Lords of Trillium Read Online Free PDF Page B

nothing to do with the evil inside her. Even in her younger days, her malice was legendary.”
    â€œYou escaped the lab—Prince Pharmaceuticals—during the fire, did you not?” asked Silvius, staring blankly at the broken shards of his teacup that had landed in the fireplace. His gaze seemed trapped in some far-off place. “That fire . . . those of us who escaped with our lives, we were all very fortunate.”
    â€œWhat do you mean,
we
?” asked Billycan, his whole body rigid. “You were in the lab, weren’t you?”
    Silvius bowed his head. “Yes, I was . . . but that’s one part of my history I’d prefer
not
to remember. Somehow, though, it’s the only part I can’t seem to forget. It seems you’d like to forget it as well.”
    â€œYou were given the shots too, then,” said Billycan.
    â€œBack in the lab, they weren’t just giving rats shots. Theywere taking from us, too. I wasn’t given shots. In that way, I was lucky. My torture involved something else entirely.”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    Silvius pointed to Billycan’s chair. “Please, sit.”
    Billycan’s eyes drifted to the chalk-covered walls and ceiling. What he had thought was a madman’s maze of scribbles began to take proper shape. He wasn’t staring at the ravings of a lunatic. He hadn’t recognized it at first; maybe he hadn’t cared to. He was staring at a large map—a map of Trillium.
    Evening had set in. Ajax snored in his chair. A place to rest his bones and a crackling fire were all that it took to put him fast asleep. Billycan was wide awake.
    â€œTell me,” said Silvius, reclining in his chair. “Why did you come here—to Tosca?”
    â€œTo get away,” Billycan replied. “I told you of my past. Staying in Trillium was a constant reminder of it. I thought I could do some good in Tosca, do
something
, at any rate. I’d heard of the harsh jungle conditions, the rough way of life here. . . . I can’t erase what I’ve done, the pain I’ve caused so many that will never go away, but coming here—I thought in some small way, perhaps, I could do a little good.”
    â€œA very noble reason, young rat, but why did you come
here
? There are scores of places in the world where rats’ lives are less than tolerable. Why did you choose this place over all others? What got you to this
precise
location?”
    Billycan pondered the question. There
were
many other places he could have gone, and done just as much good, places much closer and easier to get to. “I—I don’t know. Something just
drew
me here. I cannot explain it.”
    â€œAll these rats”—Silvius nodded at Ajax, snoring softly in his chair—“the rats who so freely allowed you to lead them, justas they did me, they are descended from Trillium rats. Only they don’t know it. Just as you were, their forefathers were driven to this island. Something inborn
impelled
them here, a compulsion they could not control.”
    â€œBut what?” asked Billycan.
    â€œThat’s what I’m trying to determine. Sadly, much of Tosca’s history is lost. The tropical environment, the constant humidity have rotted away much of their written words. We tried our best to preserve what we could over the years, but our archives are nearly destroyed.” Reaching into a wooden cask next to his chair, Silvius retrieved a large rolled-up parchment. “Here, take the other end.”
    Unrolling it together, he and Billycan gazed upon a faded map. The map depicted a portion of the vast Hellgate Sea, with three coastlines around it. “Here is the coast of Tosca,” said Silvius, tapping it. He ran his claw all the way to the other side of the map. “And here is the coast of Mastiff County, the swamp you ended up in.”
    Billycan studied the center coastline.