Journeyman Cat

by Virginia Ripple

  As they entered the room and stood in line to be assigned their tasks, the same tasks they’d been assigned every day, the boy slid into another worker’s spot to be assigned to plate collection duty. It was the best way to get close to the students. After he tied his apron on, he grabbed a rag and bucket of water to begin washing tables. Small groups of students were filtering in as he wiped down the last table. He’d have to wait for a while before he could start collecting plates. It would be then that he had a slim chance of finding out if any of them were reacting differently to the school teachings.

  It took all his self-discipline not to rush to the first table that pushed their plates aside. He waited until a couple students were left at the table before approaching it, carrying a large square box to put the dirty dishes in. He stood at the end, keeping his eyes on his task, as he listened intently to what the two students were saying.

  “I’m telling you,” whispered the girl, “it doesn’t make sense. There’s all these heroic stories about cats, but what about humans? Haven’t we done something important? And what about these mysterious disappearances? You can’t really believe all of them were transferred to some other location on campus. And don’t get me started on the lumps and scars some of us have. Something’s not right here.”

  “Keep talking like that, Charlene, and you’ll end up in isolation again.”

  The girl made a face, then glanced toward Lorn. He smiled at her and moved a little closer, picking up silverware and plates and putting them into the box. He leaned across the table, keeping his eyes on the plate he was reaching for.

  “You’re not being told the whole truth,” he whispered. Both students looked sharply at him. He nodded toward several cats just entering, then grabbed his rag from the apron string to wipe the crumbs from the table top.

  “They’ve been keeping you drugged and giving you lessons suited to their ideals.”

  The boy’s face reddened as he glared at the feline instructors. Suddenly he jumped, knocking against the table and setting the dishes in the box rattling. The boy turned his glare on Charlene, his hand disappearing beneath the table.

  “Ow. That hurt.”

  “Better a kick under the table than a trip to isolation, don’t you think, Lyle?”

  She turned her attention to the food on her plate, shifting her scrambled eggs around on it with her fork.

  “How long have they been doing it?”

  “Not sure, but my partner and I are working on getting you all free.”

  “How?”

  “We’ve altered what you’re being fed and changed the image feeds in the isolation chambers. Based on your reactions now, I’d say we’ll be ready to move in a few more days.”

  “What about the demons below? If we leave here, they’ll track us and drag us to the demon king for his feast.”

  “There are no demons below. At least not the mythical kind,” Lorn grumbled.

  “What do you mean: mythical kind?”

  Lorn’s gaze darted away and his lips thinned.

  “Are there demons or aren’t there?” demanded Lyle.

  He glanced down at the boy’s arm, noticing a thin scar that looked as if it ran beyond Lyle’s sleeve. He nodded toward it.

  “Where’d you get that?”

  “What? This scar?” he asked, pushing his sleeve up to reveal the scar ran all the way to his elbow. The boy opened his mouth to reply, then closed it again, his expression puzzled. “I don’t remember.”

  “Probably just as well you don’t.”

  “Wait a minute,” Charlene said. “They’re doing more than just filling our minds with their rubbish, aren’t they?”

  He scrubbed at a spot on the table, his jaw tight. The girl leaned forward, raising her own sleeve to reveal a row of five jagged scars, then pointed to Lyle’s scar.

  “That looks like a scar from being cut, not slashed by claws. They’ve turned us into some kind of tame animals to do experiments on, haven’t they?”

  Lorn glanced at the girl, then looked away. His hands went cold as he noticed the kitchen overseer headed in their direction.

  “I can’t say any more.”

  He grabbed his box and headed back toward the dish washing station, faking a glazed expression as he passed the feline in charge of the kitchen workers. He’d told them more than he said he would, but this time Toby was wrong. It’s for the best. They deserved to know. Besides, how could them knowing make any difference in freeing them?

  The orange tom padded through the ferns, his sensitive nose picking up the scent of water nearby. Picking up the pace, he trotted further on through the dense greenery. He was so thirsty. The scent of water drew him, faster and faster until he was racing, belly to the ground, yet it never seemed any closer. He skidded to a halt, lifting his nose to the air. Behind him. He’d passed it somehow. He whirled around and raced the other direction, only to stop again and find it behind him once again. He opened his mouth to yowl, but nothing came out of his dry throat. He sunk to the ground and laid his nose on his paws, defeated.

  Another smell, closer, more familiar. He lifted his chin, closing his eyes and opening his mouth to let the scent caress his scent glands. Mother? She was near, but moving away. The ferns swished in front of him, disturbed by her movement. He trotted toward her scent, edging into a run, trying to catch up to her. Her scent never faded, never got any closer. Like the water he desired, she seemed forever out of reach.

  He burst through a wall of ferns into a small clearing. There she sat next to a pool of clear water. He wanted to run to her, nuzzle her sleek black fur, but his paws wouldn’t move. He looked at the cool water, a searing thirst drying his throat and mouth. He wanted to slurp the water in dizzying laps, but his paws refused to bring him closer to the pool’s edge. He stared at his mother in desperation. She smiled at him.

  “All is well, my son. He knows you are thirsty. Drink and be filled.”

  The young cat stretched his neck toward the water’s edge, bumping his nose against an invisible wall. He looked back at his mother, still smiling and nodding at him. He turned back to the water, this time reaching a paw toward it and encountering the same invisible wall. He glanced back at the sleek black queen. She hadn’t moved, nor had her expression changed. He stepped back a pace, then launched himself high into the air, thinking he could jump over the wall. He landed on thin air, sliding down the invisible bubble and landing in a heap at the water’s edge. He turned to his mother.

  “How am I supposed to drink if there’s a mage bubble over the water?”

  “There is no bubble. There is only you.”

  Toby lashed his tail, staring at the water and feeling the tug of magic around it. Why was his mother lying? A faint sound in the distance made him swivel his ears backward, but his thirst drove his attention back to the pool. His fur fluffed as he turned to unleash his rage upon the barrier. He came nose to nose with the black queen and jumped back. He stared into her piercing yellow eyes, the same stern expression he had grown up with as she tutored him in magic.

  “You cannot obtain that which you desire most until you gain that which is strongest within you.”

  The orange tom shook his head and blinked. He peered past his mother at the water, his mouth feeling like it was stuffed with cotton. The sound came again, louder and closer this time. He turned to looked behind, seeing nothing but ferns moving in the still air. His determination to quench his parched throat drew him back to the clearing. When he turned his attention back to the black queen she had disappeared. Startled, he whirled around, searching the clearing. She stood further away to his right.

  “You must find the strength, Toby. You must —”

  “Fire!”

  The gray tom jerked awake as the Brother from his room shouted in his ear. He stared at the tom, trying to remember where he was
and why this cat would be prodding him in the side with a hard paw.

  “The school’s on fire,” repeated the Brother. “We have to evacuate.”

  The smell of smoke jolted Toby back to reality. He jumped to his feet and raced to the door. Screams greeted him as humans and cats alike flooded down the stairwell toward the safety of the snow covered grounds. He turned to the Brother who stood shivering beside him.

  “What happened?”

  “Some of the students started a riot. There was a struggle and it started a fire. I don’t know what started the whole thing, but the fire is spreading.”

  The gray tom’s eyes narrowed. “We gotta get everyone out of here. Where’s the beggar boy I brought with me?”

  The Brother shook his head, pupils dilated wide. Toby growled and lashed his tail, turning to watch the river of students and cats run past. He caught sight of Lyle, brandishing a makeshift knife out of a piece of glass, in the press of bodies. Behind him Charlene was herding a group of younger children toward the stairs. The gray tom darted out the door toward the girl. He leaped to her shoulder and hung on as she screamed and batted at him. Lyle turned, weaving this way and that as he tried to aim the piece of glass at Toby.

  “I’m from the OKG,” shouted the tom into the girl’s ear. She spun, screaming, making Toby scrunch his eyes closed to fight off dizziness. “I’m here to help!”

  Charlene spun around again, losing her footing and falling to the floor. Toby conjured a shield to block the oncoming mass of legs running by in panic. He felt Lyle’s clumsy stabs bouncing off the invisible bubble, the boy’s curses muted by the shield. The girl crab walked backwards, scooting as fast as she could away from the gray tom until her back pressed against the shield. Tears streamed down her face. She held out trembling hands, trying to ward off an attack. Toby sat up straight, curling his tail around his paws and letting his gray fur melt away into his real appearance.

  “I’m not going to hurt you. I just need you to tell me where the beggar boy is, the one from the kitchen.”

  “Why? So you can kill him?”

  The orange tom shook his head. “He’s my partner. He’s been working with me to free your minds. Look, I don’t have time to explain it all. Just tell me where he might be.”

  He could feel the boy pressing down against the shield, his curses getting louder and more distinct as he added his whole weight to his efforts. The girl hiccuped and lowered her hands, staring into his eyes. He hoped she saw that he was telling the truth.

  “His room’s on first floor.”

  Toby nodded, then turned and leaped toward the space between the boy’s legs, letting the bubble collapse. He heard Lyle crash into Charlene, their conversation lost in the panicked screams of the other students. He ran to the end of the hall, guessing that the secret door he’d found had corresponding exits on the next two floors below. At this point it would be the safest way down to the first floor. He didn’t bother trying to hide what he was doing as he lashed his tail to open the door. It flew open, its crash against the outer wall swallowed up in the background chaos. He leaped down the stairs, paws skimming them until he reached the bottom. He let his nose lead him to the secret door.

  Smoke billowed in as the door swung open. He belly crawled out, searching for a higher vantage point that wasn’t encased by black smoke. Several feet down the hall stood a tall table tucked into a niche. The statuette that had once stood on it lay shattered on the floor. Toby raced to the table and leaped to its smooth top. He stood on his hind legs and stretched to see between the sea of shoulders. He spotted Lorn at the other end of the hall, heading in the opposite direction, straight for Father Hanif’s office. Without a second thought, the orange tom launched himself onto a pair of shoulders, then on from one startled student to another. The cat leapt over the chaos until he reached a clearing just in front of the office door. He could hear Lorn shouting and the screams of an enraged feline in the room.

  “You’re going to pay for the crimes you’ve done against these kids.”

  “Insects one and all. We gave them a chance at greatness.”

  The crash of something large and heavy. The orange tom slid into the room, taking it all in with a glance. Lorn faced the brown tabby tom, blocking his exit through the door, his disguise as the beggar boy had melted away. He held his hands out like claws. Toby felt the mage energy humming between them. Hanif stood fluffed for battle in front of his overturned desk. Lorn’s hand drew back, a swirling ball of blue fire erupting in his palm. It was the one spell the man never had to think about to create. If he threw it, the tabby would be nothing but ash in an eye blink unless he either moved faster than thought or had magic to defend himself.

  “Stop. We need him.”

  The man swung around, releasing the ball. Toby dodged, conjuring a shield at the same time. Lorn’s face showed surprise as the fire ball shattered in a hiss against the orange tom’s shield.

  “Are you okay?” asked Lorn.

  “Don’t worry about me. We have to get this mange fur out of here before the building comes crashing down on us.”

  “I was trying to form a net, but couldn’t concentrate.”

  “Together, then.”

  The partners stepped apart, forming a two-man semicircle. Hanif looked from one to the other, his lips parting in a silent snarl.

  “I will not be trapped that easily. Croo AYSH tahEN ahMAY.”

  Lorn straightened and turned to face Toby. The orange tom looked at his partner in confusion. The man’s face had gone slack, all expression gone, but his mouth moved in rhythm to an incantation the tom didn’t recognize. His feet began to sweat as the floor beneath him grew warmer. The fire. It’s coming through the floor. He leaped toward a bookshelf. The books burst into flames as he reached the shelf, singeing his fur before he could leap away.

  Cat-sized areas of flame met him everywhere he ran. He leaped to the overturned desk and then to the smashed window beyond it. Steam blasted his face as he prepared to jump past the broken glass. He turned to face his partner who was still murmuring the strange spell, his glazed eyes never leaving the tom.

  With sickening realization, Toby was sure the Anointed Ones Below had somehow gotten to his partner, turning his friend into a weapon. If he had the reversal spell, he’d be able to knock the man unconscious, but this was something he’d never encountered before. Based on what he’d seen of the other students, Toby knew he was faced with a decision he wasn’t sure he could make — kill or be killed.

  He opened his mouth to shout the only spell he could think of, one that he hoped would end his friend’s life without suffering, but the only sound that came out was a desperate mewl.

  A blur of movement caught his attention from the corner of his eye. He turned to see Harold leap through the open door, tackling Lorn and throwing the man off balance.

  “r’PAH r’SHAH.”

  The heat and steam disappeared as the man’s eyes rolled up and he crumpled to the ground. Toby scurried over the desk and put his nose to the man’s face, hoping to feel Lorn’s breath on his whiskers. Harold pushed him away, nodding toward an open trap door in the floor.

  “No time for that. I’ll see to your partner. You go nab Hanif before he gets away.”

  Toby looked down at his human, then back at the mysterious librarian. Harold’s tail twitched.

  “I can get him up and help evacuate the children, but I can’t go after Hanif, too. Do your job, boy.”

  The orange tom nodded and whirled around to follow Father Hanif down the trap door. He charged down the dark stairwell, smelling the fear scent of the brown tabby ahead. He was getting closer. Toby rounded a corner and lunged through an open door on the next landing.

  His leap carried him into the large chapel, its various tapestries and shrines ablaze. He heard the scrape of wood and jumped aside, the podiu
m just missing him by a hair. The copy of Moriel that had been lying on it cracked him on the head as it slid past. He stumbled sideways, his ears ringing. Pain ripped across his side as the tabby raked his claws over him. Toby screeched, spinning to return claw for claw. The room continued to spin after he had stopped moving.

  Smoke rolled across the ceiling, fire reaching to join it. The orange tom couldn’t distinguish the difference between the roar of the flame and the roar in his ears. He blinked his eyes rapidly, trying to clear them. A flying mass of brown tabby collided with him, sending him crashing into a blistered shrine of the Beloved. He ducked and covered his head, trying to escape slashing claws as the brown cat rained down blows. Twisting and backing away, the young cat managed to put a tail’s length of space between them. Hanif batted hot coals and ash at him, singeing his fur and blinding him for a moment.

  “You’re a disappointment,” said the brown tabby. “The Lord has reached out to you and you bite him for his generosity. If it weren’t for His desire, I would have seen to your disposal long ago.”

  “Whose desire?”

  The head temple cat hissed and cuffed his head. Toby swiped blindly, snagging air.

  “As dull as you are irritating. Why He wants you alive is a mystery, but He spared that black beast as well, so there is something about your blood that speaks to Him.”

  The orange tom’s ears swiveled, following the tabby’s voice as he circled him.

  “Black beast? You mean my father. Where is he?”

  “The One Who Brings New Life will bring salvation to the beast upon the Mountain of Transformation just as the Beloved was transformed before his servants. And in the end we shall all witness His coming into His kingdom and He will usher us into the New Life, leaving behind the Chaos that Was and Will Be.”

  Mountain of Transformation? New Life? Toby’s mind raced as he tried to understand the temple cat’s riddles. The tabby crashed into him, sending him flying backward. He crashed against something, sending a waterfall over his head. He shook himself from head to tail, sending water droplets to disappear, hissing, into the flames. He blinked his eyes clear, thankful that the water had washed away the ash from them. Hanif stood in the middle of the room, his whiskers splayed wide, firelight reflecting in his wild eyes. The cat raced toward him again. Toby ducked and rolled to the side. The temple cat crashed into a large post holding a flaming banner. The tabby gasped and clawed at the floor as the post toppled over, pinning him.