The Schemer

[Airan]

Name: Elsabeth van Riften
Species: Wildcat
Gender: Female
Age: 22

Elsabeth's quill darted across the page, the wildcat chewing on its end as she carefully constructed an elaborate fantasy of numbers: Let's see... I already added two dozen extra soldiers to the records, so we can put in an order for that many uniforms... the quartermaster already split the profit from unloading the weapons with me so he should be fine helping with that, the extra rations we might be able to just redirect the delivery, there's got to be a hungry village-

"Lieutenant van Riften! Are you in there?!"

"How many times do I have to remind you, it's Lady van Riften you- oh, hello, Major."

Her superior strode into the room with a confident swagger, snorting at her indignant response. "Pfft, that might fool the troops, but I'm well aware of your family's situation, Lieutenant. So, mind telling me what you're doing there?"

"Just the accounts. You know, my job," she replied, closing the book as fast as she could without appearing suspicious.

"Hm. Funny, I didn't realize your job included creating invisible soldiers. Because that clearly must be the case, otherwise there's no explanation for the letter I got congratulating me on my excellent recruiting work, despite the fact I don't see anyone new in the fort."

The Major laid his palms flat on her desk, fixing her with a cold stare. Unable to meet his gaze, Elsabeth's eyes flickered to where she kept her knife, but a quick comparison between the rat's well-trained physique and her own flabby stomach put that idea to rest. She was, by her own admission, an intellectual rather than a fighter. Time to bargain. "Listen, do you want a cut? I can shave some off the cook's share, he can barely count, he won't notice-"

The look of disgust he fixed her with was enough to inflame the wildcat's pride, and she squeezed her fists together until her claws pierced her paw pads. Did he think her nothing more than a money-grubbing commoner? Did he have any idea-

"Lieutenant."

She gulped. "Yes, Major?"

"You're damn lucky it would be more trouble than you're worth to have you executed for this, because in my opinion the only thing you noble milksops are good for is crow feed. So you're getting reassigned instead. Up north."

"Er, how far north..?" Elsabeth asked, her heart sinking.

"Real far north," he replied with a sadistic grin. "Frontier outpost north. It's a barren hellhole with no civilization for miles around. They probably use bones for money or something, so I doubt you'll be able to get up to much trouble there. Maybe if you're really good at it you can embezzle enough to get a new hat... in about ten seasons or so. Oh, and the caravan leaves tomorrow, so you'd better get packing."

His final chuckle echoed through Elsabeth's head as she slumped in her chair, utterly demoralized. What the hell was she supposed to do now? Give up? Accept her family's descent into ruin and live out her life as a mid-level paper-pusher?

A vision of her mother's face passed through her mind and she winced as though struck, or reliving the memory of having been. No. No, that was not an option. She might not be as strong as these career soldiers, but she was smarter and better-educated than all of them put together. She would claw out whatever wealth that blasted wasteland was hiding or her name wasn't Elsabeth van Riften!

And, she grimly reflected, if she failed it might as well not be.

[Airan]

Name: Lucan
Species: Mouse
Gender: Male
Age: 16

"Doom and death to all vermin!" The voice boomed, shattering the sleep of the three rats.

The vermin staggered to their footpaws. Paws groped for weapons as they searched for the beast who'd awakened them. They screamed as their campfire flared brightly. The woods' shadows came alive in that instant. Blinking dancing lights from their eyes, they turned as one toward the ghostly figure that now loomed above the bushes. One rat fired his bow.

The arrow passed straight through the luminescent shape.

A blood chilling laugh came from all around them. It raised a glowing sword. The rat fired another arrow. It stuck in the figure's head, yet the figure did not react.

Then the rat screamed, falling backwards as he clapped a paw to his head as if wounded. When one of his mates hauled him to his feet, he saw blood trickling down from the wound that had appeared.

"Now you die!" the voice boomed.

The fire flared again.

The three rats screamed in terror and fled into the trees.

Silence fell. The fire returned to its normal state. The ghost lowered its sword. A breeze rippled the pale shroud it wore, but it moved not a whisker.

Something else moved in the tree directly above the ghost. The ghost gave a shudder, then thumped to the ground in a heap of glowing cloth. Several sticks landed on top.

A mouse, dressed a green Redwaller's habit, climbed down from the tree.

Lucan strolled up to the ghostly pile. "Doom and death. Flee from Martin's ghost!" He giggled. He pulled off his haversack and set it on the ground. He took the sword from the pile, which looked less ethereal now and more like a wooden toy coated with a paint made of luminous mushrooms. He unhooked a couple lengths of fishing twine and coiled them. He disassembled the rest of his ghost marionette, reducing it down to sticks, twine, and a bed sheet streaked with the same glowing paint used on the sword. He stuck a claw in the hole the arrow had left in the straw-filled head.

"Mother Veristy would have a fit to see her bed sheets now, eh, my friend?"

Lucan packed it all in his haversack, being careful of the voice-amplifying cone already there. He pulled out the small sack of flour and tied it securely. He grinned at the memory of the rats' faces, so much like old Friar Orvyn's. As a Dibbun "helping" in Redwall's kitchens, Lucan had thrown a pawful of flour at his friend, right next to the open oven door. Who knew that fire and flour reacted so?

He hurried to check through the gear that the rats had left behind. Some bits and bobs, like an iron tail ring painted to look gold, and the bow the rat had dropped when Lucan's slung stone had struck him in the head. He kept that, along with a quiver of arrows.

"You see, Father Abbot," he said to the night. "I am perfectly suited to be the Abbey Warrior. Just you wait. My friend and I," he patted the haversack where his fake ghost resided, "are going to prove you, and everybeast else, wrong. Someday, the name of Lucan the Warrior will join the names of Martin, Matthias, and Mattimeo!"

With that little speech to the trees, he hoisted the haversack over his shoulder, adjusted the straps so it hung comfortably, then strolled off into the woods to find a safe place to spend the rest of the night.

[Airan]

Name: Merrill
Species: Hedgehog
Gender: Female
Age: 24

"Miner Merrill?" The squirrel clerk dropped his crate of apples. "Don't torch my store!"

"Calm your chompers, acorn noggin. I'm here for pitons and rope." Ivory ribbons bound Merrill's quills, and char marks streaked her crimson gambeson. The hedgehog chewed on a plug of dried mint from her belt pouch. "Found spirits on Lane's Summit. They'll turn iron into gold."

"Iron to gold?"

"As you heard."

"From spirits."

"You doubt my word?"

The clerk spoke more with the apples on the ground.

"...I don't doubt that you believe it, exile."

Merrill's snout twitched, and she slammed a chunk of raw gold onto the counter.

"Let that raise your faith. I'll return in a week with more."

-

An expedition camped on a cliff well below Lane's Summit.

The villagers argued over who should brave the mountain and test the exile's claims. Killian, the village alderbeast, volunteered, and the otter climbed swiftly as the sun set.

Four teal spirits erupted from snow piles on the craggy summit, transforming any exposed rock into hunks of living crystal. Merrill's corpse sprawled at the center, frozen beside a bag of gold.

An ethereal echo drifted from the faceted stones.

We are what lies between the earth and sky. What's your need, Killian Redstream?

Killian squinted at the corpse and flame-like spirits from afar.

"Earth and sky, is it. My village needs gold for repairs."

This one asked the same but fell to the elements. She mined offering upon offering in hopes of gifting your people.

"A tragedy avoided." Killian paced to the spirits, to Merrill's corpse. "Her mate's 'gifts' burned most of our homes."

B-believe as you will, but her gold is yours to take.

Killian's brow furrowed.

"Keep your 'gold' and meadow tales. I allowed spellwork once, but not again. Witches offer nothing but...tricks!"

Killian launched a kick at the feigning hedgehog's stomach. Merrill's limbs sprung alive, collapsed about his leg, and threw him ankle first onto the ground. The "spirits" were doused as they wrestled across the summit. Hidden braziers heaped with combustive powders, to flint an ill-colored spark from afar, rested in the drifts.

Merrill disengaged from their grapple, dropped low, and threw her shoulder into a charge.

"Be still you. Damn. Fool!" Merrill's charge pinned Killian against a crag by the summit's lip. "It's a debt repaid! You were supposed to take the gold, be glad of my death, and move on!"

"No goodbeast wants gold for blood, exile." The otter struggled in vain for an escape, but Merrill's grip kept him bound in place. "Your kind thinks you can control everything. Couldn't control your spells though."

"It was an accident, you fishwhiskers! We were trying to help!"

"Never a question or permission." Killian spat in Merrill's face. "Only what you witches think we need!"

The ribbons binding Merrill's quills split as she trembled, as she shook the otter like a pup's toy. A light shove would see the alderbeast plummeting for his judgments, for calling their powders "spellwork," for banishing them from their village home.

Yet, she heard an echo.

Merrill retrieved a locket from her belt pouch. Within rested a painting of an elegant hedgelady with a sleepy smile and drying herbs along her quills. Merrill breathed deep. She recalled the lady's balm of mint, her little snorts of concentration as she weighed Merrill's mined ores, and her contented sighs as they shared a campfire's warmth.

"Then have your way." Merrill clutched the memento with one paw, smiled, and pulled Killian to safety with the other. "I know what's mine."