturin’ an old badgerwife an’ a babe. Scoundrels! We gave ’em a taste or two o’ their own medicine, I can tell you! Trouble was that we were outnumbered by about eighteen t’one—they’d slain the old badger. Well, we fought ’em off best as we could an’ I pulled the poor dead ol’ badger into the cave with the little ’un still clinging to her. Russa was protectin’ my back, that’s when she took two arrows. Then we turned and tried to hold ’em off, shoutin’ Eulalias like nobeast’s business, hopin’ you chaps’d hear us. Sadly Russa took a spear through her middle, so I bundled her in the cave with the badgers. That’s when I got the lance in me shoulder, took another few slashes too. Just look at me best green velvet tunic. Good job you arrived when y’did. I was about ready to go under. By the by, did y’get ’em all?”

Twayblade took the tunic from her brother’s shoulders and inspected it. “Ripped t’bits, be a long time before you get another like it. Ah, the vermin. Yes, they split up, but so did we, got ’em all barring one, a ferret, he escaped through a swamp. I shouldn’t think a lone villain would bother the Redwallers a good deal, wot?”

Sergeant Torgoch poured himself hot mint tea from the canteen by the fire. “Don’t think ’e would, marm. Some o’ those big otters that ’angs about the Abbey’d be only too glad to accommodate ’im, if’n ’e showed ’is nose ’round there.”

Tammo came walking from the cave, dry-eyed and stone-faced.

“Russa Nodrey has just died, sah.” His voice trembled as he tried to be a soldier worthy of the Long Patrol, but tears streamed down his face.

Perigord closed his eyes tightly and stood, head bowed.

*

That night they sealed up the cave with earth and rock. On the front of the pile, Rockjaw Grang placed a huge flat slab, which Tammo and Pasque had worked on, scraping deep into the sandstone with knifepoints a simple message:

Russa Nodrey and an unknown badger lie within.

They died fighting for freedom against cruelty.

Seasons may pass, but we will remember them.

The baby badger slept on, between Pasque and Tammo, wriggling in his slumbers to get closer to them. Tammo had never seen a badger before; he stroked the infant, glad to have a creature near who knew nothing of killing and war before that day.