(Greentail and Parsnip)

This incomplete story is a non-canonical addition to the World of Murid. Writing this story fragment helped me figure out some of my world building and gave me more characters to work with, but ultimately I decided I wanted to focus on adventure stories (with internal character dramas) rather than character dramas with little to no adventuring.

“Look, look! I’m holding a cloud!” Parsnip squeaked.

“Mmhmm,” Greentail said, eyes fixed upward and away from his younger sister. The night sky was a rich, dark purple, brightening to mauve or magenta near the white light of either moon in the sky, deepening to black near the horizon. Twinkling stars lay scattered across its expanse, like sunflower seeds peeking out of the soil after being cast from the plant. Greentail reached a paw toward one of those stars, blocking it from his view, and gripped tightly, making a fist. The way light twinkled around his paw, he could almost believe he had captured it.

To be the mouse that brought the stars down! His name would live in myth forever. Greentail—no! A storymus would come up with something better. But he would be remembered.

“You’re not looking!” Parsnip complained.

Greentail suppressed a sigh and shifted on the wide branch they were laying on. He had been in a comfortable groove in the bark that felt molded to his back; now his side pressed against rough bark that scratched his skin through his fur. He tilted his head so he was almost under his sister’s paws and noted that, indeed, the way she held her paws in the air looked a little like she was holding part of a cloud. “I see it.”

Parsnip giggled. “Now I’m going to squish it!” She brought her paws together.

Greentail made himself smile and rolled back to his previous spot, but it wasn’t quite as comfortable as it had been. Had he shifted up or down when he rolled to his side? After a few moments of wriggling, Greentail gave up and accepted that he wouldn’t find that exact spot a second time. He tried catching a star again, then sighed in disappointment—that moment was gone, too. There was no returning to something that happened even just seconds ago.

He tried not to let his mood sour as Parsnip continued to chatter and the sky gradually brightened, turning a burnt orange in the east as the sun chased the moons out of the sky. Leaves shifted and changed the framing of his upward view as branches reacted to wind or other forces. Squirrels would probably begin chattering soon—the rude creatures would probably complain loudly about obnoxious mice that kept climbing up their trees, or discuss whether or not they could steal some sunflower seeds from the dumb mice on the ground. They didn’t care whether or not anyone heard them, judging from how loud they could be.

“I’m really glad you brought me up here,” Parsnip finally said. She glanced at her brother and smiled. “It’s nice to get away. The sky is really nice, too. Beautiful, even!”

Before Greentail could craft a friendly response, a bird cry startled him. He looked at the brightening sky again and frowned. They shouldn’t have stayed out this long. Mosswillow had threatened to pull out Greentail’s whiskers if he brought Parsnip home late again. She was scarier than any predators that might be wondering the line between the end of night and the breaking of dawn.

He sighed and pushed himself onto his back paws, then stretched. His long skoppr[1] feet made him an artificially tall mouse when fully stretched out on his toes—he almost couldn’t keep his balance while tripoding[2] and stretching.

That said, even when standing normally, Greentail was large for a skoppr, four and a half inches nose-toe-end with a tail just a little longer than that. His fur was a rich brown with vertical black stripes, his belly a light tan, and his ears short ovals. He got his name from his tail, which, supposedly, had an ever-so-subtle green tint. To him it looked like an ordinary, leathery, light brown mouse tail, but enough strangers had commented on the odd color that he no longer felt his family was playing an extended prank on him.

Instead, it felt like the world was.

“Hey,” Parsnip said, looking embarrassed. “Um… I need to make pellets. How is that going to work up here?”

“I’ll hold you over the edge of the branch, I guess. You can’t wait until we reach the ground?”

Parsnip glanced at the edge of the branch, her ears flattening against her skull. She was an unusually small mouse for her age—at three months, she should have been about four inches,[3] nearly full grown. Instead, she was two inches, and stick-skinny as well. If it weren’t for her long skoppr feet, she could have easily been mistaken for a malnourished craemus. Her fur was light brown and covered in dirty yellow spots.

She broke her own tension with a glowing smile and a wide-eyed stare with inky eyes that seemed lit from within. “I’d probably like that better, but I don’t think I can wait.” She held her front legs up and wiggled her paws.

“Aim for a squirrel, if you get the chance,” Greentail said as he picked his sister up. She snorted.

Parsnip’s back legs and tail dangled uselessly in the air as Greentail held her and walked to the edge of the branch. She’d been born that way—the only surviving pup of Mosswillow’s first and only litter. Greentail wrapped his tail around a sturdy twig—to anchor himself—and held Parsnip over the edge while she did her business. A minute or so of humming and singing later and she announced she was done. Greentail shook his head. Moments like this made it hard to remember that his sister wasn’t an infant, but a young doe[4]—old enough that she could be a mother in a few months if she really wanted to.

If she were any other mouse.

“Time to go home,” Greentail said. He cradled Parsnip and looked up and down the branch. Where had he placed her carrier? Hopefully it hadn’t fallen—with layers upon layers of leafy branches between him and the ground for the carrier to get lost in, finding it would be nearly impossible. Which would make getting her to the ground nearly impossible.

And making a new carrier would be a hassle.

Greentail rolled his eyes again. Maybe a squirrel had stolen it. But they should all be asleep a little longer… Strange day-creatures.

Parsnip did her best to stifle a yawn. “It can’t be that late—I’m not tired!”

Greentail chuckled at Parsnip as he continued looking around—a real chuckle this time. “It isn’t about how tired you are. It’s about how likely Mosswillow is to kill me.”

“Mom doesn’t know how to have fun.”

Greentail sniggered. That was true. But at the same time, Greentail could guess why Mosswillow didn’t let herself relax—it was a painful story that no one in the family talked about. Greentail suspected Parsnip had pieced important parts of it together herself, though. Sickly one-mouse litters weren’t normal, after all.

With some relief, Greentail located Parsnip’s carrier resting in the crook where their wide branch met the tree’s trunk. It was made out of a nut shell that had leg-holes and a tail-hole gnawed in it; it looked like half the carapace of a brown, hollowed-out beetle. He slipped Parsnip inside, then secured her with mouse-fur rope that ran over her shoulders, so she wouldn’t slip out as he crawled down the tree trunk. More rope stuck out of the shell, tied to it at various points; these he looped over his shoulders and around his back legs’ thighs, then one around his tail for good measure, before tightening the carrier to his back. The nut shell’s irregular surface was a familiar, almost ignorable discomfort as it pressed into Greentail’s back. The rub of rope on his shoulders, legs, and tail felt similarly; he was grateful the rope hadn’t rubbed his fur off. But it was starting to thin where the rope touched.

The glowing sunrise made Greentail feel rushed, but taking his time was worth it. He’d rather risk Mosswillow ripping out his whiskers than have any chance of his sister falling off his back. He gently bounced and shook the carrier to ensure Parsnip was firmly strapped to him, asked her if she was comfortable, then crawled from their branch onto the trunk and began his descent. He moved head-first, holding his belly tight to the bark to help make up for Parsnip’s imbalance.

Rapid squirrel chatter shattered the still morning: “Heylook!It’samouse.Wonderwhatheisdoinghere?Dumbmousedoesn’theknowthatmicebelongontheground!”

Greentail rolled his eyes. Idiot creatures.

Another voice chimed in. “Lookthedumbmousehassomethingonhisback.Whatisthat?Anothermouse?Dumbmouse,ifitcan’tclimb,leaveitontheground!”

“Don’tcallitadumbmouse.Itmightgetmad.”

“Youcalleditdumbfirst!”

The squirrels’ language wasn’t identical to muris and Greentail lost a word here and there, but he understood their rapid chatter well enough. He considered turning around and growling at them—for all the good it would have done—when he felt a tug on his right ear. He glanced over his shoulder.

Parsnip waved at him.

Greentail nodded. “Hello.” He returned to focusing on climbing.

“Greentail!”

Greentail stifled a sigh and looked over his shoulder. “This isn’t as easy as it looks.”

Parsnip looked embarrassed. She said, “Um, if it’s not too much, I would like to do this again sometime. The clouds…”

Greentail bit his tongue and berated himself for snapping. “You’re welcome.”

Parsnip rested her head on Greentail’s upper back. Despite the fact that Greentail was doing all the work, she was far more tired than he, and soon squeaked with gentle, even snores. For a few moments, the descent was as quiet and peaceful as the forest ever got, with the eternal buzz of distant insects and occasional birdcalls.

Then the squirrels shattered the stillness before Greentail was out of earshot and bounding through the forest toward Whiskerroot.

“Dumbmicearemovingsoslow.Don’ttheyknowhowtoclimbright?”

“Hey,yougotatickinyourtail.Probablyshoulddosomethingaboutthat.”

“Pullitout!”

“No,gross!”

#

The den Greentail and Parsnip shared was dark when Greentail awoke. The lightbugs in the living den[5] were still sleeping; when awake, their pale, moons-like light would whisper a ghostly cadence down the tunnel connecting the two dens. That meant it wasn’t night yet, and Greentail had woken early. But he wasn’t tired—might as well take advantage of that to enjoy some privacy and finish his chores early.

Parsnip lay by Greentail’s side, pressed against him for warmth. Her little paws gently held his fur; he had to move very, very slowly to avoid waking her as he pulled free, wincing as she shifted and muttered. But he was successful; when he crept out of their room, Parsnip was still sound asleep, upper half curled tight, lower half limp.

The darkness of the early-evening family burrow didn’t hinder Greentail. His sensitive whiskers felt the dirt tunnel walls before he came close enough to touch them, warned him of sturdy sticks supporting walls and ceiling before he bumped his nose into them. His back paws felt little vibrations in the ground, traveling through the flat stones that paved the ground, that told him where to place his next steps. His ears caught small sounds that he might have missed at more active parts of the night, but that were just discernible in the morning stillness: the skritch-scratch of lightbugs twitching in their cages, the rustle of fur on grass as mice shifted in their beds, and the high-pitched whistle of the pups breathing through tiny noses.

Even if Greentail had none of his other senses, that wouldn’t have mattered much. He had lived in this burrow since he was born, just over a year ago, and knew it like he knew his own distinctly-brown tail. Where each tunnel entrance and exit was placed, the bend in each tunnel between dens, the shape of each den, and even the most common placement of items within each den, he could easily envision in his mind.

All because he hadn’t left with the rest of his litter months and months before, instead choosing to stay in the family burrow far longer than normal.

Greentail entered the living den and looked around. Generations of productive mice had lived in his family’s burrow, ancestors that helped found Whiskerroot and solidly labored day-by-day to keep it a safe, beautiful place where mice could thrive with their families. Greentail thought he could see history itself in the walls of the den; mostly dirt, but over time mice had worked supportive branches and twigs into the walls, tied together with mouse-hair rope, allowing it to expand a little wider, a little taller, than it otherwise could; trees of all sorts were represented in those twigs, hairs of all colors in those ropes. Stones were set in the ground, their edges worn to fit against each other so tightly that Greentail couldn’t fit so much as a single strand of fur between them, covered in places by comfortable mouse-hair rugs[6]; many stones had been worn just slightly concave, evidencing moons and moons of mice trodding over their surfaces. All of this he saw by the gentle, moons-like light of domesticated lightbugs, kept in a cage in the middle of the ceiling, just now awaking and brightening.

He ought go and collect some food for the creatures. That would extend his morning solitude a little longer.

Only one den directly connected to another in this burrow: the pantry den to the living den, a hanging rug separating the two. The dens were connected by tunnels, bent enough to block vision and grant privacy in that way. Greentail pushed the rug out of the way as he walked through and nearly tripped one a mouse lying just on the other side. The mouse was sprawled out on the ground, his fur hung on nearly meatless bones and his grey, springless whiskers drooping limply down his face, shifting with each breath. His front paws each held a half-eaten sunflower seed, and drool dribbled from the corner of his mouth.

Greentail picked up his own tail with one paw and stepped around his great-grandfather. At times the old mouse slept deeply enough to ignoring howling winter winds that could carry a mouse into the sky; at other times the lightest brush of a hair would wake him. Greentail didn’t want to be the reason he started awoke and started shouting, waking the rest of the burrow. If a heart attack didn’t kill him then, his moms[7] and dad certainly would.

A collection of buckets made out of nut shells with rope handles sat at the back of the pantry, each filled with food waste—leftovers from meals, seed shells that weren’t particularly appetizing, and chewed-up-and-spit-out leavings of the pups. Greentail looped their handles around his front legs and snuck out of the pantry, just barely avoiding tripping on his great-grandfather’s knobby tail. The burrow still silent save for the skritch-scratch of lightbugs—that would begin to wake the others before long—Greentail hurried out of the entrance tunnel and into the moonslight beyond.

His family burrow’s entrance was located on the side of the Whiskerroot hill, high enough above its base to avoid flooding whenever there was a storm.  The tunnel was obscured by tall grasses and stones, which Greentail hopped over rather than climbed through, clearing them by several inches. On the other side, he picked up scraps that had fallen out of his nut buckets and scurried off.

The walk wasn’t as peaceful as Greentail would have hoped, notwithstanding the air being clear, the starry sky rich with depth, and the dirt soft on Greentail’s paws. He didn’t need Parsnip to be present to feel her on his back, heavy despite weighing nearly nothing at all, shifts in her movement disrupting his balance. He kicked at a short blade of grass, scattering dew in a spray, then looked upward and sighed. Dark grey clouds were moving in, chewing up the stars—if it didn’t rain soon, it almost certainly would before the end of the night.

At the end of a long path—about halfway between the Whiskerroot hill and the line of trees that surrounded the Whiskerroot clearing—Greentail stopped at a rock pile and squirmed through a crack, popping out the other side in a space that was large and deep, extending well into the soil. It had the pungent, humid scent of rotting things—Greentail would have covered his nose if his paws weren’t all in use—and was filled with plant matter, insect husks, uprooted fungi, feces, and all sorts of other things, moldering in the dark. Looking up revealed worked stone, the remnants of some sort of Man-thing long since abandoned, yellow-lit by wild lightbugs. Whatever it had been years before, it was one of the Grub Pits now.

A mouse climbed over a pile of refuse, catching Greentail’s attention. He was a regular mus,[8] though unique for his white fur—stained green and brown all over—and pink eyes, one larger than the other. He turned his head so his larger eye could focus on Greentail, then smiled. “Greentail! Finally, you show your ugly face around here. I was getting bored.”

“Gussug!” Greentail shouted back as he began dumping buckets. “How are the grubs looking today?”

Gussug made a clicking sound in his throat, then responded, “I am doing well, thank you.” He scratched an ear, looked at something in his paw dislodged from his fur, and ate it. “Where is Parsnip?”

“I am well,” Greentail responded, annoyed. He was accustomed to Gussug’s eccentricities, so he didn’t wonder what the mouse had eaten. “She is sleeping.”

Gussug looked disappointed. “No grubs for anyone today. Herd’s on the small side, and haven’t dropped any eggs besides.” He slid down the pile of compost and skidded to a stop near where Greentail was. “Throw your trash farther so I don’t have to move it.”

Greentail tossed the waste in his next bucket as far as he could. “Unfortunate. Well, I just need a worm or a slug for our lightbugs, then.”

Gussug turned and focused on the pile of compost behind him, front paws wriggling and his chest and ears twitching. After a few moments he jumped forward, paw striking deep into the pile, and withdrew with a fat, pink, wriggling worm. “Good one today, yes. That’s a good catch,” Gussug muttered. He sheared the worm in half with a snap of his sharp incisors,[9] tossed one half back onto the compost pile and handed the other to Greentail. “Should be plenty.”

The worm, even halved, was still too long and fat to fit in one of Greentail’s buckets; with how much it was wriggling, Greentail didn’t think it would stay in one for long anyway. “Thanks,” he said as he grabbed the slimy thing around its new middle and began slipping bucket handles on his other front leg. “Any news or interesting rumors before I go?”

Gussug turned, put his paws to his mouth, and shouted, “DARGA! DARGA, NEWS!” The high-pitched squeak echoed through the grub pit, causing the lightbugs above to shiver and flutter their wings: a few lights winked out.

Greentail followed some movement at the corner of his eye and saw a distant mus—Darga—pulling herself out of a compost pile. It appeared she had been burrowing for something. She shook herself off, sending bits of who-knows-what flying through the air, and yelled back, “MAN! CAT! WIVES!” She started digging at the compost again and disappeared.

“Right, right, remember now,” Gussug said, bobbing his head and clicking in his throat again. A mouse less familiar with the Paw and Claw that worked the Grub Pits might have been offput, Greentail instead found these odd mice endearing. Gussug turned to Greentooth. “Wish I knew how she learned this stuff. Spends all day finding buried insects. Nearly never leaves. Very strange mouse.” He shook his head.

Greentail stared at Gussug a moment longer, then twitched his whiskers. “And? Details!”

“Man, cat… uh, wives.” Gussug glared where Darga had been and shouted, “Wives bit is private and personal!” He turned back to Greentail. “Don’t know how she found that out. Anyway, treetop craemus talk with some squirrels and learned about Man in the forest. Riding those giant monsters that crush. Don’t look like they are coming our way, but you never know.” He shrugged. “Cat, that old news. Sharptooth came back a moon after being sent out to chase off a bobber. Turns out, they killed it.”

Greentail’s jaw dropped. He hadn’t heard about that—Gussug was severely underselling such an awesome feat. Why hadn’t news of a slain bobber spread like wildfire through the great nest already?

Gussug continued. “Here’s the new thing—rumor is just one mouse did it, a craemus.” Gussug shook his head and giggled.

“Oh.” Greentail shook his head. That meant the story was probably fake. A craemus was far too small to ever kill a bobber—it wasn’t even something that could be considered. A gorskrmus, maybe, but even that was a stretch. “They bring back the bobber parts to prove it?”

“Yup.”

“Was there a gorskrmus in that band?”

“Big, ugly one.”

Greentail shook his head. “Gorskrmus did it, then. No idea why it wouldn’t take the glory, though. That part’s… weird.” Greentail turned to leave, but kept an eye on Gussug. “Thanks. And have a good night. I’ll see you when I take out the trash next.”

Gussug waved a paw at Greentail, then scrambled up a compost pile, already focused on something else. He plunged a paw deep into the heap, all the way up to his shoulder, and pulled out a centipede, which he threw into his mouth. “No eating my pretties, nasty invader you,” he said between crunchy bites. He swallowed; as Greentail started squirming through a crack in the rocks that covered the Grub Pit, he heard Gussug complain, “Fryth, that’s disgusting.”

#

Greentail arrived home after breakfast had already started. His family was sitting in the living den: Pale Moon’s Light, his mother, leaned against a wall with her litter surrounding her. Most of her six pups, each only a month old, were nursing, but two were alternating between wrestling and nibbling on seeds. Those might wean early.[10] Mosswillow, Greentail’s litter mother, hovered near Pale Moon’s Light and the pups, making sure Pale Moon’s Light got enough to eat and that the pup roughhousing didn’t go too far. Grorn,[11] his father, sat on his haunches beside Greywhisker, his great-grandfather and the same mouse that Greentail had nearly tripped on that morning, both munching on dried fungi and talking about spider breeding. Parsnip lay near them, listening to their conversation, an untouched mushroom cap on the stone beside her. Clinging to the ceiling, staring hungrily at the lightbug cage, was Fluff, the family spider.

Greentail stepped out of the entry tunnel and into the living den. Two pairs of eyes snapped to him: Parsnip’s and Mosswillow’s. “Greentail!” Parsnip shouted with delight. She waved a paw. “Where were you?”

“Making sure the lightbugs get fed,” Greentail said, holding the worm aloft. His great-grandfather eyed the worm for a moment and licked his lips, but his ears were turned toward Grorn.

“Parsnip was alone when she woke up,” Mosswillow said. Her voice cut across the familial noise. Greentail tried not to let his ears fall with nervousness. He had expected her to be frustrated with him from the night before—and, to be fair, this morning—but hoped she wasn’t frustrated enough to tear his whiskers out in front of everyone.

“I didn’t know when she’d wake up,” Greentail said. He glanced at Parsnip, but no longer wondered what she thought when they talked about her in front of her: it happened too often. She wasn’t paying them attention, her eyes and ears shifting between her sires.

Greentail slipped into the pantry and dropped the buckets off near the back wall. When he reemerged, Mosswillow stood in front of the dividing rug, paws on her hips; Greentail nearly ran into her. “You should have waited, or collected dew for the pups to drink,” Mosswillow said. “Something that would have let you hear her calling for help.”

Greentail fought to keep his ears up in a relaxed pose, though inside he was annoyed. Parsnip wasn’t utterly helpless—it looked like the most pitiful thing in the world, but she could drag herself around by her front paws. Doing so only made her sick if she had to do it too often. And waiting wouldn’t kill her if Greentail needed a break. But Mosswillow never seemed to understand that.

Rather than letting himself say something he might regret, Greentail stepped around Mosswillow and walked to the center of the family den. He jumped straight up three times. The first time, at the apex of his jump, he opened the lightbug cage; the second time he shoved the worm in; and the third time he closed the cage. The lightbugs immediately pounced on the writhing creature. Then, after glancing at Fluff, he decided to jump a fourth time to grab the spider off the wall. It was about the length of his front foreleg, from the tip of its abdomen to its mandibles, with a chunky body and legs covered in long, soft, white fur. It purred as he rubbed its back—the sound was relaxing.

“Well?” Mosswillow asked. She had followed him across the room.

“I’m sorry,” Greentail said. He set Fluff down and the spider scampered off in search of pests to eat. “I’ll do better next time.

Mosswillow’s whiskers twitched. She began, “Then let’s talk about how you and Parsnip came home well after the rest of us—” but was cut off when Pale Moon’s Light groaned as she tried to push herself to her feet. “This conversation is not over!” Mosswillow whispered before hopping across the room to help her sister wife with the pups.

“You can take a break, Moss,” Pale Moon’s Light said to Mosswillow. “You were up all day with them!”

Mosswillow smiled back, looking a little strained, but picked up three pups at once and cooed at them. Greentail glanced at Parsnip and saw her looking at Mosswillow covertly; when her mother picked up the pups, Parsnip’s ears dropped and she looked away. Greentail frowned and wondered how long it had been since Mosswillow had picked her daughter up, because he had every reason to believe the streak hadn’t been broken that morning.

Maybe it was his fault. If he weren’t still living here, Mosswillow might be forced to confront whatever kept her away from Parsnip. After all, she was the only one who could replace him if he left. Pale Moon’s Light was too busy with the pups. Greywhisker was too old and weak. And Grorn was too busy most of the day.

Greentail did his best to shove acrid thoughts from his mind as he sat on his haunches, between Parsnip and his father in their little semi-circle.

“There’s still a level of stickiness in the silk that really shouldn’t be there—I’m not sure the spider quite understands what I’m trying to train it to do. What’s promising is that, with a lot of effort, the stickiness can be scraped away, leaving silk that we can twist into amazing yarn—but it takes too much effort, just for the moment, to be really useful. But we’re close. We’re so close!” Grorn enthused.

Greywhisker shook his head. His whiskers, which dropped straight down from his muzzle, trailed through the air with the movement. “I’d say you got one generation more, maybe two, before they start producing webbing good for mouse weaving. Anything that could replace mouse fur, anyway.”

“Well, if you’d come out to the spider den, I could use your expertise. Might cut that time down a fair shake.”

Greywhisker growled. “I’ll die before I go expose myself to the sky. Too many birds out there.” He looked suspiciously upward, as if he expected a hawk or an owl to tear away all the dirt above him at just that moment.

“Where’s your food?” Parsnip asked, directing her question at Greentail. When he shrugged, she shoved her mushroom cap at him.

“No, you need to eat. I’m fine—I ate at the Grub Pit,” Greentail lied.

“I already ate some root,” Parsnip said. That was probably a lie as well—Parsnip hardly ate anything. “Please?”

Greentail grabbed the cap. “If you promise to take a few bites, I’ll finish it for you.” He glanced at Mosswillow; his litter mother was herding the pups and Pale Moon’s Light into the tunnel connected to the pups’ den. She’s probably be back in a few minutes to keep tearing at his whiskers. “Hey, you want to leave early today?”

With a smile, Parsnip pushed herself up using her front paws, but remained leaning on them. “Oh, please! I’m ready to get out of the burrow. What are we doing today?”

Grorn interjected, “We have some spiders to deliver today—but mostly we’re going to clean up the den, along with the usual.”

“That, apparently,” Greentail said to Parsnip. Then, to his father: “The spiderlings are old enough to imprint?”

“Just a little on the young side, but the mothers have eaten so many… I don’t understand it. No matter what I do, I can’t seem to breed the infanticide out of them. We need to find new homes as fast as we can …” Grorn scratched the tip of his nose and narrowed his eyes, deep in thought.

“I’ll get started on that early, then—the cleaning,” Greentail said. He hopped to his paws, ready to collect Parsnip’s carrier from their den and come back for her. Before walking off, he whispered in Parsnip’s ear, “I think I need to get away again today—as soon as dad lets us. Somewhere out in the forest. You in?”

Parsnip’s grin went all the way up to each of her ears. “Always!”

#

“You’ve been acting strange,” Parsnip said.

Greentail looked over his shoulder at Parsnip. His neck twinged—he wondered if the awkward way he had to bend it to see his sister was putting a crick in it. He looked away.

They were following a narrow trail worn into the dirt and grass, winding through the near forest surrounding Whiskerroot. The area was kept safe enough by the Sharpteeth that many mice visited to explore or appreciate the forest’s natural beauty—or just to get away for a while.

Nowhere was ever truly safe for a mouse. Despite the hard work of the Sharpteeth and Paw and Claw, every few moons a hawk swooped down from the sky and grabbed a mouse catching a nap on a sunflower, or a weasel crawled into a mouse burrow and ate the family inside. As such, Greentail kept focused on the moonslight-dappled forest as he responded to Parsnip. “It’s been a frustrating day for me.”

“Not just today—it’s been a while. Are you okay?” Parsnip rubbed Greentail’s shoulder.

Greentail’s nose twitched. He wasn’t certain how to respond to Parsnip. He was dissatisfied. But what was he dissatisfied about? Everything. Then he sighed. Greentail was just self-aware enough to know that wasn’t true. But whatever was bothering him, it was bleeding into other parts of his life. Was it Mosswillow? True, her criticism was frustrating—and her bizarre lack of trust, while still leaving every aspect of Parsnip’s care to him. Parsnip herself was a wearying burden that he felt just as strongly when she was gone as when he was present. It was part of what kept him from leaving: Parsnip’s weight would always rest on his shoulders. Of course, he couldn’t tell Parsnip that. It would be too cruel.

He’d just thought there’d be a little more recognition when he’d volunteered to be Parsnip’s caregiver, that’s all.

“I’m tired, Parsnip. I’m avoiding Mosswillow’s nagging.”

A brush of whiskers on his neck and ears told him that Parsnip was nodding. “I don’t understand mom.” Then, quietly, hesitantly, “Why doesn’t she carry me?”

Greentail almost grabbed his tail to fiddle with it, a nervous habit he’d started as a pup. “I don’t know. She’s really thrown herself into helping with Moon’s pups. Maybe she feels like there’s no room for her, with me around all the time.”

Parsnip was silent for a moment. Then, “This morning, I cried out because I was scared by a dream. I heard mom—she was awake before the others. She could have come helped me. Carried me out of my room. She woke up dad instead. Then she just stayed in her den.” Parsnip’s whiskers trembled on Greentail’s neck.

“Maybe—”

“I can’t remember her ever touching me,” Parsnip finished. “I was too young whenever it last happened. Not even a whisker brush. And whenever I see her carry Moon’s pups…”

Greentail flinched. Except for when Parsnip was very young and very, very sick, Greentail also couldn’t remember ever seeing Mosswillow touch Parsnip, let alone hold her. It was bizarre. She fussed over how Greentail took care of Parsnip constantly, yet nothing could bring her to so much as to brush the fur of her daughter, the child she birthed. Maybe Parsnip carried too many memories of pain for Mosswillow.

Maybe she blamed Parsnip for the loss of that litter.

The little trail went deeper into the forest, past where most mice would stop, but Greentail forged ahead, keeping an eye on the grey sky when there was a break in the canopy above. He hugged the edges of trees, passed through the inside of bushes, and kept beneath undergrowth wherever possible, winding haphazardly with the path in the dirt, brushing a surface to his right or left with his whiskers whenever he could. That made it easier for him to protect himself and his sister, with one less direction he needed to keep an eye on.

This moonslit walk wasn’t as calming as he had hoped it would be.

Greentail didn’t know what to say, didn’t know if there was anything to say to Parsnip, long after it was too late to respond. Eventually he felt a little paw on his ear; he looked over his shoulder again and saw Parsnip, eyes watery with unbroken tears. “Thank you for carrying me.”

A traitorous lump in his throat made it impossible to say anything. Greentail tried to swallow it.

Then Parsnip’s ears jumped upright, stiff with alarm. She looked around. “I heard branches breaking!”

Greentail froze. His sister’s ears were sharper than those of any mouse he knew. A few second later, he heard distant cracking—more than just a few branches breaking. Something big was barreling toward them, moving quickly. He could turn and run, but it would be impossible to make it all the way back to Whiskerroot before whatever it was appeared.

“What is that?” Parsnip whispered, her squeaky voice veined with nervousness.

“I don’t know,” Greentail whispered. Most giant beasts ignored mice, but weren’t above snapping up one that got in its way. He had to hide. He needed shelter—something more than just a bush to cower under. Something that would still protect him and Parsnip if it happened to be stepped on.

Branches snapping. Leaves tearing. High-pitched roaring.

It was on the ground, whatever it was. Maybe they could hide above it.

Whiskers stiff, fur on end, Greentail jumped onto the trunk of the nearest tree and began climbing, jostling Parsnip in his hast. His nails scraped against bark, his sister’s head knocked against his back and neck, as he rushed up the tree, hoping he was fast enough to be well above the reach of whatever was coming their way. He realized hadn’t fully strapped Parsnip into her carrier—he’d need to be careful, or he could shake her out.

Just over halfway up the tree, Greentail began to feel safe again, when—

BOOM!

A horrifying sound, utterly alien to Greentail, blasted through the air; it was louder than thunder and punched harder, making him fear his heart would stop as he lost control of his paws and legs. He fell from the trunk, turning end-over-end in the air, and landed on his stomach on a branch. Air whooshed out of him, the edges of his vision bled black; he heard Parsnip crying on his back, paws grabbing at his fur.

She had slipped out of the carrier!

“Nee ngipoosh duh kab dah theew!”[12] a voice cried. Man-speech. Greentail shuddered.

The ground rumbled like it was filled rolling boulders, the vibrations shaking the tree’s roots and spreading upward into its branches. Greentail tried to push himself to all fours, hoping to slide Parsnip back into the carrier and strap her to him tightly—

BOOM!

Greentail screamed in fear and clutched the bark of the trunk, his ears flat against his skull yet still ringing from the noise. At least Parsnip was clutching his fur, holding it almost fur-rippingly tight. She was still there. She was still there.

Below, two enormous, hairy beasts broke out of the foliage. In his wide-eyed terror, Greentail could only comprehend random details: enormous, flared noses; knobby legs that pulverized the ground with stone-like feet, tearing up soil and dirt and sending it flying; three Men, two on the first beast, one on the second. The solitary Man raised a black, bent object in the air and pointed at the duo.

BOOM! BOOM!

The object bucked with each explosion, creating sound and force like the very voice of Fryth.

“Djach! Djach!” That was one of the two Men on the first beast, much smaller than the other; the Man looked back and stretched out a hand. They whipped past the tree Greentail and Parsnip were in, turned sharply around it, and forged into the underbrush, breaking through branches like a gorskrmus bulled through grass. The second Man tried to turn as sharply, but the Man’s beast struck the tree as they passed. The tree’s thin trunk bent and flicked, whipping its branches and launching Greentail from the branch.

In open air, the ground was so terrifyingly far away. As he looked down, heart beating so fast that each thump was indistinguishable from the next, Greentail thought he saw the Night Rabbit sitting on the ground, front paws held up toward him, red eyes like a bloodskræcher’s fire and fur so dark as to make the creature look like a hole in the air. Greentail screamed again. As he tumbled and began to fall, he caught a glimpse of Parsnip, screaming and front paws flailing as she soared away from him; he tried to reach for her.

Then Greentail struck a large leaf, rolled off it, and bounced off more branches as he passed through underbrush on the way to the forest floor, head and body bruised and aching, unconscious before rolling onto the soft soil.

#

Drip-drip, drip, drip-drip. Drip-drip, drip, drip-drip…

Something pinched Greentail’s nose.

Greentail shifted his head, but remained lying on the ground, eyes closed. It felt like someone was slowly pouring water on him—why would they do that? And that pinching… it was sharp, painful, unfriendly. Was Fluff mistaking his nose for food?

Drip-drip, drip, drip-drip.

The pinch again. It was sharp and small, something tinier than Fluff, and very annoying.

His back ached. With a groan, he reached behind himself and realized he was lying on Parsnip’s carrier. Why in Fryth’s Garden would he have fallen asleep with that on?

Then memory returned to him. Greentail’s eyes snapped open and his whiskers stiffened. He was alive—lying under a bush somewhere in the forest, apparently, but alive. He could move his limbs and stretch his back with only aches, no sharp pains—hopefully that meant nothing was broken.

Where was Parsnip?

Greentail shuddered as that horrific noise made by the Man-thing echoed through his head. He pushed himself to a sitting position and began to thayma to calm his nerves. On his first pass grooming his snout he found the source of the pinching: an ant, its feet firmly planted on his nose while its pincers mightily tried to rip a piece out. Greentail tugged the creature off and tossed it in his mouth, crunching on it as he looked around.

The leaves and branches of a dense shrub surrounded him; he had fallen into a little hollow near its base. The source of the dripping was readily obvious—rainfall catching on leaves above, some of it dripping through to land where he had been lying down. But other than that spot, and two others, the soil around him was surprisingly dry. It either wasn’t raining very hard outside, or this shrub was very good at keeping out the wet—the drumming outside suggested the latter. Whatever the answer, Greentail was grateful.

And scared. He saw no sign of Parsnip, even after limping around his limited space several times and attempting to peer through the bush’s leafery to the world outside.

“Mosswillow’s going to kill me,” Greentail groaned. He feared for Parsnip’s life more than he worried about Mosswillow tearing his whiskers out, but didn’t stop Mosswillow from crossing his mind. And Pale Moon’s Light, Grorn, Greywhisker—would any of them be able to stomach the sight of him after this?

Greentail pushed through the branches of the shrub. Outside, rain drenched the land as far as he could see, waterfalling off high tree leaves and creating pools and streams in the soil below. He was fortunate to have landed in a dense shrub on higher spot well-shaded by a tree, otherwise he could have awoken in a pool of water; as it was, drizzle and mist still wetted his fur. An image flashed in Greentail’s mind of Parsnip trapped in a depression as it slowly filled with rainwater, unable to swim away. Heart thudding, he raised his paws to his mouth and shouted, “Parsnip! Parsnip!”

The forest responded with more rain.

Panic began to rise in Greentail; instinct told him to scurry in every direction, somehow equating raw movement with Parsnip being found sooner. He grabbed his tail and squeezed, forcing himself to look around and think, make every moment matter.

There. Greentail recognized the trail he had been walking, now turning into a muddy quagmire. There, enormous, round pawprints in the ground where those Man-monsters had run through, terrifying him with their horrible sounds. There, distant enough to be hard to see through the rain, the tree he had climbed to escape. Which meant that one of its lower branches pointing toward him was where he had sought safety before he and Parsnip had been thrown into the forest.

Greentail sat on his haunches and thought as hard as he could. Fear-tinged memories were unclear, focused largely on what terrified him most while leaving everything else indistinct: the stomping, rock-like paws of the Man-beasts. The horrible object that made the terrifying noise. The ground so far below, for once not seen with solid bark beneath his paws.

Parsnip had been thrown away from him, spinning off into the forest. But in what direction?

Rain fell like it wanted to wash away all things solid. Greentail couldn’t afford to wait much longer; Parsnip could be drowning while he sat in thought. He turned and faced the direction he thought—he hoped—Parsnip had been thrown, and scurried off.

A rain-soaked forest was a dangerous place for a mouse. Little streams that larger animals ignored could sweep a mouse away to places unknown. While mice danced across thick mud more easily than larger creatures, when caught they had a harder time pulling themselves free, all the while risking death by drowning. Puddles filled with soil could easily hide tangled creepers and other snares that could catch a mouse beneath water and hold it fast while rain fractured the water’s surface, just out of reach. Greentail had heard many stories of such things from his brother, a Sharptooth. He moved as quickly as he could, frequently pausing to shout Parsnip’s name, as he skirted around growing puddles of water, jumped over newly formed streams, and hoped desperately that there were no predators around hungry enough to hunt in bad weather. The whole while a cold feeling settled in his heart, coating it like snow and ice coated the hill of Whiskerroot in winter—finding his way home in this would be impossible, let alone finding Parsnip. If he ran across his sister, it would be out of sheer luck, nothing more. And if she wasn’t already somewhere safe… Greentail shoved those thoughts out of his mind.

Up and down tree roots, pushing through underbrush, his paws growing cold and stiff as time went on, his fur a heavy coat around his body, Greentail limped onward, his aches numbed by the weather. Where he could he climbed up tree trunks to get a look around, hoping to never see a little mouse body floating in the middle of one of several nearby puddles—but also wondering if he’d even recognize anything. Sticks and leaves floated in each puddle, disrupted into unpredictable movement by rain and flowing water.

“Fryth, please,” he muttered. “Ha-Thitsle, please.” He didn’t know the details of what he was praying for. It was growing hard to think. He was too cold, too tired. But he’d take something, anything, over this dripping purgatory.

He’d lost his path. He didn’t know where Whiskerroot was. He didn’t know where he’d been three steps ago. He could be moving in circles; he could be headed out deeper into the forest. He needed shelter. He was well past the point of being able to do anything to Parsnip—maybe past the point where he should have kept going. It was too late. He might have been crying, but he was too wet to tell the difference between tear and rainwater.

He found a rise in the dirt, a bit of higher ground with a tree, some shrubbery, and some large stones. It might be drier up there—or at least provide a good viewpoint. He crawled upward, past soil and onto stone, toward the tree, but near the top of a stone his paws slip and he tumbled downward, falling through the leaves of a fern. Where he landed was dry enough, and no rain was dripping on him—he closed his eyes.

[About this area might be a good time to have a Parsnip scene—maybe the first, maybe not—where she flies through the air, lands, explores, finds the bird, has a visceral reaction. Maybe the next scene could even be from her perspective, rather than Greentail’s.]

#

“Greentail! You’re alive!”

Greentail snorted, his eyes flicking open. Who had said his name? He blearily looked around, his eyes taking some time to focus, but the rest of his senses awoke sharp. He smelled wet soil and damp plant, the quiet sweetness of leaves just beginning to rot; the soil was too wet for him to feel many vibrations through it; his stiff whiskers told him something was moving just out of reach.

Something that knew his name. Something with a familiar scent.

Parsnip!

Eyes snapping into focus, Greentail saw his little sister lying on the ground in front of him, back legs and tail stretched out, front legs holding up her upper half while she smiled at him. She was covered in dirt and bits of leave, and though patches of torn-out fur Greentail could see bruises, but she was alive. She was alive!

Greentail brushed his whiskers against Parsnip’s and stroked her ears. He was too tired to feel much more than gratitude just to see her smiling. “How?…” he croaked.

“I landed over there,” Parsnip said, pointing through a gap in the fern’s leaves; Greentail saw a thick pad of moss. “I was bruised, but not really hurt. I shouted for you, then got scared that… something else might hear me. So I dragged myself in there. My legs are… so tired…” Parsnip lowered her upper half to the ground using trembling limbs, folding her front legs and resting her head on them. She sighed. “Then it started raining, and I knew I would get sick if I got too wet. So I looked around for somewhere better to hide. And I did! There’s a little tunnel inside! And Greentail—I found something in it.”

“Well, then we need to leave, now. No creature likes having its home disturbed. I’m glad it must have been asleep when you found it, or—”

“It’s a bird. I think it’s hurt.”

That made the hairs on the back of Greentail’s neck raise. He didn’t know of any burrow-dwelling birds; then again, he didn’t know much more about birds beyond avoiding the ones that looked like they could eat him, and that was all he cared to know. He shook his head. An injured animal was likely to attack to protect itself, even if it normally wouldn’t harm a mouse. Staying away was the best plan. And getting home as quickly as possible. Their mothers were probably worried sick. Grorn probably was out in the forest right now, looking for them, maybe with some Paw and Claw—or even Sharpteeth—helping him. Greentail rubbed his forehead. This was the last kind of thing he wanted to be known for, getting lost just before a rainstorm and nearly getting his sister killed.

Then again, maybe he was looking at this wrong. Greentail continued to spin the situation in his mind as he pushed himself to his back paws and began stretching, groaning as muscles and bruises complained about having to move. Greentail would have come home before the rain started if Men hadn’t appeared. They’d very nearly trampled him and Parsnip, and would have if it hadn’t been for his quick thinking scuttling up a tree. Of course, that same thinking got him and Parsnip separated and whipped into the forest when one of the Man-beasts struck the tree, but how was any mouse supposed to prepare for that? What mattered was that he found Parsnip—completely by chance, but it still happened—and now was going to bring her home.

That was the story of a hero if Greentail had ever heard one. Braving the forest, overcoming terrible danger, rescuing a helpless mouse…

After stretching, Greentail shivered. His fur was cold and wet, but inside he felt a warmth of delight. Maybe some attitudes about him would finally change after this. He’d get the recognition that, bizarrely, hadn’t come when he’d volunteered to care for Parsnip.

“Greentail?” Parsnip said. “Are you in there?”

Greentail blinked. He had no idea how long Parsnip had been talking. “Sorry. I was just… wondering how best to get us home, that’s all.”

“I want you to go look at the bird. It needs help. And it’s cute.”

“No.” Greentail shook his head. “You’re going in your carrier, and we’re going h—” as he spoke, Greentail pulled Parsnip’s carrier off his back, then froze. The back half of the carrier had been broken off at some point during the storm, or perhaps when he’d initially fallen, and several of the ropes were badly frayed.

There would be no carrying Parsnip home, at least using anything other than his front legs and paws.

“That will look better, maybe,” Greentail muttered. While Parsnip complained, he pushed through the fern leaves to take a look at the world outside and judge the damage done by the rain.

The forest had been turned into another world. As far as he could see, leaves still held large droplets of water, ready to shower at the slightest disturbance. Streams no longer ran across the ground, but rainwater had pooled in many places, and where there wasn’t a puddle there was thick mud that could grab a mouse leg and hold fast. On his own, Greentail wouldn’t be concerned about finding his way home—he’d just climb a tree, get his bearings, and traverse as much of the trip as possible going from branch to branch. But with Parsnip, and without her carrier? He couldn’t climb while carrying her, and he didn’t trust her to safely cling to his back. That meant his two options were to traverse deep, sticky mud and dark puddles filled with unknown snares while carrying his sister, or to wait a few hours for things to dry out.

Greentail fiddled with his tail and looked upward. The moons were low in the sky, signaling early night. Between the storm and falling unconscious twice her couldn’t be sure how much time he had lost, but at the minimum he’d lost a day, perhaps two days and a night. If the former, Mosswillow and Pale Moon’s Light would be worried. If the latter, they might be panicking. But Greentail doubted he’d lost any more time than that—he wasn’t hungry enough.

Hopping forward out of his relatively dry shelter, Greentail tested the mud that covered most of the forest floor just to confirm what he already feared: walking on all fours, he’d be fine. Walking on his kind legs, carrying Parsnip, even as light as he was, he’d get stuck.

They had to wait the wet out.

Greentail’s stomach rumbled. With a sigh, he pushed his way back into the fern. “Parsnip, looks like we’re waiting out here… Parsnip?”

Parsnip was gone—but it wasn’t hard for Greentail to figure out where she had gone, as there was a little furrow in the dirt where she had dragged herself away. He followed it past where the fern brushed against a tree trunk, pushed a few leaves out of the way, and paused when he saw that Parsnip’s trail entered a tunnel that began under a tree root and continued down, below the pile of stones next to the tree. Something felt eerily familiar. When he felt the brush of a cobweb against his whiskers, Greentail gasped.

“Dad!” he whispered.

Moons and moons ago, well before the winter Parsnip was born, Grorn had kept his spider breeding hidden in several different dens in the Whiskerroot forest, just further than most mice travelled. Back then, spiders were just seen as another source of food, an attitude that had completely changed in recent moons. With Greentail staying home after his siblings had all left the burrow, Greentail had helped his father maintain these burrows, and eventually move all the spiders out of them to a much closer burrow, just before the advent of last winter. That was at his mother’s request—Pale Moon’s Light, not Mosswillow. Although it had taken both of his wives to convince Grorn to stop being so paranoid that someone was going to sneak in and eat his spiders.

Greentail shook his head. He would never have thought of this den without prompting, but now that he recognized it he knew exactly what to expect: a short tunnel downward that turned sharply and immediately opened into a wide partitioned into a clover-like shape by roots, with each leaf being a convenient spot to keep different spiders. It kept dry during storms, somehow, and predators never seemed to find it. There wouldn’t be a better spot for him and Parsnip to wait out the wet.

The tunnel was black as an angry raincloud, but Greentail trusted his footing and his whiskers as he descended. Besides, as he neared the bend in the tunnel he noticed a little light bleeding out of the den—both a pale, moons-like color and something off-yellow. Perhaps the lightbugs his father had once kept here had made it their home once the mice and spiders were gone, and then bred with some wild bugs, accounting for the dual colors.

In that light, Greentail saw a little, thin tail snaking around the tunnel’s bend. He considered sneaking up on it and pouncing to tease Parsnip. Instead, he held his head loftily as he rounded the corner and looked down at his sister, who had pushed herself into a sitting position where she was leaning against the tunnel’s dirt wall. She was breathing heavily, obviously exhausted, but looked up at Greentail and smiled brightly at him anyway. “Oh, good!” she squeaked.

“Good?” Greentail grumbled. “It’s not like I was going to leave you.”

“Did you bring some seeds?”

“What? No. But we should be able to find some food in there. It’s probably a little dry for mushrooms, but if I can sneak up on a lightbug we can eat one of those, or claw some root tendrils out of the walls—” Greentail looked up and paused, whiskers stiff and neck-fur standing up straight, when he saw the bird in the middle of the den.

The bird was lying on its back, legs in the air above it, one wing tucked in and the other outstretched. If it weren’t for the rhythmic, shallow movements of its chest, Greentail might have assumed it was dead. Whatever had happened to the bird, its left side had been savaged fiercely, probably just before the downpour had started: long claw marks left bloody lacerations in its side and wing, skin and muscle easily visible due to torn or entirely missing feathers.

“She needs help,” Parsnip whispered, motioning toward the bird.

Greentail struggled to contain his fear and aggravation: Fear, because birds had beaks and talons. Even if the creature in here wasn’t a mouse-eater—and it did look a little small for that—it was still dangerous, being cornered and, as Parsnip said, injured. Aggravation, because Greentail had been excited to shelter in this den for a while.

Through all this, Greentail remained wary. The bird could still wake up and lash out at any moment without warning.

“I think we should name her Beak,” Parsnip said.

“We’re not naming it!” Greentail said, his eyes still on the bird. It did have a distinctive beak—very wide, and short, but its tip still looked sharp enough to kill a mouse instantly with one peck to the head. A ragged divot that ran across the beak’s middle suggested an old, healed injury. The rest of the bird, as far as Greentail was concerned, was very typically bird-like: body feathers of black, blue, and red, with white on its belly, neck, and halfway around its closed eyes; long wings, and long legs with dark scales and sharp talons. Because the bird’s head was pointed toward the tunnel, Greentail couldn’t get a good look at its lower half, but what he could see suggested at stiff tailfeathers. The bird’s body was a little longer than his own—crawling into this den wouldn’t have been that difficult, but still likely harder than for a creature with four legs.

Parsnip held her paws in the air. “Really? You’re right, naming Beak is really going to hurt. Because we have so many important things to do right now, so many places to go.” She looked around, then pointed up the tunnel. “You want to hide out up there, in the fern? You’re probably safe up there, but something could slip in, looking to find a little shelter, and eat you. It’s also wetter up there.” She folded her front legs. “Or you could stay here with me and be nice for a little bit.”

Greentail blinked at Parsnip. He’d never been shut down by his sister before.

Parsnip frowned. “I’m sorry. Was I being mean?”

“It’s… Let’s not worry about it,” Greentail said. His stomached rumbled.

At the sound, the bird cocked its head so one eye was staring right at Greentail when it opened. The bird’s eyes were entirely black, save for a red iris that grew and shrank as it focused. The bird made a coughing sound, its legs kicking weakly at the air. Then its eye closed again.

“Oh, poor Beak!” Parsnip said. She looked at Greentail. “Could you find her something to eat?”

Greentail looked between the bird and Parsnip several times, then snorted. “I’ll find what I find. But we’re eating first. If the dumb bird gets anything, I’m not feeding it.”

“Beak,” Parsnip said, staring at the bird.

“Beak, fine,” Greentail grumbled. He hoped it wouldn’t take long for the forest to be dry enough for him to take Parsnip home as he crept into the den, keeping a wide berth between him and the still bird.

#

Grorn and Greentail had left behind more than Greentail had guessed in the spider den. They had prioritized moving spiderlings in the rush to beat winter, so Greentail didn’t think it a particular stroke of luck that he found an undamaged nut shell, some old mouse rope that smelled of mildew (but didn’t show any), and a small cache of sunflower seeds that Grorn had kept stocked so he could spend days at a time in the den when needed. Some had spoiled, but many smelled safe to eat.

Greentail’s compromise with Parsnip was that he would help her give some seeds to Beak after the two of them had eaten and were full enough. Greentail ate several seeds and then got to work chewing holes in the new nut shell in preparation to make it Parsnip’s next carrier. It was close to the same size as the former, and had a smoother surface—maybe it was an unusually large, hollowed-out acorn. He couldn’t imagine why such a thing would be lying around, but it would be more comfortable on his back than the previous shell had been.

“You’re very clever, figuring out how to make that,” Parsnip said, watching curiously. After half an hour she still had most of her seed left, only nibbled around the edges.

Greentail shrugged as he chewed. His tooth popped through the shell, and he set to work widening the hole and softening its edges. He’d accurately predicted with the first carrier he’d devised that ragged edges would hurt Parsnip, but what he hadn’t predicted with the first carrier was that smooth, but still hard, edges were still very uncomfortable. If he chewed at the nut shell just right he could leave the edges somewhat feathered, making them almost soft. Once that hole was finished, he’d have a hole for Parsnip to stick her bottom legs out and her tail. This nut wasn’t tall enough to need holes for Parsnip’s upper legs, but Greentail had chewed out grooves that would let her rest her upper legs more comfortably when outside the nut, as well as more easily move them in and out.

That meant the carrier was almost ready. He’d need to find a sharp stone to poke some smaller holes in the thing to fit rope through and tied knots, and then he’d need to take what was left of the padded mouse fur used for cushioning in the old carrier and transfer it to this one, but he guessed that the carrier would be done well before the moons outside were at their zenith.

Beak groaned again. Greentail glanced at the bird out of the corner of his eye. The bird had been making noise like that every once in a while, and its eyes were fluttering open and closed more frequently. Then Greentail squeaked with alarm when, with a flap of its good wing and some kicking of its legs, Beak lurched onto its side and then unsteadily pushed itself to standing.

“It’s going to kill us!” Greentail said. He dropped the carrier and dashed forward to pick up Parsnip.

“Stop, stop!” Parsnip shouted as Greentail lifted her. When he ignored her and turned toward the tunnel, she slapped his nose. Her legs, even the ones she had control over, were weak and couldn’t hit hard, but Greentail’s nose was sensitive enough that he still flinched. “Look!” Parsnip said, pointing.

Safely in the tunnel, Greentail turned and looked back. Beak was on the other side of the den, pressed against a wall of root and dirt; it kept its wounded side and wing facing away from the two mice, and it stared at them, eyes occasionally blinking.

“She’s scared of us,” Parsnip gasped.

Greentail felt skeptical, but didn’t decide to challenge Parsnip. Instead, he paid attention to Beak’s eyes and talons, noting that the bird kept glancing down at the three uneaten and un-nibbled sunflower seeds. It made a low grumbling noise in its throat.

“You were probably right about the hungry thing,” Greentail muttered.

“Then put me down! Go feed her!” Parsnip said.

Greentail shook his head, but put Parsnip down and crept forward. Beak stared at him as he approached the sunflower seeds, then opened its beak slightly as Greentail prepared to lob the seed toward it. The seed arced through the air, spinning slightly before hitting the ground and rolling forward. Beak shifted its attention to the seed. It pecked once and then, apparently satisfied, gobbled the whole seed up. When finished, it looked up at the rest of the seeds. Greentail tossed them Beak’s way.

“Thank you, Greentail!” Parsnip said, clapping her paws together. “Now we just need to see what we can do about her wing…”

That was Greentail’s limit—he didn’t actually have to get close to the bird to feed it. He had every reason to believe Beak would attack him if he tried to touch its injury—not that he could do much about it anyway. They didn’t have a bloodskræcher with them, after all. He picked up the two carriers—the new one he’d been working on and the broken one—held them in one front leg, and grabbed Parsnip around her middle with the other. Then, ignoring Parsnip’s protests, he carried her halfway up the tunnel and placed her on the ground, sitting and leaning against a wall. He dropped a carrier on each side of her.

“I’m going to go see if it’s safe to start heading home,” Greentail said. He pointed a nail at Parsnip. “You’re going to move your padding from the old carrier to the new one. It’s up to you to make sure you’ll be comfortable. The bird doesn’t look like it’s going anywhere, but scream if you hear so much as a scratch, hmm?”

“Her name is Beak,” Parsnip grumbled.

Greentail rolled his eyes and headed to the surface. Before leaving the shelter of the fern just outside the burrow he peered through its leaves to see if he could spot any predators around, then hopped out. The soil was wet, but no longer felt mucky, and many of the pools he’d seen earlier had been absorbed into the soil. Good. Especially with the new carrier for Parsnip, they could start heading home, and he’d only have lost most of the night. If anything, that timing was even better—he’d arrive in time for dinner, with everyone gathered to express their gratitude at protecting Parsnip from the Men and from the rain, and then he’d fill his belly to stretching and go to sleep.

Before returning to the abandoned spider breeding den, Greentail leaped partway up a tree trunk and climbed until he was halfway up, ears perked. The forest still smelled fresh and wet, and his ears were filled with the cries of insects and distant birdcalls—nothing that sounded mousy to him, however. If there was a search party, they either were keeping quiet or they weren’t anywhere nearby.

His parents would have sent a search party, right? Greentail shook his head. Of course they would have. He scurried back into the den, growling when he noticed Parsnip missing again, the carriers abandoned. With this much activity she’d be coughing for a week, or worse.

But there was only one direction for Parsnip to go—back into the den. A little nervous about the bird, Greentail hurried forward, turned the corner, and stopped in his tracks.

The bird was on the ground, this time with its legs folded beneath it and its good wing folded at its side—its injured wing was still stretched out. Its head was laying on the ground, and Parsnip was lying next to it, scratching its crown. The bird made a contented, warbling sound and Parsnip giggled.

“Parsnip! Are you trying to get yourself killed!” Greentail hissed.

“Calm down! She likes it,” Parsnip said back. She cooed as she scratched the bird some more, then looked away and coughed. Greential grimaced—this was always how it started. She pushed herself too hard, then she spend several days, or more, coughing. Sometimes it got bad enough that flecks of blood would come with each cough.

“Well, it’s time to go. It’s safe enough outside,” Greentail said. He began walking forward, but the bird lifted its head and stared at him. Greentail couldn’t tell what the bird was feeling, but its expressionless eyes and tightly closed beak didn’t feel inviting. He hesitated. “Uh, Parsnip?”

“You’re safe, I think,” Parsnip said. She fully laid down, resting her head on the ground. “Wow, I’m tired…”

Though every instinct told him he was about to get eaten, Greentail slowly stepped forward, pausing each time to see how the bird reacted. Beak just stared at him the entire time, up until Greentail had picked up Parsnip and turned to walk away. Then its head darted forward, jabbing Greentail in the back; Greentail shouted in fear and fled, stopping when he reached the carriers. Trying to control his breathing, resisting the urge to thayma, Greentail set Parsnip down, shoved some padding in the new carrier, and began strapping it to him.

“I’m just glad this is over,” Greentail grumbled. “Fryth-cursed bird tried to maim me. If I never see it again, it’ll be too soon.” He slipped Parsnip into the carrier, ensured it was tied snugly to his back, and headed out.

“Goodbye, Beak!” Parsnip shouted back, her voice tinged with sadness. A low warble that made Greentail shiver followed them out into the moonslight.

#

Greentail was annoyed to discover that where he had landed wasn’t far from where Parsnip had landed—a few feet at most. Somehow, he recognized the bush he’d fallen in as he walked past it on the hunt for the trail to Whiskerroot—which, despite being partially washed out, was easy to find. If it hadn’t been for the rain, Parsnip likely would have heard his calls and they would have found each other almost immediately. Instead, Greentail had wandered through a drowning world for who knows how long, likely travelling in circles.

It also didn’t take long for Greentail to hear mice shouting his and Parsnip’s names. That made him smile—his parents had organized a search party. That felt good. Greentail wasn’t excited about the circumstances that made this necessary, but it would still be a lot more positive attention than he usually received.

Then his mood to crash once again when he recognized who was leading the search party. The mouse was a skoppr that Greentail was very familiar with—a touch shorter than Greentail was, but thicker-built with lusciously brown fur and ears almost shaped like leaves. The mouse carried a spear tipped with some animal’s canine and wore a furred cloak—painfully obvious signs of a Sharptooth.

“Parsnip! Greentail!” The mouse shouted, waiving. He looked around him and yelled, “Hey, everybody, I found them! Over here!” before dashing forward. He was still smiling when he reached Greentail.

“Stone,” Greentail said flatly to his brother.

“Greentail! Still looking a little green, I see! It’s a healthy color, though. And, as always, you’re as expressive as a rock—you should try smiling more.” Stone grinned even wider as if to accent his statement while he grabbed Greentail and pulled him into a lightly resisted hug. Then, before Greentail could protest, Stone slipped his spear into Greentail’s paws and plucked Parsnip out of her carrier. He turned around and shouted to the approaching mice—all Sharpteeth, and all part of Stone’s band, Greentail knew from prior experience—“We found them! They’re alive and well!”

“I found Parsnip!—” Greentail protested, but he was drowned out by the cheers of the gathering band. They crowded around Stone and Parsnip, and Greentail, cheering, then ushered them down the path toward home; Greentail felt a storm cloud brewing over his head, growing larger and darker, with every step, occasionally grumbling with unheard thunder.

The band dispersed at Greentail’s family burrow, all except Stone, off to return to their families for a day or so before striking out into the forest again. Apparently Stone’s band had hurried back when the first signs of a rainstorm showed in the sky, arriving just as the sky turned itself inside out—“And with perfect timing too, praise Ha-Thitsle!” Stone said loudly as he started down the burrow’s entrance tunnel, still holding Parsnip, with Greentail close behind. “We found mom and Mosswillow all frightened for you two before the band had dispersed, so I kept them all together and we prepared to strike out again the moment there was a break in the weather!”

“Exceptionally convenient,” Greentail said.

If Stone noticed, Greentail’s sarcasm, he didn’t react to it. “How has life been for you in the burrow, Greentail? Enjoying playing nursemaid?”

“Exquisite,” Greentail said, his ears flattening against his skull. He hated how Stone said that—“playing nursemaid.” Like Greentail couldn’t actually be a nursemaid, he just pretended. The insinuation was condescending toward Parsnip, too. She may be very dependent on those around her, but she wasn’t a child. Greentail was more like… a helper. Or a set of legs for his sister. A companion.

Not that Stone would understand. He’d left the burrow earlier than any other mouse in Greentail’s litter, had joined the Sharpteeth, and had become a captain of band only a few short months later. It was absolutely record time, Stone had been happy to share at the time, along with all the service he and his band had done for Whiskerroot.

He didn’t need to be taller than Greentail to cast a long, cold shadow of accomplishment.

“Mom! Mom! Dad!” Stone said in greeting as he strode into the living den. Then, a little confused, “Greywhisker?”

Only the elderly mouse sat in the living den, surrounded by wrestling pups. He looked up at Stone and Greentail like a drowning mouse looks at dry land. “About time you two got here. I don’t know what to do with all these little ones. Trying to send me back to the garden, that’s what they—ow!” A pup that had attempted chewing on Greywhisker’s bony tail looked up guiltily at the sound.

“Where are our parents?” Stone asked.

“Out looking for those two,” Greywhisker said, motioning at Parsnip—who had fallen asleep at some point and was snoring softly—and Greentail. To Greentail he said, “Glad the birds didn’t get you, kid.”

“Thanks,” Greentail muttered, scratching at the peck mark Beak had left on his back. He wondered if retreating to his room would be a good idea, or if leaving Parsnip and Stone alone would just guarantee that his actual place in this story was forgotten.

Before Greentail could make a decision, there was scuffling in the entrance tunnel, the scratching of paws flying over dirt and stone, before Pale Moon’s Light burst into the den. Despite her roundness, she moved quickly, grabbing Greentail around the neck with one front leg and Stone around his neck with the other. “My babies! Oh, thank you, Stone, thank you, for bringing them home!”

Greentail almost growled, but Stone laughed. “No need to thank me, mom. They were fine when I found them. I just helped them make the last hop of the journey, that’s all.”

“Oh, poor thing!” Pale Moon’s Light cried, turning to Parsnip, who had somehow managed to sleep through her little mother’s exuberance. “Is she hurt? She must be exhausted—has she eaten anything? Greentail, what happened to her?”

Greentail perked up—finally, a chance to explain what had happened. “We were out for a late walk—”

Then Mosswillow and Grorn entered. In stark contrast to Pale Moon’s Light, the two mice were slow, seeming to hold each other up, the fur around Mosswillow’s eyes betraying many tears. As she stepped into the room, Mosswillow gasped, “No!” and began crying again.

“No, Moss! She’s just sleeping!” Pale Moon’s Light said.

The tone of Mosswillow’s crying changed; her shoulders still shook, but her head lifted. “Thank—thank Fryth!” she said, still holding onto Grorn.

“Everyone is fine—a little worn out, but no real injuries that I can see,” Stone said. He stepped forward and held Parsnip out as if to give her to Mosswillow, but Mosswillow shook her head; Grorn stepped forward and took his daughter, carefully cradling his daughter and brushing his whiskers against hers. Then Grorn looked up and put a paw on Stone’s shoulder.

Greentail watched on, one eye twitching.

“Thank you, son,” Grorn said. “Caring for Parsnip can be difficult, but I couldn’t imagine life without her.”

“AGH!” Greentail shouted.

The den immediately quieted, all eyes on Greentail. Greentail looked around at his family and realized he was shaking, his paws clenched into fists so tight that his nails were cutting into his skin.

“I’m sorry,” Greentail muttered. He slipped into the tunnel leading to his den and walked away. They didn’t need him up there, anyway.

“Greentail!” someone said, but Greentail didn’t care. He stomped into his room and sat in the dark, feeling childish, but also unwilling to do anything about it.

#

Greentail pretended to be asleep when Grorn entered his den, laid Parsnip next to him, and then left.

A while later, Parsnip stirred. She stretched her upper legs, then patted Greentail’s side. “Are you awake?”

“I am now,” Greentail grumbled, then felt guilty when Parsnip immediately quieted. He rolled over to face her. “Sorry. Do you need to make pellets?”

Annoyance briefly flickered on Parsnip’s face, quickly replaced by concern. “No. I was thinking about Beak. I’m scared for her.”

Greentail sighed. “Beak’s probably dead already. Those injuries didn’t look good. And even if he isn’t, he can’t fly… can’t get food… It’s probably best to put him out of your mind. It’s hard, but it’s the way Fryth made the world.”

To Greentail’s surprise, a tear welled up and fell down Parsnip’s cheek. “I know. I just wish it didn’t have to be that way.” She wiped the tear away. “Do you know how to heal a bird?”

“No,” Greentail said. After a moment of thought, he continued, “A bloodskræcher might—maybe. But bloodskræchers don’t leave the great nest. It’s hard enough to get them to come aboveground.”

“I didn’t know that. How do you know that?” Parsnip asked.

Greentail shrugged. “It’s just how people talk about them, I guess. When I was much smaller, I went to them to see if they could change the color of my tail—”

Parsnip pushed herself up a little in excitement. “Really? Did you run away?”

“Not really. Well, mom didn’t know—Pale Light’s Moon. She was angry when I got back.” Greentail blinked. He almost lost his train of thought when he realized that, oddly enough, Mosswillow had been the calm mother in that instance. She never felt that way now. “Well, everyone I talked to directed me underground. And you know what? They told me they couldn’t do anything about my tail. I didn’t know to ask if they came above ground, at the time, so I really don’t know much.”

“I wish I could do that. Just run away.” Parsnip flopped to her back. “I’d come back. But I just wish I could. Anyone else can run away—I can’t. Everyone talks around me like I’m a pup. I can’t really talk to anyone like you, Greentail.” She smiled sadly. “But even then, I can’t ever do anything alone. It’s hard.”

Greentail was silent for a moment. “Sorry.” He felt guilt for wanting to be rid of Parsnip—but like Parsnip wishing she could run away just to prove she could, Greentail didn’t really want Parsnip gone. He just wanted to feel like his life really meant something.

Like Stone’s did.

“You don’t need to be sorry. It isn’t your fault. It’s… just what I get to live with.”

Greentail and Parsnip sat in somber silence after that. Eventually, Greentail’s stomach rumbled, followed by a tiny growl from Parsnip’s. Parsnip giggled, and Greentail chuckled with her in spite of himself.

Parsnip said, “You should go eat. They are probably having dinner right now.”

“Well, if I go up, I’m bringing you with me,” Greentail said.

“I’m not hungry.”

“You’re never hungry.”

Parsnip didn’t respond.

Greentail suddenly felt very concerned. “You need to eat, Parsnip.”

Parsnip shrugged. “Why? I don’t contribute anything—I can’t. I’m just a drain on everyone. I… don’t have a reason to.”

Greentail started worrying his tail. What Parsnip was saying scared him, and he didn’t know how to respond to it. It didn’t make sense to him—was she just choosing not to eat? How could she not have a reason to do something so basic? No matter how frustrated he felt with his life, starving himself never even crossed his mind.

How long had this been going on?

“We’re joining the family, and you’re eating,” Greentail said at last. He scooped his sister up, dismayed to feel how light and limp she was. That almost made her harder to carry, as if Parsnip were resisting him the only way she could: by being so utterly submissive that her body bent like a rope.

Greentail hurried out of their shed den. When he rushed into the living den, everyone was seated in a circle, a pile of seeds, mushroom caps, and roots in the middle: Grorn, Mosswillow, Pale Moon’s Light, Greywhisker, even Stone. The pups meandered around everyone else, nibbling on what they could, but mostly playing—Pale Moon’s Light must have nursed them already.

Mosswillow looked at Greentail, eyes nervous. “Is Parsnip well?”

“She’s fine. We’re just hungry. Sorry to rush in,” Greentail said. he looked around the circle, then sat just off of being opposite from Stone: that way he was almost as far from his brother as he could be, but didn’t have to look at him across the circle. Not wanting to sit next to Mosswillow, that put him between Greywhisker and Pale Moon’s Light.

Greentail propped Parsnip up next to him, on Pale Moon’s Light’s side, and placed a mushroom cap in her lap. She sighed and nibbled on it, leaning against him; Greentail watched her for a moment, then grabbed some sunflower seeds for himself.

“Glad you could join us,” Grorn said with a smile.

“I’m sorry we’re late. We were tired, beaten up,” Greentail said.

Grorn’s eyes softened. “I’m so glad you came home, Greentail. You and Parsnip. Stone told us how he found you staggering down a trail, holding on to Parsnip, both of you exhausted.”

Greentail wouldn’t have described himself as staggering. “It wasn’t too bad. We saw Men—they rode on these giant beasts that shook the ground like thunder. We hid in a tree, but they hit it and sent us flying. Then the rain started. Parsnip and I were separated for a little bit, but she took shelter in one of your old spider dens, and I found her there. And then…”

“Wait—there were Men in the forest?” Pale Moon’s Light interrupted with a gasp.

“Long, long gone,” Stone said. “They were spotted in much earlier, doing whatever Men do. I’m surprised they got as close as they did. Most Men never travel that close to Whiskerroot.”

“And how do you know about all that?” Greywhisker asked Stone.

Stone beamed, his chest puffing up a little. “A combination of things. The craemus in their tree talk with the squirrels sometimes and get rumors of goings-on. Sharptooth bands, as they come and go, share what they’ve seen. There’s a lot of interesting news and rumors you can only get as a Sharptooth.

Greentail scowled and focused on his sunflower seed. It appeared he’d shared as much as he was going to share. He flinched when he felt a brush of whiskers against his, then looked at his mother. She smiled at him.

“I love you, Greentail,” Pale Moon’s Light said. “I know it’s hard staying home as long as you have. People are waiting for you to do something with your life—but maybe you aren’t ready yet. I can feel that you’re frustrated now. That’s fine. You’ll bloom like a late flower.”

Greentail felt a lump in his throat. “Thanks, mom.”

“So what else can you tell us?” Grorn was saying to Stone. Something about his tone caught Greentail’s ears. “There have been stories one of you Sharpteeth killed a bobber—but something’s off about them.”

For once in his life, Stone quieted. He looked down at his paws for a moment. “Yeah, that. I wouldn’t believe it if—well, you don’t know that band’s captain, but she’s not one to lie or exaggerate. If anything, she’s too blunt. And the band brought home fur and claws and teeth… and they brought that weird bloodskræcher with them…” Stone shook his head. “Sorry, I’m being cryptic. It was a craemus that did it. Catkiller, that’s her new name. Not much larger than Parsnip, and somehow she killed a bobber with just a spear.”

Parsnip shivered at Greentail’s side.

Stone continued, “There is something strange about that spear—and her. A feeling to them. And it gets stranger that she doesn’t deny it, but doesn’t seem happy about it.” Stone looked around. “This is news that would have blanketed all of Whiskerroot like a winter snow if any other mouse had done it—to kill a bobber! Something no other mouse has ever done. Her name will live in myth forever.”

Something no mouse has ever done.

Her name will live in myth forever.

Greentail’s eyes widened as he scratched at the peck on his back. Something that would make him remembered forever—no longer living in any shadows. Something that would give him a new name. He could make a new carrier, based on Parsnip’s, for riding. Perhaps he could…

“You really believe this story?” Greentail said.

Stone looked at Greentail. “I don’t know how she did it, but Catkiller earned her name. It just seems impossible.”

The impossible was possible.

“Sorry for all the questions—what was that bloodskræcher’s name?” Greentail asked. Stone had mentioned that the bloodskræcher had travelled with the band. If the bloodskræcher was willing to go out with the Sharpteeth, why not with him to help heal a bird?

“Funny thing, that,” Stone said, scratching his head. He looked uncomfortable, which was also a first. “Don’t know. Most people don’t know. He’s weird—real weird. An acomus, to start. And he always wears this cloak that covers up his features, so it’s hard to get a good look at him. But, hey, that band seems to like him well enough. I wouldn’t complain, having a healer with us, if we could find another bloodskræcher willing to leave Whiskerroot with a band…”

Greentail almost asked where the bloodskræcher was, but decided to hold his peace. All bloodskræchers lived in the Bloodskræcher Enclave beneath Whiskerroot, so far as he knew—if this bloodskræcher was as strange as Stone described him, finding him should be easy.

Next to him, Pale Moon’s Light frowned. “Greentail, what’s this injury on your back? It looks like something bit you!”

Greentail hesitated. Did his family need to know about the bird—about Beak—yet? No—they’d only get involved. And with how quickly Stone had taken over his rescue of Parsnip, Greentail didn’t need further evidence that he’d lose his one chance at becoming a myth if he involved them too soon. “I don’t know, mom. I was unconscious for a little bit when the Men threw me out of the tree.”

Pale Moon’s Light frowned. “I don’t like it. You should have someone take a look at it. Go see a healer, I mean.”

Greentail smiled. “I like that idea. I think I’ll take Parsnip and go first thing tomorrow night.”

[I want to insert somethign that gives Greentail a lot more drive, and a provides a lot more clarity to the reader, about pivoting to take care of the bird and learn to fly with it. However, after fiddling for a bit I decided that having a better idea of the end would help me fix the beginning, so I’m just moving forward. Huzzah for rough drafts!]

#

Greentail padded forward in the dark, feeling his way forward with his whiskers, by the vibrations that rolled up his feet, and his general sense of direction. Parts of Whiskerroot’s underground were lit up by lightbugs, of both wild and domesticated varieties, and other parts were lit by fires or torches, making the air hazy with smoke; for whatever reason, the tunnel he had been pointed toward to reach the Bloodskræcher Enclave was blacker than a night without moon or stars. He shivered when he noticed a flickering light near the end of the tunnel: more fire. And yet, he didn’t smell smoke.

Parsnip wriggled on his back, shifting the carrier; Greentail was grateful that the new one was smooth. Ever since he had told her his plan, she’d been filled with uncharacteristic energy. She didn’t particularly care about the flight, just that Beak was going to be cared for. He should have waited to tell her when they woke—she almost hadn’t slept the day before.

They were deep under the Whiskerroot hill—he’d passed by, and through, dozens upon dozens of tunnels and dens by this point. He’d begun in the Deep Market, inquiring if any bloodskræchers were around, and had ultimately been directed straight to where they lived. Deeper than any of the other tunnels and dens that other mice lived and worked in, deeper than the Fungary or even the Song-Space and its Blackwater, to the point where Greentail sometimes wondered if he really was in Whiskerroot anymore.

He sense the weight of the hill above him, veined with tunnels and dens flowing with the life and activity of hundreds and hundreds of mice. Up on the surface, above him, would be the Flower Forest, its growing sunflowers stretching their faces toward the sky and all the light they could drink up. There would be laughter and wrestling up there. Down here, nearly alone, it was silent.

Greentail didn’t remember it taking so long to find the bloodskræchers when he was just a pup and had asked them to change the color of his tail. He wondered which change made the journey feel so different this time: how he’d grown, or how Whiskerroot had.

“Bizarre,” Parsnip whispered, breaking the stillness.

The tunnel ended with a bend that opened into a den much larger than Greentail’s living den. A mouse sat on a stone by the tunnel entrance, pulling mouse hair out of a basket and weaving it into yarn. She was an acomus. Greentail could tell from the fur-like spines on her body, and from the strange cloth she word around her waist. A skirt, he had been told. All female acomus wore them, but Greentail hadn’t a clue why.[13]

“Is this the Bloodskræcher Enclave?” Greentail asked. He resisted the urge to fiddle with his tail.

“Yes,” the acomus said. “Do you, or your companion, require healing?”

“Ah—sort of. Are you?…”

“Yes, I am.” The mouse nodded. “I can help you if you need it. Your tail color, is that natural?”

Greentail narrowed his eyes. This wasn’t the first time since entering the deeper parts of Whiskerrot that he’d been asked that question. “My tail is fine, thank you. I’m looking for a specific bloodskræcher. A strange one. Travels with Sharpteeth, wears a cloak?…”

The mouse sighed and rolled her eyes. “You’re looking for Thorn.”

Greentail blinked. “I was told he didn’t share his name.”

“We know it, and there’s no good reason why he’s so… secretive. My name’s Berry. You find him by heading that way,” Berry began, pointing toward a tunnel on the other side of the den. She provided a few more instructions, and Greentail thanked her. As he began walking away, she said, “Wait! I’m sorry to bother you more—what is that thing your pup is in?”

“I’m his sister,” Parsnip said. Berry looked surprised. Parsnip continued, “And my legs don’t work. Greentail made this carrier for me.”

“It’s very clever,” Berry said. “I haven’t seen anything like it.”

Greentail smiled.

“And I’m very sorry to hear about your legs,” Berry said, projecting sincerity. “Few mice survive with such ailments. You are lucky to be well cared for.”

Greentail sensed tenseness from Parsnip. As he’d learned recently, being taken care of all the time didn’t always feel like fortune to her. He said, “Thank you for your time. We should be moving now.”

“Of course,” Berry said. She returned her attention to her yarn.

Greentail followed Berry’s instructions, winding through several more tunnels and dens, occasionally meeting another bloodskræcher along the way. Most were acomus, but he was still impressed by the variety he met: regular mus, skopprs, craemus. He even met one hulking gorskrmus, his bulk such that he filled the entire tunnel Greentail was in; bizarrely, rather than insisting Greentail back up for him, he’d apologized profusely and walked backward until the tunnel widened enough for Greentail to squeeze around him. That didn’t fit with the competitive gorskrmus nature that Greentail was familiar with, but other than that every bloodskræcher he met seemed perfectly normal. If it weren’t for where he was, and if it weren’t for Parsnip asking a few times, he would never have assumed anything.

The tunnel to Thorn’s den ended with a rug hung from the ceiling, completely blocking the den inside from view. That was another oddity—Greentail wasn’t aware of any mouse that did this for any den other than a pantry. It felt unfriendly. He tried pushing the rug aside, but it was fastened to each wall with a bit of rope.

“What’s happening?” Parsnip asked. From the brushing of her whiskers, he could tell she was trying to look past his head and ears.

“These knots are tight,” Greentail grumbled as he worked at a knot. He paused when he heard movement in the den on the other side of the rug—it sounded like there were two mice in there. Now Greentail began to feel nervous. If he interrupted something very private, he doubted the strange bloodskræcher would want anything to do with him. By this point he’d undone the knot, but rather than pushing aside the rug he said, “Hello? Anyone in there?”

There was a crash, and then the sound of something dragged across the floor. Pawsteps hurried toward the rug, which was pushed open just enough for Greentail to see a shadowed hood with a nose just sticking out. “What do you want?”

Something felt very wrong, but Greentail couldn’t quite explain what it was; the feeling made his skin itch all over. “I was told this was where we could find the bloodskræcher Thorn. Are you?…”

Thorn kissed his teeth, then said, “Yes. What do you want?”

Greentail hesitated. Now that he was standing in front of the strange bloodskræcher, he felt indecision. Everything could change, depending on what he said. And how the bloodskræcher reached. “I want… Well, we found an injured bird out in the forest, and we’d like for you to heal it.”

“Why?” Thorn asked.

“Because she’s hurt!” Parsnip said.

“We’re going to use it to fly,” Greentail whispered.

Thorn cocked his head. His eyes glittered from deep in his hood’s depths, like stars poking through storm clouds. “Wait here.” He walked away and let the rug swing into place. A minute or so later Greentail heard the sound of the mouse dusting off his paws, growing louder as he walked closer, then Thorn pulled the rug all the way open. “Come inside.”

Thorn’s den was both smaller and rougher than Greentail had expected. The floor was  dirt and oddly colored, a reddish hue that made Greentail think of the bark of some trees; the walls were dirt, as was the ceiling, with no supports that Greentail could see.

The den’s every curved wall was in use. Long, flat, wide rocks and slats of wood were placed on large stones and other natural objects, creating simple tables. These were covered in nearly everything Greentail could imagine: bug and animal parts; jars and bowls made from clay, nut shells, bug shells, or carved out of stone or wood, filled with esoteria; long bone needles; and flattened leaves with strange patterns on them. Things were even piled underneath each table.

Greentail looked to the back of the room, where there hung a mouse-fur rug. The itching of his skin returned, feeling like something was twitching underneath it: he was reminded of a spider that his father had shown him, which had been eaten an infected grub. A fungus had grown within the spider, just under its carapace, sending tendrils through its flesh and making it act erratically until the fungus burst from the spider’s many eyes and it died.

He noticed, on the ground and sticking out of the corner of the rug, was a paw.

Then Thorn crossed his vision, grumbling about something. The bloodskræcher went to a table near the back of the room and began shuffling through the materials on it.

The paw was gone.

Greentail shivered. What had just happened? Fighting nausea, he consciously kept his attention away from the rug.

“What’s that?” Parsnip asked, pointing at the strangely-patterned leaf.

Thorn looked up for a moment; he had been dumping a red powder from jars into leather pouches attached to a belt. “Hmm? That? Oh, it’s writing.”

“Writing?” Parsnip asked.

Thorn shook his head. He grew increasingly agitated as he spoke. “You wouldn’t understand. No one, understands, and what’s worse is that no one wants to understand, which is even more foolish because every bloodskræcher writes—it’s the foundation of our skræchim[14]—we just hobble ourselves by forcing every new bloodskræcher to reinvent the Symbol. If I can’t get them to even consider something so small… they’re a bunch of narrow-minded—” Thorn paused and took a deep breath. “Tell me how you found this bird. Where it is. Describe it’s injuries.”

Greentail blinked. “It was after the storm…” He described how he had been separated from Parsnip, survived the storm, then was reunited with her in his father’s abandoned spider den. He described Beak as best he could, along with the injures he remembered.

Thorn tied his belt around his waist, briefly revealing short, black spines, fuzzy yellow underfur, and a white belly when he pulled back his cloak to do so. “I needed to get some fresh air anyway. Lead on.”

“Now?” Greentail asked.

The bloodskræcher motioned with a black paw. “We haven’t got all night. Your bird is probably dead anyhow, but such a situation is still salvageable.”

Greentail nodded, still nervous. He almost turned to go, then he looked down at the bloodskræcher. “Um, my father is a spider breeder, and we could bring you a craespider as thanks. They eat ants and other pests, and they make good pets.”

“No. But I might pay you, if this all works out,” Thorn murmured. “With my name.”

“But we already know your name,” Parsnip said.

“Taken, not given,” Thorn said. He spoke distantly. “It doesn’t mean the same thing. But, if you are concerned about compensation… Show them all.”

“Show… who?” Greentail asked. “What?”

Thorn chuckled, then motioned grandly upward. “Them. All of them. Show them that your name isn’t really Greentail; show them the value of a cripple. Show them the way they see things is wrong. Change the world. That’s what you’re doing, right?”

Greentail’s throat was dry. He hadn’t told Thorn his name, or about his sister’s condition; how did he know these things? And he didn’t imagine himself as trying to change the world—or even Whiskerroot—he just wanted some recognition. He looked back at Pebble, whose ears were flattened against her skull. What else could he do? Tell the bloodskræcher he wasn’t interested anymore, he supposed—but then he thought of the paw he that had disappeared behind the rug hung on the far side of the den, and the horrible thoughts and feelings he’d gotten while staring at the rug.

Maybe this wasn’t a bloodskræcher to anger.

“Follow me,” Greentail croaked.

#

Greentail found the old spider den with only one moon at its zenith, her sister trailing behind. As soon as they arrived, and Greentail pointed out the tunnel entrance, Thorn pushed past him.

Down in the den, Beak was obviously still alive, and Parsnip breathed a sigh of relief when Greentail turned to allow her to see the bird. That didn’t mean it looked good, though. Beak stood against a wall, uninjured side pressed to it and injured wing still stretched out on the other side. The cuts in his flank and wing were crusty with blood. Its eyes were closed and its breathing shallow, but one of its eyes fluttered open for just a moment when the mice first entered the den.

“Poor Beak!” Parsnip whispered.

Greentail still didn’t trust the bird, though he hoped he would if it lived and proved itself useful. He stayed what he hoped was a safe distance from Beak while still following the bloodskræcher. Thorn began by cautiously approaching Beak’s head; he froze when Beak cracked open an eye and growled.

The bloodskræcher turned to Greentail and Parsnip. “My life is too important to risk losing it to a quick peck to the head. How weak is it? Is it posturing?”

“Bring me close,” Parsnip said.

Greentail shifted uncomfortably. “I’m not going to risk that, Parsnip. I know you like Beak, but it’s still a wild bird—”

“Let me do something for once!” Parsnip squeaked. She gripped some of Greentail’s fur, hard enough to pinch but no more. “I have a connection with Beak! I can feel it! She won’t hurt me. Please. I need a purpose.”

It was almost impossible not to obey Parsnip’s impassioned plea, but that didn’t make Greentail feel any better as he lifted Parsnip from her carrier, cradled her in his forelegs, and edged closer to Beak, the whole while imagining various Mosswillow responses if Parsnip were missing a limb when they next returned home.

Beak fluttered an eye again at Parsnip’s approach, but this time didn’t make any noise. Instead, the bird alternated between staring at her and glaring at Greentail as Greentail shakily brought Parsnip closer and closer. Thorn watched, expression unreadable in his deep hood. Once close enough, Greentail listed Parsnip into the air; she stroked Beak’s feathers and scratched the back of its head. At first the bird watched her, appearing confused, then closed its eyes and warbled.

“You can approach now,” Parsnip said.

“Remarkable,” Thorn whispered. He stood next to Greentail, his movements now smooth and confident, and opened a pouch at his waist. He grabbed some red powder from the pouch, sprinkled some, on Beak’s beak, and then etched in it with his nails. Beak twitched and made a grumbling noise when Thorn first started, but by the time he was done Beak’s breathing had evened out. Thorn tenderly patted the bird’s forehead and whispered, “You deserve the rest.”

“What did you do?” Parsnip asked.

“A simple skræchim to tell the bird to sleep,” Thorn said.

“Bloodskræchers can do that?” Greentail asked. When Thorn looked at him with a raised brow, Greentail added, “I thought all they could do was… well, heal.”

“You are correct for the others.” Thorn’s grin showed a little too much tooth. He then turned to Beak. “I don’t want you to get in my way while I work. You can watch, but keep your distance.”

Greentail backed up. He kept Parsnip in his forelegs so she could more easily watch the bloodskræcher and Beak; she almost didn’t blink as Thorn worked, flinching every time he touched one of Beak’s wounds.

Thorn began by lifting Beak’s wing and bending it slightly. Even in sleep, the bird shifted and grumbled; Thorn quickly put the wing down. He stood on his toes and examined the deep tears in the wing, tapping his chin with a nail as he did so, then sat on his haunches by the lacerations in Beak’s side. He stared, then poked, pulling one wound open a little wider to take a peek at the underlying muscles. Finally, he pulled some more powder out of a pouch and smeared it around the wound, then etched in it; a strange, black foam began bubbling through the feathers around Beak’s injury.

“What’s that?” Parsnip asked.

Thorn looked up. “It tells me that the bird is sick. With what, I don’t know.” He turned his attention back to Beak and stared for a few moments, then began grabbing pieces of crusted blood and pulling them off Beak, sometimes with feathers still attached, and set them to the side.

Beak shifted again. Parsnip squeaked, “You’re hurting him!”

“There’s no healing without first pain or discomfort,” Thorn responded. “It doesn’t matter what kind of wound you’re nursing. If you want my help, be silent.”

Parsnip restrained herself with effort. Greentail marveled: he had never seen his little sister so animated, focused, or invested in anything before. It almost felt like he didn’t really know the little mouse in his forelegs. She looked up at Greentail. “I’ll bite off his tail if he kills Beak,” she whispered.

“Why do you care so much?” Greentail whispered back.

Parsnip thought for several moments while squeezing her paws against each other. “I don’t know,” she finally responded. “I just want to take care of her.”

#

Thorn powdered most of the crusted blood on Beak’s wing and side, then reapplied the powder around Beak’s wounds. Greentail had watched in wide-eyed amazement as black foam welled out from Beak, which Thorn wiped off with a leaf and then disposed far from the bird. After that he applied more powder from his belt pouches—which Greentail consciously avoided thinking of as blood, because once he acknowledged that he would begin to wonder where all that powdered blood had come from.

Beak’s side and wing didn’t heal entirely, but flesh did close and partially knit together before Greentail’s eyes—over the course of several hours—leaving patches of pale, pebbly flesh surrounded by feathers.

Parsnip wriggled in Greentail’s forelegs. “Bring me closer!”

Greentail passed Thorn as the bloodskræcher walked away from the bird. It was hard to tell through the bloodskræcher’s cloak, but he seemed drained from the experience—something about the droop in his shoulders, the way he held his head and walked with a stronger hunch than most mice did. He dropped to the ground and leaned against one of the den’s walls.

“She’s so beautiful,” Parsnip whispered. She ran a paw through the feathers on Beak’s chest, then turned to Greentail with a grin. “Isn’t she?”

“I think your bird is a male, she-skoppr,” Thorn said. Greentail felt a moment of confusion as he wondered at the bloodskræcher’s magical ability to know things. Before he could ask how, Thorn continued, “Most male birds have colorful feathers, and females dull.”

“Oh,” Parsnip said. “He’s… handsome!” She grinned again.

Greentail wanted to talk more with the bloodskræcher; the more he thought about his insane idea of teaching this bird to fly, to carry and obey a mouse, the more he wondered what was wrong with him. Sure, he was clever enough to devise Parsnip’s carrier, but this was something else entirely. Maybe the bloodskræcher, somehow, would have some advice.

Parsnip protested when Greentail began walking away, however.

“The bird will be compelled to sleep for at least another hour,” Thorn said. “But I wouldn’t be surprised if it sleeps until tomorrow night—it’s exhausted.”

Prompted by Parsnip’s further wiggling, Greentail set his sister down next to Beak. Then he went to Thorn and sat on his haunches by the bloodskræcher, eyes on Parsnip and Beak the entire time. “I don’t know how I’m going to figure out how to fly with this bird,” Greentail said. “Is it even possible to teach a bird to do that?”

Thorn shrugged. “Hopefully you’re clever enough to figure it out. I haven’t the faintest idea.”

Greentail felt a little discouraged at that. “Do you have any other… tricks that might be helpful? I don’t know… maybe you can talk to birds?”

Thorn chuckled. “No—and this is all the help you’ll receive from me. You’re on your own now, skoppr. I can’t be too involved.”

Parsnip hummed happily as she rested her forehead against a feathered part of Beak’s leg. Greentail eyed the bird up and down, feeling more concerned as he considered the bird’s notably smaller, but still open injuries. “But… it’s not healed. You’re not going to finish?”

“I’ve never attempted to heal a bird before. The energy and mental effort was more than I had expected,” Thorn said. He waived a paw at Beak. “But you don’t need me for the rest of this. Give it a few weeks—the bird will recover, and then you can exercise it, and then flight will be in your grasp, if you can take it.” He turned toward Greentail, black eyes glittering in the glow of yellow lightbug light. “Drawing the infection out will leave it dehydrated. That means it needs lots of water as soon as it wakes up. And food—whatever it eats.”

“It ate sunflower seeds when we first found it,” Greentail said.

“Unfortunate that it’s too early in the year for the Flower Forest to have its first harvest,” Thorn said with a grunt as he pushed himself to his back paws. He looked around, then started walking toward the tunnel exit.

“That’s it?” Greentail asked.

“I have business to finish—you interrupted something very important when you first arrived,” the bloodskræcher said. He paused at the tunnel’s entrance, then turned back toward Greentail. “Don’t expect me again, at least not before you’re finished. But I believe in what you’re doing—the idea of it, anyway. That’s why I came. Mice like you will change Whiskerroot forever. And that just might save us all.” Thorn paused. “I’m sorry for staring at your tail. Something about it is… off.” Then he left.

Greentail wasn’t certain what to think about what Thorn had left him with—beyond annoyance at the tail comment. The bloodskræcher had been clear that Greentail was on his own growing forward, but that all Beak should need for healing was time. At least he’d let Greentail know where to start with Beak: food. Not that Greentail couldn’t have figured that out on his own.

There would be seeds in the area to forage, perhaps some insects. Greentail could set them beside Beak for when the bird woke. As for water, hopefully he could return the following morning and collect some dew, carry it down here in buckets. That was the start of a plan.

As he started up the tunnel, not far behind the bloodskræcher, Greentail shook his head. Change the world, though—something about the way Thorn had said that felt ominous.

Collecting seeds, nuts, and insects for Beak wasn’t difficult, given that everything in the forest grew—and reproduced—abundantly for the first few moons following winter. Greentail made several trips to the den with his forelegs full, hopeful that if he collected enough now it would be a few days before he needed to forage for Beak again. He kept a close eye on the moons as he did so—he was already well past the time that Mosswillow would be worried, but that meant he still had some time yet before she would be furious. He’d make sure he got Parsnip home before then.

Beak slept the whole while, occasionally humming musically in his sleep. Greentail wondered what the bird might be dreaming. Several times his tailfeathers fanned out and a head crest of bright red feathers stood up on end, which Greentail thought suggested at very pleasant dreams.

---

[1] I’m not sure where the term “skoppr” came from—if its linguistic roots are very historical, I don’t have records going back that far. If a more recent development, it still happened before I began observing these creatures.

The word is very close to “hopper,” which is exactly what skopprs are (jumping mice), but the mice of Whiskerroot don’t treat it as a sort of wordplay—which is part of what makes me wonder as much as I do!

[2] The use of tools has led many rodents to favor walking on their back legs alone, freeing their front legs and paws for carrying and manipulating things. However, their skeletons aren’t designed to stand upright, forcing them to hunch most of the time. When they do want to stand straight, they partially rest on a lower part of their tail, creating a stable, three-point base in conjunction with their back paws. This action is called “tripoding.”

[3] This is the best translation for the word mice use to measure length or distance—although the way they use their word is more like how ancient humans used cubits. But if I used “cubit” then you would imagine the mice as far, far larger than they actually are, so I won’t do that.

[4] “Doe,” for a mouse, is comparable to “woman,” for a human; “buck” to “man” on the male side.

[5] A more literal interpretation of muris would be “den-where-all-of-the-things-happen,” but this is less wordy and still gets the point across.

[6] Mice shed a fair amount. Pre-intelligence mice would leave this hair where it was, or carry it into their nests to make their beds warmer and cozier. The current mice of Whiskerroot are very productive with this hair, paw-weaving it into rope and coarse yarn.

[7] The pre-intelligence mice you may be familiar with—assuming you are human—engage in both polygamous and monogamous mating, which may last a lifetime or the time it takes to raise a litter. How this manifests differs from species to species, and these habits may change based on the gender ratio of a population, food availability, and so forth. These natural proclivities formed the foundation for future social relationships in intelligent mice.

All Whiskerroot mouse species engage in both monogamous and polygamous relationships, generally with no more than two mice of one gender ever married to a mouse of the opposite gender. Litters are raised by all parents, who treat each pup as their own. When differentiation is necessary the non-biological mother (or father) of a pup is referred to as a “litter mother” (or “litter father”); as well, siblings from different litters are sometimes referred to as “litter brothers,” “litter sisters,” or “litter siblings,” I suppose as a metaphorical reference to the greater family litter they all share. A litter parent may take a subordinate role in parenting to a biological parent; when this is the case, roles usually reverse if the litter parent becomes a biological parent to a future litter. Parents are equal in all other areas, at least in healthy marriages.

Polygyny is more common than polyandry; a part of me wonders if this is because male mice leave Whiskerroot in greater numbers than female mice, and have a higher mortality rate, leading to a poor gender ratio for monogamy and an even worse ratio for polyandry. However, the craemus species exclusively engages in polyandry (or monogamy) regardless of the male population, which could suggest a misunderstanding on my part. Perhaps different species simply have different preferences regardless of gender ratios, or perhaps the craemus are an outlier.

[8] Mus are the most common mice of Whiskerroot, average in any way. They are a little larger than skopprs, and roughly twice the size of craemus, though smaller and less muscly than gorskrmus. Their tails aren’t prehensile, unlike the craemus, nor even partially prehensile, unlike skopprs; they, of course, can’t jump nearly as high or as far as skopprs, nor climb as well as craemus. What their species may lack in standout traits is more than made up in numbers, making up nearly half the population of Whiskerroot. A gregariousness natural to most mus, combined with a flexibility in natural talents and a willingness to perform nearly any job, also served to make the mus almost like a glue that held Whiskerroot’s varied population together.

[9] Worms, when split in two, can grow into two entirely new worms, which helps them to be a very sustainable food source for creatures that have discovered this fact.

[10] Intelligent mice have a slower maturity process, coupled with a longer lifespan, than their pre-intelligence ancestors. Pups take up to two months to wean; some choose to leave home then, as youthful as they are, but it’s more common for them to remain home for two to four months while their parents continue to rear them.

[11] Grorn is a ratta name, not a mus name; given the general poor relations between the two species, I’ve always wondered why Grorn’s parents would give him such a strange name, and why no one ever changed it.

[12] I’m capable of translating written words from any human language into the one with which I record my data—which, as a proprietary language, you wouldn’t recognize—but the corruption in my programs prevents me from translating what is spoken, or what I learn secondhand through these mice. Your guess is as good as mine as to what they are saying, but it does seem rather dramatic.

[13] Acomus are among the incredibly small number of mouse species that menstruate. Female acomus, early on in the development of mouse intelligence, developed ways to keep themselves clean while menstruating. They cover up with skirts, whether menstruating or not, so no mouse can see the cloths they wear, thus protecting their privacy at all times.

[14] “Skræchim,” as used here, is comparable to Thorn talking about an esoteric art or practice.

---

_{Copyright © 2023 by David Ludlow}