Part IV: John wended his way to Count Latath, with whom he had become well acquainted. Then something sunk in, driving his stomach into turmoil. "She had referred to me as 'dear!" Rather then be flattered by this he was deeply disturbed. He shrugged it off as he smiled to Latath, "Well, that was fun." Latath returned with a knowing smile looking deeply into John's eyes, "I would say it was. It looked that you made quite the impression." Latath's smile deepened as he saw his friend's complexion turn pink and he chuckled. Almost as swiftly as the smile came to his lips, his face hardened to make stone look soft and friendly. His voice reflected the emotion on his face, "If that is all, Baron?" John took a half step back, pain and confusion in his eyes and on his face. He stammered, "Yes, it is." With that the Count swept away, leaving a lingering chill. Out of the corner of his eye, John caught some movement, not unlike that of a small furry creature running off. He took a table, emotions awhirl and gnawed at some food. His pretense at eating was interrupted by the woman he had met that morning. She gestured to the empty chair next to him smiling, "May I join you?" He felt himself warming under her smile and managed a half hearted smile and nod. She settled in delicately looking at him with eyebrows furrowed. "Is there something wrong? This would be first time that I heard a complaint of one of the Duchess' parties..." He glanced away from her to look at the throne, but couldn't see through the press of bodies. Looking back at her, he smiled with more sincerity shaking his head, "I just have a lot on my mind." He couldn't help but notice a fresh red scar on her immaculate left hand. He thought to himself, "Oh, no, I can't even remember her name..." By then a third dance song was started up by the unseen musicians. The Lady looked at John coquettishly offering him her hand, "Shall we, m'Lord?" John grinned in return, "Of course, m'Lady!" He took her hand and escorted her out on to the dance floor. Soon they were swirling amongst the throng of dancers. A familiar burning sensation consumed him as he looked into her eyes. He knew that he couldn't hide it from his face. Confusion burned within him. He looked up and saw the Duchess in a heated discussion with her Satyr lover. The Satyr looked up and saw John. The next time he could look, he saw Elana looking at him furiously and the Satyr grinning an evil grin of victory. His heart felt cold. Then the whirling of the crowd prevented him from seeing her anymore. Count Latath saw them dancing and smiled. Once again he was enraptured of the woman beside him. A light tap on his shoulder interrupted their dance. He saw the Lady bow herself away and turned to see the Duchess behind him. Behind the Duchess was the Satyr, a disgusted look on his face. The Duchess smiled sweetly at John, "Shall we continue, where you left off?" The passion that previously been for the Lady of no name quickly changed its course and was redirected to Elana before him. He reached out and took her into the dancer's embrace, sweeping her across the floor. One time that he looked up he saw the Lady talking to the Count and pointing in his direction. The Count looked up and turned his back in disgust. ***************** Tim was feeling cold and wretched by the time the SPCA workers had put him into a cage to await veterinary examination. He curled up trying to sort out his thoughts. He was still trying to make sense of the events of the day and come up with a plan when a person in a white veterinarians uniform started unlocking the cage. He decided it was now or never. As the door swung open, he let out a hideous meow launching a cantrip at the veterinarian. He then leapt out of the cage and ran for the open door. Behind the vet was looking baffled by the empty cage. His luck held as someone was heading out the back door just as he was about to pass it. He ducked quickly out and into unfamiliar territory. He ran down the street a ways before stopping to get his bearings. He realized that wherever it was, it was far from downtown and his apartment and maybe not a good neighborhood.. ***************** The Queen looked up to see the commoner who had reported earlier entering the lair. She decided to switch into her feline form. She curled up, her sleek black coat glistening in the fairy lights. Her gaze remained fixedly on the commoner who arrived finally at the base of the throne's pedestal. "My Queen...?" A black tail twitched, "Proceed." "Old Tiger is sowing the seeds of the plan." "Very well, be gone." The commoner rushed out of the Queen's presence, anxious to return to the party. Esmerelda stretched languidly nearly slithering to the floor. She dropped down gracefully, and sauntered over to the cage. The black tom looked at her a mischievous gleam in his eyes. The mouse trembled in its prison. Esmerelda purred, "Well, well, well, the net is being slowly wound about your old oathmate. You should have known better then to return to Arcadia without your old friends. And to comeback..." The Queen's eyes narrowed to slits hatred crashing from her like a tide. A crowd of Cait Sidhe, gremalkin and noble alike, gathered around and yowled their derision, burying the mouse's squeaking losing whatever she was trying to communicate. "Perhaps, we can have a taste of the fun that we shall have with the both of you." The mouse squeaked in alarm and started running circles in her cage. Silence descended on the assembled cats, their tails twitching in anticipation, ears back. In the distance was the thud and crash of kittlings getting into and knocking over something they shouldn't. The gathered felines poured glamour into their Queen as she laid heavy enchantments on her victim. Part V: Andoris ran back and forth in her cage feeling the glamour gather about her, binding her in its enchantment. The purring of the gathered cats was sounding almost like an earthquake to the trapped Sidhe turned mouse. The Queen spoke, venom dripping from her voice, "Now, my pretties," a cantrip was cast and her voice carried throughout her domain, "the *mouse* will run loose in the freehold. She is bound so she can not leave, among other things. This is the game. She will be allowed a five minute head start, and no one is to follow or watch where she goes. When her five minutes is up, the hunt begins." Meows of anticipation filled the lair, interrupting the Queen. She hissed and silence descended once more. "She must be returned to me alive. The one who returns her will be rewarded. Any who dare kill this forsworn meat will face my wrath!" As the echoes of that pronouncement sounded down the hall, Andoris cringed into the back corner of the cage. Meows of anticipation resounded throughout the freehold. The mouse felt as though cords yanked her and she tumbled out of the now open cage door. She looked back hoping to return to the safety of the cage but it was no longer open. The cats all watched the mouse reach a decision and then it scampered away. The cats' eyes followed it. The Queen's voice boomed, "Five minutes, starting now!" The gremalkin who had gathered dispersed to their previous activities or inactivity as was their wont. The Queen languidly guided herself into her throne. She curled up in a purring ball of black fur and counted the time before the hunt would begin. ***************** Tim wandered the streets in what he hoped was the right direction. Fortunately, given the time of day, these streets were unusually quiet. In the distance was the drone of traffic and nearby the sound of the occasional car. He passed a depanneur and a little girl came out with her father, squealing in delight at the sight of the cat. Tim barely managed to save his tail from the grasping hand as his sprinted off. After crossing the street he looked back to see the father admonishing the child in French. He sighed wishing that he had taken the time to learn that language. He strolled for a few blocks before realizing that he was getting hopelessly lost. "Hey, beauty," he chided himself, "this adventure is wearing thin rather quickly." He heard an inquisitive meow from behind him and realized that he had been foolishly lax by: talking out loud, and not paying any attention to his surroundings. A brown and white house-cat was perched on a nearby garbage can looking at him with curiosity. A little boy opened a nearby door and called out in Italian. The cat looked to the boy and back to Tim, hissed and ran to and through the door. For the next half hour Tim was despondent, wandering aimlessly. He stopped, flattened his ears and spat in derision. He thought to himself, "Fool, you've been getting too fat and lazy under ole John's care, can't even think for yourself anymore." He licked his paw and swatted his tail. A little flickering light appeared sitting right in front of his nose. He twitched his whiskers and whispered, "Take me to John before he gets himself into serious trouble." The light went through a rainbow of colours before zipping off going from lamp post to lamp post. In moments he was at a metro station. He stopped in his tracks. People were coming and going. He gazed from the alley to the station watching the will o' wisp glimmering in the lights of the station. He sighed not liking the looks of things. With the feline equivalent of a shrug he ran through the doors just as someone opened one, wind pressing at him from behind. With nary a glance elsewhere he rushed through the turnstiles and down the stairs. His luck held as no one noticed the flash of fur so intent were they on their conversations. He descended the final flight of stairs to the metro platform, a sense of disquiet settling over him. He heard a voice call out and turned to see a woman pointing at him from further down the platform. The loud whirring and a whooshing of displaced air heralded the arrival of the metro drowning out her words. Tim hopped into the car, realizing at that moment that he had lost track of the will o' wisp in his haste. The car held a smattering of people. A couple of people looked at the feline passenger but in typical Montreal fashion, ignored it as the metro accelerated to the next stop. He looked anxiously about for the will o' wisp. He saw it in the next car down and rushed to the door. Then a cold and ill feeling swept up his spine leaving his fur in end. The doors opened and a pack of goths stepped in exuding banality in waves.(Author's note: these goths just happened to be really banal... can you guess why?) Tim looked up and turned to run to the other door. As he started moving, the coldness of the banality leeched at his already low reserves of glamour. The world turned grey. He felt ill. His thoughts drifted... Amy looked up as the odd looking bunch of goths boarded the metro. She had known plenty of goths in her time, but something unnerved her about these ones. Then she saw a cat run from them meowing and hissing trying to make it for the doors by her at the end of the metro car. The doors shut in its face. Her heart went out to the poor thing. It seemed daftly afraid of those goths. She reached down to pick up the cat. It looked up and jumped into her lap purring. Then it looked at the goths and hunched its back. They looked at the cat and laughed before turning to talk with someone who was already seated. She stroked the cat's back murmuring comforting words, looking forward to her stop downtown. A mote of dust, reflecting the light, drifted in front of the cat's face. The cat, in typical feline fashion, started batting and trying to play with it. The mote seemed to dance around the cat's paws. Amy chuckled, smiling for the first time in days, distracted from her fellow passengers and her worries for a time by the cat in her lap. ***************** For John and the Duchess, the evening passed in a swirl of colours, sounds, and textures, and the other person was at the center of the swirl. Forgotten to them were the Satyr lover, the Lady, the Count and matters of state. All that mattered was that they were together. They could not see that they were alone in the crowd, abandoned by friends and suitors alike. The Duchess' friends and suitor all figured John as a whimsical romantic interlude, but would have no part of it. John's relationships were newly forged and tenuous. None of his friends truly understood their rising bitterness at his apparent romance and the hatred or apathy this was spawning. They were embracing each other leaning on the door to the Duchess' apartments. The Duchess smiled coquettishly, "Well, well, my dear, care to explore the apartments..." Before John could answer, the door was opening and they stumbled into the apartments giggling and laughing. Elana whisked out of his arms, disappearing through one of the doors. Her voice, even melodious through the door she had shut behind her, called out for him to wait. His eyes took in the luxurious apartment that would make heads of state green with envy. His eyes settled on the couch. There was a cat there. It seemed to be looking at him intensely. It had a black coat and its eyes were crystal green.... Part VI: The freehold of the Queen of Cats in Montreal was nestled down a trod hidden in an alleyway off of St. Laurent street. The trod itself even if discovered was treacherous to all fey of the non-cat variety. Any who managed to wend their way through the enchanted pathway would have found themselves in front of a skeletal building overgrown with vines. They would have faced a myriad if choices on how to enter the frame of a building. Each entryway was cloaked in shadows. Many of them led to nightmare realms, others realms of dreams akin to paradise, trapping those unfamiliar within those pathways. By employing various treasures and vantages within the real freehold the cait sidhe watched the trespassers invoking cantrips to play with or help their unfortunate prey. Sometimes there were kindly gremalkin who would show up and rescue them from the traps. For those few who chose the correct entrance, they found themselves entering a world of chaos in beauty and beauty in chaos. The artistry itself could have trapped the unwary, if it wasn't for the constant romp of kittlings, cats and other fey folk distracting from the art, some may have been lost there in the wylds of the art. Those who did overcome the obstacles that far had to deal with the Queen and her knights... Tucked away in a corner, down one of the many hallways adjoining the throne room, was a velvety birch barked tree with golden leaves. Towards the top the boughs wove together in an intricate shell with an entrance. Inside that woody capsule was the home of one of the knights of the Queen, shunted off into its own dreamrealm. Within this dreamrealm, in front of a fire, on a Persian rug, was a tortoiseshell cat curled up in a ball. Her tail was twitching in reflection of the agitation of her thoughts: The Queen is off her rocker. She's obsessed. This bid for repaying the debt of the traitors I can understand; but, they don't even seem to remember what they did wrong. She chuckled to herself, and that John, he's a charmer. That doesn't excuse what happened. They deserve some *reward* for their deeds but... Her thoughts were interrupted by a scritching sound in the back room of her abode. She practically jumped right to the ceiling, landing with her back arched. The dreamhome fell silent. After a couple of seconds the scritching sound resumed in earnest. Lithui crouched down approaching the doorway behind which the source of the sound was hidden. She thought for a second realizing that she had left the door open when she had left. With a whispery meow, she 'spoke' the word which opened the door. On the other side a white mouse froze, looking at the cait sidhe in fear. With a feline smile, Lithui lay down gloating to the mouse. "Well, well, the hunt is over and I am the victor it seems..." The mouse looked at the cat and took a bite out of the door. She gnawed at the splinter of wood she had torn off with the feline looking on finishing her gloating, "The Queen will be happy to know that I was the one to find you after the others had done a couple of hours of searching Oh my, and it will be a couple of hours before she gets back even. We're going to have some play ourselves." At that point, the mouse had deposited a small piece of wood in front of herself. Glamour gathered about the piece of wood, then launched a barely telephone-like cord between cat and mouse. The mouse's mouth moved and she whispered, "Please, Noble Knight, don't return me to the prison. Can't you see the Queen is falling to bedlam?" Lithui mreowred dangerously as she stood up and paced back in forth in front of the door keeping the mouse trapped. The mouse continued, "She's psychoticly obsessed with this pointless vengeance of hers..." Lithui hissed interrupting and growled, "It is not pointless, Andoris. You and Jonold broke your promises to us when you left us behind in this world. You deserve..." Andoris whispered, "No less than what we're receiving. But there's something about the way the Queen is going about this and hints to what she's planning..." Lithui plopped down eyeing the mouse. "We shall see." ***************** Amy let out a breath that she hadn't known that she'd been holding as the metro doors slid to a dull thud behind her and the metro whirred away. She was still holding the cat who was snoozing quietly in her arms. She felt oddly warm and alive with the cat she was cradling. The memories of the odd goths and the events that occurred around them folded in on themselves tucking into a far corner of her mind. There was a hint of wonder in the air as she exited the metro station. Amy started whistling a tune she had been rehearsing at Vanier College on her flute. A wave of disorientation hit her strongly. She stumbled over to the bus stop's bench. The world was shifting under her gaze, getting a hazy effect. The cat in her arms woke with a start. The mote of dust that the cat had been playing with on the metro appeared and looked like a small firefly. Amy was hit by vertigo. She grabbed onto the cat, hugging him close. The cat looked up at her and asked, "Are you OK?" She stared at the talking cat for a second. He looked like a gremalkin. He should be... The world turned strange, too much light, too many colours for this time of night. She stood up shaking her head. What's a gremalkin anyway? ***************** The black car had avoided every overture of friendship that Jon had extended to it. He let it run away from him to the windowsill of the room. It was staring off into the night when Elana made her entrance. The Duchess sashayed in wearing intricate yet flimsy negligee. John's heart stopped for a split second as his jaw hit the floor. His pulse quickened making up for lost time as she settled into the couch next to him. He was going to mutter something about moving too quickly when the mood was shattered by a fierce meowing at the door. Elana huffed in frustration as the black cat ran at the door. There was a knock at the door. The Duchess let out a nearly feral snarl as she stood up and opened the door briskly, not caring for her attire. A stammering troll was at the receiving end of the Duchess' glare. The black cat ducked out chasing an orange tom. "Your grace, uh, the Knights reported, uh, a chrysalis." The troll was blushing. Elana smiled her most charming smile, running her slender finger under the troll's chin. "Well then, we'll just have Balinor look after that. Why don't you pass that message for me." The troll's blush deepened. He did an imitation of a fish before bowing his acknowledgment and beating a hasty retreat. Elana shut the door slowly. She gathered glamour as she placed a finger to her lips, making a shushing sound, and laid a cantrip on the door. She strode quickly to the window, opening it enough for a cat to enter. Elana turned back to John a mischievous smile toying with her lips. She sashayed once more to the couch. "Now where were we?" ***************** The Queen padded along beside Old Tiger back out on the streets. She was fuming. She was about to see her plan reach fruition when this came up. She smiled a wicked grin. At least the plan will ripen further as she took care of this little matter.