The White Assassin (14 page)

Clover gave him an understanding smile. “It’s hard for all of us. You know, I admire Elvi. I was alone in the Catacombs, just about raising myself, but I still had help from neighbors and Uncle Juniper. Elvi was utterly alone—lost in the Toscan jungle, facing down savages and vicious beasts every day. How frightening and desolate her life must have been.”

“I hadn’t thought of it that way,” said Vincent. “It’s unbelievable to think she found her way back to us all the way from Tosca.”

“The Saints were looking out for her”—Clover glanced at the other young Council members—“just as they looked out for all of us.”

Clover was right about that, thought Vincent. Carn and Suttor sat across from him, still going on about their adventures in the swamp. His brother, Victor, was listening to Cole, but Vincent bet he was thinking about Petra. Since the night they’d danced together at Nightshade’s naming ceremony, the two had been inseparable—well, at least when Petra’s father allowed her out of the house. They were all still alive. They’d weathered the storm. Vincent couldn’t understand why he felt another one was brewing. Something didn’t sit right with him—something about Billycan’s capture and Juniper’s reaction since then. He just didn’t know what that something was.

Juniper finally arrived. Everyone took a seat in silence as the Chief Citizen entered the chamber, shutting the door behind him. Few of the new Council members had seen him since he’d returned from the swamp. Standing at the head of the long table, he smiled broadly at the Council. “Billycan is captured!” Clapping and cheering, everyone stood up. They’d known the mission was a success, but to hear the actual words, to know Billycan was no longer hiding out there somewhere, ready to attack—it was liberating.

“We are finally free of him,” said Juniper, as everyone sat down again. Thinking as he spoke, Juniper chose his words carefully. He didn’t like lying. “As soon as he reveals the full extent of his plot he can rot in the prison corridor with his high majors.”

A new Council member, an old rat with dreadful posture and a sagging belly that made him appear as if he’d swallowed a tangerine whole, slowly got to his feet. He looked sternly at Juniper. “What makes you think the Topsiders’ serum will work on Billycan, that it will make him tell the truth? He’s not human, after all. It may not have the same effect.” He snorted contemptuously. “For all we know, he’s not even a rat.”

“Striker, from what we can tell the serum is already working.
Billycan is showing the side effects, just as the humans did—memory loss, personality changes—”

“Memory loss?” blurted Striker, cutting him off. “I was never informed that he might
lose
his memory. How is that helpful? What if he can’t remember who he had working with him, leaving us open for retribution at any moment? Didn’t any of you consider that?”

“Councilman Striker,” said Virden, standing up, “you were indeed told of the side effects, just like every other Council member. If you think back, we all voted on this. The majority voted to proceed. And if I remember correctly, that included you. This memory loss is temporary. His memory will return—and soon. We did our research on this serum. Who do you think the human scientists tested it on before giving it to humans?”

Striker snorted. “You bring us back a half-dead rat with no memory of his deeds? I want it on the record that I think this plan was not well conceived.” Council members started to murmur, many questioning whether the serum really
would
force Billycan to reveal the truth.

“So noted, Striker,” replied Virden. “Perhaps you could stop yourself from nodding off at our next meeting.”

Striker sputtered but quickly took his seat.

“Blowhard,” muttered Vincent, glaring at the old rat.

“Can’t you say anything nice about anyone today?” asked Clover. “He’s very old.”

Ulrich and Ragan laughed. “Vincent’s quite right, and so are you,” whispered Ragan, leaning in. “Striker means well, but it’s true. He
is
a blowhard, and an ancient one at that!”

The whispers among the Council members grew louder. “There is no cause for alarm,” said Juniper, with a decisive pound of his fist on the table. The Council quieted. “His current state is no surprise. He is
a changed rat for the time being—docile, passive. Unless it’s an act, which it may very well be, we’ll take full advantage of his new temperament. We will discover the truth.” He paused for a moment, staring at everyone with a steely expression. “There is a serious matter we need to address. We have a traitor within the Council.” The whispers turned into gasps. “Someone has been helping Billycan, filtering confidential information to the swamp. We must find the culprit or culprits and punish them accordingly. There’s no time to waste. Why, the traitor may at this very moment he plotting to break Billycan out of his prison cell.”

“A traitor?” said Striker. “What’s this?”

“In the swamp,” said Juniper, “we found scores of maps and blueprints of Nightshade and its defenses, documents that Virden, Cole, and I drew up ourselves. Members of this Council are the only ones with access to those documents, which means one of us is a traitor.”

Everyone stared awkwardly at one another. The new Council members could feel the weight of Cole’s, Virden’s, and the twins’ gazes bearing down on them suspiciously.

Striker pointed an indignant claw at them. “You think it’s one of us, don’t you? How smug you all are. We’ve worked to build Nightshade, just as you have. The gall—to think one of us would betray this city for
him,
of all rats! Why would any of us do such a thing? We have everything we could possibly need.”

“Striker is correct,” said Elvi, nodding respectfully at Juniper. “From where the new Council members stand, I think I speak for all of us when I say none of us has anything to gain by such treachery, and none of us has anything to hide. Why would any citizen of Nightshade betray our city after everything we’ve toiled for—after all we’ve lost?”

“At this point, we are not accusing any member, old or new,” said Juniper. “We only want the truth. If no one here is the guilty party,
then how did Billycan come to possess the city’s blueprints mapping everything out, down to this very chamber?”

Burton, a bulky brown rat, stood up. He was a key member of Nightshade Security, working tirelessly with Ragan, Ulrich, and Carn. He gazed gravely at each rat, making his way around the table. His eyes suddenly halted on the last of the new Council members, a flamboyant gray named Oberon. “Then the question remains …
who
would be betray us?”

Oberon momentarily struggled under Burton’s withering gaze, adjusting his red robes over his ever-widening frame as he stood up. “Are you suggesting I did it?” he asked coolly. “Burton, you’ve always taken issue with me. Is it my fault you are not as revered in Nightshade as I am?”

“Revered?” scoffed Burton. “Why, you’re a laughingstock, with your boisterous talk and exaggerations. If we didn’t know better, you’d have us all believing it was you who took down the High Ministry—single-handedly, no less!” Several Council members chuckled softly at the comment, a bit tired of Oberon’s tall tales. “After all, Oberon, you seemed to get along just swimmingly with Billycan and Killdeer before we overthrew them. Why, you even held an official position!”

Oberon pointed to Mother Gallo. “Juniper’s own wife held an official position! We did what we had to do to stay alive in the Catacombs.”

“Juniper’s wife did it to feed her family,” said Burton, with a scornful growl. “You did it to feed yourself.”

“In my estimation, this is all about jealousy, plain and simple,” said Oberon, sticking his snout in the air. “Blame the one you want to shove out of the limelight, that’s how I see it!”

“The only thing keeping you in the limelight is that ridiculous
red robe! Citizens can see you barreling down the corridors a mile away,” snapped Burton.

“Gentlemen!” barked Juniper, pounding his fist on the table. “We’ve no time for such petty squabbling. It will get us nowhere. As the Council of Nightshade City we must all work as one. Our common goal is to find out who is working with Billycan before they can help him escape again—and if it’s not one of us, then who?”

B
ILLYCAN LAY ON HIS COT,
shaking and writhing, his body aching, his head pounding. The pain reminded him of the blue kibble he’d been forced to eat in the lab, which had made his stomach and head hurt terribly. He closed his eyes. The rat, Juniper, had mentioned a place—the Catacombs. The name somehow seemed familiar, but how did he know it? He closed his eyes and concentrated. The Cata-
combs,
he repeated as he began to doze off,
the Catacombs
…

The lab tech looked up at the wall of cages. “Number 111 is acting odd,” he said to his colleague. “It’s like his fire has gone out or something. Maybe he’s sick.”

“Well,” said the long-necked female tech, “
he
may be slowing down, but his growth rate certainly isn’t. He’s a bony one, but he’s the longest rat in the lab and he eats like a horse.”

“I know,” said the short man, “it’s just that—he’s usually so much livelier. Maybe he’s depressed.”

“Depressed?” scoffed the woman. “He’s a lab rat.” She shook her head. “Really, Walter, you get too attached to these animals. What did you name that one … Billycan? Such nonsense. They’re subjects for our research, nothing more.”

The man’s face grew hot with embarrassment. “Yes, I know,” he said sheepishly.

A buzzer sounded. The female tech turned back to her equipment. The man walked over to the long wall of cages that housed the males. He climbed up on a step stool and peered in at Billycan, who was curled up in the corner of his cage. “What is it, boy?” the man asked in a soft whisper. “What’s got you so down?”

Billycan’s fur bristled. The man was kind, different from the other humans who worked at the lab, but Billycan stayed put, coiled in the back of his cage, his face to the wall. It had been two months since Dorf had died. He felt more alone than ever before.

When the man left, Billycan turned around and sluggishly pulled himself to the front of his cage. He looked out at the lab—his home. He smelled the air, immediately crumpling his nose as the scent of unappetizing blue kibble hit it. He sniffed again, this time smelling the lab techs, reeking of coffee and doughnuts. Growing up around the humans who manned the lab, he quickly learned their favorite things to consume—coffee, doughnuts, and hamburgers. The pungent scent of the hamburgers always made his mouth water and his heart race. The short man snuck him a piece once. It tasted a
bit like the dried liver the lab techs would reward him with, only far better.

“I
must
get out of here,” he said angrily. He looked toward the female cages. Again the same dark female was watching him. Why was she always staring at him?

From far away, Billycan heard yelling—loud, impassioned yelling—humans. Something was wrong. Suddenly a window broke. Glass flew everywhere.

“Bless the Saints!” yelled the male tech as he shielded his face from the flying shards.

“What’s happening?” cried the woman.

A silver canister landed on the floor between the walls of male and female cages. The canister hissed and shook, then abruptly exploded with dense plumes of orange smoke.

“It’s those activists!” shouted the man, trying to wave away the thickening smoke. “I
knew
they were planning something! I told security they’d been snooping around!” He and the female began coughing uncontrollably.

“My eyes!” yelled the female. “They’re burning!”

The male quickly took off his lab coat and covered himself and the female with it. “C’mon,” he said, “this way!” Billycan watched as they clumsily escaped through a side door.

Without warning, humans dressed in black clothes and frightening masks jumped in through the broken window. They began scaling the walls of cages, setting each rat free.

It was chaos. Confused rats scurried about the lab, running this way and that. Billycan’s heart thundered as the humans neared the top row of cages, his row. “Freedom!” he shouted, grabbing the wire door of his cage and shaking it.

An alarm suddenly sounded, filling the lab with an ear-piercing wail. The humans jumped off the walls of cages as quickly as they’d scaled them. “C’mon,” shouted one to the others. “We have to go
now
—the police are coming!” The small band of humans jumped onto a metal table, pulling themselves out through the broken window. The last human to leave tossed something toward the lab equipment.

On the top row, Billycan was the only one left. “No!” he called frantically as the equipment exploded in flames. “Don’t leave me here—please!” He threw his body against the door of his cage. “Don’t leave me!”

Just then, someone called to him. “Don’t worry. I’m coming. I’ll get you out!”

“Who’s there?”

“It’s me.” A rat appeared from nowhere, right in front of his nose.