Gratitude

[rodentus_callidus]

Gratitude. Hmmm. I have decided I shall be cheerful about this one. It will be an interesting experiment, tchu?

What does a miserly little rat like me feel grateful for?

Life. Always that. A continuing and constantly renewed gift offered by enemy and friend alike, and one I will always thank them for. I have kissed many an enemy paw, and meant it, for the gift of an hour, a day, a week. Time enough to stab them in the back, and surely that must be the most princely of gifts, to offer me life when it costs them so. *chuckles* And some even knew it before the fact. Princes among rats, they were.

Ah. Freedom. A gift maintained by a very precarious series of favours, sacrifices and luck, and all the more precious for the fragility of it. *laughs* I am not Wekha, I am not Polizei, I am not Family despite my birth. I am not Overlander, nor a true citizen of Carogne. I am the thing between, the rat in the gaps, and it grants me untold freedoms, for the price of little slaveries. A prize worth paying, and I am grateful for the ability to pay it, too.

Blindness. *grins* Yes. I mean that truly. Surprised? But a blind rat, little weakling like me, so small and frail and helpless ... *laughs* No false weakness could ever grant me the advantages the price of my birth gives me every day. A pretense is a constant danger. The price of a lie, a knowing subversion, is so much greater than the price of genuine weakness. Pity and scorn are gifts fit for kings, for the power they grant the recipient. Tchu! Kings should be so lucky! *laughs* I am at a constant disadvantage in all my dealings, and everyone knows it. Such an asset deserves all the gratitude I have to give.

*little twitch, serious again* Friends. Friends are ... impossibly good to have. Jan. Isaac. Some others, too, which I shall not mention for fear of listening ears. *chuckle* Secrets not mine to tell, dangers not mine to share. You understand, ja? But I value them, for all that few but me will ever know of them, and the roles they play in this game called Carogne. *tilts head a bit* I wonder are they grateful for me. *muses* Not much to be grateful for, perhaps. But then, it is the little things we treasure most, or should, nein?

Speaking of ... well-organised spaces. Subtle scents that don't try to blind me. Small spaces that let me use my whiskers to best effect. Warmth. A hundred thousand times. *chuckles* Perhaps I shall ruin future negotiations by saying this, but give me even a minute's warmth, and there is little I will not do for you. Food and alcohol are up there, too, but warmth will earn you as much loyalty as a little mischling like me is capable of. Sorka, magnificent terror that she is, figured that out very quickly. Well, she would. She prizes it as much as I. Warmth, gentleness, company in the dark. Such little things, to form an alliance as fraught as ours, but sometimes ... Love is not something we are very good at, she and I, but this we can give, and understand, and trust. Simple, nein?

More complex ... I am a doctor for many reasons. It keeps me alive, kept me alive. My first years ... but you don't need to know that, tchu. Let us simply say that my trade, my ability to learn it, were the difference between life and death for more than my patients. But I loved it. Love it. It is not much. I am limited by my deformity, my blindness. Surgery is beyond me, for most things. But what I can do, what I can fix ... it is good. I am grateful for it. *shakes head, chuckles wryly* Between the two, between harming and healing, perhaps I am better at the former, but it is the latter that I love, the latter that gives me ... I have not the word. But I love it, and I am grateful for it.

Simple things. Dangerous things. Fundamental things. These are the things I am grateful for. And most of all ... the chance to have them. To seek them.