Then, he noticed that a couple dozen of them, including the arch-traitor who had sacrilegiously launched Master into the cave, were flying south. This confused him momentarily, but then he quickly realized they must be summoning more traitors.
He was not mistaken, for several hours later he saw these fiends returning with humans riding on their backs and with boxes between their talons. To his horror he saw them put one box after another into Master’s home, and then to his greater horror he suddenly saw Blackie (as he occasionally called “Black Demon”) murderously flung from the lair.
A flood of mixed emotions engulfed his confused brain, as he saw the dreaded executioner of underperforming konulans go falling to what had to be certain death. Chip had often thought after The Great Relaxation that had it not been for this stern tool of justice, the konulans would have become intolerably unruly. Such an ignominious end for so noble a keeper of order seemed so morally wrong that Chip was inclined to weep.
But to Chip’s delight he saw what appeared to be tiny sparks dancing along the pathway of this plummeting fur bomb, and his heart soared as he realized he had perhaps been wrong to conclude Blackie’s fate was decided.
Then, without wasting time to think, he exited the safety of his small hideout and performed the same breathtaking aerial drop he was now beginning to find himself quite good at. He knew not what his ultimate aims were, but he figured the least he could do was learn the fate of Blackie.
In spite of the rapidity of his descent, it was only barely that Chip caught sight of Koksun acrobatically moving amongst the tree branches, and before Chip fully had time to appreciate the marvelous survival of Blackie, he noticed he had voluntarily quitted himself of the protection of the trees and begun sprinting across the ground away from the cliff with a speed which not only challenged that of Chip’s aerial drop maneuver but also warned him of some impending doom behind them.
With awe Chip watched the lithe creature’s body move across the ground as if he were the one flying, rather than Chip.
Chip fluttered along watching Koksun with ceaseless admiration, as it appeared the cat had no limit to his reserves of energy, but what had previously been a moderate feeling of doom at the cat’s ceaseless velocity was becoming more ominous by the moment. Blackie was running from something.
Before Chip had time to contemplate the question further, he heard a loud answer to his queries:
BOOOOMMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
The noise alone disoriented him considerably, and at that very moment he would likely have fallen to the ground, but then a powerful wind pushed him forward, and he felt himself being flung through the air.
His wings no longer propelled him but attempted to control his trajectory as some other force thrust him forward with a vengeance. Before he could avert his path, he found himself slammed into a small hollow groove of a tree, where he lost consciousness.
Chapter 11
Koksun almost felt relieved when the blast came. His instinct for danger continually told him it would arrive at any moment, but as “any moment” stretched longer and longer like the lithe limbs of his flexible body reaching through the air and propelling him forward in such a way as to give a prize racing stallion a tutorial on speed, he was beginning to doubt his instincts.
But at the very moment he almost paused for a well-deserved breath, as he had been sprinting for what he calculated must be at least twenty minutes, he had heard the loud explosion, and his feline instincts had reasserted themselves, pushing him forward with one final push before the blast flung him forward like a rock launched from a catapult.
Already having been forced earlier that day to thwart the irresistible forces of motion, he quite grumpily—yet passionately—rose to the occasion again. He spread his four paws outwards like the wings of a bird and attempted to maintain his balance as he flew through the air with his tail acting as the ship’s rudder.
When he did not feel rocks and trees smashing into his defenseless body, he breathed a strong sigh of relief, knowing he had gotten far enough away from the explosion to avoid a game of Dodge the Flying Tree and Boulder and was only being flung through the air because the tail end of the shockwave still had enough power to pick up twenty pounds and give it a good throw.
His relief ended, however, when he saw he was headed straight towards a rather large tree, which, while not being ripped from the ground, was bending forward severely, struggling mightily against the wind seeking to kidnap it from its beloved soil. Koksun braced himself for impact by arching his body upwards, paws still splayed out as if trying to reach the four corners of the earth, but pulled the four corners in as he neared the landing zone, preferring his paws be the unhappy tools of stopping his flight, rather than his soft underbelly, which he preferred to have caressed rather than battered by a large tree.
His paws hit the tree so hard they stung fiercely, and in fact he would have bounced backwards if not for the fact the tree was bent forward at just enough of an angle to allow him to hit the tree running rather than at a dead stop. He had little time to savor the success of his landing, as the tree then began to swing backwards, as the wind had relinquished its merciless push forwards.
Koksun’s human attributes perhaps came in handy for the first time that day, as he did not have to wait and discover through direct experience that he was now essentially perched on a giant slingshot. He leaped off of the tree entirely and watched with admiration as it flung forward angrily back into its proper upright position, realizing that it certainly would have broken even the strongest of his grips and flung him fatally through the air.
He breathed a sigh of relief, and just when he thought for the first time in what was shaping up to be one rotten day he was going to be allowed the luxury of a catnap, during which he could mull his future prospects, he suddenly saw something else that the wind had flung along in its merciless rampage.
It was large, long, and coiled to strike. The viper’s strike missed by mere inches as Koksun jumped into the tree and ascended its peak. He looked down cautiously, expecting to see the deadly serpent calmly winding its way around the trunk of the tree and climbing its branches with practiced calmness. It would have been a logical continuation of the miserable day he was having. But to his surprise and equal relief, the viper remained at the base of the tree, tongue flickering in and out of its mouth like a deadly arrow, with calm, slanted eyes perched on top of an ugly snout that seemed to tell him: Bet I can wait longer than you can.
Chapter 12
When Chip came to from the brief nap he had taken upon having his noggin rattled against the inside of the tree, he saw it was still daylight, but the sun had certainly made enough progress in its wearisome trip across the sky to let him know he had unmistakably had some shut-eye.
He flew out from the tree into the air, but the crash into the tree had left him a bit disoriented. He vaguely remembered having felt very motivated and alarmed but could not for the life of him remember why. Then, onto his tiny yet determined brain images began to fall like drops of water from an incipient rainstorm: flying south, leaving his chums, going to Master’s lair . . . .
As soon as this particular image came to his mind the rest came crashing down upon him in an instant, and he recalled that it seemed the sole survivor of the pholung treachery had been Blackie, and he had been following Blackie but had been thrown off course after one very loud noise had produced a strong wind and pushed him forward with a strength that his wings could not resist in the least.
Must find him!! the thought shot through his mind like an arrow.
Thinking the journey ahead of him long and adventurous, he was quite surprised when seconds later, he noticed a horrific viper coiled and looking intently up a nearby tree. It had some quarry trapped no doubt, which safely ruled out the animal being a bird. And while a squirrel was a possibility, given that this tree was just slightly too far from any of its neighbors to allow for escape by leaping, his gut told hi
m decisively that Blackie was in dire need of help.
He tilted his body ever so slightly, gave his wings a few good flaps, and in no time at all was hovering above the tree.
Having arrived here, he realized the next step would be a bit of an adventure. Although he was determined to find Blackie and see if Blackie could enlighten him as to just what in Kasani was going on, he realized that, whether he was Master’s most faithful subject or not, it could not be without trepidation that he visited Master’s chief executioner.
He circled around the tree, searching in vain, his eyes seeing nothing. He flew closer to the tree—as close as he dared; he did not want Blackie’s presence confirmed by the lightning strike of a furry paw snatching him out of the air. Then, just as he was about to give up all the hope in his tiny heart, he saw him.
Nature has perhaps gifted no animal a superior ability than the feline to express the forlorn state of mind. There, perched comfortably near the very top of Mount Tree in what would have been an incredibly uncomfortable position for any living thing other than a lithe, limber cat, was Black Demon. His hunched shoulders, his drooping head, his lowered eyes (occasionally opening lazily to express the depths of sorrow emanating from the passageways of his pupils), and the occasional, mournful “meooooowwwww” perfectly told the tragic story of a creature woefully succumbed to his fate.
Seeing this oddly lifted Chip’s spirits as he prepared to inform Blackie that he was not alone in this world and that perhaps—small though they might be—two might be able to perform what one alone could not.
Anxiety filling every facet of Chip’s body, he alighted onto a branch some five feet away. This, he calculated, was just about the perfect distance to allow him comfortable space to escape should Blackie don the cap of Chief Executioner, yet close enough to permit a productive conversation without needing to resort to yelling. While he was quite confident the serpent below was one of the many dumb animals, he felt it imprudent to risk the contrary.
As Chip landed onto the small branch, causing such a small rustle that no human likely would have heard it, Blackie immediately exclaimed “Mow?!” in a brief, pointed inquiry, his superbly engineered ears perked upwards revealing he had lost no auditory senses during his rather rough day.
“No need to resort to animal talk, Mr. Black. We’re both products of Master’s handiwork and quite capable of intelligent conversation.”
Koksun eyed Chip warily. He recognized him by sight, smell, and sound, for it had been he that told Master of the knighting. Only taste and touch remained . . . .
“I’m quite aware what you’re thinking, Mr. Black, and I will prove to you that it suits neither your interests nor mine. One majestic leap from you, and you might snatch me with your razor-sharp claws, but in the process you might fall into the clutches of one far deadlier than you. You see, I chose this branch because if it bends ever so slightly underneath the humble push of my meagre weight, well, it won’t so much as support yours for an instant.”
This cogent reasoning snapped Koksun out of cat mode and into the realm of logic that he preferred.
“You say it suits neither your interests nor mine. In that, I believe you’re right, but there must be something you believe does suit both your interests and mine. Otherwise, surely you wouldn’t place yourself so near a potential predator.”
“Precisely summarized. I want to find Master. You, I assume would like to be rid of that viper below us, for in spite of its dumbness, it poses a sufficient threat to keep you trapped here until you either starve or surrender to its stomach.”
Koksun knew he needed a lot more than to get past this serpent. He needed a home, some kind, loving place where food was presented to him along with loving caresses. He had heard Tristan talk enough about these woods to know that he stood little chance in them. If freed from the threat of this viper, another animal would soon take its place. Thus, it was of little consequence if the bird—that is to say, Chip; after all, he knew his name, even if he did not normally deign to think the konulans as worthy of names—could somehow get him past this predicament, and he was doubtful as to whether he could even do that. Thus, he chose not to appear overly impressed by this first round of negotiations.
“My dear Chip, I must say I’m a bit offended, even if I can forgive a little chicanery in negotiations. You’re offering so little. Once I tell you where Master is” (and at this moment Koksun realized how odd it was that a konulan was seeking out the very man who had sent the konulans away for a year and who would have killed them wholesale had Koksun not talked him out of it) “ you will have no use for me. Then, there would be nothing to prevent you from abandoning me to the horrible fate that awaits below.
“I need two things, and you will give them to me before I tell you our Master’s whereabouts,” he said, hoping to arouse a feeling of camaraderie by invoking their mutual master.
“Which are . . . ?” Chip responded calmly, not intending yet to promise anything. He couldn’t be sure Blackie wasn’t one of the conspirators. After all, he had seen Blackie flung from the cliff but had not seen by whom.
“I need to get past the snake, and I need a home. I’m partial to that of a kind woman, preferably beautiful. Unlike you, birdie, I was born human, and I have an appreciation for the sight of the softer sex. While I can never again expect to know the beauty of love, I suppose I could settle for spending the rest of my days in a place where milk flows as plentifully as water and where I might nap comfortably in the lap of a beautiful owner, being coaxed to sleep under her soft caresses, and defending her house stoically from rats and mice.”
Had Chip been a typical konulan, he would have fluttered about and marveled at the knowledge that Koksun had once been human, as many konulans had frequently speculated as to the origins of Black Demon, Black Beast, Chief Executioner, and the many other names by which they referred to him in terror. This gossip would have occasioned a party, during which the story would have been circulated no less than thirty times, and the story itself would have changed many hundreds of times, to the point where the legends of Koksun would have perhaps surpassed those of Master himself.
Not being a typical konulan, Chip merely blinked and grinned inwardly at this piece of intelligence he had obtained that none of the others would ever possess.
“Consider it done. I know how to dispatch this vile serpent, and I know the home of a woman so kind and so doting to her animals that you will perhaps thank heaven above you have been relieved of the burdens of mankind.”
Had Koksun listened more closely, he would have paid particular attention to the plural noun that was used when “animals” were referenced and would have inquired what the other animals were. Alas, so great and comforting were the images of this paradisiacal abode that his attention wandered.
He almost dispensed with further negotiations, as his instincts told him he could trust Chip, and Chip clearly held a strong bargaining position, but Koksun’s Metinvurian instincts could not be so easily expunged.
“You’ll help me dispatch the serpent. Once you do so, you will lead me to the paradise of a home you have described to me. Halfway through our journey there, I will tell you where Master is. Betray me, bird, and there’s no nest in this world you’ll find safe to sleep in for the rest of your life.”
This seemed reasonable enough to Chip. “Agreed,” he replied laconically. But then added, “When you hear me say run, you’ll be well-advised to do so.” Without further ado, he quitted the tree branch and flew away.
Koksun gulped nervously.
Chapter 13
The viper had seen many things in its seven years. And amongst them, he had seen his share of birds . . . and eaten its share of birds. He had also seen his share of cats, but as of yet had not added that delicacy to the list of items he could truthfully tell his fellow vipers he had tasted. This he intended to rectify today.
But one thing he had never even seen was a cat and bird in s
uch close proximity. He had seen felines stalking birds on many occasions, and he had assumed there was little goodwill amongst the two species. Thus, it had vexed his powers of comprehension terribly, as he watched the bird land so near its natural predator and proceed to make noises of the most unintelligible sort imaginable.
On and on, it seemed they would go bantering with one another—for the viper could not see any other purpose for predator and prey to converse if it were not to exchange witty barbs—with no chance of respite. When the bird suddenly left the tree, the viper expected at any moment to see the cat leap into the air, grab the bird, and then fall conveniently into the viper’s coils, whereupon he would dispatch both of them with two quick bites and perhaps with just one bite if the bird had already found its way into the cat’s mouth. But to his great confusion, the bird quit the tree, the cat stayed in its place, and it seemed as if he were going to have to wait an eternity before that cat would descend the tree.
Wanting to make sure the cat was still there he raised himself up several feet and peered with his eyes and flicked his tongue in and out of his mouth hungrily.
Chip knew this was the moment of truth. The first chance for application of his maneuver, which he now referred to as Cyclone, feeling a fondness for it as though it were his child. Having flown high into the sky and with the sun at his back, he was propelling himself down faster and faster and had the serpent in his sights. Seeing the serpent had raised its head up, he knew it was now or never.