The Twyning (6 page)

As I crouched, my nose against the damp earth, I could hear the young warriors at work.

— Here’s one. Here’s a trail.

— That’s not a trail. It’s a dog’s scratchings.

— Dogs! I want to fight a dog!

— Come on, let’s show that dog what a warrior is made of!

I felt the pulse within me once more. It was a revelation, and yet, I was certain, the rat who had revealed was not nearby. Only the greatest, a king or a courtier, were able to reveal across such a distance.

It was time to plan. How to find a captured king? It seemed a hopeless quest. Yet surely Quell and the Court of Governance would never have sent us into danger for no reason. Maybe, I thought, we could hide out for two or three days and then return safely to the kingdom.

No. I had been the last to see King Tzuriel. It was for me to find out what had happened to him.

Approaching the bush where Floke and Fang were engaged in a mock battle was a female human, followed by two of its young. I issued a sharp warning to the others. They ignored me. The humans passed, chattering and laughing.

I shivered, feeling suddenly lonely and young. What was I doing here? The ground beneath my paws was damp and cold.

Again, I heard the pulse of pain, louder this time. It raised the hair along my backbone. As it faded, I heard a heartbeat, throbbing slowly.

Suddenly Floke and Fang were beside me, revealing one after another.

— Did you feel that?

— It was from a rat. He sounded in trouble. Let’s go!

— If it could reveal to us here, it must be one of our rulers.

— But which ruler would be up here in the world above?

— Pulsing.

They crouched lower as, slowly, the truth reached their brains. Fang’s perfect teeth chattered with alarm.

— It’s the king.

Another pulse, fainter this time, reached them.

— So now what? — Floke asked.

The two young rats stared at me, awaiting my decision. It was odd how quickly they had accepted the leadership of a rat who was younger and smaller than they were, but then, warriors were used to following.

Briefly, in a flash of thought that came and went within an instant, it occurred to me for the first time that perhaps I was not quite the same as other ratlings, that there was something slightly different about me.

— Well?

Fang huddled closer to Floke.

— Where to?

I moved toward the light, aware for the first time of a throb within me, a mysterious tug from some unseen exterior force.

Beyond a stretch of grass and some tall trees, there were human habitations. It was from there that the pulse was coming.

— Follow me.

I darted across the thirty lengths of short grass to the shadow of the trees, followed by Floke and Fang. I was breathing heavily as we rested in an old rabbit hole. Floke and Fang, I noticed, were as fresh and at ease as when they had first emerged from the world below.

— Where are we going? — Floke asked.

I glanced at the two warriors whose lives had been changed when I had appeared behind them in the Great Hollow.

— You hear the pulse, then the heartbeat? It is Tzuriel’s. We follow the heartbeat.

Floke and Fang glanced at one another, puzzled. It was Floke who revealed first.

— Heartbeat? What are you talking about?

— There! Listen.

Floke and Fang looked at one another again. They heard nothing. It was Fang who revealed what they were both thinking.

— You’re a hearer.

I allowed Fang’s words to rest in the brain for a moment. Most things are a mystery to warriors, but few are quite as mysterious to them as the gift of hearing. Those born with this talent — hearers — are able to hear information in the very air around them, not by sound or smell or sight but through a higher instinct that no rat will ever question.

When a young rat is found to be a hearer, he would be sent to one of the courts where his gift will be of most use to the kingdom. The Courts of Spies and Prophecy are among the most favored.

But being a hearer involves sacrifice. When they reach adulthood, hearers will lose their precious gift upon their first act of carrying with a doe. For that reason, it has become accepted that they are not required to do their family duty — in fact, they are forbidden from fathering.

As a result, they hold a privileged, but slightly sad, position within the kingdom. They can hear but they can never love, never know the pleasures of being a father.

I was a hearer. A heartbeat, the pulse of a king, was calling me.

It throbbed in the air around me, growing stronger as I moved toward it.

. . . of the town. My head is fuzzy from working all night.

It is not just tiredness that has me talking to myself.

When no one is around, I like to hear my voice. It reminds me of the Peter Simeon that still lives deep within the grimy guttersnipe who is known as Dogboy.

I hear the chattering of starlings, sparrows, and blackbirds as they greet the day. Turning a corner, I see a milkman’s dray making its way toward me. The piebald horse considers me with its walleye, and I know in that moment that it has a contented life. The milkman, whistling, does not see me.

It is how I like it. As I reach a road that leads to the center of town, some young swells, their suits disheveled, pass by unsteadily after a night of revelry. A whiff of rotting vegetables from a nearby market reaches me. At other times, I would harvest the gutter for food.

Now I only have thoughts of home and sleep.

As I walk, a small dog, a terrier bitch of some kind, falls into step with me, as if she knows that I will lead her to food.

I take a path off the road, quickening my steps as I head eastward, now and then talking quietly to the dog trotting beside me. By the time I reach Mrs. Bailey’s bakery, there are two men being served at the counter.

I wait outside until they have gone. She is a kind woman, Mrs. Bailey, but I know that she would not welcome my presence while she is serving respectable folk.

As I enter, she gives me a smile like sunshine. It makes me uneasy with its brightness, and I look down at my feet.

“Oh, hello. It’s our little ratter,” she says. “Been out working, have you?”

I nod.

She is slicing a big steak and kidney pie. “Your usual?”

“Two pies, please.”

Mrs. Bailey glances at me curiously, puzzled by the polite tones of my voice.

She reaches into the oven and with a cloth takes out two chicken pies.

“Got a bag, love?”

I shake my head, then untuck the front of my shirt and hold it like an apron before me.

Mrs. Bailey lays the two pies on the shirt. Then, to my surprise, she cuts a small extra slice of the steak and kidney pie, wraps it in some paper, and puts it with the other pies, winking at me as she does.

I smile quickly, politely, and give her a penny for the pies.

As I leave the shop, I hear her say to herself, “Poor little thing. What’s going to become of you?”

Outside, the dog is waiting. She puts her head to one side as I come out of the bakery.

When I have rounded the corner and am out of sight of Mrs. Bailey, I break off a piece of the steak pie. It’s hot. I blow on it. The dog whines longingly.

Once it is cold, I give it to her. She follows me for a few paces, but when I tell her to stay, she stands and watches me go.

The pies are warm against my aching stomach as I walk, more quickly now.

Home. Friend. Sleep.

There are fewer people now and the houses are smaller, made of rotting timber and crumbling bricks.

There are no carriages, only the occasional cart.

A smell, the scent of belonging, reaches me as I turn onto the lane.

Old food. Dirty clothes. Waste. The rich smell of the maggoty flesh of a dead dog or cat.

An enormous pile of rubbish, as high as a house, is in front of me. Here is the place where respectable people bring what they do not want in their lives, to be dumped out of sight.

The tip. Its smell is with me, on my hair and clothes, wherever I go, yet it still surprises me when I return home.

It has a life of its own, the tip — not just in the darting rustle of the creatures within it, but its shape, too. Like a boil on the skin of the city, it changes every day, yet is always teeming and throbbing and alive.

I glance over my shoulder. Few people bring their rubbish at this early hour, but no one must know I am here.

Around the side of the tip, past a blackberry bush still glowing with fruit, there is an old door, its paint peeling, that lies against a tangle of brambles and wire.

Taking care not to crush the pies in my shirt, I pull the door back.

Beyond it is a burrow, a dark passage into the center of the tip.

I enter, pulling the door shut behind me. It is dark but I know my way. I crawl forward for several yards, until I reach a homemade room, a little cave, supported by branches, which I have made in the heart of the tip.

Home. I stand, happy, for this moment.

I lay the pies upon a board on the ground near to me. As their lovely smell fills the air, the stench of the tip fades to nothing.

I give a long, low whistle.

From the tangle of rubbish that surrounds me, there is the sound of movement, so quiet at first that it might be a beast.

But it is not a beast.

. . . was high in the sky.

We were far from the kingdom now, Floke, Fang, and I. Now and then I wondered how we would find our way home.

For the two warriors, it was an adventure.

— Where now, Efren?

— Just follow me, Fang.

— Are we close yet?

— Not yet, Floke.

The heartbeat was growing weaker, and yet I felt it more powerfully within me.

We reached an area of wood and bushes. Young humans were playing nearby. Perhaps it was weariness, or maybe my thoughts were with the desperate pulse of my king that was summoning me. Whatever the reason, I was not ready.

There was a sudden movement from the direction of the humans, a trem that could only be caused by one kind of enemy.

— Dog!

It was Fang who revealed the warning. We scattered, a citizen’s first instinct when under attack. As I raced across the clearing, I heard a scream from Fang, followed by a sharp yelp from the dog. I was aware of a brown shape against the dog’s face before it was thrown clear. My body, not I, found refuge by dropping down a deep hole beneath the root of a tree.

One thing I knew. A dog may be hurt, but when its blood is up, it will hunt through the pain. It is not, unlike a cat, a coward. I felt the trem above me, heard the roar of its snuffling snout as it followed my scent just past my hiding place. It paused, then turned.

Suddenly, just above me, a terrifying bark rattled my bones.

Like any rat, I knew what I had to do. I stilled, turning myself from a living creature into something so without movement, sound, or even scent that I might have been a clod of earth or a stone.

There was silence as the dog sniffed the air, then a roaring, crashing noise above me.

It had found me. I smelled the hunger on the dog’s hot breath close to my head, its desperation for blood and flesh, yet nothing, no terror on earth, would move me.
Still, still, still.
Even my heartbeat seemed to slow.

Beyond the barking, I heard the sounds of humans. They were calling the dog. It whined its frustration and rage. The ground shook as it attacked the earth with its paws and teeth. A heavy drop of warm liquid from its mouth fell onto my head.
Still, still, still.

I felt the trem of a human, smelled the enemy. They were there for a few moments. Then, silence.

We stayed, the three of us, each in our hiding place, cold, terrified but alive, until the light began to fade.