[Kachi]: 373.The Cat Boy And The Slave.Prologue

The Cat Boy And The Slave

Prologue

  "It's weird."
  "You mean: he's weird."
  "No." The voice shot back, as if expecting that response but still not liking it.
  "Come on, you know he is. Everyone says it."
  The retort obviously did nothing to appease the first speaker. “Shut it. I mean, none of us can read or write. Hell, most of us got no chance at adding anything up past ten. So why can he do all that shit?" The boy rested his chin in his hand and frowned at the other, blue eyes thoughtful.
  The blond opposite shrugged. "Gotta make up for his madness somehow, I guess. Ain't no deity cruel enough to leave someone like him with nothing."
  "You'd have thought there ain't no deity cruel enough to leave us all here, but there is." He sighed and shook his head. "It's too weird, something ain't adding up." He ignored the snigger from his friend and slid slowly sideways until he was laying out on the stripped floorboards, right arm folded under his head as a makeshift pillow. "Gotta be that someone out there, somewhere, is missing their kid..."
  The blond simply shrugged, pushing a finger through a hole in his tattered trouser leg and frowning. "These're fit to fall apart."
  The door creaking slowly open made them both look around, and the first speaker smiled. "Hey there."
  Peering between the heavy dark wood of the door and the battered jamb was a boy's pale face, topped with soft, unkempt hair and partially obscured by a too-long fringe. The blank expression quickly became animated when his eyes alighted upon the brown haired boy stretched out on the floor and he pushed the door open fully, hurrying over to him. "Wondered where you were..."
  The brown-haired youth patted the floorboards beside himself and smiled gently as the younger boy first sat down, then curled up into a ball against his stomach. For a boy only a few inches shorter than himself, when he curled up he appeared to become much smaller, and much more vulnerable. When they sat like this, the bare room seemed to become warmer and more homely.
  The blond snorted derisively, but said nothing.
  Deiyen reached down with his left hand and gently scratched behind the boy's silky upright cat ears. "You’re cold."
  "Nnmm." He shook his head slightly, eyes closed. "I’m not now." With a soft sigh, he murmured, "tired though..."
  "You can sleep here. I'm not going anywhere." Deiyen ran calloused fingers gently through the boy's fluffy hair. It was so hard not to feel protective of him…
  The blond stood and stretched, both hands pressed to the small of his back. "No doubt I'll be wanted soon. See you." He cast a pointed look Deiyen's way, reminding him that he was covering his back yet again by taking on one of his shifts.
  "Yeah, see you." Deiyen muttered, then mouthed pull his tail this time and I'll make you suffer at the blond.
  Baran simply grinned widely and left the room.
  Deiyen sighed faintly as the catboy nestled more closely against him, soft regular breathing indicating that he had fallen asleep, and rested his hand lightly on the back of the boy’s head. "Ain't no one gonna upset you when I'm here."