Celta Cats Page 5

  Or big Flair magic people had rich.

  So he sat and stared at the boy and revved his purr. The kit straightened, scrunched to the back alley wall through an unfortunate pool of rat piss. Then, tentatively, the boy reached out and stroked Zanth’s head, all around it, under his ears, and he purred and purred and made it loud.

  Then he heard words in his mind!

  Greetyou, FamCat.

  Zanth pondered the words, rubbing against one of the last rich-smelling portions of the boy’s trous. The words in his head didn’t sound much like those Zanth heard people say out loud in Downwind. And no one never said nothing to him in his head before. The boy’s brain sparked with smart, like Zanth’s. Smart magic Flair.

  Greet, he said back to the boy.

  I am Rand Ash, the boy said, then he panted wrenching wet breaths. His body shuddered. He made more of those little whimpering sounds like tiny kits did. Zanth hopped on him and licked his face, nasty slime, great boy.

  Wetness came from the boy’s eyes and nose and dribbled on Zanth. He cuddled closer so the stuff would fall on the boy’s trous instead.

  “Thank you,” the boy, Rand Ash, said brokenly.

  They sat for a while in silence, though drunk people walked across their alley entry. One man puked and others laughed.

  Another cat stuck his head in, saw Zanth, jerked back. Looked again. Then, step by step, he snuck to the rat, set teeth into it, and hauled the carcass away.

  Zanth didn’t care. He sat on Flair rich boy. Besides, he’d eaten the best innards.

  You hear my telepathic thoughts? said the boy mentally.

  Yes.

  Then you are a FamCat! An intelligent animal able to bond with people! Rand’s thought zinged happy. Good. Always better than sad. You are a Familiar Animal Companion! Maybe MY FamCat?

  That echoed sadness.

  Boy might be in Downwind now, but came from rich, had big Flair, would be rich.

  Yes, Zanth replied.

  A choked shout of joy from the kit. He rose, and Zanth stood, reaching just below his knee.

  The boy grabbed him under his front paws and hauled him up. Zanth dangled awkwardly. He didn’t like it and grunted. “You are my FamCat!” Rand said. “My kitten.”

  Not kitten. Have big balls that work. YOU are MY FamBOY. MY KIT!

  Yes, your FamBoy! Rand shouted mentally, making Zanth’s brain ring. We will be friends forever!

  All the boy’s words reverberated through every nerve. Made Zanth feel good.

  “And I will name you after...” Rand’s voice cracked and shot out pain. A sniffling pause before he continued, And I will give you an Ash Family name! His mental tone squeaked high as a very young human kit’s.

  “Zanthoxyl,” Rand said aloud. “Zanth!”

  Huge sun-bright feeling burst inside Zanth, like he’d swallowed a lightspell! Zanthoxyl, Zanth, Zanth, Zanth, Zanth, Zanth. Six times he felt his name reverberate through him, finally said out loud by someone. From bones out, he’d always known his true name. And his boy did, too! Wondrous.

  Flair magic working on them both.

  Best We sleep here, Zanth said.

  “Okay,” Rand mumbled. Carefully, he used a cloth to clean a spot and placed the book there, then lay on his back, his arm around the book. In the next breath he dropped into sleep.

  Stretched long, Zanth nearly matched his boy, Rand, in length. But Zanth didn’t sleep that way. Instead he curled over chest and belly and cock, keeping Rand’s vulnerable spots covered and warmed and protected.

  Zanth snoozed.

  Terror and horror stalked Rand’s dreams, bled over into Zanth’s joy of hunting sewer rats and crushed it. Nearly crushed him, his mind. He didn’t let it, of course, but he whimpered with his boy’s moans, saw the evil men burn down Rand’s house and his family inside. Bad fire that once started would burn a body clear through, couldn’t be stopped.

  Saw the boy’s mother turn from Rand, who’d been out of his bed and hidden, to try and save her husband and other children.

  Zanth hissed. His boy, now. His. He would not abandon.

  “Huh?” Rand sputtered, then coughed, turned on his side, opened wide eyes. “Bad dream, Zanth. Bad memories.” He gave a sob. “Happened just tonight.”

  Really bad, Zanth agreed, licked his boy’s face. But you are not alone. I am with you.

  Thank you, Zanth FamCat, came the fading thought and the kit fell asleep again.

  =^..^=

  When the sun speared watery fingers into the alley the next morning, Zanth showed Rand the corner to piss in, and the drip from the water spout to drink from. Rand put his hands under the drip and said Words that buzzed along Zanth’s fur. His skin looked cleaner.

  Then he sat, hunched forlornly and stared at Zanth. Mouth trembling, he told Zanth, “Enemies firebombed my home and burned it, and my Family.” His breath caught. “That really happened.” Now his whole face scrunched and his voice hitched with tears “All...all...my Family is gone. M…my fa-father, m...my bro-thers, N...Nuin...Gwy...Gwydion. M.... Ma...Mama!” His voice wailed, then he put a fist over his mouth as he looked around the alley, out at the street.

  Zanth rotated his ears, strained his hearing, said, No one here.

  The boy crumbled to the ground and cried a long, long, time. Minutes, even.

  Zanth brushed against him again and again, until the quiet, wet sounds stopped. I am here, with you.

  Yes, thank you, Zanth, Rand returned telepathically.

  I will stay with you.

  Good. The boy fisted his red-rimmed eyes. “You killed the awful rat.”

  “Yessss,” Zanth said aloud. Only a few smart Cats like him could do that. He stretched, feeling the bites and scratches. All healing.

  His voice yet small, Rand said, “And you kept me warm last night.”

  “Yessss.” Zanth licked a paw and groomed his ears, the one with the scars and the other ragged one.

  Rand’s words and feelings came in Zanth’s head. And you saved me from my horrible memories and dreams.

  “Yesss,” aloud, then, Me hero. He leaned over and swiped a tongue on his boy’s hand.

  A couple of more snuffles that turned to sniffs. “I’m hungry, what’s that smell?”

  New food in trash thing.

  “Oh. Is is good to eat?”

  Mostly tastes good.

  “Uh, sanitary?”

  Not know that word.

  “I s’pose it doesn’t matter,” Rand muttered. “Mama...” His lips trembled. He stood and sucked in a breath, made a fake smile at Zanth. “Let’s go.”

  Zanth stood and flicked his tail. Follow Me, kit.

  He took the boy to the nearby trash compost pillar, tall as two Rands and fatter than the boy with roundness. Rand murmured spells to open it and get better food. Boy was good for something.

  A few minutes later, Rand gave Zanth a shy smile, and they shared the not-too-old furrabeast steak leftovers, some clucker bites.

  “We’re lookin’ for a boy,” a man’s voice boomed down the cross-street. “Lost FirstFamily boy. Big for six years of age.” Pause. “Mebbe gotta book. One’a them fancy old-time books.”

  “Reward?” snapped old woman Zanth had heard called Brevipes.

  A clearing of a throat. “A’course.”

  Zanth opened his mouth and curled his tongue, drew in a big breath. Bad man. Bad! Run!

  He loped away.

  Rand stood still, hiding behind the tall trash thing. No, he said. Do not run. I must pretend to be part of here. Downwinder.

  Yes! Zanth paused. He had not shown well. He angled his head and eyes to look at the boy, small enough to stand stiff behind the trash composter and not be seen. Eyes wide, face a mask of fear.

  He looked rich. And now Zanth worried. The puny amount of black fur on Rand’s head didn’t look like other Downwind boys. His nose looked straight, but Zanth figured boy-fights would fix that.

  You stay here, I will go and see this BAD man.

/>   No! Rand yelled in his mind.

  Zanth ignored him, swaggered up to the man. Who smelled sort of rich and all mean.

  The old woman looked down at him, cackled. “Hello, tomcat, you fliggerin’ nuisance.”

  He ignored her and her stupid words. Stared up at the man.

  “Huh,” Brevipes said. Narrowing her eyes, she went on. “Some ructions and crying going on last night in your alley, tomcat. Mebbe—”

  “Crying?” snapped the man. “Where’s the cat’s alley?”

  Lifting a crooked hand, she pointed a gnarled finger. “Right there. An’ ain’t there someone behind that composter?”

  The man shot forward. Zanth tried to tangle his legs, got kicked.

  Flinging his arms upward in spell-wave, the mean man yelled, “Find, translocate boy spell!” Invisible scary Flair rippled through the air, Zanth saw his boy tumble, yanked from behind the trash pillar and into the open, arms and legs thrashing. He screamed as he was drawn to the laughing man. A guy who sweated fighting-killing-anticipation.

  Zanth’s boy kit!

  He jumped to Rand’s back as the boy zoomed by, then used Rand’s Flair and the evil’s Flair and his own Flair to hop up on the man’s shoulder.

  “Gotcha!” The man grabbed Rand.

  GOTCHA! Zanth screamed in fury, biting and tearing the guy’s ear. His turn to shriek.

  Zanth loosed his bladder. The guy swore, fell.

  “Free!” Rand yelled. He stumbled away. Zanth found himself zipped through the air and into Rand’s clasp. The boy began to run.

  “Kill him!” the man yelled, pulling a blazer.

  Rand ran, leapt to one side. The blazer hit the composter and trash went everywhere, rolling crap along the street behind them and other men showed up and jumped around, also shooting.

  The boy dodged, sped even faster.

  “Wait, you owe me a reward!” Brevipes shrieked.

  “Fliggering flitch. Not unless we catch him, we don’t.”

  Another blazer stream missed, but a spell came in its wake that made Zanth’s paws tingle.

  Using huge effort, Zanth teleported them a couple of blocks. Out of the commotion. They lost the evil men hunting them.

  =^..^=

  They spent the rest of the day hiding, this time on the nicer edge of Downwind where it met the rest of the city. Places where humans ate, with good, full trash compost receptacles. Zanth and Rand gorged. Rand did cleansing spells on his clothes while Zanth watched. Then the boy left the rich clothes in place of other, bigger boy clothes that looked like garments Zanth often saw. He gave a last sniff of the richness and only looked back once when they walked away, his paws tingling off and on.

  As the sun set behind the low roofs of Downwind, Zanth said, Me know better place. You help Me find more food when We get to shed.

  “Huh,” Rand said, then pulled pieces of meat off the slightly burnt clucker and tossed them to Zanth. He’d gotten more meat off the bird than Zanth had managed. Fingers could be helpful, Zanth saw.

  When they’d eaten their fill that evening, they wound their way north, out of the worst of Downwind. Zanth led the boy toward the big houses and land and Zanth’s shed. After a while, Rand seemed to know the way. When Zanth’s paws got cold, Rand stooped and picked him up.

  Zanth directed the boy to Zanth’s shed. Rand stopped several paces away, coughed. “What is that awful smell?”

  Zanth snarled, Boy knows nothing. Has bad taste, smacked Rand with a sheathed-claw paw.

  Rand dropped him.

  Trotting up to the little building. Zanth sniffed in his own scent, and other nasty-cleanser stuff.

  Growling, he circled the shed. No opening showed where he could get in. No broken window, no cracked threshold or board, no crumbling hole in the permacrete. And Zanth’s boy shivered with cold.

  Zanth might lose him before they became rich.

  Terrible thought!

  Rand looked around. “I don’t recognize this estate. Minor noble?”

  “The tracking spell on the cat worked. There’s the Ash kid! Back in Noble Country, like you said!” yelled a man, jumping from a bush. Blazer rays only missed Zanth because Rand ‘ported him into his arms.

  Boy panted with low shaky moans. Chest rising, falling fast. ’Porting! his mind screamed at Zanth.

  Noooo! Zanth cried. Too late. Mind flashed question where they’d end up, Rand’s burnt out house?

  They landed in the alley.

  More shouts!

  “Team one, they’re back!” The shout sounded in Zanth’s mind along with his ears. Fear shot through him. “Rue was right, follow that cat!”

  ‘Port over the back wall. Looks like this! Zanth pushed a strong image into boy’s mind.

  He squeaked. They vanished. Landed hard in smelly puddle in other alley.

  RUN! Zanth yelled. Run south to deep slums. We will lose them. They follow, they get beat up!

  Rand ran. Zanth ignored the boy’s wet eyes and drippy nose, more sob breathing. They ran until the wild fear left and exhaustion came. To the warrens, mostly narrow alleys here. Many living in lean-tos, crates.

  Shuffling now, Rand drooped. Zanth hopped from his loose grip and walked in front of the boy, tail waving. He knew this area.

  Rand glanced at the alley they passed. Slowed. “There’s a nice big crate there. And light. A water spout, too. No cracked pavement. Sorta clean. Better than many I’ve seen. No rats?”

  The alley is too big. Zanth informed him. I cannot defend it. Good barrow-tunnel not too far away. He paced on a few body lengths before noticing Rand had stopped.

  I like this, Rand’s words came to Zanth’s mind along with a rush of stubborn determination. Rand wiped his nose on his sleeve.

  With a gusty breath, Zanth turned. Sauntered back and scrutinized the alley. He’d prefer a burrow. Too big, CAN’T defend!

  YOU can’t defend it. I can. WE can.

  Sitting and blinking, Zanth stared up at him. You are right, boy.

  Rand, your FamBoy, he corrected.

  “Yesss,” Zanth agreed, stalked into the alley he and his boy owned now. Crate is good. You fix to keep out cold and hot and rats. We will live fine. When Rand caught up with him, he jumped into Rand’s arms.

  “We will live good enough,” said Rand. “Someday we will find or build a good shed.”

  Someday We will be rich.

  Though the boy still held him with gentle arms, Zanth felt rage flash through him, through them. Saw bad seeing of bad fire and heard echoes of harsh words. “Yes, Zanth. We will get my fortune and title back and rebuild my Residence. We will be rich.” Oddness covered Rand and moved over Zanth, too, like a spell. Spellwords. Vow.

  Zanth began to slip from his boy’s arms and Rand hitched him up, looked into his eyes. As Zanth watched, wetness vanished from Rand’s eyes and his mouth went from straight to curved.

  “Love ya, Zanth. We do this together.”

  Love you, FamBoy. We will be rich together. Life is good.

  =The End =

  Pinky Becomes A Fam

  Another story requested by readers. Pinky (of a beige/cream color like Peaches), changed from a regular cat to a Familiar Companion during the story Heart Choice. I didn’t describe that since it didn’t affect the main romance between Straif T’Blackthorn and Mitchella Clover. But it was a question of “how” that teased at readers (and me), so here it is.

  Druida City, Celta, 404 Years After Colonization, Spring

  Pinky sunk his claws into the examination table in the little white room. He raised his fur. He’d act tough and others wouldn’t see how scared he was.

  He’d told his Boy that he wanted to become a Familiar Companion.

  Dimly he understood a Familiar Companion was more. More thinking-being, but more closeness and love, too. He wanted that. He and his Boy deserved that. But it would be hurt and hard.

  The beautiful and wise human female who could make him Fam looked down at him now as her hand traveled over
his back, rounded along his tail. He flicked it and she smiled and he liked looking at her better.

  “Now, Pinky, tell me why you want to become a FamCat?”

  He heard a word he knew...“FamCat.” He sat and stared at her. Her face fell into disappointment. He looked at his Boy who stood in a corner of this small and scary room. His Boy shifted from foot to foot and opened his eyes wide. Then the puny bits of fur over his Boy’s eyes dipped.

  Oh! Pinky knew that expression. He remembered another word, one the female had just spoken. “Why.”

  Like, Why WOULD you eat that bug? Why DO you run from the waterfall shower? He saw those scenes in his head with his Boy’s face the same. Question. Yes, the voice went up, question.

  He sat tilted his head so his gaze met the good woman’s. “Mew.”

  Her eyefur went down, too, she put one hand—not as big as many hands—on his head, wrapped the other around his upper torso.

  And he...he felt her. In his head! Yes, in his head. Warm and good and soft and loving! Oooooh! And she smelled so good, with a hint of catnip. He purred hard.

  Why do you want to become a FamCat? Mostly words pinged in his mind, but he got images in his head. Zanth, the big, FamCat, who thought he was the best, swaggering, sneering. Zanth talking in his head with his FamMan who gave him PRETTIES. Yes, Pinky could hear at the bottom of his ears when Fams talked with their peoples.

  Zanth lived in this place. Pinky growled.

  The next cat who showed up in his mind was that Drina. The little cat as big as Pinky. Who lived in the same house as he did and talked to her man. She also thought she was the best. She hid behind doorways and swatted Pinky in the butt when he walked by. Every. Day. To show him she was better. She wasn’t! He hissed.

  Then he saw in his head a long-haired sweet female gray tabby cat. That cat lived here in this house, too. But she was not Fam. She did not talk to this female who stroked Pinky now, who was her woman. She thought of nothing but pretties and eating and sleeping in the sun and love. Pinky huffed a breath. He was not like her.

  He stared deep, deep into the woman’s eyes so she would know he was more than cat.

  The woman nodded at Pinky, her face serious.