"07 - The Bellmaker UC" - читать интересную книгу автора (Jacques Brian)

29

giggling as he clapped his paws together in time to the music.

Muta threw back her head and made happy barking sounds, and the two danced wildly, leaping and jigging back and forth. Truffen pulled the cap from Muta's head as she bowed to him and waved it about, jingling the bells and shouting uproariously, "Fasta! Fasta! More!"

Nagru flicked a damson contemptuously at Silvamord. "Well, I see you've managed to make them both happy, a prancing whelp and a jigging badger. Good work! Tell me, who looks die bigger fool now, you or the badger?"

Silvamord flung a wooden bowl at Yoghul. "Stop playing, you oaf!" she shrieked.

The music ground to a halt. Truffen jangled the cap bells. "More dances, 'Uta. Want more dances!"

Taking advantage of the moment, Serena hurried over. Sweeping her little son up, she took Muta by the paw and began leaving the room. Gael joined them. "Time for Muta to take you for your nap, Truffen. Come on, Mummy and Daddy will go with you."

They were almost at the door when Silvamord called out, "Halt! Who said you could leave without our permission?"

Nagru idly flicked another damson at his mate. "Let them go, huh. They're not going anywhere."

Silvamord leaped up, eyes blazing. "Stop flicking damsons at me, spotblotch. I'll say when they can go! You just carry on slopping wine!"

Nagru was not one to be insulted. He rose in a hot temper, sending dishes spilling and clattering. "You'll feel these claws if you talk to me like that, vixen! If I say they can go, my word is final! Don't try taking your sour

4 mood out on me because your joke went wrong!" ^t All the time the little party was edging farther out of :г; the banqueting chamber. Silvamord grabbed a spear from ,| a Captain named Hooktail and pointed it at the Foxwolf г screaming, "Put those claws near me and I'll gut you! c Stop those creatures from leaving, now!"

- Two more rats, Sourgall and Ragfen, drew swords and

- leaped up. As Gael pushed the others ahead of him into the hall outside, Serena forgot herself and cried out, "Look on the windowsillЧthe red cloth!"

Gael felt Sourgall's claws clamp on his shoulder. He jumped backward, cannoning Sourgall into Ragfen as he called out to the badger, "Muta, out of the windowЧ jump for the moat! Help is waiting there. Save my fam-

-i ily!"

Then Gael went down. He was trampled and knocked

/ aside as other rats, led by Silvamord, came charging into die passage. Muta dashed to the window where the red cloth fluttered, sweeping Serena and Truffen with her. Thrusting the little squirrel into his mother's outstretched paws, the big badger lifted them both bodily over the sill. A spearshaft broke across Muta's back. She grunted and flinched, then, gathering her mighty strength, she hurled mother and babe outward, so that they would not strike the castle walls in their descent to the moat. Turning, she ripped the dancing cloak from her shoulders. Muta smashed two rats flat with a single blow and smothered another two with the cloak, shoving them roughly into those behind and causing a melee of confusion in the enclosed space.

Now the corridor was packed with rats. Muta could not reach GaelЧit was death to try. There was only one way

3o BRIAN JACQUES

left open to her. Lifting her bulk onto the windowsill, the badger glanced down at the long drop to the moat. Suddenly, claws sank into her lower back. Silvamord had climbed over the milling rats and seized her tight.

' 'Got you, stripehead! Now you' 11 die long and sloooooo... !" Without a second thought Muta had clamped her footpaws around the vixen and rolled off the windowsill, carrying her enemy through with her.

Rab's otters already had Serena and Truffen out on the bank as Muta and Silvamord came plummeting down and hit the water with a resounding boom. Locked together, they plunged beneath the surface. Muta rolled over, thrusting the vixen beneath her, then, stepping on Silvamord's head, she pushed up toward the surface. Seconds later Muta was hauling herself up onto the bank and scrambling off in pursuit of her friends and their rescuers.

Terror and panic gripped SilvamordЧthe badger's footpaws had pressed her down into the muddy moat bottom. The vixen's ears, nose, and mouth filled with water as she kicked and scrabbled furiously, then, coming free with a dull sucking noise, she drifted upward.

Whump!