Cat Tales Issue #1

by Steve Vernon

  He gestured to a small room behind him, lit with many candles. A great stone table with a groove carved in the center of it sat in front of an altar. A dark shroud lay piled atop the altar.

  “Take your cloak off, Misha. Very good, just hang it over there, on that hook.

  When she hung it, she saw Timmuk, huddled in the corner, out of the way, in a pile of rags, his ears flat, his eyes narrow as he stared at her, his bright green eyes boring into hers, his posture saying wished to be unseen, a great hunter waiting for the strike.

  Very well, she thought. Be a cat. But she was glad he was there to see.

  “Don’t dawdle,” Winterton said. “The ritual requires you to be in your shift only.”

  Misha shivered. She was right. This was like the Equinox rituals her granny had worked with her. She was proud. All this time she’d struggled, done what he’d asked, and now she’d reap the reward. She hung her dress over her cloak and set her boots neatly beneath them.

  She moved to where Winterton adjusted the silk cloth covering the top of his own table. She’d admired his mahogany mage table since the first time she’d seen it when he came to Teller Village, carved and intricately painted with flowers, symbols, tiny animals, and youths that looked out with all manner of blue, green, hazel, and brown jeweled eyes. It must have been a fortune in jewels. But she’d always wondered why the artist carved them with sad or frightened expressions. Better to be glad and proud to adorn such a mage’s table.

  “They should look happy to be part of such an illustrious man’s magic.”

  “Beg pardon, Misha?”

  “I was just looking at your table. I think the animals and faces carved in your table should look happier since they’re a part of your table.”

  Winterton smiled. “That’s a very nice thing to say. Where would you see yourself on the table?”

  She looked carefully. “There, at the base of this tree, next to that cat.” Its eyes were not jeweled, but she thought he looked like Timmuk.

  Winterton’s face clouded up. “Very well,” he said stiffly. “You can be right there. May you do a better job than that cat.”

  “What was he supposed to do?”

  “His job, what I expected him to do,” Winterton growled, and Misha shrank at his anger.

  Why was he here, working rituals with her when he was so angry? Granny had always said you must bring only what you wished to take away from the ritual. What kind of magic would accept such darkness?

  “But you,” he said, softening his voice. “You have done everything I asked, been right here where I put you, came when I called you. I am very pleased, Misha Millik, very pleased. So I will reward you with the spot, right there under that tree.”

  “Thank you, sir,” not understanding what he meant, but pleased that he recognized her suffering. “It’s been so hard. I try and try, but I am just not a magician.”

  He laughed. “No, Misha, you’re not. But you have done far better that I thought you would. Your granny said you were a rare jewel, a good hearth witch, resourceful, and stubborn. She didn’t lie. You’ve been perfect, talented in your own way, persevering, acquiescent, and meek. Just what I needed.”

  Misha flushed with shame. He didn’t think she’d succeed? Then why keep her here and why did he need her now? A spark of anger made her clench her teeth.

  “Climb up here, Misha. The dawn is coming and the season will swing shortly after it does. There’s much to be done before that.”

  She tried to resist, angry that he didn’t believe that she’d succeed, but the thread pulled her up on the table, settled her, tied her down.

  She looked over to where Timmuk had crouched in the pile of rags.

  “Look up at the ceiling,” Winterton said. Stay looking at the ceiling.” The thread wound itself around her head, tying it in place.

  She was furious that he thought her a good hearth witch, but felt the need to force her to play her role. She began to feel that she wanted no part of his ritual.

  “Calm down, Misha. Look up.”

  A complicated round pattern with an eye in the middle stared at her, a mandala. She didn’t like looking at it.

  “What kind of ritual are you doing, sir?”

  He smiled. “An offering. I’ve been at this school for a very long time and I’m ready to go back to the king’s service. I have plans that are much more exciting, much more profitable, than administering to the needs of the spoiled get of a gaggle of self-righteous magicians. You’re my ticket back to the castle.”

  An offering? Offerings were made to receive something in kind. Why would he offer her?

  Winterton began chanting, waving his wand. Tendrils of luminescence began to form in front of the shroud. The words were harsh and grated across her spine, like nails on a chalkboard.

  “No,” she whispered, but subsided at a fierce growl from Winterton.

  He lifted a knife, an obsidian blade, sharp and edged with light where the lamp glow caught it. He leaned over her, waving the blade and chanting. The spell tore up and down her spine, seeking the edges of her center. She gritted her teeth together, trying to push it away.

  Now she understood. The table, all the animals, all the faces. They were others who had been meek and skilled and just where he wanted them. That’s why his power ebbed and peaked. That’s why they disappeared just before Winterton went on to serve the King.

  She began to struggle harder. The thread pulled tighter. Her breath grew ragged and shallow as it cinched around her chest.

  And something happened to the cat. Timmuk. She’d always known that he was more than a cat. Cats never had the kind of thoughts Timmuk had. They were concerned with hunting and eating and grooming and a warm hearth to sleep by.

  She tried to look over at him, but the thread held her head down.

  She struggled harder when she remembered Winterton’s words about the cat on the table, but the ties were as strong as despair. What could she do against such a powerful wizard? Even if he was at an ebb, he was still more powerful than her.

  The spell caught an edge of her soul and she felt it tear a gap, reaching a tendril in. She pushed against it, but knew that she couldn’t let any more in or it would have her.

  It pushed and slid, and sliced along her resolve, hunting the way in, the best leverage. Her heart pounded loud in her ears, drowning the chanting, narrowing her world to the hissing scratch of the spell as it worked her soul loose from her body.

  It pried and pulled, half of her soul now loose, the wavery ends shredded and torn. Heart pain filled her thoughts, regret and loss began to drown her, allowing the spell more slack to work with.

  Her soul held on raggedly, resisting. Holding on to hope. Holding to where it belonged. The spell raged against this last holdout.

  Which made her think of the carved cat under the tree with no jewels. What had Timmuk done? How had he escaped?

  “Be what you are,” the tom cat had told her over and over, rubbing against her arm. “Don’t worry about these budding Dames, these blustering wizards.”

  What was he that let him resist this powerful magician?

  What was she?

  A young woman. A hearth witch born and trained. What could a hearth witch do against a wizard?

  The thought sparked a memory of Kellin weeping in her room.

  “He’s spelled me, Misha. What am I to do against his swooning spell? Bricker’s older and stronger than I am.”

  Misha caught her breath, then let it out, quelling the fear in her heart at the audacity of the thought, the simplicity of it, lest Winterton see, lest he smell her renewed hope. The spell intensified, thinking that it was winning.

  She ignored the chanting tearing at her soul, ripping her strength, her life from her fingers, her heart, and watched instead the wizard’s face coming closer and closer. When she could feel his breath as he chanted the spell, she spoke quickly, pressing against the suffocating threads wrapped around her chest.

  Her breath came out th
in and ragged, turning the spell to this moment, improvising, the way a good hearth witch did with her small skills, her simple wit.

  “And back to you, back to the beginning, all the fine words, caught back in your throat, turn back to your heart, just as you spoke, back to the start, that day on my hearth.”

  Winterton gaped at her, his eyes at first unbelieving, then filling with fear and hatred. He swallowed convulsively like he was choking.

  Misha repeated the unknotting spell and this time it worked completely. The threads unraveled and she scrambled off the table and backed to the wall where she came in.

  The thread was unwinding from her, so much that she wondered that she never recognized how tightly she was wrapped in it. Unhooking from her chest, it reeled back into his wand, went up his arm and out his head, mingling with the luminescent light on the shroud. He wrestled with it before the shroud light subsumed the thread back to the beginning, back to the top of Winterton’s head. It sucked him up, fluttering cloak, kicking boots, wand, and all.

  The light flickered as if settling after a meal and rose up, in an arrow into the center of the eye on the mandala. It flared and sparked and a great cloud billowed out from the center of it, obscuring the pattern, and smudging the colors.

  There was a long moment of silence and then a wind began howling, rising in volume. Winterton’s carved cart shuddered and clattered and she realized the wailing was coming from it. All the jewels were lit up and little bursts of light came through them to shoot off and away from the table. There had to have been three score flashing away and disappearing into the walls, the ceiling, and the floor.

  Misha huddled against the wall, frozen with fear in the silence that fell after the last light left.

  She heard footsteps and squeezed her eyes tight. She’d had enough.

  “Misha,” Timmuk said. “Open your eyes.”

  She opened them, looking down for the cat, but saw instead a pair of long, lean legs. Following them up, she saw a man, a few years older than her, with brilliant green eyes and brown hair streaked with silver, his nakedness covered in rags.

  “You did good, Misha. Everything I hoped for.”

  “What did I do? What were the lights?”

  “Winterton’s offerings. Those he’d captured with his filthy rituals. You freed them. You freed me.”

  “How? Why were you not in the table?”

  “Because at the last moment, I looked away. He didn’t get to see into me, to give me to the shroud.”

  Misha looked up. On the ceiling the mandala was now blurred and scorched where the Winterton had disappeared into it.

  “I knew you could do it, Misha. I knew you’d know what to do. You’re a good hearth witch, skilled, and witty.”

  She looked at the man, Timmuk. He was lean and strong with a ready smile and dimples in his cheeks. She blushed to think that he’d nuzzled her breast, laid his paws upon them, and snuggled in against her on cold winter nights.

  “So now what, Timmuk, lately a cat?”

  “We’ve got to go before they find this place. You’ve broken the spell and saved the others, now you’ve got to save yourself.”

  “How shall I do that? Where shall I go? My village has a new hearth witch.”

  “There are always villages who will welcome a hearth witch, and a good dowser.”

  “You hear the water?”

  “That and other hidden treasures.”

  She considered. She didn’t fit here, didn’t want to be here. The wide open world was big and unknown, but Timmuk was giving her his hand, helping her up.

  “Come on, get dressed,” he said. “We’ll go to the kitchen. The staff will give you food and we can be gone before the rest have finished breakfast.”

  He spoke the truth there. She’d always been more comfortable in the cavernous kitchen, but students weren’t to be there.

  “But what will they think?”

  “Do you really care what Salome and Bricker and Kellin think?”

  She considered, remembering her disgust of Salome’s bossiness, Bricker’s greed, and everyone’s disdain for her hearth magic.

  “Not much, but they’ll think me a coward.”

  “And leave you alone as beneath their effort. You’ll be safe this way, and we can find a life that suits us.”

  A life that suits us.

  Misha’s heart lifted, freeing her to realize that Timmuk was a man, handsome man, and not a magic cat. Yes, a life with him would suit her, and he wanted her, Misha Millik, hearth witch.

  He gestured to her clothes and she smiled at him, at those brilliant green eyes, and took his hand. She dressed quickly, pausing only a moment before she pulled the doeskin cloak over her shoulders.

  I’ve earned this, she thought. And I’ll keep it, a reminder of who I am and how I know.

  The parchment rustled in her sleeve, and she almost pulled it out, but decided to have her own ritual later and burn it over a fire. The moly in it would be the perfect touch.

  “Come on, don’t dawdle.”

  She paused for a moment and then realized Winterton must have said those words to Timmuk, too. Something else between us, she thought, another tie in a long chain that was warm and comfortable.

  Together they made their way through the dark hallways to the kitchen, where the kitchen mistress’ eyes grew round and a pleased smile covered her face when she saw Timmuk.

  “Why Timmuk, where have you been these two years? We thought you’d run away, that you’d had enough of the school, and magic.”

  “Please, Mistress,” Misha said. “We are leaving. Can you give us food for a day?”

  The woman smiled. “Leaving finally. About time, I say. And as for a day, well, we can do better than that.”

  She shouted instructions and soon, she had a pile of supplies laid out in front of them. “Well, here’s a wallet with food, and breeches, a shirt, and a cloak for you, Timmuk. Wherever you’ve been you need one now. The coal cart is just leaving. He’ll give you a ride if you tell him I sent you. Do him a little favor, Misha. I know his horse has a sore hoof.”

  “Thank you, Mistress,” Misha said.

  “Oh, get along with you. You mended my best pot, and, you,” she said gesturing to Timmuk, “you found the leak in the pipe before it burst all over my kitchen.”

  The cart driver was very glad to give them a ride and Misha spoke to his horse, laid her hands upon him, and told his master she’d make a plaster to apply for a few days to finish the job so the hoof would be good as new.

  The world was bright and new as they made their way down the pass, muddy snow giving way to a sloppy trail as they made their way from winter’s end to spring fully turned. Misha smiled as they looked out upon the new green leaves and blooming flowers.

  Timmuk smiled too, his teeth white and shining, and clasped her hand. She squeezed it back and said, “Let’s get where we’re supposed to be and start doing exactly what we’re supposed to be doing.”

  “And dawdle as we may.”

  They laughed and the cart driver shook his head.

  Reviews

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  About the Author

  Thea Hutcheson writes across science fiction, fantasy, horror, and thriller genres, enjoying sales to traditional publishers, e-publishers, and independent publishing. Her story "Not a Meat Puppet, a Magic Puppet" garnered an Honorable Mention in The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror: 17th Annual Collection. Lois Tilton of Locus Magazine called her work "sensual, fertile, with seed quickening on every page. Well done..." She also won Apex Magazine's 2013 Merry Christmas Flash Fiction Contest.

  Other Works by Thea Hutcheson

  “A Full Moon Over a Desolate Plain”, Crossing Colfax, RMFW Press

  “Becoming Connie”, Ergosphere

  “Bonita and the Hacienda”, The Enchanted Conversation

  “Fishing”, Baen's Universe, Vol 1, Issue 4

  “
Galoshes and Neckties”, coming in 2017, Pulse Pounders 3, Fiction River

  “Hoarding”, Haunted, coming September 2016, Fiction River

  “Not a Meat Puppet, a Magic Puppet”, Hot Blood XI, Fatal Attractions

  “Over the Wire”, Lilac Moon Books

  “Stockings Hung at the Hearth”, Apex Magazine, December 2013

  “The Gleaming Crater”, Issue 15, Recycled Pulp, Fiction River

  “The Good Husband”, Realms of Fantasy, 100th issue

  “Postcards from Home”, Singular Irregularity

  “Waiting for on Humanity's Table”, Lilac Moon Books

  “Walkabout”, Lilac Moon Books

  * * *

  Want to Learn More?

  Follow Thea at Twitter

  See more of her work here.

  About Lilac Moon Books

  Lilac Moon Books specializes in a wide variety of genres including science fiction, fantasy, new and young adult, and spicy romance with a number of authors. These stories feature exotic locales and complicated characters. See more here.

  A Hearth Witch at Chisolm Keep

  © 2009 Thea Hutcheson

  PUBLISHED BY:

  Lilac Moon Books in 2011

  This story originally appeared in Alternative Coordinates

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except in the case of a reviewer, who may quote brief passages embodied in critical articles or in a review. Please do not participate or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author's rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.