The White Assassin Read online

  The White Assassin

  THE NIGHTSHADE CHRONICLES

  BOOK I

  Nightshade City

  BOOK II

  The White Assassin

  BOOK II OF THE NIGHTSHADE CHRONICLES

  The White Assassin

  HILARY WAGNER

  Holiday House / New York

  Text copyright © 2011 by Hilary Wagner

  Illustrations copyright © 2011 by Omar Rayyan

  All Rights Reserved

  HOLIDAY HOUSE is registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

  www.holidayhouse.com

  ISBN 978-0-8234-2453-5 (ebook)w

  ISBN 978-0-8234-2687-4 (ebook)r

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Wagner, Hilary.

  The white assassin / Hilary Wagner.—1st ed.

  p. cm.

  Sequel to: Nightshade City

  Summary: Snakes, bats, and rats join forces to save Nightshade from Billycan and

  his horde of brutal swamp rats, aided by an antidote to the drug that made Billycan

  the way he is, but the revelation of secrets proves an even more powerful weapon

  in the fight for peace.

  ISBN 978-0-8234-2333-0 (hardcover)

  ISBN 978-0-8234-2485-6 (paperback)

  [1. Fantasy. 2. Rats—Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.W12417Whi 2011

  [Fic]—dc22

  2011009579

  For Lenny Lee,

  a very brave young writer

  “Rats Rule!”

  Contents

  Acknowledgments

  Chapter One: A Gathering in a Chapel

  Chapter Two: The Horde

  Chapter Three: Dig Him Up

  Chapter Four: A Dead Boar

  Chapter Five: A Stealer of Family

  Chapter Six: A Dark Morning

  Chapter Seven: Billy

  Chapter Eight: A New Council

  Chapter Nine: A Secret

  Chapter Ten: Lenore

  Chapter Eleven: Violent Tendencies

  Chapter Twelve: Suspect

  Chapter Thirteen: Appalling Tea

  Chapter Fourteen: The Parchment

  Chapter Fifteen: A Well-Timed Visit

  Chapter Sixteen: Born on Hallowtide

  Chapter Seventeen: A Clutch of Crows

  Chapter Eighteen: Spirit of a Lion

  Chapter Nineteen: Of Fish and Family

  Acknowledgments

  The rats of Nightshade are family to me and would not exist without my own family. Many thanks to my husband, Eric, who gives me extraordinary ideas, inspiring me to lead my rats to places they never expected to go. My son, Vincent, gives me the outlook of a growing boy—what interests him, what makes him happy, and what drives him nuts—which is a lot! Thanks, V! My daughter, Nomi, inspires me to keep wondering about everything and keep learning about the world around me with wide-eyed amazement on all the things I still don’t know about. Thanks, Chip Chop!

  Thanks to my agent, Marietta Zacker, who has the good grace to put up with me on a regular basis—and still keep talking to me! Heaps of thanks to my editor, Julie Amper. Once again, she worked tirelessly with me, making The White Assassin the very best it could possibly be. Billycan thanks you too and is glad you liked the brownies he made.

  Last but not least, thank you to everyone who supported Nightshade City.I never thought so many people would read my books. Please don’t stop! The rats have a lot more to say!

  CHAPTER ONE

  A Gathering in a Chapel

  AGAINST A FULL ORANGE MOON that seemed to punch the night sky, eight members of the Mastiff County brown bat colony silently wheeled through the dark, each clutching a Nightshade rat in its claws. The rats, airborne for the first time, tightly gripped the legs of their bat escorts, staring nervously at the swamp below. Lofty white oaks and cypress trees, steeped in hanging moss, smothered the ground, curling under the rats’ feet like ancient beings too aged to stand erect, their spidery branches beckoning the newcomers into their secret world.

  Vincent bristled as they swept over the plantation manor, a ghostly whitewash against the black, its broken windows like rotting teeth, flaunting a ghoulish grin. Fitting, he thought. Where else should the rat dwell—the White Assassin, as the creatures of the swamp had so aptly named him. He glanced over at Victor, who gazed wide-eyed at the vast swamplands, then over at Carn, who suddenly twisted in the bat’s grip, jolting as an owl screeched from the shadows. Carn grunted as his escort squeezed him tighter, the bat warning him that it was not the time for such fidgeting, not unless Carn wished to be dropped into the bog and quickly consumed by whatever lurked below. Vincent knew well why Carn was so nervous, and it had little to do with their treacherous journey across the swamp. Carn faced a far more dangerous mission, one that would have even the toughest of rats quaking in fear.

  Chief Elder Dresden soared down to the chapel at breakneck speed, his oversized wings unfurling as he prepared to land. Dangling precariously in Dresden’s grasp, Juniper examined the bats’ swampland home. It was a crumbling chapel, rotted by time and the elements to a deathly black. Its steeple leaned at an exaggerated angle, held upright only by the towering trees around it. All the windows and doors had long since disappeared. Fat, gnarled tree limbs and creepers grew through the openings, rambling endlessly across the chapel floor and up the crumbling walls.

  One by one, the bats carried the rats into the chapel through a gaping hole in the steeple. Vincent’s skin prickled as he took in the bizarre scene. The walls were adorned with peculiar symbols and massive paintings of ferocious fanged snakes in luminescent colors being flung into fire and chopped to pieces by swords wielded by black-cloaked humans. A secret sect once lived in the chapel, Dresden had explained, using snakes as part of their religious sacrifice.

  Swooping up a staircase, Dresden flew to a round oak podium overlooking the chapel’s pews. A lone torch stood on the podium, resting crookedly in its rusted iron stand, its flames illuminating the painted serpents. Dresden released Juniper as he landed on the podium. The rest of the bats followed, dropping off the other rats behind Juniper, and then flying to the ceiling in one smooth motion. While the rats were relieved to be back on land—or close to it—they remained edgy, unsettled by the flickering images of hideous writhing snakes all around them.

  Dresden gave a shrill cry. The rats covered their ears, the sound excruciating. Within seconds, tiny eyes popped out from the darkness. Wings opened from their cocoon-like closures, and bat after bat softly fell from the rafters, easily navigating the web of tangled branches, elegantly plunging to the pews below and landing one next to the other as if waiting for a Sunday sermon. Juniper was awed by the speed and precision of the colony. If only we Nightshade rats could organize so swiftly, he thought.

  Dropping from the ceiling, Cotton and Telula, Dresden’s children, took position behind their father while the others continued to gather.

  “They’re here,” whispered Cotton to his father. “Our borders are secure. As agreed, they have come alone.” Dresden nodded. He looked at the Council and motioned to the chapel’s entrance.

  Two huge snakes entered, rolling down the center aisle, winding up and twisting down the trees and vines that grew through the floorboards, finally reaching the front row of pews. With an inquisitive gaze they eyed the bats and rats, then glided up the side of the pew where they abruptly stopped, staring intently at the freakish snake paintings on the wall—grim reminders of why no snake had dared venture into the chapel for generations. The pair exchanged glances, gliding from the railing onto the pew. Droppings fell from anxious young bats still up in the rafters, petrified by the slithering creatures their parents had always warned them
about.

  Juniper approached, cautious but undaunted. The mission was far too vital to give in to any dread a snake could inspire. “Greetings, new allies,” he said, “thank you for coming tonight. I’m aware this chapel is not a welcome sight for your kind, but there was no other place for us to safely gather. I am Juniper, Chief Citizen of Nightshade City, and these others are all members of our esteemed Council. We have traveled to your swamp from the north based on information from our old friend Dresden.”

  Dresden, whose feet weren’t meant to walk on land, came forward in an awkward spider-like crawl that made him the most vulnerable to the snakes. He stood between Juniper and Carn, the closest he had ever been to a snake, the bats’ sworn enemy. “Welcome, snake leaders. I am Dresden, Chief Elder of the Third Chapter of the Mastiff County brown bat colony.”

  The banded snake spoke first, a large female, bigger than her companion. She was striped in wide segments of red, black, and yellow, her scales glistening like colored glass in the torchlight. She turned her head from side to side. “Thank you for your welcome, one and all,” she said in a raspy tenor. “I am Silt, leader of the scarlet king snakes.”

  Victor nudged Vincent. “I thought snakes couldn’t hear,” he whispered.

  “That’s a myth,” answered Vincent. “They hear—just in a different way. They feel the vibrations from our voices and translate them into speech.”

  “He’s right,” said the other snake in a throaty voice. “Why, I heard you just fine, young rat!” The snake laughed, causing his buttery skin to pulsate. His black, forked tongue, flanked by glowing white fangs, sputtered wildly from his mouth. Victor twisted uncomfortably, wincing at the sight of shiny, sharp teeth. “I am Wicker, leader of the rat snakes. Ironic, I know.” He slowly coiled his long body around itself. “We wish you no harm. As you are well aware, snakes have long preyed on your kind—rats, bats, any meat we can safely digest. But now we must cease this practice. We must join forces with you against a common enemy.” The snake’s eyes narrowed. “Over the last three years, the white rat has killed vast numbers of our kind, slipping into our nests under cover of night. We’ve found many of our brothers’ and sisters’ bodies in the woods, gutted, his stench all over them. He is the only rat who has ever had the power and cunning to kill us. Never have we seen a rat so fast, so sly, so strong. We have tried to catch him, but he is a shrewd one. He has no business in this swamp. His tactics are dissolute—unnatural.” Wicker glanced at the wall, snorting at the painted snake that glared back at him. “He is as unnatural as this chapel.”

  Silt twisted toward Dresden. “Is this the one your sentinels speak of? The one who knows the white rat well?” she asked, sticking out her blood-red tongue at Juniper.

  “Yes,” answered Dresden. “I’d say he knows him better than most. Juniper …”

  “I won’t waste your time,” said Juniper to the snakes. “Billycan is everything you say and more. Thanks to Dresden’s intelligence reports, we know Billycan is planning a grand-scale attack, using his brutal horde of swamp rats to invade Nightshade, to slaughter us and any rat who stands in the way of what he wants—and what he wants is our city.” He looked at his Council and then back to the bats and snakes, his voice filling the chapel. “With your help, we can save our city. With our help, you can save yourselves. If we work together, we can capture him and stop his bloody reign forever.”

  Cocking her head, Silt stared fixedly at Juniper. “Capture him? Why not kill him?”

  “We Nightshade rats have sworn an oath not to kill another creature unless absolutely necessary, not even Billycan. In our investigations we have discovered a serum created by human scientists, military scientists—one that forces their enemies to reveal the truth.”

  “And how will this truth serum help us?” asked Silt skeptically.

  “Soon after we’ve injected him, Billycan will reveal all. We can find out if he’s planning a major attack on the swamp snakes. Are there other proposed targets? Has he spies hidden in Nightshade, other allies with troops ready to attack even without Billycan? So you see, this cure will not only neutralize him, it will give us information vital to our safety, to our peace.”

  “Peace,” said Silt with a sigh. “Something we haven’t felt in three wearing years. Chief Citizen, how do you intend to capture the White Assassin and bring us such peace?”

  Juniper put a paw on Carn’s shoulder. “This one knows Billycan better than anyone in Nightshade.” Vincent and Victor watched hopelessly, knowing there was nothing they could say to change their friend’s mind. “Carn was a Kill Army soldier, working directly under Billycan’s command for eleven years. He knows his ways, his habits—his malice—firsthand. Carn will go undercover to infiltrate the horde.”

  An unnatural sound erupted from the bowels of the rusty phonograph, forcing out the old human’s theatrical sermon, his grainy voice sounding through the halls of the manor. “We come here tonight to celebrate de snake, under whose help gather all who share dis faith.”

  The cat fell to the floor. Billycan lifted its limp orange chin. The white rat cocked his head, examining the dead animal. The thing didn’t appear to have much flesh on it, but it would do. Other than fish, turtles, and frogs, the swamp didn’t have much to offer in the way of food. Poachers had killed off the gator population decades ago. He was told there were packs of wild boars that roamed the swamp, but he had yet to see one. Billycan was sick to death of turtles, and loathed the briny taste of frogs. After so many meals of oily fish, the thought of them was beyond stomach-turning. Cat meat was a welcome reprieve, no matter how meager.

  Three years he’d been in the swamp now. After escaping the Nightshade rats, Billycan hadn’t planned to end up here, but here he was, lord of the swamp rats, who found him so intriguing with his snow-white fur and neon-red eyes. They hailed him as a mystic sent to guide them. He grinned devilishly at the thought—him a sage, a spiritual leader. How pitifully funny!

  The swamp rats were slow-witted and simple, making them easy to control, at least when they weren’t acting like spoiled children. They had nowhere near the intellect of Trillium-born rats.

  Slapping his ivory tail against the rotting floor of the manor, Billycan yelled to Cobweb and Montague to light the fire pit in the back of the plantation.

  The fervor in the priest’s voice grew louder, and the phonograph trembled as if terrified by his words. “Papa Twilight say don’t fear the fiend that come to kill ya. Look him in those red devil eyes and let him know you gonna win!”

  Dragging the cat by the tail, Billycan smiled broadly as he made his way to the back door of the manor. That was his favorite part of the sermon.

  The flames licked the skinned cat as Cobweb and Montague turned the spit. The swamp rats sat in a crooked circle around the bonfire, staring at the searing carcass like tongue-wagging jackals. Billycan sat above them in a crude throne that Cobweb had carved for him out of a fallen bald cypress.

  The lord of the swamp rats stared vacantly at the flames, his red eyes lightening to a cool orange. Lazily he scratched his snout, feeling the raised trail of blackened skin that traveled across his face—a souvenir of his clash with Juniper, who had anchored his claw at the corner of Billycan’s eye, snagging it like a fishhook and creating a deep scar across his muzzle. He watched the cat meat brown. What a grisly way to die burning must be, he thought. How merciful of me to have killed the thing first.

  Despite the fact that Billycan had managed to inflict more damage on Juniper—gouging out his eye—he vowed revenge on his mortal enemy. He would exact his pound of flesh. Juniper had done more than scar Billycan. He’d taken everything from him. Soon Billycan would take it all back.

  Ravenously hungry, Billycan rapped four hard claws against the side of his crude wooden throne. The swamp rat horde could sit still no longer. He watched with little interest as a young female hurled a rock at the head of another. Her victim, a male, went down instantly, smacking the ground, blood trickling from his
temple. The rat eventually pulled himself to his feet, wobbled a bit, and then laughed hysterically. Still dizzy from the blow, he fell back to the earth and lost consciousness. A gaggle of young females, including his attacker, gathered around him, giggling wildly and jumping up and down with glee.

  “Imbeciles,” muttered Billycan to himself. He knew if he didn’t get back to Trillium soon he would surely lose all patience, taking out his rage on the swamp rats, tearing the lot to shreds. He was not meant to stay in this wretched swamp, with its swarms of insects and unrelenting heat, king to a mob of mindless fools.

  At least he had Cobweb and Montague, his seconds-in-command. They were smart and they, too, were transplants. The two brothers had come by train when they were small boys—possibly from Trillium, for all they knew. Soon after they arrived, their entire family had been eaten by a pack of corn snakes. Cobweb and Montague were the only ones who’d escaped, finding sanctuary with the swamp rat horde.

  When Billycan arrived in the swamp, they immediately took to him. He understood them. The brothers found that living with the horde was like dealing with children who never grew up. One after another they’d wander off, getting themselves eaten by snakes.

  Snakes had always been a huge threat to the swamp rats. Billycan quickly put a stop to it. One night he crept into a nest of twenty rat snakes and slashed the family to pieces. He left just one of them alive, telling her that he spared her so she could warn the other snakes of the vicious White Assassin.

  Billycan issued an ultimatum: the plantation and its grounds were now off-limits to the snakes. If a snake was caught on the premises, Billycan would kill it and then a dozen more of its kind as punishment. If a swamp rat was foolish enough to leave the plantation, the snakes could have at it. After seeing the carnage left by the oversized white rat, the snakes grudgingly agreed.