Soul Music - Quoth

'All right, all right! ' The bundle opened one eye, which swivelled around wildly until it focused on Susan. 'I warn you,' said the bundle, 'I don't do the N word.'

'I'm sorry?' said Susan. The bundle rolled over, staggered upright and extended two scruffy wings. The rat stopped kicking it. 'I'm a raven, aren't I?' it said. 'One of the few birds who speak. The first thing people say is, oh, you're a raven, go on, say the N word . . . If I had a penny every time that's happened, I'd-’

SQUEAK.

'All right, all right.' The raven ruffled its feathers. 'This thing here is the Death of Rats. Note the scythe and cowl, yes? Death of Rats. Very big in the rat world.'

The Death of Rats bowed.

'Tends to spend a lot of time under barns and anywhere people have put down a plate of bran laced with strychnine,' said the raven. 'Very conscientious.'

SQUEAK.

'All right. What does it - he want with me?' said Susan. 'I'm not a rat.'

'Very perspicacious of you,' said the raven. 'Look, I didn't ask to do this, you know. I was asleep on my skull, next minute he had a grip on my leg. Being a raven, as I said, I'm naturally an occult bird-'

'Sorry,' said Susan. 'I know this is all one of those dreams, so I want to make sure I understand it. You said . . . you were asleep on your skull?'

'Oh, not my personal skull,' said the raven. 'It's someone else's.'

'Whose?'

The raven's eyes spun wildly. It never managed to have both eyes pointing in the same direction. Susan had to resist trying to move around to follow them.

'How do I know? They don't come with a label on them,' it said. 'It's just a skull. Look . . . I work for this wizard, right? Down in the town. I sit on this skull all day and go “caw” at people-'

'Why?'

'Because a raven sitting on a skull and going “caw” is as much part of your actual wizarding modus operandi as the big dribbling candles and the old stuffed alligator hanging from the ceiling. Don't you know anything? I should have thought anyone knows that who knows anything about anything. Why, a proper wizard might as well not even have bubbling green stuff in bottles as be without his raven sitting on a skull and going “caw”-'

SQUEAK.

'Look, you have to lead up to things with humans,' said the raven wearily. One eye focused on Susan again. 'He's not one for subtleties, him. Rats don't argue questions of a philosophical nature when they're dead. Anyway, I'm the only person round here he knows who can talk-'

'Humans can talk,' said Susan.

`Oh, indeed,' said the raven, 'but the key point about humans, a crucial distinction you might say, is that they're not prone to being woken up in the middle of the night by a skeletal rat who needs an interpreter in a hurry. Anyway, humans can't see him.'

***

Soul Music - p31-33