“I think you’re right.”
They were indeed rats, or at least mostly. There were several varieties, from rotund cotton rats to big-eyed deer mice, and even the occasional chipmunk, but primarily they were plain, ordinary rats, the sort that Slate saw every day going about their business in the alleys and gutters of the capital.
Unlike those sleek urban rats, however, these were not quietly pursuing their own rodent interests.
They appeared to be dancing.
With each beat of the drum, the rats would take a step forward on their hind legs. Their whiskers and tails moved, and they shuffled back and forth to the high skirling of the pipes. A step at a time, hundreds, if not thousands of them, they danced and squirmed and stepped across the rocks and up the opposite hillside.
That’s really quite horrible.
A single dancing rat might have been cute, a line of several dancing might have been amusing, but this constant, slithering stream was deeply unsettling. If they stopped and turned, Slate and Learned Edmund would be ankle deep in squirming bodies.
Now that’s a pleasant thought.
“Well…” she said, trying to keep her voice even, “I suppose it could be worse.”
“I think it is,” said Learned Edmund weakly. “That one there doesn’t have a front.”
Slate looked.
The back end of a rat, the sort of thing that a cat might leave as a present to its unfortunate owner, was stepping merrily along in the line. The fact that its waist ended in a kind of bloody rag of fur didn’t seem to bother it.
Slate put a hand over her mouth. The potato wasn’t sitting very well at all.
Ohhhh…
Now that her eyes were adjusting, she could see that many of the rodents were much the worse for wear. Some of them were obviously dead, missing heads, entrails, or other vital bits. Some might simply have been badly wounded. Despite this, they capered as fluidly as the others dancers in the line. If the body had feet, it seemed to be able to dance to the music.
The only mercy to the whole thing was that she had absolutely no desire to sneeze.
“I’m going to be sick,” said Learned Edmund, and was.
Slate reached over and held his hair with one hand. She didn’t take her eyes off the line of tiny dancers.
If the sound of a scholar dry heaving bothered the rats, they gave no sign. The column showed no sign of tapering off. Rat after rat came dancing down the hillside, to cut a grotesque saraband across the river.
A few minutes slid by. By the time Edmund had stopped heaving, and was wiping his mouth, Slate had made a decision.
“Learned Edmund,” she whispered, “I want you to go back to the horses.”
“Mistress Slate?”
“Go to the horses. If we’re not back by noon tomorrow, take them on the road, and go back the way we came. Once you get toa large enough town, send a message to the Captain of the Guard. Tell him we’re all dead and to send someone else to help you.”
“You can’t be serious!”
“I’m very serious.”
“I’m not going to just leave you all!”
She could have growled with frustration. The music beat in her head like a pulse. “Listen to me, Edmund. Of the two of us, I can’t handle the horses, and Icansneak into places.”
“But—” He blinked at her. The moon was rising, and she could see his pallor, and the determination of his expression under it. “Sir Caliban is my friend. I can’t let you go alone. You’re—”
“Expendable,” she said.
“A woman.”
