...I Repent I Had Not Done More Mischief.

[Plink]

Plink sat in the shade with her arms wrapped around her knees and watched the goodbeasts dig a grave for the rat. One of them had covered the body with a worn coat, but a paw stuck out the side, and Plink could see the way the color had already faded from it. Just an hour ago, she had watched those same claws rake up Chak's forearm as he held the rat underwater.

Perhaps those scars hadn't come from battles after all. Perhaps they came from drowning rats.

It gave Plink a chill just thinking about it, and she eyed the otter where he loitered nearer to the surf? but murderer though he was, Chak was still right about one thing. The world wasn't so simple as goodbeasts and madbeasts. That hedgehog was a fool. A fat, old know-nothing.

Plink watched him dig, the way he plunged his oar deep into the sandy soil. The healer was digging as well. Even the freed squirrel slave was helping. Working together like that, they would be done in just a few hours.

Everything came so easy for woodlanders.

Plink scrambled to her footpaws and hurried off into the bushes. Only when she emerged at the edge of the stream did she realize she had been following the sounds of running water.

It was a pretty little stream, lined at the bottom with smooth pebbles and tufts of fluttering green mermaid fur. That was what her ma had called it, anyways. Mermaid fur. She'd made a story of it, about how the mermaids had tried swimming upstream, but kept losing fur on the rocks, and when they got to wherever they were going, they were naked and pink and all very embarrassed - but they were embarrassed together, so it was okay.

With a noise between a snarl and a sob, Plink snatched up a rock and hurled it into the forest. It ripped through some leaves and disappeared. She grabbed another stone, and another after that and threw each into the forest until she was breathless and her shoulder was sore. Even then, she kept going.

That was how Plink had dug the grave, too. It had taken three days to chip deep enough into the winter ground behind the hut outside Hearth. Another day to drag the body and settle it in, to cling for a few last precious hours to the scent of that beloved fur. Never mind the lingering smell of long sickness or the biting cold, never mind the shadows stretching, or the stillness that went on forever after the last story ended.

And now, long before dark, those goodbeasts would be finished burying a rat they didn't even know. It wasn't fair. Plink hated goodbeasts. She hated them.

The little rat clenched her claws around the last stone and staggered as she threw it. It must have hit a tree, because there was a knock and the missile came straight back to strike her footpaw. Plink hopped around and spat all the curses she knew, then sat on the bank of the stream, sniffling and cradling her sore toeclaws.

Nothing was going right. She'd lost Scully, the pirate ship was sunk, Chak might find cause to kill her next, and the party was overrun with woodlanders. She couldn't even leave them behind because she didn't know anything about this place - perhaps The Zephyr had made it all the way to Blade's secret island, but even so Plink couldn't be sure what she would find here.

Besides, if she left the party, she would be alone again. It was better to travel with goodbeasts and a murderer than to wander this strange forest alone. Plink shut her eyes and made herself stop crying. No point in crying. It didn't change anything.

The sting in her toeclaws faded in the face of a brighter need. The stream was chuckling and Plink had never been this thirsty before. She clambered to her knees and drank repeatedly from the dirty cup of her paws until her belly sloshed, then splashed her face and neckfur, scrubbing away the tears and saltwater.

Maybe she was stuck with these beasts, but she wasn't going back to watch their stupid funeral. Recalling that the healer and the two pirates had come from a clearing near where this stream emerged on the beach, Plink sighed and began picking her way downstream. She turned over some larger rocks along the way, munching on any worms and bugs she could find and spitting out the bitterest ones like her ma had taught her.

The camp was easy enough to find, and Plink sank down beneath the shelter, struggling out of her jacket so she could use it for a pillow. She sprawled out on her side in the afternoon heat, but curled her tail around her to rest between her paws. As quickly as she was settled, she was asleep.


*


If it was me, I wouldn't die. Plink knelt by the pallet, scowling at the broth left in the chipped bowl. I'd kick Vulpuz square in the snout 'til he gave up an' went after some other beast's soul.

You think I'm givin' up too easy. A smile, labored as her breathing, and Damppaw shut her eyes. I ain't strong like you, my little buccaneer. But I ain't scared. Know why?

Plink glared at the broth until her ma's paw closed around her wrist.

I ain't scared, 'cause where I'm goin' is just a rest from where I've been. The Dark Forest's all soft moss an' crickets in the moonlight. Nothin' to be scared of. Her grip tightened and her eyes shone a little. An' I can rest easy - knowin' you'll be alright without me.

Plink jerked against her ma's grasp, but couldn't bear to pull away. But I won't!

You know how to find food and keep clean. You know where's safe to hide?

I'll be all alone!

A tear raced down Damppaw's cheek and vanished into the ragged bedding. Be brave now, sweet. You know it ain't forever. You got all the best parts o' me an' your da, an' none o' the worst. You'll find beasts who can see that in you, an' you'll take care of each other. It'll just take a little time.

Like Da's crew? The way they looked out fer each other?

Damppaw shut her eyes for a long moment, and when she opened them, more tears slipped out. Could be, sweet. You keep your eyes open, an' you'll see who your friends are clear enough.


*


When Plink woke, it was night, and the camp was transformed. A small fire was dying in the center of the clearing, casting light on a few new shelters that must have been built while she slept. Indistinct mounds slumbered beneath them. The healer seemed to be the only one awake. She sat by the fire, staring into the flames. There was a smell of smoke and roasted fruit in the air and it made Plink's belly rumble.

She sat up, only to find that somebeast had laid a coat over her against the cool of evening. From the scent and the holes poked through the back, it had to belong to the hedgehog. Irritated that he'd exploited her sleep to do her a kindness, Plink fished around in the pockets and stole the most interesting thing he had: a stubby charcoal pencil.

Shrugging into her own jacket, the rat approached the fire quietly. The healer saw her coming and gestured to a couple of large leaves folded up into a packet sitting just within the fire's heat. "We saved you some fruit. It's not much, but it should keep you from starving."

Hungry as she was, Plink looked askance at the leaf-packet, not certain she wanted to accept what amounted to charity from these beasts.

The healer sighed and shook her head. "Don't tell me you think we'd try to poison you."

Plink glared at her and crouched down to pluck the fruit from the heat. "If ye did, ye'd just be makin' work fer yerselves, seein' as ye'd have ta give me a decent burial. Must be hard, bein' so decent all the time."

The healer's only response was a single raised eyebrow and, with nothing to argue back against, Plink laid into the roasted fruits. They were a bit overcooked, but so soft and warm and sweet that she just gulped them down one after another. When the leaves were empty and Plink was licking her sticky claws clean, the healer spoke again.

"You and I both know you're the only one here with a vial of hemlock in her pocket."

Plink met her stare, bewildered. "What's hemlock?"

"That's the name of the poison you stole from my infirmary." The healer's expression was a little sad, but mostly grim. "Why would you take it, Plink? What were you going to do?"

"I never-!" Plink pulled up short, finally remembering. The poison. Scully's poison. The truth of what had happened shouldn't matter anymore - The Zephyr was gone and so was Scully - but it did. Plink looked at her paws as she dried them on the tail of her long shirt. "Doesn't matter why I took it. It's probably at the bottom of the sea now, anyways."

The healer made a faint noise, perhaps of disbelief, but Plink just focused on her paws, then on the hypnotic dance of the flames. Finally, she huffed.

"If your stupid poison's so important to ye, why'd ya let me go, anyways?"

"It was the right thing to do. There was a battle going on and you were innocent. You weren't hurting anybeast."

"I could've." Plink subtly shifted her arm to make sure the dirk was still shoved through her sash. It dug against her side, cool and weighty.

"You could have," the healer agreed, "but you didn't. You could have put that hemlock in the water supply and killed us all without a fight, but you didn't do that." Her eyes rested steadily on Plink, and it made the rat want to squirm. "Everybeast makes mistakes, but there's a line. Once you cross it, once the blood of another beast is on your paws, there's no repairing the damage you've done."

Plink tore her eyes away to watch the flames twist and fade. At length, the healer sighed and stood. "If you're going to sit up for a while, I might as well get some sleep. Wake me or Robert when you start getting tired."

Plink frowned, but nodded.

"I'm Crue, by the way."

The rat turned to stare. The word rang in her head, loaded with all that it meant to her.

"Crue Sarish," the healer finished, offering a weary smile. "Goodnight, Plink." She made for one of the shelters.

"Crue." The healer turned back. Plink licked her chapped lips. "Did? You were there for the battle? Did you see what happened to Scully?"

Crue tucked her paws together before her. "I'm sorry, but I don't know. There were so many wounded to be tended to, I hardly saw what went on in the battle at all. Thankfully." She shook her head woefully, then looked back to Plink and hesitated before smiling. "But I wouldn't give up hope just yet. Scully's young and healthy. Probably, he made it to the island and we'll come across him sooner or later."

Plink nodded hard and watched from the corner of her eye as Crue settled beneath her shelter. She reached into her pocket and withdrew the pencil, fiddling with it between her claws for a while before turning over one of the leaves that had held her food and sprawling on her belly across the ground to draw on the clean side.

For a long while, the camp was still. The fire burned down to embers and the insect song rose like a sea of chirps and trills, so foreign yet still familiar. Plink drew until she couldn't see, then rolled on her back and watched the stars and the slim moon beam down through scant gaps in the trees.

A faint rustle of footsteps made her sit up, ears pricking and eyes wide to penetrate the shadows. It was the weasel, Tooley. He paced at the edge of the camp, pausing near a lump across from the shelters before hurrying away. He repeated this several times as Plink watched and grew steadily more interested.

She hadn't paid much attention to Tooley - he'd been so still and quiet since the beach - but Plink remembered him from the ship, the sound of his cries over the wreckage as he searched for his friend. Daggle. Even if she hadn't heard the name again on the beach, Plink would have guessed that was the rat. What else but the death of a dear friend could reduce a grown beast to a state like that?

But the weasel was alert now, and the way he loomed over that particular beast-sized lump made Plink watch very closely. She thought about waking Crue, but before she could make up her mind, Tooley rushed off into the forest.

The little rat hesitated, then crept across the camp to identify the beast - the only one sleeping without a shelter. She couldn't make out his face, but his smell was clear. Chak. Plink backed away, then peered into the darkness of the jungle.

Tooley was an odd sort of pirate, but he was still a pirate. He clearly cared a lot about his friend. Maybe he would be more interested in making a new friend than Chak had been.

Plink glanced toward the spot where she knew Crue was sleeping - and Robert, too, without his coat. And Minstrel, somewhere here. She felt an unexpected pang at leaving them with no lookout in this strange place?

But she'd only be gone for a little while. She'd talk to Tooley and then come straight back. Nobeast would even know.

Mind made up, Plink pushed her way through the leaves into the near-total darkness and caught the weasel's scent on the heavy, wet air of the jungle.