The Rat and the Serpent (18 page)

“I don’t know,” she replied, annoyed at the question. “Isn’t that for you to find out?”

I said nothing.

She turned, put her hand on my shoulder and leaned close to whisper in my ear. “I know you want me, you can’t deny it, you know what’s between my legs. Isn’t it lonely atop this tower? Imagine what we could do together.”

Still I made no reply.

“Lying on this couch with me.”

“That’s not the only thing I want,” I said.

She laughed at this feeble attempt to defend myself. “So you admit you want me,” she breathed.

I did not reply. I could not.

“What man wouldn’t?” She kissed my cheek, then sat back.

With an effort I said, “Passing the third part of the test means I can’t live with a nogoth—”

“I know that,” she interrupted, as if it was a matter of no importance. “You’ll make me a citidenizen soon. I don’t think we have anything to worry about.”

I turned to face her. “I was prepared to keep Karanlik and fail the third part of the test. But now I’ve passed...”

A glint entered her eye. “Karanlik,” she said. “That—”

“Don’t call her that!”

Raknia threw herself back into the couch and folded her arms, anger on her face. The silence that followed was long and heavy. And when at last she did depart, I noticed a skein of cobwebs upon my door.

Another night passed, then a third, and it was time to visit the Forum of Constantine to discuss work. I prepared myself—make-up good, clothes clean, parasol whole and illuminated—before departing. I examined the stairs and corridors of the tower for Raknia, and then the street outside, but there was no sign of her. I walked alone to Vezirhani Street.

Two old women awaited me in their reception chamber. They were manners epitomised, offering me a cup of that sour yoghurt drink called ayran, and bowls of blanched fruit in a clear sugar sauce. In one corner a bald youth played soft chords on a tambur. They found a cushion for my chair, then invited me to sit.

“Now then,” said the more wizened of the pair, “what sort of work do you think Stamboul would most appreciate from you?”

I pondered for a moment, grasping for a reply, before saying, “I know the sewers well, perhaps something down there.”

She nodded. “We hear you are a shaman of the blackrat?”

This was an unexpected question. I wondered if an affirmative reply would jeopardise my chances, but I knew I could not lie since Musseler and others knew about my ability.

I answered, “Yes, I am a shaman.” I wanted to add that I thought it an unimportant skill, but I knew such a suggestion would be an obvious mistake.

“Then,” said the woman, “sewer work would be ideal for you. We’ll place you there. It is vital that the sewers are constantly blocked, so that erosion is minimised.”

I nodded to show my agreement.

“Good. This talk has been simple. You can return home. In a few days we’ll send you a message explaining who you’ll be working with, and where exactly within the Zolthanahmet borders.”

“A few days?” I queried.

“There’s no hurry. Take the time to acquaint yourself with Stamboul.” She grinned, then whispered, “When I became a citidenizen I spent my first month in a haze of raki fumes and narghile smoke.”

I returned home, the sensation that something was amiss stronger than ever inside me.

And it was not long before thoughts of the nogoths that I had left behind began to crowd my mind, memories of desperate times, when for days I did not eat—the squalor, the hopelessness, my mother surviving on so little in her cellar, with only a loose federation of nogoths to defend her and the others from attack. It was unfair that merely for working in Stamboul I acquired the right to waste food and water; to throw it away. But I knew now why the citidenizens in the street had looked down on me with such disdain, when they noticed me at all, for they too had learned to separate themselves from nogoths.

I felt I was different. There were ways and means. A nogoth with the particular skills I had could, no,
should
circumvent the rules.

I had already acquired a small surplus of food, a bag of mushrooms, grey bread, milk, olives and an aubergine. I did not need them, and by the time I did they would be covered with grey mould. I wrapped them in a cloth then departed the tower; a short walk past the Hippodrome, left into Blackguards’ Passage, and in a few minutes I was loitering outside my old doorway. It felt like home. The attachment I felt to this simple spot welled up inside me, and I realised that I was still a nogoth at heart.

Though it was the middle of the night there was nobody present, no citidenizens, at least, for I could see a few nogoths lying in a gutter at the far end of the alley. The time was at hand. I ducked into the yard beside the building, then clattered down the steps to the cockroach-infested doorway of the cellar, where I opened the door and entered. Astarta took some time to recognise me, at first disbelieving, but when she saw the food her manner changed.

“You’ll bring more?” she asked, her bony hands gripping me like the talons of a bird of prey.

Having acted on a whim, I had not considered the possibility of the mothers wanting regular handouts. I hesitated.

“More, more, more,” she insisted, and the other mothers took up the call, until the whole cellar echoed to their wheezing cries.

I felt the approach of panic. “All right!” I said. “Mother, I’ve got to go now.”

At speed I left the cellar, using my rat leg to bound up the steps five at a time, then rushing into the alley, where I halted, breathing hard.

“What were you doing down there?”

I span round to see a woman staring at me, small and grey under the light of her parasol, but with a determined expression on her face.

“Huh?” I managed.

She sniffed the air, then took a step forward. “It smells like old water and cockroaches down there. What were you doing?”

“Nothing.”

“You were consorting with nogoths.”

“I wasn’t!”

She spat. “Are you from Zolthanahmet?”

I tried to sound authoritative. “Of course. I live on Tulku Sok Street. You probably know me. I just dropped my... my parasol down there, and I had to retrieve it.”

“I’m reporting you—you’re that nogoth who pretended to be a cripple. You’re notorious. But you’re no citidenizen that I know.”

I scrambled for a response. “But you don’t have any evidence. You will need evidence.”

“I’ll name you as soon as I get home.”

Now panic was close. “But you don’t know my name.”

“I’ll find it out.”

I ran. I could think of nothing else to do.

The message arrived on the following night. It read: ‘You are required to report to Morkorther of the Forum of Constantine at dusk tomorrow. You have betrayed the conditions of the citidenizen test by showing insincerity in the face of the Mavrosopolis. You have shown loyalty stronger to nogoths than to the Mavrosopolis. If you fail to appear, you will by default be returned to the nogoths. Scribe Van of Constantine.’

I placed the note on my sorcerer’s block, where, slowly, it turned black, then crumbled.

It was over. A chance, a mistake, and it was over. Now that the disaster had happened I wanted to remain a citidenizen, despite my earlier feelings, knowing that life as a nogoth would be unbearable. I did not feel tearful, even sad, rather I felt empty, as if something had been ripped out of my body. I sighed. This was not how I had wanted it to be.

Time passed. I brooded, ate nothing, paced my rooms, then brooded some more. In no time it was dusk.

I presented myself at the Forum of Constantine, found the chamber of Morkorther, and entered it to find a portly man, middle aged, wearing steel-rimmed spectacles. He sat behind an enormous ebony desk, the top of which was covered with parchments.

“Yes?” he asked, glancing up at me.

“I’m here,” I replied. My voice quavered.

Morkorther shuffled scrolls, then glanced at me again. “I was not expecting anybody. Are you Gaharthazay?”

“No.”

Morkorther pushed one scroll aside. “Velhazi of Babiali Street?”

“No.”

Morkorther clicked his tongue, frowning at me. “Then who are you?”

I said nothing.

“Who are you, eh?”

I replied, “I think I might have got the wrong room, Scribe Van.”

There came an exasperated growl. “My name is Morkorther! Now leave me in peace.”

I ran off. In minutes I was standing outside in Vezirhani Street.

There came a hiss from the alley behind me. I turned to see a tall figure with a plume of white hair: Zveratu. I slipped into the shadows beside the old man.

“Frightened?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“I suppose I could have stopped you going in.”

I stared at him.“You saw me?”

“I do have eyes. You are a lucky man, Ügliy. You rejected the terms of the citidenizen test, yet you escaped your fate—if only because I switched a few scrolls and bamboozled a scribe.”

“But I passed the test. Does it matter what I do afterwards?”

“It is not a question of passing, as you well know, it is a question of following the tenets. To be a citidenizen you have to arise from and forget your nogoth roots. I thought that was what you wanted?”

“But now I am here it doesn’t seem right,” I complained. “I am being told that I have been insincere to the Mavrosopolis by showing decency to my nogoth mother, yet to live as a citidenizen I have got to be insincere inside myself.” I touched my chest with one hand. “In here, that feels wrong. What am I to do?”

“Nogoth rules are animal rules,” Zveratu replied, “food and water and shelter. Citidenizen rules are the rules of the Mavrosopolis, civilised behaviour, work, reward—”

“It isn’t civilised to ignore thousands of starving nogoths!”

Zveratu said nothing. Then in a quiet voice he said, “Is it not?”

“No.”

Silence.

“It
can’t
be,” I insisted. “Is it so wrong to say such a thing?”

The grin on Zveratu’s face told me he was going to take a different tack. “How then will you promulgate these beliefs?” he asked me. “Or will they remain locked inside your mind, never to escape?”

I shook my head, then leaned against the wall, disconsolate, confused. “I don’t know what I’m doing here,” I said.

“Then think. That is something I believe you are good at.”

“Really?”

Zveratu made no reply.

“Nogoths are not animals,” I said in a low voice. “Nor are these counsellords right to treat citidenizens as inferiors. I do not like what I see.”

“Only the counsellords can dispense justice.”

“I know.” I glanced at Zveratu, then grimaced. “What do you want from me?”

“Your commitment. One of my many tasks is to seek citidenizens suitable for the office of counsellord. I believe you to be one such. I am here to encourage you.”

“Me, a counsellord?”

Zveratu wiped the rheum from his eyes. “The reason for you not bothering to try must be profound indeed.”

I said nothing. I felt like a fool before Zveratu. “It’s too early,” I muttered.

“Tonight, yes. But tomorrow is tomorrow.”

“Why should anybody in Zolthanahmet even remember who I am?”

In reply Zveratu put a forefinger in his mouth, then wiped the kohl from under his eyes to create a bizarre tribal line across his face. “Now will you remember me?” he said.

I nodded, aware that I was being taught. “I suppose so.”

Zveratu nodded once. “This is one method of fixing yourself in the minds of your kin. Learn others.”

“I will,” I replied. My mind was a whirl of thoughts. I took a deep breath, then said, “One last thing. Is it possible for a person to become a citidenizen again if she—if he has been returned to the gutter?”

“It is impossible,” Zveratu replied. “The Mavrosopolis never forgets. It can never forget.”

I nodded. “As I thought.”

Zveratu grunted, as if unimpressed with me. “I too mention one final thing,” he said, taking a slip of paper from his pocket. “I think you ought to read this.”

I took the slip. “What is it?”

But Zveratu was already walking away. I opened the slip to find a note in wobbly handwriting: Nogoth, know that the body of Karanlik the cimmerian was marked with a single dot on the left arm. Thus was she killed.

I stood in silence, re-reading the note, my body chill, numb, then hot with anger. I knew what the note must mean. I began the walk to Gulhane Gardens. At Raknia’s door I knocked, then pushed, to find the door open. I walked in then turned to slam home the bolts.

From the far side of the room Raknia said, “So you’ve decided that I exist, Ügliy?”

I turned to face her. She was sidling towards me, but when she saw my face she stopped.

“What?” she asked, petulantly.

“It turns out that a fallen citidenizen cannot be returned to the heights she once occupied,” I said.

The vicious voice returned. “You know for certain, do you?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

I walked forward, biting my lower lip, sitting on the couch then putting my head in my hands. I felt a cool touch on my shoulder. I shrank back.

“Get off me.”

“Why?”

“I am a citidenizen and by coming here I am putting myself in danger. I have only just survived being spotted by a woman who reported me to the Forum of Constantine.”

“What? You’ve been ejected already?”

“No. I—”

“What do you mean, no? There are no exceptions.”

I cursed. “I don’t know! Stop goading me.” For some moments I struggled to control my emotions, before I said, “All I know is that, for some reason, by some administrative mistake, I was overlooked. But I
cannot
take any more risks, Raknia. You are a nogoth and I am a citidenizen.”

Raknia seemed calm, despite what I was saying. “You can’t leave me,” she said. “You’re addicted to me. You came here tonight, didn’t you?”

I wanted to reply, but I could not.

“I will be a citidenizen again,” Raknia stated. “Until then I’ll visit you in private. I have ways. Invisibility is merely not being seen.”

I thought of Karanlik. “I know you have ways,” I said, bitterly.