The sudden melee drew the attention of the Felinos who had been assigned to watch the prisoners. Feliz took advantage of the confusion. Popping out one of his claws, he pried apart the chain that held his collar to the others. “Pudding, you need to get out of here quickly while you have time,” he barked at the chocolate-brown cat.
“Not on your life,” she shouted back. “That degenerate has my cousin in there.” She bolted into the old windmill to chase after Meyer and Muse.
Lucius Jr. was worried. The unexpected arrival of Frankie and his reinforcements had made the outcome of the day unclear. He began to think of ways to salvage what he could of his victory. That meant Caterwaul had to go.
“Bugsy!” he yelled to his henchman. “I need you to finish him off now. We don’t have time to mess around anymore.”
Bugsy understood. There would be no more toying. Caterwaul was pretty beaten up, but the big yellow cat had been playing around up until now. He grabbed Caterwaul by the collar then, rising up onto his hind legs, he lifted Caterwaul up with his right front paw until his face was close enough to breathe on.
Caterwaul could clearly see his attacker’s droopy eye and mangled ear. He had an amusing yet terrifying thought. As dangerous as this cat was now, how much more effective would he be with two good eyes and ears.
“Boss says it’s time to go. I guess that means it’s time to go.” Bugsy unsheathed the claws on his left forepaw. “It’s time for Caterwaul to go to sleep . . . forever.”
He drew back his left arm. Caterwaul knew he was done for. One swipe of that powerful left paw, and it was all over. Suddenly he felt the big cat’s grip loosen. His one good eye rolled backward, and he yelped in pain. Looking downward, Caterwaul could see his saviors. Juan was slashing furiously at Bugsy’s exposed chest while Frankie dug his claws into his legs.
Bugsy staggered and fell forward. As the big yellow cat moved to land on all fours, he let go of his victim. Caterwaul grabbed onto Bugsy’s upper arm and with a sudden burst of energy, swung himself onto his back. Grabbing on with his hind legs, Caterwaul slammed his front paws downward into Bugsy’s face. His right paw connected with the big cat’s nose, while the left tore into the flap of skin covering his remaining good eye.
Virtually blinded and bleeding from his many wounds, Bugsy shook the ragged Caterwaul from his shoulders and staggered off, howling into the woods.
Pudding was raging. She’d watched that piece of trash Meyer drag Muse back into the old windmill only minutes before. She had no way of knowing if they were still inside or if Meyer had hauled her out the back and vanished. The lanterns that lit the building had, for the most part, burned themselves out. The only light remaining came from a few last flickering candles and the moon. She heard something coming up behind her, and she spun around with her claws bared.
“Shhh . . . easy now, it’s just me. I’m here to help.” It was Feliz. He signaled for her to be quiet. Whispering to her, he asked, “Which way did they go?”
“I’m not sure,” she answered. “Maybe up, maybe out.”
There was noise coming from the room where the cushions were. Carefully Pudding and Feliz moved forward toward the sound, but when they got there, they found it was only Gerhard trying to get to his feet. Just then, they both caught a glimpse of a shadowy figure moving toward the stairway.
“Get Gerhard to safety,” said Feliz. “I’ll go after whoever that was.”
Pudding wrapped the injured Gerhard’s paw across her shoulders and led him out through the back door.
Outside the old windmill, the fight was drawing to a close. With Bugsy and Meyer out of the fracas, the momentum quickly shifted from the Felinos to Frankie and his men. Lucius Jr. could not believe it. With a sweep of his eyes, he could see most of his crew had been beaten up pretty badly. How was he ever going to explain this to his father? After a disaster like this, there was no way the old man would let him succeed him as capo di tutti gatte.
He needed to get out of there. Moving with a stealth one could never imagine from a cat of his build, Jr. slipped from the battlefield to the area behind the windmill. A smile returned to his face when he saw Pudding and Gerhard before him, defenseless. At least it wouldn’t be a total loss. He could get rid of Gerhard for good and take the chocolate female as a hostage.
He brought out his claws and readied himself to pounce. But before he could launch himself, something grabbed him and yanked him away. It was something big and wet with a massive set of teeth. It was Huxley, and he had the fat cat engulfed in his jaws. From high up on the hound’s back came a voice. “I’d love to see you try to get out of this one, Jr.” Straddling the big dog’s neck, grabbing onto his collar, was Coy the kitten. He was laughing triumphantly. He slid down to the ground as Huxley gripped the terrified Felino tightly in his jaws and shook him.
Gerhard grabbed his hat off Lucius Jr.’s head. “I believe that this belongs to me,” he said.
“Better late than never,” said Coy with a chuckle. He extended his paw in friendship to Gerhard. “Hi, I’m Coy . . . I’m glad to see the party’s still happening.”
Feliz caught up with the shadowy figure on the windmill’s fourth level. It was a medium-sized cat, but that was about all he could be sure of in the darkness. The figure seemed to be dangling from something overhead and apparently had not yet caught Feliz’s scent, too busy at the moment to notice his approach. Feliz flung himself at the swinging cat, landing across his chest. He then drew his claws and sneered. “I guess you’re not as tough as you thought you were, eh, Meyer?”
“I guess not,” said the cat underneath, “But there’s only one problem with your logic . . . I’m not Meyer.” In the sparse light of the moon coming through the window above them, Feliz could now see the cat beneath him was not a stripy. He was all black. He had just tackled Caterwaul.
“Get off me, Feliz,” said Caterwaul. “I need your help.” Feliz put his talons away and helped Caterwaul to his feet. “Up there on that nail, there is a pack. It’s very important to me. But after the mauling I just took from Bugsy, I don’t have the strength left to jump up to that ledge to get it.”
Feliz had no trouble with that request. He was relatively undamaged from the night’s events. He hopped up onto the ledge and handed Caterwaul his pack. Caterwaul opened it up and withdrew a pouch full of his salve and a small canister of liquid. He drank down a little more than half the liquid and then passed the container to his friend. Feliz looked at him curiously.
“Go ahead,” said Caterwaul. “Drink it. It will help restore your strength.” He grabbed a handful of the salve and started smearing it onto his wounds. It had a really strong odor, and Feliz wrinkled his nose. The black cat pushed the packet over to Feliz. “If you have any cuts or scrapes or open wounds of any kind, put some of this on it. And when you’re done, I need you to put some on my back. I can’t reach it.”
This surely is a strange cat, thought Feliz, but he did as he was instructed. Almost immediately, he started to feel better, but he wasn’t too sure he liked the strong smell of wintergreen that now emanated from his body.
Caterwaul searched through the contents of his pack. He was certain he had brought with him a packet of the Witch’s spell reviver. But it was nowhere to be found. I must have forgotten it, he thought. That meant if he needed to use any kind of actual magic spell, it would completely wipe him out energy-wise.
“No magic for me today,” he mumbled quietly to himself.
The two cats searched the remaining upper levels thoroughly, but there was no sign of Muse or her captor. While they were on the sixth level, they heard a tremendous racket from below, followed by what sounded like a wooden door slamming shut. Whoever it was had been hiding below the trapdoor to the basement.
“Will somebody please help me?” It was the cry of a female cat. Caterwaul and Feliz ran to the edge of the platform just in time to see Meyer dragging the screaming Muse through the back exit.
“Come on!” shouted Caterwaul
, as the two cats turned and ran back down the stairs.
By the time they got down and through the door, Meyer and Muse had vanished. But ahead of them in the grass, they could hear moaning. Moving toward the source, they could see a white cat lying in the grass.
“Muse!” shouted Caterwaul as he ran to the fallen cat.
“No,” said the cat, shaking his head. It was Frankie, and he was bleeding from a large bite on his neck. “We have got to stop meeting like this,” said Frankie.
“Meyer?” Caterwaul asked him. Frankie nodded.
“They went that way.” Frankie pointed in the direction behind him. “Watch out for his teeth. They’re really big. I swear I’ve never seen a set of fangs like that on a cat before.”
“We should be able to catch up with them pretty quickly,” said Feliz. “He can’t move too fast with Muse slowing him down.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of,” Caterwaul replied. “In order to get away, he might just do something awful to her and leave her to die.”
After about fifteen minutes, they came to a clearing. There, tied tightly to a tree, was Muse. There were a handful of leaves shoved in her mouth to prevent her from calling out, but her wide, blue eyes were filled with terror. Feliz ran forward to cut her down.
“Feliz . . . no!” screamed Caterwaul. “It’s a trap.”
Before he even finished that sentence, Meyer sprang. He had been lying in ambush on a tree limb. He caught Feliz completely by surprise and started wailing away with his claws. Before Caterwaul could move to help, Meyer drew back his gums revealing his massive teeth. Two strategic bites to Feliz’ shoulders were all it took to incapacitate the impetuous feline.
Meyer turned toward Caterwaul. “Looks like it’s just you and me now, cupcake,” he hissed at Muse’s would-be rescuer. “This is gonna be hysterectical.” He pointed to his head. “I know you’re a smart kitty cat. But I don’t imagine you’ve quite the fighting skills of your now parapalegical friend there.
“You know what I’m gonna do to ya now?” he asked, not expecting an answer. “I’m gonna immortally wound you. That’s so as you die real slow like. Then I’m gonna make you watch as I distemper your girlfriend here right in front of your eyes. Then finally,” he flashed his fangs at Caterwaul, “I’m gonna tear you into teensy little bits with my saber teeth.” Meyer’s fur and tail were at attention. He was hissing. The stripy looked positively insane as he stepped toward Caterwaul. Then a shadow passed over the Felino’s head, and he looked up, just in time to see the huge, toothy, open mouth of Huxley looming over him.
“Mine are bigger,” said the hound as he brought his head down on the gangster and gobbled him up.
The following afternoon, Caterwaul woke up next to Muse on a cushion inside the old windmill. There were cats everywhere, some awake and milling about, some still sleeping.
Muse was already awake, rested and staring at him with her big, blue eyes. “I like watching you sleep,” she said stroking his fur. “You make the sweetest purring sound when you sleep.”
Caterwaul sat up. Much of the night before was still a blur. He wasn’t sure what was real and what was a dream. “Meyer? What happened to Meyer?” he asked.
Coy, who was running toward him, answered his question. “Huxley happened to him, that’s what.” Coy had a big old smile on his face. “Glad to see you’re okay, pal,” he said.
“But how did you guys find us?”
Coy started to laugh. “That was easy. Whatever that goop is you put on to help heal your wounds, it stinks. I could smell it a mile away. So, for a dog with a sniffer like Huxley’s, it was a piece of cake.”
Caterwaul got to his feet and walked outside; Muse and Coy followed him. Out on the grass in front of the old windmill, Frankie was singing a song. He had three other cats singing harmonies and an audience of six or seven cats listening intently.
Frankie wasn’t just boasting, Caterwaul thought. He is really very good. He gave the crooner a wave of his paw in thanks, and Frankie nodded.
“I’m going have to get that cat to come sing at the castle someday,” Caterwaul said.
“The castle?” asked Muse. “That’s the second time you mentioned that horrible place. What do you have to do with the castle?”
Caterwaul answered her. “What if I told you that Cathoon is no longer the dreary, desolate place you think it is, and that the queen has changed? She has been a good friend to me. She’s even allowed me to transform the castle into a beautiful sanctuary for cats,” he said. “It’s my home. Come with me, and I’ll show you.”
Muse scoffed. “Bugsy must’ve hit you even harder than I thought, and you are out of your cat head. Queen Druciah, a cat lover? You sure have an active imagination, my love. It was Queen Druciah who sent that man to take my mother away from me all those years ago.”
“Trust me, it’s all true. She is different now.”
“If it were only true, then I would love to take you up on your previous offer. I have never had a five-course dinner, especially not one prepared by a gourmet chef.” Muse pondered the possibility that the queen had changed. She shook her head because she did not believe it.
“Come to the castle then in five days, and I’ll show you,” Caterwaul boasted. “I will have Orris make you the most amazing meal you have ever tasted. You will see that what I say is true. Muse, the queen is going to love you as much as she loves me.”
At that point, Muse could not doubt him. He had saved her life. She was in love with her furry, black hero and would follow him to the end of the earth if he asked her to.
“Very well, my Caterwaul,” she said. “I will see you at the castle in five days.” She leaned forward and kissed him on his nose.
Caterwaul was ecstatic, but he was also in tremendous pain. He was so badly beaten up that he could hardly walk. Even if he had not gone ten rounds with the strongest cat on the planet, he would need at least two days to get back to Cathoon. So he said goodbye to Pudding and Gerhard, and the brothers too.
To Frankie, he promised a chance to sing at the castle one day in the not too distant future. The two cats embraced and swore to remain friends forever. He made sure there were no Felinos lying around loose and left the job of taking care of Lucius Jr. in the capable paws of Coy and his new friend Huxley.
Then after a final farewell to Muse, he started to walk away. As soon as he was completely out of sight, he said, “That’s enough of this.” He uttered a few words of incantation and disappeared.
22
Back at the Castle
Caterwaul felt the cold water rush over him, and he shot to attention.
“Get up!” a voice shouted at him. It was the queen, and she was fuming. “You’ve been lying there for more than two days, cat. I’ve been screaming at you, shaking you, and this is the third time my guards have thrown water on you. Yet you just lie there. You were gone more than a week. What news do you have for me? Were you able to locate the all-white female cat as I instructed?”
Druciah paced frantically around the room, and she rubbed her face. “I found three more awful hairs this morning,” she shouted, “and what on earth has happened to that oaf Warwick Vane Bezel III? He’s been gone for days now, too, with no word. That’s not like him at all. I have work for him. I need him.” She was gravely distressed.
Caterwaul could only interpret her hostility as a reaction to his “sleeping off period.” Performing any powerful spell, such as the one which teleported him from near the old windmill to here, required a certain amount of recovery time. Still, for him to have slept for nearly two days had to be because of his injuries.
“Well . . . tell me. Did you find her?” Druciah demanded.
“As a matter of fact, I did,” he said. “Her name is Muse, and she is the most incredible cat I have ever seen in my life. She is smart and beautiful and just perfect in every way.” Caterwaul tingled when he talked about her. “She will be arriving in . . . let’s see, you said I was asleep for two days . . .” h
e quickly did the math, “in three days time.”
All of a sudden Druciah’s outward personality changed completely. A huge smile came across her face as she lifted Caterwaul up and grabbed him in a big hug. She was squeezing a little too tightly, and Caterwaul attempted to squirm free.
“My wonderful, amazing cat,” she gushed. “I knew I could count on you. Three days . . . I don’t know how I will last that long without meeting her.”
Caterwaul was no fool. He had a suspicion that something was up from the way her emotions flipped so easily from foul to fair.
“I’ve invited her to dinner at the castle,” he said. “I told her that Orris is the finest chef in all the land.”
“Well, of course he is, my dear,” she said with a smirk. “He works for me doesn’t he? You don’t think I would employ anyone but the best to cook for me, do you?” She was elated. Finally she was going to have her youth back.
“You go ahead and rest, my friend. You have made your queen very happy, and you have a big day coming up. In the meantime, I will meet with Orris to discuss the menu for our upcoming feast. We will pull out all the stops and spare no expense. After all, we must make sure it’s a night your lovely Muse will never forget.”
As she slipped away, Caterwaul shook his head. Something was just not right at Castle Cathoon. The queen was acting strangely. In fact, ever since she returned from the Red Moon Forest, she had not been the same. He loved her very much and wanted to trust her, but the queen was not the same woman he had befriended and with whom he shared a home. Caterwaul decided he should keep a close eye on his “beloved queen.”
Pudding ran up to Muse excitedly. There were only two more days until her cousin would be reunited with her heroic Caterwaul. Neither of the females had ever been invited to a royal function before, and they really had no inkling how to prepare. Muse wanted to make the best impression possible so that the queen would like her.
The Adventures of Caterwaul the Cat Page 16
