Suzanne Collins - Gregor and the Code of Claw

Gregor announced he was going to practice some more and went back into the tunnel. Then he just lay down on the stone floor with his head propped against a rock. He didn't feel like sword fighting, so he turned off his flashlight and clicked. His echolocation ability was improving by leaps and bounds. He could see so much — the jagged edges of the ceiling, individual pebbles on the floor, even small details in the rough surface of the walls. He experimented using different sounds — coughing, humming, whistling. In a quiet moment, he realized that even the sound of his own breathing could send images back to him. He felt comforted, because that meant as long as he was alive he would be able to see.

His heart rate slowed and he dozed, slipping in and out of sleep, alternating between dreams and images of the tunnel. Fear crept into his dreams. He was lying helplessly on his back, when a rat appeared over him, then another, then he was surrounded by their faces. Gregor shook his head to awaken only to find he hadn't truly been asleep. The rats were still looming over him, and they were real.

Without even attempting to rise, Gregor yanked his sword from his belt and sliced the air over his body to protect it. The rats fell back, giving him a chance to spring to his feet. By this time his dagger was out and he was about to start killing, when the voice reached his brain: "Stop, Overlander!"

Gregor hesitated. He knew the rat's voice. It was higher-pitched than Ripred's rough growl. Female. But not Twirltongue's silver tones that had so easily led him astray. Twitchtip? No, she was dead. And this voice didn't belong on his voyage across the Waterway, or in the impossible twists and turns of the rat's maze. It came with memories of jungle heat and sweat and the smell of sweet deadly blossoms. He clicked and tried to focus in on the speaker. "Lapblood?"

"Yes, it's me. Put away your sword. We're not here to fight you," said Lapblood.

Gregor clicked again. The small pack of rats was hanging back, none of them in attack position. He slowly slid his blades back in his belt. Rat or no rat, he didn't think Lapblood would lie to him. Not after what they had been through together. Besides, if the rats had been after his blood, they'd have taken him on the ground. "What are you doing here?"

"We've come to join with Ripred against the Bane," said Lapblood. "I'm supposed to meet him now for our battle orders."

"For real? How many of you are there?" said Gregor. Echolocation was great, but he wanted to use his eyes again. He snapped on his flashlight, causing the rats to squint in the sudden brightness. "Sorry." He pointed the beam to the floor.

"There are a dozen of us here in the tunnel. But hundreds wait in the caves below," said Lapblood.

"Hundreds?" Gregor said. He knew Ripred had a small band of rats loyal to him in the Dead Land, but where had hundreds come from?

"Did you think every rat wanted the Bane for their leader?" asked Lapblood. "That we would willingly live under his rule?"

"Pretty much," admitted Gregor. "I mean, except for Ripred, we haven't seen a whole lot of resistance from you guys."

"Well, you're wrong," retorted Lapblood. "Many of us have no use for that bloodthirsty, twisted creature or the connivance of those who guide him."

"That's good to hear," said Gregor. He noticed two smaller rats crouched at Lapblood's side. They were too big to be called pups, but they weren't fully grown, either. "Are they ...?" He didn't want to say the names in case he was wrong. "Who are they?"

"Flyfur and Sixclaw. My children," said Lapblood.

The children she had gone to the jungle to save by finding the cure to the plague. Mange's children, too, then, although he had never lived to see them again. He'd been ensnared and eaten by giant carnivorous plants. But his pups had lived. Gregor peered closely at them. They stared back, scared but tough. "You look a lot like your dad," he said, and was surprised by the emotion in his voice, by how moved and glad he was that they'd survived.

"And your mother?" asked Lapblood.

It seemed like an eternity since anyone had asked him that. People avoided the topic of his mother's health in general, as if bringing it up was just a painful reminder of her sickness. But Lapblood knew better. "She's okay, I think. I mean, she was real sick from the plague, but she got better. Only last time I saw her she had pneumonia and they evacuated her to the Fount. It turned out to be a good thing, because the hospital at Regalia was so packed, but I haven't had any news of her since. Ripred says he'll get her home for me. After the war. Since I can't. Ripred says he will." Gregor realized he was babbling and pulled himself together. "Thanks for asking."

Gregor had a sudden impulse to touch Lapblood, to place his hand on her head and feel that silky fur again. But he knew that would seem weird, if not downright threatening, to the other rats. So he just headed up the tunnel. "Come on. Ripred's up here."

Lapblood followed him while the rest of the rats remained deep in the tunnel. This was just as well. Gregor was afraid the arrival of even one rat might start a panic attack in Lizzie. But she took her cue from Ripred, and he was pleased to see Lapblood.

"Good. You made it. How many do we have?" he asked her right off.

"At least seven hundred. Perhaps as many as a thousand," said Lapblood.

Ripred raised his eyebrows, a bit impressed. "That many? You've been busy."

"Where do you want us?" asked Lapblood. Ripred quickly gave her a time, position, and instructions. She nodded, turned to Gregor, and said, "Thank you for what you did in the jungle."

Gregor had saved her life, but Lapblood had saved Boots. "You, too."

Lapblood touched her muzzle to his wrist, then she was gone.

"Just another good-bye," thought Gregor. Another last time. But it was nothing compared to the ones he would have to face in the next couple of days.

Ripred ordered them all to bed. Gregor's slumber was deep and dreamless. He was awakened by Ripred's nose nudging his shoulder. Gregor rubbed his eyes and looked around. No one else was up. "Over here," the rat whispered, and Gregor followed him to the far end of the cave. "This is the day," Ripred said.

"The day I die," Gregor thought. But he only said, "So soon?"

"Yes. We have to move fast. But there's something I want to say to you in private," said Ripred. "It's regarding a certain line in 'The Prophecy of Time.'"

The warrior's death. "Here it comes," thought Gregor. He braced himself for the good-bye, but the rat's next words were something entirely unexpected.

"The thing is ..." said Ripred. He glanced around to make sure everyone else was still sleeping. "The thing is, I don't believe in Sandwich's prophecies."

Gregor was floored. "What? But you ... always do what they say."

"No, I don't. If I really believed in them, would I have run after the Bane and tried to kill him myself? It would have been pointless. I pretend like I believe in them, even try to convince myself I do for short periods, because everybody else down here does. So if you want to make them do something, it has to fit the prophecies, you see?" said the rat.

"Not really," said Gregor. What was Ripred saying?

"Look, there are hundreds of prophecies predicting all kinds of things. If you wait around long enough, numerous events that resemble each and every one of them are bound to come up. Take that plague. We've had loads of plagues down here. Might have been interpreted to fit any of them," said Ripred.

"But you're always trying to interpret them," Gregor said.

" I have to. If I don't come up with some reasonable interpretation of them first, someone else comes up with a foolish one," said Ripred. "And then it's a whole lot of extra work changing everyone's minds."