Children of Bast (12 page)

“Stay here,” Mutt whispered. “We’ll come get you when Meffie gets used to the idea of a stranger. Stay down and be quiet.”

They slunk off low to the ground like they were tracking a kill. I hid behind a tree and hunkered down. It was a long time before I saw Fergus trotting toward me.

“Come on, Sugar Foot, she’s cool with it.”

I followed him to a thicket covered in small flowers and green plants that looked like small umbrellas. The leaves were deeper, too, coming up to my belly. I glanced up. The sky and stars were in full view; the moonlight washed the thicket with gray light. Mutt sprawled in a lush flowerbed, and near him was this very beautiful, rich black creature with a bright white stripe starting from her plush tail and splitting along both sides of her body and coming together on top of her head like a cap. A thin white stripe ran between her eyes and stopped at her nose that was covered with shiny black skin. Her small head was tapered to a point at her nose, and her ears were round like tiny leaves. I froze as she studied me with her beady black eyes.

Mutt spoke up, “Meffie, this here’s Nebibi that I told you about. He’s okay. A little dumb about bein’ on the street, but we’re shaping him up, right Ferg?”

“Right. Say somethin’, Sweet Thing, so she won’t think your stupid.”

“Eih axbār.” My voice gargled.

Fergus said, “I don’t think she knows what that means.”

“Happy meet you,” she said, surprising all us that she did know what I said. “Mutt say you okay.” She had a soft, sweet voice that rose and fell.

“Nice meeting you, too, Meffie. The guys have told me a lot about you. You sure are pretty.” I sounded so pathetic.

“You, too, pretty. Black, um, black . . .How you say, Mutt?”

“Faraawi? Black faraawi?”

“Ah, yes, black faraawi like me.”

Suddenly, she got up and started over to me. I dropped to a crouch and wrapped my tail around my body like it’d protect me. She shuffled through the leaves toward me and I gotta whiff of her: a choking smell like those white flowers that grow in the park by that pile of rocks. You know, Chubby, the ones that stink real bad in summer when you walk on ‘em? She didn’t smell as bad as the flowers, but I knew if she let loose like Mutt said, it’d knock my head off.

I froze while she sniffed my nose, my head and ears, and down my left side to where my tail begins. She glanced at Mutt who stifled a giggle by stuffing his tail in his mouth. “I tink you not smell good. Need Mutt give bath.”

Lady, you oughta get a load of yourself, I thought, but said, “You’re probably right. Mutt, what about it when we get home?” I punched “home” louder, hoping he would get my drift.

The kith brain dropped his tail but still grinned like a ninny. “Sure thing, Little Buddy, and, hey, Meffie, I think we need to go. Tomorrow is gonna to be busy, and we need to sleep now.”

“Amai no sleep night. Sleep day.”

“Yeah well, you’re right, but tomorrow we, uh . . .we need to teach Junior, here, some more of the ropes. Teach him how to. . . uh . . fish.”

Meffie stared at me, her little black eyes blank. “He make good fisher, I tink.” Turning back to Mutt and taking a quick look at Fergus who was sort of turned off, she said, “You no hunt with me tonight?”

“Oh, sure,” Mutt answered. “I forgot.” He turned to me. “We always hunt with Meffie when we visit. She pretty much likes what we like, and our eyes are better in the dark than hers are. So, let’s get going.” He jumped up and headed into the woods. Fergus followed with Meffie waddling behind.

After I got to know her better, I found she had short legs and couldn’t move very fast. ‘Course with her defense system, she didn’t have to.

We hunted ‘til almost Tuyuur Song and killed a pile of mice that made us all so full we laid around in the thicket until dawn.

I won’t say Meffie became a close friend, and I don’t think Mutt and Fergus were best buddies with her, either. But, she was fascinating to be around for a short time, and I think short time was the way she liked it, too. Hunting with her was fun, like all hunting is, but once the food was gathered, she made it clear that we were dismissed soon after eating.

~ ~ ~ ~

“I knew a skunk once,” Chubby said. “About where you said Meffie lived. Wonder if it’s the same one?”

“Ouch! Damned flea. It’s boring a hole in my belly. Hold on, Chubby. When I find the little sucker, I’ll eat him.” I found the flea and crush him between my front teeth. “I couldn’t tell you, Chubby, if Meffie was the one you met or not. I’m not good with a skunk’s age.”

“Don’t matter. The skunk I met wasn’t thrilled with me, so we both skedaddled in opposite directions. I’d say you’re lucky to have an experience like that. Not many of us do.” He yawned and stretched. “It’s suppertime. Let’s go back to the mollie bašar and get a handout.” As he scurried away with me behind, he was all smiles

We ate the rich food she set out, and I realized that Chubby was, well, fat. “Hey, old buddy, think you might slow down on this food? I mean you are a bit wide in the rear.”

“No, but I will happily knock you on your tail, if you desire.”

Chapter 11

The cat is domestic only as far as suits its own ends.
Saki (Hector Hugh Munro)

Like Mutt said, we had all the fresh food out there we wanted. Rats were definitely not my favorites, but when hungry, eat what’s available. That was my new motto, and the only motto I’ve ever had.

Freedom. Day after day sitting in that prison at the seminary, looking out the window, watching bašar, other amai, kalb, teir and everything else go where they wanted to go, do what they wanted to do, I dreamed of freedom. I’d been trapped all my life, so I wasn’t sure what freedom was, but I suspected it was outside. And it was, and is. Fergus, Mutt and I went where we pleased, slept all day, caught a meal, laid around, groomed, and then went off to somewhere else just for the pleasure of going.

Of course, there were other amai around, and we’d hang out a lot. Fergus and Mutt knew them all. Most of them were cool and fun to be with, but there were stinkers, too, like Raeed and Thain, and amai stuck on themselves, shoving their tails under our noses and waiting for us to bring in the food. They lasted about a minute before Mutt let ‘em have it or Fergus shredded an ear. We guarded our territory, but we’d share as long as no one muscled in on our stuff. I was still living in Fergus’ territory, which he was quick to remind me when I horned in, like hunting without his okay.

“All the eats out here are mine, hey. Just ask; that’s all. You’re always welcome, but just ask. Okay?” I understood, but some amai didn’t, and some amai hurt a lot after.

Mutt’s territory was at the lakeshore in the bushes, but he didn’t seem to care much about protecting it. He let most other amai come and go, hunt, and seldom stopped them. Except for Pach, a sexy white and black tabby mollie who Mutt hated.

“She’s a liar, a tease, and dangerous,” he’d say after he ran her off.

I didn’t ask why because Mutt was so mad that he scared me. Fergus told me in private that Pach had been his one true love, but had left him for a yellow tabby house pet in a fancy apartment.

“Broke his heart. He never got over it and has never had a mollie since.”

“Poor guy. Guess she just comes around to needle him, huh?”

“Yeah, and he ain’t havin’ it.”

One day it occurred to me that I didn’t have a territory and mentioned it to Fergus.

“Well, Kid, you’ll have to find one that’s open or fight for one” While we talked we dined on baby arnab we’d found under a log. “More’n likely you’ll have to fight ‘cause you’ll never find an open one unless the owner’s dead.”

Feeling like a kith seeking advice from his maama, I asked, “How can you tell?”

“You gotta go in careful like and give it the sniff test. If the smell is real strong, someone owns it and takes care of it, like I do. Mutt, now, is kind of lazy about marking, and he’s had some problems. Good thing he’s a great fighter, or he’d be homeless.” He finished his last bite then washed. “Now, if the scent is real strong, you can decide what to do. Lay low, see who the owner is, size him up and figure if you can take him or not. If not, buzz off and look around. Now, if the scent is real faint, almost not there, you’re probably in luck and can lay down some stink of your own. But, make sure you look around carefully, ‘cause you might be around someone like Mutt and get yourself clobbered. Oh, and another thing: if is smells female, leave. Our pretty mollies are dangerous all the time, but especially at certain times, if you catch my drift.”

“Yeah. When they come in.” I washed my face.

“You been around, I see.”

I finished washing. “No. A friend I had once told me, as she warned me.”

“Ah, not your maama?”

“No.” We found some sun on our favorite sleeping porch and stretched out.

Fergus continued: “Mollies are usually snarly unless you go easy. Then, they can be good friends for a short time, or while their loaded sometimes. All of mine kicked my tail out once they felt the kiths move.” He yawned. “To continue the territory thing: all I’m saying is be careful, and from my experience you’ll have to fight to get a place. If it’s an old guy, you may have a chance, but you’d be some lousy amait to move in on an old amait’s territory. A young one? Well, how good are you?”

“I don’t know. Never fought.”

His eyes bugged and his mouth dropped open. “What?” he managed after a moment. “A fully developed tom as big as you are and never had a fight? What did your maama do, Nebibi? Just sit around and ignore you?”

Now I was really embarrassed. How could I tell him she was a boozer? “My maama is dead, but she drank a lot, and was probably fixed.”

“Drank? How do you mean? Sits around a water bowl all day and drinks?”

“Fergus, I told you we were trapped in a seminary, right?”

“Yeah, but to understand I’d have to know what a seminary is.”

“I’m not completely sure myself, but it has to do with things they do for something they call god, or something called our lord other times. I don’t know, but I think both of my captors are in charge of the place. It’s like they obey, or something.”

“So what does that have to do with your maama drinking a lot of water?”

“They drink a lot of nibiit as they talk to these gods. And nibiit is this stuff that’s red and smells bad, and when you drink a lot of it, you stagger around, bump into walls, don’t make sense when you talk and sleep most of the time. My maama was hooked on it because she drank it from glasses they left around the place and sometimes sipped it from bottles that didn’t have lids. She’d push the bottles over and lap it up.”

Fergus looked at me and smiled. “So they have their kef, too.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“You ain’t ever had kef? Sweetie Pie, Daddy’s gotta take you to the garden tonight. Mutt and me don’t use much, but ever so often we gotta get some kef.”

“What does this kef do?”

“What this nibiit stuff did for your maama. We gulp down four or five leaves and mellow in the grass for like a whole End of Light and come around just before Tuyuur Song. Don’t even hunt.”

“I don’t know, Fergus. My maama wasn’t much of a maama when she drank the stuff. If this kef . . .”

“Relax. I’ll explain later. We’re off the subject of fighting.” He sat up and licked his paw, stretched and yawned. “Guess I’ll have to give you lessons in fighting, too.” He shook his head and looked away. “Why am I doing this? You’re competition. I should have run your tail off when I met you. But, oh no, tenderhearted ol’ Fergus has to be a teacher. Sic a kilaab on me. Come on.”

He jumped off the chair and hopped from the porch to the ground with me tagging after. He ran toward the lake and Mutt’s place.

“Hey, Mutt,” he called. “Gotta teach the kid to fight.”

Mutt stuck his head out, eyes winking like a crossing signal, and grinning. “Teach him to fight? Yahoo! Ain’t never taught an amait to fight. Thought we was born fightin’”

“Well, some of us have maamas who drink nibiit,” Fergus said.

“Nibiit?” Mutt said and stopped blinking.

“I’ll explain later. Let’s go to the beach where it’s soft, and, besides, I gotta pinch a loaf before we get started.”

We raced to the beach where Fergus dug a hole. Mutt did the same thing and beh yeh contentedly while I watched.

What am I into, I wondered. I’d seen amai fight. Adele and I watched two toms slug it out over a pretty little tabby once, and the loser later died. We also watched a queen beat the khara out of a tom she didn’t want anymore. We thought it was a bit much since all she had to say to him was scram.

So, I sat and waited for my teachers to finish, hoping that when the lesson was over, I’d be able to sit up and eat. I also knew I didn’t have to do this, none of it. I knew if I went back to the seminary and looked pitiful, I’d get back in. But they wouldn’t call me Nebibi? Not a chance. I was Gaylord to them and always would be because they couldn’t understand my language. I do not care for Gaylord and never did. Now, Nebibi was cool: a wild, black amait roaming the forest. That I could get use to.