Tales From High Hallack, Volume 2 Read online

  “HE won’t come so easy, milady,” Jennie observed.

  “Probably not, Jennie. But what do they say tempts Hob’s famous appetite? Cream, is it not? And surely something quite out of the ordinary to be added on this occasion. Hmmm—”

  She looked about as if waiting for a suggestion.

  Jennie had gone to fetch the cream. The only other object on the table was a covered bowl. Thragun sniffed that—spices—Great-Aunt Amelie took the cover off.

  “Why, it is a Christmas pudding! I thought that Mrs. Cobb had not yet begun to make such! And this one has been steamed ready for the table, though it is cold.” Lady Ashley pulled the bowl closer.

  “Oh, milady.” Jennie was back with another bowl, the contents of which made Thragun’s whiskers twitch a fraction. Certainly its contents were more to be desired than this Christmas pudding. “That was sent up from th’ village just this evenin’. Thomas brought it in on th’ cart from Windall. Cook, she an’ Miss Davis over at th’ Jolly Boy has been for years now a-talkin’ ‘bout which Christmas pudding be the best—them with brandy or them with rum. So this year Miss Davis up an’ sent one of hers over for to give us a taste like.”

  “Bring a plate, Jennie.” Great Aunt sat up straighter. “And then turn the pudding out. We’ll just see if Hob has a taste for a seasonal dainty.”

  So the table was set, the bowl of cream, the pudding on a plate. Under Lady Ashley’s direction, the bits of rowan were placed around three sides of the offering allowing only the fourth to be open.

  “Now we shall have to leave it to Hob. He has no desire to be seen, or so I was always told. Come—”

  With Emmy before her with the lamp and Jennie still holding the toasting fork at ready to help her, Lady Ashley went slowly out. They had left Jennie’s lantern sitting on the ledge of the cupboard shelf and Thragun remained where he was, on the table well away from the rowan.

  With slitted eyes he looked to the fireplace. There had been more noise from the forepart of the house, not muffled by the length of passages and rooms in between. He thought that Hob was still busy at his destruction and that he was doing more than ever to cause all the damage he could as he went.

  But after the others had left there was silence. What new mischief was the Khon about?

  Out of the fireplace sped a shadow, and Thragun subdued the hiss he had almost voiced. He did not know how the preparations Lady Ashley had made would act. But he sat up on his haunches and with his forepaws made signs in the air, following as best he could his memories of what was done to discourage a Khon in his old home.

  It was Hob in form who squatted on the table top, grabbed the bowl of cream in both hands and held it high, drinking its contents in a single slurping gulp. Then he swung about to look at the pudding.

  There was a crinkling of Hob’s wrinkled face as if he were in pain and his two claw hands at the end of spider-thin arms patted his protruding belly which looked as if he had already swallowed the bowl along with what it held.

  Thragun did not hesitate:

  “You are Hob, the thewada of this house—”

  Hob’s head was cocked to one side as if he did hear and understand, but his eyes were all for the pudding.

  “Hob’s Hole—Hob’s own

  From the roasting to the bone.

  Them as sees, shall not look,

  Them as blind, they shall be shook.

  Sweep it up and stamp it down—

  Hob shall clear it all around.

  So Mote this be!”

  Hob’s one hand went out to the pudding, though his other still rubbed his middle as if to subdue some pain there.

  “Hob’s Hole alone—Hob shall hold it!”

  Thragun snapped at a piece of the rowan in spite of the fact that it scratched his lips. With a jerk of his head as if he were disposing of a rat, he tossed that.

  Hob threw up an arm but, by fortune, the rowan sped true, striking against that round ball of a stomach. Nor did it fall away.

  With a screech Hob leaped up. One big foot touched rowan and he screeched again. Then he began to shake as if some giant hand had caught him and was determined to subdue all struggles.

  Hob’s mouth opened to the full extent as if half his jaw had become unhinged. Out from between his small fangs of teeth came a puff of sickly yellow as if somewhere within him there burned a fire and this was smoke. His head, flying back and forth from the violence of that shaking, sent a second puff and both struck full upon the top of the pudding.

  Now that shivered and rocked. Thragun, not knowing just why he did it, threw a second sprig of rowan and that touched, not Hob, but the pudding.

  There was a howl of dismay and defeat. Hob was loosed from the shaking, to crouch on the table. The pudding was gone. A shimmer of the yellow Hob had been made to disgorge hid it completely. That faded, seeming to sink into the ball of dried fruit and flour.

  Hob, his head now in his hands, rocked back and forth. But Thragun pressed closer with a third sprig of rowan which he laid on the top of that ball. Only what stood there now was a teapot—a fine brown teapot, its lid crowned by a sprig of rowan also frozen in time and place.

  The cat gave it two long sniffs. He could smell none of the evil that other pot had cloaked itself in. It must be true that the magic of this land was indeed more than even a Khon could fight.

  Hob straightened, rubbed his stomach, and there was no longer any sign of pain on his withered face. With a swift bound he reached the fireplace and was gone into his own hidden ways again.

  Thragun regarded the teapot critically. It was certainly far more innocent looking than it had been in its other existence, and by what all his senses told him its evil will was firmly and eternally confined. He yawned, feeling all the fatigue of the night, and jumped from the table.

  The lantern flickered and went out. But the pudding pot remained to mystify Mrs. Cobb later that morning and many mornings to come.

  Noble Warrior Meets with a Ghost

  Catfantastic III (1994) DAW

  Such a noise! Even ten temples’ worth of rattle swinging, horn blowing priests at the heights of celebration could not drown out—this! And the smells! Thragun Neklop lifted a fastidious lip enough to show a very sharp fang. This was like the Ninth Hell itself and no proper place for the well conducted, feline or even human. He felt cross-eyed from watching through the narrow slit in his bamboo riding case, yet he dared not let down his guard.

  The roar of a dragon sweeping on its helpless prey made him almost cower, but he was Noble Warrior, Princess’ own guard. Dragon or no dragon, he faced danger directly and with both blue eyes wide open. The dragon crawled along one side of this infernal place and its side scales opened so that those it had previously devoured were issuing forth apparently unharmed. Would the wonders of this barbarian territory never cease?

  Now another crowd was sweeping into those dragon scale doors. And Emmy, his own Princess Emmy, was hurrying along toward this unknown fate. Noble Warrior gave tongue in no uncertain yowl. He saw Emmy’s head turn in his direction, but then her father swung her up and into the dragon and—

  Noble Warrior’s traveling cage swung aloft. He had been picked up. And the scent of this newcomer was unpleasantly familiar though he could not see more than a looming shadow. Emmy—he must be transported to join Emmy. Only that did not happen. The carrying cage rocked as its bearer picked up speed. Not toward the dragon but away from it. They burst out of the noise and confusion of the station into the open. But not the open Noble Warrior knew. There was the smell of horses, that was familiar, but there were other smells, nearly as bad as some in the poor villages at home. And the noise continued.

  Noble Warrior threw himself against the front of the cage. He tried to slip one brown paw into the crack about the door, to free himself. But he did not have a chance. The cage was whirled up into the air and came down with a slam which brought another yowl out of him. The cage rocked with the floor under it and Noble Warrior was sure he had
been loaded into one of those wagons such as Emmy often traveled in, sometimes taking Noble Warrior, who knew his place and sat statue still by her side while she pointed out various points of interest.

  There was still that familiar scent. He could only think of the stable yard at home as the carrier rocked from a kick. Noble Warrior crouched belly to the floor to consider his present plight. He did not believe in the least that Emmy had abandoned him to this fate—whatever it might be. But Emmy was fast in the dragon and he was left to do battle on his own.

  Alerting all his senses he tested as well as he could what might lie beyond the walls of the carrier. He could smell horse very strong. And there was also the smell of unwashed human—a human who drank the fire spirit—that groom the Captain had ordered off his land! There were other smells also. And all the while, the noise ebbed, roared, and ebbed.

  The wagon came to a halt and there was a beam of light. Once more, Noble Warrior’s carrier was swung out into the open and he caught a fleeting glimpse of a soot-stained brick wall and the iron pickets of a fence. Then he was again in drab shadow as the carrier thumped to the floor.

  “Here y’be, guvener. Right one an’ all.”

  “So.”

  Noble Warrior’s head swung around. He could not see through the weaving of the bamboo, but the fur along his back ridged and his ears flattened to his skull. But he made no sound—no guardian warned before attack, that was not the way.

  Only there was evil here—just as he had sensed it at other times and in other places. Khon? Demon dweller in the shadows? Or more?

  He had no time to speculate. Once more his carrier was swept up and off, to be placed on a flat surface again. Now it was surrounded by smells which made him sneeze and shake his head. There came a fumbling with the catch and the doorway to his temporary prison swung open. Noble Warrior made no effort to leave his conveyance. Make sure, instinct warned. Who knew who or what awaited him.

  “Here, puss—puss—”

  A large hand appeared in his range of sight. The skin was discolored in places almost as if it had been burnt, and on the forefinger was a large ring, the setting of which was the red of a half awakened coal.

  Noble Warrior hissed a warning as that ill-omened hand approached. He readied his own paw for a good raking slash.

  The hand remained where it was for a long moment and then a second joined it. In the hand was a round ball. There was a sudden squeeze and from the ball issued a puff which caught Noble Warrior straight in the face. He coughed, uttered the beginning of a howl, and subsided to the cushion beneath him.

  The hand with the ring reached in to catch him by the scruff of the neck and dragged him out to dangle helplessly in the air while the owner of the hand surveyed his captive. Helpless Noble Warrior was—he could not even summon a growl.

  “Soooooo—” The large head opposite him nodded. “Indeed—even as Jasper said—”

  The hand loosened its grip and Noble Warrior fell, landing on a table top not far from his carrier. He tried to command his body, to leap for that refuge. But he was as helpless as if he were entangled in a bird hunter’s net.

  “We shall be friends—”

  Noble Warrior managed the weak beginning of a snarl. What he saw was dark, shadowed. It was even as the Great Old Ones of his own kind said; evildoers were always dark shadowed. This one resembled nothing so much as one of the carven Khons set up in warning.

  His shoulders were hunched and his head, which looked too large for his body, might not sprout the fangs of a Khon to be sure, but his teeth were yellow and he showed a nasty snaggle of them as he grinned. Pallid, grayish skin was half concealed on a retreating chin by a straggle of fuzzy beard. But the spreading dome of his head was bare save for more fuzz over large ears which showed distinct points. He wore a loose coat or jacket which might have once been white but was now begrimed and stained into a twilight gray. His eyes had retreated into dark caverns under an untidy thatching of brow, but they held a bright glint which Noble Warrior caught. Maybe not a Khon—but certainly one who had willingly chosen the Dark Path.

  “We shall be friends—you shall see—” The great head nodded. “Until we are, there shall be precautions taken.”

  Again the hand swooped and the helpless cat dangled in the air as the man shuffled across the dark room and pushed his captive into a cage, snapping the door behind him with a click, and turning his back as if he had fairly settled the matter.

  Noble Warrior lay where he had fallen. There was a stench in this cage, and with it came the dregs of far off fear and pain. He snarled and tried to move. Whatever spell the Khon master had put upon him seemed to be lessening. Now he pulled himself up and sat as one of the Old Blood should.

  The light of the room was dim. There were several windows, but they were barred and set very high on the wall, so covered with dust and the webs of long dead spiders that they might have been securely curtained. Over the table where his carrier still stood, there hung a lamp and there were candles posted here and there—a whole line of them on an old desk at one side where there was a pile of age-eaten books. His captor had settled down in a sway-backed chair next to that desk and had one of the books open now, impatiently switching candlesticks around for a better reading light.

  There were a number of cabinets lined up under the windows at one wall, the doors of several hung open to show rows of bottles and jars of strange things Noble Warrior could not guess the use for. At the darker end of the room was a single door. That was flanked by two tables which bore—cages! Cages such as the one in which he found himself.

  There were other captives—his cat sight was not defeated by the gloom. In one were rats—but such rats—their fur was white or else unwholesomely mottled in color and they scuttled about aimlessly. In the next—

  Noble Warrior stiffened. There was no mistaking the scent, overpowered as it might be by the smells of this place, but there was a cat. Not one of his own regal breed, of course, but still another cat. Though its fur was matted and it seemed so lost in despair that it made no effort to cleanse itself, he could see now that it was a female, and had fur unusually long and black.

  She was half curled against the bars of her prison, her eyes closed, her position crying out hopelessness and fear.

  There came a buzzing sound and the man by the desk shook his head impatiently. “Time—never any time. Devil take Henry—” Leaving his book open, he got rustily to his feet and shuffled to the far door.

  As he approached the cages flanking the door, the other cat’s head came up a little. Noble Warrior saw its mouth open but without sound. The man brushed by it, paying no attention, while the rats scrambled in a wild dance around their prison.

  When the door closed behind their jailor, Noble Warrior raised his voice:

  “I am Thragun Neklop of the Royal Guard. Who are you and where is this place? What does this evil one want of us?”

  The black cat raised its head and opened golden eyes.

  “This is a place of pain, and hunger, and we are forgotten. I was—” the black cat shook its head slowly, “I cannot remember. What I am—what you will be—is one to suffer, suffer as he wills it. And will it he will!”

  “I do not understand.”

  “Oh, you will, my fine would-be fighter, you will—as have the others before you. And probably not to any productive purpose.”

  Shadow detached itself from shadow, leaped to the same table as supported Noble Warrior’s cage, to become substance. Another cat—the largest he had ever seen—this one also black, its ears ragged from ancient battles, its eyes bearing strange red sparks within their greenness.

  The newcomer took a couple of strutting steps and then settled down, sitting upright, its tail end wrapped composedly over its forepaws. It looked Noble Warrior over, and the open contempt in that survey brought a snarl to the prisoner’s lips, a flattening of ears in warning.

  “You are a strange one,” the black cat observed. “Yes, I can see why old M
arcus was ready to pay a full guinea for you. Supposed to come from foreign parts if I heard their talk right. Maybe this time he will be able to do it—I’ve heard tell that in foreign parts they have other learning.”

  “Do what?” demanded Noble Warrior.

  “Make a familiar out of you. Old Marcus, he’s cracked in the noggin as Henry says. This place,” with a slight sweep of his head, the cat indicated what lay about them, “is an old hidy-hole where those before Marcus thought to speak with the Devil and gather black power. Some of them—” the black cat paused, “some of them in the past had the Old Learning—but always on the dark side. There was Sir Justin Clayman—yes, and that Parson turned wizard—Master Loomis. They did things such as would make old Marcus’ eyes pop right out of his skull. He tries, but he’s far from learning even the first of the lessons. That’s why he’s trying other ways now, why he wants a familiar. He heard tell of the Princess first—” The cat inclined his head toward the captive on the other side of the room.

  “She’s a foreigner, too—comes ‘cross seas from the Far East. But she’s no magic maker and he can’t turn her into one. So when he heard tell of another cat as seemed to bring luck to people—well, he made up his mind to gather you in and see if he would fare any better with his plans.”

  “What about you?” Noble Warrior had followed this garbled account as best he could, translating it into what he knew of old. One who would work with Khons needed an animal as some kind of a helper. Yes, he had heard of the priests of Kali and the serpents they were said to send to gather the souls of those who opposed them.

  “Now wouldn’t he just like that.” The black cat opened his mouth in an unmistakable yawn. “Oh, I could be what he wants right enough. But I’ve served my time as the saying goes. Sir Justin, he was a right pleasant one to work with. Parson Loomis now, I’ll not say the same for that one. No, old Marcus can’t get his bonds on me—seeing as how I’m living in another time these days.”