The Land Beyond All Dreams (3 page)

I could tell Rose didn’t have any, and the only one I had was whether or not we could get to the car before being charged for Thirteen’s medical care. He’s a nice enough cat and I was intrigued by the doctor’s statements, but neither was enough to make me want to foot the bill.

I smiled and said, “No questions, doc. Thanks for all your help. Thirteen, stay out of trouble.”

Thirteen looked at us, which distracted him long enough for Dr. Byers to get a heavy blanket around him and scoop him up. He hissed and struggled, but she had a good grip and was used to the tactics of bloodthirsty felines.

“Have a good day, you two, and don’t worry about him. He’ll settle down as soon as he realizes we’re not going to hurt him.” She exited through the staff door, rocking Thirteen like a colicky baby.

We went out to the lobby and straight to the parking lot. A quick check verified the Range Rover was free of unwanted passengers, Human or feline, so I turned us out of the parking lot and hopped on I-25, headed for home. Once we were in our garage, I got out of the car and froze.

Thirteen was curled up in the back seat. He gave me a sideways glance out from under the brim of his hat and said, “
Mrow
.” He hopped out of the car and sauntered toward the door to the house. The phone started ringing as I let us in.

“No, we haven’t seen the cat since you took him into the back office,” I lied. “We drove up I-25 coming home. I doubt even a bionic cat could have kept up with us.”

Rose tickled Thirteen under the chin and snickered. I put my finger over my lips and stepped away from them before one of them did something to rat me out to Byers.

On the other end of the line, the good doctor sighed. “Well, please let us know if he turns up at your house. I have all the animal control agencies between Castle Rock and Fort Collins keeping an eye out for him. It’s critical we find him due to the possibility that he’s carrying an unknown pathogen.”

“How did he get loose?” I asked.

“One of the lab techs put him in a regular cat container. He was out in a matter of seconds. We think his paw structure allowed him to spring the door, which I take full responsibility for. I should have ordered the door to be secured with a padlock, and it slipped my mind. We turned the lab upside down looking for him, but he wasn’t in the building.”

“So, a real hairy Houdini,” I said.

I could almost hear teeth grinding. “That’s one way to put it,” she said. “If you could keep us apprised I would certainly appreciate it.” She hung up with a definitive
click
.

“How bad was the damage?” Rose asked.

“A sudden and unexplained server crash cost them all of the data they’d entered over the last hour, most of which they can reconstruct. Thirteen’s blood sample was one of six that fell out of the lab’s shipping container and broke on the floor. None of them are usable now.”

Rose scratched Thirteen behind his ears. “For a non-magical cat, he’s doing pretty well. I think we should keep him.”

“I’m not so sure he isn’t using magic,” I said. “When I was in high school, I accidently locked our cat, Blitzen, in the basement one night. I walked past him as I was leaving the basement and shut the door behind me. When I got upstairs, I realized what I’d done and started to go back to let him out. He came walking out of my parents’ bedroom on the second floor, down the stairs, and into the kitchen to get his dinner.” I sat down and looked at Thirteen. “Blitzen teleported two stories up and about forty feet sideways, and I don’t think for a moment he’s the only cat who ever had that power.”

“No,” Rose said. “He wouldn’t be. But even my people don’t know how they gained it or where they travel to when using it. I wasn’t sure cats on your world had the power either.” She stroked Thirteen under the chin until he closed his eyes. “It was a cat who brought us the means to come to your world, ages past.”

I sat down and stared at Thirteen. “How did that happen?”

“We keep cats, just as Humans do.” She moved her attentions to the back of the cat’s neck, rubbing in small circles with her fingertips. “One day, a scholar noticed one of his cats, thought lost long years before, walking the halls of his lair again. The cat was only a year older and wore a collar of gold and onyx marked with a language the scholar did not know. It wasn’t from our world.

“Plane walking is difficult and dangerous without a guide. The only safe way to find a specific world is to possess something from that world, at least until you’ve been there a few times. The scholar followed the collar’s vibrations to this world and explored it. He found the time difference too extreme for his purposes, but…” She smiled and shrugged. “This world met our needs perfectly.”

“So, you can’t travel to a world unless you have an object from it?” I shook my head. “A perfect Catch-22. So how the hell did the scholar’s cat get here?”

Rose shrugged. “Ask a cat. All we’ve been able to find out is that they can travel, and they do.”

“What about this guy?”

Rose shook her head. “He’s not from any world I know of. I wouldn’t want to try to find it, to be honest. I don’t think it’s a very nice place.”

The cat, of course, would neither confirm nor deny Rose’s statement.

Frakking cat.

Cookie Day

I’ve never had a pet. Aside from the whole
remembering to feed them
thing, I can’t stand the idea of an animal sharing my bed—especially after doing its business. Thankfully, Thirteen didn’t need a litter box. He used the toilet and flushed afterward. He stayed out of our bedroom and took to kipping on my recliner in the living room. It was near the pet door the house’s previous owners had been thoughtful enough to install for him, and the back of the adjacent couch let him look out on the back yard. Best of all, the recliner had an excellent view of the television. I should know. That’s why I put it there.

When I got up Sunday morning, I could hear a man’s voice shouting in rapid-fire Japanese. I looked into the living room. The damn cat was awake and watching a subtitled game show. I made coffee and started a skillet full of bacon while athletic Japanese ladies took turns taking on a killer obstacle course, only to wind up falling into the water with much laughing and screaming. The remote was on the seat next to him, so I assumed he had picked it on purpose. I tried to ignore it, but the
schadenfreude
kept pulling me back in. The BBC may produce the best comedies in the world, but nobody beats the Japanese at game shows.

While I was getting breakfast together, Thirteen jumped up on the kitchen counter with a mouth full of Unicorn horn. He set it at his feet and meowed at me. I picked the horn up and looked it over. It seemed undamaged, but no longer tingled with stored power. I gave Thirteen a closer look.

His fur was soft, clean, and glossy, filled in and restored to a creamy yellow with a white bib and socks. He’d gained some bulk, but his skin still felt thick and stiff. I pressed my hand against his chest. His heartbeat was still nearly imperceptible and his muscles still felt like beef jerky.

I waved the horn under his nose. “I had plans for this, buddy. You used up all the juice making yourself fat and fluffy.” I fished out some of the nearly done pieces of bacon and set them on a paper towel to cool. “My mother has cancer,” I said. Don’t ask me why I was explaining it to the cat. “She decided not to fight it. Just…live out her days and enjoy the time she has left. I thought I could cure her with the horn. Not enough power left in it, though, and what there was, you used up. We can’t replace it, either. Getting that one cost Rose her ability to have children.”

I pulled more bacon out of the skillet and tore one of the cooled pieces into bits. Thirteen took them out of my fingers and chomped away. “I was going to use it on Mom, with or without her permission, but it was depleted already. I think all of the Unicorn’s life energy went into destroying Rose’s fertility. I tried for months to power it up. Meditation, energy rituals, prayer, you name it. I did manage to learn a few things. I learned it needs life energy to work, preferably pulled from the body of the wielder. I knocked myself out for three days curing Ember’s sinus infection.

“In the end, though, life energy is electrochemical. Simple electricity does the job, although the amount of current required is astounding. Electricity isn’t efficient. It took three months of household current to build up the charge you used. The only reason I’m not mad as Hell at you is that it would take years to store up enough power to heal Mom, and she doesn’t have that kind of time.”

Thirteen stepped back, looking at his feet. “
Rawr
.” He pushed the horn toward me with one paw.

“It’s fine, you didn’t know.” I handed him some more bacon. “In fact, why don’t you keep it? The most powerful magical artifact on the planet, now just a stray cat’s chew toy. Right damn poetical, don’t you think?”

I got up to get a tissue and dabbed the tears out of my eyes. “I used to look forward to today. The Sunday before Christmas was Cookie Day. Even my father would get involved. All he’d ever make was shortbread, but it was his thing. The whole family took part. Since Audrey and I moved out, the tradition has been honored more in the breach than the observance, though. Given Mom’s condition, this is likely to be our last year together.”

Rose came in and took the bacon to the table while I finished the eggs. I put Thirteen’s plate on the floor, but he walked past it and hopped up on the table. He glanced down at the plate and gave me an
Oh, please
look. I set the plate on the table.

If that weren’t enough, he patted Rose’s coffee cup and cocked his head at me. Why not? Coffee for everyone. He spooned sugar into it, grasped the cup handle, and lifted it up enough to lap up the contents.

I watched him for a few seconds before it occurred to me that Mom would love to see that. The idea crystallized into resolve. “Rose, I’d like to invite everyone over here to do the cookies today. Mom’s kitchen is just too small and they only have one oven.”

“I don’t mind,” Rose said. “Does your sister get to call me a whore again?”

“Not if she wants to stay. Besides, she’s allergic to cats.”

Rose smiled. “I’d love to see them. Thirteen, please make David’s sister feel warm and welcome.”

The cat took a piece of bacon out of Rose’s pile and nodded to her. “
Mrow
” was all he said, but to me it sounded a lot like, “You got it”.

Mom loved the idea. “Audrey and I were about to go to the store for the ingredients. We’ll come over as soon as we’re finished. You should start your ovens warming up.”

“Is Dad coming?”

“No,” Mom said. “He’s going out to look at motor homes.”

I had a sudden urge to punch my father out. It wasn’t the first time, and it wouldn’t be the last. I didn’t say anything, but Mom heard the catch in my breath.

“David, he’s coping in his own way. I accept it. You should too.”

I sighed. “All right, I’ll try.”

“There is no try, young man. You’ll do it. For me.” She paused to let the words sink in. “We need to be going. Call me if you think of anything you want us to pick up.”

I hung up the phone, shaking my head. She’d been using the imperative form on me since long before I knew there were Dragons in the world. I guess they teach it in Mommy School.

Mom arrived in a flurry of kisses and a small cloud of powdered sugar escaping from a torn bag. Audrey was dressed for a mess, but her exhibition of filial piety would have done the
Domina
of a noble Roman family proud. Mom pulled me aside and said, “Audrey, take everything in to the kitchen. I need to speak with David.”

Audrey nodded and carried the grocery bags off. I held up a finger and waited. The bags thumped on the floor and Audrey called out, “God…bless it, when did you get a cat? I didn’t bring any allergy pills!”

“There are some in my purse,” Mom replied. She handed me an envelope and said, “Take a minute and read this. I don’t know what it says. I’m going to go meet your cat.” I waited for her to go into the kitchen before looking at the envelope. It was addressed to me, in my dad’s handwriting. I pulled the letter out and started reading.

David,

It’s long past time this came to you. You’ll be the man of the family soon enough and it’s yours by right. It came from my grandfather. Keep it safe, and keep buggering on.

Dad.

There was also a folded sheet of rag paper containing a shortbread recipe, dated 1896. On the back of the page, someone had translated the measurements and rewritten the recipe into a more usable format. It was dated 1940 and had my grandfather’s initials at the bottom. I blinked my eyes until I could see again and went up to my office to scan and reprint the pages.

When I got back downstairs, Mom was directing Audrey in setting up the
mise en place
for sugar cookies while Rose tended the stove, rendering a skillet full of diced bacon.

Without looking directly at Rose, Audrey announced, “Chocolate chip cookies are perfectly good as they are. I can’t see what’s to be gained by adding bacon to them.”

“Flavor and crunch,” Rose said. “Plus, there’s the bourbon.”

“The bourbon will cook out,” Audrey said. “It’s only supposed to be for a bit of flavor.”

“I was talking about the rest of the bottle,” Rose replied. She measured out twice what the recipe called for into a juice glass and set it aside. She poured two shot glasses and handed one to Mom. “Boat drinks, Gypsy.”

Mom saluted Rose with the shot glass. “Boat drinks.” She tossed it back, triggering a spasm of coughing. She waved everyone away, holding a tissue to her mouth, until the spasm stopped. Once she could breathe again, she turned up the flow of her oxygen for a minute and sat still with her eyes closed. “Oh, that hit the spot, but that’s about all I can take. We’ll see if I’m up for another when we’re done.”

“Mom, don’t you dare.” Audrey turned to Rose, wagging her finger. “The last thing my mother needs is you encouraging her.”