The Aristokittens #1 (Volume 1)

Toulouse, Berlioz, and Marie all shared a cozy cat bed in the corner of Madame’s room. It had supersoft blankets, silk pillows, and a curtain canopy. When the kittens didn’t want to go to sleep, they stayed up and pretended their bed was a fort.

Not that night, though. Toulouse couldn’t stop yawning, which made Berlioz yawn. Then those double yawns made Marie yawn, too.

“My darlings, you must be so tired from your adventure today,” Duchess purred at them. She picked up Toulouse by the scruff of his neck and placed him gently under the covers.

“I’ve always wondered what happened to the Creature Café,” O’Malley said as he nudged Berlioz with his nose until Berlioz crawled into his sleeping spot between Toulouse and Marie. “I ate there once, but it was too fancy for me. Not exactly my scene, you know? But plenty of my cat compadres liked to go for the sardine soup.”

Marie snuggled in and sighed. “I really wish I could have seen it.”

Duchess used her teeth to pull a blanket up to her kittens’ chins. “Good night, darlings. May you all have sweet-cream dreams.”

Duchess leaned over and kissed each kitten on the forehead. O’Malley gave them his most charming wink, and they winked back. Then the two big cats walked out of the room, leaving the door open a crack, because Berlioz was afraid of the dark.

Duchess was right: all three kittens really were exhausted. It took just a few moments for them to fall fast asleep, purring—and, in Toulouse’s case, snoring.

Marie’s whiskers twitched as she started to dream. In her dream, the Creature Café was not a dusty, abandoned space but a busy cake and pastry shop—in France, they call this a pâtisserie—filled with many animal friends. There was Roquefort, the mouse, eating a slice of maple nut cheesecake. Somehow, Madame’s horse, Frou Frou, was sitting at a table in the corner, wearing her flowered hat and declaring, “Neeeeigh! These are the best carrot apple cookies I’ve ever tasted!”

The dream version of Marie was in charge of the kitchen. She wore a chef’s hat as she kneaded dough into kitty croissants like the ones her friend Louis made.

“Coming right up!” she murmured in her sleep.

On the opposite side of the bed, Toulouse was having his own amazing dream. The old restaurant had become an art gallery. Paintings created by Toulouse and other neighborhood creatures covered the bright white walls. Animals of all types wandered through the gallery, oohing and aahing over the art.

In between Toulouse and Marie, Berlioz started flicking his tail in his sleep. Thwack-thwack-thwack. The tapping made the beat to a song he played in his own dream, where he’d turned the café into a jazz club. His paws danced up and down the piano as cats from Alley Cat Parlor played their instruments along with him. Berlioz started singing.

Everyone in Berlioz’s dream clapped and danced to his song. He was the jazz club’s star, and a crowd of animals had gathered to see him perform. He raised his voice louder….

The problem was, he wasn’t just singing in his dream. He was singing in the real world, too. Toulouse jolted awake to the sound of Berlioz’s musical stylings.

“Awww, man,” Toulouse grumbled. “You and your sleep-yowling. I was in the middle of the best dream ever.”

He flicked a paw at his brother’s head. Berlioz’s eyes popped open.

“Me too,” Berlioz grumbled as he sat up. “In my dream, I turned the old café into an awesome jazz club.”

“A jazz club?” Toulouse echoed. “That’s ridiculous. It’s perfect for art, not music.”

“But I need a place to perform!” Berlioz said, poking Toulouse.

“And I need somewhere to show my art!” Toulouse elbowed Berlioz.

Berlioz jumped on his brother.

“Music!” he growled as they started to wrestle, tumbling their way across the little bed.

“Art!” Toulouse growled back.

“No, music!”

“No, art!”

Toulouse tried to leap onto Berlioz but missed, landing on a still-snoozing Marie.

“Owwww!” she cried, opening her eyes. “What’s happening?”

“Berlioz thinks the old café should be a silly jazz club,” Toulouse told her.

“A jazz club would be better than a boring old art gallery,” Berlioz said, rolling his eyes.

Marie stood up and huffed. “Stop! Both of you. Stop it right now. It’s the middle of the night.”

“Sorry…” the brothers mumbled.

“You should be,” Marie said. “Especially because that old café should be turned into a new café. One where I’m the chef!”

Toulouse scrunched up his nose. “Eh. My idea’s better.”

“And mine is best of all,” Berlioz added.

“You know there’s only one way to settle this,” Toulouse said, raising his eyebrows mischievously.

“Oh, no,” Marie said with a sigh. “Not another Grand Staircase Race.”

“First one to reach the bottom has the best idea. Ready? Set? Go!”

Before Marie could protest, Toulouse bounced out of bed, followed quickly by his brother. She leapt like lightning after them as all three scrambled through the open bedroom door toward the house’s grand staircase. When they started to turn into the hallway, Berlioz caught up to Toulouse, grabbing at his tail to try to slow him down.

Toulouse let out a “Mrrrrrow!” and jumped out of reach, turning around for a second to stick out his tongue at Berlioz. But he caught one claw on the rug and tripped over his own four feet.

Berlioz skidded to a stop. “Are you all right?” he asked his brother.

“I think so,” Toulouse said, rubbing his face with one paw.

“See you guys later!” Marie shouted gleefully as she sped past them, around a corner, and toward the staircase.

“Come on,” Berlioz said, pulling at Toulouse’s blue bow collar with his teeth. “We can still catch her.”

The brothers took off running again, their paws pitter-pattering. Berlioz reached the staircase first, but Marie was already halfway down.

“I can go faster than that,” Berlioz said, and started hopping from step to step.

“That’s fast,” Toulouse called after him, “but taking stairs one at a time is for beginners!” Then Toulouse launched himself off the top of the staircase, flying over the first two steps and landing…right on Berlioz.

“Mrrrrroooow!” Berlioz squealed, toppling over. The two of them rolled down several steps and right into Marie, who had almost reached the bottom of the staircase.

Marie let out a startled “Mee-oh!” as all three kittens became one big ball of fur, tumbling down the final steps and onto the floor…toward a table holding a fancy china vase.

BUMP. They barreled right into one of the table legs. The china vase began to topple as the kittens broke apart and all shouted, “First!” at the same time.

The vase started falling. Berlioz, Marie, and Toulouse looked up in horror as they watched it sail through the air and…

In the blink of an eye, O’Malley jumped up, caught the vase with both paws, and landed on his back.

THUD.

The vase was safely hugged to Thomas’s chest instead of shattered into a thousand pieces.

Duchess appeared and walked over to him. “Thomas, that was truly heroic! Are you all right?”

“Just dandy,” O’Malley said. He sat up and carefully placed the vase next to him.

Duchess turned to her kittens and started thumping her tail hard against the floor. “Who is going to tell me why you’re out of bed, chasing one another around in the dead of night, and almost breaking Madame’s favorite vase?”

Toulouse stepped forward. “We had a good reason, I swear. It all started when each of us had a different dream about the old café.”

Marie joined her brother. “I imagined it as a pâtisserie, Toulouse thinks it should be an art gallery, and Berlioz wants to make it his jazz club.”

“So we tried to settle it with a race,” Berlioz added. “Sorry, Mama. We’ve just been really bored. We want to do something new and fun.”

Duchess took a long look at her kittens. Then her blue eyes twinkled and she smiled. “You need another adventure, don’t you?”

The kittens all nodded.

“My darlings,” Duchess continued, “I know how you love to create and share what you create with others. I adore that about all three of you. But you each have something that’s more important.”

“Beautiful collars?” Marie asked.

“Sparkly toys?” Toulouse suggested.

“Sparkly toys with bells inside?” Berlioz guessed.

“You have one another,” Duchess said.

Marie looked at Toulouse. Toulouse looked at Berlioz. Berlioz looked at a bug that had just started crawling up the wall.

“You are a team,” Duchess said. “So think as a team. Ask yourselves, How can our ideas work together?”

The kittens were quiet for a moment.

“Well,” Marie began, “my pâtisserie would feel much cozier with art on the walls….” She turned to Toulouse.

Toulouse’s face lit up. “And great food and beautiful art go really well with…”

“Some hot jazz!” Berlioz exclaimed.

“A new café could have all three!” Marie declared.

“Now that is one lovely idea,” Duchess said. “And you didn’t need to shout and chase each other to decide on it, did you? Now, back to bed with you all. In the morning, you can figure out—quietly—what to do next.”

The kittens glanced at one another. They already knew what to do next: they had to ask Pierre’s permission to transform the old café. Hopefully, he’d say yes!