Grey
Dialectical Hermeticist
Explosions rocked The Enlightenment as she circled high above Deadspire, smoke filling the bridge and klaxons wailing in the failing light. Wounded crew grappled in the tight corridors and exchanged gunfire across cargo holds. Bright scarf protecting her face from the smoke, First Mate Flickerwit darted onto the bridge with a blade in either hand, and just behind her the infamous Captain Dash Springtail, whose embroidered coat swept back to reveal his enchanted pistols.
“We have you now, pirate!” Captain Dash barked, spinning a pistol around in his hand. “Surrender now and we’ll take you to see justice served!”
At the head of the bridge, a towering figure unfolded itself from the command console and turned to face the daring sky-rats.
“There is no justice but mine, foolish adventurer! For I am Imperus, King of Kings!” the figure boomed.
Flickerwit frowned. “You can’t be Imperus. Imperus is a mami.”
“Can too!” replied the Dragon Emperor, “and I’ve got his magic scythe!”
“Her.”
“His!”
“They!”
The litter ceased their antics - Petal holding a pair of fancy old boots menacingly toward a grumpy-tailed Edgar - and looked to Caterina, the runt. Curled up with a book at one end of the creaky old service lift, not looking at her littermates, even as Renfrith pulled the scarf away from her snout and shrugged.
“She is right,” she said, “not that it really matters for playing pretend.”
Edgar sagged, though his tail still twitched at the tip with irritation.
“I suppose so.”
“And why would Imperus be a pirate anyway? That’s stupid,” added Petal.
“You’re stupid!”
Petal pounced, and the lift platform rocked gently, bouncing against the rotting old exterior of the ruined spire. Dull, hollow booms from the impact echoed in hollows of the structure, mingling with the wind through the trees below. A fall from up here could kill a little rat, and the guardrails were rusting. They played with abandon, anyway, with the fearlessness of knowing no better.
They’d come to explore this side of the woods a few months ago, as the snows melted away. Afterall, no one had told them to stay away from the ruin, and little rats are curious things. The rotting hulk had been a mile high once upon a time, now sunken into itself and the ground below, rising just over the forest canopy; corroded steel and exposed copper. The litter had played around the base, at first, until they found the intact service lift - little more than a metal platform rigged to a pulley, perhaps used to clean the exterior windows. That some forgotten spell still powered it was borderline miraculous.
Naturally, the litter immediately decided it was an airship.
“Imperus was only pretending to be a pirate,” Edgar gasped, as Petal managed to pin him down. “To catch hi- their brother.”
“No one was being Mandalthraxus!” Petal replied, tapping him on the snout with her tail and standing up.
“Catty could be,” Edgar said.
“I don’t want to play right now,” Caterina said, eyes still on her book.
“So you can’t be Imperus, it’s silly,” said Petal, hands on her hips. Renfrith nodded enthusiastically.
“Catty please,” Edgar wheedled, dusting off his waistcoat.
Finally looking up, she offered him a blank stare before sighing heavily, and equally heavily closing her book.
“Fine,” she said, at which point Renfrith pulled her scarf off.
“Wait, wait, if we can be Mandalthraxus I want to do it,” she said, “Catty can’t do it.”
Mildly affronted in spite of herself, Caterina nodded. “Okay, but i don’t like Flickerwit so I’ll be…”
She wracked her memory for some member of Springtail’s infamous crew she found likeable.
“I’ll be Quetzha Brighthand,” she finally declared.
“Sibling!” Mandalthraxus yelled, an enchanted cutlass in all four hands, glaring at Imperus across the burning peak of the Deadspire.
“You will not escape my justice again, brother!” replied Imperus, spreading their wings and pointing with their huge scythe. “At last, you will answer for your crimes!”
The two clashed, in a blaze of Divine essence and flashing steel, the surface of the tower peeling away under their fury.
“This is boring,” whispered mighty captain Dash Springtail, watching from the edge of the Deadspire with his crew.
Frowning, the powerful mage Quetzha stepped forward and flung her hands forward in a spellcasting gesture, sending a powerful fireball blazing through the air toward Mandalthraxus.
The litter stood aghast, frozen by the shock, staring at the broken guardrail and empty space where Renfrith had been before the blast from Catty’s paws sent her tumbling through the air to strike one of the spire’s rotting plates. The metal crumpled and fell in, taking Renfrith with it, disappearing into the dark belly of the ruin.
Caterina, numbly, held her paws up to her face and stared at them.
“What did you do?!” Edgar practically screamed, his tail whipping with panic.
“I don’t know,” she said, mumbling.
“How did you do Magic?”
Catty just stared, dumbly, like she’d woken from a dream.
“I… just did,” she said, knowing it wasn’t an answer.
Her siblings had, without her notice, shuffled to the opposite side of the lift, pressing together against the rails.
“What did I do?” she asked, quietly, turning her paws over and over, looking for a sign of some kind.
“It was like you… threw wind at her,” said Petal.
Catty stepped toward the opening in the Spire, gingerly, as if afraid the platform would collapse under her paws. She peered into the darkness, leaning toward the broken rail.
Nothing but the suggestion of cobwebs and open space, descending into the dark.
“We should tell a grownup,” said Petal.
“We’ll get in trouble…” Edgar said, “and what about Renfrith? What if she’s hurt down there?”
Caterina grit her teeth, and ignoring her siblings, leaned into the hole with paws waving through space, looking for some kind of handhold. She gripped what she thought was a girder, feeling something tickle her hand and skitter away. She swallowed hard and held still, stifling her disgust.
“Careful,” Petal started, but didn’t know where to end.
Catty leaned further, half in shadow, and almost fell in when Edgar leapt back to the middle of the platform.
“Wait! Wait. Petal, can you climb up the pulley?”
“Why?”
“There’s a spare coil of cable up there - papa told me Spires always have redundancies like that.”
“Are you sure?” Petal said, squinting up at the mechanism from which their suddenly fragile footing hung.
Meanwhile, Catty sat down with a thump and sigh of relief.
“Will it kill you to look?” Edgar said, exasperated.
“Will it?”
He rolled his eyes, but Petal was already scrambling up the cable, making the lift swing and rattle, and Edgar tried to look nonchalant as he gripped the guardrail.
Moments later, a dusty black line dropped in front of him, and he stepped aside to avoid the rest of the coiling length.
“Found it,” Petal cheerily announced, and came sliding back down.
Caterina got to her feet, turned around, and flailed to keep her balance against the unexpected obstacle of the cable.
“That could have squished me, Petal!” she cried, suddenly indignant in spite of it all.
“But it didn’t, and anyway, you could have squished Rennie!”
Tears sprang to Catty’s eyes, and her snout twitched in a repressed sob.
“I didn’t mean it!”
“Stop it!” Edgar shouted, stamping a paw. “We should look for Renfrith.”
The sisters stared at each other, resentment simmering in Petal’s eyes, until she huffed a muffled ‘fine’ and turned away to look over the treetops.
Edgar took a chunk of wood from a pocket and gnawed thoughtfully, considering the cable.
Catty rocked on her toes, idly twiddling her tail. “Do you think it’s safe to tie on here?”
“No,” said Edgar, glumly, “but it’s better than nothing.”
“Can’t you Magic it?” said Petal, without looking around.
“How could I-” Caterina started, a snap cut off by Edgar’s triumphant ‘yes!’
“Remember, Catty?” he continued, “Stormlords control wind and lightning and stuff like that.”
He picked up the end of the cable and peered at it, looking for something, and nodded.
“There’s a metal core in this - can you stick it to the bulkheads or something?”
“I can try, but how does that work?”
Edgar rolled his eyes “i thought you paid attention in school?”
Petal stopped herself from clapping with delight. “Oh, oh, you can magnetize it!”
Frowning, Caterina swished her tail and took the cable, concentrating as she held it to a secure-looking chunk of weathered bulkhead. Sparks jumped and she leapt back with a shriek - but the cable held. Edgar punched the air.
“You did it!” He said, and immediately tried to pull the cable away, only to find it was wholly immovable from the now slightly warm metal.
“Okay,” he said, “we can use this to climb down after her.” He tugged again, and nodded to himself.
“Dangerous,” Petal said, half-watching her sister, with wide eyes.
“I’ll go first then,” Edgar said, firmly. Caterina stood with her hands clasped tightly, and said nothing.
He fed the cable into the hole, shaking it from time to time to get around unseen obstacles.
“At least we might have pawholds,” he noted, and then climbed over the broken metal. Petal followed. Paw over paw, tail wrapped around the cable, Caterina climbed after them. She found plenty of footholds, but going was still slow.
At the bottom, there was no sign of Renfrith. The walls were less rusted than Caterina would have expected, and most of the fittings looked intact - dead bulbs in ceiling recesses, an emergency communicator set into the inside wall. The corridor curved to the left and right, circling just inside the exterior. Petal half-crouched near the cable, and Edgar was a few steps away to the right, peering into the encroaching shadows.
“Do you see anything, Edgar?” Catty asked.
“There’s… vines, but I don’t see anything else.”
“Vines?” Petal said, frowning. “But it’s so dark down here, and they’d have to get into the soil somehow.”
“Maybe that means there’s a hole. Renfrith might already have gotten out and gone looking for us.”
Petal balled her fists and strode up to Edgar’s side, then beyond.
“Let’s go look, then!”
The others trailed after, Edgar more emboldened by his sister’s determination than Caterina felt.
The creeping greenery thickened as they ventured into the dark, the walls festooned in so many vines and leaves that it was hard to tell they hid metal plates. A curtain of them fell across a doorway on their left, leading toward the centre of this floor. There was no sign ahead of a gap through which the plants could have crept. Petal peeked through them, carefully pushing them aside. Humans, Caterina knew, would struggle here, but the little rats could see better in light so poor, and Petal was no doubt following her nose.
Catty hadn’t really noticed anything but the thick, sweet smell of the vegetation.
“There’s someone here,” Petal whispered, and Edgar crept after her. Caterina stood high on her toes and tried to see.
In the next room were two more doorways, the old doors forced into their beds in the walls, and dense shoots around their footpaws. But on the wall to their immediate right was a person. A human, overgrown with the vines which bloomed with tiny pink flowers, his skin drawn and pale. He was still as a corpse.
“Humans don’t come out here much,” Edgar muttered. Catty was transfixed by the human’s face, the strange lines of the skull standing out under parchment skin.
And the eyes snapped open.
“Is… someone there?” the man said, wheezing. “Please, has someone… come to help?” he continued, turning his head back and forth as if there was some angle at which he could see them.
One of the flowers, jostled by his motions, released a puff of something. Spores, or pollen, or whatever these things had. The man inhaled and relaxed.
“Has someone come to smell the flowers?” he said, and giggled. Catty felt her blood cool, chilled by the madness in his voice.
“Sir, we’re looking for our sister,” said Edgar, stepping into the room.
“Sir!” the man cackled, “I was never a sir before. What are you, more monsters come to torment me?”
“We’re rats, from Eldock,” said Petal, and Catty shushed her; “Don’t tell him!”
“Oh, don’t worry, wormtails, I can’t leave her. She won’t let me,” he said, and made a sound that could have been more laughter, or a cough.
“Did another rat come by here?” Edgar asked, more firmly, clearly insulted by the old slur.
“No, no, I’m the only living thing down here,” he said - and moved his head sharply, fixing his eyes on Caterina such that she backed away.
Not at her, she realized - through her.
“She’s coming,” the man crooned to himself, and began to weep.
“Who?” Petal said, demanding, taking the cue from Edgar.
Caterina, in the hallway, looked over her shoulder, and she knew. Red eyes, glinting in the dark, in a head three times higher up than hers.
She screamed and she ran, fleeing through the darkness with vines slapping her face and leaves under foot. She ran until she scrambled up a staircase and found herself out of breath.
She sat against the wall, panting in the dark, until she felt the vines coiling behind her like live snakes and took flight again until her legs gave up in protest.
She found herself in a room as dark as every other, less overgrown but still partly overgrown. An old cafeteria, she thought, benches and tables bolted to the floors.
She’d lost her siblings. Left them somewhere in this horrible old place because she’d been scared. She was the most grown up, even if Edgar was born first, and she hadn’t taken care of them.
Heart pounding from the exertion, she didn’t have the strength to sob as tears flowed from her eyes. She’d lost them, left them alone with the strange man and his flowers.
And now she was alone in the dark.
No, not alone - something was coming down the hallway, footsteps too heavy for a rat. Too heavy even for a clumsy great human. She found reserves somewhere to drag herself under a table, watching the door in silent terror.
Those eyes again, red and faintly luminous, appeared in the doorway. Something as tall as a dozen rats peered inside, then came close as something ducked under the lintel, and rose again to terrible height.
The creature, as much as she could see, was green as the overgrowth and scaled like a lizard. It stood like a rat, with a thick tail and clawed hands.
Paralyzed, she watched the long-snouted head descend to bring those eyes level with her own.
“Hello,” it said, in a deep and resonant voice, “little rat.”
Caterina lashed out, lightning cracking from her paw and briefly blinding her, the bolt striking the creature in the face.
At the same time, she felt a wrenching pain inside and collapsed on her face.
Chest heaving, she pushed herself up on her paws with a weak cry, and stared at the monster.
Sparks ran over its scales, and faded, and it remained still as stone.
It sat, gently, crouching between prominent knees, long talons resting on its feet.
“You must not use Magic so carelessly, little rat,” it said, “you have hurt yourself. Strained your little soul.”
“Please don’t eat me,” Catty whispered, so quiet she could hardly hear herself.
The monstrous lizard swished its huge tail, and then laughed. A hearty laugh that reminded her of grandmother.
“I will not eat you, little rat,” it said, “I am Henbah. What is your name?”
Too tired for defiance, she slumped and rested, whispering her name.
She wasn’t looking at the monster, at Henbah, now. Only hearing that deep voice.
“Caterina,” it said, “an old name. Hero of Umah’s Cleft. I will tell you a secret, little one.”
She felt those talons slide around her body, with a flex and gentleness betrayed in no way by their aspect.
“You are braver than the Caterina I knew.”
Head swimming, she left the creature carry her into the dark.
She must have slept. There was still an ache somewhere within her, and she opened her eyes to the dimmest of evening light. She grasped for blankets, but pulled up only soft moss. Not a bed like the one at home.
And then Renfrith popped her head into sight.
“She’s awake!”
Petal and Edgar followed, her brother’s whiskers twitching in discontent.
Caterina sat up, rubbing her head behind an ear, and looked around. Henbah crouched on the opposite side of the room, serene, watchful. Renfrith lay beside her on another bed of moss, thick enough to lift her off the floor a foot or two.
“Renfrith’s leg is broken,” said Henbah, “and she struck her head.”
“I’m so sorry,” Caterina said, stumbling to her feet, fur on her face already matted by tears. “I did this to you-”
“You didn’t know,” Renfrith replied, lying back. “My head hurts.”
“Will she be okay?” Caterina asked, turning to Henbah.
Edgar put a paw on her shoulder.
“Henbah says… she might not.”
Before Caterina could say anything, Henbah spoke.
“If I take you home, your healer should be able to help her,” the creature said, “but by then it could be too late.”
“Will you do it, please?” Caterina said, feeling woozy, Petal keeping her upright.
“Hrrrrm,” Henbah droned, “of course, but I can also heal her myself. I would not do so without asking.”
“Why do you-” Caterina started, and Edgar interrupted her.
“Henbah says… she needs to give Renfrith her blood to heal her.”
“It will be quite harmless, just this once,” said Henbah, “but all the same, I did not wish to be inconsiderate.”
Caterina was at a loss for words, but Petal stepped forward.
“Would you, please, miss Henbah?”
The monster laughed again, unusual warmth in the sound.
“When did anyone call me thus? How many lifetimes?” she chuckled.
The rats did not know what to say to that.
“Renfrith, shall I do this thing for you?”
Renfrith, quiet ‘til now, craned her neck to look.
“Yes’m.”
Without hesitation, Henbah stood and crossed the room like a ghost. With one long talon she opened her wrist and offered it to Renfrith. Her nose twitched in disgust, and Henbah held the wound closer until she could only lap, cringing, at the blood. A moment later, Henbah stood back. Renfrith lay back, more at ease.
“She will heal swiftly, now.”
“What about…” Petal said, trailing off.
“About?” Henbah fixed her with a stare.
“The man downstairs.”
The stare went on.
“He’s… he’s trapped.”
“Yes,” Henbah said at last, “it is best that he remain so.”
“Why?”
“He is a murderer,” she said, matter-of-fact.
“But why is he here?”
“Would you prefer he was elsewhere, or dead?”
Petal fell silent.
A moment later, Renfrith sat up, and carefully got to her feet. Gingerly she tested her leg and winced.
“At least it isn’t broken anymore,” she said, with a weak smile.
“You should keep it still a touch longer,” said Henbah, “or it will not heal right.”
Renfrith nodded and lowered herself again.
Caterina sat on the ‘bed’ and watched Henbah. She was crouched again, still as steel.
“Do you like my garden, little rats?”
Caterina frowned, and then shielded her eyes - a dim light was rising along the walls. Blue mushrooms unfolding and glowing, revealing the constellation of colourful flowers blossoming on the vines that covered the walls and floor.
“It’s beautiful,” said Petal, reaching out to touch one of the luminous fungi - which closed up again on contact.
“I would ask you tell no one else, when you leave,” said Henbah. “I have dwelt quietly here for decades and would hate to leave.”
“Why would you have to leave?” asked Edgar, folding his arms and leaning against the wall - carefully, between mushrooms.
Henbah blinked, the gesture deliberate.
“My kind are rarely welcome… anywhere,” she said.
“We’ll keep your secret!” Petal said, excitedly, and Caterina exchanged a look with her brother.
“We will,” said Renfrith, standing again, testing her leg again. “We will, thank you so much m- Henbah.”
The creature made a face. A smile, or something close enough.
“Then you should go home. I will show you the way.”
Caterina could not quell a private worry as they left, Henbah peeling steel away like paper to let them leave through the wall. The sun was setting and the breeze was sweet, the air promising a storm. Caterina could feel it, rumbling inside her alongside the pain.
“You must take care, Caterina,” Henbah said, voice echoing within the walls. “Find a teacher, learn to use your Magic safely.”
“Can we come back?” said Renfrith, throwing Caterina a curious glance.
“No,” said Edgar and Henbah in the same instant.
And Henbah’s eyes faded away into the dark.
Renfrith turned brightly to her siblings, tail flicking happily.
“Let’s go home!”
“We have you now, pirate!” Captain Dash barked, spinning a pistol around in his hand. “Surrender now and we’ll take you to see justice served!”
At the head of the bridge, a towering figure unfolded itself from the command console and turned to face the daring sky-rats.
“There is no justice but mine, foolish adventurer! For I am Imperus, King of Kings!” the figure boomed.
Flickerwit frowned. “You can’t be Imperus. Imperus is a mami.”
“Can too!” replied the Dragon Emperor, “and I’ve got his magic scythe!”
“Her.”
“His!”
“They!”
The litter ceased their antics - Petal holding a pair of fancy old boots menacingly toward a grumpy-tailed Edgar - and looked to Caterina, the runt. Curled up with a book at one end of the creaky old service lift, not looking at her littermates, even as Renfrith pulled the scarf away from her snout and shrugged.
“She is right,” she said, “not that it really matters for playing pretend.”
Edgar sagged, though his tail still twitched at the tip with irritation.
“I suppose so.”
“And why would Imperus be a pirate anyway? That’s stupid,” added Petal.
“You’re stupid!”
Petal pounced, and the lift platform rocked gently, bouncing against the rotting old exterior of the ruined spire. Dull, hollow booms from the impact echoed in hollows of the structure, mingling with the wind through the trees below. A fall from up here could kill a little rat, and the guardrails were rusting. They played with abandon, anyway, with the fearlessness of knowing no better.
They’d come to explore this side of the woods a few months ago, as the snows melted away. Afterall, no one had told them to stay away from the ruin, and little rats are curious things. The rotting hulk had been a mile high once upon a time, now sunken into itself and the ground below, rising just over the forest canopy; corroded steel and exposed copper. The litter had played around the base, at first, until they found the intact service lift - little more than a metal platform rigged to a pulley, perhaps used to clean the exterior windows. That some forgotten spell still powered it was borderline miraculous.
Naturally, the litter immediately decided it was an airship.
“Imperus was only pretending to be a pirate,” Edgar gasped, as Petal managed to pin him down. “To catch hi- their brother.”
“No one was being Mandalthraxus!” Petal replied, tapping him on the snout with her tail and standing up.
“Catty could be,” Edgar said.
“I don’t want to play right now,” Caterina said, eyes still on her book.
“So you can’t be Imperus, it’s silly,” said Petal, hands on her hips. Renfrith nodded enthusiastically.
“Catty please,” Edgar wheedled, dusting off his waistcoat.
Finally looking up, she offered him a blank stare before sighing heavily, and equally heavily closing her book.
“Fine,” she said, at which point Renfrith pulled her scarf off.
“Wait, wait, if we can be Mandalthraxus I want to do it,” she said, “Catty can’t do it.”
Mildly affronted in spite of herself, Caterina nodded. “Okay, but i don’t like Flickerwit so I’ll be…”
She wracked her memory for some member of Springtail’s infamous crew she found likeable.
“I’ll be Quetzha Brighthand,” she finally declared.
“Sibling!” Mandalthraxus yelled, an enchanted cutlass in all four hands, glaring at Imperus across the burning peak of the Deadspire.
“You will not escape my justice again, brother!” replied Imperus, spreading their wings and pointing with their huge scythe. “At last, you will answer for your crimes!”
The two clashed, in a blaze of Divine essence and flashing steel, the surface of the tower peeling away under their fury.
“This is boring,” whispered mighty captain Dash Springtail, watching from the edge of the Deadspire with his crew.
Frowning, the powerful mage Quetzha stepped forward and flung her hands forward in a spellcasting gesture, sending a powerful fireball blazing through the air toward Mandalthraxus.
The litter stood aghast, frozen by the shock, staring at the broken guardrail and empty space where Renfrith had been before the blast from Catty’s paws sent her tumbling through the air to strike one of the spire’s rotting plates. The metal crumpled and fell in, taking Renfrith with it, disappearing into the dark belly of the ruin.
Caterina, numbly, held her paws up to her face and stared at them.
“What did you do?!” Edgar practically screamed, his tail whipping with panic.
“I don’t know,” she said, mumbling.
“How did you do Magic?”
Catty just stared, dumbly, like she’d woken from a dream.
“I… just did,” she said, knowing it wasn’t an answer.
Her siblings had, without her notice, shuffled to the opposite side of the lift, pressing together against the rails.
“What did I do?” she asked, quietly, turning her paws over and over, looking for a sign of some kind.
“It was like you… threw wind at her,” said Petal.
Catty stepped toward the opening in the Spire, gingerly, as if afraid the platform would collapse under her paws. She peered into the darkness, leaning toward the broken rail.
Nothing but the suggestion of cobwebs and open space, descending into the dark.
“We should tell a grownup,” said Petal.
“We’ll get in trouble…” Edgar said, “and what about Renfrith? What if she’s hurt down there?”
Caterina grit her teeth, and ignoring her siblings, leaned into the hole with paws waving through space, looking for some kind of handhold. She gripped what she thought was a girder, feeling something tickle her hand and skitter away. She swallowed hard and held still, stifling her disgust.
“Careful,” Petal started, but didn’t know where to end.
Catty leaned further, half in shadow, and almost fell in when Edgar leapt back to the middle of the platform.
“Wait! Wait. Petal, can you climb up the pulley?”
“Why?”
“There’s a spare coil of cable up there - papa told me Spires always have redundancies like that.”
“Are you sure?” Petal said, squinting up at the mechanism from which their suddenly fragile footing hung.
Meanwhile, Catty sat down with a thump and sigh of relief.
“Will it kill you to look?” Edgar said, exasperated.
“Will it?”
He rolled his eyes, but Petal was already scrambling up the cable, making the lift swing and rattle, and Edgar tried to look nonchalant as he gripped the guardrail.
Moments later, a dusty black line dropped in front of him, and he stepped aside to avoid the rest of the coiling length.
“Found it,” Petal cheerily announced, and came sliding back down.
Caterina got to her feet, turned around, and flailed to keep her balance against the unexpected obstacle of the cable.
“That could have squished me, Petal!” she cried, suddenly indignant in spite of it all.
“But it didn’t, and anyway, you could have squished Rennie!”
Tears sprang to Catty’s eyes, and her snout twitched in a repressed sob.
“I didn’t mean it!”
“Stop it!” Edgar shouted, stamping a paw. “We should look for Renfrith.”
The sisters stared at each other, resentment simmering in Petal’s eyes, until she huffed a muffled ‘fine’ and turned away to look over the treetops.
Edgar took a chunk of wood from a pocket and gnawed thoughtfully, considering the cable.
Catty rocked on her toes, idly twiddling her tail. “Do you think it’s safe to tie on here?”
“No,” said Edgar, glumly, “but it’s better than nothing.”
“Can’t you Magic it?” said Petal, without looking around.
“How could I-” Caterina started, a snap cut off by Edgar’s triumphant ‘yes!’
“Remember, Catty?” he continued, “Stormlords control wind and lightning and stuff like that.”
He picked up the end of the cable and peered at it, looking for something, and nodded.
“There’s a metal core in this - can you stick it to the bulkheads or something?”
“I can try, but how does that work?”
Edgar rolled his eyes “i thought you paid attention in school?”
Petal stopped herself from clapping with delight. “Oh, oh, you can magnetize it!”
Frowning, Caterina swished her tail and took the cable, concentrating as she held it to a secure-looking chunk of weathered bulkhead. Sparks jumped and she leapt back with a shriek - but the cable held. Edgar punched the air.
“You did it!” He said, and immediately tried to pull the cable away, only to find it was wholly immovable from the now slightly warm metal.
“Okay,” he said, “we can use this to climb down after her.” He tugged again, and nodded to himself.
“Dangerous,” Petal said, half-watching her sister, with wide eyes.
“I’ll go first then,” Edgar said, firmly. Caterina stood with her hands clasped tightly, and said nothing.
He fed the cable into the hole, shaking it from time to time to get around unseen obstacles.
“At least we might have pawholds,” he noted, and then climbed over the broken metal. Petal followed. Paw over paw, tail wrapped around the cable, Caterina climbed after them. She found plenty of footholds, but going was still slow.
At the bottom, there was no sign of Renfrith. The walls were less rusted than Caterina would have expected, and most of the fittings looked intact - dead bulbs in ceiling recesses, an emergency communicator set into the inside wall. The corridor curved to the left and right, circling just inside the exterior. Petal half-crouched near the cable, and Edgar was a few steps away to the right, peering into the encroaching shadows.
“Do you see anything, Edgar?” Catty asked.
“There’s… vines, but I don’t see anything else.”
“Vines?” Petal said, frowning. “But it’s so dark down here, and they’d have to get into the soil somehow.”
“Maybe that means there’s a hole. Renfrith might already have gotten out and gone looking for us.”
Petal balled her fists and strode up to Edgar’s side, then beyond.
“Let’s go look, then!”
The others trailed after, Edgar more emboldened by his sister’s determination than Caterina felt.
The creeping greenery thickened as they ventured into the dark, the walls festooned in so many vines and leaves that it was hard to tell they hid metal plates. A curtain of them fell across a doorway on their left, leading toward the centre of this floor. There was no sign ahead of a gap through which the plants could have crept. Petal peeked through them, carefully pushing them aside. Humans, Caterina knew, would struggle here, but the little rats could see better in light so poor, and Petal was no doubt following her nose.
Catty hadn’t really noticed anything but the thick, sweet smell of the vegetation.
“There’s someone here,” Petal whispered, and Edgar crept after her. Caterina stood high on her toes and tried to see.
In the next room were two more doorways, the old doors forced into their beds in the walls, and dense shoots around their footpaws. But on the wall to their immediate right was a person. A human, overgrown with the vines which bloomed with tiny pink flowers, his skin drawn and pale. He was still as a corpse.
“Humans don’t come out here much,” Edgar muttered. Catty was transfixed by the human’s face, the strange lines of the skull standing out under parchment skin.
And the eyes snapped open.
“Is… someone there?” the man said, wheezing. “Please, has someone… come to help?” he continued, turning his head back and forth as if there was some angle at which he could see them.
One of the flowers, jostled by his motions, released a puff of something. Spores, or pollen, or whatever these things had. The man inhaled and relaxed.
“Has someone come to smell the flowers?” he said, and giggled. Catty felt her blood cool, chilled by the madness in his voice.
“Sir, we’re looking for our sister,” said Edgar, stepping into the room.
“Sir!” the man cackled, “I was never a sir before. What are you, more monsters come to torment me?”
“We’re rats, from Eldock,” said Petal, and Catty shushed her; “Don’t tell him!”
“Oh, don’t worry, wormtails, I can’t leave her. She won’t let me,” he said, and made a sound that could have been more laughter, or a cough.
“Did another rat come by here?” Edgar asked, more firmly, clearly insulted by the old slur.
“No, no, I’m the only living thing down here,” he said - and moved his head sharply, fixing his eyes on Caterina such that she backed away.
Not at her, she realized - through her.
“She’s coming,” the man crooned to himself, and began to weep.
“Who?” Petal said, demanding, taking the cue from Edgar.
Caterina, in the hallway, looked over her shoulder, and she knew. Red eyes, glinting in the dark, in a head three times higher up than hers.
She screamed and she ran, fleeing through the darkness with vines slapping her face and leaves under foot. She ran until she scrambled up a staircase and found herself out of breath.
She sat against the wall, panting in the dark, until she felt the vines coiling behind her like live snakes and took flight again until her legs gave up in protest.
She found herself in a room as dark as every other, less overgrown but still partly overgrown. An old cafeteria, she thought, benches and tables bolted to the floors.
She’d lost her siblings. Left them somewhere in this horrible old place because she’d been scared. She was the most grown up, even if Edgar was born first, and she hadn’t taken care of them.
Heart pounding from the exertion, she didn’t have the strength to sob as tears flowed from her eyes. She’d lost them, left them alone with the strange man and his flowers.
And now she was alone in the dark.
No, not alone - something was coming down the hallway, footsteps too heavy for a rat. Too heavy even for a clumsy great human. She found reserves somewhere to drag herself under a table, watching the door in silent terror.
Those eyes again, red and faintly luminous, appeared in the doorway. Something as tall as a dozen rats peered inside, then came close as something ducked under the lintel, and rose again to terrible height.
The creature, as much as she could see, was green as the overgrowth and scaled like a lizard. It stood like a rat, with a thick tail and clawed hands.
Paralyzed, she watched the long-snouted head descend to bring those eyes level with her own.
“Hello,” it said, in a deep and resonant voice, “little rat.”
Caterina lashed out, lightning cracking from her paw and briefly blinding her, the bolt striking the creature in the face.
At the same time, she felt a wrenching pain inside and collapsed on her face.
Chest heaving, she pushed herself up on her paws with a weak cry, and stared at the monster.
Sparks ran over its scales, and faded, and it remained still as stone.
It sat, gently, crouching between prominent knees, long talons resting on its feet.
“You must not use Magic so carelessly, little rat,” it said, “you have hurt yourself. Strained your little soul.”
“Please don’t eat me,” Catty whispered, so quiet she could hardly hear herself.
The monstrous lizard swished its huge tail, and then laughed. A hearty laugh that reminded her of grandmother.
“I will not eat you, little rat,” it said, “I am Henbah. What is your name?”
Too tired for defiance, she slumped and rested, whispering her name.
She wasn’t looking at the monster, at Henbah, now. Only hearing that deep voice.
“Caterina,” it said, “an old name. Hero of Umah’s Cleft. I will tell you a secret, little one.”
She felt those talons slide around her body, with a flex and gentleness betrayed in no way by their aspect.
“You are braver than the Caterina I knew.”
Head swimming, she left the creature carry her into the dark.
She must have slept. There was still an ache somewhere within her, and she opened her eyes to the dimmest of evening light. She grasped for blankets, but pulled up only soft moss. Not a bed like the one at home.
And then Renfrith popped her head into sight.
“She’s awake!”
Petal and Edgar followed, her brother’s whiskers twitching in discontent.
Caterina sat up, rubbing her head behind an ear, and looked around. Henbah crouched on the opposite side of the room, serene, watchful. Renfrith lay beside her on another bed of moss, thick enough to lift her off the floor a foot or two.
“Renfrith’s leg is broken,” said Henbah, “and she struck her head.”
“I’m so sorry,” Caterina said, stumbling to her feet, fur on her face already matted by tears. “I did this to you-”
“You didn’t know,” Renfrith replied, lying back. “My head hurts.”
“Will she be okay?” Caterina asked, turning to Henbah.
Edgar put a paw on her shoulder.
“Henbah says… she might not.”
Before Caterina could say anything, Henbah spoke.
“If I take you home, your healer should be able to help her,” the creature said, “but by then it could be too late.”
“Will you do it, please?” Caterina said, feeling woozy, Petal keeping her upright.
“Hrrrrm,” Henbah droned, “of course, but I can also heal her myself. I would not do so without asking.”
“Why do you-” Caterina started, and Edgar interrupted her.
“Henbah says… she needs to give Renfrith her blood to heal her.”
“It will be quite harmless, just this once,” said Henbah, “but all the same, I did not wish to be inconsiderate.”
Caterina was at a loss for words, but Petal stepped forward.
“Would you, please, miss Henbah?”
The monster laughed again, unusual warmth in the sound.
“When did anyone call me thus? How many lifetimes?” she chuckled.
The rats did not know what to say to that.
“Renfrith, shall I do this thing for you?”
Renfrith, quiet ‘til now, craned her neck to look.
“Yes’m.”
Without hesitation, Henbah stood and crossed the room like a ghost. With one long talon she opened her wrist and offered it to Renfrith. Her nose twitched in disgust, and Henbah held the wound closer until she could only lap, cringing, at the blood. A moment later, Henbah stood back. Renfrith lay back, more at ease.
“She will heal swiftly, now.”
“What about…” Petal said, trailing off.
“About?” Henbah fixed her with a stare.
“The man downstairs.”
The stare went on.
“He’s… he’s trapped.”
“Yes,” Henbah said at last, “it is best that he remain so.”
“Why?”
“He is a murderer,” she said, matter-of-fact.
“But why is he here?”
“Would you prefer he was elsewhere, or dead?”
Petal fell silent.
A moment later, Renfrith sat up, and carefully got to her feet. Gingerly she tested her leg and winced.
“At least it isn’t broken anymore,” she said, with a weak smile.
“You should keep it still a touch longer,” said Henbah, “or it will not heal right.”
Renfrith nodded and lowered herself again.
Caterina sat on the ‘bed’ and watched Henbah. She was crouched again, still as steel.
“Do you like my garden, little rats?”
Caterina frowned, and then shielded her eyes - a dim light was rising along the walls. Blue mushrooms unfolding and glowing, revealing the constellation of colourful flowers blossoming on the vines that covered the walls and floor.
“It’s beautiful,” said Petal, reaching out to touch one of the luminous fungi - which closed up again on contact.
“I would ask you tell no one else, when you leave,” said Henbah. “I have dwelt quietly here for decades and would hate to leave.”
“Why would you have to leave?” asked Edgar, folding his arms and leaning against the wall - carefully, between mushrooms.
Henbah blinked, the gesture deliberate.
“My kind are rarely welcome… anywhere,” she said.
“We’ll keep your secret!” Petal said, excitedly, and Caterina exchanged a look with her brother.
“We will,” said Renfrith, standing again, testing her leg again. “We will, thank you so much m- Henbah.”
The creature made a face. A smile, or something close enough.
“Then you should go home. I will show you the way.”
Caterina could not quell a private worry as they left, Henbah peeling steel away like paper to let them leave through the wall. The sun was setting and the breeze was sweet, the air promising a storm. Caterina could feel it, rumbling inside her alongside the pain.
“You must take care, Caterina,” Henbah said, voice echoing within the walls. “Find a teacher, learn to use your Magic safely.”
“Can we come back?” said Renfrith, throwing Caterina a curious glance.
“No,” said Edgar and Henbah in the same instant.
And Henbah’s eyes faded away into the dark.
Renfrith turned brightly to her siblings, tail flicking happily.
“Let’s go home!”
Last edited:
