The Clan of the Cats Read online

  The pack had lost their fear of hurled stones in the night and once more were ranging close about the tower. But the men discovered that there were few loose rocks remaining on the rims; only in the center, where their combined body heat had thawed the rubble to a degree, could they ply up broken bricks and shards of grey granite.

  With the supply of rocks decreasing, Milo awarded such as were available to the four most accurate hunters — Dik, Djim, and the tracker’s two younger brothers, fiery-haired twins called Bili and Bahb. Milo and the other Horseclansmen set themselves and their dirks to worrying loose more of the bits and pieces of old masonry littering the center of the tower.

  Milo thrust his dirk blade under a brick that looked to be almost whole . . . and felt his blade ring on metal! He set the other men to working upon the same area, and slowly a pitted, red-brown iron ring was exposed. Shortly, they had cleared the two-foot-square trapdoor in which the ring was set.

  One of the Horseclansmen took a grip upon the ring and heaved, then grasped it afresh with both hands, gritted his teeth and strained until the throbbing veins bulged in his forehead, but the rust-streaked door never budged.

  “Wait,” counseled Milo. “There may be a catch of some kind holding it shut.” His dirk blade proved too wide for the crack at the edge closest to the ring; so too was the blade of his skinning knife. But the blade of the small dagger he habitually carried in his boot top slipped easily in. Even with the center of the ring, the blade encountered an obstruction; while pushing the knife against the unseen object. Milo noted that the ring turned a millimeter or so. Maintaining knife pressure, he gripped the ring in his other hand and twisted it right, then left, then right again. At the last twist, the obstruction was gone, and the blade slid easily from corner to corner of the door.

  “Try it now.”

  The Horseclansman heaved. There was momentary resistance, then, with an unearthly squeal and a shower of rust, the door rose jerkily upward to disclose the first treads of what looked to Milo like a steel stairway, covered with dust and cobwebs.

  When the nomad’s belts were once more formed into a makeshift belt and knotted to the back of his own belt, Milo gingerly set foot to the ancient stairs, saber slung on his back and big dirk ready in his hand. As the Horseclansmen watched, all huddled about the opening into the unknown, Milo disappeared into the darkness, only the ring of his bootsoles on the metal telling them that he was still descending.

  * * *

  A sudden intensification of the hot lancing pain in her left foreleg awakened the Hunter, that and a thirst that was raging. Arising, she hobbled across the high-ceilinged, airy den to lap avidly at the pool in one corner — a pool that never froze even in the worst of winters and that never had been dry even in the most arid of summers.

  Her thirst quenched in the crackling-cold water, the Hunter hobbled back to her guard post by the mouth of the tunnel. Lying down once more, for she seemed utterly devoid of energy, she licked at her swollen, throbbing left foreleg. Even the gentle touch of her tongue sent bolts of burning agony through every fiber of her being . . . and, of course, that was when she heard the first wolf enter the tunnel.

  The Hunter had been aware that the two-legs were upon the high, flat place, where birds nested in warmer times, and where she and her now-dead mate had right often sunned themselves. But because she did know the place so well, she knew that there was no danger of the two-legs getting from there to the den. And if the wolves could find a way to get to the two-legs and wanted to eat them, they were more than welcome. As for her, she had nearly gagged at the foul stench of that two-leg she had so easily killed on the preceding day.

  When the clawclicks and shufflings told her that the lupine invader was past the first turn of the passage, she entered it herself, puffing as little weight as possible upon her strangely huge and very tender left foreleg.

  They met between the first turn and the second, in a section too low-ceilinged for either to stand fully erect. The Hunter knew that she possessed the deadly advantage here, for with only toothy jaws for weapons, the wolf could only lunge for her throat, whereas a single blow of her claw studded forepaw could smash the life from him as quickly as she had killed that two-leg. But she reckoned without her disability.

  Sensing more than seeing the location of the wolf head, she lashed out with her sound paw . . . but this suddenly transferred the full weight of her head and fore-quarters onto the hot, swollen left foreleg. Squalling with pain, she stumbled, and her buffet failed to strike home; the bared claws only raked the wolf s head and mask, and before she could recover, his crushing jaws had closed upon her one good foreleg, eyeteeth stabbing, carnassials scissoring flesh and cracking bone.

  But before the wolf could raise his bloody head, the Hunter had closed, had sunk her own huge fangs into the sinewy neck and crushed the lupine spine.

  As the wolf’s jaws relaxed in death, the Hunter slowly backed down the tunnel, dragging her two useless forepaws, growling deep in her throat as the waves of pain washed over her. Weak and growing weaker she tumbled the two-foot drop from tunnel mouth to den floor.

  Two of the kittens, trailed by the third, bounced merrily over to her, but a growled command sent them scurrying back into a far, dark corner. The Hunter knew that she and they were doomed now. She might have enough strength remaining to kill with her fangs the next wolf that came out of the tunnel. But there would be another behind him, and another and another, and the one she proved too weak to kill would kill her. Then the pack would be at the helpless kittens, ripping the little bodies to shreds, eating them alive.

  Deciding to guard her young as long as possible, the Hunter painfully dragged herself across the den and took her death-stand before them.

  * * *

  The steel staircase was spiral, and though it trembled and creaked and crackled under his weight, Milo made it safely to the bottom. Untying the belts from his own, he mindspoke the men above him.

  “The stairs will hold you, but don’t come down yet. This room seems small. See if that door will open wider, then get back from it. It’s dark as pitch down here.”

  The hinges screamed like a damned soul, but finally the Horseclansmen got the trapdoor almost flat on the roof. In the increased light, Milo could see that the chamber was, indeed, small, a bit smaller than the roof above. Every surface was covered with a century of dust and hung with a hundred years worth of cobwebs. But he could spot no droppings of any kind, so apparently no animal or bird had ever gained access to it.

  It took him a moment to remember just what the dust-shrouded object sitting on a shelf at waist level was: it was a gasoline lantern.

  “I wonder . . .” Brushing away the dust and cobwebs, he could see that the artifact was not rusted, being finished in chrome or stainless steel; the glass was intact and there was even a filament still in place. Lifting the object, he shook it beside his ear. It sloshed almost full, and if that liquid was gasoline . . .

  Finding the handle of the air pump, he tried it. The shaft moved smoothly in the tube. Now if he’d just had a match.

  He let his fingers wander the length of the shelf. Near the edge they encountered a small metal cylinder. Not daring to hope, Milo brought his new find into the light. It was badly rusted, and it was all that he could do to coax the screwtop loose.

  “Sonofabitch.” He breathed softly. The cylinder was filled with matches, the heads each coated with wax.

  With the trapdoor closed and seven bodies gathered in close quarters, the nomads soon ceased to shiver and exclaimed upon the clear, intensely bright light of the lantern. A lighted exploration discovered another, larger lantern, two corroded and useless flashlights, a two-gallon can of lantern fuel, an assortment of rusty machine tools, and a holstered revolver, now just a single lump of rusty metal.

  There was one other find. Set in the concrete floor near the foot of the stairs was another trapdoor, about three feet by two. Milo filled and lit the larger lantern, took the smaller for
himself, then opened the second trapdoor to disclose more steel stairs, but these looking to be in better condition.

  “Dik, Djim, you and the men stay here. I’ll mindcall if I need you or when I find food or water. Leave that thing in the leather holder alone. It was once a dangerous weapon and still might hurt or kill one of you if you tinker with it.”’

  The floor at the bottom of the second spiral stairs was also concrete, but it had once been covered with asphalt tile, which cracked and powdered under Milo’s boots. To his left, grown over with plant roots, was a jumble of brick and stone, and Milo guessed that he was probably within the main ruin, whereon the tower sat perched.

  Behind and to his right were plain, sound brick walls, still partially covered with remnants of rotted wood panneling. More of the rotted wood framed the door ahead of him, its brass knob pale-green with verdigris. The knob turned stiffly in his hand, but the door remained closed. Setting the light on the stairs, he put both hands to the task. Something popped and the door swung open.

  The door led into a small, narrow room, the left side of it lined with closed metal cabinets, the right taken up by a flight of concrete stairs leading down. All of the cabinets proved bare of much that was still usable — a few brass buckles, a handful of metal buttons; perhaps the nails and eyelets could be salvaged from the several pairs of rotting boots by the metal-thrifty clansmen.

  As he opened the last cabinet, he jumped back and cursed at unexpected movement, his hand going to the hilt of his dirk. The big brown rat struck the floor running and scuttled down the steps, only to come back up twice as fast, shrieking in terror and streaking directly between Milo’s feet to leap into a hole in the wall.

  Thus warned, Mile descended the stairs slowly and carefully, holding the lantern high. It was well that he had done so. The bare concrete of the small room below was littered with nearly two dozen sluggishly writhing rattlesnakes!

  “Well” thought Milo, “that answers the food problem.” But none of the vipers lay between the foot of the stairs and the closed door in the facing wall, so he left them alone.

  This door was the hardest to open he had encountered, but at last he did so, to find himself faced with a short stretch of corridor and three more doors, one in each wall. He entered and closed the door behind him.

  The doors to both left and right were secured with heavy padlocks. Stenciled on the face of the left door was “FALLOUT SHELTER — KEEP OUT — THIS MEANS YOU!” On the face of the right was “PRIVATE SANCTUM OF STATION DIRECTOR — TRESPASSERS WILL BE BRUTALLY VIOLATED!” The door straight ahead was unmarked, but an iron bar at least two inches thick bisected it horizontally, held in U-shaped brackets firmly bolted to the brickwork.

  It might well be a door opening to outside. Milo put an ear to it but could hear nothing. Removing the bar, he opened the door a crack, keeping shoulder and foot against it, just in case a wolf should try to come calling.

  But stygian darkness lay beyond the door. Darkness and a powerful odor of cat. Milo closed the door and drew his saber, then opened it wide and quickly descended the two steps to the next level, lantern held above his head and eyes rapidly scanning the large, high room.

  Chapter III

  The Hunter tried to raise herself when the two-leg holding in his paw a small, white sun opened a part of the den wall and came in, but she was too weak to do more than growl.

  Milo let his saber sag down from the guard position. The big cat was clearly as helpless as the kittens bunched behind her body. One foreleg was grotesquely swollen, obviously infected or abscessed; the other was torn, bleeding, and looked to be broken, as well.

  There was a flicker of movement to his right, and he spun just in time to see the slavering jaws and smoldering eyes of a wolf’s head emerge from a hole just above the floor, to two quick strides, he crossed the room and his well-honed saber blade swept up, then down, severing the wolf’s neck cleanly.

  But the headless, blood-spouting body still came forth from the hole, and as it tumbled to kick and twitch beside its still-grinning head, another head came into view, this one living and snarling at the man who faced him.

  Milo thrust his point between the gaping jaws. Teeth snapped and splintered on the fine steel and the point grated briefly on bone, then sliced free. Milo jerked the steel out, but the dying wolf came with it, and behind him crouched another.

  He split the skull of the third wolf, but even as its blood and brains oozed out, another was pushing the body out into the den.

  “This,” thought Milo, “could conceivably go on forever.”

  But as the lifeless fifth wolf was being slowly pushed through, Milo suddenly became aware of the rectangular regularity of the opening. Man-made! And men would surely have had a means of closing it.

  And there it was! Half hidden in a camouflage of dust and dirt, a sliding door, set between metal runners on the wall above the opening. But did it still function?

  In the precious moments between butchering wolves. Milo pulled and tugged at the door. Setting the lantern down, he drew his dirk with his left hand and used its point to dig bits of debris from out the grooves of the runners. Clenching the dirk between his teeth, he hung his full weight from the door handle . . . and it moved!

  Another wolf, this time a huge, black beast. He chuckled to himself, thinking, “The Chinese used to say that you should never be cruel to a black dog that appeared at your door. Well, hell, I wasn’t cruel to the bastard. I gave him a quicker, cleaner death than he’d have given me.”

  The black wolf had been in better flesh than most of his packmates, so it took the one behind a few seconds longer to push the jerking body out of the tunnel. And that few extra seconds’ respite made all the difference. With all Milo’s hundred eighty pounds suspended from it, the ancient door inched downward slowly, then, screeching like a banshee, faster. Finally, it slammed and latched itself in the very face of the next wolf, which yelped its surprise.

  “Dik, Djim, the rest of you,” Milo mindcalled, “take up the lantern, carry it as you saw me carry this one and be careful you don’t drop it or strike it against something. Come the way I came.” He opened his memory of the stairs and passages to them. “Be careful at the bottom of those stone stairs — a nest of rattlesnakes is denned on the floor there. Those with a taste for snakemeat can kill them. But any who want wolf steaks need only come in here and gut their choice of ten or twelve of them, fresh-killed. Oh, and there’s water here too — I can hear it dripping.

  Then an intensely powerful mindspeak drowned out any reply the Horseclansmen might have beamed. “What are you, two-legs? You carry a small sun in your hands, you slay many wolves to protect kittens not your own, you can open walls and close them, and you can speak the language of cats. What are you?”

  * * *

  The Hunter could no longer trust the witness of her eyes. At times they seemed clouded with a dark mist; at others she saw the images of three or four identical two-legs, and as many of the little, bright suns. Therefore, when first she sensed him beaming the silent language, she thought that others of her senses were awry as well. But at length, she beamed a question . . . and he answered her!

  He just stood and stared at her for a moment, then, very slowly, he laid down his long, blood-dripping claw beside the little sun and took a few steps closer to her, extending One empty paw.

  “You are badly hurt, Sister. Will you bite me if I try to help you?”

  The sight of him faded into the dark mist, but his message still came into her mind. “Help this Cat? Why would you want to help this Cat? This Cat killed one of your pack last sun. Two-legs do not help Cats, they slay Cats, just as you slew those wolves.”

  He answered, “Wolves are enemies of us both, Sister. Besides, my brothers and I are hungry.”

  “You would eat wolves?” The repugnance in her thought-beam was clear.

  He moved his head up and down for some reason. “Hunger can make any meat taste good, Sister.”

  All o
f the Hunter’s life had been hard, and she could grasp the truth stated by this two-leg. Perhaps he then was truthful about wanting to help her. “If this Cat allows you to come close, what will you do, two-legs?”

  The bleeding of your right leg must be stopped, the wound cleaned and packed with healing herbs and wrapped with cloth . . . uh, something like soft skins . . . then the broken bones must be pulled straight and tied in place to heal. It will hurt, Sister, and you must promise to not bite us in your pain.”

  “Us?”’

  “Yes, Sister, one of my brothers must help me, he is skilled in caring for wounds and injuries.” To himself, Milo thanked his lucky stars that chance had sent Fil Linsee with him. The young man was well on his way to becoming a first-rate horse-leech, and was certain to have a packet of herbs and salves and bandages somewhere on his person.

  “Does your brother, too, speak the language of Cats?” the Hunter asked. She was feeling very strange, much weaker; it was now all she could do to keep her big head up.

  The Hunter half-sensed an answer from the two-legs, but it was unclear. Suddenly, nothing was clear for her. The dark mist closed in, thicker and darker. A great waterfall seemed to be roaring about her. Then there was nothing.

  As it was, Fil was the first man through the door, his long spear in one hand and the tails of a couple of thick-bodied, headless snakes writhing in the other. At the sight of the unconscious cat, he dropped his snakes and grasped his spear shaft in both hands, bringing the point to bear.

  But Milo waved at the spear. “You won’t need that, with luck, Fil. That cat can mindspeak. We were having quite a conversation before she passed out. We . . . you . . . are going to do what is necessary to heal up those forelegs. Do you think a cat will be much different from a horse?”