Rat Song

Chapter 18

"They're going to take over Hamelin," William said numbly. The crowd had dispersed after the Piper had finished his speech, leaving him and Thomas to watch the stragglers from their rooftop hiding place.

Thomas scowled. "What happened to saving your sister?"

"How am I supposed to save her when the Piper has an entire army?" William rolled up the sleeves of his tunic, exposing the bruises darkening his wrists. "I barely escaped from the children last time."

"That may be true, but folks aren't as keen on the Piper as they used to be." Thomas nodded toward a stall near the town square. Half a dozen people clustered around the merchant's meager offerings, clawing at each other in their haste to grab the food on display. "His music may be powerful, but it's no match for everyone's hunger. With him waiting until the harvest before attacking Hamelin, you might have a chance to get people to come to their senses."

"Maybe." William winced as a pair of maroon-clad guardsmen broke up the brawl below before snatching the stall's rations for themselves. If the rats were struggling to survive in Aerzen, Thomas was bound to have his work cut out for him too, especially once the first frost came. "I thought you wanted me to avoid the Piper?"

"I did, but..." Thomas blew out a long, slow breath. "If the rats are going to steal our lives from us, we might as well go down fighting. If you're half as good a musician as your hands say you are, we might actually stand a chance."

William rubbed the calluses covering his fingers. He'd earned the rough skin with countless hours of strumming, with the hard thickness shielding him from the strings' stinging. More than his musical ability, a single word tugged his lips into a smile. "You said 'we'."

"Can't have you face the Piper alone, can I?" Thomas said with a smirk that quickly faded as he glanced around to check their surroundings. Even up on the rooftop, he was always checking to make sure they weren't being watched. "I always come up here to listen to the Piper so I know what he's planning. Next time you come to Aerzen, meet me here, and I can tell you all about what he's been up to. Maybe you'll know how to play that song of his by then."

After Thomas led him as close to the general store as he could without Father potentially seeing them and asking all manner of unpleasant questions, William thanked the older boy profusely for everything he'd done for him. He watched him slip away with an ache in his heart. Though he was accustomed to returning to Father's side, it was not often he had to part from someone he could call a friend.

Father spent the whole ride home in a foul mood, though his grievances with the town meeting were far different from William's. "Bunch of heathens, the lot of them," he grumbled as he drove their cart back toward Hamelin. "Every week the whole town grinds to a halt so they can listen to their mayor prattle about nonsense. Haven't even bothered to rebuild their blasted church."

"Has Aerzen always been like that?" William asked. Though Thomas had told him the adults hadn't always been under the rats' control, he hadn't lived in the town long enough to know when the children had fallen victim to the rodents.

"It's been strange for quite a while, but it's gotten especially bad since a couple years ago." Father cracked the reins, earning a low moo of protest from the ox. "Why? You'd better not be getting any ideas from those heathens, boy."

"I'm not," William said quickly. "I just thought I should ask since I'll be going there more often now that I'm spending more time at the forge." As much as he hated to admit it, his apprenticeship to his father did have the benefit of giving him ample excuses to investigate the Piper.