“No!” With a bellow of rage, Dashwood picks the rat up and hurls it with all his force back into the pit.
“The bout was uncompleted.” There is a tremble in Molly’s voice. “So I declare Charlie Buckingham’s bitch Drum the winner of the contest.”
Dashwood’s face darkens as if all the unspoken words within him are massing like cavalry beneath the pores of his skin.
“You know the rule, Jem.” Molly points to the clout. “The rat left the circle.”
She touches Jem Dashwood’s arm.
“We’ll give you a return bout next month, Jem.” Her tone of voice is husky, caressing. “You can choose your opponent, eh?”
Dashwood’s eyes remain fixed on Charlie Buckingham. “Today,” he says. “Now.”
“Your dog’s not fit for another bout.” Molly speaks quietly. “You know that.”
“I’ve got a second dog. A young Yorkshire. I’ll set him against your Kentish Lad, Mr. Buckingham. If you’re game for it.”
Buckingham waits, enjoying the moment. Then he gives the slightest of nods.
“Same purse as last time?” Dashwood asks.
Buckingham’s reply is lost in the cheers.
. . . Malaika felt her prison move.
There was light above her, the giant face of a human looking down.
Second by second, the wall of flesh that protected her was being removed as, with screams of terror, rats were lifted upward and out of sight.
Malaika felt a tightness around her own tail. Before she could shrink away from it, she was swinging facedown through the air, the dancing lights and smoke and the faces of the enemy swirling before her eyes. Her journey seemed to last forever. Then, suddenly, her tail was released and she was falling.
For the briefest of moments, she felt the welcome earth beneath her feet and looked around for the nearest way of escape. Then she smelled the blood, the terror, and death.
She began to run.
. . . Bill Grubstaff likes to say. Each one of them has a story to tell.
Today the memories are not going to be good.
I stand beside Bill, looking down on the pit.
“I think there might be a little bit of bother tonight,” he mutters with an unhappy smile.
It is true. The good humor of a few minutes ago has gone as if it were never there. Instead, there is an edginess, an anger, in the smoky air of the bar.
Dashwood is inspecting his dog Scrapper’s teeth. Now he straightens up, wiping the saliva off his hands.
He walks to the pit and watches the beasts scuttling desperately around the metal wall.
He points to a rat cowering in the corner. “It looks sick. Out.”
I climb into the pit with a sack, grab the rat, and drop it out of sight.
“The lame one over there.” Dashwood points to another. “Where did Bill get these beasts? They’re half dead already.”
“They’re good fighting rats, Jem,” Bill growls.
“And that’s not a beast — it’s a bloomin’ mouse.” Dashwood jabs his finger in the direction of a small gray-and-white rat.
As I reach for it, I feel that strange lurch within my head once more. Lifting it, I see that it is the fancy rat I had noticed. She’s quaking with terror as I lift her.
“The rest will have to do.” Dashwood turns away from the pit.
I climb the ladder, the sack in my hand. The first two rats I return to the cage, but when I hold the gray-and-white doe in my hand, she is still — almost trusting — as she looks at me.
Glancing around me to check that no one is watching, I slip her inside my shirt. As I reach into the cage for three new rats for the pit, I feel her scrabbling frantically against my skin, and for a moment, I wonder if she is going to bite me.
She reaches my armpit. I feel the small body trembling.
One rat, at least, will survive tonight.
. . . for a rat, but, quelling her shame and her helpless terror, Malaika surrendered to warmth and closeness.
. . . I walk over to where Jem Dashwood is preparing his young dog Scrapper.
The dog, I can see, has the right breeding in him. But when I look into his eyes, another story is being told. The sounds of other dogs, the smell of rats and blood, have not excited him as they should. He looks up at me, as if sensing that only I can understand his fear, and whines softly.
When Dashwood’s son, Eddie, approaches, Scrapper actually wags his tail.
Jem is gazing toward the pit. “The Buckingham dog’s tiring,” he says.
“Old dog, see.” Dashwood nods in the direction of the pit. “Old dogs get bored of the game. They kill sixty or so beasts and lose interest.” He winks at his son as he runs a hand down Scrapper’s flank. “Stick with youth, son. That’s the secret.”
It is still a while before Buckingham’s dog is taken from the ring. The time announced by Molly, thirteen minutes and forty-five seconds, gets jeers and boos from the discontented crowd.
And now Jem Dashwood advances, the young dog Scrapper in his arms. There is a cheer from his supporters.
“Good old Jem,” someone shouts. It is as if his dog has already won. The animal glances at me, terrified.
I notice that Bill looks worried. Too many men want this dog to win. Too many men will be disappointed if he does not.
“Set him ready, Jem.”
Dashwood releases his right hand. He strokes Scrapper’s pelt, down his spine, then his muscular haunch until he reaches between the dog’s hind legs. With a wink at Eddie, he squeezes.
The dog yelps with pain, then whimpers, looking not at the rats below him but over his shoulder toward his owner.
“You’ve got a lady’s lapdog there, Jem,” someone shouts.
“Go!” shouts Molly.
Dashwood hesitates slightly longer than usual before releasing his charge. The rats have gathered at one end of the pit and are watching, motionless.
“Trouble.”
I say the word out loud. The rats, I can see, are not as afraid as they should be.
Dashwood moves around the edge of the pit to the right-hand wall, giving Scrapper a run at the beasts with his left side protected.
He drops him. There is a cheer from the crowd around the pit.
“Go on, my son,” one of the punters shouts. “Finish ’em off. ”
Then, quite quickly, the noise dies down. Something is going wrong. Scrapper is looking up at his master, wagging his tail uncertainly, as if asking what to do next. The dog moves away from the protecting wall, then glances, fearfully, toward the far corner, where a hundred pairs of dark, glittering eyes are staring at him.
Scrapper sniffs the air, then lifts a paw, like a pointer who has seen pheasant. There is nervous laughter around the pit.
And it is in that instant, when the dog looks up, surprised by the noise of the spectators, that the unexpected happens.
As if at a given signal, the rats move forward, no longer fearful.
Then the reality becomes clear. The rats are not retreating at all. They are attacking.
The first beast to reach Scrapper leaps upward, seizes the soft base of his ear, and holds on, swinging against it. The dog yelps in pain, but by the time it starts to shake its head, a writhing hairpiece of rats hangs from it.
Jem Dashwood bellows encouragement at his dog but it is too late. Scrapper’s long legs and thick fur provide an easy target for the rats. The dog screams as every part of his body seems now to be covered by attacking beasts.
He staggers forward, unable to see for the creatures that swarm over his face and eyes. He falls against a wall, but the rats’ teeth are too firmly sunk in his skin for them to be shaken off.
Nothing of what was once Scrapper can now be seen under the writhing cloak of rats. Like a giant rat himself, he totters forward, across the pit toward where Jem and Eddie Dashwood are standing. In the center of the pit, he stumbles and falls under the weight of the beasts he is carrying.
Jem Dashwood gazes in disb
elief at what had once been Scrapper. He takes out his timepiece and glances at it as if at any moment his dog will come to life and complete the bout.
One minute fifty seconds. Scrapper’s career in the pit has lasted under two minutes.
A mighty bellow cuts through the room. Dashwood walks quickly to the edge of the pit and vaults into it. Grabbing the bloodied corpse of his dog, he lifts it over his head and hurls it in the direction of the rats that are now trapped in the far corner.
Growling like a dog himself, Dashwood kicks out at a passing rat, catching it with a heavy boot. A cheer echoes around the room.
Something about the crunch of small bones, the sight of the big man taking revenge for his dog, brings the room to life. One of the punters, a man in his fifties, shouts, “Let’s ’ave ’em, then, Jem!” and clambers into the ring himself. Laughing, he brings down the heel of his foot on a nearby beast.
Soon others are clambering into the pit.
There are more men there, whooping and laughing and killing, than there are looking on.
Molly Wall watches, her face pale. Beside her, Bill mutters again and again, “This is wrong. No, Molly, this is wrong.”
The massacre lasts five minutes, maybe longer, before the men begin to lose interest. All the rats are dead now. For a moment, the men stand in the crimson pit, looking at the blood that is now all over their boots and trousers. Then, one by one, they climb out of the pit, reddening the floor of the pub with their footprints.
“Collect your winnings and be off with you.” The voice is that of Molly Wall. “There’ll be no more bouts in this pub.” She looks down at me. “Poor lad.” She speaks softly. “You should never have seen that.”
I am feeling sick, and weary at the thought of clearing up the remains of the rats.
Bill lays a hand briefly on my shoulder. “You’ll be needing a shovel, lad.”
Just for a moment, I am tempted to tell him that there is one rat who survived the massacre at the Cock Inn, and she is resting in the arm of my shirt.
No. Bill will probably think me soft in the head. I take the shovel and get to work.
. . . and respectful when Quell appeared on the Rock of State. Now as he shuffled forward, all gray and important, the bustle of activity in the Great Hollow continued. A couple of ratlings scrapped over food. A captain was calling her courtiers. Near the front of the crowd, warriors were jostling one another as a doe turned away from them invitingly.
It was not as large as the throng that had attended the farewell of King Tzuriel, and the mood in the Great Hollow was utterly different.
I stood behind a wall of courtiers, hoping to be invisible on the Rock of State as Jeniel was pronounced queen. I was already tired of the power games, the fights that would break out within the court, the half-heard revelations, the rumors. I was a taster. I wanted to go home.
On the Rock of State, Quell looked around and quested the air with his gray, scarred snout. It was several seconds before eyes turned to him and he was able to start his revelation.
Even then, the audience was only half listening, until he mentioned the word for which, I now realized, every citizen had been waiting.
— Jeniel . . .
The noise of chattering teeth started quietly but grew louder, so that Quell had to wait before he continued.
— Jeniel . . .
He tried again. As the acclamation echoed off the walls of the Great Hollow, Quell seemed to lose his thread, as if what he had been about to reveal no longer made any sense.
It was at that moment that there was movement among the courtiers not far from me. A small figure emerged from the shadows of the Rock of State.
The noise was deafening. Jeniel walked forward, not with the strut of warrior and courtier but with a sort of scuttle, her head lowered, her eyes fixed to the ground before her. She passed Quell as if he were not there. When she reached the front of the rock, the acclamation grew louder. Slowly, she raised her eyes until she was staring out at her audience, returning their adoration with a loving gaze. The warmth in that look seemed to say to every rat that the future of the kingdom, the future heritage of rats, was safe with her.
She was queen, without it even being announced on the Rock of State. She was the queen of our hearts. Some of the warrior rats, forgetting duty in their excitement, dived into the river in front of the Rock of State, in order to be closer to her. I noticed one or two of the courtiers glancing in the direction of Quell, expecting a command to be issued to the court guards, but the old rat seemed no longer to care what was happening in the hollow.
The closing words of his revelation were weak, but the two words for which the kingdom was waiting were clear enough.
— Queen Jeniel.
At the back of the Rock of State, I peered past the courtiers as the new queen delivered her first royal revelation.
There was nothing new in the speech. Destiny, duty, faith, loyalty — citizens had heard it all before. But Jeniel’s manner was not like that of a courtier or a queen. She was easy, relaxed almost, like a mother revealing to her ratlings.
And yet I found it difficult to concentrate. Her words skittered off the surface of my brain. Matters of state were all very well, but at that moment I had other worries. Where had Floke and Fang been taken? As the queen revealed, I scanned the ranks of her audience for any sign of my friends.
— Efren!
I was so deep in thought that when I heard my own name, it took a moment for me to realize that it was part of Jeniel’s revelation.
That’s right. The queen, addressing her subjects, had just mentioned my name.
— Efren!
The revelation was as strong as a pulse of pain flashing across my skull. I looked toward Jeniel, who had turned and was questing the air, as if searching for me.
— Step forward, ratling. They need to see you.
Fearfully, I moved forward, holding myself low and humble against the stone beneath me. There was polite, confused acclamation. Turning to me, Jeniel continued.
— What this young rat from the Tasting Court has done shall act as an example of bravery and intelligence to other young rats in the kingdom. Without his bravery, we never would have known the evil and deadly plans of our greatest enemy. The name of Efren shall be remembered in generations to come.
I squeezed my eyes shut, praying that the moment would end.
— For this reason, I am appointing him to the Court of Governance.
At that moment, I glanced at the queen in astonishment. Her face showed nothing. It was as if I were not there. I shuffled backward to stand beside Swylar once more.
Now I knew it.
Now it was certain.
There was no escape.
. . . given to me by Molly Wall. And in it are the bodies of hundreds of dead rats, killed by the teeth of dogs and the boots of humans.
Tomorrow I shall find a place away from here where I shall leave them. Food for my friends, the dogs of the town.
Now I have something more important to do.
I crouch by the tip, pull back the door. I scramble down the passageway that I have made through the rubbish.
In my shirt, spattered with blood, are presents.
A loaf of crusty bread.
A rat.
I whistle, a low, long note. From the heart of the tip, there is a shorter whistle in reply.
She is there. When I reach the room, the small stove is open, its burning logs lighting the face of a girl, her eyes dark and wary, her face a pale, dirty smudge of light in the gloom.
“Caz.”
“Hullo, Peter,” she says quietly.
I hand her the loaf. She tears into it and eats her half ravenously.
“Good?”
She nods, smiles. With her mouth full, she says, “God bless your friend Molly.”
Watching Caz eat, I remember the moment when I first saw her, sleeping in a doorway, a pair of pink dancing shoes in her hand. She looked even younger than her eleven ye
ars.
Caz. What would I do without Caz? She makes me feel normal.
There are no more words until we have both feasted on the bread.
“It was a strange day,” I say.
Sometimes, when I come home, it takes time for the habit of speaking to come back to me, but now there is so much to tell Caz that the words come spilling out.
She listens as I tell her of the terrible things that happened at the Cock Inn.
When I describe the men shouting and stamping, she looks away. She has never liked my work with Bill Grubstaff.
“Poor creatures,” she murmurs, running a finger over her left hand to collect the few remaining crumbs.
“They say there will be no more bouts.”
“Good.”
“Fewer pennies for us.”
Caz is looking around at the tangle of wood, metal, paper, and rags that we have turned into a home.
“There aren’t many places that have rats like we have here,” she says. “And what harm do they do to us? They eat up the food that people have no use for.”
“Maybe.” It is true, over the months we have lived in the tip, that the rats who live here have become a sort of company for us. When they stop moving at night, I am alert for danger. They are our guard-rats.
It is now I remember the other present.
I reach into my shirt. “I saved one,” I said.
Carefully, I take out the gray-and-white fancy rat. She rests in my hand, making no attempt to escape.
Caz laughs, a happy sound. “It’s so small.”
“She. She’s a fancy rat. They reckoned she would not be much of a fighter.”
“I think they reckoned right.” She takes the beast from me and holds it to her chest. “Why is she that color?”
“Bill says that it was Jack Black, the queen’s rat-catcher, who started collecting strange-colored rats that he found. He bred them as pets.”
“Rats as pets.” Caz shakes her head. “Who would have thought it?”
The Twyning Page 8
