The Catswold Portal

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The Catswold Portal Page 10

by Shirley Rousseau Murphy


  “She is my wife,” the prince said hotly.

  The king coughed blood. “You are a fool, Ithilel. She has destroyed us, she has used you.”

  “No! She…”

  Melissa caught her breath, realizing suddenly that if this was young Prince Ithilel, if she was seeing the fall of Xendenton, then the little girl was Queen Siddonie. But who was the young woman?

  The king fixed his eyes on Ithilel. “If you were a man you would kill the Catswold traitor. Your wife has betrayed us. Do you not realize she has destroyed us?” He coughed, spitting blood, then looked evenly at Ithilel.

  “There is no choice, you must go from the Netherworld. Take your cursed wife—do not leave her here to do more damage.” He turned from Ithilel and reached to the child Siddonie, taking her hand.

  “You are the strong one. You must keep yourself safe, my child, until you can win back Xendenton.”

  Siddonie’s dark eyes were hard as glass. One thin hand remained clenched on her sword. “I will return.” She stared at her father, brazen with a queen’s challenge. “And when I return I will rule more than Xendenton.” There were tears on her face, but she smiled coldly. “One day I will rule the Netherworld. And,” she said, smiling, “I will build a formidable power in the upperworld as well—in memory of you, Father. And for my own amusement.

  “And,” she said, “I will take revenge on the Catswold beasts. Revenge such as they have never dreamed.” She knelt before the king straight as a shaft, waiting without tears for his death. But the dying king clasped her to him, holding her rigid little body, his white face buried in her black hair.

  The king of Xendenton breathed his last.

  Melissa watched in the mirror as the prince crossed his father’s hands over his chest to protect him from the creatures of the Hell Pit that could come for the souls of the dead. He closed the king’s eyes with two gold griffons and then, rising, he took up a heavy bag of jewels from an iron chest by the door, and jerked his young wife out of the shadows.

  Prince Ithilel sealed the wall behind them, making of the secret chamber the king’s burial tomb. They hurried along dark passages, the prince holding the young wife’s wrist. At last he opened the passage wall with words like spitting snakes and pulled his wife through the gaping hole and stepped aside for the child.

  They lit three of the oil lamps stored within the tunnel, and then began to climb up the black twisting way. Their journey became a montage of the miles of tunnel. Melissa saw deep cracks in the ancient earth, dark trickles of water, falling space; time tilted and changed, and the earth around them changed as they rose within it. Melissa thought many hours had passed when suddenly thunder echoed above them and they entered a tunnel with smooth pale walls and a floor of glazed tiles marked with occasional shallow puddles. Then, where a black rune marked the pale wall, the prince said an opening spell.

  A portion of the wall swung back. They passed into another smooth tunnel lit from above by yellow lights which were not oil lamps. This passage led to an echoing basement. They climbed iron steps strewn with paper and bottles. At the top of the long flight they pushed out through a metal door into white fog. Lights sped past them incredibly fast, smeared within the fog. A hissing noise ran with the lights, like wet snakes. The young woman drew back, afraid. The prince took her hand, urging her on. But Siddonie walked alone, small and erect, staring around her at this world with a sharp, canny interest.

  The three refugees crossed half the city, climbing hills crowded with tall, pale buildings. High up, they left the fog behind them. It lay below them like a white sea. Now above them a black sky reeled away empty, pierced with lights that Melissa knew were stars. The vast space in which those stars swam terrified her.

  Then came a scene of daylight painfully bright. Melissa could see through a large window the city spread below, the tall smooth buildings thrusting up through that vast space that was bright now, pale blue and awash with the yellow sun. She thought of elven tales of the sun. The yellow ball blinded her. The young wife stood at the window, her hair more golden than the sun. Behind her Ithilel and young Siddonie worked at a desk littered with papers. Another montage of scenes showed Siddonie and Ithilel writing in ledgers, entering figures, then the two out on the street, going into buildings carrying a leather satchel. She saw them enter a paneled room and empty Netherworld trinkets from the satchel onto a desk: emeralds, opals, diamonds, sapphires. She watched them trade these for a slip of paper. This happened many times. Their clothing became rich. Their dwelling changed to a huge house looking down at a bay. She saw servants, rich food, and rich fabrics. She saw in a last sharp scene the face of the child Siddonie looking directly into the mirror. Her black eyes were appraising and cold. Then Melissa was jerked back to the dungeons.

  She felt as weary and drained as if she herself had made that terrible journey. Before her, the Harpy ruffled and stroked her white feathers. Melissa saw that the rebels were still in sight, searching the cellar as if no time had passed. She faced the Harpy crossly. “That was a fine vision but it told me nothing about who I am.”

  The Harpy snorted with disgust. “Yes, it told you. You will figure it out soon if you are using your mind.” The beast looked hard at her then brought another vision. “After this I will have my mirror or I will yell so loud every guard in the palace will hear me.”

  Chapter 16

  Now in the Harpy’s mirror mist clung against the buildings of the upperworld city and shrouded the upperworld alleys where cats roamed lithe and restless. The sight of cats stirred a strange feeling in Melissa. She watched a yellow tom circle a doorway, watched a gray female shoulder out through the flimsy screen door in the back of a wineshop. She saw a thin tiger cat in the alley behind a grocery picking through trash, stopping often to stare up at the sky where, through fog, glowed the diffused light of the upperworld moon. She saw within a satin apartment a tan and brown cat waking her mistress with harsh cries then streaking past the woman’s silk-gowned legs into the night. She watched a fat white female cat lead four starving cats through an open cellar door into a shabby room. There the female vanished; and a white-haired woman opened tins of cat food and fed the strays, then went out again, leaving the door ajar.

  Inside apartments cats cried and paced, staring out through dirty back windows or through curtained front windows, or leaping over furniture and across desk-tops seeking a way out into the moonlit night. All over the city cats moved restlessly, caught by the moon’s pull. Melissa knew more from the vision than simply what she saw. She knew that this night, not only the moon called to them.

  In an alley between the Tracy Theater and a tall Victorian house, a big, heavy-boned tiger cat leaped from the fence to a rooftop. Pausing on the flat tar roof, he looked around, puzzled, restless and irritable, and a strange eagerness gripped him. Tail lashing, he jumped from that roof to the next, a four-foot span, and trotted to the next chasm and leaped again.

  Covering the length of the block across the roofs of the store buildings, he dropped into the branches of a stunted tree that shouldered across an alley. There he settled himself in a crotch of branches as if he had done this many times. He listened, looking up at the sky, looking around him.

  He was broad shouldered, with big paws and a broad, square head; he had the body of a fighter beneath his wide curving stripes of gray and silver. He lay limp along the branch, though beneath his indolence his spirit seemed coiled like a spring. His thick, striped tail swung idly. But then its tip began to twitch as, looking up through the mist, he watched the exact place where the moon would lift.

  Suddenly he tensed. His tail stilled. He listened intently, tracking the faint hush of fur against brick, then the crackle of paper as an approaching cat disturbed a fallen poster.

  Then he scented her and relaxed, letting his tail swing again; he knew her.

  The old buff female climbed rheumatically into the tom’s tree. He watched her, first lazily then intently, his yellow eyes suddenly widening. He sa
w that she was wild with news, her movements were jerky, he could smell her excitement.

  He waited with growing impatience as she settled herself on a branch below him. When at last she spoke, her voice was harsh with agitation. “Three humans have come up.”

  He stared at her. “From below? Through a door?”

  “Yes.”

  “Which door?”

  “The warehouse on Telegraph. A man, a little girl, and a woman. The woman is like us.”

  The tom’s body slid into a crouch. “Like us? Are you certain?”

  “Quite certain. Her hair is piebald, her eyes are a cat’s eyes.”

  “Who is she? Did you listen to them? Why have they come here?”

  “I followed them last night. I have watched them all day.” She looked to him for praise. He broadened his whiskers at her and raised his tail.

  “There was war in the world below,” she said. “These three have escaped a massacre. He is Prince Ithilel of Xendenton, the child is his sister. Xendenton has fallen, and these two seem all that is left of the royal family.”

  “And the Catswold woman? Why is she with them?”

  “I don’t know. But it was the Catswold who defeated Xendenton, fighting beside peasant rebels. The man and little girl discussed it last night after the Catswold woman slept; I listened from the roof next door through their open window. They think the woman is a traitor to them, that she is loyal only to the Catswold.”

  “Then is she their captive?”

  “No, she is the wife of the prince.”

  The tom froze, his body going hard. He looked back at the female gently; she was old, and dear to him. “You did well, Loua.” He didn’t expect her to feel his distress. She had been born on the streets of the upperworld, her mother had no Catswold memories. Loua was as ignorant of her heritage as any common cat. “Why,” he said softly, more to himself than to Loua, “why would a Catswold woman be married to a prince of Xendenton?”

  Loua mewled her confusion. “The small princess hates her. She says the Catswold woman betrayed them. How could the woman turn against her husband? Why would they marry if they are enemies?” Loua was always miserable when life did not add up. She hunched down, staring at McCabe.

  McCabe said, “Tell me, this Catswold woman…What does she look like?”

  “She is beautiful,” Loua said with envy. “Tall, sleek as silk. Her hair is gold striped with platinum and with red. Hair,” Loua said jealously, “bright as hearthfire, and her eyes are like emeralds. She must be gorgeous as a cat. Her name is Timorell.”

  “Timorell…” McCabe tasted the name. “And where are they now?” His tail twitched with impatience.

  “In an apartment on Russian Hill. From the roof next door you can see into the living room and into the couple’s bedroom. It is the street of the Great Dane, third house north of him on the same side.” She preened, expecting McCabe to praise her for bravery at circumventing the Dane. But McCabe was lost in speculation. Loua purred his name, moving closer; but then she turned away. She was too old to appeal to McCabe, too long past her prime. This Timorell would appeal. She hunched miserably, bereft of defense against beauty and youth.

  As McCabe quit the tree he turned, his face filling the mirror. Melissa stared into his huge eyes, startled. He dug his claws into the branch, then leaped to the alley. In the shadows, before stepping into the street, he took another form.

  McCabe stood tall under the fuzzy streetlight, adjusting his tie, then strode across Powell. His shoes made a soft echo in the fog. He was a tall man, powerfully made, broad shouldered, his dark gray hair streaked with pale gray. His hands were broad, capable, stained from work, the nails trimmed short and clean. His yellow eyes were light against his tanned skin. He was a man to whom most women were drawn, though some women avoided him with a strange fear.

  He passed the house of the Great Dane without disturbing the beast. In the shadows he changed to cat again, his broad stripes sharply defined by the street light. He leaped, and flowed up the thick vine onto the apartment house roof.

  He stared across six feet of space to the next apartment building, to the three dormers with their open windows. Inside, the rooms were dark. He leaped the six-foot span to the center dormer, and clung there on the ledge and pressed against a dusty-smelling screen, looking in.

  The couple slept in an iron-footed, rumpled bed. The Catswold girl’s pale hair spilled across the prince’s shoulder. She was long, supple. The sheet clung to her, thrown back so McCabe could see that she slept raw. He admired the curves of her arm and shoulder and, beneath the sheet, the curve of her breast. He wanted to touch her, wanted to slash the screen and go in. She slept deeply, innocent of him. He wanted to wake her, touch her; he wanted to say the changing spell for her and slip away with her across the rooftops, to be with her in the secret night.

  Melissa, watching McCabe in the mirror, knew his feelings as if they were her own. Gripped by the desire he felt, her own passions awoke in a way that shocked her.

  McCabe watched Timorell a long time. He would have stayed near her all night, but suddenly in the silence he heard the brush of a hand across a window screen. He leaped from the dormer across the chasm onto the neighboring roof, then turned to look back.

  The screen of the next window was pushed out. A child looked out. For one chilling moment McCabe saw her eyes. For one moment he stared into deep, complete evil.

  The child drew back and closed the screen. McCabe sped across the roof and down the vine. He hit the sidewalk as the little girl came out the front door carrying a heavy lamp. Heart pounding, he pressed into the shadows. He changed to man as young Siddonie reached him, holding the lamp like a club.

  He grabbed her arm, and threw the lamp to the street. It shattered. He held her wrists as she kicked and bit him, and he shook her until she became still.

  “You were going to injure the cat—kill it.”

  “Catswold,” she hissed. “Get away from me! Leave the girl alone!”

  “What do you fear?” McCabe looked her over, laughing. “That I will despoil your brother’s wife?” He saw the child blanch. “Why have you come up from the Netherworld?”

  “What business is it of yours?”

  “Tell me.” He twisted her arm, enjoying her pain, caring nothing that she was a child; she was evil, coldly evil. “Tell me what happened in Xendenton. Tell me, or I will kill you.”

  “You dare not kill me.”

  “The laws say only that I would endanger my immortal soul; that is my choice. Gladly would I do so to see you die, Princess!”

  “If you know so much, why do you ask questions?”

  He twisted her arm harder. “Who is the Catswold woman?”

  “A traitor,” she hissed. “A bitch—a traitor. And she will pay for her deeds—you all will.”

  “You are curiously indignant, for one whose kin has murdered thousands of Catswold.” McCabe looked closely at her. “You are like a hard, sinewy little bat, Princess. Brittle and blood-hungry.”

  The child stared at McCabe, expressionless as glass, then touched her tongue to her lips with a dark, twisted laugh.

  “Go back in the house, little girl. But know this: if you harm the Catswold woman in any way, you will know pain by my claws as you have never imagined pain.” McCabe grasped her hair for a moment, hard. “Have you ever seen the guts torn out of a mouse so the creature, still alive, stares at its own offal, frozen with terror?”

  She blanched, did not move. McCabe stared at her until she turned at last and went into the house, her back straight and ungiving.

  The scene vanished, the mirror went smoky. Melissa stared, confused, into the blackness around her.

  “You are in the cellars of Affandar Palace,” the Harpy said softly.

  Melissa brought a spell-light and reached to touch the bars, but she was still adrift between the two worlds. She was surprised to see the rebel prisoners crowded around her, silent, watching her. She was clutching the mirror so har
d that when she dropped it in her pocket its mark was struck deep into her palm. When the Harpy reached through the bars toward the pocket, she backed away. She had started to speak when footsteps scuffed on the stair and she doused her spell-light.

  A spell-light blazed above them, moving down the stair. The rebels fled. Halek grabbed Melissa and pulled her to a stack of barrels and down behind them.

  Chapter 17

  The spell-light came quickly down the stair striking across barrels and pillars and lighting King Efil’s face. His voice struck sharp through the silence. “Melissa? Surely you are here. Melissa, guards are posted everywhere, but I can get you out. Come quickly.”

  She moved, wondering if she dare trust Efil. If she found a way out she could come back for the prisoners. But Halek jerked her back. “No! We are not to trust him.” He clapped his hand over her mouth as Efil approached, passing within feet of them, heading straight for the Harpy’s cage. His light picked out a shock of white feathers. “Where is the girl? She brought your mirror to you. Where is she?”

  “What girl? Do I have my mirror? Do you see my mirror? Do you think if I had it I’d be behind these bars? The queen has my mirror, and if you were any kind of a king you would return it to me.”

  “I will search the cellars until I find her, so you might as well tell me, Harpy.”

  Melissa touched Halek’s hand. “If he searches, he will find you. I can bargain with him. I—have something to bargain with.”

  He held her arm hard. “If he finds us, we will kill him. That’s safer.”

  “But Halek, I can make him take you out of here. I can make him free you.” She watched the king turn away from the Harpy. He approached and passed them again. Only this time he didn’t pass them, he turned back and came toward the barrels that hid them. His light shot straight into her face.

 

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