Free The Mousehunter by Alex Milway Page B

voice dropped to a hush and she placed a finger over her lips. “We’d best be quiet in here. These are all the mice that aren’t for sale, and they are so easily woken. They do make such a racket when they’re awake!”
    Drewshank suddenly realized the room was filled with cages of all sizes, and within them were mice of all kinds. He’d been too preoccupied with Beatrice to notice before, but now he realized there were also metal bolted doors on each wall, and some even had bars protecting their circular windows. The Trading Center spread out much more than its small front let on.
    “So you still have a thing against mice . . . ,” he said.
    “Such smelly little creatures. But Isiah does like me to be in charge here. He says I have a knack for spotting good breeding, and on that point I’d have to agree. We’re currently involved in Snapper Mice breeding trials . . . .”
    “Breeding trials?” queried Drewshank, his voice squeaking like a mouse.
    “ . . . and, funnily enough, I do quite like to see the results,” she added.
    “The results?” queried Drewshank once more. He received no reply; instead Lady Pettifogger took a sharp turn onto a staircase and led the way upward.
    As usual, Lady Pettifogger was dressed provocatively, in a flowing yet well-fitting red dress, and Drewshank looked on gloomily as she vanished upstairs. He had a terrible feeling that the evening was going to end badly.
    “I knew Mousebeard would be an offer you couldn’t refuse,” she said knowingly, opening a door to a glowing orange room, filled with the warmth of a roaring fire. She showed him to a chair and poured him a glass of wine.
    “We’d have been closer to our goal too, but you can’t account for sea monsters,” he said, sitting down in an upright and slightly guarded manner. He knew better than to trust her.
    “I take it that the ship’s still in one piece?” she said, hopefully.
    “Just about,” he replied. “We’re lucky the shipwrights work quickly here in Hamlyn.”
    “It’s amazing what a bunch of pirates can achieve when they put their skills to something useful,” she said. “They also make very good spies.”
    Lady Pettifogger took a folded map from a tabletop, and passed it to Drewshank. “Without them we wouldn’t have this!”
    Drewshank unraveled the browning parchment; it was hand-drawn, and a detailed chart of the seas that surrounded Old Town and Hamlyn, as well as many far-off lands. Islands were sprinkled over it like lily pads, and in the top corner was a wide red circle, scratched into the map in what looked like blood.
    “As you know, Lovelock has many contacts around the Great Sea and beyond. We’ve noted every attack Mousebeard’s made in the past few months and plotted them on the map with tiny black mice. We believe that the pirate’s hideout is located at the far reaches of the Cold Sea, somewhere in that red circle on the map. It’s beyond his usual hunting ground, but we don’t know the exact coordinates. It is said that he hides on an island so tall and impenetrable that no one has ever been able to scale the cliffs that lift it into the sky. If you do come across his lair, you may have to find a way past such obstacles if you’re to capture him.”
    Drewshank looked a little amazed by Lady Pettifogger’s information.
    “So, our target is simply the Cold Sea? Beatrice, I’d have thought your spies would come up with more than this!” he said.
    “Oh come on! You’re the best captain there is, Devlin. If you head north and use the map and your wits, you’ll surely succeed.”
    “Well, that’s not in doubt; like you say, I am one of the greatest privateers who ever lived! But even so, Lovelock seemed to think that you had
useful
information for me!”
    Lady Pettifogger leaned toward Drewshank, who shuffled back further into his chair.
    “This is Mousebeard we’re talking about, Devlin,” she said, smiling sweetly and holding her arms out. “I’ve told you all