Soot and Cassandra Read online

  Soot and Cassandra

  DAVE FREER

  About the author:

  Dave Freer is the author or co-author of some 17 novels (hard to keep track) including SLOW TRAIN TO ARCTURUS, which was listed as a Wall Street Journal sf bestseller. Various other books have been on Locus bestseller lists. He is also the author of a large number of shorter works. For a complete list and work which will be available nowhere else see http://davefreer.com/. He lives on a remote island off the coast of Australia. For more about this and links to other sites see his Amazon Author’s page.

  “Soot & Cassandra” by Dave Freer Copyright © 2011.

  Electronic edition published by Dave Freer, November 2011.

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction, in whole or in part in any form. This short story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  An earlier version of this story, titled SOOT, to which I own the non-exclusive rights, was published in the Anthology ‘Witch Way to the Mall’, edited by Esther Friesner, 2009 which is not available at the time of publishing this story on Amazon in electronic format. THIS VERSION OF SOOT & CASSANDRA IS MINE EXCLUSIVELY.

  My name is Sothbubastis. I am an almost black cat, with green eyes. I live in a little gingerbread house with a witch. It is on the corner of Apogee Crescent and Diana Avenue, and is quite unlike any of the other houses around here. Suburbia has sprawled out of London and engulfed us. We even have a shopping mall just down the road.

  Cassandra, my witch, calls me Soot when we are alone. It is a little lacking in dignity, but for fish, warm milk and catnip mice I will put up with it, and with having my white paw dyed black. She has assured me that the dye is not toxic, unlike some of the jangling charms which she insists on wearing, and the incense that she keeps on burning. I sometimes think she tries too hard. Few if any of the clients will know the ancient meaning and purpose of frankincense.

  Our house is proof that people will believe almost anything. It is, supposedly, a Queen Anne relic with Victorian additions. Ha ha. The house is actually much, much older, but little remains of the original building. Still, humans believe what they want to believe, and therefore it has a preservation order. It cannot be demolished, altered, or otherwise interfered with, without approval from the Historical Structures, Monuments and Buildings Commission, the Department of County and Urban planning, and the local authority, none of whom will co-operate with any of the others, on principle. Cassandra says it has been very awkward for plumbing. However, this is a human problem and not one of mine.

  I would like a preservation order too. It would be very useful in my aspect of our work, especially if dogs and motor vehicles were informed.

  Work? From a cat? Other than catching mice? Yes. Work. I share my work with Cassandra.

  We watch the way. It sounds easy, doesn’t it?

  It is mostly done in darkness.

  “I’m worried about Leanne. My daughter,” said the client sitting in what they call a parlor, and Cassandra and I call the front office.

  I would worry about her daughter too. But then, I am out at night. I can see very well in what you humans call darkness. I reclined on the mantel behind Cassandra, next to the stuffed owl. Curse Harry Potter. The taxidermy of it left something to be desired and the bouquet—uneasily mingling with the incense—made me want to sneeze. That would disturb the unblinking stare that was my task with clients. It unnerved them. An unnerved client was more likely to part with cash, and some of that was needed to pay the taxes, the electricity bill, the internet connection, as well as for human food, and, more relevantly, catnip mice.

  Cassandra fanned the cards onto the baize table. “What is troubling you, Mrs Syrus?” she said in her best mystical medium voice.

  The plump client fondled the protective crystal around her neck. She was wearing an embroidered blouse of Egyptian cotton, complete with a hieroglyphic inscription. It was part of a funerary prayer to Osiris, unless I was much mistaken. She leaned forward, her generous breasts nearly sending Cassandra’s planchette tumbling, and said, in a hushed whisper. “I think she’s messing about with the Oh-cult.”

  Huh. Not unless young Ralph Rachen had changed his name to ‘Oh-cult’. But no, the boy had kept a part of an old name, which was why we were watching him. So far the two kids hadn’t done anything that involved more than lip and tongue gymnastics. Humans are strange like that. We cats have a far more sensible attitude to sex.

  “Take a card, Mrs Syrus,” said Cassandra, and, as the plump be-ringed hand reached out she asked: “So, what makes you think that she’s toying with the forces of darkness?”

  The woman turned over the card. The devil looked up at her. It was an original Durer. The artist had captured the sardonic expression on the face perfectly, and of course the chained boy and girl at his feet. “Oh, it was Clint, I mean… Father Pillman, who told me,” she said coyly.

  I stood up and arched my back, but kept up the stare. I’d get a blink when she looked down at the next card. I’d have to forgo hissing and spitting.

  “I see,” said Cassandra, with remarkable control. Cassandra really was very, very good. “Take another card, Mrs Syrus. And what did Father Pillman say?” Mrs Syrus would remember exactly what he said. Our new, very modern and radical priest had all the suburban housewives clinging to his words… and anything else they could get their hands on.

  “Oh it was something Leanne said to him during the counseling session. He likes to hold one-on-one counseling sessions with the younger members of his flock.”

  “I bet he does,” I muttered.

  Mrs Syrus stared at me. I stared back. “Your cat. It… it spoke.”

  Cassandra looked reproachfully at me. “He does it all the time. Never knows when to hold his tongue.”

  What a foolish expression that is! If cats had the equipment for holding things, short of sticking a claw into them, we would not need to keep humans. As usual, Cassandra’s magic worked perfectly. Mrs Syrus tittered. “Oh, you are a silly, Madame Cassandra.” It was a good thing that one of the job requirements for godhood had not been intelligence, or Cassandra might have had a harder time of the curse placed on her.

  Cassandra smiled. “Take another card, Mrs Syrus. You were saying, before my cat so rudely interrupted?”

  “Well,” said the woman, drawing the Sorceress, “He wouldn’t tell me exactly what she said… but he said I would have to keep a strict watch on her. Lock her room door at night. And keep her away from Bad Influences. That boy.” She sniffed. “She’s not my child, you know. She’s adopted.”

  “That would explain it,” said Cassandra. “Take another card.”

  “Father Pillman has given me some blessed silver crosses to keep her safe from Oh-cult forces,” confided Mrs Syrus happily.

  The reading went on. Cassandra unsettled her client, and found out more than Mrs Syrus had meant to tell. She gave her a reading that impressed her… and that Mrs Syrus would naturally disbelieve.

  “Did you have to talk?” asked Cassandra.

  I licked my paw, ignoring her.

  “You’ll wash the black off,” she said crossly. “It could have been very awkward, you know.”

  I twitched my whiskers. “Oh yes. She might have called the Inquisition down on us. They might suspect that you are a witch. It’s just as well that you don’t have a sign above the door which reads ‘Madame Cassandra, White Witch, Charms, Tarot Readings and Crystal Therapy’, or they might possibly suspect you,” I replied.

  She sighed. “Sarcasm doesn’t suit you, Sothbubastis. Pillman is planning s
omething.”

  “Sarcasm is natural to a cat. The new emissary is up to something, I agree. We suspected that when he arrived. We now know that it will probably be soon. It will involve a young girl. What he plans seems self-evident,” I said dryly.

  She nodded. “It’s how and where, that is a little more obscure.”

  “I suppose a pre-emptive strike is out, as usual?” I asked, ever hopeful.

  Cassandra shook her head. “You know the rules.”

  Cats believe rules are for other people, with the emphasis on the people part. But in this case she was right. These rules are not petty constructs put in place to soothe the ego of some panjandrum or hierophant. They are based on experience: if one crossed those lines, one died. Of course, any self-respecting cat will tell you, you have to keep testing the boundaries, and searching for ways around them. “I’ll go and scout,” I said, getting up. “There’s a chance I’ll see something.”

  She looked out of the window to the street. “Better wait for nightfall.”

  “They’ll expect me then,” I said, shivering my tail, and leaping over to the sill.

  I slipped out of my window, up onto the fence, down onto a wheelie-bin and off into the shadows towards the church. And then I took a sharp left. Some force was repelling me. Now, cats are more resistant to compulsions than most creatures, but I did not want to alarm it. So I sheered away. I went to consult an associate of mine instead. Cassandra disapproves of him. The previous watcher and he clashed. But he gives me fish.

  On the way I met a lanky teen in a hoodie slouching along the sidewalk. He even had the obligatory can of lager in hand. “You’re not fooling me, Wolfie,” I said.

  “Shut up, cat. It’s not you I am trying to fool,” said the were-wolf.

  I waved my tail at him. “Won’t fool her mother either. The priest ratted you out, wolf-boy. She’s got the girl protected.”

  “Curse him,” he snarled.

  “If you’ll tell me why you want her then I might help you,” I offered.

  “I’m in love with her.”

  I sniffed, disbelievingly. And I then hastily slipped through the gap in the fence, dodging the hurled can and the spray of frothy horse-urine-substitute that splattered from it. There was a vague possibility that he spoke the truth. But cats are not trusting. Down Styx Street (humans and street names - I ask you) I wove and darted across hidden weedy backyards, slow-rotting Wendy houses and past sagging wash-lines on the secret side of suburbia.

  The Peaceful Rest Funeral Parlor was tucked away at the back of a dead end. Very appropriate, I always thought. “What took you so long, cat?” asked Cassandra, crossly.

  I forget just how accurately she foresees things. It’s patchy of course. She tends to see those she cares about. “I stopped to talk to Wolfie. He threw beer at me.” I wound my way between her legs.

  Cassandra bent down and stroked me. Gave me the benefit of her famous crooked smile. “You wasted your time, Soot. He’ll be along later.”

  “You could have told me,” I said, crossly. She doesn’t communicate well. It comes from not being believed, I think. Or it could just be part of this being human thing.

  She shrugged. “You could have told me you weren’t going to the church.”

  “It’s warded,” I explained. “I didn’t want to trigger any alarms. Shall we go in?”

  Cassandra gave an involuntary shudder. “He gives me the creeps.”

  I stretched. “That’s what he does, witch. His kind can’t help it.”

  “Ugh,” she said, as we skirted around the funeral parlor to his back-room.

  “I prefer Oogh,” said the squat shaggy headed fellow, peering out at us from under his low, heavy brow. He whiffled his big stick-out wobbly nose at us. Trolls are more scent-orientated than humans. This doesn’t mean they smell any nicer, because trolls don’t. They stink nearly as much as humans, but differently. It’s at the root of the ancient distrust between the species. “What can I do for you, woman-who-foresees-the-future?”

  “I am not too sure,” admitted Cassandra, her forehead wrinkled. “I foresaw that the cat and the wolf-boy were coming here, and that it would be important.”

  He nodded. “Well, you’d better come in. I am having tea, which is also important.

  “How come you believe me?” asked Cassandra, accepting a chipped mug of tea from him (and thereby proving she was not infallible. Her foretelling skills are typical Greek God shoddy, not a patch on decent Egyptian workmanship), and finding a rickety chair to sit on.

  He rubbed his too-broad, too-low forehead. “Your curse only affects humans, I suppose,” said Oogh. His speech is a little odd. He told me he battles with consonants. There was a tentative knock on the door. “That’ll be Wolfie. You’d better let him in. They tend to run away from me,” said the troll.

  Sure enough, it was. He looked doubtfully at Cassandra. “I thought you lived in that cutesy house up on Apogee?”

  “You’re lucky my house isn’t here to hear you or you’d be in trouble,” said Cassandra. “Come in. We’ve been waiting for you.”

  “How did you know I was coming?” he said warily. “I just decided to follow the cat.” I should have thought of that. Wolves track well by scent. He sniffed. “Something smells very odd about this.”

  “It’s the troll,” said Cassandra. “He stinks, but he is mostly harmless.”

  “It is you modern humans that stink,” said Oogh. “You want tea, wolf-boy?”

  Wolfie’s eyes narrowed. “There is something very weird going on here. And,” he said, looking hard at Oogh, “Something that looks human, but isn’t.”

  “And you, wolf-boy. What are you doing here?” said Oogh. “I’ve been here since prehistory. But we get very suspicious when one of your kind turns up suddenly.”

  “I… I am not too sure,” he said, walking into Oogh’s pseudo-cave. “What are you doing here?”

  Oogh waved at the building. “I clean the crematorium. And I do odd jobs around the place.”

  “Very odd jobs, sometimes,” I said, my tail weaving an S. “He’s in pest control. Good with mandragoras and vampires.”

  The wolf-boy blinked. “I meant… magical creatures. Here in suburbia?”

  Oogh shrugged. “We were here before suburbia. What did you expect us to do? Go off and look for a ricketty-racketty bridge? Operating a troll booth, when you’re not allowed to eat anyone without the right change, is so yesterday.”

  “And we want to know why a werewolf has come to town,” demanded Cassandra, sternly. I knew that tone of voice. I tensed my muscles and readied myself to spring.

  “There is something special about this place, isn’t there?” said Wolfie. “It… attracted me.”

  I relaxed slightly. He sounded genuinely puzzled.

  Cassandra raised her eyebrows. “Von Rachen. You would have us believe your parents didn’t tell you?”

  “I never met my parents. Well, not that I remember. I’m an orphan. And it’s Rachen. Not Von Rachen.”

  Cassandra stared hard at him. I knew that stare. The reading trance. “I think,” she said, “that it is time that you told us about yourself. Sit down.”

  He did, warily. “This is something to do with my being able to turn into a wolf, isn’t it?”

  “You might say so,” said Cassandra. “Tell us about this orphaning?”

  He shrugged. “My parents were killed in a car crash. I wasn’t hurt, apparently. The cops found their ID, but failed to find any next of kin. So I ended up in an orphanage. I got adopted twice… but it never worked out. Odd things happened and I got sent back. And when I was eighteen I had to leave.”

  I didn’t say anything. But weres didn’t die that easily.

  “Ah,” said Cassandra silkily. “And then you did what? You’ve been hanging around here with no visible means of support for nearly a month now. Yet you have clean clothes, and you only chase rabbits in the park at night occasionally, and very ineffectually. You don’t appear to work.
”

  He shrugged. “I was a Ward of the Crown. They looked after things… I get an allowance every month. See, when I left St. Stephens… I found out that I actually had inherited quite a lot of money. I was eighteen. The trustees pay me an allowance until I’m twenty-one. I didn’t have a family or any real friends. I didn’t know what to do with myself. I kept turning into a wolf at awkward moments. It… unsettles you a bit. So I thought I’d travel. I was just passing through this place…”

  “And you stayed here?” said the troll sounding just as suspicious as I felt.

  Young Ralph Rachen looked genuinely taken aback. That or wolves are better actors than I’d realized. “Well, there was the girl. She just…”

  “Attracted you,” said Cassandra, sardonically.

  “Smelled different, if you must know,” said wolf-boy, looking sulky. “I’ve always seemed to be able smell so much more than other people.”

  “Leanne Syrus. She does,” said the troll. “She’s a half-breed. Fay. What you would call a fairy. Damn colonists.”

  “She’s a fairy princess?” said Wolfie-boy, impressed… but rather doubtful.

  “Nah. Probably just a common-or-garden fairy,” said the Troll, with a dismissive wave. “They’re quite indiscriminate. Shag anything. Have the morals of a cat.”

  I like that! Cats are exceptionally moral. We just have a different set of values. Most of them concern ourselves.

  Wolfie-boy blinked. “So… why does she attract me? And why is she here? Why are you all here?”

  “Is this a real question or a philosophical one?” asked Cassandra, dryly. “And just how do you know who we’re talking about, troll?”

  “Couldn’t be anyone else, could it?” said the troll.

  But wolf-boy was persistent. “So why are you all here, in this town?”

  I arched my back and stretched. “To stop the likes of you coming here. And her. Or rather, her real Daddy,” I said, staring at him.

  “The cat talks too much,” said Cassandra, coldly.