Breath (9781439132227) (17 page)

But this piper is no fool. He smiles beguilingly. “There's little sense in wasting the time of such important people as yourself. You've come to the right man.”

“Indeed?” says the mayor. “How do we know?”

“I eased Turkey of vampire bats.”

The members of the town council look appropriately impressed. One of them even says, “Ah.”

I feel queasy. When we talked of geography, this piper acted impressed by my knowledge. But if he has traveled as far as Turkey, I know nothing compared with him. Was he making fun of me? Or is he maybe lying now? If I've brought a charlatan here, Hameln is lost.

“One thousand guilders,” says the piper. “That's the arrangement, right?”

“One thousand,” says the mayor without a blink.

“You look like prosperous lords,” says the piper slowly. The mayor smooths the front of his shirt. “We're good for it, I assure you.”

“And all I have to do is rid the town of rats?”

Eyes widen. Does he think it a simple task?

He glances at me out of the corner of his eye, as
though we're in cahoots. His upper lip twitches. And now I almost smile, for I recognize that selfconfidence that nearly offended me the last time we crossed paths. He can do this. I'm sure he can. I heard his beat. My hand tightens around Ava's. All will be right with Hameln; the piper has come.

“That's all,” says the mayor, failing to keep the excitement from his voice.

“Then, I'll do it.”

The mayor extends his hand to shake.

The piper looks at it, and for an instant fear shows on his face. Of course. To him we're lepers.

The mayor blanches.

But immediately the piper looks at his own hands and smiles apologetically. “I haven't bothered to clean my hands, knowing I was about to work with rats. Forgive me.” He bows. “Now, go home. Stuff your animals' ears with wool. Stuff your children's ears with wool. Then stick your fingers in your own ears. Tell everyone my instructions. That goes for farmers and townsfolk alike. Keep your ears stopped from three hours hence till dusk. No one must hear my pipe.”

“Why not?” asks the mayor. “I thought you charmed animals.”

“I do.”

“Then, why can't we hear?”

“For your own good.” The piper glances at me.

I remember now how he said I was a funny boy to come to animal music. Maybe there are others like me who would listen and be charmed like the rats. I try to thank him with my eyes for protecting us.

He turns his back and walks to the door.

“Wait,” calls the mayor.

The piper stops and looks at the lords again.

“If you succeed,” says the mayor, “we'll see you back here tomorrow afternoon, for a celebration.”

The lords hasten to agree.

The piper smiles. Then he goes out the door.

For a moment the lords look at one another in wonder. Then everyone's rushing to do as the piper said.

Ava and I go with the town council down the stairs and out to the market square. No one stops us. They have more important things to tend to. They're already shouting orders.

I swing Ava to my shoulders and I'm off, running through the narrow streets, calling for Kuh. I go up every alley. That cat hates rain, so I look in every sheltered spot I see. I call till my throat is hoarse. He's hidden himself well. If he lives still.

Time is passing. The piper said to stop our ears from three hours hence till dusk. It's already been more than an hour.

I give up.

I rip one sleeve from my smock and tie it around Ava's head so it covers both her ears tightly. Then I run the path home, slipping in the mud. Ava runs far behind me. Along the way I stop at the few farmsteads that remain and I talk to any herdsmen I see, spreading the piper's instructions. Each time I stop, Ava manages to catch up. But then I leave her behind again, for carrying her slows me too much and already nearly two hours have passed. But I had to stop. Oh, Lord.

When I get home, Kuh practically flies across the room at me. He climbs to my shoulder. We rub faces; it's so good to be together again. Smart cat, who found his way home, smart, smart cat.

Father and my brothers are sprawled in the common room, in that trancelike state I've come to hate.

“It's the other one,” says Melis. He's lost my name again. His head is full of mush.

Ludolf glances at me dumbly.

Bertram and Father don't even look.

Their hands rest on their knees. The cracks in
their nails are caked with dirt. Their hair is matted and clumped. Without Großmutter every semblance of order has disappeared.

I find Großmutter's wool basket and stuff Kuh's ears. He tries to dig the wool out, but I stuff it in deep.

Now I stuff Melis's and Ludolf's ears. Ludolf nods in thanks—which is strange, given that he can't possibly have any idea why I'm doing it. Melis doesn't react at all. I'm not even sure he notices.

It's been nearly three hours since the piper made his decree. But I haven't heard his pipe. He must still be in town. As long as none of us hear his pipe, we'll be all right. We must be.

I consider Bertram and Father. I haven't talked to them since they denounced me in the courtroom. A giant sadness settles on me. I stand staring at the backs of their heads.

Bertram said Saint Michael told him to kill me. He believed what he said. He's never been one to lie, and in his present state I don't think he could lie even if he wanted to. I cannot hate a brother for following an angel's orders.

And Father, well, Father is a practical man. He sold my sisters, after all, though he must have loved
them. A father loves his children. When he was faced with Bertram's future versus mine, what else could he do? No one believes I have a future now that Großmutter's dead.

And what is the point of hate anyway?

I come up behind Bertram, a wad of wool in each hand.

He snaps his head around. “Think you'll kill me now is that it?” His breath reeks of beer. There's food between his teeth. “You took Mother.” His voice lashes at me, but he doesn't rise from his chair. His head swings on his neck like laundry buffetted by the wind. “You took Johannah. Now you're after me.”

“What do you mean?” My heart quakes for him. “What happened to Johannah?”

“Don't pretend. You can't fool us. We're not doddering and blind like that priest. We live with you. You can't fool us. Murderer.”

“She's dead,” says Father. “Johannah's dead. Her feet gave out in the road, and she fell under a wagon.” He laughs.

Bertram laughs.

They have completely lost their senses. I've almost lost mine. I could dissolve in laughter, laughter or tears, if I allowed myself the slightest
margin. “Here. Put this wool in your ears, both of you. Keep it there till dusk.”

To my amazement, Bertram takes some wool. Then he swallows it. He laughs and claps his hands, then gasps at the pain, for his burns aren't yet healed. He lunges for me with a scream, falls on his knees, and slams onto his face.

Kuh digs his nails into my shoulders deep. I let out a yip.

Bertram is twisting around on the floor, kicking his legs. I can't get close enough to jam the wool in his ears.

I turn to Father. “Please, Father,” I say.

He puts his fists up.

This is so hard. But even if they heard the piper's music, they couldn't go anywhere. They can barely walk.

Still, I leave more wool on the floor, in case. Then I take the basket and run outside to the cow barn. The doors are shut. I open them and the stench that bursts forward knocks me to the ground, coughing. Kuh screeches and climbs a post to the hayloft. Half the cows are bloated and dead. The other half stand dazed and weakened with hunger. No one has cared for them since I left. For once I'm glad their milk has dried up. They'd all
have milk fever by now if no one had milked them for this long.

I go from one to the next, stuffing wool in their ears. When I've done the last one, I drive them out into the rain.

Ava comes stumbling up the path. I wave to her. I'd yell to her to stay there, to wait for me, but she couldn't hear with her ears covered.

I close the barn doors behind the cows. They stand in front of the barn and low pathetically. I can't just leave them here. I smack their rumps and push, and finally they move slowly toward the meadow. As soon as they're staggering along on their own, I turn back.

I open the pig barn, but this time I'm holding wool over my nose. The smell here is even worse. Hungry pigs feed on the corpses of dead ones. I've never seen such a thing, never heard of such a thing. Flies alight on me thick as a cloak. The pigs rush me, asking for slops. I stuff wool in their ears as fast as I can. Then I try to get them out of the barn, but pigs are stubborn. I leave, propping the doors open.

I look around for our two horses, but they're nowhere in sight.

And I hear it. Music comes high and thin
through the rain, but it insists, like the beat insisted the day I met the piper; it insists, no matter how delicate it is. It amazes.

I should stuff the wool in my ears. But then I wouldn't be able to hear that music. And I have to hear it. I have to go with it. My feet move toward it without my willing them to. My mouth hangs open with need.

Ava latches on to my legs as I go past to the path. But I don't want to stop, I can't. She climbs up the front of me and locks her arms around my neck, her legs around my waist. My own arms close around her, but I don't stop. I hurry.

Rats come out of the pig barn. Rats crawl out the high windows of the cow barn. Rats come from under the woodpile and the eaves of the roof. Rats run down the path toward town. Rats come from the next farmstead and the one after that. They run like streams forming a river.

Hamsters and foxes and field mice, skunks and martens and badgers, hares and stags and even boars, come from the woods. Quails, woodcocks, grouse, partridge, snipes, teal, wigeon, geese, ducks, farm chickens, come flapping and flying. I'm running, Ava thumping against my chest with each step.

All of us run across the east bridge and through the center of town, and join the river of town rats, flowing west toward the Weser. We're lost in the great river of rats. Thousands of rats.

Ahead I see the piper, in his dandy clothes, leading us all out the main town gate, over the bridge to the dock. I run to catch up, to be as close as possible to that music, but I'm tired from all this running, I'm tired from never sleeping, I'm tired and weak. I cough. I fall on the ground, coughing, rolling to my side so I won't crush Ava. The river of rats runs over us—hot, smelly feet running over us—and I can't breathe.

Then they've finally passed.

I scrabble along the road, my hands grabbing at the dirt, pulling us toward the music. I have to get to the music. Ava hangs from my chest, her arms and legs still clamped around me. The piper has swum out to the middle of the Weser River. Somehow he still manages to play that music. Fowl scream in the air around his head. Land animals are jumping into the water, disappearing in the swirling current. I jump.

The water is cold and deep. I swim to the surface, toward the piper, toward the music that promises everything good.

Ava gasps for air. She butts the top of her head
against my collarbone.
Thump, thump, thump
. She presses her cheek into the hollow of my throat. She grabs my hair and climbs me, her nose against my lips now. We swallow river water and struggle to stay in the air.

What am I doing? We'll both go under and never come up again.

Gone. Like the rats.

But the music. I have to reach the music. Nothing else matters.

Her nose is higher than mine now, but she scoots higher still. She puts her lips to my ear. “Shhhh,” she says, “shhhh.”

Quiet.

“Shhhhh.”

The weight of loss makes my bones sink deeper in the water. I have lost Großmutter. I have lost Father and Bertram and Ludolf and Melis. If I don't follow the piper, I will lose the music's promise as well.

“Shhhh,” says Ava. “Shhhh, Salz.”

She's spoken my name. She shivered on the S.

I exhale and enter my quietest place, my place between time, where I cannot hear and pain cannot get me. Where I know that there is still something left to lose: Ava exists, Ava matters.

I turn and fight the current. The water is fast and the cold numbs me. But my arms are strong, as strong as my will. I swim and swim and crawl out and collapse on the bank. Ava clings, hugging my head.

Gone. The rats are gone.

And Ava is here. With me.

The nightmare is over.

I close my eyes and sleep.

You'd think it was a beer festival in the most carefree year of our town's history, the way they've decked out the first floor of the
Rathaus
. The town council hired a cook with dozens of helpers, and overnight they've made a feast. Lines of tables and benches fill the room.

More tables and benches fill the market square. And the weather has even cooperated. The sky is cloudless. Candles line the very center of the market square, where revelers usually dance. No one will dance tonight, of course. Not with so many lame. But the mayor had a platform erected there, and he plans to pay the piper in a ceremony after the banquet, with all the candles to be lit and stay lit through the night. The platform is high enough that everyone will be able to see.

The ladies wear tight-fitting bodices with lowcut necklines, despite the chilly air. Servants follow them, carrying the trains of their gowns and sleeves to keep them out of the mud. Those ladies who are too lame to walk on their own are carried between two servants. And those servants who are too lame to walk on their own are wheeled in barrows by other servants.

I'm getting a lesson in the benefits reaped from the Crusades. Some of the lords' tables are covered in embroidered cloth. Some of the ladies have ordered chairs brought out from their houses—chairs with leather cushions. Some of the rich children snuggle on divans that have been carried right out into the street. And all these things come from the Arab world.