The pale lights of the hall cast an eerie, somber glow into the tent as Autumn entered. It took her eyes a few moments to adjust to the gloom inside, as the interior was lit by only a single anemic lantern glowing in the corner. Her nose wrinkled as she smelt blood and medicine hanging heavy in the air. Autumn cast her gaze about, taking in the space. The tent was a modest affair, designed for either a single occupant to relax in reasonable comfort alongside their gear, or a pair to do the same in less reasonable and more intimate comfort.

However, the tent’s comfort mattered less to her than its current and sole occupant.

Upon the lone bedroll sat a somber Eme, hugging her tail tight to her chest. She drew a pair of battered knees up as Autumn entered, cradling them with a single arm. Autumn’s gaze locked onto what remained of the other that Eme tried to shy away. The catgirl’s right arm ended mid-bicep, wrapped in a swathe of fresh gauze that smelled of infection covered by a fragrant poultice.

Sable-colored ears flattened in response to Autumn’s glance.

Autumn quickly dragged her eyes back up to meet Eme’s own that stared back, wide and red-rimmed. A river of tears had carved well-traveled paths down a set of pale, sunken cheeks. Like both Autumn and Liddie, the young Felis was skinnier than she’d been at the offset of this journey; grief, horror, and starvation having hollowed her out.

The pair stared at one another silently, seeing a mirror reflected in the other’s eyes. Autumn was the first to break their gaze as a strange, suffocating warmth billowed in her chest.

Clearing her throat, she gestured to the space opposite Eme.

“May I sit?” She asked.

The sudden words startled Eme from her trance, hurriedly she offered Autumn a seat.

“Sit, please. I’m s-sorry that there isn’t much, most of my stuff got washed away.”

Autumn waved off Eme’s concerns; by now she’d slept on worse than a tent’s floor.

Choosing an unoccupied spot, she sat down as gracefully as she could, taking care not to expose herself to the poor catgirl. However, judging by the sudden flush of pink that graced Eme’s pale cheeks, Autumn might not have been as successful as she’d have liked.

Her own cheeks bloomed at the realization.

A quiet awkwardness fell over the pair like a shroud, neither knowing what to say nor what to ask. Flickering eyes would meet, only to dart away in a panic, and unspoken words died on their bitten lips.

Swallowing heavily, Autumn mustered herself against her anxiety and blurted out the first thing that came to mind.

“Liddie called you a kitty cat.”

Autumn winced as she mercilessly threw her teammate under the bus.

Wild eyes snapped to her as sable ears flattened further and fur puffed up in righteous anger.

Hurriedly, Autumn scrambled to salvage the disaster of an opening.

“That wasn’t what I meant to say—not that she didn’t call you that, but—I mean, she said you weren’t talking to the others. Are you…okay? Well, not okay okay, but are you eating, at least?” Autumn winced. “Is there food in this tower? Or…are you eating the…?”

Eme’s angry gaze lingered on Autumn a moment before she softened, her puffed-up fur settling.

Eventually, she softly spoke.

“There wasn’t any food left in the tower when I got here, not this floor anyway. The other floors are trapped and full of undead still, or so I’ve been told. We…we ate what we could.” Eme shuddered as she stared hollowly at the floor. Autumn couldn’t help but shudder, too. “Luckily, Liddie,” she glared, “gathered up a bunch of meat from a dragon carcass—ancestors, isn’t that strange to say—as we found out it doesn’t rot.”

Autumn blinked. “How’d she find that out?”

“I wasn’t awake when it happened,” Eme shrugged, “but she said she just wanted to eat a dragon before she died and went out before anyone could stop her.”

“Ha, sounds like her.”

“Mmm.” Eme agreed. “Even back on Nekomini I’d heard of her tales. Those of the Kraken Eater and the sinking of a thousand human warships. Ah, no offense.”

Autumn shook her head, her locks of freshly cleaned hair flying freely without her hat to pin them down. It felt weird to her to be without it after not removing it for so long, but it deserved to be laundered and dried. She was looking forward to seeing if Liddie tried to pick it up; the look on her face would be well worth its temporary loss.

“Is Nekomini your home?” Autumn asked.

A soft, longing look graced Eme’s face and her tight grip upon her knees was loosening.

“Yeah,” Eme breathed out the word, “it’s an island in the great thirst, one of the largest in fact. Mainly just sandy beaches and rolling grasslands. There are a few small forests and mountains, but those are sacred, so we import most of our lumber and stone. It’s…” Eme paused, thinking something over before continuing, “…nice, if a little isolated.”

Autumn smiled. “It does sound nice.”

Eme nodded, her eyes then refocused on Autumn. “Umm, what about you? What is your home like?”

It was Autumn’s turn to pause. Her brows furrowed as she ruminated on the question and whether her answer would be a lie. Finally, after a long silence, she spoke.

The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

“It’s loud; too many people and too few as well.”

Eme tilted her head quizzically, but took the answer and the ending of that line of questioning with grace. Another silence descended upon the pair, this one charged with the expectation of a question dancing on the tip of a tongue. Eme clutched at her arm instinctively and Autumn’s eyes followed.

“What…what happened?…to your arm, that is?”

Eme hunched in on herself at the question, her fingers turning white as they clutched at the stump of her arm. She ignored the pain. Fresh tears glittered in a pair of eyes that would not meet Autumn’s. The crystalline droplets fell as she remembered the screams that haunted her still.

“There was…” Eme rasped like the condemned walking towards a guillotine, “…there was a beast, a monster in the dark. He looked like a man only with the head of a cat the likes of which I’ve never seen before.” Autumn flinched, yet Eme didn’t notice, consumed as she was by recollection. “It—he…killed…” Eme hiccuped. “Delight was with me when we—when it…I ran and ran and ran.”

Eme’s tears were flowing freely by now. She brushed at them with her arm as she hiccuped.

“I still hear her screams.” Eme whispered her confession.

Autumn was silent as she took in the crying girl before her. Guilt ran rampant in her chest. It wasn’t the dancer’s death that troubled her so. Rather, it was the burden of the lives that she’d inadvertently ended with her inadequacy and the responsibility she held of delivering the devastating news to the already grieving girl. But there was fear hiding there too, an intoxicating amount. Of course, she thought, of course there’d be more.

More of the beasts that hungered in the dark.

“I…” Autumn started, “I ran into one too with…with…”

The words clawed into Autumn’s throat, refusing to be spoken. No matter how much Autumn worked her cracked lips, no words tumbled free. Eme’s teary eyes rose to meet Autumn’s frantic gaze.

She knew. Somehow she knew.

The young witch was unsure just what the other girl caught in her eyes, her expression that made it so, but she did and could not undo what she’d seen. Eme didn’t want to listen, didn’t want to hear, as the dreadful truth murdered her hope. And as she locked her eyes onto Autumn’s scared and faltering lips, awaiting their judgment, she wondered who it was that the words would kill. She could stop her. Autumn, that was. If she covered those lips, she could live a few more days in blissful ignorance, but she could not, for she felt frozen in place.

She wanted to know the truth.

Eventually, the words crawled out of Autumn.

“Leshana and Vuriac…they—”

“Was it quick?” Eme interrupted, eyes burning.

Autumn couldn’t meet them, “...no.”

Eme’s eyes watered again as she collapsed back into herself. Slowly, she drew her knees back up from where she’d steadily been relaxing and buried her sorrowful eyes back into them. Right now, she didn’t want Autumn to see her crying.

A soft whisper drifted into her ears, spoken as if saying it too loud would be a crime.

“It’s not your fault.”

Eme’s eyes snapped up to Autumn angrily, but the witch wasn’t even looking at her, just staring past her.

“It wasn’t your fault.” She whispered again.

“Shut up.” Eme hissed, shaking. She didn’t want to hear it.

Undaunted or perhaps just not listening, Autumn repeated herself like a matra.

“It wasn’t your fault.”

Growling, Eme launched herself across the space. A pair of soft lips crashing against her own silenced Autumn. The kiss was furious, aggressive, wanting, desperate and panicked, all rolled in one long embrace. It wasn’t a kind kiss or a loving one, just a wreck of emotions that wanted no more words shed between them.

Autumn returned it.

When the pair finally parted, they did so panting. Autumn rested her feverish forehead against Eme’s cooler one, her battered lips parting to speak, but Eme interrupted her with a growl before she could offer anymore meaningless words.

“Don’t…thank you, but just…don’t.” The catgirl lightly headbutted Autumn to emphasize her point.

Autumn nodded, swallowing her spit; it tasted like her.

She didn’t quite know how she felt about the Felis sitting in her lap. Attraction certainly, if the rapid beat of her heart could be trusted. There was also something more primal roaring inside of her as claws pricked her skin through the gambeson and sharp teeth bit into her lips. But whether that all combined into something more than a teenage lust, she didn’t know.

Do I even count as a teenager in this world? Wasn’t I like 20ish by this world's rotations?

The more she experienced, the less she felt she knew. Thoughts for another place, another time.

Autumn cleared her throat, ignoring the way Eme gazed with a threatening hunger at her lips.

“Umm, if you want, I can fix you?”

Eme’s eyes narrowed. “Fix me?”

“I meant your arm!” Autumn said in a panic, gesturing towards the missing section. Eme flinched, but didn’t draw back, allowing Autumn to touch her. A pale hand gently rested on Eme’s upper bicep just above the wound. It was still surprisingly firm.

“How? It’s gone, and I doubt you have any regeneration potions.” Eme winced at how harsh that’d come out. She softened her tone. “No offense meant.”

Autumn shook her head as she slowly traced the musculature of the catgirls arm with her fingers, causing a shiver to roll up Eme’s spine. Not that she was complaining or wanted her to stop.

“Those dragon bones outside ought to be sturdy, right?” Autumn held up her prosthetic fingers with a grin. Flakes had chipped off in the descent down the crystals and general wear and tear without her wand to repair them. “I was thinking about replacing these with something more robust and magical and I could do the same for you?” Autumn flushed under Eme’s hot gaze “I-if you’d like, that is. Y-you don’t—I mean—I wouldn’t presume—”

“Yes. I’d very much like an arm.” Eme said blankly, but amusement lingered behind the facade. “Idiot.”

Autumn gaped. Movement above drew her eyes. Eme’s ears stood proud and tall above her head, no longer dimmed with sadness or anger. A sudden thought, a desire, flickered through the witch’s mind.

While it was hard to do, pinned as she was by the catgirl’s weight, Autumn straightened and tried to project as much dignity as she had left.

“Well, for that rudeness, I won’t do it for free.”

Eme raised an eyebrow. “Fair, I suppose. It’s not gonna cost me an arm and a leg, is it? I’m running out of those.” She giggled to herself, as if shocked by her own joke.

Autumn coughed to hide her own smile. “I was thinking more along the lines of a favor.”

“Oh?” Eme said between her giggles.

Autumn gulped. “W-well, I’ve always wanted to pet a catgirl’s–” Eme narrowed her eyes, “—a Felis’,” Autumn hastily corrected herself, “ears. Can I?” she pleaded.

“Fine, I suppose so. Not like it’s a big deal, anyway.” Eme muttered, seemingly unconcerned, but a rising blush painting her cheeks proved otherwise.

Slowly, also reverently, Autumn scratched Eme behind the ears. The fur there was so soft, unbelievably so, almost like cotton in its feel. Eme melted into the touch and before long was pressing herself into Autumn’s gentle ministrations. A great rumbling purr from Eme’s chest startled the pair and Autumn’s hand was swiftly batted away.

With eyes wet with fresh, embarrassed tears and a face bright red, Eme chased Autumn from her tent.

“Get Mewout!” Eme flushed further. “Go away you pest, hiss!”

Autumn fled with a smile on her lips, behind her Eme grinned despite herself.

“Well, I bethink yond conversation wenteth well. Wast exposing yourself to thy bestial girlfriend part of the plan, or doth thee undress yourself for every passing wench?”

Autumn tripped.