Everyone's a Catgirl! Ch. 334: Naan Stop (Patreon)

Cailu,

This is the third letter that I have penned, and likely the third that will collect dust at the bottom of a locked drawer. I often wonder if I should burn them, as in each missive, my emotions spill from the ink without my recognizing until it is too late. 

I imagine your travels have fared well, as I’ve heard nothing of the alternative. I received word of your safe arrival in the Port of Elliot from the traders I work with. I pray Zahra has proven a worthy asset to your Party, and that Kirti has stilled her tongue. Though I am not senseless enough to believe the latter ever possible.

Not knowing where you are is…difficult. I keep repeating this in each letter as if it will bring you nearer. For so many years, you were my advisor, my mentor, and my anchor. I feel your absence like the weight of night, greedily stealing the warmth of the sun from my back.  

I mis—

A knock startled Naeemah from her letter, dragging a line of ink across the page stemming from the last ‘s.’

“Who is it?” Naeemah called as she folded the parchment in thirds and fetched the tiny golden key hidden in the decorations of her belt.

“Taraji, my lady. It’s urgent.”

“A moment, please.”

Naeemah unlocked the bottom drawer to her desk, then tugged on the false bottom she’d crafted. The other two letters were folded neatly beside three vials of her most potent poison, and a tiny carved trinket from Krethik that he’d called an ‘elephant.’ She added the new letter and reset the false bottom before closing and locking the drawer.

“Come in, Taraji.” Naeemah stood and smoothed her hands over her skirts. She willed away the heat from her cheeks, not wishing to receive Taraji red in the face. There was so much work to do on Ichi Island that there was little time for her fantasies.

Taraji entered and bowed. Her wide eyes and pale face gave Naeemah pause. This was a woman who had faced the Chikara and lived.

“I’m sorry, my lady. I didn’t know where to tell him to go.” The words spilled from Taraji’s tongue like sand in an hourglass. “So I just had him follow me. I’m not sure how many saw—”

Him? Naeemah’s heart sped. “What happened?”

Taraji bowed again, stepped to the side, and then looked over her shoulder. “Come in, please.”

Elias rounded the corner for the second time that day, cradling an unmoving catgirl in his arms. Blood stained the left sleeve of his tunic, with more smeared across his chest. The smile he’d worn before was gone, replaced by a hard stare made colder by the nearly-black iris of his right eye.

Did he do this? Naeemah fought to keep her composure. “Taraji, fetch a healer—”

“That will not be necessary,” Elias replied. “Valiqa is dead.” All of the warmth and charisma he’d put on display not an hour past was gone. “She attacked me unprovoked in the First Shell, and I defended myself.”

“By killing her?” There was no masking the sharp daggers in her words. It was happening again. Another man had come to Nyarlea to use and dispose of catgirls as he liked.

“Yes, before she killed me.” Elias adjusted his arms beneath Valiqa’s weight. “Valiqa engaged me with a Skill that would have easily laid another opponent prone. I could not allow an enemy—whom I offered multiple chances to disengage—to track me through Rājadhānī and eventually finish the job.” 

Taraji readied her spear, pointing the tip towards the center of Elias’s back. His right ear twitched in her direction, and a chilling expression twisted the corner of his mouth.

Naeemah scarcely saw such an expression, but when she did, it almost always led to the spilling of blood. He wants this situation to escalate. “Taraji, lower your spear.”

Taraji blinked. “But, my lady—”

“I will not ask you again. Lower your weapon.” Taraji relaxed her posture and kept her spear pointed away from her. Naeemah returned her attention to Elias. His features had returned to the picture of…disappointment, she realized with dismay. “Why did you bring Valiqa here?”

“First, to be honored and buried by whatever rights your world deems fit.” Elias took a step to his left, putting both Naeemah and Taraji within view. A tactician’s mind. “Second, to inform you that this woman referred to herself as ‘Captain Valiqa,’ and was raising a clan to stand against you.”

Naeemah narrowed her gaze. “I was well aware of this ‘clan’ that you speak of.” She crossed her arms over her chest as her frustration flared. The informant she’d placed among their ranks would be useless now. “By killing their leader, I’ve lost the chance to address their threat as a whole. They will disperse and reform under a new leader.”

“I fail to see the issue. Not only have I given them a tremendous reason not to attack you, but you’ve also gained more time to persuade those who did follow her not to assemble again.” 

“I will not spread fear, Elias,” Naeemah hissed. They were arguing politics as if there weren’t a woman’s corpse in his arms. “I had hoped you capable enough to understand that the shadow Magni cast on my island is one I intend to remove, not enhance.”

“Then place more guards in the Shells,” Elias countered. Anger sharpened his words to pointed tips. “You see me incapable, yet I received no aid when I was attacked by a high-Leveled woman who called herself ‘captain’ of her rebellion to any who would listen. If there are not enough guards, train more.”

“Do you think it so simple? Soldiers and guards come at a cost. Magni emptied our treasury on refinement. It will take time to recoup that loss.”

“Until you do, it will be more than my spear that’s bloodied in your streets. As I’ve heard it, you’ve had to deal with murder before my arrival.” Elias shook his head. “Paint me as your enemy if you wish, but it will not wipe away Valiqa’s senseless death.”

He walked to the sofa where Naeemah often slept during late nights spent on bookkeeping. Bending forward, he carefully laid Valiqua so her head rested on the pillow and her body on the cushions.

Naeemah watched him in seething silence. Her first instinct was to imprison him in the citadel. But that would only hurt them both—his eventual release would unleash a new wave of fear over her people, and if he was truly defending himself against Valiqa, that would set a dangerous precedent. Defend yourself and face the dungeons.

Her second instinct flowed in the vials beneath the false bottom of her desk. Cailu had promised to defend her should she need to remove the next man from Ichi Island. However, deep within her anger was a tiny voice insisting that she wasn’t familiar enough with Elias just yet. She was viewing him in Magni’s wake, actively searching for the echoes of the man who had usurped her throne.

“I leave her in your capable hands, Queen Naeemah.” Elias didn’t add an inflection to his words, but his patronizing gaze pierced through Naeemah’s chest.

Do not let him win. “Thank you for bringing her to me, Elias. We will honor her appropriately.”

“As you wish.” He bowed and turned to leave. When he reached Taraji, he paused, stared down at her, and his threatening smile returned. Taraji winced, choking her hand up higher on her spear.

The moment passed, and he was gone. Taraji exhaled and relaxed her grip, her fingers trembling around the wood.

“Taraji, would you please fetch Svarga for me?” Naeemah asked.

“Y-yes. Of course, my lady.” Taraji stepped into the doorway, glanced around the threshold, and vanished.

They would need to find a [Priest] or [Bishop] to initiate the rites, and a woman capable of digging a sizeable grave in the recently built cemetery in the Second Shell. Valiqa would lie beside the mother and kitten they’d lost barely a week before.

Naeemah moved to the couch and brushed Valiqa’s hair from her face. A catgirl in her Second Class had found her defeat at the hands of a man who’d arrived in Nyarlea less than one day before. In time, Elias would prove a formidable foe or a fearsome ally.

It was her choice to make. Alone.

Cailu… I miss you.