The Catswold Portal (15 page)

V
rech left the portal and garden quickly, heading east along the busy two-lane road that led to Highway 101. The bag was heavy. When the cat tried to claw through the leather, he punched her. Each time after he hit her, he could hear her licking. He cursed having left the car with the damned mechanic in the city. He'd thought of going after it, then knew the delay would stir Siddonie's rage. She wanted everything done now.

When he reached 101 he headed north, walking along the concrete shoulder beside the fast traffic, jerking his thumb at every passing car. No one stopped for him. The day was
growing hot. His upperworld pants bound his crotch, and his pants and shirt were sticky with sweat. Upperworld clothes were too tight. He dodged a reefer truck careening close to the shoulder, and when he stumbled, the cat yowled. He wished the beast was dead, but he daren't kill her. He didn't think much about the Primal Law, but he wouldn't go against Siddonie. The cat could die after he left her, but not while she was in his possession.

He had served Siddonie long before she married the twelve-year-old prince. He had been seneschal to the old king of Affandar and had adeptly managed the affairs that resulted in the king's death. For Siddonie, he would have killed the king with his own hands. Before she had any claim to the throne, when she was only visiting Affandar, she would meet him at night in the stables or in the woods beyond the palace. Her ways with him stirred passions no other woman was capable of; she knew his weaknesses; she knew how to touch him and when to cast a spell as she caressed and fondled and bit him, drawing from him the mind numbing, shuddering responses that no other woman could elicit. In turn, he had set the stage for the old king's illness and had helped her to reach the small prince, arranging her seemingly chance meetings with him. By the time the king died, Siddonie had enslaved young Efil with charms to drive a boy mad. Vrech had stoically endured the knowledge that Siddonie lay with him. Thus she had bound and corrupted the child. Within a month of the old king's death, Siddonie and Efil were wed, and she was crowned queen of Affandar. Once they were wed, he of course had returned to her bed, slipping into her chambers after young Efil slept.

The cat shifted position again, pawing at the bag. Along the highway the traffic was growing heavier, but the drivers looked at his lifted thumb and stepped on the gas. When at last a ride did stop, it was an ancient delivery truck, home-painted blue over the words,
A-ACTION PLUMBING
. He climbed into the hot, exhaust-smelling cab and dropped the bag on the floor next to the engine. “How far you going?”

“Portland.” The boy was dirty, with pimples down his neck.

“I won't be going that far. Crescent City, maybe.”

“What you got in the bag? It's moving.”

“Trained monkey. It sleeps during the day.” He nudged it with his toe. “Big dreamer—wiggles in its sleep.” The bag jerked, and the cat gagged and heaved.

“Ate too many marshmallows. Makes him sick. Kids love to feed him marshmallows.”

He parted with the van north of Crescent City. It was almost dark. Wind swept the tall grass in waves across the empty fields. He dropped the bag between the road and a clogged drainage ditch. If the cat was smart enough, it could get out. That should satisfy the Primal Law. He crossed the highway by running between cars, and in the diner he ordered a beer and a hamburger. Within half an hour he had eaten and caught a ride south again with a trucker.

As the eighteen-wheeler turned out of the diner's parking lot and passed the spot where Vrech had dumped the cat, he thought briefly of the girl Melissa with a pang almost of remorse. She was a toothsome thing, young and untried or nearly so. But then he put the little chit out of his thoughts; she was of no use to him. He belched comfortably and settled back, chewing on a toothpick.

S
peeding trucks made the roadbed tremble. Their hot diesel wind sloughed through the tall, dry grass, shaking the bag, bringing the cat up stumbling with fear, falling against her leather prison so it writhed and rolled. At the onslaught of each truck, she fought the bag, trying to run from the thun
der and shaking; then she would stop fighting and lie panting until another eighteen-wheeler sped past nearly on top of her, jerking her up again. At last, too exhausted to fight, retching and dizzy, she curled into a little ball and escaped into a trance-like sleep.

She was jerked up again when a semi careened off the pavement nearly on top of her. She exploded, throwing herself stumbling and fighting the bag. Flecks of saliva flew against the leather. Her tongue was thick from thirst and her body was sore in a dozen places from Vrech's blows. She was very thin from her days locked in the chicken cage, all bones and fur, her calico coat cupping in ugly shadows along her thin back and flanks. During her week-and-a-half confinement in the cage, she had been fed only enough to keep her from dying. And on the journey up the tunnel then up the highway there had been no food or water. The shape of her skull showed clearly beneath her matted orange-and-black coat. Her left eye was swollen shut where Vrech had struck her. Weak and sick, the stink of diesel fuel sucking in through the hole where the bag was tied made her sicker.

But then through the hole came another smell, a healing smell, making her more alert. The wind sucked in, carrying the scent of earth and grass; and she could smell muddy water. She pawed at the leather and licked at it, and tried to push out through the tiny hole. She could get a paw out, but no more. She had dug at the hole for some time when another smell reached her as the wind changed, a smell that made her force her nose frantically into the tiny opening.

The shifting wind brought the smell of frying meat, from the diner. She gulped at the greasy smell ravenously; it filled her senses, tantalizing and rich.

Each thundering truck made her try to run, tripping and fighting inside the bag. In between, when the highway was silent, she dug and pushed toward the smell of food that came to her from across the highway.

After more than two hours of fighting to get through the hole, she had chewed through the cord. She did not realize she was free. The puckered leather remained closed. She lay
heaving and weak, retching from the road fumes, wild with thirst. Her raw nerves made her muscles jump at every faint, distant approach of a truck. She could feel their approach in the shaking ground. She panted fast and shallowly. She had no more strength to fight. Yet when the next diesel roared by, the sudden blast of its horn jerked her violently to life. Inside the bag she tried to run, plunging away.

She hit the puckered hole, and was out, scrabbling at earth and grass, running blindly through the tall grass.

She might have run until she dropped, but in the darkness and confusion she didn't sense the ditch and she fell.

She landed six feet down in mud. She smelled the brackish water and crouched, licking frantically, swallowing mud.

When her thirst was slaked, she climbed out of the ditch sniffing the greasy, delicious smell from the diner. She approached the edge of the highway and crouched, watching the broad black expanse with her good eye. The macadam was warm under her paws. But the thunder began again, shaking the highway. She stared at the approaching lights growing larger, growing huge. The wind of the semi buffeted her; she leaped away into the grass and crouched and hissed.

When the highway was empty once more, the smell of food drew her back. Hunched and shivering, she crouched, tensed to dash across. There was thunder coming, but it was not very loud yet. She ran.

She was halfway across the first lane when the lights of a Greyhound bus exploded fast out of the distance; she froze; light bathed her small, still form and reflected from her eyes. Her white parts blazed bright. The driver didn't swerve. She leaped back from the speeding wheels barely in time.

When the bus had passed she sped forward again, confused, directly into the path of the next racing light. This time, an air horn drove her back as a pair of racing trucks bore down, their lights picking her out. The passenger of the nearer truck stared down at her laughing, as if he would like to see a cat mashed on the highway.

Then there was a lull in traffic. The four-lane was empty,
and silent. Only one set of lights was coming, very far away and with not so much noise. Eagerly she ran for the diner.

She misjudged. The car was quieter than trucks, but it was moving fast. The driver saw her and slammed on the brakes, skidding, screeching the tires. The cat was so terrified she didn't know which way to run, she crouched directly in the car's path, full in its light; then at the last second she leaped into blackness. She felt its wind behind her.

She crouched on the white line in the center of the highway, dazed by the lights now coming from both directions. Again tires squealed, another car skidded, and she ran wildly as it slid sideways. Through its open window a woman screamed at her. She could taste the smell of burning rubber as she fled toward the gravel ditch beside the diner.

She scrambled and slid down the side of the ditch to safety.

Above on the highway the car straightened and went on, the driver cursing.

There was water in the ditch. It tasted faintly of dog urine. She drank, gulping, then rested, panting and pawing at her sore eye.

At last her heaving heart slowed. She roused herself and began to stalk the smell of food. She climbed out of the ditch and crept across the parking lot, taking shelter under a car ten feet from the steps of the diner. She stared out at the door where the smell was strongest. The noise of the juke box, of boots moving inside on the wood floor, and of raised voices and occasional shouts made her tremble. Suddenly the door was flung open, noise blared out, and she fled as three men swung out loudly arguing, clumping down the steps toward her. Panicked, she streaked through the darkness toward the rear of the diner.

There she paused, drawn by the smells from the four garbage cans.

She could smell dog, too. Warily she stalked the garbage cans, then jumped onto one. She pawed at the lid and when she could not get inside, she moved to the next can.

All four were sealed tightly. At last she leaped down and slunk back to the front of the building.

As she crouched beside a truck, huddled against its rear tire, two women came out of the diner. They were quieter than the men, and she didn't run. They saw her white parts catching the light from the diner's window, and they began to croon over her. She backed away from them under the truck, tensed to run. But then the women went back inside.

She was still there when they returned, knelt down beside the porch, and pushed a paper plate under it. “Here, kitty. Here kitty, kitty, kitty.”

She smelled the food, close enough to make her drool. She didn't come out until the women had left.

Then she fled underneath, and stalked the plate.

Convinced there was no danger, she attacked the food. She gulped fried hamburger, potato skins, and spaghetti. She ate until her stomach was distended. Then she curled down beside the plate and slept.

 

When she woke, the diner was silent. No noise, no lights. She stared out from under the porch at the expanse of blacktop. The shelter of parked cars was gone. She crouched in the blackness beneath the porch, watching and listening. She saw no movement, and she heard no sound to threaten her. Far in the distance thrummed the soft hoot of an owl.

She finished the potato skins and spaghetti, then chewed the greasy paper plate to remove every last bit of goodness.

She came out from under the stair pawing at her sore left eye and staring warily around the parking lot.

When she was certain that nothing threatened, she sat down in the center of the blacktop and began to wash her front paws and her face. Then she sat staring toward the south. From that direction something drew her. Faint, incomprehensible images touched her. Dark spaces beckoned. In her puzzled feline thoughts, stone caverns waited, and safety.

She rose and left the parking lot, trotting due south along the shoulder of the highway.

When trucks passed she veered into the tall grass. She passed under an occasional oak tree, and glanced up into its
branches, where instinct told her height meant safety. When she came across the fresh scent of another cat she ran. She kept moving steadily, obsessed with the sense of deep, sheltering caverns somewhere ahead.

She traveled all night. By morning her left eye was matted and oozing, and the pads of her feet were beginning to crack. At first light, as the sky began to redden, she climbed, exhausted, into an oak tree. She curled into a concave where three branches met, and slept.

She came down at mid-morning, hungry again. The sense of stone caverns drew her on, she kept moving and did not turn aside to hunt; she knew little about hunting; a kitten must be taught by its mother to hunt with skill.

Late in the afternoon she approached an abandoned shack. She was very hungry. She watched the shack and listened for a quarter of an hour, then she crawled underneath it to rest. Here she stumbled on the scent of mice. Investigating, she discovered a mouse nest. She ate the six baby mice, then stalked the cobwebby darkness where the mouse smell was strongest.

She caught a grown mouse not sufficiently wary. She killed it quickly and ate it, but she caught no more. It was that night, when she tried to catch a rat, that she learned how viciously a small beast could attack, and learned how to fight her prey.

She had crossed a cut field through heavy stubble. In the center was a small trash dump, and as she explored the rubble for food she smelled the rat in a half-buried wooden crate. The crate smelled of celery and of spoiled meat. The rat was a big male, old and rough coated. He had survived dogs, and had killed his share of kittens. Deep inside the barrel, he had heard her coming a long way off, but he hadn't bothered to hide himself. Now he crouched, listening to her approach, staring out at her.

The cat circled the crate, watching the gleam of his red eyes. She moved to the entry, to block him from running out. She crouched, tensed to spring, ready for him.

When after a moment he didn't run, she moved in.

She was close to the rat when he charged. She dodged and lashed at him. He swerved and clamped his teeth on her paw, biting clear through. He hung on as the cat thrashed and fought, and gnawed her paw brutally. Then before she could bite him he loosed her, dodged, and leaped at her throat, biting deep. She struck at him with her claws, then sank her teeth in his flank, trying to pull him off her throat.

The rat had miscalculated his distance; he had only the skin of her throat, not the jugular. She managed to jerk him free, tearing a piece of skin from her throat. She shook him, swinging him, and in her terror she hit him again and again against the sides of the barrel.

The rat went limp. She turned it loose, to lick at her wounded paw. The rat came to life, leaping straight into her face. She clawed at it and tore it away. Enraged, she grabbed it by the neck and bit and gnawed until it died.

After it was dead she thrashed it against the crate floor, heaving and shaking it.

She ate the rat, then licked her wounded paw. There was nothing of Melissa apparent in the little beast; she was all cat, learning to care for herself. Yet somewhere within the little calico, too deep to be sensed by animal instincts, breathed another presence. Within the little cat something waited poised, watching, learning.

Her hunger eased, the calico left the dump and headed south.

It took her ten days to cover the miles Vrech had covered in a few hours. The country remained open, with tall grass, occasional trees, and scattered farm houses and shacks. At first she hunted, but as her wounded paw grew painful and bloated with infection, she began to search out the easy pickings at garbage cans and dumps. Twice near dumps, half-wild farm cats attacked her. The first time, she ran. The second time, she fought the two females. She came away bitten and hurting, but she had taken her share of the garbage. Her hurting foot made it hard to run fast enough to avoid dogs, but the scattered trees gave her refuge beyond a dog's domain. She learned to stay near
the trees if she scented or heard a pack of dogs. At one promising garbage dump she faced a family of raccoons, and when the big male charged her she fled. It was the next morning that she approached a salt water inlet on the outskirts of a town.

Houseboats and fishing boats were tied up along the banks. Somewhere a radio played music, but she had learned that this kind of sound didn't threaten her. She smelled human waste from the houseboats, and she smelled food cooking. Beside a dock, she smelled fish offal. Very hungry, she approached the fish cleanings, prepared for a feast.

She did not see at first the three big female cats who were already maneuvering for position over the fish, snatching at it, snarling and striking at one another. With the music playing, she didn't hear them. One cat was heavy with kittens, the other two were in nursing condition. Left alone they would have shared the food out in their usual desperate way. Now they froze, staring at the intruder, hissing at her and threatening with low growls. But the calico, as she traveled, had grown bolder: these were only cats, not dogs. She approached them, stalking stiff-legged.

A female's ear twitched. A tail dropped, and all three crouched.

The three attacked her together. They had her down, clawing and biting her when a little girl, fishing at the other end of the dock, threw a bait bucket at them.

The three cats fled. The calico fled, too, limping, her swollen right front paw sending shooting pains up her leg. Running, she stopped often to lick the lump that had formed as each day the abscess grew larger and more painful.

Five days after the rat bit her she came to the outskirts of a town. Her white parts were dirty now, her white chest matted with grit and road oil. And, cowed by the pain in her foot and by fear, she carried her ears and her tail low.