Tailchaser’s Song

Her companions were gone-captured, probably, or killed-and at this moment all she wanted to do was go far away: to disappear into the southern forests and never think of this terrible place ever again. But at the moment she could go nowhere. Her instincts told her to stay put. She needed to heal.

The thought of Tailchaser and Pouncequick had stirred her for a moment, and she lifted her head and scented the air. Then a shooting pain contorted her face, and she laid her chin back down on the cold earth and pulled her tail over her nose and eyes.

Deep underground, in the mazes of Vastnir, Fritti Tailchaser was learning a few of the secrets of the mound. Jumptall, his acquaintance from nesting days, was too weak to talk much, but with the help of a young cat named Pawgrip he had been able to explain some puzzling things to Fritti.

"… You see, the Clawguard are mostly just the bullyboys. They're fierce enough, Harar knows," said Pawgrip with a grimace, "but they don't make any decisions. Even their chiefs don't make many, I don't suppose."

"What do you mean?" asked Tailchaser.

"They can't even hunt unless someone tells them to. Whiskers! No one even makes me'mre in this ghastly ant heap unless somebody gives him permission."

"And you say that there are others? Other creatures?" Fritti thought of the shadowy Boneguard and shook himself nervously.

"Hissblood and his Toothguard," whispered Jump-tall in a quavering voice. He coughed.

"They're bad, sure enough," assented Pawgrip. "They're even uglier-and more wrong, if you know what I mean-than the Claws. They just seem to skulk around and keep everybody behaving. Even most of the Clawguard seem scared of them."

Tailchaser was puzzled. "But where do they all come from? I've never seen or heard of any Folk like them."

Jumptall shook his head, and Pawgrip answered. "No one has. No one knows. But you-know-who…" Here the little cat lowered his voice and looked around. "You-know-who can do all kinds of things. Mate Folk and Growlers? Worse things than that have happened down here…" Pawgrip trailed off significantly. U

"But why the digging?" he wondered aloud. Behind him Jumptall raised himself up on his forepaws and swayed weakly.

"Cats weren't meant to dig," he said with surprising strength. "Killed Earpoint. Killed Streamhopper." Jumptall shook his head sadly.

He looks more ancient than old Smfflick, thought Fritti. How did it happen? He is scarcely older than I am.

"Always digging they are… or rather, we are," said Pawgrip. "Should think they'd have enough nasty tu

"Then why?" persisted Tailchaser.

"I don't know," admitted Pawgrip, "but if they keep digging like they have been, soon all the tu

"Killed Streamhopper…" muttered Jumptall sadly, "killing me…"

CHAPTER 21

Here sighs and cries and wails coiled and recoiled on the starless air, spilling my soul to tears. A confusion of tongues and monstrous accents toiled in pain and anger. Voices hoarse and shrill and sounds of blows…tumult and pandemonium that still whirl on the air…

–Dante Alighieri

After a long passage of sleepless time for Fritti, several Clawguard came to the mouth of the prison cave and summoned the captives out to work. Whining and huffing, they scrambled one after another up the steep shaft. Fritti was surprised to see many of the Folk moving at all, let alone making the strenuous climb, but Pawgrip explained that no one was fed unless he could clamber out. Those who could no longer manage the ascent would remain in the small cavern until they died. Jumptall, with help from Tailchaser and Pawgrip, managed to struggle up the sloping entranceway. At the top they all made a hurried meal of insects and grubs, then the waiting Claws bullied them into a straggling line and led them through a seemingly endless succession of tu

They were delivered over to Snoutscar, a heavy Claw whose fur clung patchy and sparse over his muscular body. Snoutscar sent the prisoners, in bands of three and four, down a tangle of short tu

As they reached the mouth of their designated tu

"I'll have no sun-worms questioning me! Is that clear?" he raged. His body stank.

"Yes!" quailed Tailchaser, "I just didn't understand!"

"You'll dig is what you'll do, and you'll dig hard, sun burn you! And you'll be finished when I say that you are. Do you see?" Fritti nodded his head miserably. "Good," continued Snoutscar, "because I'll have my eye on you from now on, and if I catch you shirking I'll have your tongue out. Now dig!"

Fritti ran to rejoin his tu

The rest of the day passed in damp, steamy misery. Tailchaser and his two companions scraped away at the end of a small tu

They paused briefly at midday. Fritti tried unsuccessfully to clean the packed earth from his sore paws and bleeding, lacerated pads. After what seemed like mere moments of rest they were ordered back into their tu

As time wore on Fritti found himself wanting only to lie down and sleep: if they killed him, what difference would it make? It would happen sooner or later anyway. But when he had almost convinced himself the snarling head of Snoutscar would appear, blocking the entrance to the burrow, eyes glittering and mouth twisted. Tailchaser would redouble his efforts, digging rapidly and painfully long after the head had disappeared again.

The two older Folk at his side had mastered a relentless but unhurried pace; toward the end of the digging time Fritti finally began to imitate them. At last Snoutscar ordered them up from the tu

Half-tumbling down the incline, Tailchaser fell almost immediately into a deep, overwhelming sleep.

Deeper in the Catacombs, with hundreds of jumps of earth and rock between themselves and the sun, Pouncequick and Eatbugs had fared no better than Fritti.

As Tailchaser had been led unwillingly away, Longtooth and Bitefast had shoved and threatened the two remaining companions down into a cave several levels below. There they had been instructed to stay until Scratchnail should return and decide what to do with them. Unlike Fritti in the cave to which he was eventually led, Pouncequick and the old cat found themselves the sole inhabitants of their prison-but cracked and split bones strewn across the dark floor suggested that they were not the first inhabitants.

After what had seemed like Hours of solitude a soft snuffling sound broke the cavern's silence. Certain that it was the Clawguard returning to kill them, Pouncequick stiffened himself against the far wall of the hole, ready to resist that final departure.