Wicked Bronze Ambition

68

Penny was waiting to let me in. I heard talk from Singe’s office. John Stretch was using his deadly calm, lethally reasonable voice. I thought he would use that voice to explain why he was going to kill you. He was the only one doing any talking.

I raised an eyebrow to Penny. She shrugged, raised one hand with all five digits up, said, “The others are over there,” indicating the Dead Man’s room, then stepped around me to wait for Playmate and Hagekagome.

She knew they were coming, though I hadn’t said anything and they were still out of the Dead Man’s range.

Old Bones was peeking again.

Dean had not brought out any refreshments. Maybe our guests were less than totally welcome.

Perhaps he was being encouraged to restrain his natural hospitality.

I could endorse that attitude wholeheartedly, and about time, too!

You are dithering.

And not even recognizing it. I checked Penny. She was on tiptoe at the peephole. Satisfied, I advanced boldly on Singe’s office.

It was like a rat people clubhouse in there, minus the weed smoke and beer smell. There was plenty of rat smell, though, all with anger and fear behind it.

Singe was at her desk, making notes. Her brother stood beside her, dressed to the nines for a rat. Dollar Dan Justice and an unfamiliar mutant almost my size stood to either side of the doorway. The rest of the room was filled with four smaller, poorer, rattier rats who were much more gray than my friends. They were a different breed.

There are three kinds of rat people. Most humans don’t pay attention, but the two breeds that aren’t John Stretch’s and Pular Singe’s kind are uncommon. The differences hark back to the species of rats the creator sorcerers used in their experiments, and to the methods they used.

There are only two species of ordinary rat, ugly and uglier.

Rat eyes turned my way. I wasn’t stricken shy. “Some of these guys were on me and Tara Chayne a while ago.”

John Stretch said, “They were. They’ve never been so bold. I thought this might be a good place to ask them why. And thank you for sending word.”

“Best place in town for asking questions.” Speaking of Tara Chayne, what had become of her?

She is in the kitchen with Dean.

So at least one of his minds was not fully occupied.

Singe rewarded me with her most penetrating look. “Tara Chayne? Really?”

“Moonblight, if you prefer. Got to call her something.”

Her look shifted subtly. The subject would be tabled. It would come up again. I didn’t get why. She had to know that the sorceress wouldn’t be that kind of problem.

I asked, “What’s their story?”

Singe said, “My apologies on behalf of the rude interloper, gentlemen. This is Garrett. He owns the place and on that he tends to presume.”

The sleekest gray said something in dialect.

It is impenetrable to me as well, though I will pick it up. It descends from Karentine as spoken by the poorest poor two centuries ago.

John Stretch hunched his shoulders, nodded. He had been included. He was not yet used to hearing voices inside his head.

Singe bobbed her head, too.

Tara Chayne strolled in. She had equipped herself with my own favorite oversize tankard. It was filled with fragrant Select Dark. My mouth watered. She said, “Stinks like the monkey house in here.”

The grays cringed.

The other rat people were not much more at ease.

They all knew what she was, and maybe who. Her forbears might have had a paw in the creation of their lines.

She asked, “Have we learned anything yet?” Then slurped.

His mouth watering, too, John Stretch said, “Friend Evil Lin here was just starting to tell us a story.”

Singe said, “Perhaps you could translate, Humility.”

“But. .”

“Is anyone better qualified?”

“No.” He just did not like to admit that he had contacts as low as these people.

Everybody has somebody to look down on.

“Evil Lin?” I asked.

“They favor names like that. Wicked Pat is his littermate.”

Wicked Pat. I knew that name. He was a gray tribal leader.

I’d had nothing to do with grays before today. The opportunity hadn’t come up.