Fin didn’t mean to fall asleep, but as the shadows grew weaker in his burrow and the sun rose in the sky, thoughts flew around his head like frenzied moths. Was Zumi alive? Did Scratch get to her in time? What about Papa? What if he found out? It was too soon. Papa couldn’t find out yet! Edging between each question flashed pictures of stacked two-legs, mounds of dead rats, silent tunnels, a market that was dead.
Each thought, each worry, weighed him down like heavy stones on his back. His head sank, and he fell into a restless sleep.
***
Nia stands over him, her eyes fixed on something behind him. Her eyes are wide. She crouches, her haunches tighten, and she springs.
For a moment she seems to fly. She flies over him where he lays curled in the nest, but then he hears her scream.
“Pip! Help me!”
Trembling, he shakes his head. “I can’t…” He squeezes his eyes shut.
“The pup is blind!” says a voice.
“Pip!” screams Nia. “Open your eyes!”
“He will never see,” says the voice.
And in his sleep, Fin opens one eye. And then the other.
***
A voice spoke, startling Fin out of his dream. “Pip, you say?”
Fin blinked, sniffing the air groggily.
“I should have guessed,” said the voice. That voice.
Fin’s eyes flew open, but all at once his vivid dream faded. Papa crouched by the nest entrance. “Papa?”
His uncle said nothing. Fin moved towards him. “Papa? What’s wrong?”
“Stay where you are.”
Fin’s blood froze. Papa knew. And he would believe that Fin was a Wrecker. “I didn’t betray you!” Fin’s voice broke. “I did what was best for the Tunnels. What was best for you! If you’d only open your eyes!”
“My sister’s son,” hissed Papa. “I am betrayed by the pup I have loved, I have cared for, I have cried for…”
“But Papa—”
“SILENCE!” In one leap Papa was at Fin’s throat, his teeth seizing his neck. He lifted Fin from the ground. Fin’s paws pedalled the air. His body burned for air, and darkness seeped into his mind.
Fin went limp. With a cry, Papa kicked him away with his back legs and launched him into the air. Fin slammed against the wall and slid to the floor. Pain shot up his leg. He groaned. “I love you, Papa. No matter what.”
A sob escaped Papa. He began to pace in the centre of the burrow. “Love is a dangerous thing. The most dangerous thing. I should have killed you, too.” He stopped to look at Fin. “In my weakness, I could not. There was something in you that drew me. All the others, even Nia, yes. But I could not bring myself to kill you. And now, still I cannot!”
Fin’s head swam. The smell of blood filled his nose. “What? You…you said my father killed my mother!”
Papa paced in front of Fin, weeping. “What am I to do? Do I kill you? Do I kill my boy?” Bursting into a fresh round of tears, he shouted, “Nia! You got what you wanted. And now he must die because of you. This is your fault!”
“Papa,” said Fin, “I—”
“SILENCE!” roared Papa. He lunged at Fin’s face, forcing Fin to dodge to one side. Papa stood over him. “Disloyalty means death, dear Nephew. I cannot tolerate betrayal. That’s why the little ugly one had to die. Telling on you, as if you were a common Tunnel Rat and not my nephew. I asked the ugly rat what virtue I valued most, and it didn’t know.” Papa’s eyes glittered with tears. “You know, though. Don’t you, Nephew.”
Fin didn’t answer. The smell of blood was so strong. Not his blood, someone else’s. Something pale lay in the dirt by the tunnel opening. “Where…where is Scratch?” asked Fin.
“Nephew! The most important attribute! Tell me!”
Fin stared at the mound. “Papa. What is that?”
“Forgotten, eh? Or you never knew it? Like your mother? She didn’t listen to me, either. It’s loyalty, Fin. Or shall I call you Pip?”
Pip. Memories flooded Fin, rushing at him, pushing him under. He gasped. “Pip!”
“LOYALTY!” shouted Papa. “You’re just like him. Nia knew better than to bring trash into the Tunnels!” Papa spoke as if to himself while he paced. “An escaped two-leg pet? Pah! He still had two-leg stink on him!”
“My father…?” The stories Papa had fed him, the history of his father, all lies. The truth had always been there, hidden in dreams…it had been Papa.
Papa. The walls of the burrow swirled around Fin.
Papa stopped pacing and looked down at Fin. “They broke Tunnel Law, and the penalty was death. And you will follow them.”
Papa lunged and seized Fin’s crippled paw between his jaws, drove his teeth to the bone, just as he had done so long ago.
Squealing, Fin jerked back his paw, but Papa did not let go. With his good leg he thrashed against his uncle’s muzzle. “No, no, NO! Aagh!”
Papa opened his jaws, dropping the paw. He stared at Fin, panting. “Why is it so hard to kill you?” Fin lay on the ground, his ribs heaving.
“You were the last,” said Papa. “It should have been easy! But as I pulled you from your nest, you struggled and fought, like me. I gambled that you would be my own. I gambled and lost.”
Fin lay at the entrance and felt his life ebbing. The smell of blood was everywhere. His own, and…and…
His eyes flew open. The pale mound was beside him.
The bite was clean, neat. Two red crescents on the snow-white fur. The red eyes were slightly open, as if Scratch were only sleeping.
“Oh, Scratch,” choked Fin. He pulled himself off the ground. He turned to Papa. Almost as one they charged. Over and over they rolled. Papa’s claws ripped into Fin, rending his back into bloody strips. Fin screamed.
Tears streamed onto him from his uncle, mixing with his own.
Long teeth were drawn at the back of Fin’s head. But as the thrusting teeth plunged toward their mark, Fin slipped under his uncle’s chin and sank his teeth into the soft, delicate flesh.
***
“ANANDA!”
Ananda. That was her name. Meaningless now. She is free…she drifts to the edge that opens before her. One step farther …
“ANANDA! NO!”
She turns to the waiting dark, but too late…the name knits itself to her, entangling her, claiming her.
Then, like an ember that smokes, then blazes, pain erupts through her limbs. Over the sound of her own cries, she hears her name, Ananda, said over and over.
Ananda…Ananda…Ananda…
CHAPTER SIXTY
“For those who still live, pray for the world so that God can be merciful to us all.”
Simon Islip, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1349
Fin stood outside the drainpipe, unable to bring himself to go in. Finally, he forced his feet forward. His claws echoed on metal. Entering the small burrow, he saw that Zumi’s careful pile of rags was blown around. The air was so cold that his nostrils stuck together as he breathed in. A stalactite of ice clung to a frozen pipe that ran across the top of the den.
Why had he come? He’d known it was too late.
A whisper of scent stopped him. He sniffed the air, side to side, whiskers trembling. In one bound Fin leaped to a scattering of rags and leaves. Gently, his heart fluttering, he pulled the rags away with his teeth.
She was there. Her fur was still crusted with dried blood, and her ribs heaved. But she was there, and she was alive.
Zumi.
Days followed nights. Each moonrise Fin foraged, bringing back whatever food he could find. As Zumi ate, he tended her wound and groomed her, licking his own wounds while she slept.
She had cried when he’d told her about Scratch. Had cried for Fin when he told her about Papa. But as day followed day her coat became glossy, her eyes once again bright.
>
“You came back,” she’d say.
“Of course I did,” he’d answer.
But there was still one thing left undone.
“I’ve got to go,” Fin said to Zumi. “But I’ll be back. I promise.”
He remembered the way.
Under a shrub outside the little two-leg’s tall nest, Fin crouched. His eyes swam with tears, but now he knew, as Balthazar had known, that it was right to cry for someone you love. For one who is dead.
Forgive me, Little One, he thought.
A flicker at the window caught his eye. There, looking out at him, was a familiar face. She leaned close, her pale hand pressed against the glass.
Straining, up on his haunches, Fin tried to see, scanning his nose back and forth. Could it be? Brown eyes found his. Joy flooded his chest. Yes.
***
Ananda sat up in bed, drawing. She’d been home for a week. The face that looked out from the paper was her own. The thinner cheeks. The eyes that seemed too big for her face. The lingering bruises around her neck. But it was her own.
The plague pandemic had finally released its grip. For months, lab researchers had toiled to find an antibiotic that would work against the “superbug” strain of plague. The trials had saved lives, including Ananda’s. But that was only part of the story.
She had been so close to death that no one could quite explain why she was still here. Her parents looked at her with wonder, like she was Lazarus out of the Bible, risen from the dead. They had taken turns sitting with her for the first few days, holding her hand, stroking her hair. Ananda had lain in their arms, as safe and snug as when she was little. Her mother would cup Ananda’s cheek in her hand. “My sweet girl,” she’d say. Her father found another copy of the book on Stalin, and as he read it to her, the three of them would talk about things that seemed even more important, now.
Ananda had insisted, weak as she still was, on writing a letter to George, and to George’s mother. To finally tell the truth about what happened. She had lied. Now her parents knew. And now George would be believed.
Her father’s lab was temporarily closed and research suspended. All of the rats had died, and to Ananda’s shock, her father was broken up about it. It was odd to see a glimpse of the real man behind her father—the man who struggled just like she did.
Ananda set the charcoal down. She was still so tired.
Through half-closed eyes she gazed out her window. Simple things seemed miraculous to her now. Soft snow piled like whipped cream. Tender green shoots that peeked through the drifts. A cobalt blue sky.
A car puttered down the road. One of several she’d seen just today. There had been a slow return to life in the city, just as a seed awakens after the long winter.
Something flickered below her window. Squinting, Ananda leaned forward, her hand on the glass. Near the road sat an evergreen. The snow around it was pristine, except for a small trough that had been plowed through it. A small, rat-sized trough.
A flick of grey and white. A flash of pink tail. Too fast for her to clearly see.
Carefully, Ananda climbed to her knees, trembling from the strain. She leaned on the windowsill.
Could it be? There…it was him! Tommy.
He sat up in the snow on his haunches, swaying his nose back and forth as if looking for something.
Her breath fogged the window. She rubbed at the glass, and his black eyes darted toward the movement. She was crazy, almost certainly crazy, but she could swear he looked straight into her eyes.
SIXTY-ONE
“The dead shall live, and those who were killed shall rise again. Awake! Give praise, all who live on earth.”
Friar Johann von Winterthur, quoting Isaiah, Germany, 1348
When Fin arrived back at the burrow, Zumi was sitting, grooming herself. She looked up. “Everything okay?” she asked.
“Yes,” he said. “Everything is fine now.”
“Good,” she said. “I’m glad.”
They left the burrow and travelled toward the market. There was a shift in the air. Though it was still cold, the buds on the trees seemed plumper, and anticipation clung to every seed.
About the Author
A.T.Balsara lives in Ontario, Canada, with her husband. She is the proud mom of two adult daughters, two dogs, two cats, and two hives of bees. She writes and illustrates for children and young adults.
To learn more about her, visit:
Her website
Facebook
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About the Artwork
The illustrations in this story were done digitally by the author, using Corel Painter on a Wacom tablet. All the illustrations are original, with the exception of the following:
Dance of Death, found in the Nuremberg Chronicle, 1493.
The Plague, by Marcantonio Raimonda, c. 1515-6 (with rats added by the author).
"Death Taking a Child" from the Dancing Death series by Hans Holbein the Younger, engraved by Hans Lutzelburger, c. 1526-8.
Acknowledgements
First and foremost, I want to thank my husband. Nav, you believed in me before I believed in myself. I could not have done this without your patient, loving support. You are a constant example to me of what it means to be a truly successful human being. I am the luckiest of women to be married to my best friend.
To my daughters, Katie and Mehra. Katie, your faith in me and enthusiasm for all things mom continues to humble me. So generous with your editing advice and writing expertise, you astonish me with your resilience, depth, and zest for life. Mehra, your patience and support through this has been invaluable. You posed for me without complaint—stooping over pairs of socks that were stand-in’s for Fin, laying on the ground while pretending to be attacked by plague-ridden rats—as I snapped reference photos from fifty different angles. And thank you for sharing my joy when I was finally done, buying me a book of cartoons (Gary Larson!) and a celebratory coffee.
To my parents, who taught me to search for truth, and who took me and my siblings through the Dachau concentration camp museum, where the seed of this book was planted. Thank you for teaching me that although there is darkness, there is also light.
To my sister Michele, who was the first to see that I had a story to tell. Thank you for encouraging me to write, and for your mentorship and love over the years.
To Marianne Ward, my first editor who helped me get this story to a publishable state. Thank you for your enthusiasm and belief in this story. Without your help it would still be languishing in a drawer.
To Ellie Sipila at Common Deer Press, a gifted book publisher, designer and editor, who also happens to be an awesome (and funny!) human being. Only Ellie knows who Gary really is. Thank you for loving this book as much as I do and for joining me in the weirdly wonderful world of rats. Your creative insight, vision, and expertise has caused this story to be raised to a higher level than I could ever have done on my own.
The Black Death, translated and edited by Rosemary Horrox, published by Manchester University Press, had a huge impact on this book. The eyewitness accounts of the 1300’s scourge of the Black Death were both harrowing and heartbreaking.
Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar, by Simon Sebag Montefiore, published by Alfred A. Knopf, provided me with the insider view of what it was like to be in close proximity to a charismatic, mercurial, insecure man who had the power of life and death over millions.
And finally, to Frodo, my little rattie. You were never supposed to come home with me that day at the pet shop. I was only doing research, after all. But when you snuggled into my palm and fell asleep, what could I do? I was helpless against your sweetness. With my car bursting with rat supplies, a huge cage, and you, my four-legged guide into this new world, I was ready to write.
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