Weasel Presents (27 page)

He started to count out money into his paw, while Coryn gaped. His father would be ecstatic if they returned to the farm with ten Royals. But the rat cleared his throat. “Beggin’ your pardon, but have you seen the fine work on the candelabras?”

The fox raised an eyebrow. “All looks the same in the furnace,” he said, but he stopped counting.

“Oh, my friend, what an opportunity you’re missing,” the rat said. “The serving dish, aye, that’s got names, but the candelabras, that lovely detail, you could sell those for five gold each. Surely they’re worth an extra two apiece.”

“Hmph.” The fox held three neat rows of five coins in his paw. He added another row of five, and then two more. He held out his paw.

“Surely you can at least give me twenty-four?”

The fox stared for a moment and then added just one more coin. The rat sighed and cupped both his paws to accept the gold. “May Canis smile on your generosity.”

“May Rodenta bless your fingers.” The fox waved to the cougar, who picked up the dish with the silver on it and carried it back to the boat. The fox took the candlesticks and followed. Coryn saw him examine the reliefs on their base as he walked.

“C’mon.” The rat had retrieved his cloak and now tugged on Coryn’s sleeve, pulling him to the other side of the bridge. The coins had vanished from his paws, but if Coryn focused, he could hear a soft clinking under the loud hiss of the rain. Just inches from the driving rain, the rat pointed to a stair in the bank. “Need to drop this off in a lockbox before we go to the Cathedral. You want to wait here? Ah, thought not,” at Coryn’s headshake. “Right, then, up those stairs, follow me.”

He took off at a trot, considerably faster now that he wasn’t burdened by the sack of silver. Coryn cast one last glance back at the houseboat. The fox and cougar had gone inside, leaving the houseboat apparently deserted, bobbing slowly on the river in spite of the storm. The young wolf sighed, and then hurried to catch up with the rat, who was already at the stairs.

“Thought you didn’t wanna wait,” the rat said at the top. “Don’t stay night f’rever, y’know.”

“Sorry,” Coryn said. “The boat was pretty.”

“That? She’s okay.” The rat scampered across the street, Coryn right behind. He kept going down another alley, without pausing again to look around. “We shoulda got thirty gold for that lot.”

“Are the candlesticks that nice?”

“Nah. They’ll melt ’em down too. But that’s a lot of silver. They’ll prob’ly get forty for the lot.”

“You got three extra gold.”

“True ’nuff, and from the Vergies, that ain’t bad.” He slowed to pad across another street, turning onto it and walking quickly. This narrow street was lined with apothecaries and two metal-workers, one copper and one tin. It smelled like scorched metal, even through the rain, which might be one reason it was deserted.

“They were Vergies?”

“Aye.” The rat slowed, scanning the houses. “Don’t stay put, always sailing up an’ down the river, or some tribes just wander the country in wagons.”

“I know what they are,” Coryn said. “They sell second-hand clothes and pots in my town sometimes.”

“Aye. There’s always one group or ’nother around, but y’never know which one you’ll run into. I know the river Vergies, though. Why I did the job tonight is, I knew they’d be there. Ah, here we go.”

He’d stopped at a narrow doorway. His body hid what he was doing, but Coryn heard the door handle jiggle, and then the door swung open. “Jus’ a quick stop,” the rat said, stepping inside. “C’mon in and get dry.”

Coryn followed him into a cramped room, with a door at the back and an unsteady-looking wooden staircase leading up. “Wait ’ere,” the rat said. “I’ll be back in a mo.”

He was up the stairs before Coryn got the word “Okay” out. So the wolf leaned against the wall and listened to the rain fall outside, his sodden tail thumping the wall. The thought began to enter his mind that he might stay here. Surely, if his help were that valuable, the rat wouldn’t mind. He could become an apprentice thief, or maybe travel with the Vergies.

It was only when he heard a thump from upstairs that he realized that it had been a little while, and the rat was still gone. He sniffed at the air, but his own wet fur overwhelmed the scent of the rat’s. “Hullo?” he called cautiously up the stairs.

He took two steps up, and listened. “Hullo?” he called again.

He’d just put his foot on the next stair when the rat appeared on the landing, fastening a light tan cloak around his neck. “Where you headed? I’m comin’, I’m comin’.” The rat skipped down toward him, as Coryn backed up toward the front door, his chest swelling with relief.

He groped for the door handle, but the rat held his wrist. “Just a mo.” Turning his paw upward, the rat dropped two gold coins into it. “Fair pay, aye?”

Coryn gaped. The rat had to close his fingers around the coins. “Thank you,” Coryn said. “Thank you!”

“Well,” the rat said, “Y’did carry that dish. You deserve a li’l something for the trouble. Now on to the Cathedral?”

The weight of the gold in his paw made his tail wag. “Oh, yes!” he breathed.

“All right, then.” The rat gestured to the door. “One more wet run?”

Coryn pulled the door open. Outside, the rain hissed down. The rat rested one paw on the arch of Coryn’s tail. “Which way?” Coryn said, wagging under the touch.

“Left,” the rat said, “an’ then just follow me.” His paw slid down, with just the briefest touch on Coryn’s rump, and then he was out the door.

The rain felt just as heavy as ever, but Coryn barely noticed it. He splashed along at the rat’s side, and now the rat was more talkative. “That there’s the best brothel in Divalia,” he said. “Might be able to afford m’self a night there, now.”

Coryn saw a hanging sign with a picture of a fox-like creature, his naked erection huge. Under it, he barely made out the words, “Jackal’s Staff.” Then they were past it, walking quickly past another pub that was just turning its patrons out for the night, and that’s where Coryn looked to his right and saw the palace for the first time.

Its wall rose up to his right, pitted but solid stone two stories tall. Opposite him was the main gate, a metal fence between two small guard houses from whose shelter gleaming eyes watched him. And through the fence, through the sheets of rain, he saw the front door of the palace. It rose in a majestic arch over two wooden doors, above which two more floors of windows rose, irregular shadows in the wet night. Between the doors and the gates, rows of flowers and trees shuddered under the water and wind, their colors faded to grey.

Coryn wanted to stay and stare at it, but the eyes in the guard houses worried him. He closed his paw tighter around the two gold pieces and walked on, slowly, fixing the image of the palace and the gardens in his mind. Then he had to run, because the rat was already nearly at the corner where the long palace wall ended. But he couldn’t resist, as he ran, approaching the wall and brushing his paw along the dripping stone. How many others, in Doubleford, had touched the wall of the royal palace?

He caught up to the rat just beyond the corner of the palace. The wall bent around to the right, and up in front of them was the vast expanse of the Great Cathedral.

Up close, even through the rain, he could now see the intricate reliefs lining the walls of the Cathedral. They must be on the Mustela side, because he could see weasels and skunks, mink and otter, all making their way up the wall, where Mustela herself surmounted the column of sculptures. To either side, narrow stained glass windows were black slits in the stonework. To the left, several plain columns rose, and beyond, he could see another column of reliefs.

The rat looked to either side and then made his way around the Mustela column, away from the large front doors. Over here, sheltered by the bulk of the church, the rain didn’t beat down as hard, and Coryn could take time to look more closely at the stone, so ancient, so sacred.

As they passed below the narrow stained glass, Coryn noticed a small wooden door in the side of the wall. The metal plate around the latch was more formidable than he’d seen on any other door in the city; he supposed it made sense that the Great Cathedral would be more securely locked up than any other place. Hopefully the rat could get through one of those doors. But they passed another one, stopping finally at the base of a column of reliefs of rats, mice, squirrels, and porcupines all reaching up to Rodenta, who smiled down with a pair of prominent front teeth. The rat put his paw in the nearest statue’s and hoisted himself up. He grinned down at Coryn. “How’s yer climbing?”

Coryn put on a brave face. “I climbed the big needle-tree back home, I can climb that.” He looked doubtfully to the top of the column.

“Ain’t too far,” the rat said. “I know the pawholds. Jus’ watch me.” And he set his foot on the head of the lowermost mouse, reached up for the foot of the squirrel above, and pulled himself up.

The stone was only slightly slippery from the rain, not as much as Coryn had thought it would be. The rough limestone held his paws well, though twice he would have been stuck had he not seen where the rat was placing his paws. He resisted the urge to look down, though the wind was now rushing in his ears and his head felt a little dizzy. He did look to the side and thought he saw the awnings of the market a mile or so away in the city. Had they walked that far? He supposed they had.

When they reached the statue of Rodenta at the top, her outstretched cloak and arms presented little difficulty to the rat, who swarmed around them with what Coryn would have sworn was magic. While he was studying the sculpture, trying to see where the rat’s paws had gone and whether he, Coryn, could also be lighter than air for as long as it would take to get up there, a brown paw came down around the cloak.

Coryn grasped it, and it yanked him so hard he lost his balance, hanging on to the rat with one paw and Rodenta’s arm with the other. And then he looked down.

The street swayed below him, fifty feet, a hundred, two hundred. He whimpered and then steeled himself, just as the rat said, “Don’ look down, jus’ hold on.”

“I know,” Coryn yelled back, staring into the smiling muzzle of Rodenta. It hadn’t looked like there were more than two or three people in the street below, all either hurrying along with their heads down or holding something over them, but he still felt exposed. “Hurry!”

The rat pulled, and Coryn struggled, and between them, they managed to get him up onto Rodenta’s back. Panting, the rat sat back against the wall, ignoring the stronger wind. “Nice view up here, innit?”

Coryn huddled in his cloak. He could see the rain spattering on rooftops all the way out to the city walls. The patchwork of red ceramic and grey stone shimmered with life, even though most of the streets were deserted. The palace lay behind him, but he could see the market, the curve of the Lurine around the heart of the city, the South Gate through which they’d entered, and a hundred other buildings he didn’t know. “It’s nice,” he said, trying to keep his teeth from chattering. “Are w-we staying up here all n-night?”

“Nah,” the rat said. “Jus’ a nice view from here. Little bit o’climbin’ left t’do.” He stretched and slid back to the wall, where a narrow ledge extended from Rodenta’s cloak. “This way.”

Wind hissed past his ears, drenching them. Coryn saw again the spinning ground below him and hesitated. But he’d been higher up than this, in the tall branches of the oak tree above his house. Not at night, nor in a storm like this, true. But the rat was six, eight feet along already. He lifted his sodden cloak and faced the building.

The wet limestone smelled like the cemetery. Up close, the stained glass was filthy, dirt in all the crevices. Even in the rain, insects scurried away from his fingers as he edged along the ledge, which was not as narrow as it looked. His entire foot almost fit on it. He took a step, then another, gaining confidence with each one. Then he looked to his right, and the rat was gone.

Panic seized him just as a gust of wind came along, driving rain into his face, trying to push him away from the wall and down to the cold stone below. He leaned in against the stone, heart racing, and the weight of the water in his clothes helped press him safely to the Cathedral until the wind had calmed again. He eyed the statue of Rodenta, and began to edge back toward it, not looking forward to the climb back to the ground.

“Ay!”

He turned. The rat’s whiskered face was poking out of one of the windows, staring at him. “C’mon,” he said, beckoning with a paw.

Coryn edged toward him. He saw, now, that one of the windows opened inward. It took him a good five minutes to make his way there, and then, because the bottom of the window was at his waist, another minute to get up the courage to leave his feet and jump inside. But he’d come this far, and the alternative was not very appealing, so he rested his paws on the bottom of the window, lifted himself and hung in mid-air for a moment before pushing himself forward into darkness.

He landed on a carpet thick with the scents of hundreds of people, mostly cubs. Some of the scents were only a few days old, but he caught some that might have been lingering for years. His head spun, all his attention on the smells now that he was out of the wind and rain, its driving hiss comfortingly remote though the window was only three feet from him and rain continued to spatter the carpet.

Light bobbed into the room, a candle and the smell of burning wax preceding the rat from the hallway. He eased a door shut behind him, and Coryn, sitting up, could now look around the room he was in.

Three old wooden chairs, mismatched, lined one wall, a nondescript cloak tossed over one of them. Two ancient wardrobes faced them, on either side of the window they had fallen in through. The doors of the right-hand one were open, revealing its empty interior. The door the rat had come through was the only one, and beside it stood two old wooden trunks whose leather bindings were coming apart. It was over these trunks that the rat tilted the candle to drip some wax. He set the candle firmly down in the soft wax and walked to the window.

The burning, waxy scent overwhelmed the others. Coryn rubbed his nose, still staring around at his surroundings. They seemed quite neglected, not at all as he had imagined.