The Dark Yule Read online

  It was Dorothy, better known as Dot, from three blocks down and two blocks over. She had a face as crooked as a street-fighting feral’s, but in her case, appearances were misleading. In fact, her human was quite wealthy and pampered Dot, being particularly generous on the subject of sardines. Even now the rich, heavenly whiff of canned fish lingered in Dot’s fur.

  “I’m sure I don’t care,” I told her in a sniffy way, not wanting to admit how frightened I’d been. “But I put up a Mark, just in case.”

  “I thought Her Husband was going to declaw you if you scratched any more of the wallpaper?”

  “Morwen won’t let him,” I said firmly.

  “It’s not so bad, being declawed,” another cat chimed in. A long, spotted tail dangled from a nearby branch, though its owner remained hidden by leaves. This was Cinnamon, a Savannah cat hardly older than a kitten, and the newest addition to our neighborhood. “You get used to it.”

  I refrained from pointing out that, as a declawed cat, she could hardly hope to climb a tree outside the dreamlands. “Have you seen a night-gaunt?” I asked her point-blank.

  “Not in this lifetime,” she replied.

  I personally found Cinnamon profoundly irritating. It was bad enough that the Savannah cat rivaled me in size. Equally offensive was her name, which was far too close to my own. But the fact that Cinnamon was my elder by several lives really got under my tail. It didn’t help that she seemed none too bright in this lifetime, though I was never quite sure whether she was genuinely obtuse, or merely ignorant.

  “Then you’re no help,” I snapped at her, and stalked, stiff-legged, down the street, in the direction of the glorious setting sun.

  I ignored the half-seen shadows of strange cats, and the tempting rustling sounds in piles of fallen autumn leaves, whose delightful crunch co-existed with the fresh green foliage overhead. The dreamlands are full of such pleasant contradictions.

  Personally I preferred my own proprietary patch of trees, which represented the last remnants of timber belonging to the old, old house. I thought of crouching under that big fir not long ago, and of watching the silhouette of the night-gaunt flap across the waning moon.

  What if it had returned in my spiritual absence? Could it even now be knocking against the window of my baby’s room, while he and I slept on, oblivious?

  I felt my dream-self slipping back into wakefulness, and resisted the subtle urge to open my eyes. I wanted time to think about all this, and the material world was not always conducive to deep consideration. In particular, I wanted to be both alone, and somewhere up high—all cats know elevation is necessary to proper cogitation.

  I approached a likely-looking tree. Bunching my hind legs beneath me, I prepared to launch myself at the nearest low-hanging branch—and stopped. An enormous black paw was just visible between in the gap between the leaves, and a second glance showed me the gleam of a massive, liquid eye within the beech’s dappled shadows.

  “Your Highness,” I said. “My apologies.”

  “No apology required, Pumpkin Spice,” said the panther, with an undertone that might have been either a growl, or a purr. “I hear you bear troubling news.”

  How had he known? Had he tapped into mysterious kingly powers to learn the content of my conversation? Or had he merely eavesdropped? It was impossible to say. Besides, I was more miffed about him using my full name, though perhaps that wasn’t strictly fair. Likely the king simply didn’t recall that I preferred “Spice.” I was a fixed female on the edge of his territory and, as such, hardly deserved his consideration.

  “I saw a night-gaunt,” I told him, craning my head back to better observe the panther above me. Deliberately or not, the king remained nearly invisible amidst the thick foliage. “In the material world,” I clarified, after a second’s pause produced no response.

  “Is that all?” the king wanted to know.

  Isn’t that enough? I wanted to ask. “It seems unusual,” I demurred instead.

  “What did it do?”

  “I tried an incantation on it, and it flew away.” Stated baldly, my adventure appeared less than impressive.

  “Just one night-gaunt?” the king asked.

  “Just the one.”

  The panther paused. I was becoming tired of sitting with my head practically laid against my back, but it’s hard to look away from a cat that big. It’s not very wise, either.

  “Well, it is Kingsport,” he said at last. “Visitors aren’t uncommon, are they? I wouldn’t worry about it. Go about your business.”

  I blinked at the king respectfully, and trotted lightly away. I managed to make it around a corner before my tail lashed and my ears flattened against my head.

  Well, it is Kingsport! And what did Jack know? He’d only been king two years, after that highly-questionable defeat of the far-more-beloved Big Red, and he’d only been in Kingsport a year before that. I’d been born and raised in Kingsport, and I knew with certainty that this was at least my second life in the area. I had vague memories that stretched back even further, to white-sailed ships and muddy lanes, so it was possible I’d accumulated three or even four lifetimes in this location. Such repetition was not unheard of, though it was unusual.

  This time, I managed to find an unoccupied tree, and leapt aggressively upon a wide, comfortable branch. Violently sharpening my claws on the soft bark improved my mood, and as I scratched, I came to two conclusions.

  First, it was possible that I’d seen a night-gaunt, and no one else had, because the night-gaunt had been drawn to our house in particular. Granted, it had been an age since Morwen had worked any magic, and she hadn’t been much good to start. Still, it might be worth sniffing around the house, to see if she’d dabbled in the occult again. To be perfectly honest, I rather hoped she had. I’d enjoyed being a familiar.

  Second, the person to speak with wasn’t King Jack, but Tilly. The immemorial Tilly was an old crone of a cat who’d stubbornly refused to die—every neighborhood had one. She’d know if a night-gaunt was unusual (even for Kingsport), or if my concerns were misplaced. If Tilly didn’t see any cause for alarm, and if Morwen hadn’t been getting up to magical shenanigans, I’d just have to let the whole matter drop.

  Like most ancient cats, Tilly spent three-quarters of her life in the dreamlands, with no more than an occasional, drowsy appearance in the material realm for food or a piss. She was almost certainly in the dreamlands now. I leapt down from the tree, ready to search for her…

  …and awoke with a shriek as something seized the back of my neck. Choking, I fought the strong grip. I was rising into the air…I could see the shadow of the night-gaunt stretched below me…

  Then I saw what was actually below me: my sleeping baby. The edge of the crib. And then the floor, as I was flung violently down. With a half-twist I landed on my feet and instantly jetted out the door, squeezing past Morwen’s slippered foot as she stomped into the room.

  Her Husband was yelling, probably at me, but I never understood anything he said—his speech was just noises in the air, with none of that subtle spiritual comprehension that exists between true companions. I picked up much more of the meaning behind Morwen’s exasperated sounds. Damn it, don’t throw the cat! Baby is fine…cats don’t suffocate infants…a myth. Then my baby awoke with his characteristic roar, and both human parents were occupied.

  In a quiet corner of the kitchen I licked my fur back into place, vigorously stripping the smell of Her Husband’s hand from my neck. Then I squeezed through the back door’s slightly-too-small cat flap, almost losing my footing on the deck’s half-melted morning frost.

  It was true that Tilly’s soul was almost certainly in the dreamlands, even now. However, it was also true that a great dream traveler like herself could be anyplace, whereas I knew exactly where to find her physical body. As for the humans, I hoped they noticed I’d left in a huff. It would serve them right.

  3

  Antiquated

  Despite my ridiculously early
rising, getting to Tilly’s house would be no easy task. This was partially due to traffic on the large road, Walnut Street, that divided my territory from hers. Walnut Street was the road by which King Jack and the previous monarch, Big Red, had held their fateful duel. Jack had rolled Big Red onto the street, and a large truck struck his ginger opponent, leaving Jack the somewhat doubtful victor.

  I hadn’t been there in person, but like all the neighborhood cats, I’d known at once that our king was dead. Such knowledge strikes one as a sudden blast of cold air; for just a moment, your mind freezes with cold clarity, and you see the world through ice. Since that day I’d taken extra care on Walnut Street.

  Mostly, however, the difficulty lay in the half-wild dogs that dwelt on the corner of Walnut and Jefferson. They called themselves the Bastard Pack. We called them pretentious jerks. There was a Mastiff, a Dane, and two Pit Bulls, but their leader was a standard poodle called Mo, and he was by far the meanest of the lot. Poodles usually are.

  Dogs are rarely a problem to us free-roaming cats—so long as we have claws, and the neighborhood boasts plenty of trees, fences, and low-hanging roofs—but the owner of the Bastard Pack was a beer-swilling low-life who couldn’t be bothered with something like basic fence repair. Thus his “fence” was more of a faint wooden suggestion, barely able to stand up to a stiff breeze, let alone five large, aggressive, cat-hunting dogs. If I wanted to survive a visit to Tilly’s, I’d either have to take care they didn’t scent me, or stay high enough that it wouldn’t matter.

  I wove my way through the series of backyards and bare hedges that would lead me to Walnut Street. The pink light of the sunrise was reflected by the clouds, which hung low and luminous with unshed snow. The whole morning enjoyed a pleasant sort of glow, a hushed sense of expectation. It was also cold as hell, and my breath puffed whitely before me as I slunk through a neighbor’s garden. In warmer weather I’d have left little footprints in in the soft soil, telling tales of my passing, but in this season the ground was frozen hard.

  It was a time to hunker down and enjoy the pleasures of the indoors: crackling flames in the house’s old fireplace, with its cracked bricks and persistent draft; a soft blanket to knead under my tired, cold paws; a warm lap in which to snuggle and snooze. Morwen’s growing belly, heavy with her second kit, didn’t leave much room for said snuggling, but I still felt obligated to try. It was good to purr sweet little nothings to the unborn within, so that it might recognize my voice when it emerged. Gods, though, human birthings did take forever! Had I been unfixed, I could’ve borne three entire litters in the time it took Morwen to form a single child.

  Busy with such contemplations, I hardly noticed where I was, until the fence I was walking ended abruptly. My front paw was actually dangling in mid-air before I could stop; I had to execute an awkward little pretend-grooming session, licking the paw’s side and smoothing it over my head—just in case any other cat had been watching.

  As I performed the pantomime, I took a good look at Walnut Street. To my disappointment the traffic was as heavy as ever. There was hardly any pause in the stream of vehicles, let alone a gap lengthy enough for a cat to dash across. Speed was not my greatest asset; better to leave the mad sprints to smaller, whippier cats.

  That left the crosswalk at the corner, directly opposite the home of the Bastard Pack. I couldn’t hear the dogs, but I could smell their lingering reek all the way down the street, so it was difficult to say whether or not they occupied the yard this morning. I debated the possibility that they were eating breakfast. Morning seemed a rational time to feed big, hungry beasts, but their degenerate owner hardly seemed the type to stick to a schedule.

  Perched on the narrow fence, watching the cars speed by, I found myself fixated upon the idea of breakfast. Delicious breakfast…moist and savory…what was it, exactly, that I was craving? I sniffed the frigid air and corrected myself. Not craving: smelling. What was it that I smelled?

  I dropped off the fence and wandered down the sidewalk, a little nearer to the teasing odor. It seemed to emerge from the storm drain in the gutter. I halted, disappointed. I knew better than to try and go down there. Kingsport lost kittens every year to the sewers.

  Yet the aroma intrigued me. It smelled somewhat like tuna, and yet, not at all like tuna. It was definitely fish, and raw at that. Were there actual fish swimming in the sewers now? Perhaps some koi abandoned by a careless human, grown to enormous size? I wondered what it would take to locate a safe entrance to the sewers, and organize a little hunting party. Dot would be interested, I was sure—for such a well-fed and pampered cat, she was an inveterate and unsympathetic hunter, and the terror of the neighborhood songbirds.

  With care I crept to the edge of the sidewalk, hoping for a better whiff. My ears flattened as a car sped by, too close for comfort. I’d have to sniff quick. As soon as the next car tore past, I dropped my head over the side, and inhaled deeply.

  A scaly, fishy, horribly slimy paw closed over my head, crushing my face. It was dragging me down the hole!

  I shrieked and sank my claws into the pungent, disgustingly spongy flesh, as deeply as they could possibly go. I’d hoped to touch bone, but then again, I wasn’t entirely sure there were any. At the same time I launched myself upwards with a powerful thrust of my hind legs, fighting that awful downward pressure.

  The paw, or hand, or whatever it was, spasmed under my claws, loosening its grip for a critical second just as I made my leap. I ended up somersaulting forward, to land ungracefully upon my back in the middle of the street. With a twist and a roll I snaked out of the creature’s slackened grasp, at the same time releasing my own death grip. Now free, I sprang upright onto my toes, spitting and hissing into the face of my assailant.

  But all I could see was the storm drain’s low opening, gaping blackly. There was no sign of my attacker.

  A car horn honked madly, and I remembered where I was: in the road! I leapt into the air, twisted mid-jump, and dashed pell-mell away from the sewer. This took me directly into oncoming traffic, but whatever spirits or guardians look after me were in good form that day. Three cars slammed on their brakes, and I heard more horns behind me, but in two breathless, terrifying seconds I had gained the opposite sidewalk and was hurtling top-speed toward Tilly’s house.

  From here it was all old, narrow, quiet neighborhood roads, with nothing to dodge but an occasional trundling car bumping over the cracked asphalt—and those were easily avoided by staying high. I did pause to wash the fish smell from my head, a nasty task that took longer than I’d expected.

  At last I dropped off an old stone wall and into the handkerchief-sized square of greenery that was Tilly’s “backyard.” It was primarily occupied by an out-of-place koi pond, whose surface gleamed with translucent ice. On a flat rock beside the pond was a ratty pink blanket, and on this blanket, posed with paws outstretched like a particularly small, mangy, and grumpy Sphinx, was Tilly.

  I usually encountered Tilly in the dreamlands. There, whether she appeared in the sunset city or the cat-thronged streets of Ulthar, she was young and black-furred, with a star of white upon her chest, and eyes as green as a frog. I’d come to understand that this was Tilly clinging to the appearance of a previous, and far more exciting, incarnation.

  In this lifetime she was only a rather dull gray tabby, and her pupils had grown increasingly milky with age. In fact, though she opened her eyes at my approach, I wasn’t entirely sure she could see me at all. But then, did an elder cat like Tilly really require physical senses?

  She didn’t bother to turn and face me; instead, a single ear cocked in my direction. “Pumpkin Spice,” she muttered. “What do you want?”

  Though she wasn’t looking at me, I blinked twice and settled into a crouch before responding, “I could use some advice, Elder.” You see? I could be respectful at times, if the other party was deserving.

  Tilly’s eyes lazily closed again. She yawned, showing the brown remnants of teeth, and a goodly dose of gum
disease. “Meet me in the dreamlands,” she commanded, and dropped her head upon her chest, preparing to doze her way into alternate realms.

  I actually wasn’t very good at moving in and out of the dreamlands on cue—I required darkness and genuine exhaustion to make the transition. Libby, by contrast, could pass between worlds with a blink and a sneeze. But how could I possibly admit that? “Ah, Tilly…” I began, stalling for time. An excuse manifested abruptly, and I seized it. “I want to ask you about the night-gaunts,” I told her. “And I’ve heard that if you whisper their name too much in the dream realms, they’ll return to haunt your sleep.”

  Tilly’s eyes snapped open. “True,” she said. “Better safe than sorry.” And just when I thought I’d gotten away with it, she added, “And besides, I’d forgotten how clumsy your dream-entries are.”

  This I ignored. “I found a night-gaunt on my roof,” I explained. “Last night.”

  “Interesting,” Tilly mumbled, sounding profoundly bored. She didn’t say anything for another few moments. I was beginning to think she’d dozed off again, and left for the dreamlands without me, when she asked, “What about your human? What’s-her-nose, the little wannabe witch? Has she been at it again?”

  “Morwen?” I said. “I don’t think so. I’m certain I would’ve noticed her workings.” In truth, I wasn’t certain at all, because Tilly wasn’t totally wrong—very little of Morwen’s magic had actually worked. She’d still been at the my-magic-books-have-colorful-covers-and-come-from-the-mall-bookstore phase when she’d met Her Husband and ceased her practice. For all I knew, she might have been casting her “spells” with abandon, and I’d never have noticed a thing.

  Still, I felt compelled to defend my “wannabe” witch’s honor. “She’ll pick it up again, after this next kit’s born,” I told Tilly, with far more hope than conviction.

  Tilly sneezed. “I hope so,” she said, quite unexpectedly. “We could use any half-decent witch. This town is going to hell in a handbasket because the damn humans can’t see past their whiskers. If they had whiskers. You know what I mean.” Once again, her ear twitched in my direction, though her clouded eyes still stared into the distance. “And this generation of cats isn’t much better. Your mother was good at Seeing That Which Cannot Be Seen. I thought you’d inherited her gift. But here you are, babbling about night-gaunts, which ought to be the least of your worries.”