BLINK
Chapter One - The Cat
“You’re supposed to open it in your room,” said the hotel concierge.
"Who's it from?"
"I'm afraid they declined to leave their name, sir."
Sitting on my bed, I ripped open the package and was immediately overcome by a wave of lightheadedness. My hand sought the window latch and then suddenly I was pushing up the lid of a dumpster and collapsing into a dark alleyway.
“What the hell?” I tried to orient myself despite the foul smell now assaulting my nostrils.
“Do you always enter a place like a dropped chandelier?”
“Who’s there?”
The dim light of the alley made it impossible to see anything and when the voice called out again, I put my back to the dumpster.
“Where are you?”
“Maybe I’m in your head.”
“That’s enough! I won’t be toyed with.”
The voice chuckled and a patch of black quickly zigzagged in the shadows. I reached one hand into the dumpster and upon feeling glass, I thrust out a bottle.
“My, my,” said the voice. “Whatever do you plan on doing with that?” It added a long “hmmmmmmm?” as two green eyes opened wide in the darkness.
“You’re a…”
“Something got your tongue?” it asked.
“How did I get here? And how the hell can you speak?”
“I’ll answer one of those questions,” said the cat. “You should pick carefully.”
“Fine. How can you speak?”
The cat shook its head.
“But you said you’d tell me.”
“I made no such promise.”
“You did too.”
“Not at all. I said I would answer one of those questions. But you picked the one I wouldn’t answer.”
I tossed the bottle and walked away.
“For someone who's just fallen out of a dumpster, you’re awfully surefooted. Have you no conception of what lurks in these parts?”
“All the more reason for me to be going,” I said.
“You should stay put. Red Star Square is already crawling with goons. Witches draw crowds.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“The Mistress is due to be hanged on the morrow’s eve…” The cat extended a claw and began scratching a crude hangman into the wall. “The gallows are—”
“Good night!” I stomped towards the mouth of the alleyway. Some nefarious joke this was. When I got through with that damned concierge, there’d be hell to pay.
“Stop!” yelled the cat, and when I tried to kick past, the damn beast scampered up my leg and wrapped itself round my neck.
“Get off me—!”
A sharp claw pressed against my jugular.
“Do not mistake me for my aloof brothers and sisters,” whispered the cat. “I take great satisfaction in human anatomy.”
“What do you want from me?”
“It is not what I want, but what my mistress needs. You’ll have to be flexible. If you wish to return home, that is?”
I nodded quickly.
“And you understand that this endeavour will be dangerous, for witches have cunning enemies, the kind that require an equal measure of finesse to defeat.”
“I understand.”
“Bravery’s important too.”
“Fine.”
“Hmmmmm.” The cat drew a slow scratch down my cheek. “I suppose then—”
Something scuttled in the shadows and the cat leapt after it.
I wiped the blood from my cheek.
From the mouth of the alleyway I saw two yellow headlights flaring through the mist. The bus gave a long, hungry honk.