A year later, at Redwall Abbey, the two dibbuns named Fantoy and Hestoy raced around the ramparts. They were running from Lassa the Badger Mother.
"Heeheheheh! I ca' run more fast dan you, Hes'!" giggled Fantoy.
"No ja can't! Hehehehe- Owch!" Hestoy tripped and tumbled down onto Fantoy. Then Lassa scooped them up in her huge arms.
"You naughty Dibbuns! You could have fallen off the ramparts and gotten killed! Just wait to Mother Abbess hears about this!" But the dibbuns weren't listening. They were arguing about who ran the fastest.
The next day was a busy one at Redwall. They were all preparing for a humongous picnic on the ramparts. I was to be the first annual October Leaf-Falling Festival. Huge cakes were being hoisted up to the top of the Abbey walls. Moles were climbing the stairs with humongous vegetable pies, and otters walking about with pots of hotroot soup. It was a merry time.
The two squirrel dibbuns, Fantoy and Hestoy, waved their sticks about, as if directing the preparations. Always competing, the siblings were seeing who could shout orders the loudest.
"Heave dat cake! Ha, I'm loudest!" shouted Fantoy.
"Nu-uh. Moes! Move dat pie! Hup-two,hup-two! I'm loudest," screamed Hestoy. The two didn't see Lassa creeping up.
"Ha! I'm the Loudest!" bellowed Lassa. The two dibbuns shot straight up and them zoomed to the dormitories. Lassa chuckled. Then a huge cake dropped straight out of the sky and 'splatted' right on Lassa. Four mice up on the ramparts were laughing uproariously. They had dropped the cake.
"Lintey, Modeg, Pibbweed, and Fentley! Why did you have to drop that cake! Now poor Lassa is covered! Tsk, Tsk," cried the Mother Abbess as she strode by.
"No, Mother Abbess," yelled Lassa from below. "It's quite alright. I love Great Hall Cakes!"
A year earlier, in the woods far to the north, a reunion occured.
"What have you got to say for yourself? Speak up, now!" Neemava grasped Marble's hand, and then Marble and Nata walked into the fort. Neemava burst out of the kitchen crying and laughing.
"Oh, you rascal! You promised you wouldn't do that....." She trailed of as he stared blankly at her.
"He won't speak," whispered Nata. "He hasn't since. . ."
Neemava finished for her. "Since he slew his father. . .I know, I felt it. I am a soothsayer." Then the pair of ladies talked about what happened as Marble silently grieved.
"So now we are going to Redwall. Would you like to come?" asked Nata. She had just finished telling Neemava what happened in the mountain.
"No, I wish I could, but I will stay here to see if my father comes home. But I will miss you."
"And we will miss you. May we take some haversacks of your delicious food?"
"Certainly. I will go fix them up now." So the woodrat busied herself with the food, and the pair of ferrets sat silent.
Along their way south, the pair went west, and freed the slaves that Lichobon had kept. Everywhere they went, a wave of emancipation followed them. By the time they reach deep Mossflower, the two ferrets had quite a large band, at least two hundred beasts, young and old.
Every day they met more orphans and feeble creatures to add to their horde. They all wanted to go to Redwall Abbey.
Their journey took a year, and it took the them to the gates of Redwall. There the preparations for the October Leaf-Falling Feast were almost ready. Again the two troublesome dibbuns, Fantoy and Hestoy, were messing around on the ramparts.
"Muvver Abbess, you can't catcher me!" they sung as they darted about. "Ooh, you'll be sorry if I do catch you, you rogues!" The Abbess was having as much fun as dibbuns, running about the great Abbey. Finally, the pair stopped and plopped down on the ramparts above the main gate. "Whew! Let me catch my breath, you two!" The Abbess sat down also, but was almost immediately back up.
"Muvver, ders a bunch of aminals out is fron' of de Habbey!"
"What?! Skipper! Foremole! Get up here! You too, Lassa!" The Abbess stood dumbfounded as she stared out at the vast horde of slaves and other helpless beasts. In a flash the other three beasts were beside the Abbess.
"Two ferrets heading the band?"
"What do they want?"
"Do they mean war?"
"I intend to go find out!" So the four Redwallers marched down to the main gate and walked out onto the path.
Nata spoke. "Are you the rulers of Redwall?"
The four beasts looked to each other. Then the Abbess began to talk. "You could call us that, yes. If you want our hospitality, then you can stay as long as you like, but if you want war, then we will defend ourselves!"
Nata continued to speak on behalf of the band. "We don't want war, but we're stayin' forever!" The band cheered.
Lassa growled. "What- Oh! Mother Abbess! They want to join our order!" Then Lassa turned to the crowd. "Redwall! Redwall!" The band took up the chant, and then cascaded into the halls of Redwall Abbey. Lassa turned back to the Abbess. "Mother, some of those slaves were not of our kind."
"Oh, you mean they aren't all goodbeasts. They may not look it, but they all want freedom. They will do fine in our Abbey walls."
And indeed they did. Most of the band did not become Brothers and Sisters in the Abbey, but instead the traveled the world freeing other creatures. Nata and Marble stayed at Redwall, though, and had many ferretbabes. But Marble never said a word the rest of his life.
From the Extracts of the writing of Neemava, the Recorder of Redwall:
"As you can see, I did go to the Abbey! My father returned, and traveled with me to Redwall. We were accepted warmly, especially by Nata, who's now my best friend. And I could tell Marble was at least a bit happy, though he tried not to show it. And we're doing well here, my dad's the cellarkeeper, I'm the recorder-and I'm to be wed! Another rat who was a slave named Reece Naab fell in love with me. But enough about me, this isn't my journal!"
"Lassa still chases dibbuns, and so does the Mother Abbess. It seems the two never grow older. And it's good they don't; I don't know where we'd all be without them. Foremole has expanded his team of moles from the moles that were rescued. He's got quite a crew, as does Skipper, who's putting his new band to work making boats to run the River Moss."
"All seems well. The world has been kind to us, though it could've been kinder to a young ferret I met so long ago."
Here ends Neemava's writings.