Rats and Gargoyles by Mary Gentle

Author:Mary Gentle
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Science Fiction, Fantasy
ISBN: 0670833894
Publisher: Roc
Published: 1989-12-31T13:00:00+00:00

Desaguliers walked past the turning treadmill, not pausing even to brush the sparks from his fur as they fell from the crackling chandeliers. One sweating human face turned towards him. He slapped the end of his tail against the bars. "Get working."

"Scum!"

Unbelieving, he swung back to throttle the whisper out of the naked straining worker. Before he could reach her, a Lord Magus in a golden robe appeared at his elbow.

"All’s arranged."

He felt a small hard object pressed into his palm.

"Watch me, then. Don’t miss the signal." Desaguliers, sweating in the heat of midday, the audience hall’s closed curtains and artificial light, let a cynical smile appear on his lean features. "I’ve known too many of these affairs be messy failures. This one has to succeed. If I go down, I’ll take all of you with me."

"We never doubted that, messire."

Desaguliers left him, walking under the clover-leaf vaults of the great chamber, now bright with the flare of generated lights. He pushed between two Rats, one in blue satin, one in linen and leather; both feeding by hand and from the same dish their leashed human slaves.

A flurry in the thick crowd caught his attention. A tall Rat in the gold of the Lords Magi, awkwardly riding the shoulders of a female brown Rat-Guard, yelled a drunken toast to the four or five hundred packed into the hall: "The King!"

Different voices chorused: "The King and victory!"

"To our future without masters!" the Magus echoed, slipped, and slid to vanish from Desaguliers’ sight into the crowd and a roar of laughter.

Pushing onwards, elbowing, the former Captain-General worked his way towards the circular dais-throne. The crowd grew thicker. He thrust a way between four female Rats in Guard uniform, a priest, a cluster of gallants quarreling; stepped down hard on the long-toed foot of a dazed-drunk brown Rat and opened a gap in the front row.

The Rat-King sat among wine-stained cushions, under the incandescent glare of the lights. Receiving toasts, congratulations; waving away a messenger, talking to a priest in the robes of the Abbey of Guiry, bright-eyed with victory celebrations . . .

"Messire Desaguliers!" The younger of the silver- furred Rats-King raised a wine-goblet in ironic salutation. "Have you come seeking your co-conspirators?"

Silence began to seep into their immediate circle.

"Conspiracy?" Desaguliers asked mildly.

"Janin, Reuss, Chalons," the silver-furred Rat-King enumerated. "And, of the Guard, Rostagny and Hervet—"

"–Volcyr, Perigord, de Barthes," the bony black Rats-King picked up, turning away from the young female Guiry priest. "If you have come inquiring for them, I recommend you seek them out in the palace oubliettes. But, then, you’ll—"

"–be there in their company soon enough." A brown Rats-King flopped down on his belly, tail cocked high, and wrinkled his nose dazedly. "Drink, man! We’ll settle your execution tomorrow. Things will be different tomorrow."

"They certainly will." Desaguliers spoke over the nearest of the crowd’s ragged cheers. He made a low formal bow and, as he straightened up, added: "You were well informed about the conspiracy, your Majesty. If not quite well enough.

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