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Epilogue
IT WAS A beautiful summer morning in late July. Just outside Kinsale, at the edge of Pendragon land, lay the freshly prepared Pendragon Racetrack, newly initiated this very day. The dowager countess of Lancaster, Madeleine Malcombe, was the mistress of ceremonies. Like Lady Dauntry of the famed McCaulty Racetrack, she stood on a dais, surrounded by at least one hundred people.
Cats heaved and panted and tried to escape their trainer’s arms.
She called out, loud enough to be heard all the way to Cork, “CATS READY!”
Miss Crittenden of the Pendragon mews, who’d been meowing her head off, struggling to get free of Thomas, her secondary trainer, the only one strong enough to hold her steady, suddenly stiffened like a cannon, every muscle tensed. She was ready to run.
“CATS SET!”
There were twelve new racing cats, some confused, some eager for whatever was going to happen, some bored, some wishing there was food in their trainer’s hands, some wanting just to bathe themselves or sleep in a nice shady spot under a bush.
None of the participants, none of the attendees, none of the trainers, particularly Meggie, had any idea at all of what was going to happen.
Madeleine yelled, her hands cupping her mouth, “FREE THE CATS!”
They were off, at least five of them were, Miss Crittenden among them, thank the good Lord else Meggie’s credibility would have been sorely in question. She was running behind Jubilee, a howling black beast with witch green eyes, from Jenny Malcombe’s new, exclusive training mews, who was running straight and fast.
Meggie felt a moment of base envy. Jenny shouldn’t know success this quickly, it wouldn’t be fair, not after all Meggie’s work, all her dedication.
Meggie yelled, “Run, Miss Crittenden! Get Jubilee, pull him down, chew his neck! Run!”
The crowd, until this moment, not really knowing what to do, took up chants for the racing cat each of them was rooting for to win.
The noise was deafening. This was both good and bad. The noise made Jubilee and Miss Crittenden run all the faster because Meggie had shared with Jenny that they must accustom the cats to cheering, and so they had until all the stable lads were hoarse.
Two of the cats, calico sisters, nearly three years old and fast, suddenly stopped dead in their tracks, sat back on their haunches, stared a moment at all the ridiculous shouting and jumping people, and began licking each other, even though their ears were forward, taking in all the cheering. Meggie knew this was their way of coping with this unexpected chaos.
Butch, a lean and hungry black-and-white spotted mouser from the Witcherly mews, suddenly rose straight in the air, his hair sticking up, an impressive distance up since he was a longhair, and fell flat onto his side, evidently insensible from all the excitement.
Suddenly, out of nowhere, came Brutus, Thomas’s dog. He burst onto the track, right behind Miss Crittenden and Jubilee. Both Jenny and Meggie were now standing at the finish line, frozen in horror as Brutus caught up with Miss Crittenden, grabbed her tail in his teeth, and hurled her a good six feet off the track.
No one had thought to mention that a dog anywhere near a cat racetrack wasn’t to be allowed.
Thomas shouted at the dog, but Brutus wasn’t about to stop this new sport.
Thomas shook his head, looked toward his appalled wife, and said, “Oops.” He ran after Brutus.
Jubilee, an intense, sober cat, saw the dog’s shadow, knew time was short, girded her loins, and leapt—at least six feet off the track to land on top of small Liam MacBail’s back. Brutus was blocked by Liam’s mother, who smacked him in the head. Jubilee jerked her claws out of Liam, ran back toward the track, then stopped, confused, until she heard Jenny’s voice yelling, “Come to me, Jubilee, you can do it, come to me, run, you little critter!”
As for Miss Crittenden, she was flailing her tail about, thankfully still attached, back on the track now and running straight at Meggie, who appeared to be her only savior amid the chaos and the wildly barking dog she heard behind her.