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run.”
    â€œThank you for reminding this company of my prowess, Your Highness,” Swiss said with dignity, while the others had the grace to look ashamed. “There may in fact be another alternative to swimming. Warriors, look about for something to use as a raft.”
    After some nosing around, Corncob found an old wine crate that had gotten caught up in a clumped eddy of straw and refuse. Swiss held on to one of the wooden slats with his tail as the rest of us piled in; then he pushed it into the current and took a flying jump to land inside.
    We were off, at a spanking pace.
    â€œNice, eh?” Swiss said, and grinned at me.
    â€œHeroically uncomfortable,” I replied as I watched my warriors scramble about with every roll of the leaky wooden craft.
    We knew we had reached Castle Wendyn when we caught sight of a stairway carved with the seal of the human royal family of Angland. We leapt off our crate and swam over to the steps, ran up them single file, and emerged in the palace dungeons.
    â€œDon’t bother to dry yourselves,” I announced in a low tone. “We must find a source of clean water and wash in it. All the stealth in the world will do us no good if our stench betrays our presence to the humans.”
    As things turned out, the most hazardous part of our inbound mission was the washing up. When we located a pail of water by a set of stone stairs leading up and out of the dungeons, we plunged ourselves into it one by one to get the task done. Just as the last of us was finishing, we heard the approach of a palace guard. The situation would still have been fine had not Truffle, in her haste to quit the wooden bucket, knocked it to the stone floor with a loud clunk.
    â€œHey!” the guard shouted, rounding the corner and chasing us. “Dirty, disgusting creatures. I’ll chop off your tails!”
    Greatness is often misunderstood in this world.
    Truffle apologized while we squeezed safely inside a narrow crack in the stone wall. I turned to her with reassuring words on the tip of my tongue. However, before I could utter them, the voice of a strange rat came from behind us.
    â€œWhat is your mission here, visitors to the Southern Rat Realm?”
    Royal sigh. I had hoped to do this swiftly, in and out, with no inconvenient encounters with Princess Mozzarella or her people. I pushed forward to face the owner of the voice, a gnarled little gray rat with extremely large eyes.
    â€œHail, Southern Realmer,” I said. “I am Prince Char of the Northern Rat Realm.”
    He appeared duly impressed and bowed and twittered a bit.
    I calmed him down by saying, “We wish to pay a visit to Her Highness, Princess Mozzarella.” I gave Swiss a look that warned him not to comment upon this blatant falsehood. Then I smiled at the gray rat. “Will you lead us to her?”
    He gave an excited bounce and replied, “With pleasure!”
    We followed our guide through a convoluted series of burrowed passages into a dark throne room of such squalor, such disarray, you would not believe me if I tried to describe it in detail. The last time I’d visited Mozzarella was many years before, and the place had been a sty even then. Now it was almost impassable, with droppings, dry bones in piles, and dust everywhere.
    The Southern Realmers lived in the royal castle of the humans, and this was the best they could achieve?
    â€œWhy, if it isn’t the handsome Prince Char!”
    The luscious, languid voice came from a black rat so enormously plump, you would surely have taken her for a woodchuck had you encountered her in the dark. Yet I doubted whether anyone would ever encounter her anywhere but in the throne room itself these days, for I could not imagine how she was able to move with so much bulk around her middle.
    She was surrounded by various courtiers in similar states of poundage.
    â€œAt least we need not fear a swift attack,” Swiss