by Jane Yolen
The school reporters all seemed mesmerized by the story, except for Callie who, pen poised over her notepad, waited for something real to write down. Get on with it, she begged him mentally. After all, her parents might want to see her notes. And right now there was nothing to show them.
“The shop owner and I haggled for hours,” Gringras continued. “He claimed I was trying to beggar him and I screamed about shoddy workmanship. When he said I would starve his children if I forced him to go lower, I claimed I would not be able to afford a wife if I paid his asking price.”
Wife? Callie thought. I haven’t read anywhere about a wife. Now it was getting interesting. She jotted down wife with a question mark after it.
As if reading her thoughts, Gringras shook his head. “Always the price came down, down, down. When it was finally somewhere reasonable, well, I pulled out my wallet and bought myself one large brass rat.”
The kids in the room breathed a long sigh, except for Callie.
I don’t get it. The hand holding her notebook dropped to her side, but not so the other reporters. They were all madly scribbling on their pads. Mr. Tie had filled an entire page.
“I walked out of that store whistling and holding my new brass rat, buffing it with my coat sleeve,” Gringras said, his voice getting lower as he spoke. Not lower, as if whispering, but lower in actual notes. He leaned forward again, too. “But fairly soon I noticed something strange. There seemed to be a large rat following me. And it was not made of brass. One very large, lean, and hungry-looking rat stalking me in broad daylight.”
Callie drew in a ragged breath this time. She couldn’t help herself.
“Well, this was strange,” Gringras continued, “but it did not worry me overmuch. One rat is just not that frightening. But soon I saw another rat. And then another. And then … well, you see it coming.”
The reporters all nodded, though only Callie really understood what Gringras was doing.
“Soon thousands upon thousands of rats were chasing me through the streets of Edinburgh! I ran and ran with a million rats behind me. And then I understood! They were after my rat. My big, beautiful brass rat. Now, I loved that brass rat! But I loved myself more. So I ran as fast as I could down to the Firth of Forth, which runs into the North Sea. And when I got there I threw that brass rat as far as I could.” His arm made a huge arc as if he were throwing the rat at that very moment. In fact, he’d thrown an empty can that hit its intended target—the wastebasket—with a loud clang.
They all jumped at the sound.
Gringras continued the story as if the clanging can had been but a bit of punctuation. “The rats swarmed past me, paying me no mind. They charged into the river and climbed over each other in their frenzy to get to the brass rat. It was madness. They went to their deaths, drowned, every last mother’s son of them.” He paused and leaned slowly forward to grab another soda off the low table. Lifting it to his lips, he took a long drink.
Callie looked around the strangely silent room. The kids seemed stunned by the story—the shaggy rat story, she mentally dubbed it. However, she was more interested in how the band members were reacting and glanced at them each in turn out of the corner of her eye.
Scott sat restringing one of his guitars, yet was still listening intently. As Callie watched, his hands twitched and the end of a string punctured his index finger. A drop of blood sprang up from the wound. Scott ignored it and kept looking at Gringras.
Oh, Scott … she thought suddenly, the now-familiar ache in her stomach returning.
Tommy Nickels never glanced up from his science-fiction novel.
But Alabas sat stock-still, staring daggers at Gringras.
Gringras leaned back into the couch once more and spoke again. “When the carnage was over, I went back to the store where I had purchased the rat. I told my horrific story to the owner and he explained to me that no refunds would be given. ‘No, no, you’ve got me all wrong,’ I told him. ‘All I want to know is…’” he paused for effect and winked at Nick, “‘how much for that brass drummer there!’” He pointed at Alabas.
Nick erupted into laughter, which Gringras joined. Scott put down his guitar and took a long nervous pull from his drink. Alabas growled—actually growled—then stomped out of the room. Tommy Nickels still hadn’t moved.
The school reporters seemed a bit startled that the story was just a joke. They stretched uneasily, then shot a series of questions at Gringras which he handled easily. Clearly he’d heard all the questions before.
At last he turned, grinned, and winked at Callie.
“Now, do you have any questions for me, young lady?”
Only then did he realize she was the only girl there.
“Um…” she said. It was not a good beginning.
“Did you ever get enough money for your wife?” Nick asked suddenly.
Callie flushed. Not because it was a stupid question. In fact it was on her own mental list. But to ask it so baldly. And in that way. And the implication that—since Nick was her little brother—she wanted to know the answer especially was too much.
“Nicky,” she said, her voice low, “shut up or go away. Or both.”
Gringras looked at her a moment, and it was as if only the two of them existed in all the world. His voice was soft, musical, low. “Be careful what you wish, my lady, for it might come true. And then you will have many years to rue it.” He sighed, an uncharacteristic sound. “As I know all too well.” Then he turned to the others. “Interview over. Time for the second half. Hope you like the show.”
Before they knew what had happened, they were all back in the hall and the band was playing “Green in the Haven,” a fast and furious reel.
What was that about? Callie asked herself. Be careful what you wish and all that? Any fool knows wishes don’t come true. If they did, she’d have parents who were less strict, a name like Elizabeth, her brother Mars at a school closer to home, and a boyfriend who looked a lot like Scott. A lot!
But the music had some kind of power that overtook her. Dancing to it, Callie let the music wash over her until it had stopped her thinking altogether.
“Green in the haven,
Green in the bower,
Green in the wide wold world all over.”
8 · Exile
Gringras hunched over his flute, improvising madly. Brass Rat was well into its ten-minute final encore, “Exile,” and the chord changes were coming fast and furious. Still, Gringras let his mind wander as his fingers danced across his instrument. The band was in disarray. He could feel the tension between the members like a physical weight on the music.
He knew why. The approaching teind had him uneasy. And when he was uneasy, he made the others downright uncomfortable.
Turning, he glanced at Alabas, who stared down at his own feet, grimly striking his drums.
He’s still angry, thought Gringras. All these years and I can still prick his pride with an old joke or an off word.
He signaled the others and spun in place, coming to rest with his flute in his left hand pointing at Scott, who took over the solo.
Scott was another problem altogether. Judging by his reaction to the Brass Rat story, he was beginning to suspect something. It was getting time to tell him everything or cut him loose.
And if he is cut loose, Gringras thought, he can’t be left to walk around. Not in the condition he would be in then.
He sighed. Threes, he thought, trouble comes in threes. If Alabas’ pride is one, and Scott’s suspicions makes two, then what is the third? The third is always the killer.
Scott had begun an intricate run of triplets that signaled the end of his solo. Gringras raced over to the opposite side of the stage and Tommy Nickels shotgunned him with the bass and grinned.
No problem there, thought Gringras, returning the grin with as much warmth as he could muster. He couldn’t remember the last time Tommy had spoken more than a single sentence, let alone voiced an opinion or caused a problem. He had onl
y two loves—music and sci-fi. The rockets and ray-guns kind. I can always count on little Tommy.
The pyrotechnics flared again and more explosions rocked the hall. The audience screamed with delight and Gringras sprinted to center stage in time to sing a reprise of the chorus.
“Time and place mean nothing if you can’t call them home.”
The crowd sang with him, holding their hands up pinkie and forefinger extended. To them it meant “Go for it! Great! Brill!” To him, it was his father’s sign. The way he had held his hand up when he’d sent Gringras out into the world.
Gringras smiled his mocking snake smile at them all, thinking: This gig will easily cover the remainder of the teind, and Alabas will soon recover from whatever slight to his pride I have delivered. He always does.
“Born of man and woman, you do not walk alone.”
And Scott … he will either accept things as they truly are or he will be dealt with in turn.
“Me, I stalk the darkness, each solitary mile.”
Nothing to worry about then, he thought. But he wasn’t convincing himself. There was something different this time. Something even he, with his farsight, was not seeing.
“Apart but not far distant—Exile!”
9 · More Curses
Callie was so caught up in the music, she forgot that “Exile” was the final piece Brass Rat played in each concert. Or so the Internet reviews had said. So when the last note died away and the lights went down, then came up again on an empty stage, she felt empty, too.
That was when she remembered that Peter Gringras had never answered the one question her readers would really want to know. Well, her girl readers, anyway. What about this wife? What’s this about a payment? She bit her lip. Was that one question or two?
Shrugging, she spun around, looking for her parents in the crowd. She finally spotted them leaning against the far wall, looking spent. Nick stood in front of them, waving his hands at her frantically, like a sailor on a sinking ship waving flags.
Callie walked quickly to them, ignored Nick, and said, “I have one more question I have to ask the band.”
“We need to go,” her dad said. “Your mom’s pooped.”
Her mother interrupted. “Your dad’s the one who’s done. Not as young as we once were.”
Running his right hand through his hair, her dad leaned forward and said, “What more do you need to ask them? You were in there for at least half an hour.”
“A half is not a whole,” Callie said, immediately regretting her snarky tone. So she added, “This is for school, Dad.”
“Make it quick then,” her dad said.
“We’ll meet you outside,” her mom added.
Nick’s eyes brightened. “Can I come?”
“Not this time.”
“Mommmmmmy…” he began, but Callie was gone.
Pushing past a long line of people waiting for a chance at the unisex bathroom, Callie found her way back to the band room. She waved her press pass, and was about to go inside when she realized the door was ajar. She could hear angry voices coming from within.
One belonged to Gringras. “What is this? What does this mean—a freebie?” He spoke like a snake, low, hissing.
“Look,” came the rough growling answer, “I already told your manager that…”
“I am the manager,” Gringras said. There was real menace in his voice.
“I thought the manager’s name was Lola Kudnohofski,” the man complained.
“I use that name when dealing with creeps like you, Garner,” Gringras said. “It saves face all around.”
“What’s this about saving face?” the man demanded.
Gringras was silent.
Callie thought a minute about barging in, decided against it, but that didn’t stop her from listening at the door. A reporter, she told herself, has a duty to her readers. Besides, her parents would ask what was said.…
“Look, here’s the letter, and the contract—which you signed—and it clearly says this is a concert to raise money for the homeless,” the growly man added.
“And just as clearly I—or rather Lola—told you that we would come but would expect to be paid our normal rate. Not a percentage of the gate, not an advance on future earnings, but our normal rate. In cash. Now.”
Callie heard a chair being shoved back. Someone was standing up. If anyone left the room now, the door would hit her in the ear. That would be tough to explain! But if she left, she’d never know—and could never report—how this whole thing ended. She pressed herself back against the wall. Now if the door opened, she would be behind it and invisible to anyone exiting.
“Pay us the money, the gold and silver we worked for,” Gringras continued. “We need it tonight. Not tomorrow. Tomorrow will be too late.”
Callie heard something else in Gringras’s voice. It sounded like a wild pleading and a threat, both at the same time.
“All the funds go to the homeless. That’s the way it is.” The man spoke as if he made the rules. “All funds.”
Then Gringras said something really odd. “I am the homeless. More so than you can ever know.” He threw the door open, completely shutting Callie from view, and stomped off, his boots making a resounding noise.
The door shut again, partway, and Callie took a deep breath, ready now to declare herself. But Alabas’ voice from the band room stopped her. He was saying something that made no sense, his voice rising louder and louder until he was thundering:
“May ye gae thru mirk and mire,
Fill your breeks with muck of byre.
Wade through blude, and walk the gyre,
And ne’er come hame till I desire.”
What he was saying sounded English or Scottish or both. Like Callie’s Scottish gran when she really got going. A few of the words were even ones Gran used. Breeks, meaning “pants” or “breeches.” Blude, meaning “blood.” The whole thing, though, was both like a song and like a curse and like nothing Callie had ever heard before. She shivered and the hair on the back of her neck stood up.
“Look, Mr. Garner,” this time it was Scott speaking, “Alabas is just riled. Don’t pay any attention to him.”
But Alabas kept going, and Callie got that shivery feeling all over again.
“Walk abroad until ye tire,
Head and hair and heart afire,
Round aboot the dread dear’s spire,
And ne’er come hame till I desire.”
“Crazy musicians,” Garner growled, and then he, too, stomped off, throwing the door open, which once again blocked Callie.
“Now look what you’ve done,” Scott said, clearly speaking to Alabas.
“What I’ve done?” Alabas laughed, but there was no humor in it. “You still do not understand, Scott. Twenty-one years with us, and you do not understand.”
Actually it was Callie who didn’t understand. Twenty-one years Scott had been with the band?
She tried to remember her research. If he’d been with the band for twenty-one years, he’d been there from the beginning, though not—she recalled—Tommy. Suddenly something that should have puzzled her before leaped out at her. Scott was maybe twenty, though he looked Callie’s age. Or a year or two older. Yet if he’d joined the band twenty-one years ago. She thought about this. He’d have had to have been fifteen at least then. Maybe sixteen. Plus twenty-one. She did the math. Gulped, Did it again. That couldn’t be right.
“Tomorrow is All Hallows’ Eve and he needs that money to make up the teind.”
“Yeah, I know, I know.” Scott sounded almost bored. “Every seven years and he has to send money—our money—back home. Or else. Though no one ever says what the or-else is. And he makes it up to us after, so who cares.”
“I care,” Alabas retorted. “You do not understand.”
“Try me. My God, Alabas, after all this time, at least try me.”
There was a deep intake of breath, then Alabas said, “He must send silver or gold or souls Under the Hill. H
uman souls. To pay off a blood guilt, a teind. And if he does not, he will grow old as any who walks upon the earth instead of living long Under the Hill. He will grow old and then die himself. Do you believe Gringras would let such a thing happen?”
“Hey—we all die. In time.”
Alabas laughed. It was not an easy laugh and there was no humor in it.
At that Scott was silent. A deep, long silence.
Callie had no way of knowing if he was silent because he knew that what Alabas was saying was crazy, or if he was just about to laugh at the joke, or … Because nothing Alabas had just said made any sense.
Callie turned over the words in her mind: Silver. Gold. Human souls. Blood guilt.
What is Alabas talking about?
And where is Under the Hill?
Then all of a sudden it made a kind of bizarre sense, ugly and scary. Like a horror movie the moment after you get the plot.
Only, Callie told herself, this is real life in Northampton, Massachusetts, not some mad Hollywood concoction. Not one of Granny Kirkpatrick’s fairy tales which used to scare me out of sleeping. Not watching some dumb TV show while Mars made spooky commentaries.
Yet somehow Callie believed Alabas. Believed what he was saying. Believed him down in the urpy part of her stomach. And afraid she was going to be sick, she slipped away and ran out the nearest door marked EXIT.
* * *
SHE FOUND HERSELF IN A small, dark alley behind the theater. An over-full Dumpster seemed to be vomiting up beer cans and Coke bottles and paper trash. The place smelled strange, old, damp, unhealthy.
Hearing the sound of a flute, she looked up.
Gringras was sitting on the fire escape above her, his legs dangling down. He was playing a sort of doleful version of “Ratter.” Down below him some movement drew her eye.
Three brown rats were standing on their hind legs and dancing in a circle, paw-to-paw-to-paw, chittering.
Callie gasped, and turned to go back inside the theater, but the door had shut silently behind her and there was no handle on the outside.