The Blue Candle Society

Cyril surveyed his army of minions, arrayed below him.  Their ranks stretched for feet in either direction, from the culvert on one side to the low spot with the puddle where no one wanted to stand on the other.  Cyril’s enemy had thought him vanquished when he was dropped off near all the cows and windmills miles away, but he had not counted on Cyril’s alliance with the League of Groundhogs, who were in turn owed a favor by a pigeon, who had carried Cyril back home.

Now, before once again taking back the mailbox, he had amassed an army of rodents, now arrayed in the ditch below him, squeaking their fury to the sky.  He held up his paws, waiting for silence.

“Fellow mice!” he shouted.  “Voles, moles and shrews!  No longer will we be forced from the old boots and car seats that are ours by divine right!  Today, we take back our homes, and we begin with that mailbox!”  He pointed one paw at the mailbox that loomed over them in the gloom, basking in the cheers from his minions.  “Tonight,” he shouted, “we return to that mailbox, one at a time.  If one of us is seized and thrown into the hated cat litter bucket for the long journey into the countryside, another will take his place.  Again and again will we climb the post and enter the mailbox, until the enemy gives up.  That will be the first step.  Once the mailbox is ours, unequivocally, it will serve as our beachhead to the next stage, the paper tribute that appears within it the bedding for countless new homes!”

His army cheered, not seeing the smirk on his tiny face.  For he cared nothing for the living arrangements of the other rodents.  Once he’d used them to regain the mailbox they could go hang for all he cared.  For if Cyril had ever been a good-hearted rodent, he had become twisted in the battle for the mailbox, and he was now a manipulative creature, more weasel than mouse.

That night, the assault began.

~ by smwilliams on September 20, 2012.

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