| Subject: Trouble elsewhere |
Author:
Steph
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Date Posted: 14:25:05 08/02/02 Fri
In reply to:
Gabriel
's message, "Troubles Abrewing" on 09:16:07 08/02/02 Fri
Jeff and Gwenneth reached the high fence, crowned with barbed wire, that surrounded the school yard. The boy knelt and rubbed the cat's cheek gently. "Run on home, Gwennie," he said quietly. Gwenneth looked up at him solemnly.
"Hey, Cheysuli! How's your lir-lover?"
Jeff leapt to his feet, face reddening, and glared fiercely at the trio of boys who stood inside the fence, pointing at him and laughing merrily.
"Shut up!" he shouted, clenching his fists at his sides. "I am not a Cheysuli!"
"Yeah, yeah," one of the boys said, smirking. "Why does she follow you around so much?"
"She's my pet!" Jeff yelled, taking a threatening step towards the fence and angrily shoving his glasses farther up on his nose.
"Cheysuli! Cheysuli!" the boys taunted. Up at the schoolhouse, the bell began to toll. Laughing raucously, the boys dashed up towards the building, leaving Jeff red-faced and furious.
Gwenneth stared up at her boy. He was in a fighting temper, more angry than she had ever seen him. She reached out a paw and gently touched his ankle. Jeff jerked away from her like her paw was on fire, glaring wildly down at her. A pair of young women, stepping mincingly through the gate to avoid getting dust on their white stockings, glanced at Jeff suspiciously and hurried towards the schoolhouse. Jeff looked after them like he was about to call them back, an almost desperate look in his eyes.
"I'm not Cheysuli," he whispered to himself. "I'm just a regular human. How could they say something so terrible?"
He looked down at the cat, as though suddenly remembering she was there. "Go home, Gwen," he said in an oddly flat voice. "Just go home." Gwenneth was startled to see tears in his eyes as he pulled his jacket more tightly around his shoulders and hurried through the gate. In the distance, thunder rumbled, and across the sky great thunderheads began to roll.
Gwenneth sat at the schoolgate for close to an hour, staring after her boy. Only when large, splattering raindrops began to fall did she turn and walk back down the road, and then her head and tail were carried low to the ground. When she reached her family's house she stood beneath her boy's window for a long moment, and then pressed her muddy paws against the wall so that two clear footprints were left. Then she turned and exited the yard once more.
In fifteen minutes' worth of carefully-chosen paths through the buildings, she had reached the outer wall. With a long, searching look in each direction, the tiny cat hopped onto the vertical slope and began climbing. She climbed like a fly, quickly and easily as though she was walking down the street. When she reached the top she sat on the ledge of an arrow slit for a full minute, looking out over the fields and woods that sprawled outside the city. She dreaded to go, to leave her boy for even a short while, but she could not put off the journey any longer. She had tried since the day he was born, but she simply did not have the capacity to reach him alone. It was time to seek help, before it was too late. She could sense them out there, far away, grouped together in places that were, at least for a time, protected from the humans. There were even a few pairs wandering separate from the clans. The closest of these pairs caught her attention immediately, for they were moving quickly-- too quickly for normal travel. Being pursued.
The cat's eyes narrowed. Quickly she reached out her mind to touch that of the animal-- a wolf, she sensed.
Perhaps, she thought to herself, they will help me if I assist them. Aloud in the mind link, she spoke to the wolf.
::I'm coming.::
Without hesitation, Gwenneth leapt from the wall, plummeting with the rain towards the ground fifty feet below. Halfway down, however, her body seemed to fade until there was nothing to be seen. A few seconds later, a creature appeared in the shadow of the woods. It was as large as a catamount but built more lightly, a giant cat whose white coat was splashed with black and gold. With only a glance over her shoulder at the walls of the city, Gwenneveire ran. The pair was at least twenty miles away, but in her true form the lir was very fast.
::I'm coming,:: she repeated to the wolf, and the miles fell away behind her in the rain.
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