China Miéville - King Rat

It might be that he was only concerned with Saul, with the half-and-half, the rat-man he could not control, but he must suspect that Anansi would be there, too, and King Rat, and Loplop. They were not brave or proud. They were not ashamed to turn down challenges. But they knew that Saul was the only thing that the Piper could not control, that Saul was the only chance they had, and they knew they must be there to help him. If he did not survive, they could not.

The rats spread throughout London.

Saul was alone amidst the rubble and the scaffolding.

He stood in the centre of a wide ruined landscape, a blitzed corner of London that hid behind hoardings, in easy earshot of Edgware Road. A forty-foot by forty-foot square, carpeted in crushed brick and old stone and surrounded by the backs of buildings. On one edge of the square a rough wooden fence hid the street that flanked the site, and above the fence towered the old brick walls of ancient shops and houses. Saul looked up at them. On that side the windows were surrounded by large wooden frames, rotting but ornate, designed to be seen.

On all other sides the walls that enclosed him were vulnerable. They constituted the buildings’ underbellies, soft underneath the aesthetic carapace. Out of sight of their facades, he was ringed by great flat expanses of brick, windows that spilt at random down featureless walls. Seen from behind, caught unawares, the functionality of the city was exposed.

This point of view was dangerous for the observer, as well as for the city. It was only when it was seen from these angles that he could believe London had been built brick by brick, not born out of its own mind. But the city did not like to be found out. Evens as he saw it clearly for the product it was, Saul felt it square up against him. The city and he faced each other. He saw London from an angle against which it had no front, at a time when its guard was down.

He had felt this before, when he had left King Rat, when he had known that he had slipped the city’s bonds; and he had known then that he had made off it an enemy. The windows which loomed over reminded him of that.

In the corner of the square lurked obscure building machines, piles of materials and pickaxes, bags of cement covered with blue plastic sheeting. The looked defensive and overwhelmed. Just in front them stood the remnants of the building that had been pulled down. All that remained was a section of its front, a veneer one brick deep, with gaping, glassless holes where windows had been. It seemed miraculous that it could stand. Saul walked over the broken ground towards it.

There were lights on in a few of the rooms that overlooked him and, as he walked silently, Saul even caught sight of movement here and there. He was not afraid. He did not believe that anyone would see him; he had rat blood in his veins. And if they did, they might be surprised to see a man striding by lamplight in the forbidden space of a nascent building, but who would they tell? And if someone were, unbelievably, to call the police, Saul could simply climb and be gone. He had rat blood in his veins. Tell the police to call Rentokil, he thought. They might have a better chance.

He stood under the free-standing facade. He stretched his arms up, prepared to scramble over the city himself, to join his emissaries in their search. He did not believe that he would find Fabian or Natasha or the Piper, but he could not fail to look for them. To acquiesce in the Piper’s plans would be to abrogate his own power, to become collaborator. If he were to meet the Piper on the ground the Piper had specified, he would be dragged there, he would be unwilling. He would be angry.

He heard a noise above him. A figure swung into view in one of the empty window-frames. Saul was still. It was King Rat.

Saul was not surprised. King Rat followed him often, waited until the rats had left, then poured scorn on his efforts, ridiculed him in agonized contumely, incoherent with rage at the behaviour of the rats who had once obeyed him.

King Rat grasped his small perch with his right hand. He crouched, his left arm dangling down between his legs, his head lowered towards his knees. Seeing him, Saul thought of a comic-book hero Batman or Daredevil. Silhouetted in the ruined window, King Rat looked like a scene-setting frame at the start of an epic graphic novel.

‘What do you want?’ Saul said finally.

In a sinewy sliding movement King Rat emerged, from the window and landed at Saul’s feet. He bent his knees on landing, then rose slowly just before him.

His face twisted.

‘So what silly buggers are you playing now, cove?’

‘Fuck off,’ said Saul and turned away.

King Rat grabbed him and swung him back to face him. Saul slapped the other’s hands down, his eyes wide and outraged. There was a horrible unease moment as Saul and King Rat stared at each other their shoulders wide, their fists ready to strike. Slow and deliberately, Saul reached up and pushed King on the chest, shoved him slightly back.

His anger boiled up in him and he shoved King Rat again, growled and tried to make him fall. He punched him suddenly, hard, and images of his father raced through his mind. He felt a desperate desire to kill King Rat. It shocked him how fast the hatred could overtake him.

King Rat was stumbling slightly on the uneven ground, and Saul reached down to snatch up a half brick. He bore down on King Rat, flailing brutally with his weapon.

He swung it at King Rat’s head, connecting and sending his opponent sprawling, but King Rat hissed with rage as he fell. He rolled painfully across the shattered ground and swung his legs up at Saul, taking him down. The fight became a violent blur, a flurry of arms and legs, nails and fists. Saul did not aim, did not plan; he flailed in rage, feeling blows and scratches bruise him and rip his skin.

Blood exploded from a vicious strike below his eye and his head rocked. He slammed his brick down again but King Rat was not there, and the brick struck stone and burst into dust.

The two rolled and grappled. King Rat slid from Saul’s grip and hovered like a gadfly, ripping him open with a hundred cruel scratches and dancing out of the range of retaliation.

Saul’s frustration overwhelmed him. He suddenly broke off his frenzied attack with a shouted curse. He stalked away across the rubble.

Another vicious half-fight. He could not kill him.

King Rat was too fast, too strong, and he would not engage Saul properly, he would not risk killing Saul, King Rat wanted Saul alive, for all that he was growing to hate him for his following among the rats, for his refusal to obey him.

King Rat shouted scornfully after him. Saul could not even hear what he said.

He felt blood well from the deep scratches on his face and he wiped himself as he began to run, surefooted despite the terrain. He threw himself at one of the walls which overlooked him, scrambled up its tender surface, slipping by those unadorned windows, leaving a long smear of blood and dirt on his way up the bricks.

He stared briefly behind him. King Rat sat forlornly on the hulking piles of cement. Saul turned away from him and set out over the top of London. He looked around him as he moved, and sometimes he stopped and was still.

On the top of a school, somewhere behind Paddington, he saw harsh security lights catching on billowing cobweb suspended below the railings topped the building. The fragile thing was empty an long deserted, but he lowered himself to the ground and stared around him. There were other, smaller webs below it, still inhabited, less visible without the accumulated dust of days.

He lowered his lips to these webs and spoke in a voice he knew sounded removed and intimate, like King Rat’s. The spiders were quite still.