Strange Tales from the Land of Novis

To Kick a Cat

One unseasonably hot fall day, beneath the apple trees that stood thick and tall in the forest that bordered the small city of Minima, a young man of about 24 years old tried to shield himself from the vicious rays of the sun. He leaned against a sturdy trunk and sighed, biting into one of the apples he'd gathered. He'd barely begun to chew when a very small gray and white kitten came sidling up to him. It placed two tiny white paws on his sandaled feet and peered up at him with big, green-ringed eyes, mewing softly. Damien took another bite and looked down at the creature who clearly hoped for a bit of his snack. It was a scrawny thing, probably the runt of the litter. It mewed again, a pitiful sound. Damien sighed and shook the tiny kitten off his foot...then sent it flying with a swift kick. He watched with some amusement as the little cat went tumbling through the grass, letting out a cry of distress. Some distance away, the kitten righted itself and quickly disappeared off in the direction of the creek.

"Good riddance," the young man laughed, tossing the remainder of the half-eaten apple into the dry grass beneath his feet. It was the only apple left on the ground now, as he'd spent the better part of the morning gathering all the fallen fruit from grass beneath the apple trees, despite his grandmother's specific instructions to avoid it.

"Don't take the fallen apples, Damien! The ground fruit's not for us. It's for the worms and the little creatures. That's their share. The stuff up in the trees? That's ours." She'd rasped from her cot on the floor of her modest wooden cottage earlier that morning. With her bad knees, Grandma couldn't get around much these days, and Damien's mother often sent him to check up on her. He'd hoped the old woman wouldn't be in the mood to send him on an errand run (or two, or three) today so that he could make it to the market and attempt to woo the pretty village baker, or (or her less stunning sister, who would do just fine as a back-up) but no such luck. "Besides, you wouldn't want to feed me worm-food, now would you?" Grandma added as he walked out of the door, dismissing her with a lackadaisical wave of his hand.

"Well, beggars can't be choosers, you old fossil," he snickered, recalling the moment. Sure, he was a reasonably well muscled, red-blooded young man. It's not like it would have been hard for him to harvest the apples that still hung heavy and ripe from the trees, but that didn't mean he was going to overwork himself by wrestling for hours with branches, needlessly laboring to wrench free the finest, freshest, reddest specimens. Not to mention bothering with all the careful inspection involved in making sure each apple was "just so" for consumption. That sort of attention to detail was lady stuff, and Damien was clearly no lady or milk drinker. A few worms or soft spots here and there wouldn't kill ol' granny. Besides, the day's heat had been relentless, beating down on him like an overzealous drummer, making his skin sting and his entire body was slick with sweat. He wasn't going to let his grandmother's stupid apple craving take up any more of his day, or char anymore of his smooth tanned skin, than it already had. Realizing he'd worked up quite a thirst, he picked up his apple-filled satchel and made his way to the creek for a quick drink.

Once there, he saw a woman crouched down on her hands and knees, leaning over the water's edge further down the opposite side of the creek. He approached her slowly, noting how she didn't look like anyone he'd seen around Minima before; he'd made his mission to mentally catalog every pretty maiden within his radius. She was several shades darker than Damien, with warm hazelnut brown skin and honey colored hair that had a soft sheen in the light of the sun. She didn't seem to notice his presence at all. As he grew closer, he found himself admiring how the white silk dress she wore contrasted nicely with her features, but was taken aback when he noticed something was off: she was lapping up the water from the creek in the same way an animal would. Still, this strangeness was not enough to deter him from making an introduction; if she turned out to be some sort of ravenous lunatic, he knew he could overpower her. A madwoman was still just a woman, no match for a man like Damien.