Puss In Boots Part 3

3
A Different Life



“You can stay with us as long as you like,” Mykal told Thomas. The sixteen year old orphan looked at his despairingly.

“Thanks to father, that may be a long time indeed,” Thomas grumbled.

“That’s not fair!” Mykal began. Thomas looked at him evenly. The two brothers stared at each other for a silent moment. “There must have been some reason.” Mykal finished rather lamely.

“Why don’t I just ask him,” Thomas sneered bitterly. He was undressing, wanting desperately to be rid of the funeral clothes that he wore. He almost couldn’t believe that this wasn’t a dream. He wished that it was. Several times on the way back home with Mykal he had pinched himself to make sure that it wasn’t. No, it wasn’t a dream, it was a nightmare.

“Mykal!” the older brother’s new wife called out to him. Mykal looked hard at his youngest brother’s confused eyes then turned to answer his wife’s call. They had been married only a few months before his father’s death.

Once his elder brother left Thomas shed his pants and collapsed onto his bed in his undergarments. His thoughts wove a circle around the priest’s words, “sixty gold coins and my calico cat”. What kind of inheritance was that for a wealthy merchant to leave his youngest son? He brushed his blonde locks out of his eyes and sighed deeply. All the pain and weeping had taken their toll on him and his body refused to move anymore.

As he thought of the priest’s words he wondered where his father’s multi-colored cat was. Surely it hadn’t been at his father’s funeral, like he had thought. Before he could think much more on the manner he curled up and he drifted into an exhausted but restless sleep.

*          *          *

At the very time of Thomas’ questioning thought the cat was quite a ways away from its home. It was stalking the fields of a neighboring farmer. It walked with it’s normally proudly lifted tail bent sadly in the middle. As it walked it seemed to be growling lowly and quietly, almost as if it were muttering to itself.

He walked in the quick swishing way that only cat’s can walk. Despite his bent tail and his downcast head, his swiveling ears remained ever alert. Walking across the newly plowed field, the cat was heading directly for the large dark forest just beyond the fields. As he walked the cat growled lowly to itself. For no other animal was around to hear him.

He entered the forest with the smooth confidence of a feline, ducking below low branches and rubbing purposefully against the rough bark of the pine trees. The calico moved with slow confidence, unwary as it moved deeper into the shadowy parts of the woods.

In the shadows of the bushes and trees eyes peered at the multi-colored intruder. Some eyes held fear, others held something different. The cat’s ears twitched as it heard rustling in the leaves behind it and in front of its path, but other than that it gave no indication of what it was thinking.

“Hold it there cat,” a long sleek form covered in shaggy shiny fur slunk out from the shadows. It was a mink, and it was speaking in the language that all animals that have intelligence speak to one another.

“Listen, mink, I am no mood for your little games today,” the cat snarled at her crossly. “I have had a very bad day.”

“It’s about to get a lot worse,” the mink’s black lip curled, showing her shiny white teeth. Her eyes flicked to look behind the cat. The cat didn’t follow her gaze, he already knew what was behind him. The nasty mink’s overgrown son.

“You are nothing more than an overgrown weasel,” the cat hissed at her, his tail going proudly up. His fur fluffed up, nearly doubling his size as he arched his back. He bared his larger fangs for her to see. For an instant it looked as if the mink would change her mind, but only for a moment.

Growling the mink launched her thin tube-like frame at the awaiting calico. The cat dodged to the side, he knew the son would attack as well. The pair of shiny-coated minks clashed in mid-air. There were hisses and bits of fur then they redirected their focus back on the cat.

The cat seemed to know this was coming and slowly sidled up to a tree, gaining a higher ground on one of its roots. The minks approached him together, keeping their ears flattened and their heads low.

“I warn you,” the cat hissed and screamed. “If you don’t turn from your course now it will be your lives!”

The minks’ only response was violent growling and hisses. Spitting angrily the cat raised one strong front leg and extended his long sharp claws, for they had never been trimmed, and brought it down in the midst of the carnivorous family. Both of the smaller mammals went rolling away, a few more of the minks’ relatives edged into the area where the three were fighting.

“Yours shall not be the only death today!” the cat hissed again and rushed the two minks regaining their feet. He used his left paw to snap up the head of the son then dove in with his fangs, ripping at the larger mink’s throat. It screamed at him, but before it could take another breath he tore one last time. Hot red blood spurted onto his pink nose and mink fell still.

“Attack!” the mother mink screamed, the other children growled in unison and raced down to the fight like a shiny mudslide. The cat slammed both of his front paws down on the mother. One thumped onto her head the other onto he shoulder. She screamed and tried to claw at him with her short legs but he had her pinned. His mouth came down like the very jaws of death, clamping onto her neck. With a quick twist and a popping sound he broke her neck.

Her children swarmed him with furious energy, but he didn’t let up. All his pent up anger and rage showed as he moved through them like a dark whirlwind. Long slender bodies flew through the air and splattering blood joined it in scarlet ropes as one mink after another died by the cat’s fangs and claws.

Mere moments later the cat stood up and looked at the carnage he had created, his sides heaving and a few nicks on his own hide, fur covered bodies lay strewn about the forest floor. He licked his scratched nose with a pink tongue and growled grumpily at the pile of bodies.

He looked about at the beautiful mink fur. It was the kind trappers hunted all year for and were lucky to get two or three of. The cat sat down, his eyes shone as he licked his chops.

It was the next day when a hunter came through the forest to find the bodies of ten minks, all of them skinned.

*          *          *

Thomas woke with a bit of an ache. His eyes were sore and the sheets had left impressions in his skin where his undergarments didn’t cover. He rubbed his face and sat up in bed. He opened the curtains that covered his bedroom window. It was morning. He had slept all afternoon and through the night.

Thomas turned back to his bed and quickly made it. Then he began searching for some new clothes. His blurry head kept him from thinking much about the day before, he was glad it did. A faint sound made him stop his search. There it was again, almost like a child crying. He stood up straight. The sound came again, and this time he recognized it for what it was.

His father’s cat – his cat – sat perched on his windowsill meowing at him to let it in. Thomas smiled at it; at there was something that was his. He went to the window and opened it. The cat pranced in, purring in appreciation. Thomas gave it a quick rub in the chin before turning back to search for his clothes.

“Meow,” the cat called out to him. He turned. It was seated on the very pants he had been looking for.

“Thanks,” he told it as it got of the pants as he bent down to retrieve them. It meowed back a “your welcome” and pranced off out of his vision. Soon he found it sitting on the shirt he wanted. He scratched his head and looked at the animal in puzzlement. It wasn’t possible. He shook his head and donned his clothes.

The cat returned to the window and was looking out of it. Thomas joined it at the window as he pulled his shirt over his head. His brother was already outside with the servants, feeding some of the animals and tidying the stables. Thomas frowned as he looked out at the scene.

“I feel like I no longer belong here,” Thomas confided in the feline. It purred at him in comforting tones. “Both of my brothers have careers and families. I’m just the fifth wheel on the cart, along for the ride.” The cat meowed sympathetically and rubbed against his legs with a purr.

“I can’t live leeching off my brother,” Thomas mumbled to himself. “What choice do I have? My father left with nothing more than sixty gold. I guess that’s enough to get started. Where should I go?”

Suddenly Thomas’ jaw set firmly and he picked up a large purse that jingled. It was heavy with the gold that was his inheritance. The cat meowed encouragingly. He left the room and walked briskly down the stairs, the cat following in his wake. He entered the dining room and followed through it until he arrived at the hall that led to his father’s study. He paused hesitantly. The cat meowed at him expectantly. He looked down at it and nodded.

He pushed open the door to his father’s study. Everything was still as his father had left it. Papers containing important records stuffed tidily into the top drawer area. New blank sheets lay in a stack on the side. An inkwell with a fountain pen still dipped in it sat alone in the center. Thomas rushed forward before he could change his mind and seized the pen. He grabbed a new sheet of paper and placed it in front of himself. He stopped for a moment then began to write fervently.

“Dear Brother,
I thank you for your generous offer to stay here with yourself and your wife. I feel that I have come to a time in my life where I must go out into the world and make a life for myself. I have taken my small inheritance and a few possessions to make a new life for myself in the city. Do not worry over me, our father will watch over me."

-Thomas


With a proud smile on his face Thomas looked at his short letter and supposed it was enough. He was afraid he would change his mind if he stayed much longer. He shook the paper so that the ink would dry and then rose to his feet. He sprinted back up the stairs and collected a few changes of clothes into a knapsack along with some early fruits and left the note on the dining table where they would be sure to find it, but not before he had put some distance between himself and his childhood home. He looked down to find the cat still at his feet.

“I guess you can come if you like,” Thomas told the calico. “I have a feeling you’ll get tired and turn back after a while though.”  The cat meowed at him defiantly and Thomas smiled down at the cat. He put his knapsack on his shoulder and left through the backdoor to avoid prying eyes. He was off to a different life.