'I hoped it would be better than this,' said Dangerous Beans. 'But it turns out we're just... rats. As soon as there's trouble, we're just... rats.'


'I hoped we could be more than rats,' said Dangerous Beans. 'I thought we could be more than things that squeak and widdle, whatever Hamnpork says. And now...

…

'You're all talking?' he said, at last.
'Yes, sir,' said Nourishing.
'So... who's doing the listening?' he said.

'We're getting round to that,' said Maurice.


…

And there are lectures about the Rat Tax and how the whole system works, and how the rats have a town of their own under the human town, and get free use of the library, and even sometimes send their young rats to the school. And everyone says: How perfect, how well organized, how amazing!

And then most of them go back to their own towns and set their traps and put down their poisons, because some minds you couldn't change with a hatchet. But a few see the world as a different place.

Mr Saveloy looked at them and realized that they were speaking another language in another world. It was one he had no key to, no map for. You could teach them to wear interesting pants and handle money but something in their soul stayed exactly the same.

"But demons like Ligur and Hastur wouldn't understand. They'd never have thought up Welsh language television, for example. Or value-added tax. Or Manchester. He'd been particularly pleased with Manchester."

“Cats are like witches. They don’t fight to kill, but to win. There is a difference. There’s no point in killing an opponent. That way, they won’t know they’ve lost, and to be a real winner you have to have an opponent who is beaten and knows it. There’s no triumph over a corpse, but a beaten opponent, who will remain beaten every day of the remainder of their sad and wretched life, is something to treasure.”