The Rat and the Serpent

by Stephen Palmer

  I knew we would fight soon.

  It was not long before Atavalens stood in Siyah Street. I watched him being offered a home by one of his new colleagues. I observed from a safe distance, using shadows and the stippled fur of my rat image to conceal myself. I felt sick with anxiety.

  Almost immediately, we fought.

  Our arena was the square at the eastern end of the street, a wide space of paving slabs and gutters, one side abutting the street, the other three sides set with buildings five and six storeys high, from which marble bridges arced, like so many finger bones. In the centre of the square was a pool and a fountain. Gargoyles looked down from the walls. The place was cold and eerie; the soot-painted ivy had not been cut, nor had the convolvulus, that tonight gave forth white flowers, pale, almost luminous under a shining crescent moon.

  We stood at opposite ends of the square, the open street on one side, the pool to the other. We stood alone. It was the hour before dawn when folk retired to their homes, so silent that soot falling from cold stone made an audible noise.

  “So you have reached the level at which I now live,” I said.

  He was at once riled by my tone. “I have,” he snarled. “I came for you. I cannot allow one such as you to spoil Constantinopolis.”

  “Is that the truth of your motive?”

  “It is.”

  I knew Atavalens spoke no lie. The panther shaman was riddled with an arrogance born of his exalted totemic beast, the like of which was rarely seen. Blackrat, widowspider, mambasnake, even crow and raven were as nothing compared to the panther.

  “Is there nothing we can do to settle this like civilised men?” I asked.

  “This is not a matter that can be settled,” Atavalens replied. “The exigencies I deal with do not allow for settlement, only for action. The rat is the lowest of the low—this is undisputed fact. So prepare to die, rat boy.”

  I grinned, a feeble attempt to show that I was not frightened, though my heart was thumping and there was cold sweat on my skin. I managed a low, “Prepare for a surprise then.”

  “All bluster,” Atavalens said. His sensitive feline ears had caught my whisper; he was acquiring shamanic potential.

  “Once,” I said, as I began taking the deep breaths necessary for the assumption of my totemic powers, “I called us brothers in black. That is what we are. You are the fool to deny it.”

  “Never!”

  There was a sound of ripping fabric as Atavalens vanished. I darted back into shadow, knowing that silent stalking would be my enemy’s strength. I would have to rely on rodent cunning, and sharp teeth and claws. I looked up at the array of gargoyles, sills and ledges above me. Of course, I could climb.

  With the power of my transmuted leg I leaped to a window ledge, then turned to survey the square. The moon lay behind me. I saw no movement below. I called on inner guides, low and wriggling and cunning, moving at speed, tail flicking, eyes beady, and I became a thing half man half rat, a shaman in stance and actuality, aware of what I had to do, aware of my devious opponent.

  There was a purr then a screech as invisible claws were unsheathed nearby: then a breath of air as a paw swept by. Without thought I leaped away, avoiding the strike, jumping, dodging, seeking a safe place. I crouched low upon another ledge, now on the building opposite the pool.

  Again a narrow miss, again a leap away, then again and again, like a dance of two madmen around the sooty stones. I realised this could go on forever. We epitomised too well our totemic beasts, Atavalens always hunting, never tiring, me impossible to catch.

  But I had modes of attack as well as defence. Suddenly I leaped out into the square and skittered across it to the buttress from which the lowest bridge rose. There I sat, twitching, waiting. There was a movement in the shadows above me, a dark shape slinking along the pale structure; then it pounced. I leaped towards it, teeth exposed, darting aside at the last moment, sensing a limb beside me, twisting, biting, then leaping away.

  But I had made a mistake. There was a snarl, the smell of feline breath, and then I was on my back looking up at the tracery of bridges against the night sky, with two warm paws on my stomach.

  “You thought you could escape a panther?” Atavalens said.

  I made no reply. I was beginning to realise what I had done.

  “You had no chance,” Atavalens continued. “I would feel sorry for you, but...”

  Now I understood what a fool I had been. I had gambled when gambling was never an option. I would die in seconds. I wriggled. The paws bore down. I was trapped.

  Urgency begat desperation. I became a rat like never before, in being and to my core. Behind the panther head, framed by the stars, there appeared an image of my rat totem, as if the milky way had writhed, puckered, then formed itself into the image of my heart’s desire.

  “Help me!” I cried.

  “There is no help available,” Atavalens said, misunderstanding my plea.

  I realised that my enemy’s mind was focussed on prey alone; the feline response. I cried out, “My second time! Aid me now!”

  “What?” Atavalens said.

  I continued, “Make a bargain with me, anything, and I’ll agree to it.”

  “Anything?” said the rat of light.

  “I will not bargain with you,” Atavalens declared.

  The rat of light was circling the sky, chasing the sparkling image of its own tail. I felt the possibility of power. This had happened before. “Give me strength!” I cried. “Give me the strength I need.”

  “In your arm this time?” said the rat of light.

  “Yes! Hurry!”

  “Enough of this chatter,” said Atavalens. “Die, rat boy, like a rat—in the belly of a hunter.”

  “Your arm,” said the rat of light. “This is the bargain to which you agree?”

  “Yes.”

  Atavalens took a deep breath.

  There came a bank of smoke that blew across us, acrid enough to make Atavalens cough and raise himself. I felt heat and power in my right arm. I smashed it into Atavalens’ face, and he yowled and leaped away. The smoke dissipated. The stars and the moon were bright, too bright, as if to aid my vision, and I saw that Atavalens was for a moment confused. I got to my feet. Atavalens retreated. I gave chase, but in seconds Atavalens had tripped and skidded into the low wall that contained the pool. Then I was upon him, with the elongated claws of my right hand around his panther throat. Just beyond us lay the dark water of the pool, close enough for me to smell.

  “This is your end,” I told Atavalens.

  “It cannot be.”

  “It is.”

  “You have cheated.”

  “No,” I said. “I made a bargain, that you, in your pride, cannot make. I have sacrificed. You are too vain to sacrifice. That is why I have won.”

  Atavalens struggled. “You haven’t won yet, rat boy.”

  But the strength in my right hand was enough to keep Atavalens pressed against the pool wall. I said, “Now you must prepare to die.”

  “The panther cannot die!”

  I raised Atavalens by his throat and plunged his head into the water, keeping my own body away from the slashing claws, pressing down, unwavering, until the bubbles and the struggling ceased, and all that remained in my grip was a cold, human body.

  I held tight for another few minutes, just in case.

  Then I stood up and let go. Atavalens was drowned. I picked up the body and took it to the yard of my house, where I pulled up slabs and buried it.

  The conflict was over.

  Only then did I look at myself. My right arm was longer, with claws and tough, black hair. Battle fury departed, I stared in fear and then in hatred at myself. I was losing my humanity. I could never disguise this. I ran into the house, then hurried to my cupboards, where I flung open the doors and pulled out the clothes inside, throwing them to the floor until I found a pair of black leather gloves, which I pulled on. I drew a velvet cloak around my body and put on a new hat, so tha
t only my face remained visible. Then I collapsed into a chair. I felt secure inside these thick, black clothes...

  I ensured that the steel bar that I used as a club remained attached to my belt. It lay cold and heavy, an added security.

  One wish remained of the three that I had been promised. I had lost a leg and now an arm to my rat saviour. What next? My head? I sobbed then without restraint, for I knew that this was how it would be; that if I called for aid a third time I would lose my head—my mind—to become a rodent forever. This was the nature of shamanic bargaining.

  Some time passed as I dreamed my future away. Then, feeling hungry, I prepared a meal. I stayed wrapped up in my clothes—I did not dare take them off. Their deadening thickness insulated me from the terrible world I inhabited.

  It was much later that I noticed something inky and small on the path outside my front step. Cautiously I opened the door to see what at first I thought a fat spider, but which I soon realised was a kitten. The sad-faced creature miaowed at me, a sound so high and feeble it was on the edge of audibility. I picked it up and was able to hold it in the palm of my hand. Its weight was negligible.

  I took the kitten indoors, putting it in my bedroom, preparing a saucer of milk and a bowl of cod, then returning. Somehow, the feeling of caring for the kitten restored a sense of balance to my mind. From great things I had been reduced to something small, and the experience took some of the pressure off my shoulders. I found myself relaxing in a rocking chair, the kitten playing with a piece of string on my lap, as I gazed out of a window and twisted the buttons on my new velvet cloak.

  “Ow!”

  The kitten had sunk its claws into my right thigh. With my right hand still gloved, I used my left hand to disentangle it and return it to its string. It miaowed again, glanced at its milk, then looked at me.

  Again it sunk its claws into my leg.

  “No,” I chided. “No claws.”

  The kitten ignored me.

  “No claws,” I insisted, removing the kitten then putting it into my gloved hand. The kitten stretched, then sank its claws into my thigh and my forearm. I hissed at it, but I was in no great pain; they were just needle pricks. I tried to disengage the kitten, but it was determined. It looked longer than before, as if the game was stretching it.

  Black fur bristled in a line down its back. Frowning, I bent down to examine it, to see that it had elongated a surprising amount.

  Glittering eyes: I jerked back. Without thinking I pulled my right arm away, but instead of a sickening yowl and the click-clack of claws in fabric, the kitten extended and visibly grew. I sat still. The thing was staring at me. I swallowed, tried to stand up. I felt weak.

  This was no tiny ball of fluff that I had mistaken for a spider, this was a cat... and a big one.

  “Claws out!” I shouted. “Get them out.”

  There came the strange sensation of warmth leaking from my shamanic limbs, and I realised, with a horror enough to make me fall back into my seat, that the claws were glowing as they channelled power away from me. This beast was draining me in order to grow.

  “Atavalens!” I cried. Now I stood, and with some violence pulled my right arm away from my right leg, but it was hopeless, for the beast stretched like elastic. My real body also felt weak, and I realised that it existed split into two, a shamanic part and a normal part, forever divided, with the former part the reservoir from which I was losing power. And I had felt like this before, it seemed long, long ago, when I had received a rat leg for a withered one.

  But these thoughts brought an understanding of what was happening to me. I screamed, forced my awareness into my new limbs, sensed the flow of energy, stopped it, then in a single motion plucked the wailing beast from me and staggered to the window. I shattered the glass with a single blow of my elbow. Already the thing had become a kitten once again, mewing for pity, but I threw it as hard as I could and in the pale light of dawn I saw it arc, spinning and screeching, until it fell with a crash upon a roof, and there lay still.

  I bent over, hands on knees, breathing hard. I had only just survived.

  I closed the shutters outside the window, made sure everything else was shut and locked, then returned to my seat.

  I tried to recall the sensation of division within my body. I had not enjoyed that.

  But then I leaped from my seat. “I’ve got it!”

  I had realised what my strategy would be for the initiation rite.

  Without hesitation I left the house, walking fast until I reached House Sable, where I stopped and with a bold grin surveyed the building. I strode up to the front door and knocked three times upon it.

  I knew Herpetzag would answer the door. “What do you want?” he asked.

  “I am here to begin the initiation rite,” I answered. “I am to become the new elitistor of Zolthanahmet.”

  “You are a shaman,” Herpetzag pointed out. “Shamen are unable to accept the role because their natural sorcery makes them automatic heretics. You would fail as soon as you started.”

  “I am not a shaman in the way you understand,” I replied, hoping this concoction of truth and lie would be enough to intrigue him. Just to be on the safe side I added, “Wouldn’t you like to see me fall?”

  “Very much. But there are five other elitistors to consider.”

  “Aren’t you above all that?”

  Herpetzag hesitated, and I wondered if my bludgeoning flattery had gone too far. But he let the ignorance born of pride stifle his powers of reason. He said, “Any counsellord can take the rite, it is true. So you are serious?”

  “Yes.”

  “The sorcery of the Mavrosopolis will enter you, then be repelled, and you will be returned to the street.”

  “Siyah Street?”

  “Whichever gutter you were born in. A failure becomes a soot blot, nothing more. To fail is to fail utterly. Be sure you understand that.”

  I nodded. “A blot of soot, yes, like a tiny pool of sorcery. I understand, Herpetzag.”

  This half guess made Herpetzag stand back. “Zveratu taught you well,” he muttered.

  I shook my head. “I found out the truth all by myself. And that is why you are afraid of me.”

  Herpetzag hissed like a snake. “You think so.”

  I was not given an opportunity to reply, for there came a shout from inside House Sable. “Who is it?”

  Herpetzag grimaced then answered, “Just a rat at the door.”

  “The test?” I whispered.

  In a louder voice Herpetzag added, “Who wishes to take the initiation rite. We will all meet forthwith in the garden.” Then Herpetzag turned to me and said, “You think you are so clever, having Zveratu as your mentor, rising from the street like a firework, telling all and sundry that they must bend to your will, winning a game here, a game there. Not so, young rat. What you do not know is that the occupants of House Sable are more than just people. We are cultists of the Mavrosopolis, and the Mavrosopolis does not like your sort. Remember that when next you eat grit and drink sea water.”

  I felt anger within me. A reply floated into my mind. “Suddenly you see me only as a representative of the rat,” I said. “But I am more. Remember that when I am sitting at the same table as you.”

  Herpetzag hissed again, and with fury in his face he pointed to the gate at the side of House Sable. “Through there,” he said.

  I walked along the side of the building and into the garden at the rear, where the other five elitistors were waiting. They sat as before at their table, all of them staring at me.

  Herpetzag said, “This is Ügliy, novice counsellord of Zolthanahmet. He wishes to put himself forward for the initiation rite.”

  Like a silent and spectral cabal the five black-cloaked elitistors walked towards a tiny hut at the bottom of the garden, me following, Herpetzag bringing up the rear. One of the elitistors, an old man with a white beard and moustache, said, “I am Silvögyur, elitistor of Bazaar. Are you certain that you wish to begin this r
ite?”

  “I am.”

  “Herpetzag has explained the consequences of your failure.”

  “He has.”

  Silvögyur glanced at his colleagues, then said, “The rite is in two parts. One tests the suitability of the heart, one the suitability of the mind. If the Mavrosopolis decides you are not fit to be inducted into our cult, you will be stripped of everything you have gained and made into a nogoth.”

  “I understand.”

  Silvögyur gestured at the hut. “Through there lies the first part of the rite.” He looked me up and down. “Good luck. You seem like a strong man.” Then he pointed at the door. “In you go.”

  I examined the hut, noting that if I stretched out my arms I would be able to touch both its side walls. “Is this to test my heart or my mind?” I asked.

  “You must decide,” Silvögyur replied. “Open the door and walk in.”

  I did as I was bid, and the door slammed shut behind me. I stood in total darkness.

  For a few seconds I waited, expecting my eyes to become accustomed to the dark, as I pushed every particle of shamanic sensation into my right arm and leg, and left myself open and vulnerable—human alone, human once again—to whatever awaited me. But my eyes revealed no shadows in the black, not even after a minute of silent waiting. This was both good and bad: good because I must not be tempted by rat vision, bad because without sight what could I do? Then there came a thud from up ahead and the sound of heavy breathing. My imagination ran riot. It sounded like a beast, like one of the great black bulls of the inner fields; not a human noise. With both hands I gripped my steel club.

  “Hello? Is anybody there?”

  As I spoke the breathing stopped, then after a pause began again, but this time it was a gentler noise, as if the breather wanted to use stealth. I understood that whatever else stood inside this place it was, like me, confused. Perhaps it had never been here before. Perhaps it was in competition for the elitistor place. I realised also that the space inside the hut was far larger than that suggested by its outside dimensions. There was deep sorcery here.

  “I don’t know who you are,” I said. “Who are you?”

  No reply. A thought drifted through my mind: perhaps this other occupant could not speak, perhaps it really was a beast of the fields.