Chương 363: 8.8

A cat guards a foolish boy. Its coat is white in the room where it watches him, a mere cat. But the boy is safer under that watch than the most fearsome hounds or armed guard. The medallion alone hanging over the boy's collarbone protected against wounding blows better than any armor. But still a cat watched him, for the boy was proven incredibly foolish, and stupidity had a terrible way of spreading.

The ingenuity of the idiot to undermine those that assured themselves in their wisdom was an often seen thing for a cat. So vigilance was always required for fools. In one of the four towers of the palace, at the furthest point from where the Shepherd Wyrm roamed. Where those that thought themselves clever to have gauged and tested the hearing of a 'mere beast', A cat was not present. Not seen, not smelt, not heard.

But still waiting, listening, watching from the dark of a corner pried open into the round curves of that desolate highest room. A risky maneuver but a needed one. A vital act even with the sniffing wind of those that would call themselves a cat's peers in sorcery. Hunting air, sand and silk was in the palace, laying snares and hides for itself in preparation to match another. Not yet realizing that already a hunter stalks those she promised to protect. After all, a cat is inconsequential, beneath notice.

But the corner split open where none had been before? The corner was a risk, a sign that another hunter could use to find what stalked the capital. But just so, a cat needed to be in that room, listening, seeing, witnessing. Watching a man who thought himself the highest of kings turning on one who had once been called a prince. It was good, the chosen prey was doomed, already within the jaws of its hunter. A mark long since having wandered from the safe thoroughfares into dangerous alleys.

The one who claimed kingship over princes spoke with a dangerous tone that promised terrible violence.

"Abas, do you think my commands are mere suggestions?" The prey who was once prince sensed danger, but it did not yet see the jaws already closing over it.

"No my king? I swore to serve your commands as law." He who was named Murad, who claimed himself to be first of his name scowled. The jaws were closing further on the once called prince Abas.

"Then is it stupidity on your part Abas? Were my instructions not clear enough? Are you perhaps feeble? Accursed in your old age?" Abas' fear rose, but as all men who pretended power he made it appear as righteous anger and bluster. Wrathful, like the smaller animal he was, the once prince tried to make himself larger.

"What is this? my king!? Who slanders my name with these-" Murad apparently had enough of the prey man's words.

"My exact command Abas, was that no word would be spoken of what my letters sent within the hearing of the wyrm child. Not one, not by any in your staff, not by you, not by any courtier in your court!" The once prince paled, but his act of fury rose ever sharper.

"My King! I have obeyed every-" The slap across the other man's face was more than the muscles of even a skilled and fit warrior in their prime could have mustered. Murad the first was well kept for a man his age, but such aged hands however calloused by the sword could not have delivered a blow which threw the once prince to the tower's floor let alone the cramped room's far wall. Nor could it have scattered teeth and blood, or cracked the jaw apart like that slap had just done.

Without intercession from the heavens or sorcerous healing the once prince might die from this wound alone. His ability to speak had been utterly ruined, leaving only the pained and garbled animal yowling of shock and pain to be spoken over by the High King. You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story. The glint of gold and sorcery shining in the rings upon the striking hand.

A cat could not quite determine the precise nature of it, but it was almost surely a fine work of the Djinn nation. Some bargained treasure either made in recent times or generations past.

"Do you have any idea what you have risked you idiot? The Wolf Prince came to me speaking of 'your' treachery. Our stars be praised, he came with sincere loyalty to me in this matter, by a miracle from the heavens your blunders have at least failed to implicate me." The ring shone as the High King's fist closed. Ruby and gold glinting where no light shined upon it. Then he kicked into the prey's chest with a silken slippered foot. Ribs cracked, blood spewed from the already broken jaw, spraying past lips.

But not a drop stuck to the weave or gold embroidery of the High King's clothes. The blood rolling with perfect repulsion from even daring to stain its thread with even a drop, not even the scent of the man's victim would cling to those silks.

"You risked all of Magarska with your stupidity Abas." Another kick and the slowly crumpling and twisting thing was spun and thrown about. Moaning and mewling, wheezing and bubbling for breath.

"You risked it and you couldn't even cover your tracks competently." An arm snaps under the silken shod toes of the High King of Murad. It was more than just a simple working to make him stronger. No, there was barely even a drop of sweat or raised heat from the skin of the one who claimed command over kings and princes. A cat recognized these things, every blow was more than effortless besides their speed and power.

"I barely had to look to find damning proof of your idiocy, Abas." The slowly disintegrating thing no longer tried to speak, it didn't even scream. Sorcery empowered kicks and stamping slippered feet breaking what was once a man piece by piece. One limb and blow at a time.

"You've somehow earned ire from your closest staff. They revealed your treachery immediately, It is shameful." A cat felt the slightest hint of stone, of metal, of powerful shields just barely heard, things mere human men could not sense but they lingered behind every strike by the one called High King. A pelvis did not so much crack as explode, shatter, shards of bone bursting from flesh, filling the room with the stink of spilling viscera and shit.

"How did you fall so low Prince of the Vanand? To have lost the loyalty of those closest to you?" An absolutely immaculate silk covered leg rose up, not even trembling in the effort. A different ring on the high king's fingers shone, a green gem set into it glowed. Bracing tendons that should have creaked with age, supporting muscles and bones that should not have been so limber without hours the High King did not spend tending his body.

"Take solace, you treasonous fool, that your family will not suffer for this dishonor, you will be said to have gone into exile to the east. An honorable dismissal having found your responsibilities too taxing in your age and the Wolf Prince sufficiently learned to act beyond your direct guidance." The foot came down one last time, and the skull exploded. The meat, blood and bone of it scattering around the slipper. Splashing over the silken finery of the High King of Magarska.

But as with all the other cleverly hidden sorcery upon the man the working kept not a drop, nor a hint of scent upon it. The cost of such a commission for clothes like this would be ruinous. The two other artifacts were equally costly. Entire cities had likely had to pay years of tithe to afford each. A cat watched from the corner in the dark. Peeking around an edge of a continuous wall. Murad who called himself High King of Magarska stepped out of the ruin that had once been called Abas, Prince of Vanand.

He turned from the chamber and walked back down the narrow stairwell. The blood was not even being left as footprints. Not even clinging to his slippers long enough to outline his steps. Only the slowly closing gap in the midst of what had been a man's head could even suggest the nature of the implements that had brutalized him. Leaving a mashed and crumpled ruin hardly identifiable as a human at all for its state. Even the noble finery shredded and near black crimson in blood from the brutality enacted on it.

Bits of the prey were scattered all around the room. Yet not even a whiff of scent could have placed the man named Murad there. If there hadn't been a witness there would be not a hint of proof as to what had transpired except that it had been violent in the extreme. A cat finally withdrew fully behind the corner. Letting it close up into as perfect a seal as was possible. Not even a single mark upon the stones.

In a guest chamber well below the tower which had borne such terrible violence a cat guarded a terribly foolish boy. One element of the streets had been walked, one carefully made snare sprung. One morsel caught. But the bigger prey yet roamed, and from this witnessed act a cat considered the greater care that would be needed before pouncing on this quarry. A cat did so enjoy the hunt.