The Prince Who Fell From the Sky (18 page)

“The queen will have your friends,” a long-haired white said. “They belong to her. But you, my little dear … you are ours.”

“Nobody is eating anybody,” Casseomae said, “so you cats might as well clear out.”

“That is not how her queendom works,” a cat said.
“She provides us with prey. Viand birds. Crawly viands. Creeping viands. Micey viands.”

“I’m not a mouse, you hairball!” Dumpster said.

“But you are a present,” the tabby said. “I didn’t get any of the others of your kind. You should have been mine.”

Dumpster looked as if his eyes might burst. “Others of my kind?”

“We thought we’d eaten all the Vorago speakers,” one of the cats said. “Then more arrived not a few suns ago.”

“My mischief!” the rat said. “What did you do to them?”

“We ate as many as we could catch before she decided her gift had been too generous.”

Dumpster looked faint again. He staggered a step, mumbling, “My … my mischief … no.”

“Which of you is the queen?” Pang barked. “Who rules here?”

The cats drew back against the walls, hiding under furniture and debris. “Mother Death is not here,” one said. “You would already be hers, cur, if she was.”

Casseomae huffed. “No puss hunts a dog.”

“She will have you too, old bear,” the tabby answered with a malicious glint in his eyes. “Mother Death has eaten bigger bears than you.”

“And she is fond of the apes as well,” a cat added,
looking at the cub. “Even a strange hairless one like your friend there. She will be glad to know there are more about the city.”

An ape? Casseomae had no idea what sort of creature that was. Dumpster was right; there was something mad about this clowder.

The child knelt down to inspect Dumpster, touching the wounds on his back.

“I’m fine,” the rat said, leaping onto the cub’s arm and scuttling up onto his shoulder.

“We’re leaving,” Casseomae said, moving to the door. Pang and the child followed behind her. “Tell your queen she’ll have to find another present.”

The mob watched them go, tails lashing. “You can tell her yourself, old bear,” one of the cats called, “when you meet her.”

At the staircase, Pang said, “I’m really not liking this.”

Casseomae started up the stairs. “Let’s go look for those towers the Auspectres told us about.”

The climb was long, but after seemingly endless sets of steps, the stairs ended at a door. The cub worked something on the door’s face and then opened it with a faint squeak of rust. They came out into bright sunlight on the top of the skyscraper. The city with its towers of vine-coated concrete spread out below them.

Pang slunk flat to the ground. “Don’t go too close to
the edge,” he whined. “You’ll tip the building over and we’ll fall.”

“If this thing hasn’t collapsed yet,” Dumpster said from the cub’s shoulder, “it probably won’t today.”

Pang lay whimpering as Casseomae and the cub walked slowly to the edge of the roof. When they got there, the child gasped and backed away. But the height did not bother Casseomae. She poked her nose over the edge and peered down, thinking it must be like what a bird sees. The trees and buildings below were tiny. She could just make out the wolves waiting for them. How would she ever fight her way through them all? She snorted. They would simply have to find the best time, possibly when the wolves were sleeping or out hunting.

Grasping the cub’s hair with his forelegs to steady himself, Dumpster stood on his hind legs and peered into the distance. “What’s out there?” he said.

Casseomae knew her eyesight was not as good as a vulture’s, but it was better than Dumpster’s at seeing distances. In the direction where the sun rose, the city gave way to the Forest, a rolling haze of green oaks and poplars and hickories. The river that bordered the city cut through the woods, winding toward the horizon, where a silver flatness shimmered. The Wide Waters, she realized. And just before that silver shimmer, at the most distant edge of the Forest, strange forms rose above the treetops.

“I see towers,” she said.

Pang stood tentatively. “They don’t look like lick-trick city towers.”

“What do they look like?” Dumpster asked.

Casseomae narrowed her small eyes. The dog was right. They were not like the skeletal framework of the Auspectres’ towers or the fallen tower they had used to cross over the river. They rose smooth and gray like the trunk of a lightning-struck pine. There were three of them. At the tops, flat fins revolved in lazy circles.

“It looks like they have wings,” she said.

“Wings?” the rat squeaked. “The spinning trees!”

“Just as the Auspectres said,” Pang added, coming up beside them. “And look there, Cass. Can you see in the middle? It looks like each has a red glowing eye.”

Dumpster lashed his tail. “Glowing?”

“Yes, I think he’s right,” Casseomae said. “Each has a light.”

“Lights!” Dumpster clawed around on the child’s shoulder, and the cub picked him off, holding him gently in his hand. “But how can that be?”

Behind them they heard a trembling growl, like the cats’ but much deeper. Casseomae turned, her nose filling with a strange new scent. In the darkness of the doorway, a pair of large golden eyes watched them. A head emerged from the shadows. It was a cat, but far larger than any puss, larger even than the cougar.

It padded slowly onto the roof, a massive orange cat with black stripes like scars raked across its body. Casseomae had no doubt that it was at least twice the weight of the largest bear in her sloth. But what cat grew this large?

Pang snarled as the cub huddled behind Casseomae.

“Those pusses,” Dumpster said. “They really weren’t crazy. That’s their queen, isn’t it?”

Mother Death rumbled.

C
asseomae drew her claws across the concrete roof, popping her jaws threateningly.

Mother Death said something with a throaty laugh, but whatever language she was speaking, it was not Vorago. It was no language of the Forest.

“You can’t fight her, Cass!” Dumpster said.

“Pang, get ready,” Casseomae said. “You’ve got to get the cub back inside.”

Casseomae hit the roof with a heavy swipe, then sidled to her left, leading the cat farther from the doorway.

Mother Death laughed again as she closed in on Casseomae. She had no fear in her scent and seemed to be enjoying this moment of toying with her prey.

Casseomae charged, clashing with the cat with all her weight. The blow would have sent a cougar end over
end, but Mother Death hardly budged. She sank her fangs into Casseomae’s shoulder, teeth reaching bone.

With a surge of anger, Casseomae burst onto her hind legs, knocking the cat off her before swiping her claws against Mother Death’s throat. The blow drew blood and ripped free a clump of feathery white fur.

The cat circled away, a clever fighter who would manage how many injuries she would take before she went in for the kill. But she had opened up even more space between herself and the door.

Pang nipped the cub’s fingers, then ran. The child followed with Dumpster cupped in his hand. Mother Death started after them, but Casseomae feigned a charge, driving the cat back. Before she reached her, Casseomae twisted deftly and raced back through the doorway.

“Go!” she bellowed, seeing her cub waiting for her. “Run!”

The cub didn’t obey. As soon as Casseomae was inside, he grabbed the door and pulled it shut. An instant later the door rocked in its frame as Mother Death threw all her weight against it. She roared in frustration.

“Come on,” Casseomae said, nudging the child ahead of her. Together they hurried down the stairs toward Pang’s echoing whines.

The cats huddled and spat from the corners as they passed. “All that enter the city belong to Mother Death!”
they cried. “She will have you, dears. She is coming for you!”

Casseomae could no longer hear the enormous cat tearing at the door, but she knew they were right. Mother Death would break the door apart before long, and she would have no trouble following them.

It seemed to take longer going down the stairs than it had taken to climb them, especially to Casseomae, whose wounded shoulder burned terribly. At long last, they reached the bottom.

A throaty roar echoed down the stairwell.

“She’s free,” Pang said, tail tucked and shaking with fright.

“Come on,” Casseomae said. The four ran to the room where Casseomae had come through the window. The wolves milled about in the alley below.

“I almost wish you’d left me to those crazed pusses!” Dumpster squeaked.

Casseomae surveyed the alley. Down a little way was the metal dumpster that blocked one end. It was filled to the top with rainwater and floating debris. On the other side, the alley continued to the far end of the building, where sunlight illuminated the empty street beyond.

The cub cried out. Casseomae turned, half expecting to see the enormous cat. But the child was waving a hand at her from the hallway.

“What’s he saying?” Pang asked.

“No idea,” Casseomae said. She ran toward him as the cub pushed open a wide pair of doors.

Mother Death roared from the stairwell, nearly to the bottom.

The child hurried through the doors with Pang at his heels. Casseomae lunged after them. A few paces ahead was a ledge with a short section of broken stairs—the ones Casseomae had collapsed when they’d first entered the building.

Mother Death landed in the hallway as the child slammed the doors shut. Her weight cracked the doors’ frame, but for the moment the doors held.

“I knew you’d come back,” a voice whispered below them.

Casseomae turned to look over the edge. The room below was filled with wolves, and the black-coated Ogeema stood at their center.

C
asseomae felt the platform creaking under her weight.

“Stay still,” Pang yipped with tucked tail.

Mother Death hit the doors again.

“What sort of trouble have you stirred up now?” the Ogeema asked.

“You don’t want to know,” Dumpster squeaked.

“It would probably be best if you sent your cub down here to us,” the Ogeema said. A deep-throated chorus of growls filled the room.

The cub had his back against the doors, wide eyes drifting over the army of wolves. A sudden blow from Mother Death knocked him forward. Casseomae caught his arm with her teeth and pulled him away from the edge.

“Get behind me, cub,” she growled.

The child crouched against the wall with Dumpster running madly across his shoulders.

“What do we do?” Pang asked, looking from the doors to the wolves. “She’ll be through those doors soon.”

The next blow sent a crack down the center of one of the doors.

“If not sooner,” Casseomae said. She stood on her hind legs and, struggling to ignore the seething wound in her shoulder, leaned her full weight against the doors. Mother Death hit them again with a furious howl.

“Best come down with us,” the Ogeema suggested. “Let us protect you from … whatever it is you’ve disturbed.”

The cat rammed the doors again, and a shard of wood broke away, slamming into Casseomae’s nose. The doors were crumbling. Another blow, and Mother Death would be through.

As she listened to Mother Death circling for a final charge, Casseomae had a desperate idea. If Mother Death hit the doors expecting Casseomae to be blocking the doors with her weight …

Casseomae dropped to all fours and pushed Pang and the cub against the wall.

“What are you doing?” Pang yipped. The cub grasped Casseomae’s paw in panic.

The doors exploded into pieces as Mother Death burst through. The cat pitched forward, her claws spread against the floor. But she was going the wrong direction for those hooks to help her. She slid down the short set of remaining stairs, her head tipping over the edge, her back legs flying up.

She could not stop herself. She fell into the wolves below.

There was a moment of utter quiet, then a swell of horrific noise. Barks and growls. Roars and howls. Sounds Casseomae had never heard coming from wolf or cat.

Pang gathered his wits first, dashing through the shattered doors. Dumpster leaped from the cub and followed, with Casseomae and the cub right behind him. The four ran to the room overlooking the alley.

Dumpster climbed into the window. “They’re leaving,” he said.

Casseomae stuck her head through the opening. The wolves that had been on watch were running down the alley to join the fight.

“It’s still too far down to jump,” Casseomae said.

Dumpster was already out the window, scampering down a ledge that ran along the face of the building. He stopped just over the dumpster at the far end of the alley.

The rat snapped his tail and leaped. He landed with a plop in the pool of rainwater filling the metal container.
Bobbing to the surface a moment later, he paddled to the side, where he climbed up on the edge and shook the water from his fur.

Pang eyed the ledge dubiously. “It’s too narrow,” he panted.

Casseomae peered out the window. The ledge was too narrow for Pang and certainly too narrow for her. Suddenly the cub poked his head out of a window farther down the ledge. The window was right over the dumpster.

The cub waved at her and chirped cheerfully.

“Come on, old bear,” Pang said, running into the hallway.

Casseomae followed, the awful roars and howls of the battle louder inside. Pang led her to a room down the hall where the cub was climbing out the window. He squatted like a squirrel on a branch and stared down at the dumpster.

Casseomae snorted reassuringly at him. “It’s safe, cub. Jump.”

He took a deep breath and dropped. The child splashed into the water and came up with flailing arms. He sputtered and coughed but soon managed to climb up on the edge of the dumpster’s rim. He looked up and barked for Casseomae and Pang to follow him.

“You’re next,” Casseomae said.

The dog ran for the window and leaped, his paws
catching the window ledge and propelling him through. Casseomae leaned out to see Pang paddling around inside the dumpster. The child slipped an arm under the dog and hoisted him onto the rim. Both dropped to the ground.