Ratastrophe Catastrophe

by David Lee Stone

  The Brotherhood of Yowler was indeed the stuff of nightmares. It was a ruthless organization rooted in the worship of dark gods who demanded the theft of priceless treasures and ritualistic executions to sustain their life force.

  The Yowler cultists were cloaked assassins, thieves, and cutpurses, but their presence in Dullitch was endured because several of the city’s founding families were members. These midnight rogues were extremely well paid and enjoyed considerable support from the City Council, who turned a blind eye to corrupt Yowler-run associations.

  Mifkindle Green, a junior Yowler member, was “wasping.” This meant dropping in at any large and important gathering, planting a sting (that is, assassinating the most prominent person there), and clearing out quickly to avoid capture. His colleague, Victor Franklin, a known night-runner and poison-dart specialist, was drumming his fingers distractedly on the stonework.

  “W-w-will you stop that, Vic?” snapped Mifkindle.

  “What? Oh, sorry, I just wondered why you hadn’t fired yet. You’re usually in and out in a cat’s sneeze.”

  “Shhh. Can’t you k-k-keep quiet? You’ve been so judgmental since you k-k-killed old Banks in that g-graveyard run.”

  Mifkindle’s gaze returned to the scene, but he wasn’t looking down toward the fete. He was staring intently at a small cottage garden on the opposite corner of the street.

  “What is it?” Victor persisted, anxiously. “Have we been spotted? Is it the militia? What are you looking at?”

  “R-r-rats.”

  Victor boggled. “Come again?”

  “R-r-ats,” Mifkindle confirmed. “There’s a l-l-line of them heading into the DeLongi place through a g-g-gap in the front wall.”

  “Yeah, and?”

  “They’re w-w-walking in s-single file, like an army. It’s odd,” he said, with conviction. “And I’ve seen a l-lot of them r-recently. Almost every d-d-day, in fact.”

  Victor shrugged. “Dullitch is a big city. You gotta expect rats.”

  “Not l-l-like th-these,” said Mifkindle, pursing his lips as he passed the spyglass across to his partner.

  “B-b-big, aren’t they?” Victor said, after a pause.

  Candleford School for Boys stood proudly on a slight rise in the northwest corner of the city. It was usually a place of high activity, breaking glass, and enthusiastic blasphemy. Now, however, during the summer holidays, the place was quiet.

  In a room crammed with stoves and piled high with crockery, Bernard Grim, the ratcatcher, applied half an ear to the wall and listened intently. His apprentice, a boy named Malcolm, with rugged features and a black eye, watched with mounting trepidation.

  “It could be a field mouse, Mr. Grim.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous, lad,” Grim growled. “You don’t get field mice in a workhouse kitchen. Who ever heard of such a thing?”

  “My uncle had one come into his kitchen,” answered Malcolm.

  “Your uncle’s no better than he should be.”

  “Do you think it could be a rat?” piped up a short, plump maid with golden ringlets and a porkpie smile.

  “Aye,” said Grim, wondering about the unconcealed eagerness in her voice.

  “Ain’t nothing wrong with my uncle,” said Malcolm sulkily.

  Grim ignored him and leaned in closer, raising a finger and tapping tentatively on the woodwork. A scratching began on the other side of the wainscoting.

  “He might be eccentric,” continued Malcolm. “And I know he talks to himself a bit, but he’s never done anyone no harm. Well, apart from that Mrs. Haveshank, and she said she wouldn’t be pressin’ charges.”

  “Quiet, lad! It’s on the move; listen!” said Grim.

  The apprentice knelt down beside his employer, face creased with the effort of concentration. Eventually, he gave a reluctant nod.

  “Right,” Grim whispered. “Get me a forty-seven from the cart.”

  Malcolm crept out of the kitchen and returned a few moments later, laden with an assortment of wooden planks. “I couldn’t remember which one was which, Mr. Grim.”

  He passed a plank from the stack to the ratcatcher and waited patiently as Grim balanced it in the palm of his hand.

  “That’s a sixteen.”

  He handed back the plank and rolled his eyes as the apprentice chose another. “That’s a one-seven-four.”

  “But they’re identical, Mr. Grim.”

  The ratcatcher turned to the maid and offered her a wry smile, but found no sympathy in those eyes. The woman’s face was distinctly odd; it looked as though there was far too much space between her brain and her mouth. Grim returned his attention to the wainscoting, and found himself hoping the rat had managed to escape.

  “Are there cellars below, miss?” he asked.

  “There used to be,” the girl said, nodding. “The principal had them all blocked up when a few of the teachers were caught tutoring after hours.”

  Grim focused on the flagging wallpaper. For the first time, he spotted a large yawn in the wainscoting. “Would you mind leaving us alone now, miss?” he managed. “This little experiment shouldn’t take long.”

  The maid gave a slight nod, lifted her apron and hurried away. The curious smell that Grim had noticed on the way in seemed to depart with her.

  “She didn’t look too clever, did she?” the ratcatcher whispered conspiratorially. “I reckon she’s been at the stock or something.”

  The apprentice looked mystified. “Why d’you say that?”

  “Well, there’s a funny smell from her. Didn’t you notice it?”

  “I did, as it happens. I just didn’t like to say anything; I thought it might be those scones you had for breakfast.”

  Grim studied the young man’s expression for a few moments, and then hit him with the one-seven-four. After offering the boy a vicious scowl, he returned his attention to the wainscoting, and froze.

  A pair of glowing red eyes was staring back at him. They were attached to the largest rodent Bernard Grim had laid eyes on in more than twenty years in the trade.

  “M-m-malcolm,” he managed. “Forget the wood. Get a dagger.”

  Afternoon came and went.

  “Apprentice to Bernard Grim the ratcatcher, milord.”

  The palace guard bowed low and stepped to one side, admitting the scrawny frame of the ratcatcher’s assistant. At the opposite end of the long hall, a thin, angular-faced man sat scribbling furiously behind a desk laden with paperwork. He didn’t look up when the door closed behind his trembling visitor. “Sit.”

  The command echoed around the hall. Eventually, the man behind the desk stopped scribbling and popped the pen into an inkwell. Then he looked up. “Not on the floor, boy! Get a chair, for heaven’s sake.”

  The apprentice moved quicker than the eye could see, snatched up one of the chairs, and pulled it toward the desk. Then he tucked his cap into a back pocket and sat down, embarrassment playing across his face like sunlight on a pond.

  “Now,” said the duke. “You wanted to see me about something?”

  The boy nodded.

  “Well?”

  “We caught a rat, milord,” said Malcolm, nervously.

  “Really?” said the duke, proffering the smile he generally reserved for lunatics and tax evaders. “And that’s unusual, is it?”

  Malcolm frowned and reached up to scratch his chin. “In what way, milord?” he asked.

  “Well, unless I’m very much mistaken, you are a ratcatcher. Surely snaring the odd rodent is all part and parcel of the job, no?”

  “Not when they’re this size, sir.”

  The creature the apprentice proceeded to pull from his trousers was quite unlike anything Duke Modeset had seen before. He leaped from his seat and yanked the chair in front of him. He had no desire to suffer the frenzied death leap of a half-expired monstrosity.

  “Oh, don’t worry, milord,” said the boy, reassuringly. “It’s a goner. But there are more of them, we reckon. That’s why I’ve come
to see you. They’ve built a base beneath Gandleford School. We heard ’em, this morning. They start goin’ at it, they could be all over Dullitch in minutes. I know the council’s supposed to deal with this sort of thing, and I did try knocking at City Hall, but I don’t think anyone’s available.”

  “Oh?” said Modeset, eyebrows raised.

  “There was this wooden board outside the door. It said, Gone Fishing.”

  Modeset let out a long sigh. When reflecting on the council’s overall performance of late, “Gone Fishing” seemed to be an accurate description.

  “These, er…these rats. There could be an awful lot of them, you say?”

  The apprentice nodded. “Mr. Grim, that’s my gov’ner, he reckons that if you let it go more than a week you’re gonna have to paint whiskers on the royal crest.”

  “I see. Thank you, young man. That will be all.”

  He dismissed the boy and summoned his servant. After a few moments, a man came hurrying into the room. He was short and stocky, with long hair (though none on the top of his head), a well-groomed beard, and a fixed, sort of bemused smirk. “What is it, milord?” asked the servant.

  “Pegrand! We have something of a crisis on our hands.”

  “Oh gods, no. What is it, the chef?”

  Modeset sighed, plucking a copper coin from the tabletop and employing it to scratch the bridge of his aquiline nose. “No, Pegrand, not the chef. Don’t get me wrong: I don’t like him and he has to go, but this time it’s something a little more serious.”

  “Okay, milord. I’m all ears.”

  “Good. Do you remember those fellows from the watchtower patrol who fell in here last week mumbling something about a rat horde beneath the Poor Quarter?”

  “Vaguely, milord,” Pegrand said, dismissively.

  “Have them arrested immediately!”

  “Er…right, milord. Any particular charge?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Causing a disturbance of the peace? Malicious lies? I’m sure you’ll think of something.”

  “Of course, milord. Is there a problem?”

  “Yes, perhaps. There does, in fact, appear to be a rat horde beneath the Poor Quarter, and I don’t want any I-told-you-so’s stirring up the conspiracy theorists.”

  Pegrand Marshall scribbled a note on the pad permanently suspended on a chain attached to his belt.

  “Er, won’t the act of arresting two watchtower guards stir up the conspiracy theorists, milord?”

  “Mmm? What? Well, oh, yes, I suppose it will. What do you suggest?”

  Well, we could rub them out, dump the corpses up past Gate Field, and then have two boys from the plough crew carve out a crop circle round ’em. That way we might have the conspiracy theorists up in arms, but at least they’ll have something baseless to talk about.”

  “Excellent. Meanwhile, however, we do have a serious problem. This morning’s little visit follows three from the merchants, two from the sewer attendants, and several from the Yowler Brotherhood, all with news of rat sightings. An outbreak is imminent.”

  “I’ll put the palace on high alert, milord. Anything else I should be doing?”

  Modeset nodded gravely. “Go down to the riverbank and round up the council. Tell them we have an infestation of giant rats that, despite its humble beginnings, could have designs on the Merchants’ Quarter. That should get them suitably anxious. Oh, and let them know time is short; we need a publicly acceptable announcement by Friday evening.”

  Modeset took a deep breath, waited for the servant to flitter away, then caressed his eyelids with the rough tips of his fingers. It was obviously going to be one of those days.

  Morning arrived to find a grim scene at City Hall.

  The Dullitch Council members stared gloomily at one another over the long debating table. They had been called to the Gray Room at an unspeakable hour and were waiting to shout at anyone who looked even partly responsible.

  Eventually the acting chairman, Tambor Forestall, appeared in the doorway. Tambor had been dreading this moment ever since his predecessor had vacated the premises over a month before. It was just so typical of his luck. For three years Gambol had chaired Dullitch Council and, in all that time, there had not been a single catastrophe or even a mild uprising. He gets the job and, whizz, a plague of giant rats.

  He wasn’t being helped by Duke Modeset’s latest initiative demanding “A Council Structure Reflecting the Ethnic Makeup of a Modern Society” either. He cast a worried glance around the room, noting with horror that only four members of the council were human. He recognized a local alchemist, but the barbarian was a total mystery, and the cross-species squabbling in the corner, he’d already decided to file under “Politely Ignore.” There were definitely a few goblins in there somewhere, and possibly even a wood gnome.

  A vein throbbed in Tambor’s temple and his arms were aching, but it was too late to back out now. He banged his gavel hard on the tabletop. “Gentlefolk!” he began.

  “Gadjfjr—” said a squeaky voice nearby.

  “We have been called here today—”

  “Gktgngn gkkrg jfjf kfg fjy—”

  “On a matter of the utmost urgency.”

  “Ghfhfh fkfkf frjfjfj.”

  Tambor hesitated, driven to distraction by the echo that seemed to accompany his every utterance. Sitting beside him at the table was a warty, green-skinned midget with long, pointed ears and teeth in various stages of decay. His nose looked like a melted candle, and a strange green mucus dripped from the end to the tabletop. It occurred to Tambor that he’d never seen this creature before. “Excuse me,” he ventured. “Who are you?”

  The creature sighed. “I’m the translator.”

  Tambor leaned forward conspiratorially.

  “For who?” he said.

  “The orc down at the far end,” said the midget. “He doesn’t speak Plain Tongue.”

  “What language does he speak?”

  “Brave. Not that you can call it a language, as such.”

  “No Brave translation for ‘terrible infestation,’ then?”

  “No,” said the midget, shrugging noncommittally. “Not unless you can squeeze it into words of one syllable.”

  Tambor appeared to consider this. “Fair enough,” he said. “How about ‘rats’?”

  He leaned back and smiled contentedly.

  The rest of the council began to sit up and exchange a few concerned glances.

  “Right. Everyone listening?” said Tambor forcefully.

  “Rats, you say?” shouted a seer, from the far end of the table.

  Tambor glared at him. He had a personal dislike of seers for a number of reasons, not least because their largely invented profession had outlived sorcery in Dullitch. Also, they regularly insisted on fanciful names like “Izmeer of the Swarm” and never seemed to achieve anything that didn’t require a lot of skulking about in caverns with a piece of chalk and a far-off look in their eyes.

  The seer glared back at him, correctly reading his expression. “Sounds jolly intriguing,” he said, and turned away to finish his game of cards with the goblins.

  Tambor watched him quietly, then returned his attention to the remainder of the City Council. He wished, quite fervently, that he had taken the job at Jimmy Stover’s pie shop. Only Quaris Sands, the elderly Home Secretary, seemed to be paying any attention, though he was mumbling incessantly under his breath, clearly put out by the early call. Tambor groaned. “All right, everybody,” he said wearily. “We have a plague of giant rats in Dullitch. It started beneath the Gandleford Boys’ School, and it’s growing by leaps and bounds. The Poor District is already in dire straits and the Merchants’ Quarter could be next. All the ratcatchers have fled in terror, and even the assassins have declined the contract. We’re looking to devise some potential solutions to offer to his lordship, Duke Modeset.”

  The translator raised his hand. “How about sending in a big cat?” he said.

  “I don’t think you’re actually on the c
ouncil,” said Tambor. “Anybody else?”

  The translator offered him a scowl, and leaned across to inform the orc representative that Tambor had just insulted its mother.

  “It could be an omen from the gods,” said Taciturn Cadrick, the trade minister. “A sign that we should seek spiritual and intellectual fulfillment.”

  “So, what do we do about it, O wise one?” asked Tambor, mockingly.

  “Don’t ask me. Perhaps we should try hiring a mercenary to destroy them. How about that barbarian fellow from the Virgin Sacrifice Scandal?”

  “No chance,” said the Home Secretary quickly, shaking his head. “I wouldn’t have that lunatic back inside the gates for all the gold in Spittle. It took us months to mop the blood off the clock tower. This city has suffered enough humiliation at the hands of mercen—”

  The rest of his sentence was drowned out by the screams erupting from the almshouse across the street. The council hurried to the windows and looked down at the scene unfolding below. People were pouring out of the small doorway, trampling over one another and crying out for help.

  One woman’s screech was clearly audible amid the uproar. She was yelling at the top of her voice, “Rats! Rats! Raaatsss!”

  As the council looked on, the writhing sea of humanity swarmed toward the marketplace, turned a corner and disappeared.

  “All right,” said Tambor, massaging an injury from the council’s mad dash to the window. “Let’s have a vote of hands, shall we? One, two, four, eight—yes, I think we’re pretty much decided. I’ll get a message to the duke.”

  THREE

  DIEK WUSTAPHA WAS WATCHING three of the village girls watching him. Their names were Trist, Tadrai, and Dreena, and they had been following him across hill and dale for the best part of the morning. This was odd, Diek noted, because only weeks before, they had thrown a bucket of sheep excrement over him and called him names. Now they were trailing mere feet behind him, stopping when he stopped, eyes turning downward with a curious respect each time he cast a glance over his shoulder. Strange.

  Still, the attention felt good: he liked the taste of it, the air of power it gave him. He wanted more….