Rattus Faber

From The Fifth City Wiki
(Redirected from Rat)

"You have rats: and some of the ratholes have been dynamited open, not gnawed. An infestation of L.B.s, aka rattus faber! Viciously intelligent rats who set traps for humans! No landlord or Constable will tangle with these."[1]

Rattus Faber are a species of sapient rats with a knack for tinkering and espionage.

Ecce Rodentis[edit | edit source]

The rarer and cleverer of the city rats - the dangerous ones - employ their tiny hands to marvellous effect, making tools and clockwork of unparalleled precision. They use these chiefly to set cat-traps, but can sometimes be employed by humans. Formally, one of these exceptional rats is rattus faber. Informally, it is an "L.B.".[2]

Caminus Yards Pneumatic Ratsender: "Get Rats Where Rats Are Required. Pneumatically."

The Rattus Faber are an extraordinary species of rat: sapient, bipedal[3] and capable of remarkable feats of engineering.[4] With deft paws and ingenious little minds, they craft intricate devices, weapons, and mechanical marvels[5][6] collectively known as ratwork.[7][8] Ratwork craftsmanship is highly prized; it is sold at the Echo Bazaar, as well as the rats' own mercantile haven, the Rat Market.[9]

Thanks to their diminutive size, Rattus Faber are well-suited to delicate maintenance work, and many are employed by humans to service fine mechanisms and machinery.[10] They are not without their quirks, however. They have a reputation for kleptomania,[11] and outside of their markets, they prefer to barter for goods rather than accepting human currency.[5] Entire subterranean factories staffed entirely by Rattus Faber operate beneath London, producing ratwork en masse on contract.[12][13] Some even work as couriers,[14] while a few work directly for Mr Cups, accompanying its Relickers on their rounds.

Rattus Faber have not replaced any of their counterparts in the Neath; there are certainly plenty of their non-sapient cousins,[15] who come in quite the variety of sizes.[3] Rattus Faber have been known to use ordinary rats as beasts of burden,[16] disposable infantry soldiers,[17][18] or even as food - cannibalism does not appear to be taboo among rats.[19] The average lifespan of this species is unknown, but shorter than a human lifespan.[20] Dead rats, sapient or not, are often tied up on strings and used as food among London's lower class;[21][22] members of the Topsy King's court are particularly fond of this delicacy.[23]

Despite their intelligence, most humans do not bother to distinguish Rattus Faber from their less intelligent cousins, and the Department of Menace Eradication awards bounties for killing any type of rat.[24] This is not thoroughly unwarranted, considering that Rattus Faber often invade homes[25] and occasionally ride tame sorrow-spiders into human dwellings.[26] Even rat-catchers often prefer to avoid confronting Rattus Faber,[27] up to and including being quite friendly with them instead.[28] Some savvy Londoners have learned to negotiate with rats, and may hire entire colonies to guard their homes and belongings.[29]

Social Structure[edit | edit source]

Ratty society in London appears as multifaceted as human society. Many rats maintain a surprisingly devout Anglican faith.[30][31][32] Baptized and churchgoing, they perform their own funerals, with rat-sized Bibles[33] and ordained rat-priests officiating burial rites.[34] Some rats are even officially canonized saints, or at least as officially as they can be.[35][36]

A more warlike subset of London's rats have divided themselves into tribes and gangs,[37] which frequently war over territory and resources; the aftermath of these tiny turf wars is often visible on the streets of London.[38][39] Within this class of rats are the Venge-Rats, who have been specifically trained in espionage and infiltration of human homes.[40] Legend has it that an old Venge-Rat family rejected a Christian baptism, and instead chose the lives of rogues;[41] these are the rats who scout ahead of their peers and establish footholds for future settlements, so the Department of Menace Eradication often uses Venge-Rats and their intelligence against their own kind.[42] Deceased Venge-Rats are skinned and made into boots sold at the Rat Market (very economical, these rats).[43]

A Rat Zailor

There is a large Rattus Faber population on Pigmote Isle, and they have a presence on Nuncio. They roam all over the zee, hiding on ships and sometimes zailing their own rat-vessels as pirates;[44] they can more or less be found anywhere, because they are rats at the end of the day. In Parabola, ratty dreams are hidden away in a place of their own called the Whisker-Ways.[45]

  • Algernon
    Algernon
  • The Rat Brigade
    The Rat Brigade
  • The Post Rat
    The Post Rat
  • A Talkative Rattus Faber.
    A Talkative Rattus Faber.
  • A Working Rat.
    A Working Rat.
  • A Rattus Faber Bandit Chief.
    A Rattus Faber Bandit Chief.
  • The Scuttering Squad. The best mercenaries the Neath has to offer.
    The Scuttering Squad. The best mercenaries the Neath has to offer.
  • An albino rat. Poor thing.
    An albino rat. Poor thing.
  • The Piebald Dreamer, a dashing adventurer
    The Piebald Dreamer, a dashing adventurer
  • Archbishop of St Algernon
    Archbishop of St Algernon
  • The Rodentine Panegyrist
    The Rodentine Panegyrist
  • The Deathless Chieftain
    The Deathless Chieftain
  • Formerly Talkative Bearer of the Sausage About Which Nobody Complains
    Formerly Talkative Bearer of the Sausage About Which Nobody Complains
  • A Ratronaut
    A Ratronaut
  • Mr Treats
    Mr Treats

Murine History[edit | edit source]

This section contains spoilers for the following Fate-locked content and Exceptional Stories: A Dream of a Thousand Tails, Sacksmas (Fate branches), and Death and Tax Evasion. Proceed at your own risk.

You can find out more about our spoiler policy here.

Information in this section may cite datamined story choices that are not accessible in-game. The canon status of this content is dubious.

You can find out more about our content guidelines here.

"In the endless tumult there are patterns and repetitions. History rhymes, echoing throughout the tangle. Rats live and rats die. They love and they invent. They make ticking wonders and timeless bonds. Ever-canny, ever-spreading, they trick and they believe and survive. Claws and paws and always-growing teeth. Bright and quick and small. The tide swells. The threads tangle. The myths conclude, and then repeat."[46]

The story of the Rattus Faber is a long and tangled chronicle. Their lives are brief, their bodies small, and so it is easy for outsiders (and sometimes even the rats themselves) to forget that they are a people with a history as rich as any other. What follows is a timeline of the L.B.s, pieced together from their myths and collective memory.

Pre-Awakening[edit | edit source]

"I am aware that rats dream, although they avoid my kin. Once, I think, their dreams took them to lands much farther away than these. Not so, since they were brought to speech."[46]

Little is known of this period, for the ancestors of the Rattus Faber were ordinary, speechless rats. One detail, however, stands out: before their awakening, the rats dreamed in a different quarter of the Is-Not, a realm set aside for creatures without speech.[47] There they dreamed of a single vision known as the Swarm.[48] The memory of that unity lingers still, shaping Rattus Faber society, most clearly reflected in one of the Prophet-King’s guiding philosophies.[49]

The Great Awakening[edit | edit source]

"You scamper in places dark and narrow. Light is the enemy. You re-experience the great awakening; you recall the man who fell to the depths and spilled words into tiny skulls. His tongue still binds you now."[50]

St Eligius

Once upon a time, during the era of the Third City, or possibly earlier, a goldsmith from Flanders named Eligius fell into the Neath.[51] Rats were the only other living souls he found there, so he befriended them.[52] and taught them all he knew.[53] In the process, he granted them sapience and the ability to speak, and thus the Rattus Faber were born.[54][55] He eventually ended up out in the Unterzee,[56] where his entourage of Rattus Faber may have helped him survive;[57] upon his return, he led the rats to the gates of the Fourth City to "demand their due".[58] Eligius' entourage of rats traveled in small chariots, bearing little instruments in their claws (Eligius, being an artisan, may have been the reason these rats have such proficiency with craftmanship). The Khatun was so taken with them that she granted them immediate entrance.[59]

The Prophet-King

Eligius, a faithful Christian, preached about a new, strange gospel[60] of "the word made flesh."[61] His teachings influenced the rats in a different direction than he probably expected,[62] causing things to get a bit out of hand. The rats devoured his tongue[63] and used it to "link their tails,"[64][65] becoming a telepathic rat king known as the Prophet-King,[66] that eventually connected all Rattus Faber in a gestalt consciousness.[67][68] Eligius could not abide what he had created;[69][70] he abandoned the rats[63] and fled west to Hell.[71] After some time, his cover was blown, and he was thrown out to zee again. The saint still lives underwater[72] and continues to bless rats with the gift of the gab to this day.[73]

The Rattus Faber made a pact with the Khan of Clutter for exclusive rights to scavenge the refuse of a Fallen City; this pact also banished foxes from London.[74][75] There are many stories as to how this occurred. According to one account, after their awakening to sapience, the Rattus Faber found purpose in the Neath’s refuse - treasuring what humans discarded. Their rivals were the foxes, servants of the Khan of Shards hoarding scraps for their master. The rats set up a scheme: they fought the foxes for items sure to displease the picky Khan, and guarded them fiercely. The foxes, intrigued, begged to trade. “For a price,” said the rats. And that was how the foxes offered up junk disguised as treasure, losing the Khan’s favor bit by bit. When the time was right, the Rattus Faber came to the Khan with true gifts, and a deal that would both seal the foxes' fate and ensured theirs.[76]

Post-Eligius[edit | edit source]

"Long ago – after the disappearance of the Saint – a group of great chroniclers strove to preserve his sacred teachings."[46]

After the disappearance of Eligius, the Rattus Faber had to record his teachings before time wore them away from their busy little minds. They founded a society called the Endless Chroniclers, an assembly of hooded rats dedicated to the sacred task of chronicling all ratty thoughts and deeds. Their histories accumulated more quickly than they could be written, and even a surge in the society's numbers could not keep pace with the overall population of Rattus Faber. Moreover, the Chroniclers found discrepancies in their own knowledge of the very truths they were supposed to preserve.[77][78][46] The Endless Chroniclers sought aid, and made a pact with a Fingerking known as the Knot of Tales, who promised that their stories would endure forever in Parabola - untouched, immutable, and perfect. All they had to do was visit its domain, the perilous Garden of Knots.[79] But once they made the perilous journey, both parties realized they were trying to pull a fast one on each other, and the bargain soured.[80] Neither side wanted the other to leave, so they trapped each other within the garden.[81] Over the course of centuries, they became entwined together, and eventually fused into a single entity[82] called the Knotted Tail.[83]

References[edit | edit source]

  1. ↑ A Bad Case of Rattus Faber, Fallen London
  2. ↑ Sidebar Snippet: Rattus faber?, Fallen London
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Employ rattus faber engineers, Sunless Sea "[...] The rat-foreman seems as confused as you. He looks at his feet and sketches a sign with his finger, a looping conundrum of a symbol. [...]"
  4. ↑ Employ rattus faber engineers, Sunless Sea "Rats sweep over your ship like tide! Day and night, their tiny tools click. Your crew step over them cautiously. Unfortunately, some complex rat-vendetta is at play here: warring rat-families decide to use your ship as a battleground. They're quite well-behaved about it, and the damage is minimal - but an unfortunate passing zailor gets a rat-bullet through the eye and drowns in the Thames. You protest, but the contract is clear - there is an exception for 'ocular perturbations.'"
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 Employ rattus faber engineers, Sunless Sea "The rats of Fallen London are remarkably skilled engineers; and they know ships well. They are not, however, reliable. Payment is in kind, not currency."
  6. ↑ Ratwork Derringer, Fallen London "Say what you like about the L.B.s, their metalworking skills are second to none."
  7. ↑ Ratwork Watch, Fallen London "So many dials! Moon-phase. (Pearl-powered.) Zee-currents. Bat migrations. Empress' Progress. Year of Death. Really? Is this a rat-prank? The -ping- of the cash-register almost drowns out a single tiny chime from the watch. The 'Purchase Interval' hand has just reached the end of its arc."
  8. ↑ Ratwork Pocket Piece, Fallen London "A gun that can be fired by the pressure of a single fingernail. Best not carried too close to the heart."
  9. ↑ The Rat Market, Fallen London "A crawling, squeaking, jostling hubbub, precariously perched on the rooftops overlooking Flowerdene Market. Of course, as the Rattus Faber will tell you, the Rat Market is the real market. The human one is but a sad imitation of the ratty glories to be found up here."
  10. ↑ Sigh and sell off the Working Rat, Fallen London "He doesn't want to be sold on, but it's not up to him. You show off his workmanship and don't let the purchaser meet him in advance. Your strategy works, and your rat is off to repair machinery at Mrs Plenty's Carnival."
  11. ↑ Rely on ratwork to keep your equipment in order, Fallen London "They climb inside your equipment. They make realignments. They adjust springs and prevent cogs from rusting; they redirect optics and polish lenses. They are probably not stealing anything that you really want to keep."
  12. ↑ A Dream of a Thousand Tails, Fallen London "A grimace and a hiss, as air escapes between long incisors. [...] "He works so hard. And he makes sure we do too. The contracts we have with Iron & Misery are how the family is able to live so well." You think back to the swarm of similar faces on the factory floor. It is a large family to look after."
  13. ↑ "Welcome to L.B. Industries!", Fallen London "L.B. Industries is a factory which fell with London, and then fell a little further. Inaccessible to Londoners, it was taken over by Rattus Faber. Ratty generations later, they still run the place, producing cotton and steel to trade with London, and weapons reserved for their own kind."
  14. ↑ A Letter from the Khanate, Fallen London "The rat postman knocks on your door at an inglorious hour. This is not a regular delivery."
  15. ↑ Making Your Name: A Contract for a Worryingly Large Rat, Fallen London "You're almost certain the ratskins used to make this thing belonged to the more ordinary variety of rat. Stands to reason. Rattus Faber are harder to catch."
  16. ↑ Employ rattus faber engineers, Sunless Sea "The rats are hardly an hour into their work when the trouble begins. Someone's surly, speechless rat-steed eats someone else's packed lunch. Someone's hot-blooded friend eats the rat-steed. The rats exchange cross words, then blows, then shots. The ensuing battle sweeps over your ship, and disappears down the dock. At least they didn't have time to eat much."
  17. ↑ Opening salvoes: launch an early offensive, Fallen London "With the guidance of the L.B.s, the lesser rats avoid poisoned bait and quench fires. They learn not to enter the room if you have a gun ready. Redoubled efforts are called for!"
  18. ↑ Opening salvoes: shore up your defences, Fallen London "They bring in sharp-toothed rats to gnaw into the sandbags, then form ratty chains to carry the sand away in tiny buckets. Pouring sand smothers a handful of them, but your defences are breached."
  19. ↑ The battle for the pantry: starve them out!, Fallen London "You're hungry. God, but you're hungry. The rats, however, are starving. You see a few set upon each other in their famishment, and you finish them off. The casualties mount in their ranks. This seems to be working, if you can stick at it."
  20. ↑ Shutting Down for the Day, Fallen London "We don't do the long days your lot do. Our lives are short enough."
  21. ↑ Keep your hands quick, Fallen London "You move through the crowd when the market is at its busiest, and much later when the costermongers yawn and rub their bristly chins. Your fingers are fast and you soon fill your burlap sack with little furry morsels."
  22. ↑ Unlikely customers, Fallen London "[...] the steaming rat-puddings are here. These urchins eat well, at least the ones in the more organised gangs do. Though when they each throw a rat into the air as 'the Masters' portion', none of the rats come down again."
  23. ↑ A Feast!, Fallen London "They will help you if you throw a feast for the whole beggar-court. They like rats. Oh God, how they like eating rats."
  24. ↑ The Rat-Catcher, Fallen London "...which brings us to one-hundred and fifty. That's for the drownie, you understand. We don't pay for live rats. Hang that L.B. on a string and we'll talk again. Meanwhile, if you're looking to squeeze it for secrets, may I suggest cheese deprivation? Rodents always crack when you deprive their cheese."
  25. ↑ A Bad Case of Rattus Faber, Fallen London "You have rats: and some of the ratholes have been dynamited open, not gnawed. An infestation of L.B.s, aka Rattus Faber! Viciously intelligent rats who set traps for humans! No landlord or Constable will tangle with these."
  26. ↑ Charge!, Fallen London "These rats aren't like most of their kin [...] A company of them are riding sorrow spiders!"
  27. ↑ A tactical opportunity: employ a rat-catcher, Fallen London "Rat-catchers prefer to avoid L.B.'s altogether, but here's a surly villain who'll take your money to deal with the creatures."
  28. ↑ A tactical opportunity: employ a rat-catcher, Fallen London "[…] in the pantry playing poker with a number of the more affable watch-rats. There is a nasty scene which ends when you forcibly eject the miscreant from your […] door. 'And don't come back!' you shout. Rats cheer drunkenly from an upstairs window. […]"
  29. ↑ The Rats in the Walls, Fallen London "Wealthy and paranoid Londoners have very particular ways of safeguarding the contents of their homes – like employing entire rat colonies as both an alarm and horrific trap."
  30. ↑ Deliver the bodies to their final end, Fallen London "This is a priest who has seen much, and heard more. When you lay the rats before him, his eyebrow raise is momentary, his soothing smile unfaltering. [...] "I don't recognise him, but I know those who might. [...]" The priest bids you wait, then heads in the direction of the clergy house pantry. When the priest returns, he presses a gift into your hand. "They wanted to thank you. For understanding. Most just dismiss their beliefs [,...]""
  31. ↑ Claim the crates cleared out of Saint Cyriac's Illuminated College, Fallen London "It appears that Saint Cyriac's has some trouble with infestations, and has recently seen fit to hire eradicators. [...] One rat was evidently held in special esteem by God's Editors. It has been wrapped in a tiny silk shroud and laid to rest in a cocoon of shredded theology."
  32. ↑ The Diminutive Vicar, Fallen London "He does, indeed, have a priest's collar the size of a wedding band wrapped tightly around his fat little neck. His stall is more of a pulpit. A tiny wooden structure atop which he perches, regarding the bustle of the market with beatific magnanimity."
  33. ↑ Oho! Ripe rats!, Fallen London "[…] the rats must have learnt to expect the depredations of your kind. A platoon of blunderbuss-wielding rat-sentinels bursts from cover! […] One rat-priest flings his peculiar Bible at you […] You find it later, lodged in your collar."
  34. ↑ Watch, Fallen London "Rat-mourners lay wreaths of lardy twine and pickled cabbage. Burlier rats inter one stiff-furred corpse after another, while white-collared rat-priests solemnly spit and trample on an image of St Gertrude de Nivelles. […]"
  35. ↑ Claim the crates cleared out of Saint Cyriac's Illuminated College, Fallen London "Nestled in the top of the pile is a delicately jewelled reliquary containing a rodent skull. A rolled scrap of paper records its hagiography: the Blessed Withernwick the Hooded, baptised first of all rodent-kind, at the Church of Saint Alban the Protomartyr in the early hours of January first, 1863."
  36. ↑ A golden find, Fallen London "Sanctified" "The body of a rat, mummified and set in a wooden box inlaid with gold and jewels. The rat's serene face gazes out through a wooden trellis, glass eyes left permanently open. But the box is missing one of its jewels – no, there it is."
  37. ↑ Consult with rats you know, Fallen London "The internecine warfare of the L.B. gangs is hard for outsiders to follow."
  38. ↑ Carnage on the street, Fallen London "Rat bodies and broken weapons carpet the alley near your lodgings. Overhead, the plaster face smiles smugly."
  39. ↑ Look for clues, Fallen London "Scattered bodies, most wearing masks or armbands of midnight blue. Plum-sized chunks knocked out of the brickwork by a ratwork cannon. Tracks in the muck where the cannon was dragged away. But the identities of the combatants are obscure to you."
  40. ↑ Venge-Rat Corpse, Fallen London "The L.B.s, the most cunning of ratkind, train venge-rats as instruments of their will. The well-disciplined venge-rat is a sneak-thief, an assassin, deadly intent on the ravagement of pantry and parlour."
  41. ↑ (Side) for the plaintiff in a civil suit of Rats against Urchins, Fallen London "The plaintiffs are the descendants of a venge-rat dynasty, their lineage long and august. For generations, they have performed acts of attack and sabotage – daring far beyond their size. Often, they have done this in the service of urchins and under the command of thieves. But there are old promises, made to their forebears when they first entered into venge-rattery – when they were first lured away from holier paths. These bargains were struck when their many-times-great grandmother declined baptism by Theophilus Withernwick, donned the leather cap of her new calling, and walked clear-eyed into the Flit."
  42. ↑ The Venge-Rat Waders, Fallen London "The Maundering Rat is solemn as he parcels up the heavy boots. "The skins are real," he says. "Canaries in the sewers those lads. They go first, the rest of us follow. Without the cunning of our volunteers, the Department would be shelling out for a lot more of our tails.""
  43. ↑ The Venge-Rat Waders, Fallen London "And he's made the bodies of the dead into footwear? The Maundering Rat shrugs. "They died for the community. I'm sure they wouldn't mind if they brought in a little profit to boot.""
  44. ↑ Rat Corsairs, Sunless Sea "Ah, the gully: the ambusher's favourite terrain feature. It looked like such a short and easy way. But now a sudden flood of black and white fur confronts you: a starving torrent of rattus faber corsairs! Their chief addresses you in a piping unhuman voice: "Easy there, me giants! We're in dire need, here. Lend us help, and we'll pay well for it. No need to fight." (But you notice his rat-hand is on the hilt of his rat-cutlass.)"
  45. ↑ A Dream of a Thousand Tails, Fallen London "The Piebald Dreamer frowns. "Why wouldn't we dream? We think. We invent. [...] Just because you don't see us doesn't mean we aren't here. [...] We have our own places, like the Whisker-Ways. But we're everywhere, too. You're just so used to ignoring us that you tend not to see us, even here.""
  46. ↑ 46.0 46.1 46.2 46.3 A Dream of a Thousand Tails, Fallen London
  47. ↑ A Dream of a Thousand Tails, Fallen London "I am aware that rats dream, although they avoid my kin. Once, I think, their dreams took them to lands much farther away than these. Not so, since they were brought to speech."
  48. ↑ A Dream of a Thousand Tails, Fallen London "Did the Rattus faber dream, before they were awakened with speech? Surely, somewhere, far from human dreaming. Perhaps their voiceless cousins linger still, dreaming of the Swarm in the tangled dreams of beasts."
  49. ↑ Ferret: Ferret's Baptism, Mask of the Rose "The swarm has neither name nor ambition. The swarm remembers and the swarm carries. You will not be left behind. You will fear neither fire nor water, nor the fall of cities [...] The swarm will be your cradle and your comfort. Blessed are the rats, who held faith where a saint could not. Blessed are the rats who carry sainted words in their bellies. Blessed is the swarm who sets you free."
  50. ↑ Death and Tax Evasion, Fallen London
  51. ↑ The Box of Saintly Whiskers, Fallen London "[...] a small crowd [...] gathers to hear the Maundering Rat's stories of St Eligius – how he was a goldsmith in Flanders before sinking down into a marshy polder and finding himself in the Neath; how he taught the rats of the Third City to make needle-like spears to do battle with cats, and wrestled with the horse-sized fish lice that live in the gills of zee-beasts..." [Editor's note: a polder is a patch of land that has been drained or reclaimed using dikes and lies below the surrounding ground level.]
  52. ↑ Harjit: Rodentine Powers, Mask of the Rose "A saint of rats, who came from Flanders apparently. Or fell. Supposedly taught the rats to speak, for they were the only souls he found down here."
  53. ↑ Ferret: After the Hulk, Mask of the Rose "The interesting thing is I've been talking to a few of the other rats. None as eloquent as our Algie. But I heard a few whispers of this rat-saint. That [...] he taught 'em how to navigate the letters and numbers."
  54. ↑ Death and Tax Evasion, Fallen London "You scamper in places dark and narrow. Light is the enemy. You re-experience the great awakening; you recall the man who fell to the depths and spilled words into tiny skulls. His tongue still binds you now."
  55. ↑ A Dream of a Thousand Tails, Fallen London "Before the dawn of whiskered speech, there was a man who fell without his book. He wrote upon his body in an effort to remember, for he held in his heart an impulse: the Word should not be lost."
  56. ↑ The Box of Saintly Whiskers, Fallen London "[...] a small crowd [...] gathers to hear the Maundering Rat's stories of St Eligius – how he was a goldsmith in Flanders before sinking down into a marshy polder and finding himself in the Neath; how he taught the rats of the Third City to make needle-like spears to do battle with cats, and wrestled with the horse-sized fish lice that live in the gills of zee-beasts..." [Editor's note: a polder is a patch of land that has been drained or reclaimed using dikes and lies below the surrounding ground level.]
  57. ↑ Ferret: After the Hulk, Mask of the Rose "Me: It seems unlikely he survived his descent alone. Ferret: Out at sea? The odds seem less'n favourable. Algernon: Saints have a habit of defying those. But it must have been long ago. We can only interpret."
  58. ↑ Ferret: After the Hulk, Mask of the Rose "Others say he taught the rats how to think as well as speak. And led them to the gates of the old city that was here, to demand their due. Eligius converted the rats. Or 'e was converted by 'em."
  59. ↑ Barqujin: Saint Eligius, Mask of the Rose "Ugh. I remember him. He came with his rats. Stinking of the zee, and them all capering behind. We remembered the plague of course. And its carriers. But they came in small chariots, bearing instruments aloft. He must have trained them en route. The Khatun was so taken with them, she gave them immediate entrance. Dreadful man. I have no idea what became of him. Nothing good, I hope."
  60. ↑ Mr Pages: Saint Eligius, Mask of the Rose "An unlooked for vexence. Eminent in his botheration. He claimed to have sunk from some marsh or mire. And wanderated the Neath preaching a new Gospel. The Age of Joachim, the Pentecostal Fire. From every living mouth to inspire. Or some other such doggerel. I did not pay undue heed."
  61. ↑ Moss: Purloined Books, Mask of the Rose "It is a hagiography of St Eligius, seemingly written in his own hand. The letters sear and dance upon the page. It describes a goldsmith who vanished from Flanders long ago, and fell beneath the earth. One traveller writes of meeting a man of mossy aspect, holding a goldsmith's lens. He used it to teach letters from a book written on his own skin, his Bible being lost in the descent. The text suggests he sought to teach those of varied forms about the word made flesh. And each teaching left himself changed. Until at the last, he underwent a sea-change. In traditional doctrine, Eligius' disappearance was his final miracle. But it seems down below, that was but his first of many."
  62. ↑ Death and Tax Evasion, Fallen London "'And so did St. Eligius descend unto the kingdom of the rats, and brought the message that was the flesh that was the word. And in our newfound wisdom, we fell upon the word with the fury of the starved, and took his tithe of flesh, and were rewarded.'"
  63. ↑ 63.0 63.1 Harjit: Rodentine Powers, Mask of the Rose "Once, we ate a saint's tongue. He gave us voice, before he abandoned us."
  64. ↑ Harjit: Rodentine Powers, Mask of the Rose "Many Rats: Now we are bound by his relic, a piece we took from him, which links our tails."
  65. ↑ Harjit: Rodentine Powers, Mask of the Rose "Harjit: With that many heads? Not to mention tails - all chained around a golden... relic? My eyesight is impeccable. It recommended me for this position."
  66. ↑ Harjit: Rodentine Powers, Mask of the Rose "We are the Prophet-King of St Eligius. Every rat is our concern."
  67. ↑ Harjit: Rodentine Powers, Mask of the Rose "Have you heard the ancient expression, which was preached unto us by Eligius? "If thy brother be grieved with thy meat, now walkest thou not charitably." We have fed fully upon the flesh that is the word. It has bound us in a community - a greater Ratdom. A crown of rats upon his head. When he beheld our many eyes he named us the angel of Ezekiel. Now we are bound by his relic, a piece we took from him, which links our tails. But look not to the old carrion; the word lives in our flesh. And though our bodies perish, the swarm persists. This is the greater Ratdom - Which extends across time, in a great chain of knotted pink tails. Nothing wasted; nothing forgot. One in many, many in one."
  68. ↑ Harjit: Rodentine Powers, Mask of the Rose "Oh yes, we are in many places. An eye unblinking behind the skirting board. A plaintive squeak beneath your bedpost. These things can be coincidence. Yet, though all rats are not the same, all are bound together. In us."
  69. ↑ Ferret: Ferret's Baptism, Mask of the Rose "You came. Most would balk. Even Saint Eligius did, at the last."
  70. ↑ Ferret: Ferret's Baptism, Mask of the Rose "Blessed are the rats, who held faith where a saint could not."
  71. ↑ Ferret: Algernon's Baptism, Mask of the Rose "Blessed Eligius, we venerate and adore. Blessed Eligius, we loathe and abhor. Blessed Eligius, who taught the swarm and forsook us. We swallowed his tongue. We filled our bellies on his sanctity. Freed from his holy fetters he fled to Hell, and there underwent a change."
  72. ↑ Ferret: The Story of Speech, Mask of the Rose "...But far below the water, I saw a glow - like gold beneath the waves. I thought I spied a man, much too large. He held a goldsmith's lens and a tail. He waved me on. I thought it a dream, as one has when on the verge of death –"
  73. ↑ Harjit: Rodentine Powers, Mask of the Rose "Me: Algernon certainly hasn't learnt to speak from you. He uses but the one tongue. Many Rats: Not from us. The Saint himself. But before he found Eligius, he was an idle rat we'd wager, fat on cheese and stolen trifle."
  74. ↑ Conspire with the rats, Fallen London "[...] A truce is reached: the rats will suffer the fox to stay – as long as it's under your custody. By remaining under your watchful eye, their ancient agreement with Mr Cups remains inviolate. [...]"
  75. ↑ The Mysteries, answered, Failbetter Games "'Why are there no foxes in the city?' Because Mr Cups denied them dominion over scraps and refuse; that was given instead to the rats."
  76. ↑ A Dream of a Thousand Tails, Fallen London "After their awakening, the Rattus faber found affinity with the detritus and the refuse of the Neath. In the waste of those bigger and clumsier, they found opportunity. In the overlooked and oft-scorned, they found beauty. And in the foxes who ruled over it, they found dire enmity. The steppe-beasts brought scraps to their Khan, and their Khan repaid in kind. So the Rattus faber plotted. They sought amidst the refuse-heaps and ejecta items that they knew would displease the picky Khan of Shards, and fought tooth and nail with the foxes to keep them. Soon enough, the foxes' curiosity was piqued; what had these creatures, so tiny and weak, seen that they had missed? Well, said the Rattus faber. For a price, we might let you take them. And so it was that the foxes lost the favour of their Khan, bringing for moon upon moon those objects that the rats had convinced them were treasures. The Rattus faber let this continue for as long as they dared – and then, when the Khan of Clutter's patience was thin as gossamer, they approached it with their own treasures. And with those treasures they brought a deal."
  77. ↑ A Dream of a Thousand Tails, Fallen London "[...] an order of hooded Rattus faber. In the dream, they've been entrusted with a holy duty – the chronicling of all of ratty thought and deed. But the histories mount up faster than they can write them. The order swells and grows, but the numbers of the Rattus faber grow quicker. And – yet worse – the members of the order disagree; on the proper order of things, on their task, on those precious events already passed, on histories that it is their duty to recall without fault nor error."
  78. ↑ A Dream of a Thousand Tails, Fallen London "But the world laughed at permanence. Words disappeared on the wind. Their writings were destroyed, or lost. Even their own memories began to fail, and they began to argue amongst themselves about the proper shapes of truth."
  79. ↑ A Dream of a Thousand Tails, Fallen London "So the Endless Chroniclers treated with a dreaming power for its aid. A being called the Knot of Tales, that spoke to rats in their sleep. It promised that the Chroniclers' stories would live forever in Parabola, perfect and changeless. All they needed to do was visit the Knot of Tales in its Parabolan abode – a place called the Garden of Knots, a treacherous, curious, many-coiled realm. The Chroniclers made the journey."
  80. ↑ A Dream of a Thousand Tails, Fallen London "Bid to tell our tales so that they could be preserved—" "—bound to listen, and to capture each upon a scale—" "—saw the cunning of our captor—" "—the cunning of our prey—" "—passed an endless tale from whisker to whisker, never ceasing—" "—hostage, by incautious terms, by endless tails and chronicles—" A sudden synchronicity once more. "And now we lie imprisoned, knotted by time and tale and tail."
  81. ↑ A Dream of a Thousand Tails, Fallen London "We sought [...] to prevent the serpent's escape, and blocked our entrance with ratwork and traps." The hooded rat is monotone. "—to prevent the ratlings' escape, and sealed our realm with mazes and plots." [...] And now, aeon-weakened, neither one thing nor the other, both layers of our protections are beyond our untangling."
  82. ↑ A Dream of a Thousand Tails, Fallen London "We need not be at odds. We contain all of your desires. We are one mind, grown from two, rat and king grown over and through and into each other by tale and time and necessity."
  83. ↑ A Dream of a Thousand Tails, Fallen London ""You may call us the Knotted Tail." A hundred heads bob at once. The Knotted Tail shifts its coils, so that the face closest to yours – and the Dreamer's – belongs to a rat, hooded and golden-eyed. Its mouth moves in concert with the rest of the horde. [...]"
Retrieved from "https://thefifthcity.wiki/w/index.php?title=Rattus_Faber&oldid=22381"