"My, my, my, what have we here?" It was a feminine voice, light and lilting and pleasing to the ears. And one Kataryna recognised instantly. Her ears flattened and her neck fur rose.
"Titus," she whispered, "run, run now." Beside her the deer let out a little nickering-sigh. Kataryna took a deep breath. "Hello Tawny," she said with as much composure as was possible.
"Oh look, a couple of kitty-kats," Tawny continued, "all losted in the woods." She paused. "You really don't want to point that at me, kitty."
Titus made a noise low in the back of his throat, a rumbling, feral growl. "Leave now."
"Tsk, tsk, you shouldn't be threatening me. Something bad might happen to you, you know." As if on cue, Titus unleashed a startled shriek and there was the sound of some sort of scuffle. A brief flash of time later the Feline tumbled into the hole beside her. There had been barely enough room for her and the deer. Titus struck her and the two of them tumbled to the floor in a cascade of dirt. The deer screamed and bucked.
"That black fellow jumped me," Titus muttered. "I'm sorry."
"You should have run when I told you."
"And leave you here? At her mercy? Do no be so foolish babe."
"I told you," Kataryna snarled through gritted teeth, "please do not call me that."
"Having fun down there kiddies?" Tawny cooed. She dropped to the ground beside the pit trap and leaned over it, her face coming into view. She had dyed her hair since those distant days of Tirra-Inle, it now hung in blue-black curls about her slender face. She stared at Kataryna, her eyes alight with delight and amusement.
"I went to your funeral," she said, "a year ago. It was so touching." Somehow she made those words sound mocking. "I couldn't believe you'd slashed yourself. Still," she shrugged, "you were too naïve and happy in Uni, and the higher you get, the harder you fall." Her smile widened, displaying teeth. "Poor, poor Danny boy," she sighed, "he's no longer nearly as delectable as he was in Uni. Poor thing's nothing more then skin and bones now. Really Kittie-Kat, they may call me cruel but you really take the cake, the cream and the icing. Maybe I should take some tips from you."
Tawny's words struck Kataryna as surely as any weapon. Her hands clawed and tears lined her eyes, awaiting their marching orders. The words were all the harsher because they were true. All of them.
And Tawny was not done with her yet.
"You know, despite what you'd done to him, how you'd slashed his life away as surely as your own, he gave a very touching speech. Or would have, had he not become so overwhelmed with his grief that halfway through he could do nothing more then stutter and stammer like a simpleton." She sniggered, "you're a treasure, love, a real treasure."
Kataryna wondered if she were going to be sick, and perhaps would have, had Titus not put his arm about her shoulders and whispered in her ear: "she uses her words like weapons, babe, they're nothing more then that."
But Kataryna knew that was not true. She had betrayed the mutual bond between her and her beloved, shattered it with a single crimson slash. It was an act from which she could, would, never forgive herself. And she doubted Daniel would either. No matter how much he loved her and how much she loved him, there were some sins that could never be forgiven.
The Fossa grabbed a handful of dirt and started sprinkling it over the two captives. "I would so love to stay and chat, Kittie-Kat, but would you believe it, Dary, me and one of our mutual friends are going to a rock concert tonight. Don't you just love them? The adrenaline pounding through your body as the music takes hold, the way you feel at one with the crowd." She paused, "the horrible screams as the flesh is seared from their wretched bodies and the mass hysteria as they stampede for the doors." A light chuckle rose from her throat, "well, have fun kiddies, don't do anything I wouldn't."
It was only then that Kataryna dared to believe that Tawny had only just begun her game as was planning on stringing it out over a much longer, and in her mind more delectable, fashion. Perhaps she really did mean to leave without torturing, maiming or killing either of them.
She should have known better.
Tawny vanished from view and Kataryna's sharp ears could pick up the sounds of footfalls on leaves. She dared to breath again. The war had begun with nothing more then words.
Then the face of the Fossa materialised above them again, so suddenly the both of them jumped, lurching against each other in the close confines.
"Oh, I almost forgot," Tawny said, slapping herself exaggeratedly on the forehead. "I had a little something to give you, Kittie-Kat - an apology for killing your little pets all those years ago."
And she tipped something over the side, sending a cascade of dark black-red pellets into their midst. As they struck the ground each and every one of them uncurled, revealing itself to be a small beetle, its shell bearing the distinctive skull-head pattern of the blagh gru, the vampiric cockroach.