Tailchaser’s Song

CHAPTER 20

Beyond the cavern the tunnels seemed to grow warmer. Fritti knew that aboveground it was winter; snow and freezing rain were falling. Here, deep in the earth-how deep Tailchaser had no way of knowing-the air was becoming thick with heat and moisture.

Eatbugs was up and moving now. He mumbled quietly to himself as he walked, but otherwise showed no signs of resistance to their captors. Longtooth, his muzzle not yet completely healed from the swipe that Eatbugs had given him, was taking great delight in harassing the old cat, who gamely resisted all attempts by the Guard to enrage him.

Tailchaser, trudging on leaden paws, once again began to feel the throb of the mound. Here, beneath the ground, the sensation was different, the vibration digging deeper into his bones and nerves. The pulse of the mound seemed lower and more basic- all-pervading, but, strangely, more natural. Tailchaser knew that they were approaching their destination.

"You can feel it, can you?"

The harsh croak made Fritti jump. Scratchnail was following close behind, watching him, the unpleasant yellow eyes observing his every movement.

"I see that you've started to hear the song of Vastnir. You're a sharp-sensing little bug, aren't you, star-face?" The chief moved up to Tailchaser's side. The massive, thick-muscled form looming over him intimidated Fritti, and made it difficult to speak.

"I… I feel something," he stammered. "I felt it before… above ground."

"Well," Scratchnail leered, "aren't you the clever-quick one?! Don't you worry… there'll be some Folk who'll pay plenty of attention to a smart young torn like you where we're going-more attention than you'll like, perhaps." With a cold, bleak grin that exposed few teeth, the Clawguard chief dropped back to pace behind Fritti once more. The skin around the young cat's whiskers itched and crawled. He didn't want anyone or anything more interested in him than was already the case. He hurried forward to catch up with Eatbugs and Pouncequick. The earth throbbed.

Soon the tunnel began to broaden. Every hundred or so jumps now, the company passed branching tunnels or caves-it was difficult to tell which, since they were just dark holes in the wall of the main shaft. The air continued to warm, a damp heat that made Fritti and his companions feel sluggish. Eatbugs twitched his head from side to side as if to throw off something binding.

"Here now, back to the holes-never do, never do…" The mad old torn looked imploringly, first at the unresponsive Pouncequick, then at Fritti, who could only shake his head. "All this bim-bam bashing and gnashing… can't… can't…?" Eatbugs rolled his eyes and subsided into muttering. Tailchaser pushed at Pouncequick gently with his head.

"Did you hear him, Pounce? What do you think of all this, hmmm? Got your whiskers up, does it?" Fritti waited vainly for a response, then tried again. "What a storv this will make when we get back to Meeting Wall, won't it? D'you think the Folk will believe us?" After a moment, Pouncequick raised his head and looked at Fritti plaintively.

"Where's my friend Roofshadow?" he asked. His voice was so quiet that Tailchaser had to cock his ears forward to make out the words.

"We'll find her, Pounce, I promise. I swear on my tail name-we'll get away from here and find her!"

The kitten looked at him for a moment with a puzzled expression, then lowered his gaze to the ground once more.

Skydancer's Ears and Tears! Fritti cursed himself. When am I going to stop making promises I have not the slightest chance of keeping? Still, he thought. I had to say something to Pounce. He has the look of someone who's going to lie down and float to the Fields Beyond any moment. At least I got a word or two out of him.

Now Tailchaser noticed that the sound of the tunnel had changed. Below the near-silent padding of their paws, he thought he could discern a thin wash of voices-cat voices, but very distant.

Bitefast, the nearest Guard, turned and hissed: "We'll be home, soon. Your home, too-for a short while, anyway."

Finally the underground path widened again and turned downward. The pulsing had become constant and almost familiar, and the voices Fritti had noticed earlier sounded louder and louder. Then, when it seemed as if any moment they must come upon the source, Scratchnail stopped the procession.

"Now," he said, fixing Fritti and his comrades with a hard stare, "we are about to enter Vastnir by one of the Lesser Gates. If you make any movement to escape I will tear you to ribbons, and be pleased to do it. And just in case you decide to try your luck" -here he narrowed his gaze on Eatbugs, who turned his eyes away uncomfortably-"even if you're fast and tricky enough to get by me-which I doubt- you'll come to wish you'd died at my claws, I promise you. The Clawguard are not the worst who home in the Vastnir Mound."

Scratchnail turned to his fellows. "And you two. Remember, no one is to interfere-especially not the Toothguard. The prisoners stay with us until I say otherwise, understood? It had better be."

They all followed Scratchnail downward, and shortly rounded a bend in the tunnel to find themselves in a wide entranceway before the gate. Silhouetted at the end of the tunnel by a fitful blue-green light stood two massive Clawguard, silent and terrible, bigger even than Fritti's captors. On either side of the entrance they guarded, on small piles of raised earth, were skulls. One was of an enormous Growler, the eyesockets dark as sorrow. The other was the skull of a large horned beast. All four of these sentries looked down pitilessly on Tailchaser and his companions as they were led through.

As he passed beneath the arched tunnel mouth into the depths of Vastnir, Fritti felt a strange sensation. As he had in his catmint nightmare, he began to experience a burning feeling on his forehead. Whatever it might be, though, neither his friends nor the Clawguard took any notice of him.

Beyond the threshold was a vision that would stay with Tailchaser as long as he lived.

Before them sprawled a vast cavern, the roof as high above as the treetops of Rootwood. It was lit by the luminescent earth they had seen in the tunnel, and also by the faint blue glow of stones that protruded down through the ceiling rock. The phantom light rendered all in the cavern into spirits and vaulting shadows.

Below, on the cavern floor, countless cats moved back and forth like termites in rotten wood. Most of them appeared to be normal Folk, although their faces were so full of despair and pain that they seemed almost a different race. Among them moved the Clawguard, lumpish and huge, directing the streaming, insectlike hordes as they crept to and fro.

It's like some horrible dream ofFirsthome, Fritti thought.

The stench of fear and blood and unburied me'mre rose up on the hot air currents and filled his nostrils, choking him. With a snarl, Scratchnail herded them down to the cave floor, across the jutting rocks and warm, moist soil. They maneuvered among the lines of cats, brushing past Folk who did not even look up, but only plodded on toward whatever grim destination the ubiquitous Clawguard were leading them to.

As they passed one group Fritti saw a smallish cat, eyes and ribs bulging, who appeared to be sick. He coughed and staggered, then collapsed to the stones. Before Fritti could move to help him, a Clawguard shouldered his way past and bent over the sick one. Then the brute picked him up by the neck and shook him violently. Tailchaser could hear the sound of bones snapping; the Claw flung the broken body to the side with an impatient head-flip, and the line of cats moved on. Tailchaser stared after them, then over at the crumpled body lying unnoticed and unmourned in the dirt. His hatred flared, then settled into a low flame, banked deep inside himself. He, also, turned away.

As Scratchnail's procession reached the far side of the great cavern and was approaching the gaping maw of another tunnel, a thin, piercing voice called out: "Ssscratchnail!" The sound seemed to come from one of the innumerable caves in the rock wall before them. The chief halted the group as a dim shape appeared in the darkness of a cave mouth.

"What do you want of me?" Scratchnail snapped angrily. His voice held an odd intonation.

"Hissblood wants to sssee you, Sscratchnail," the thin voice said, sibilant and mocking. As the shape in the grotto spoke, Fritti could see the gleam of its teeth, but no reflected shine of its eyes.

"That's a laugh!" the chief snarled. "Why should I care anyway?"

In the dark grotto the teeth were bared again. "Hissblood wantss to know who your prissonerss are. There wasss to be no more taking of captivesss. That was the understanding, no?"

"My business is between the Fat One and myself, and there's no room for you crawlers to go sticking your hairless snouts into it. If Hissblood wants to have any dealings with me I'll be in the lower Catacombs later on." Scratchnail pivoted and walked away.

"He will meet you there," said the thin voice, and the sound of deathly merriment came from the shadowed cave.

Entering the huge tunnel in the cave wall, Long-tooth hissed at Scratchnail: "What do the Toothguard want with these, anyway?"

The chief turned on him with a growl. "You keep your muzzle shut!"

Longtooth asked no more questions, and they went some distance down the tunnel in silence. Scratchnail finally halted the group at a widening of the way. The chief pushed Eatbugs and Pouncequick roughly to one side, then turned to Bitefast.

"You and this dribbling me'mre," he barked, indicating Longtooth, "take these two down to the Middle Catacombs. They're not to go anywhere else until I say so. Me, no one else!" Bitefast nodded. "Good. I'm going to take the clever one here for a special audience. I think you-know-who will be interested in him. Now move!" With this he propelled Tailchaser up the tunnel, and the other Clawguard herded Fritti's companions off toward a side tunnel.

Tailchaser turned as he was pushed forward and called back over his shoulder: "I'll be back for you, Pounce, don't worry! Take care of him, Eatbugs!"

Scratchnail dealt him a stinging paw-blow to the side of the head that brought moisture to his eyes.

"Fool!" rasped the beast.

The winding way led farther down into the earth. The tunnel they traveled was strewn with rocks and bits of bone, and wet things that made Fritti wince when he stepped on them. He had to scrape against the dirt walls to avoid contact with the terrifying Claw chief.

Now the shaft pitched down steeply. The faint glow of the walls was interrupted by splashes of blue-and-purple light that seemed to be reflected from farther down the tunnel. Stepping along the sloping pathway, Tailchaser also noticed a change in the air-it was becoming much colder. Within twenty steps the chill had sharpened, and the ground underneath his pads seemed hard, perhaps frozen. With Scratchnail beside him, he ducked to pass beneath the low roof. When he raised his head again he found that they had passed into a great chamber- the Seat of Vastnir. They had come to the Cavern of the Pit… the heart of the mound.

The cavern was high-domed, the ceiling dark and distant. Around a central pit fissures in the ground spewed forth indigo light, stark beams glaring up through the mist of the cavern floor. The walls above were honeycombed with grottoes and tunnels, and everywhere dark shapes streamed in and out, bustling around the wide rim of the pit and climbing up the jagged stones to disappear into the holes above.

Fritti could see the plume of his breath in the icy air. Cold like this so far underground was terribly wrong-but what was not in this nightmare place?

Moving forward at Scratchnail's harsh insistence, he looked now to the pit, and the massive shape that rose from it, dominating the subterranean chamber. As he neared, wonder turned to horror.

Up from the dark mist-shrouded center of the pit rose a squirming mass, a heaving pile of small bodies that protruded above the edge of the huge hole in the cavern floor like a volcano rising in a deep canyon. The squirming mountain was a mass of animals- tortured, dying, many already dead. Cats and fla-fa'az, Squeakers, Praere, Growlers and Rikchikchik, the heap of writhing beasts gave forth a million ghost-faint sounds. Many of the creatures were maimed or dismembered; closer to the bottom, most were not even moving. The stench penetrated Tailchaser's nose, and he gagged. He slumped to the cold ground, the mist billowing up around him, hiding for a moment the terrible sight. Scratchnail leaned down and butted him with his wide, flat head.

"Step up, now, you simpering beetle. You're about to meet His Lordship."

Weak in the knees and stomach, Fritti was prodded and dragged forward to the edge of the pit. He wanted to close his eyes. Instead, repulsed yet fascinated, he stared out at the squirming mountain, at the thousands of blank eyes and mindlessly sagging mouths puffing little jets of vapor.

The Clawguard stepped up beside him. "Your Mightiness! Your humble servant has brought you something!" Scratchnail's voice grated and echoed from the towering walls.

"Oh. You have, have you…?" bubbled a grotesque, suety voice. "Throw it in with the rest… I'll eat it later." A gigantic, dark shape-heretofore invisible at the top of the pile of bodies-turned its head and opened vast, eggshell-white eyes. Blind eyes.

Tailchaser gave a bleat of fright and leaped backward against the stone-hard body of Scratchnail. Cowering between the Clawguard's legs, Fritti forgot for a moment even his fear and hatred of the chieftain-the thing atop the pit blew all else from his mind like a screeching wind.

It Has a cat. Twenty, fifty, a hundred times bigger than himsell. Tailchaser could not tell; its swollen body was so massive that its tiny legs could not reach past to lift it. It lay, bloated and supremely powerful, on the peak of the wriggling flesh-mound.

"No, Great One, it is not to eat… yet." Fritti heard Scratchnail's voice, distant, unimportant. "This is one of the ones you sensed, Great One. Do you remember?"

The hideous creature pivoted its neckless head until the blank, dead eyes were facing the shivering Tailchaser. The nostrils flared.

"Oh, yes…" said the voice slowly, a sound like mud splattering on stone. "We remember now. Did it have companions? Where are they?" The voice took a sharper tone.

"He had two, O Lord." Scratchnail sounded nervous. "A kitten, Lord, a little mewling kitten, and a crazed old torn, filthy as sun and flowers. But this one, this is the one you want. There's something to this one. I'm… I'm sure of it."

"Ahhh," burbled the giant, and rolled back slightly onto its side, as if to think. It poked its round head down toward the pile on which it lay, but could not overcome its own bulk. A look of annoyance creased the vast brow, and suddenly three Clawguard, who had been watching with dismay from the opposite edge of the pit, leaped down into the hole. They quickly plucked the struggling form of a cat out of the midst of the heap and scrambled up to the monster. As they clambered over his belly he opened his mouth complacently. The wriggling, yowling cat was dropped in. Crunching sounds were heard as the great cat began to chew, and a look of contentment crossed the blind face.

As Tailchaser looked on helplessly, the beast swallowed, then turned its attention back toward him once more.

"Now," it dripped, "let us see what kind of Folk threaten our designs." There was a shocking jolt. Tailchaser felt for a moment as if a huge mouth had picked him up and shaken him. Then came a fiery pain, and something bored into his mind. Digging, burrowing, it tore through his thoughts, knocking them asunder-it waded through hopes and dreams and ideas; it carelessly crushed notions as it passed. An invisible force held Tailchaser to the spot. He contorted and howled as the mind of the beast invaded him.

When it was over he lay stunned and quivering on the icy earth beside the pit. A stabbing pain ebbed and surged behind his forehead. Finally Scratchnail spoke. His voice sounded subdued.

"Well, Great Master?"

The shape above the pit yawned, showing blackened teeth. A brief flare of light empurpled the scabby gray fur.

"This little bug is nothing. There are suggestions, yes-hints-but no power to speak of. It can do nothing. You say its companions are harmless?"

"This was the only one with even a trace of anything different, Lord, I swear it."

"Well…" There was a bored finality now in the liquid heaviness of the creature's speech. "Take it away. Kill it, or put it to work digging tunnels-we do not care."

The Claw chieftain dragged Fritti to a standing position, then forced him toward a doorway out of the cavern.

"Clawguard!" called the bloated thing. Scratchnail whirled and bobbed subserviently.

"Yes, Master of All?"

"Next time, do not so lightly disturb the meditations of Lord Hearteater." The milky eyes glinted.

Bobbing and choking, Scratchnail hurried Tail-chaser out of the Cavern of the Pit.

Stumbling and stupefied, Tailchaser was driven through the labyrinthine corridors of Vastnir. His captor dogged his footsteps and did not speak. Although he felt spirit-broken, still Fritti's mind was awhirl with the thought of what he had seen.

Hearteater! Lord Hearteater of the Firstborn! Fritti had seen Grizraz Hearteater, the ancient enemy of the Folk. He had heard him speak! A fit of shivering wracked his weakened body as he thought of the huge, blind thing lolling in the cavern behind them.

He had to get word to Fencewalker and the others… somehow. The Court of Harar must know of the danger… whatever good it might do. How could they defend themselves against such power, such terrible minions? Hundreds of the fierce Clawguard were in the main caverns alone-there was no way of knowing how many more lurked in this insect nest of tunnels and caves.

How can I do anything anyway? he thought bitterly. I'm under sentence of death.

His mind turned finally to Scratchnail, whose hot breath even now feathered his tail. Tailchaser dimly recalled that Scratchnail had been somehow embarrassed before the terrifying Hearteater. Surely the Clawguard leader would not suffer Fritti to live after that?

Limping, pondering, Tailchaser felt a gust of dry air ruffle his face-fur. He looked up. Here the tunnel was dark, almost lightless. Fritti could faintly see forms moving toward them in the shaft ahead.

With startling swiftness, Scratchnail reached his hook-taloned paw forward and slammed Tailchaser against the side of the passageway. For a moment he had to strain to catch his breath. As he wheezed helplessly he heard a strange rustling, a creaking as of old tree limbs, and suddenly the tunnel was full of whispering shadows.

Several dark shapes passed by. Tailchaser could faintly see tails and ears, but all seemed shadowy and indistinct. The air was full of choking dust and a cloying, sweet smell. Beside him Scratchnail lowered his head respectfully and averted his gaze. A faint sibilance, as of dry, powdery speech, fluttered in the air; then the strange shapes had passed up the corridor.

As Fritti regained his breath Scratchnail stared up the passageway with burning eyes.

"The Boneguard," whispered the dark beast. "The Master's closest servants."

At the mouth of a cross-tunnel-indistinguishable by Fritti from the countless others they had passed- Scratchnail halted.

"I don't know what your secret is," he growled, heavy brows shadowing his eyes, "but I know there's something there. I will not make the mistake of taking you before the Fat One again without knowing what it is, but I will find out. The Master can make mistakes, and I believe you are one of them." The chief snorted angrily. "Whatever your little secret is, I will force it out of you. In the meantime, you can keep your miserable self occupied. Get in there." Scratchnail extended a malformed paw, indicating the hole near Tailchaser.

Screwing up his courage-apparently he was to live a little while longer!-Fritti asked: "Where are my friends?"

"Filling the bellies of the Toothguard, if I don't return soon. Keep your nose out. You'll have enough to worry about just saving your own wretched pelt. Now, move!" The chief gave Fritti a fierce shove that sent him stumbling into the opening behind him. He lost his footing on the inclined gravel surface and found himself skidding and tumbling down into deeper darkness. As he rolled to a halt he heard Scratchnail's voice scrape down to him: "I'll be back to see you soon enough, never fear." A coughing chuckle bounded down the shaft.

It took some moments for Tailchaser to accustom himself to the almost total absence of light. He was in a chamber of rock: he could see the dark forms of other cats huddled at the extremities of the chamber. The stone cavern walls sweated moisture, and the air was hot and damp.

Scores of emaciated, dead-eyed Folk lay about him. Most, sunk deep in misery, did not even look up at the new arrival. As Tailchaser slunk along the wall- hunting for another exit, or a place to lie down- some of the cats snarled weakly up at him, as if he were intruding on their territory, but it was a perfunctory sort of resistance. The thought of the Folk crammed into this tiny space, forced to live next to and on top of each other in sweltering heat, brought anger to Tailchaser's spirit once more.

As he stepped across the sprawled bodies, Fritti was halted by the tones of a familiar voice. He scanned the faces and shapes of those around him, but saw no one he recognized. Neither could he summon a name to match the memory. He was about to continue across the cavern when his gaze touched on the cat who lay at his feet.

This one was shrunken, thin as a ferret. His sunken, bleary eyes stared hopelessly up at Fritti. It was this mumbling apparition whose voice had stopped him, and now Tailchaser sucked in a deep breath of surprise as recognition swept him: it was young Jumptall, one of the delegates from the Meeting Wall Clan to the Court. He looked on the verge of death!

"Jumptall!" said Fritti. "It's me, Tailchaser! Do you remember me?" For a moment Jumptall looked on uncomprehendingly; then his eyes slowly focused.

"Tailchaser?" he mumbled. "Tailchaser from… home?" Fritti bobbed his head encouragingly. "Oh." Jumptall closed his eyes, weakened, and was silent for a moment. When he opened them a spark of comprehension was there.

"I don't understand," he said. "But… luckier if you'd died…"

Jumptall's eyes closed again; he refused to say any more.

Roofshadow crouched in the shelter of an overhanging rock, watching the flurrying snow. The chill air made her feel dizzy. She wanted desperately to get up; to run and keep running until she was out of this horrible forest-far away from the terrible, throbbing mound that was the source of all distress.

When they had been attacked by night, given only scant warning by the appearance of the crazed woolly cat, she had run with her friends-had run wildly. For all her seasons of hunting, she had been panicked, frenzied. At one point she had almost knocked down little Pouncequick in her overwhelming desire to escape. The shame of that still hurt her more than her wounds.

As they ran, something had seized her, knocking her from her paws-she had grappled with something large, but by scratching and twisting had managed to pull free. Bolting into the deep brush, she had lain hidden for some time, hearing the sound of flight and pursuit carrying on into the night. Not until the first rays of Spreading Light had she forced herself to crawl forth and look for a hiding place out of the cold.

She had been hurt by the thing that had grabbed her: her hind leg was very painful-she could not put her full weight on it, and had limped a long way over frosty ground before locating the windbreak. She had lain for two full nights and days, sick, feverish, too weak to go hunting.

Her companions were gone-captured, probably, or killed-and at this moment all she wanted to do was go far away: to disappear into the southern forests and never think of this terrible place ever again. But at the moment she could go nowhere. Her instincts told her to stay put. She needed to heal.

The thought of Tailchaser and Pouncequick had stirred her for a moment, and she lifted her head and scented the air. Then a shooting pain contorted her face, and she laid her chin back down on the cold earth and pulled her tail over her nose and eyes.

Deep underground, in the mazes of Vastnir, Fritti Tailchaser was learning a few of the secrets of the mound. Jumptall, his acquaintance from nesting days, was too weak to talk much, but with the help of a young cat named Pawgrip he had been able to explain some puzzling things to Fritti.

"… You see, the Clawguard are mostly just the bullyboys. They're fierce enough, Harar knows," said Pawgrip with a grimace, "but they don't make any decisions. Even their chiefs don't make many, I don't suppose."

"What do you mean?" asked Tailchaser.

"They can't even hunt unless someone tells them to. Whiskers! No one even makes me'mre in this ghastly ant heap unless somebody gives him permission."

"And you say that there are others? Other creatures?" Fritti thought of the shadowy Boneguard and shook himself nervously.

"Hissblood and his Toothguard," whispered Jump-tall in a quavering voice. He coughed.

"They're bad, sure enough," assented Pawgrip. "They're even uglier-and more wrong, if you know what I mean-than the Claws. They just seem to skulk around and keep everybody behaving. Even most of the Clawguard seem scared of them."

Tailchaser was puzzled. "But where do they all come from? I've never seen or heard of any Folk like them."

Jumptall shook his head, and Pawgrip answered. "No one has. No one knows. But you-know-who…" Here the little cat lowered his voice and looked around. "You-know-who can do all kinds of things. Mate Folk and Growlers? Worse things than that have happened down here…" Pawgrip trailed off significantly. Unnerved by the reference to Hearteater, whose presence still loomed huge and frightening in his memory, Fritti got up and stretched. He walked to the entrance of their cell and looked up the shaft.

"But why the digging?" he wondered aloud. Behind him Jumptall raised himself up on his forepaws and swayed weakly.

"Cats weren't meant to dig," he said with surprising strength. "Killed Earpoint. Killed Streamhopper." Jumptall shook his head sadly.

He looks more ancient than old Smfflick, thought Fritti. How did it happen? He is scarcely older than I am.

"Always digging they are… or rather, we are," said Pawgrip. "Should think they'd have enough nasty tunnels by now."

"Then why?" persisted Tailchaser.

"I don't know," admitted Pawgrip, "but if they keep digging like they have been, soon all the tunnels will come together. The whole world will fall into their holes."

"Killed Streamhopper…" muttered Jumptall sadly, "killing me…"