Speaker 1: The Scum Kings, a broad Sword Studio production created and
written by Mike Daltrey. Chapter thirty eight, The Rats.
Speaker 2: We are eating in the dark. The candles ran out
days ago. Or So says, we need to save the
oil for the torches on the wall in case they attack.
But they don't attack. They just cook. So we sit
in the dark of the Mayor's Hall, listening to the silence.
The door opens. Stigan walks in. He isn't stumbling, he
isn't shaking. For the first time in long time, he
looks like the man I remember. He's holding a sack.
It's moving inner, he says. His voice is deep, resonant.
He sounds pleased. He dumps the sack onto the table. Rats,
a dozen of them. They scramble, squealing. Stigan moves faster
than I've seen him move in years. His big hands
dart out, snapping necks with terrifying precision. Crack crack, crack.
In ten seconds, they are all dead. Bob Stiggin says,
boil them. Bob takes the pile of gray fur to
the hearth. I watch Stiggin. He wipes his hands on
his tunic. He looks proud. He looks like he just
dragged a bear back to the cave. I found a nest,
Stigen says, behind the old granary, they were fat. Good job, stick,
I say, But my stomach turns not from the rats,
from him. This is the man who shocked the gutters.
This is the man who broke the abby gate with
nothing more than swinging his axe. Now he's swelling with
pride because he snaps the necks of rodents. A sound
from the stairs, soft, deliberate footsteps Saligne. She hasn't left
her quarters in a week, not since the treason letter.
She looks like a ghost. Her dress hangs off her
frame like wet laundry. Her eyes are huge in her
hollow face. She walks to the table. She looks at
the pile of dead rats. She looks at stiggand room
for one more, she asks, her voice as dry as dust.
Stiggin pauses. He creates a space on the bench. Sit
tob brings the platter back. The rats are skinned and boiled.
They look like little naked men. Stiggin takes the biggest one.
He tears into it. Gix joins him, biting into the
rat meat with a manic energy. Eat stigand commands the room.
The hounds have pork. We have this, but this makes
us strong, this makes us hard. Selaine picks up a rat.
She holds it by the tail. She examines it with
the same cold calculation she used to use on the Ledger.
You know what this means, don't you, she says, Stigging
stops chewing. It means dinner. It means we've eaten the cleaners,
she says. She takes a small, precise bite. She chews swallows.
The rats eat the garbage, they eat the rot. When
the rats are gone, the filth piles up. She looks
at me. First the cats went, she says, now the rats.
Next comes the flies. And after the flies shut up,
Selaine stig into growls the plague. She finishes. We aren't
eating dinner, Stig. We're eating the only thing keeping the
sickness away. But then again, will be dead by starvation
by then, so maybe it duanced matter. She takes another bite.
It needs salt, she says. Stigand glares at her. But
his pride is punctured. He looks at the bone in
his hand. It's not a trophy anymore. It's a sign
of the end. Eat your share, Dre Stiggin says, his
voice flat before the play gets you. I look at
the rat on the silver platter. I pick it up.
It's limp and wet. I take a bite. Stigand watches me,
but the joy is gone from his eyes. He was
expecting gratitude, and he's getting discussed. Selaine eats quietly next
to him, dissecting her meal like an autopsy. He is
the provider, she is the prophet, and I am just
the mouth to feed
Speaker 1: Wh