Plain Kate

In the darkness, Kate waited for Taggle’s return. She held the burl wood carving of Lenore’s face in her hands, using the edge of her knife to polish a rough bit here and there. Drina dozed shivering beside her, the heavy clouds pressed close over her, and the city slept restlessly below her. Taggle was gone a long time, long enoughfor Kate to struggle in and out of dreams: She was bent over her cabinet box in Samilae, carving, only she had wings instead of a shadow. She was lost in a maze of stone streets and someone was screaming, and then the stones melted. She was holding Taggle’s body in her arms.

She woke with Taggle’s cold nose nudging hers. His fur was damp and smeared with foul mud. She stroked him and loose hairs clung to her hands.

“A dark place, full of blood smell and fear smell and grates and grilles,” he reported. “It would take a rat to slip in—a skinny one. There will be no rescue.”

“I dreamt… ” Kate tipped her head back. The crumbling bricks of the chimney caught and yanked at her hair. “…no rescue.”

Taggle eyed her.“You’re planning something.”

“If I go down there,” she said slowly, “the guard will see that I have no shadow. They’ll arrest me. And then—maybe I can get close to him.”

“No,” said Taggle.“No friend of mine will take on such a fate.”

Kate looked down at Lenore’s carved face. She remembered promising her father that she would be a full master by twenty, and she had been right: This was her masterpiece. But what was going to happen instead was that she was going to die. She said, “Someone will notice my shadow soon, Taggle. It will happen eventually.”

“Not here,” he said. “Not like this. You didn’t see it. You can’t imagine.” The cat sighed and paced up and down in front of the dovecote. Finally he turned to her. “Katerina, this city is a rat’s place. Let us leave the rats to the rats and go on with our adventures. What say you?”

She wanted to say yes. There was nothing to love in the walls of Love. But there had been little to love in Toila either, and yet a stranger had saved them. And in Samilae, where an axe had come from the darkness, Niki had stayed strong and kind.“There must be a basket woman,” said Kate, “or a baker.”

“Well then,” said the cat. “He means to kill himself in this stupid way. We must either kill him before he can, or save him from it.” He shook his head, human, fretful. “I suppose one chance or the other might present itself. Personally I think we should aim for killing him.”

Drina shifted in her thin sleep, and shivered. Kate watched her sleeping for a while, wishing for a scrap of blanket. The rain was so cold. Finally she asked,“Will we…will we all live?”

“I doubt it,” drawled the cat. “We put our lives on claw tip to do this, Katerina. Tell me you are sure.”

“I have to stop him, Taggle. My blood. My shadow. He used me to do this. It’s my fault and I have to fix it.”

Taggle sat up, slender and strong as a column, unshakable. He made no suggestions. Kate rubbed him between the ears. She could still feel the lump where Stivo’s axe had hit him. He climbed into her lap, rumbling, and she huddled into the broken chimney’s meager heat.

“We must get close to him,” said Taggle. “Close enough to spring. If chance comes, we must be ready.”

“The stake,” she said. “He’ll—he’ll be brought there.”

***

So at first light they found their way down into the square, to the burning place.

The stake was a neatly built thing, and horrible in its neatness. The platform was stone and nearly as tall as they were. A flight of steps was cut into the side. A stone lip would keep the fire contained. And there would be fire: There was already a stack of split logs and branches, like a great stork’s nest, around the stake. They stank of pitch and tallow. More barrels of pitch were lined up like condemned men at the platform’s foot. Kate and Drina wormed their way between these and crouched down to wait.

It was a strange morning. The light was like a bruise. Cold breezes blew straight down from low clouds—clouds like a wall of boulders hanging over their heads. Above those clouds, Kate was certain, something circled. Something hungered. Something waited.

Between the curved black walls of the barrels, Kate and Drina watched the square fill. Hawkers sold pretzels and roasted nuts, tinkers peddled charms, musicians played, acrobats tumbled. But you could not buy fur or cloth, raw meat or flour, or anything that would take more than an hour to make. It was not a market: It was a carnival.

“They’re saying they’ve caught him,” reported Taggle, slinking in from the crowd. “That soon the rain will lift and life will be better. They mean to burn him at noon. Also, they are selling meat pies.”

They waited. The crowd grew larger, and soon they could see little but legs, good boots, and patten shoes holding dainty slippers above the puddles. Taggle kept mentioning the meat pies. The bells in the church told the hours: Nine. Ten. Eleven. They crept out from between the barrels. Twelve.