It leaked savory blood into the water sloshing around it. The water was the problem. In order to reach the little morsel, one would have to get wet. Of course, one could reach down from the ledge with one’s claws, and if one stretchedstretchedstretchedah! One caught a piece of the pelt and could heft it to where one could support the weight of the rest in one’s jaws andah-it moved. Still alive then. Good. Fresh meat was best. All it would take was biting down a bit on the neck, under the mane, and the kill would be clean, the meat fresh. There would be no necessity for leaving the relative shelter of the ledge.
One leaned forward, resting on one’s chest, and extended one’s neck to meet the bit rising on claw tip andit slipped! It was trying to get away! The other paw lashed forward, claws extended, to help the first, and one instinctively leaned forward, one’s jaws coming into play to assist one’s claws andandthe thing slipped again before one could sink a tooth into it. The pelt was flimsy stuff and tore out of the claws just as the other paw grabbed the morsel in a second place. The morsel let out a terrified squeal, rather like a rabbit. One was about to smack it to silence and lean forward for the fatal chomp.
Then the cave shook, the ledge broke under one’s over-balanced weight, and one tumbled tail over nose into the pool, relinquishing the morsel, which yelped again. Inconvenient and embarrassing to be so indisposed in front of the food. One climbed out of the pool and shook the water from one’s coat and began to wash before one’s meal.
The morsel began to flail frantically toward the den’s entrance. One padded nonchalantly after. The cave, the ground, the world, shook again. One knew when one was being addressed. One sat on one’s haunches and perceived.
The morsel was also arrested in mid flight. “Did youd-do that?” it asked. “Areare you the G-Great Monster?”
One yawned.
The world shook again and one realized that one had understood the speech of the morsel. One also understood that it was a youngling, and female.
One waded forward while the youngling waded backward, outlined in the dusk outside the mouth of the cave. One’s paws dripped water, albeit warm water. One lapped a bit. The youngling stood still.
“You’re not so terrible,” it said. “You’re nothing but a big cat.”
One had one’s dignity to maintain. One lashed one’s beautifully and delicately marked tail and growled.
And from beneath one’s sodden paws, the world growled back at one and bucked, sending a wave of water to swamp one, knocking one onto one’s back, causing one to drink more deeply of the spring than one cared to, paws over head, and be propelled backward, away from the youngling.
When one got to one’s feet, one saw that the younglingit no longer seemed safe to think of it, no, her as a morselhad not used the opportunity to run away. Indeed, it, too, was just arising from the water, sputtering and snorting. Ah, good. It had not seen one’s discomfiture. Dignity was preserved.
“I’m not afraid of you,” the youngling declared as one advancedclaws sheathed, teeth safely contained within one’s lips, growl little more than a polite, inquiring rumble in one’s throat. A mere purr, actually, one corrected, as the waters bubbled and sloshed ominously. I used to know a cat. A little one. I was a baby then. Shepherd Howling made my mother kill my cat. Hehe tried to, anyway.
Heshe wouldn’t andand .. .” Something odd was happening to the youngling now. It began leaking again, saltiness into the fresh sulfurous water covering it. “My mother was not like Ascencion. She was brave. The Shepherd punished her for disobedience and both she and my cat went away. Soso I’m not afraid of you. You live where the Great Monster is supposed to dwell and lie in wait for the foolish superstitious minds of the flock to be warped and maddened into everlasting wickedness while our bodies are tormented by the great fires from within. But you’re not the Great Monsteryou couldn’t be. Are youare you the Guardian of the Underworld?”