Read Hollhaus Vampyre :: The Chickenbone Throne

I believe it is best to begin with my earliest true memory, that is, a memory free from the dark edges and vague shapes the passage of time gives it. But before I begin, I must say that, had I written this just a month or even a week before today I might have been able to conjure up an older memory... but lately I've been thinking about cats, cats and their little idiosyncrasies. And so this is the oldest true memory I can think of.

I recall how the French trees scratched the sky, every breath of wind bringing with it a swirl of dead leaves. The trees were so tall to me then, for I had taken the form of a small child, no older than eight, whom I had found rotting by the roadside.

It was the Plague that took him, its fleas borne upon the backs of the Bloodless, Lycan servants who rebelled against the Vampyre Cults. No doubt they stole into the nearby town Issoire and spread it there, I thought, No doubt the hysteria has already begun.

Just as they intended.

I was a Vampyre, and thus had become well-acquainted with hysteria. Scapegoats are always found first, I knew, the first of them being those that are different. The Jews would be murdered or exiled, then behind them the lepers, and behind them the deathly poor or other outcasts. I could help none of them, for I did not yet have the tongue, nor the mind, to manipulate Humanity. But, when they ran out of Human scapegoats...

I climbed a tree and set myself comfortably in its crotch. Drawing from my wasteband a flute, I played a bewitching melody, eerie to Humans and plants and most beasts, creatures with souls; but not to Vampyres, and not to cats.

As I played out they came from the undergrowth, a grey, a tabby, a spotted, a black. For a while they gyred about the base of the tree, twitching their tails and flicking their ears at the sound. Until eventually, one remembered that he could leap, and so he jumped into the tree, and the rest followed him, so that by the end of my song nearly every branch of the tree held a cat, purring and prodding and nudging. At this sight I could not help but giggle, the shrill giggle of the dead boy.

When I dropped out of the tree I was finally able to count them. There were a dozen in all, mangy and scrawny. I counted them by their eyes - those that were not closed by sickness or injury - which shone Daemonically in the midnight gloom. I think now that, should a Human have chanced upon us that night, they should have been stricken by the sight: dozens of red, glowing eyes, mine chief among them, hanging in the still darkness, appraising them. Could I now laugh, I would.

Beyond that place I took my Cult of Cats north. It is among the Vampyre's simplest abilities, if they live long enough, to sense the tides of pain and suffering that hang in the air, the collective consciousness of Humanity. Following these tides, within three hours I brought my feline host to Veneix, and swelled their ranks with another dark song. Then to Clermont-Ferrand, and then to Murol.

But at Murol, things were different. In the half-built castle atop the hill, I heard voices and the sound of work. I resolved that it must be early morning, and that my flute-song would attract unwanted attention. The cats seemed to be brought low by the fact that I could not play, and grew more affectionate with me in order to achieve that end. With a stern look I confirmed that I would not, and then most of them grew indignant. In the eyes of two of the cats I fancied I saw a spark, a sign of the quarter-sentience sometimes gifted to lesser beings. Very quickly these two came to jointly lead the group, with one representing their more savage interests, and the other representing more complex thoughts for their animal minds. There, as the sun rose, I decided I would name them, but being that I have no soul, and therefore am unable to be creative, I simply named one Spot and the other Black. Of all the cats that turned up their noses at the fact that I would not play, Spot the Savage was the first. And of all the cats that still stayed by me, willing to listen to what next I had to say, Black the Brain was the first.

I told them that I must be entombed come dawn, that they can go where they please, and that I should not see them until the night has come again. And so I buried myself in the earth, and slept until dusk.

By night when I awoke and rose from the ground, I found battle-scars upon the cats. Missing fur here, deep scratches there, eyes shut from pain. I could tell these wounds had been cat-inflicted, and, when I saw how they sat before me as I woke, divided into two groups, Spot's and Black's, I understood why.

At first I believed this no more than a toddler's conflict, where a line is drawn between two warring nations, only for them to come together for their mother, to suck. But, as the night progressed, and I played my flute-song in the villages Murol, Le Mont-Dore, La Bourboule, Tauves, I saw in my ever-growing host of cats, an ever-expanding division of hate.

The head came very late in the night, at the cusp of dawn. Before, neither side openly fought in front of me, content with simply growling and posturing, but when a bird was knocked from a tree by one of Spot's cats, the fight began. At the head, Spot and Black came at each other, clawing and screaming, and behind them, the rest fought savagely, as if in war.

When a lull came, and both sides retreated to lick their wounds, they found me sitting against a tree. They were ashamed, as any children are when they see deep dissappointment in the eyes of a parent. For a moment, the cordon between them fell as they sat before me, penitent. I was convinced I had made a mistake in doing this, in playing the flute-song, in bringing them together, though they rubbed and purred to convince me otherwise. The deepest shame was in the eyes of Black, who approached Spot to show that they could be brothers again. As he came close, Spot clawed him, beginning another fight. I turned away from them. This fight ended as soon as it started, and the shame was now in both their eyes. I stood up and went away from that place. Dawn was coming, and I had to be entombed soon. As they followed me I told them to go away, for I did not wish to live among hatred, as Humans do. Their heads fell low at this, and turned away as I buried myself beneath the dirt. At dusk when I awoke, I found that the cats were gone. Sighing, I took a path to the south, expecting to never see them again. Then, in a tree branch above my head, I found Black gesturing to me in a presentative manner. With the closest a cat could give to a smile, he bounded away. I followed. In a clearing at the top of a hill, I found the cats' creation, which they had sleeplessly toiled over during the day: a throne of bone. The bones of birds, of fish, of little animals, of chickens, upholstered with leaves and branches, and surrounded by cats, very proud of their handiwork. Funny, as I write this I thought of a name for it: the Chickenbone Throne, a neat little English rhyme that wouldn't have worked in Occitan.

I congratulated them heartily for their construction, petting them and smiling. This made them burst with happy energy, and they purred and playfully fought among one another, though they had not slept.

I told them to stay there and sleep, while I travelled to the surrounding villages to gather more cats. Reluctantly, they listened, and I set out with a promise that I would return. As dawn crept over the land, I returned to them with more cats. Now that they had slept, they were bounding with excitement, and I felt myself almost pushed to entomb, so that they could safely build without my prying eyes. They were so alive with energy and focus that the excitement grew infectious, I slept that morning with a smile upon my lips, knowing that they had found something to do for me... to do together. When I rose at dusk the cats were not there. I giggled at this, confident that if I took a path in any direction, I should soon find the head of a cat peeking from a tree, or his tail behind a bushel, excited to lead me to his next creation.

But they did not come.

Finally, when the curiosity became too much to bear, I walked to their clearing. And there, at the base of the Chickenbone Throne, I found them in a great pile, emptied of their blood. Away to the right I saw Spot, and beyond him I saw Black. At first I was shocked and confused, then I felt my hands, my mouth, drenched in blood... I had not eaten in three days. As I buried them, I felt a pit of sadness in my black stomach, and as I went away from there, I resolved to never again play the Song of the Cat.