The Wildings

by Nilanjana Roy

  “Impressive,” said the cold voice, from a distance. “Our little visitor here thinks we miss the sunlight? He thinks we have no games of our own, yes? Shall we show him how we play? Aconite? Ratsbane?”

  Southpaw growled, twitching his whiskers to see if he could locate the owner of the voice. But the darkness was still too thick; his eyes hadn’t yet fully adjusted, and moving further inside was far too risky. He could still smell the dog outside, and hear its growls, but he hoped it would go away before it was too late, and he could use that bolthole.

  “Where are my manners?” said the voice. “I’m Datura, little piece of meat. Forgive me for not making introductions: we aren’t used to visitors here.” The voice was moving across the room, and Southpaw snarled, baring his tiny teeth.

  This time, he could sense the laughter rippling out from several sets of whiskers, all around the room. Upstairs, the sounds of scurrying became louder. Southpaw tried to remember what Katar had told him about using his whiskers to sense predators, but though he could raise his black whiskers up just as the tomcat had, he felt nothing in the air. He hadn’t learned the finer points of sensing, and the kitten hoped his unseen enemies wouldn’t be able to guess how vulnerable he was.

  “Fresh meat,” another voice whispered, making Southpaw bristle in alarm. This one sounded as though it was at the far end of the room. “Hold, Aconite,” said Datura’s voice, his mew sharper than normal. “But it’s been so long since we had visitors.” There was something oily about the second cat’s voice, and Southpaw felt his fur crawl, as though he had sat in a nest of ants. “Two seasons since the roofboards rotted and that stray tomcat fell in. It was summer, do you remember?”

  “I remember,” said Datura. There was a sigh among the unseen cats in the room, and Southpaw felt his whiskers rise along with theirs. It was an unpleasant feeling, as though someone had tugged on his whiskers without his permission. The air felt prickly, claustrophobic, and though Datura had stopped talking, Southpaw felt himself included in the silent images that the cats of the Shuttered House were sharing among themselves.

  The stray cat had fallen in at the height of summer, when the cats were restless from the heat, picking fights with each other, vying for the coolest spots in the shade. The roof had parted, rotten from the previous monsoon, and Aconite had jumped back in alarm as the cat came yowling down in a shower of plaster. It was a young tomcat, and it had screamed in pain as it hit the ground, unable to turn its paws in time.

  “How he cried!” said Aconite’s voice, remembering. “His poor paw was broken, wasn’t that so? He could barely stand up; his paw was swelling, and he had to drag himself upright, drag himself away from us. Such a pity that he didn’t get very far.”

  “Where did he go?” asked Southpaw, feeling sorry for the unknown tomcat, empathizing, as all cats instinctively did when they heard of another’s mishaps.

  Aconite laughed, a rusty sound, as though her whiskers were unused to laughter. “Go?” she said. “No one ever leaves the Shuttered House.”

  The kitten’s ears flattened slightly. There was a sound from the staircase on the right, and he peered into the gloom, which seemed a little less impenetrable, now that he had been here for a while. He thought he could see a shape on the stairs, a blur of white, but he couldn’t be sure.

  “It would have been better sport if he had been able to run,” said Datura, his voice regretful. “But you can’t have everything, can you?” “How he mewled!” said Aconite, with relish. Southpaw felt that tug on his whiskers again, the sound of rusty laughter. “The funniest part was when he asked for refuge. What was it he spoke about, Datura? The law of cats? Sanctuary for the wounded? Some such rubbish.”

  Southpaw’s head spun, and the kitten froze in horror as the story began to make a terrible sense to him.

  “You refused an injured cat sanctuary? But what about the laws of hospitality?”

  The laws were the first thing Miao had instructed him about, when he was a young three-weeker with his eyes still the blue of all newborn kittens. The laws were the first thing all cats learned when they were old enough to leave their mother’s side, and like all wildings, Southpaw had the words running through his mind:

  Help, water, shelter and feed

  To any of the clan in dire need;

  No one shall refuse a stranger

  Sanctuary, should he be in danger;

  Hear these laws, and hold to them fast

  As have all wildings from the days of Bast.

  Datura’s amused growl broke into the kitten’s thoughts. “Funny, that’s what he said, too, just before we tore out his stinking throat. It must be one of your strange outside cat ways. But we’ve spent enough time on pleasantries, meat. Will you stand, or will you run?”

  “Oh, run, do,” pleaded Aconite’s oily voice. “It’s been so long since I chased anything larger than a rat.”

  “You lie, Aconite,” said a third, bored voice that made Southpaw jump, because it was so close to the door. “You chased those kittens around from Hemlock’s last litter.”

  “They looked like tiny rats,” said Aconite. “Like blind mice. They would never have lived anyway, Ratsbane.”

  “Three blind mice,” said Ratsbane softly to himself. “See how they run. And how fast can you run, kitten?”

  Southpaw screamed, his mew high and helpless, as a massive black cat with blazing green eyes sprang out of an alcove towards him.

  “Flushed from his lair,” said Datura as the kitten shot away from the door, into the middle of the room. “Good opening move, Ratsbane. Now perhaps we’ll see some sport.”

  “Wait!” said Southpaw, trembling in fear but holding his ground. “I’m sorry I had to rush into your home, but you heard and smelled the dog, and all cats may seek sanctuary from predators. We don’t know each other, Datura, Aconite, Ratsbane, but I mean you no harm. Can’t we—?”

  Aconite’s rusty laughter rose to the roof. “Wonderful!” she said. “Datura, where did you find this one? He means us no harm, did you hear?” Southpaw felt the presence of many other cats, and swinging around, he stared up at the stairs. Now he could see Datura more clearly. The cat was a perfect white, his fur clean and shining despite the filth in the house. He had curious eyes; one was a mottled blue, the other a glaring yellow. The tip of his tail was ringed with black. He looked at Southpaw with an idle curiosity, and the kitten’s small gut constricted as he recognized the look: it was the same one he’d seen on Miao’s face many times when the queen went hunting. The look said: hello, prey.

  Around the kitten, creeping out from under ancient wooden wardrobes, dropping down silently from crumbling pelmets where thick velvet curtains hung, the ring of feral cats was growing. Southpaw took his eyes off Datura and circled, turning to face his predators one by one. His heart plummeted: Ratsbane lounged against the door, covering his one hope of escape, and there were far more cats than he’d expected, at least a dozen, possibly a score.

  Upstairs, a slow thumping noise made Datura look up. The white cat’s tail flicked from side to side in annoyance, and he signalled to the others to stay where they were. Southpaw stayed crouched to the floor, trying to ignore the squelch of what felt like mouldy newspapers pressed against the fur of his belly. The stench made him feel sick to his stomach.

  He considered surrendering—most toms and queens would not fight a kitten who rolled over on its back and offered its throat in abject submission—but for a small kitten, he had a full-grown cat’s worth of pride. Southpaw looked up at Ratsbane, with his great yellow teeth bared, and then at Datura, and some instinct told him, pride apart, that if he bared his throat to these two ferals, they would tear the soft flesh into shreds as though he were a mouse.

  “The meat isn’t scared enough, Datura,” said Aconite’s sinister voice, right behind Southpaw. “Shall I play with him, then?” And before the kitten could run, a paw cuffed him hard across his back, the blow heavy, the cat’s claws raking his back paw painfully. />
  Southpaw miaowed and turned to slash back at Aconite. But the cat—a skinny grey with malevolent golden eyes—was circling the kitten lazily, padding around just out of reach. It seemed to the kitten then that time slowed down, and he could almost hear Miao’s injunctions, out in the park, to the older kittens: “Never leave your back unguarded! Let your whiskers and the fur on your tail tell you what walks your way, wherever you are!” He flattened himself to the ground and rolled, just in time to escape Ratsbane’s chattering teeth. The black cat had moved away from the door, drawn by the prospect of sport, and would have bitten the kitten’s paws or tail right through if he hadn’t shifted in time.

  The circle of cats was tightening around Southpaw. Fear made the kitten’s heart hammer. He stared into Aconite’s eyes. His blood hummed with a sudden understanding: this was not just play, nor was it the often savage defence of territory that many cats would consider a reasonable response to intruders. The kitten slashed at Aconite’s nose swiftly, watching the blood flow and exulting in his small victory as the cat howled and backed off. Southpaw whirled and slashed, blindly, driving three would-be predators back; his size gave him an advantage—he was so small that he made a difficult target for the ferals.

  He knew now that these cats would kill him as soon as they had finished playing with him. Then, oddly, an unbidden thought came to him. Looking in Datura’s direction, but speaking to the room at large, he said, “I feel sorry for you.” The whiskers stilled, and then they crackled all around him in outrage.

  “He feels sorry for us?” said Aconite, the grey’s voice incredulous.

  “Let me rend him limb from limb,” said Ratsbane. “Let me break each of his paws, slowly, so that he cries the way that stray did, and then let us tear out his whiskers and his tongue, Datura. I want to feel his bones snap between my teeth.”

  The white cat barely flickered an ear, but the room fell silent, and even Ratsbane didn’t venture further towards Southpaw.

  “You interest me, meat,” said Datura. “You smell of blood and fear, and you will soon stink of pain and regret, before we take pity on you and end your foolish life. You are alone, and we are many; your friends have deserted you. And yet you feel sorry for us? In the few seconds left to you before you join the rats and the mice whose bodies litter the floor, as you can see, you choose to feel sorry for us? Explain yourself.”

  The white cat’s purr was mild, even reasonable, but Southpaw’s ears were sharp enough to catch the undercurrent of rage, and to sense the anger that Datura held tightly contained in his whiskers.

  “The crows peck at strangers as you do; the rats round on the young and helpless as you do, Datura; but no true cat would behave as you and your kind do,” said the kitten.

  Datura turned on the stairs and Southpaw saw the white cat’s whiskers start to extend. No doubt, this would be the order to Ratsbane, Aconite and the others to finish the game.

  “I haven’t finished speaking,” the kitten said, letting his own voice rise sharply and fill the room, a skill he had learned from watching Katar conduct the colony’s sometimes uproarious meetings on the link between the older cats.

  A murmur of incredulity rippled through air, but the kitten cut through the rising storm. “Miao and Katar always told me that even cats of a different scent should be heard when they ask for shelter, unless they are a threat to the clan,” said Southpaw. “I came here to escape the dog, because you said I could come in, Datura. But you don’t behave like the cats I know.”

  Datura began descending the stairs, his yellow eye blazing in fury, his blue eye opaque and inscrutable.

  “What fine entertainment we have today!” he said, his fur radiating contempt. But he did not stop Southpaw, or order his kill.

  The kitten’s heart was beating so fast that he wondered if all the ferals in the room could hear it.

  “When was the last time you went outside, Datura?” he asked. Aconite hissed. “Let me kill him now! The impertinence!”

  The ring tightened around the kitten, and he sensed that there were more ferals coming around the back. He was surrounded.

  The white cat was on the bottom-most stair, his tail flicking steadily back-and-forth.

  “Why should Datura go outside?” asked Ratsbane, his teeth bared in a growl. “Why should any of us go outside? Here, we have everything we need, you stupid piece of meat. This is our kingdom, our domain; we feast on rats and the few pigeons who flutter through the windows, we live by our own laws, not your foolish, weak rules, and we are disturbed by nobody.”

  Southpaw drew on all of his reserves of anger, allowing it to well up inside his small chest and bury the sharp fear he felt as the ferals of the Shuttered House crept closer.

  “I’m asking Datura,” he said, “not you.” The white cat snarled, his ears back, and now the kitten could see the madness in his eyes. Datura began padding towards the kitten, his claws clicking on the floor. Southpaw’s fur was taut from tension, his sparse eyebrows and black whiskers crackling.

  “Were you born here?” he asked desperately. Datura stopped, his tail waving from side to side.

  “I was,” he said. “What of it? What difference does it make where I was born?”

  Southpaw felt his terror slip away from him. His black whiskers rose slightly as he tried to imagine what it would be like to exchange the vast expanse of Nizamuddin—the canal roads, the Bigfeet’s lawns and rooftops, the narrow alleys and old ruins—for this confined, reeking space. He now understood where the thought that had briefly interrupted his impending demise had come from. “You were the first, weren’t you?” he said to Datura.

  “The first what?” said Ratsbane. “Datura, just raise a paw, and I’ll tear the little scum’s whiskers out by the roots.”

  Suddenly, Southpaw realized he was no longer afraid. He ignored Ratsbane, backing further until he could feel the broad comforting expanse of a wooden wardrobe behind him.

  “The first to be born in the Shuttered House,” said Southpaw. “Isn’t that true, Datura? You grew up seeing the outside, feeling the wind from the skies on your whiskers once in a while, through the windows, out on the roof, but you’ve never really been outside, have you? The rest of the cats came here later, didn’t they? Most came here when they were still very young kittens, some were born here, but you were the first of them.”

  “What of it?” said Aconite. The grey cat was staring at the kitten, but there was open space between her and him, and she would have to launch a direct assault if she wanted to go on the attack. “You speak of things we all know, or even if we didn’t, these are matters of no importance.”

  There were twitches of assent all around the room, but Southpaw noted that only some were strong; a slight, almost imperceptible uncertainty also travelled along the whiskers, and he thought he could sense hesitation in the air. The kitten found his paws sweating; whatever he had picked up from those powerful but scattered images in their brief sharing added up to little more than a feeling. But his only chance was to hold the attention of the cats, to keep talking until—and here his mind shut down, refusing to accept that there was no escape.

  “You say these are matters of no importance, Aconite?” the kitten said, letting his whiskers relax. “But why haven’t you been outdoors to see what it’s like? Why are all of you shut up here like mice, like rats, like a band of scuttling, scurrying roaches, living off stale food and stinking milk, when the hedges outside teem with fresh, fat prey?”

  “I’ll pull your whiskers out myself!” hissed Datura, and came sideways at him. Southpaw bared his small teeth and growled. The white cat stopped just a foot short, arching his back and hissing hideously, but careful not to get too close. The kitten’s claws were tiny, but sharp, as he had demonstrated to Aconite.

  “I’m not done,” said Southpaw. Out of the corner of his eye, he was judging the distance to the velvet drapes, wondering whether they would bear his weight if he had to make a run for it. A low hum was rising up from the
ferals.

  “You’re done,” growled Ratsbane.

  “Look at yourself, Ratsbane!” Southpaw called, as loudly as he could, startling the large black tom.

  “You’re so proud of your strength, of your muscles, of your killing abilities, aren’t you? And yet, why have you never used these outside? Never battled the crows for the right to your kill, never brawled gloriously with another tom, never fought a dog? Look at your kills—a cat with a broken paw, a kitten with its whiskers not even white yet. Are you proud of yourself, Ratsbane? You, Aconite?”

  The snarling that greeted him made the kitten back up and shiver, but he could not let them see how scared he was. Pushing himself up to his greatest height, which placed him a long way under Ratsbane’s massive shoulder, he fluffed his fur out and hissed.

  “The only reason you haven’t gone out is because your leader never went out. Datura shut you all up in the Shuttered House because he had never been out as a kitten! And you followed his example blindly! You call yourself cats?”

  Southpaw saw a flash of doubt in Aconite’s golden eyes, and felt triumphant when Ratsbane sat back on his haunches, washing a paw to hide his obvious perturbation.

  Datura moved so fast that the kitten didn’t see him coming, until a cruelly sharp set of claws slammed his tail against the rotting wood of the wardrobe, holding him pinned. The pain shot through his body like a lance of fire.

  “That was very clever, meat, and very entertaining,” said Datura. His yellow eye stared down at Southpaw, pinning him just as mercilessly to the ground with its fury as his claws held the kitten’s tail to the wood. “But the only law that matters is the law of the Shuttered House. And that law is absolute: when we find meat, we kill it.” There was a gleam in his dissonant eyes. “Slowly,” he added, and then Datura pulled lazily at one of Southpaw’s whiskers, using his teeth delicately, almost gently.