"Right. I"m off, then. Been nice meeting you!" Jack waved the giant owl off, and I started for the nearest tree.
"We shouldn"t have to wait any longer than it takes him to reach the clouds," I said.
Jack sat down at the foot of the tree and started pulling at the dog"s ears. I leaped into his lap; truce or no truce, I wanted it made clear just who was top cat around here. Jack shoved the dog gently aside with a sigh, and I gave the mutt my best slitted-eye look of triumph, but he was too dumb to understand and sat watching with his tongue lolling as Jack stroked my fur.
"b.u.t.terfly, how does Poplios get back to the present?"
"The hard way," I said, as I settled myself. "He waits a month."
Jack frowned. "But can"t he get some more time anda""
"It only works backward, Jack. Don"t bother your head about ita"time travel is an advanced subject, hardly of a level for an apprentice at your stage."
"Yeah? Look, b.u.t.terfly, I"ve been thinking. Since Uncle Hugh seems to have neglected to teach me such a lot, how about if I become your apprentice instead?"
I had to start washing my face in order to think of an appropriate reply for such an absurd suggestion. I was interrupted, however, by Arachne, who cried out, "Jack! The tree!"
Sure enough, a great gash had opened in the bark, and along its edges were a number of pale yellowish, walnut-sized lumps.
"There you go," I said. "Now, pluck out an eyelash, roll it in the gum, and have Arachne weave it into the sock."
There was a tense moment when Arachne, having completed her task, seemed to be stuck to the inside of the sock, but Jack pulled her free without harming a hair on her little spidery head, and reinstalled her behind his ear.
"Okay, this is it," he said, as he pulled on the first sock, the undamaged one. Even the blue bird held its breath as he rolled up the second sock, the newly repaired one, and slipped it over his toes.
"Itworks itworks itworks works worf!" barked the dog, and the rest of Jack"s menageriea"concealed on his person and so sharing his invisibilitya"joined in with their various cheers.
Jack took off the magic socks and stowed them safely in his shirt. "Well, gang, I guess that finally wrapsa""
I felt the tingling of my sixth sense too late. Jack pitched forward as if struck by a hard blow and landed flat on the ground, sending his menagerie scattering in alarm.
I squinted my amber eye closed, so I could watch with my blue one. There was a tremendous upset in Jack"s aura, blue and green light flashing about and then suddenly dissipating and being replaced by an unhealthy glow rather like radioactive gangrene in color. By the time he was on his feet again even his face had a different look about it.
I began to wash my paws with studied nonchalance. I needed time to figure out the details. What had happened, of course, was that Jack had been possessed by one of the Lost Minds that wandered about in the desert; the question was, whose mind? And what exactly did he or she intend to do? And was Jack still in his body, dominated by the invader to the point where his aura was no longer recognizable, or had he been ousted to the desert?
I cursed many mental Feline cursesa"I won"t shock you with them just now. I should never have brought him herea"as the incompetent Hugh"s apprentice, he had never learned any psychic self-defense. The whole wild-goose chase through Some Place had gone much too easily up to now, but this was a situation where Jack"s animal talent was useless. It was up to me to right things now.
"Jack" was dusting himself off, but his miniature zoo showed no inclination to return to their perches upon his person, and the dog whined, obviously uneasy but not understanding it all. "Jack" did not seem to notice.
"Well," I said, pretending not to have noticed any thing, "if you"re through being clumsy, Jack, what do we do next?"
"I want to go to the Sea of Lost Spells."
He was eyeing me carefully, obviously uncertain. He could not know we had just come from the Sea, but whoever he was, he knew of the Sea"s existence, and wanted the power and wealth of the scrolls. That fit with the unpleasant overtones I observed in his muddy aura. That aura bothered me; not only was it hostile, but it seemed familiar.
"But, Jack," I purred, "we"ve just come from there."
"Well, I decided I want to go back. I"m not leaving here without some of those scrolls."
I twitched my whiskers, and felt an itch behind my ear.
"Don"t scratch me off!" Arachne whispered. Jack"s other animals, no longer attracted by his unique charisma, had wandered off in various directions.
"Well, unless Poplios the owl happens to come back, we"ll have a rather long walk there," I said to "Jack."
"Oh, Beelzebub"s belly blubber!" he cursed.
My eyes dilated repeatedly. No wonder the aura seemed familiara"it belonged to Jack"s uncle! But how had he lost his mind? Then I remembered; of course, he had gone to a wizards" convention, and most likely was drunk out of his mind at a party. Eventually, his mind would have to leave Jack"s body in order to return to his own, when it sobered up, at which time anything he might remember about Some Place would seem to be an alcoholic delusion.
"I know who you are," I said, now that I knew all I had to do was wait him out.
"You do, eh? And I know who you area"my landlady"s supposed pet. Blast that Jacka"some apprentice! While I"m away, he steals my socks and takes up with a tortoisesh.e.l.l tom! Well, the joke"s on the two of you, because I"m not going back to my body. Jack"s is a good deal younger than mine, and I can use a long life to study the scrolls I"m going to take from that legendary sea. And don"t think of deserting mea"I"m holding Jack"s body hostage. I can toss it off a cliff and go back to my own body and he"ll be stuck in this desert indefinitely, while I won"t be any worse off than when I started."
I froze. Even my tail stopped twitching. Could he really do it? "All right," I said, "you win. But it"s still a long way to the sea. We"ll have to walk along the river bank."
The wizard grumbled, but off we went, and as we went I tried to think of a plan. I turned on my telepathic radar, and, as I had hoped, I detected a presence hovering behind us as we walked and knew it must be Jack"s mind. He was following us, but I knew he didn"t have the telepathic training or experience to reenter his body and kick his uncle out. By the time the wizard was ready to sit down and rest I had a plan worked out.
"Don"t try anything," he said, watching me suspiciously as he settled back after a drink from the stream.
"Me? I"m for a catnap," I said, and folded my paws under me, closing my eyes. I had already told Arachne in whispers just what I intended; she would wait for my signal. Now came the hard part.
I began purring my cat mantra, quickly dropping into the meditative state of consciousness which is preparatory to feline "paranormal" activity. All cats can do at least a little in this line, but tortoisesh.e.l.l toms are experts. I reached outward with my mind, carefully so as not to attract the wizard"s attention. But the psychic wall he had built to prevent Jack reentering his body had also effectively "blinded" him telepathically and he didn"t even notice when I reached past him to net Jack"s mind and draw it into my own.
a"Listen carefully, Jacka" I told him, as we sat in the safe refuge of my brain. a"I"m going to breach the wall he"s built around your body and pull you in on my tail, so to speak. But once we get in, it"ll be up to you to overpower him and toss him out.
Just say whena" Jack said grimly.
I sneezed, which was Arachne"s signal. She hopped off my shoulder and I watched through slitted eyes as she scuttled across the ground and around behind the wizard. For a moment all was quiet, and then I saw her, climbing up "Jack"s" shoulder to her former perch above his ear. She flexed her mandibles a"This is it, Jack a"and I twitched a whisker at her. Arachne bit the ear.
"Yow!" The wizard jumped up, and brushed at his ear, sending the spider flying, and while he was distracted I drove my mental force straight between his eyes like a battering ram. The psychic walls shattered, and I slung Jack"s consciousness in where it belonged.
a"Hit him while he"s down, Jack!a" I said, and retreated to my own body, in case Hugh tried to flee there when Jack ejected him.
I watched the rather bizarre spectacle of a body being fought over by two separate minds. He kept trying to get up, moaning in pain, holding his head in his hands. More spectacular was the flickering clash of auras, twined in combat around the body. There was nothing more I could do, now. It was strictly a contest of wills between Jack and his uncle. I was placing my bets on that (admittedly hypothetical) feline spark in Jack"s nature, and when suddenly the struggle subsided and the aura shone emerald and sapphire around his body, I knew I was (as usual) right. I leaped at once to his side, scanning around in a wide circle, and detected a mere bedraggled wisp of a mind retreating along the stream.
"Sweet Bastet!" I hissed. "What in a cat"s nine lives did you do to him, Jack?"
"I turned him inside out. He"s had it coming for a long time!" he said fiercely.
I looked at him in astonishment. Seeing this sentimental animal-lover trounce his own uncle with such a very feline viciousness gave me a whole new opinion of him.
I licked my lips. "Well. I don"t think you"ll need much more psychic training to protect yourself from him in the future."
"He won"t get another chance. He was stealing my power for his own use. If I had not found this way to break free, I would soon have been completely enslaved by his sorcery."
Though she did not know what we were talking about, Arachne was concerned for Jack.
"Are you all right now, Jack?" she asked timidly as she crawled up his sleeve, marvelously uninjured from her "flight."
"Thanks for helping, Arachne," he said. "I"m fine now except my mind tastes foul."
"It should pa.s.s," I said. "Meanwhile, your uncle"s mind will soon return to his body on the mundane plane. I suspect he got here via the bar at the convention. Which means in fact that he"s still there, so we won"t even have to stop on the way back for some lost time."
Jack blanched. "I have to face him again when he gets home?"
"Not exactly," I said. "People who lose their minds through chemical means don"t usually remember having been here when they sober up. Now let"s get goinga"you owe me an anchovy pizza."
We materialized in the laundromat, just before sunup, where, miraculously, no one had stolen Jack"s three weeks" worth of laundry. Jack was moaning as he contemplated the job of putting it away, when a shriek of delight came from behind him.
"Jack! Look! I"m human again!"
I am no judge of human beauty; I can only observe that Jack"s jaw hit his chest when he caught sight of the new Arachne, who looked about his age and height. I rather disliked her sleek black hair myself, but then humans are not cats, so I am sure it was nonsignificant. Her body, Jack informed me later, was "built," and apparently (so he thought) showed to advantage under the ancient Grecian-style costume she wore.
Arachne wanted a mirror, but the best thing available was the gla.s.s door of a laundry machine. "I"m more beautiful than ever!" she squealed.
I sniffed, and Jack nudged me. "Uh, b.u.t.terfly, what"s she saying?"
I realized then that of course she was speaking Greek, which I knew, but Jack did not. It was one of the many things Hugh should have taught him but did not. It was also apparent, from the way Jack"s eyes followed Arachne, that he wasn"t going to be much use at teaching her anything about humility. I sighed; with one thing and another, there was nothing for it. As soon as we could work it out, Jack would have to become my apprentice. (You may think I decided this because I happened to like the boy, or because his empathic talent was influencing me; to which I will reply that, on the contrary, it was merely a case of ordinary feline whim.) "Let"s get Arachne some better clothes," I suggested, "and get this laundry put away."
The problem of what to do about Jack"s uncle, as well as Arachne"s disenchantment still loomed before us. But for now everything was organized. Arachne had been introduced to Miss Parke as a recent immigrant from Greece, looking for domestic work, and the ideal tenant for Miss Parke"s spare room on the ground floor, where Arachne was now safely installed. The socks of invisibility, along with the rest of the laundry, were safely put away. And the scent of anchovy pizza lingered in the empty box on the front steps in the morning sun. I leaped to a perch on Jack"s knees and checked for the most comfortable spot.
Jack yawned, then scratched the back of my right ear. "Say, b.u.t.terfly, old buddy, do you like me at all? Just a little bit?"
I gave him an appropriately aloof feline stare, then started kneading my claws on his lap; finally finding the perfect position to curl up in.
"What a perfectly ridiculous question," I said.
The Dreaming Kind.
by C. S. Friedmart.
1.
There was a time between sunset and evening when the wall between the worlds grew thin; when, if one was watchinga"if one knew how to watcha"the dark little creatures of the dreamworld could be seen slithering through.
The one called Hunter-In-Darkness knew how to watch.
The time would come just before true darkness fell, in that moment when Night and Day were most precariously balanced. It would last for just a few seconds (but they were long enough) and then the way would be closed again, and the things which had come from there to here must now remain here forever.
He never hunted until after it was over. Never failed to watch it happen, once he had learned how. The shadowy dream-creatures fascinated him, as did their presence in his world. He had seen such things in the dreamlands, of course, and had hunted them there; to do so was a cat-custom as old as the worlds themselves. But here they seemed a wrong, somehow. As if pa.s.sage between the worlds had weakened them. Their inner light was dim, often flickering, and their edges dissolved as the wind brushed against them, trailing off into thin wisps of fog. They came in a thousand shapes, no two alike: from tapering worms of amber-gray mist to the deep carmine crabs that scuttled over unseen pebbles and stones in their path to an invisible sea. And all seemed wrong to him.
He had hunted them once, in his kittenhood, but had quickly learned the futility of such action. In the world of dreams these creatures had substance and might be hunted, slain, and eaten, but in the waking lands they were wraithlike and could not be grasped, either by claws or in the teeth. One was left with only a foul tasting residue wherever contact had supposedly been made, a bitter reminder that something had not been caught. It was better to leave such things to one"s shadow-self, and devote one"s waking hours to the capture of more solid prey.
Tonight he would hunt in the manlands. The moonless night was perfect for it, the darkness so thick that he could feel it brush against his coat, black against black in the chill autumn wind. There was the fence to deal with, of course, but that was no real obstacle. Like a neuter"s spray it lacked any scent of authority; his people had scratched their way under it or climbed across the branches that crossed over it so often that it lookeda"and smelleda"like a thoroughfare. He found a channel that cut under the wirework and crawled through it easily, into the home turf of the same twofooted creatures who had once tried to kill him.
And there he found prey. He saw it first, a point of light against the ebony darkness. Mouse? He was already downwind, and began a careful approach. Soon the scent came to him, cool and promising: Mouse. He put one paw forward onto the carpet of dying leaves, shifted his weight slowly to follow. Careful. No noise. It couldn"t smell him, couldn"t possibly see him; only the sound of his presence might warn it in time.
It p.r.i.c.ked up its tiny ears, wary. He froze. Time pa.s.sed. The wind shifted, but didn"t fully reverse itself; it would no longer serve him, but nor would it warn his prey. Be still. Be still. The field mouse looked about, moved two steps closer to a patch of ivy. Be still, Hunter. And then it relaxed at last, and began nosing down among the fallen leaves for food. He dared a slow step forward, then another one. The scent was unclear, but the mouse was in plain view, and the wisps of bodylight that clung to its coat played foolishly across the brown fur, heedless of danger.
It would hear him when he leaped, he knew, and would probably dart for cover. He guessed that it would run off in that direction, prepared himself to compensatea.
And: flight. Strong hind legs propelled him into the air, straight as an arrow shot toward his prey. It ran, in just the manner he had antic.i.p.ated a and he had it, his claws dug firmly into its shoulder, his teeth closing joyously about the tiny neck. Its bodylight played into his nostrils as he subdued it, anda"when he tired of its strugglesa"killed it. He knew from experience that such light took time to fade, that not until dawn would the last of it drift off. He ate the mouse where he had caught it and then left the sc.r.a.ps, faintly glowing, upon a pile of gold-edged leaves. A good meal. To be followed by a good washing, after whicha"
It was then that he became aware that something was watching him.
He turned quickly. Ears flattened, claws unsheathed, he was ready for whatever battle the intrusion required. But all he saw was a dream-creature, its form glowing brightly against the contrasting darkness. An unwholesome shape, half fish and half slug, with a gaping, toothless mouth at the forward end.
He jumped out of its way, no longer certain that such things were harmless. His fur was on end, and although he made a token effort to smooth a bit of it with his tongue, his soul was on edge as well; the ugly thing had frightened him.
But it had no interest in feline company. It floated past him, against the breeze, until it came to the place of his recent meal. And then it paused, as though thinking. He felt himself growl, m loathing and m fear. Though the thing had no scent, its aura was decidedly threatening; it took all his self-control not to turn and run, nor to attack it outright.
It hovered over the mouse carca.s.s for a long while, its foggy flesh pulsing. And then it settled itself upon the body, leechlike, its round mouth fastened to what was left of the head.
Horrified, Hunter-In-Darkness watched a"it feed. No flesh pa.s.sed into the dream creature, but the light contained within the carrion slowly began to fade. Flickers of radiance shivered above the flesh, then extinguished; within a short time there was only the light of the leech-thinga"and Hunter himselfa"to see by.
Fear outweighed curiosity at last, and Hunter-in-Darkness turned and ran.
2.
The house, Miles noted, was just as he had expected it to be, no more and no less. A small farmhouse which had withstood the force of the northern winters for nearly two centuries, which his friend and old college roommate had decided to renovate; it stood as a monument to Wesley McGillis" unique personality. Half renovated, and it would probably remain that way forever; Wes had a tendency to grow bored with any project once he had mastered the skills necessary to complete it, and this house was no exception. A pity, Miles thought. The building had promise. Maybe Wes" daughter, who had recently moved in with him, would motivate him to finish the project.
He bounced down a dirt road with thick gra.s.s growing down its center, into a yard long overgrown with weeds. Wesley was waiting on the porcha"and d.a.m.n him, he hadn"t changed a day since last they met! Nearly ten years now, Miles realized. He had changed, that was certain.
"How do you like it?" his old roommate asked, with a gesture that encompa.s.sed the house, the grounds, and even the gleaming white citadel of Bell & Hammond"s primary research facility, some miles in the distance. "Nice, eh?"
"Cold." He had left his coat in the trunk in Maryland, and he quickly retrieved it and put it on before pulling out his suitcase. "Give me the southlands, any day."
"Here, I"ll take that." Wes reached for the suitcase, finally had to take it forcibly out of his hand. "You"re sounding like them, you know that?"
"Southerners. Never thought you would." He led him up the stairs of weatherworn porch, to a screen door that was obviously new. "Elsa sends her love, wishes she could be here. Some business down at NMHI, I"ll tell you all about it when you"re settled in. Odd stuff, really." Opening the door, he waved Miles through. "Watch the cats," he warned.
As if on cue, a gray tabby bolted for the door. With practiced grace Wes blocked its way, pushing Miles into the primitive kitchen as he pulled the screen door shut behind them. The cat yowled oncea"a token efforta"and then disappeared into a nearby shadow.
Adjoining the kitchen was a common room, in which a central fireplace managed to drive back the worst of the chill. Wesley indicated a calico-covered rocker and then nodded toward the stairs at the far end of the room. "Make yourself comfortable while I put this away. There"s hot water on for coffee or tea, your choice. Be back in a minute."