Redwall

Sela, the fox, tends to Cluny’s injuries. He is satisfied with her treatment but grumbles that it will take three weeks for him to recover. For her part, Sela intends to leak the enemy’s plans to Redwall for a price:

Old Sela had lived on her wits for many years. She was a counterspy by nature. In any dispute or conflict she invariably sold secrets to both sides. [...] Her crafty, golden eyes had not been idle for a second since entering Cluny’s camp (136).

When Cluny’s guards won’t let her leave, Sela summons her son, Chickenhound, and has him carry a message to the abbot, demanding payment for her valuable information.

At the abbey, Matthias and Methuselah explore the hidden staircase that leads deep below the abbey's foundation. They eventually come to another door with another riddle. Having become experts at solving Martin’s riddles, they soon get the door open and find Martin’s tomb inside. They also find his shield and sword belt, but his legendary sword is missing. Yet another riddle offers them clues to finding the sword itself.

On the ramparts, Constance sees Chickenhound arrive with Sela’s message. She refuses to let him in but tells the foxes to meet the abbot two nights later in Mossflower Wood to discuss payment. In the great hall, Matthias shares lunch with his friends, the squirrels, the hare, and Cornflower, but he is distracted by the unsolved sword riddle. After eating, he seeks out Methuselah, who has made a list of all the facts they now know:

Item one: Martin is Matthias. Item two: We have found Martin’s tomb. Item three: We have also found his shield and sword belt. Item four: Our task is to find Martin’s sword. Item five: Where? From here, the top of the gatehouse wall. Item six: When? At one in the morning when moonlight streams forth. Item seven: In which direction? To the north (151).

The two mice walk to the top of the gatehouse wall, where Matthias discovers another clue. After the moles clear the rubble away, the mice see an indentation in the rock that looks like a tilted disk with 13 small circles carved into its face. As the two mice puzzle over the meaning of this object, Constance strolls by and solves the riddle. The 13 disks represent the 13 full moons of each year. Martin’s shield is meant to fit into the niche. Its reflection in the light of the full moon will reveal the location of the missing sword.

Back at the church, Cluny is still recuperating, but he suspects that Sela is planning a double-cross. He decides to give her false information to transmit to the mice. Cluny sketches out a battle plan showing a battering ram attacking Redwall. He then slips the parchment under his pillow and only pretends to take a sleeping potion. Sela arrives and night and steals the plans to make a copy for the mice. Cluny gloats to himself after she takes the bait:

No doubt the mice would be interested to learn of his scheme to attack the main gate with a battering ram. […] Cluny could have laughed out loud. While they were defending the gate, he would be tunneling under the south-western corner of the Abbey Wall! (158).

Matthias, Methuselah, and Constance wait until one o’clock in the morning on the night of the full moon to climb above the gatehouse wall. When they position Martin’s shield in the niche and the moonlight hits it, the beams point to the weathervane on the top of the abbey’s roof. The sword is probably affixed to it.

The next morning, the abbot calls for someone skillful enough to climb to that height: “Not even in the oldest recorded writings was there any mention of a creature venturing to climb as high as the Abbey roof. It was a most formidable task” (163). Jess, Silent Sam’s squirrel mother, is an expert climber and volunteers. She reaches the pinnacle, only to be attacked by an aggressive flock of sparrows. As she flees for her life, mice archers are called out to drive the birds away. One of the flock is injured and falls to the ground. When Jess returns to the courtyard, she reports that the sword was removed from the spot where it had been fastened to the weathervane. No one knows who took it.

On the night when Sela is supposed to rendezvous in the woods with the abbot, she tells Cluny that she needs some special herbs in the forest. He can already guess her plan but sends two guards with her. Sela gives the guards the slip, but instead of the abbot, Constance arrives to meet her. She takes the parchment with Cluny’s plan and knocks the fox out. When the guards arrive to attack her, Constance swings one of them against a tree trunk, killing him. The other rat and Sela flee back to the church.

Constance returns to the abbey with Cluny’s battle plan, and all the woodlanders realize that they need to prepare for war yet again. Meanwhile, Matthias and Methuselah try to figure out what’s happened to Martin’s missing sword. Methuselah remembers the rumor about the sparrows having something of value to the mice. He decides to trick their sparrow prisoner into a confession.

The aggressive little sparrow is called Warbeak, and the mice have her caged in an overturned basket. When Methuselah threatens her, she says, “Ha, go on, you killee Warbeak with dagger! Wait see! You not get King Bull Sparra with little worm knife. King have a big sword! Chop all mouses up! Killee pretty quick, you betcha” (177). Matthias and Methuselah conclude that the king of the sparrows has taken Martin’s missing sword.

Back at the church, Sela and the guard have returned and invent a story about getting lost in the woods and falling down to explain their injuries. Cluny plays along, knowing that someone from the abbey has taken his fake battle plan. He dismisses the liars while, out in the woods, Asmodeus consumes the carcass of the dead guard: “No need of burial parties. Nature and the woodlands took care of their own funeral arrangements. There was but one efficient undertaker” (180).

While the rest of the mice try to fortify the abbey before the next attack, Methuselah and Matthias study old blueprints to find a way to reach the roof from inside. Matthias has tied a small brick around Warbeak’s uninjured leg so that she can’t escape but must follow him around while he finds another route up to the weathervane.

Meanwhile, at the church, Cluny considers how many of his senior commanders have now died. Some promotions might be in order. He summons a ferret named Killconey and asks what he knows about tunneling. The ferret professes to be an expert, and Cluny proceeds to make a plan to tunnel under the abbey wall. One of his lieutenants finds Sela and Chickenhound eavesdropping. Without a second thought, Cluny orders them executed.