Children of Bast

  “You stink.” I knew the voice, low, ragged and sexy.

  I glanced over my shoulder. “It’s wonderful seeing you, too, Adele.”

  “What do you do, sleep with rats?”

  She was sitting, cleaning a paw, her green eyes sneering at me. Still so beautiful, still with those long legs and that soft faraawi I loved to nuzzle–she took my breath away, again. But I noticed a small notch on her left ear. “Fight?” I asked.

  “What?”

  “Your ear. Get in a fight?”

  “Oh.” She laughed. “No. Nothing that exciting. Caught it on a splinter going under Chubby’s hideaway.

  ~ ~ ~ ~

  Chubby snickered. “I remember that. She was so mad. Said it ruined her good looks. Stuck on herself! She was worse than you, Gaylord.”

  “Well, yeah. But, she had every right to be stuck on herself. Anyway, I asked her how you were getting along.”

  “He’s okay,” she told me. “Don’t see him much. He’s still under that shack where you first met him.”

  “I wanted to race over here and see you right away, but things got a little hairy between me and Adele.”

  “How so?”

  ~ ~ ~ ~

  I moved a little closer to her, but she backed off.

  “I’m serious. You stink like rat. Face down wind, will you?”

  “No hug?”

  “No hug.”

  “If I cleaned up?”

  “No hug.”

  She was not glad to see me. She was ice, and it made me ache because I needed her to be like she’d been before I left. I wanted to talk and cuddle, but she wasn’t having it. In my simple mind I didn’t think I’d hurt her and that we could just take up where we’d left off. “How about some chow?” I asked.

  “I’ve eaten. But you can get something and bring it back. I’ll wait.”

  Maybe there is a chance, I thought. “Okay. Be right back.”

  “Take your time.” She plopped down and washed her front paws.

  I hadn’t come back to dig in a dumpster for some nasty thing that a restaurant had thrown out. I mean, if it isn’t any good for them, why is it all right for me or any other amait? I wanted fresh, and rats are fresh and they even sounded good at the time because I was starving.

  I stooped by the wall of a building and listened. Shuffling. I heard shuffling, the kind rats make. There was a hole in the wall so I ducked in. It was almost pitch-black inside and it stunk like rat. Suddenly, I saw a huge shadow and it stared at me. I figured it was a rat, but I’d never seen one so big. When my eyes cleared, I saw that it was a rat and we were nose-to-nose. It hunkered down like it was going to pounce. Fergus told me once that rats got nasty when they were cornered, but this one was out in the open. Probably makes no difference, I thought.

  I moved on it because I figured it would bolt and I could grab it, but it reared up and hissed. I stopped like a car had hit me. But the rat just stood there and hissed. Nobody ever told me what to do in case a rat turned on me. I thought about backing off and finding another rat, but Mutt’s face shimmered up in my mind and said, “Run and you’ll die. Every rat in the place’ll be after you.” I’m gonna fight a rat, I decided, and shivered at the idea.

  Squatting down, I planned my strategy. I had to get behind it to give it what Fergus called the killing bite. Now, experience taught me, Chubby, that rat teeth are sharp and deadly, so a frontal attack was not a good thing. I could get my throat ripped out before I knew what hit me, so I stayed squatted and kept quiet. They’re fast, too, and cunning; they can chew you like a toy ball before you can kill them. I’d been bit a few times, and Mutt’d had a lot of scars he called his rat marks. Suddenly, the rat relaxed his stance and turned to leave. He never felt my bite.

  There are two things about us above all, Chubby: speed like lightning and compassion; we kill instantly. Yeah, now and then a queen will bring a wounded mouse to her kiths to teach them about mice and how to kill them. I always felt bad for the mouse, but, hey, how else you gonna teach kiths to take care of themselves? If my maama hadn’t laid up drunk most of the time, she might have taught me and my sister. Maybe I wouldn’t have needed Fergus and Mutt, but then, of course, I wouldn’t have met them, or Adele and you.

  Tuyuur Song was showing behind the buildings when I drug the rat to where Adele sprawled, trying not to sleep. She jumped like she’d been hit when I dropped it in front her

  “What is that?” She screamed and ran back against the wall.

  “A rat.”

  “I know it’s a rat, but what is it doing here?”

  “It’s my supper.”

  “Gaylord, you’re making me sick. I swear I’ll puke all over you.”

  “Hey, why not join me? Big as it is, there’s enough.”

  I flipped it belly up and prepared to slit it open. I watched Adele’s face getting paler and paler. It was a bit cruel, I admit, but I wanted Adele to break the dumpster habit and become a hunter.

  She screamed at me. “Gaylord! Stop! That’s disgusting. Smell it. It . . . It smells like you. I’m outta here.” She turned and ran along the wall and disappeared behind a large can spilling over with rotten vegetables and meat that had green stuff oozing from it.

  I gawked at her because I saw the problem. Sure, she was an alley amait, used to the stink and taste of the rotten food she scarfed down and loved. She wasn’t used to rats and mice. They repulsed her? It didn’t matter if amai were supposed to eat rats and mice; she didn’t like them. End of story.

  I felt ashamed for being so hard on her. She’d never had to kill to eat. She ate bašar garbage, already dead, and fights over food didn’t happen because the amai were soft and spoiled because garbage was all over the place. Right? Adele never went hungry, but I had been hungry and had to hunt and kill every mouthful of food. Yeah, I felt superior. I was a real amait. I was a hunter and killer.

  Starving, I began to eat. It was good. I wanted a tuyuur, but teir perch along roof tops and telephone lines in this part of town and are harder to get because they don’t fly down much, except in proyet when bugs are gone. ‘Course, those huge black teir land all the time, but those suckers are mean, and taste bitter. Mutt got me one once. Then rolled on the ground laughing when I spit it out. Yuk!

  “Why am I telling you all this, Chubby? You know what I’m talkin’ about better’n I do.”

  “Figured you need to brag about how great you think you are.”

  “Thanks.” Just what I needed, a critic.

  Okay. Since the rat was huge, I left part of it and strolled over to the garbage can where I’d seen Adele run, but she was gone. I sat and washed my face.

  “You need to do that to your whole body.” It was Adele standing behind me.

  I ignored her until I finished washing, and without looking at her I said, “Don’t start with me, Adele. Where I’ve been, I had to stink, as you put it, like a rat in order to eat. You stink like garbage, and that puts me off, but I don’t throw it in your face, do I?”

  “Oh, you’re so superior, now.” She sneered. “My, my, we must crack you up because we don’t suck guts outta dead rats and lap their blood. Wow! How grand you are, Gaylord.”

  She got to me, so I turned and glared at her. “Yeah, well, I’m an alley amait, too, and I am superior to you. You’re trapped in this one place, grubbing off bašar for that khara you call food. Take it away, and you’d starve. You’re nothing but a bunch of housies on the loose. I can hunt, Adele, and kill, and I’m damned proud of it. Now why don’t you go slop around in the garbage and leave me alone?”

  I jumped up and ran, thinking seriously of not stopping until I was home with Fergus in my own territory. Damn Adele, I thought. Who’s stuck up? If she isn’t, I’m a dead tuyuur.

  ~ ~ ~ ~

  “Well, what did you expect?” Chubby yelled. “You weren’t the same amait, but she was the same Adele. Did you expect her to gush all over you? You hurt her, Gaylord, and a mollie’s not quick to forgive. I speak
from experience.”

  “I know that now, Chubby. Yes, I was so puffed up with myself that I couldn’t see Adele. I wanted her to respect me and fall all over me because I was so great. I wanted her to admire me, look up to me because I thought I deserved it. I wasn’t thinking of her, and I didn’t know what she’d gone through after I left. I didn’t know she loved me. She never said. Adele never came across as the lovey type, so I thought she hated me or just didn’t think about me at all. How was I to know?” I laid down and looked at Chubby who stared at the ground. “But, she was always loving and generous, and eventually she did forgive me.”

  “No one was more loving than Adele,” Chubby whispered. “And whether you want to believe it or not, she could hunt if she’d wanted to. You insulted her, Gaylord. You were wrong to do it.”

  “Yes, I was. I’m so sorry, now.”

  “Well. what’s done is done, but I’m glad you’re sorry.”

  Chapter 15

  “But I don’t want to go among mad people,” Alice remarked. “Oh, you can’t help that,” said the Cat: “we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.” “How do you know I’m mad?” said Alice. “You must be,” said the Cat, “or you wouldn’t have come here.” Alice didn’t think that proved it at all; however, she went on “And how do you know you’re mad?” “To begin with,” said the Cat, “a dog’s not mad. You grant that?” “I suppose so,” said Alice. “Well, then,” the Cat went on, “you see, a dog growls when it’s angry, and wags its tail when it’s pleased. Now I growl when I’m pleased, and wag my tail when I’m angry. Therefore, I’m mad.” Lewis Carroll

  I stopped by a tree and sat down. The wind was picking up a chilly breeze. The Season of Emergence was not far away.

  “Going back would be easy,” I said aloud. “Fergus would be delighted and I wouldn’t have to hang out with these greenhorns.”

  “Like you were when I found you?” She was a silhouette against the growing light.

  “Yeah, like I was.” I admitted to her that I was a kith brain twice, first with her and second with Fergus and Mutt. “But I’m not one now.”

  She came and flopped beside me. I gave her a smug grin as I sniffed her face. “Let’s see, moldy meat, rotten bit of fish, some slimy lettuce and . . . ah, yes, rotten onions. Right?”

  “Don’t you start” She said and moved away a little. We were silent for a moment. “Who’s Fergus?”

  “A friend who taught me all I know. Well, he and Mutt, my other friend who was killed by a car recently. Great amai. I owe them everything.”

  She looked at me hard. “Everything? What am I, a bucket of khara? You’d be dead now if I hadn’t been . . . what’d you call it? Oh, yeah, a garbage amait, livin’ off of bašar scraps. If I hadn’t been a garbage amait, you’d have starved.” She was calm as she spoke, no screaming, no ranting, but she was mad as hell and close to blowing her cool.

  “Okay, I’m sorry. Yes, you saved me and taught me stuff I had to know to make it in the street. I admit it. I apologize. We laid there and absorbed the chilly breeze. I wanted to curl up with her, but I knew that was a stupid idea. “But I’m not the same kith brained tom who cut out on you. I’m a grown up now. What you see in front of you is a streetwise alley amait, a real amait. Thank you for what you taught me, but it was only a start. I know just about everything there is to know now. What can I say?”

  She stared at me like I’d lost my mind, and I had, Chubby. Nobody could’ve matched my bighead; I was so puffed up.

  “So what am I? An unreal amait?” I saw the hurt in her eyes.

  “You know what I mean.”

  “No, I don’t. You think because you can hunt and kill that makes you a know-it-all streetwise amait? I can hunt and kill, too, Buddy. I just don’t choose to. I’m lazy, okay? I hate the taste and smell of rats, and, yeah, I’ve had some. When I first came to the street, I tried a mouse, and it sickened me, so I went the easy way. But that doesn’t make me less of an amait. How many kiths have you had, oh, wonder amait?” She got in my face. “Don’t ever brag like that in front of me again, or I’ll tear the khara right outta you.”

  I glared at her and laughed. She went crazy and made a lunge at me. I sidestepped, caught her front leg, flipped her over and pinned her to the ground. Her eyes almost popped out. “How the hell did you do that?” She whispered.

  “Training.” I let her go. “Can we calm down, Adele. I won’t fight you, but I will not let you mess me up. I know you can, but as long as I have the strength, I’ll stop you. Understand?”

  She rolled over and sat. We were grooming ourselves when she started to laugh. I glanced at her. “You’re right about one thing.” She’d finished smoothing the faraawi on her chest. “You’re not the same amait. When I found you out here, I could have blown you over.”

  “Amai can’t blow.”

  “Hiss, then. Did your friends teach you to be a smart ass, too?”

  “No. You did a pretty good job of that.”

  It got cold and the wind gusted around us. We headed for Adele’s crack in the wall, and when we went inside, she said, “The wind did something to you because you don’t stink as much.”

  “You’re getting used to it.” I sprawled on the floor.

  “No, no, I’d never get used to that.” She dropped near me.

  It felt so good being there, Chubby. I started to feel happy like when we were together before. We’d said some things we needed to say, but I knew there’d be more; I still loved her. As I said, I didn’t know how she felt about me, and I know amai don’t hook up for life and mollies have a lot of lovers; it’s part of being an amait. But, I was nuts about her. I couldn’t imagine ever leaving her again.

  I also wondered if I could I live knowing I was just one more tom in her life? I watched her smooth herself with her cute little tongue and dig her gorgeous face deep into her faraawi to take out a flea and thought, How cool it’d be to have her all to myself.

  Suddenly, the seminary floated into my mind. Maybe that’s the answer, I thought. Go back to the seminary with her, beg to get in and insist she be brought in, too. And—listen to this, Chubby—I thought if I could get her settled, Ned and Harriet couldn’t turn her away. Huh? What about that? Good idea, yeah.

  ~ ~ ~ ~

  Chubby leered at me for a moment. “You are a very sick amait, Gaylord, but a clever one. I’ll say that for you.”

  “So, why am I sick?”

  “Because you were only thinking of yourself.”

  “I already said that. But, how’s that make me sick? I don’t understand. I was selfish, yeah, but sick?”

  “Don’t beat it to death. Maybe sick’s the wrong word. A little crazy? Is that better?”

  “I guess. I see what you’re sayin’, Chubby. Sorry I got sore.”

  “S’okay. I forget you’re touchy.”

  ~ ~ ~ ~

  I knew getting her loaded would be a huge problem because I’d have to let other toms get to her. So what’s the problem? I thought. Loaded was loaded, and how would Ned and Harriet know? Adele loved to be comfortable and would go for being in a warm house to have the kiths. And if the kiths were given away, like I was sure they would be, Adele wouldn’t care. What happened to kiths once they were eating on their own was no concern of hers. We all knew that, hey.

  Of course, I knew Adele would go wacko when she came in, and that scared the khara outta me. I’d have to fight her.

  ~ ~ ~ ~

  “Did you ever think about what you’d do if Harriet and Ned threw you out?” Chubby asked.

  “Yeah. I thought of that. It was simple: I’d go where she went, wherever. We’d make it. I was never going to let her go again. Where she went, I went. No argument. Just fact.”

  “You’re okay, Gaylord.”

  I smiled. “We were tangled together when we woke up at Tuyuur Song. Apparently, sometime during the night my stink didn’t matter to her, and hers, of course, was like perfume to me, although smelling a bit like yesterday’s
chop suey.

  “Oh, brother.”

  “Oh, brother? What wrong, Chub?”

  “You’re makin’ me sick with all that silliness about stinkin’. Her smell was perfume. Brother, oh, brother. And don’t call me Chub. Hate that.”

  “Okay, but you’re just jealous.”

  “You’re right about that. Go on.”

  ~ ~ ~ ~

  I was still determined to load her with kiths and take her to the seminary. Breakfast was a dive in the dumpster for her, and for me a couple of fat mice I found under it. I saw some cockroaches under there, too, and I remembered Mutt said they were tasty. But bugs have never been my thing. I tried a grasshopper once. Yuk! Dry and bitter. Mice are good, small, but good.

  While we ate I thought about my plan for Adele and wondered when she’d be ready. “When do you come in again?”

  “What?” She dropped a mouthful of some crap she’d been chewing on.

  “You know what I’m talking about. When will you be ready for kiths again?”

  Mouth open, she glared at me like I’d asked her to fly. “I don’t know, Gaylord. It hits me anytime, anywhere. You’ll know when I go for your throat in the middle of the night. Why?”

  “Well, for one thing, to save my throat, and I might wanna try to be first.”

  “You’ll have to stand in line.” She went back to eating. “Every tom in the neighborhood will be there. We stink to high heaven, and you guys can sniff us out a block away.”

  “I know. I didn’t spend all my time away hunting rats. Think I might have a chance?”

  “If you fight like you did yesterday, yeah, I’d say you’ll have a very good chance. ‘Course, this would be against a tom with lots of experience. Think you could take him?”

  A picture of my encounter with Mutt flashed before me. “Like I said, I didn’t spend all my time hunting rats.”

  Some time later I was ripped out of a deep sleep by yowling so earsplitting I thought my head would explode. It was Adele, rolling around on the ground like a snake.

  “What the hell?” I was truly scared khara-less. I went to her, and she whacked me so hard I heard bells. Her claws slashed my nose and made it bleed. She leaped out of the crack and was gone. I cleaned the blood from my nose and smiled. She was ready.