Chapter #4Cat person by: Yote   An animal in human lands can be one of three things: it can be useful, it can be tasty or it can be vermin. Vermin is as good as dead in the long run. You don't want to be vermin and aside from a few strange looks from the Hashaan that suggest otherwise, you don't think you're very tasty either, so you quickly found it necessary to become useful.
Employment options for "subhumans" are limited. The guilds are effectively barred to you as none would ever wish to be associated with your kind, while owning your business is out of the question, after all your our status is that of property, and property does not own property. There is always manual labour for those derived from robust stock - the dogmen or the minotaurs - but your feline form was never built for breaking rocks or plowing fields.
A lucky few, prized for their rarity or exceptional beauty, find their way into households as pets and their lives are blessed, but that is a pedigree you could never hope to attain. You are a street cat, and two years in the gutter has only made that more plain to see by the ragged look of your ears and matted fur. This form was undeniably appealing - a fact you were forced to accept each miserable day - but too much in the way of a tavern wench, too sexualised for the refined, sensitive tastes of the nobility.
To survive in human lands, it was a sad fact that most female animals took to a form of prostitution grim ever by the standards of that profession. Their clients were the lowest of the low - stinking, piss-soaked tramps, orcs or those with more money but more deranged appetites. Most experienced the short lifespans expected of animals, to the point where the common knowledge was that beastmen had naturally brief lives. You had been six months a street cat before you learned that this was false - you were doomed to this existence for the remainder of a full human life. You'd almost cried.
Unlike natural-born halfbreeds, you still have pride. Unwilling to stoop to prostitution, you'd found yourself in the only career path left for one with a body like yours. Mouser.
In the basement of the Boastful Bard, you are crouched atop a barrel, your rat mallet in your paws as your bright green eyes peer through the darkness. Rows of ale casks disappear into blackness too thick even for your animal eyes to penetrate.
Four tails already hang from your belt. A trickle of gore runs from the business end of the mallet, down over your paws, and you wipe them clean on the matted, tortoiseshell fur of your calf. It's not easy sitting still for so long. The fleas infesting your coat itch like crazy today.
You've had a shower a few times in the two years since your humanity and manhood were take away, whenever it rained, and a bath once when somebody pushed you in a river. You resist the instinct to lick yourself clean on a daily basis. You figure it is best to be as physically repulsive as possible. Less chance of somebody trying to put kittens in you.
"I wish I was tasty," you mutter to the empty basement. Pigmen waddle through the streets behind their masters, fat and healthy and happy, while a good milk-giving heifer is highly prized.
A rat skulks out from the shadows between two casks, sniffs the air and scuttles to the lump of cheese set out on the basement floor. Your already expansive eyes widen, the fur rising all along your spine. The rat is the size of a small dog.
You leap, the mallet striking a heavy blow on the skull. It shrieks. Its teeth sink deep into the thick wooden shaft as you swing again, nearly snapping it in half. Had that been your arm...
Not giving it time for another bite, you let go of the mallet, claws springing from their sheaths, slashing at the creature's eyes. Its own claws rake along your chest. Acting on instinct, you sink your teeth into its neck, blood pouring out as you puncture skin and veins, and with a powerful thrash of your body you fling the thing against the floor. The already shattered skull caves in completely. It twitches and dies.
Gasping for breath, you survey the damage. Scratches cover your chest. A lot of blood but most of it is the rat's. You draw your knife and reach down to retrieve your prize - the thick, pink, snakelike tail that winds its way into the shadows between the casks.
Something is moving there, writhing and rustling. The dead rat is dragged inches over the floor. With a hiss of outrage, you grab the tail and pull back. This is yours, you fought for it.
As the tail is pulled into the weak candlelight, you see a lump on the end, a ball of encrusted filth and dry blood into which four more massive tails are knotted. A Rat King. Dropping the carcass, you back away as the four conjoined rats step into view. With a single mind, they lunge. The weight of their dead brother is the only thing that saves you, slowing them down as they drag it across the floor. You sprint across the cellar with them snapping at your bare heels, leap and land atop a high casket.
Pressing your back against the wall, you push against the barrel with all your strength. Ever so slowly it rolls, falls, hits the Rat King with an almighty bang and four death screams.
"WHAT IN THE BLAZES OF HELL IS GOING ON DOWN HERE!" The basement door is thrown open, the barkeep silhouetted against the light of the inn. You climb down from the shelf, sever the bundle of tails from its bodies and climb shakily up the stairs. As you step into the bright warmth, he stares at the blood and gags. "Did you get them?"
You spit out a glob of blood and growl, "When you said you had a big rat problem, what you really meant to say is you have a Giant Rat problem, wasn't it?"
The corner of his mouth flickers up. "Well yeah, that's what I said. Big rat problems. Aint my problem if you don't listen right."
"I could have been killed."
"Like I said, that aint my problem."
You push the grisly bundle into his hands. "I want my reward. A room for a week and food."
"Oh no. You promised me twenty tails," he replies indignantly. "This counts as one. Get back down there and make sure the job is done."
You find yourself shaking. "I don't deserve this... I was a human once-"
"And I'm the Prince of Tryzantium."
"I had rights!"
"Well now you got rats. Or rather, you don't got enough. So you get more. Or you don't get paid."
Another failed job. If you don't find work soon you'll starve. You turn and push through the patrons huddled in the warm inn who gawp at you as you pass.
"Filthy animal! Getting blood all over my floor. My wife'll use your hide fer a dishrag! Don't walk away from me when I'm talking to you. We had a deal. I want my twenty tails." Your tail is seized tightly in the innkeeper's hand. He is trying to drag you back to the cellar door. Either that or he's trying to pull your tail off. You dig your claws into the floorboards.
"The agreement was for twenty rat tails," you howl. "You're not paying me enough for Giant Rat Kings."
A hush passes through the inn. The innkeeper let go. You turn to see him casting nervous glances around as the low murmur of gossip begins to build. His customer are suddenly edgy, glancing for the door.
His huge hands grab you, muffling your mouth and dragging you back into the kitchen. "Keep your mouth shut," he hisses. "No more talk of Rat Kings. I'll pay you more, just clear out the damn cellar. I'll give you board for a month. Fresh straw every week."
There was that pride again. "No deal."
"If people find out I've got a Rat King downstairs, I'll lose all my business."
"Like you said... that isn't my problem."
As you turn to leave, he seized your arm. "Three months and ten gold pieces. These creatures, they're ill omens. Unnatural." He lowers his voice to a hush. "People say they herald the presence of... demons."
It is as though a weight has been lifted from your shoulders. He frowns as you smile wildly and shake his hand enthusiastically. Finally, a lead!   indicates the next chapter needs to be written. |
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