I was never a happy girl. It wasn't due to the unrelenting stares and jeers of the common people. Or the constant comparisons to my perpetually bouncing sister. Although I suppose those didn't help.

But I had something much more important to worry about. As long as I can remember, I was haunted. No, not metaphorically. My demons were very real. Whispers in the night. Scratches on my window. Shadows chasing me down the hall. Of course no one believed me. But that did nothing to comfort me. It only pushed me deeper into solitude. 

Although I had many sleepless nights, one in particular showed me that this world did not just exist to house beautiful fields, boundless streams, and annoying sisters. The true purpose of this world was to imprison something far more sinister.

I was nine years old. Cornered in the library, surrounded by impossible darkness, tears streaming down my face, shivering like a disgusting soaked rat, I saw them.

Andromeda awoke the next morning to the sound of shrill laughter echoing the halls. Obviously annoyed by her interrupted beauty sleep. She kicked open the library doors to find me, on the ground, panic in my eyes, and laughter unwillingly streaming from my mouth.

After much frustrated slapping and kicking the foreign voice within my throat finally uttered something new. Something I’d never forget.

The eyes of ruin. The cat finally spoke. 

Although I've never heard the phrase spoken out loud since that night, I felt in my frail bones this stupid cat was referring to the very same thing that has darkened the back of my mind for years. Suddenly I was that nine year old again.

“No-no…they can't be real.” 

Oblegaimon’s face was as grave as a cat’s face can get. His amber eyes flashed. 

Archer, do you recall the story of the day of your birth?

”Well,” I said haltingly, “Mama had been in contractions for hours, they had sent for the doctor and the midwife, when—“

No, you sweet naive waif. The other stories.

My bright eyes bugged out of my face, like a rat’s do when you squeeze it. 

“You mean…the start of the Fae war?”

Oblegaimon bowed his head then, his whiskers scraping the lacquered floor. 

Humans call it the Fae War—some far-off conflict among warring kingdoms, a conflict that does not concern them. But humans are fools to think themselves exempt. It will find a foothold in this world—just as soon as it is done ravaging its own. The Fae Kingdom is less a land of continents and seas the way you imagine it. It is, rather, a world adjacent to this one, occupying a frequency just slightly apart. But where the barrier is thin—well, it would only be natural for the Fae to bleed through, wouldn’t it?

I had stopped listening because I noticed a whole entire wolf’s nose in the soup, and I was trying to dig down between the radishes to get a better piece of meat, because it was really gross, and Gods knew my willowy, emaciated frame needed the protein. But the next thing Obie said snapped me back to attention.

Archer…your birthdate is no coincidence.

Broth spilled out of my slack jaw, dribbling down my bony, pixie-like chin. 

Just then a knock was violently applied to the front door. Everything loose, shook with each haunting thud.

Quickly cleaning my dribble off my chin I fixed my eyes to the door. 

“Expecting someone?”

Obie’s hairs slowly rose. 

Cats don't get visitors. We don't make for good hosts.

“Awh that's sad!” I glanced down at the wolf nose bobbing fervently in my soup. “But yeah I get it.”

A second barrage of knocks echoed throughout the cottage. With the final slam the wooden door began to crack, scattering splinters to the floor.

The erie quiet afterwards was almost as deafening.

“So…are we gonna get that or?”

Are you joking? Fuck no. Follow me.

I followed Obie towards the iron stove. I was shocked to see a dark hallway behind it.

“Was…this always there?”

Obie ignored me and effortlessly hopped on top of the stove and leaped into the darkness ahead. I listened as his cute little footsteps went deeper within and out of earshot.

I mentally shrugged and began clumsily squeezing myself behind the stove. My pathetically tiny waist and inadequate perky chest effortlessly maneuvered between the iron protrusions of the stove. But my shameful basketball ass got caught. Sandwiched between the backside of the stove and the entrance to the hallway.

KNOCK KNOCK CRASH

The wooden door flew across the room and slammed against the wall beside me. I shielded my face from the shreds of oak and debris thrown across the house from the collision.

Squinting through the floating dust at the entryway, I could barely make out the outline of a figure. I saw what looked like a sweet little dumpling of a granny. Gross, an old person.

Feeling another presence next to me I turned to my side to find myself face to face with Obie. His eyes were incredibly wide. His kitty jowls looked as if they were pulled down tightly into an exaggerated frown. A mixture of rage and disappointment, expressions I've never before seen on a cat.

What the hell is taking so long.

“My booty too bumpy” I pouted. “And who puts a hallway behind a massive iron stove!”

Obie hissed and swatted at the stove which instantly ignited in flame within it's hearth.

“Ow! Shit! Ow! Okay I'm going! Stupid magic cat!”

I quickened my pace wiggling my backside closer and closer to freedom. Meanwhile Obie positioned himself between myself and the door. Crouching down, looking ready to pounce. He snarled as the old lady took her first step within the home.

“RRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH” An inhuman scream emitted from the old woman. As soon as her foot reached the floor boards, she erupted into an explosive ball of something hot, bright, and flamey. 

I shielded my eyes from the bright light. 

“Stop lighting things on fire!”

That wasn't me. Well not directly. It's a seal to keep out- OH NEVERMIND.

Obie lept onto my face and with a force way more than I’d expect from a tiny cat, pushed me free of the stove and into the darkness. I tried fixing myself upright but couldn't keep my feet planted onto the floor. I watched as the light from the stove receeded further and further from view. I was falling. That idiot cat built a hallway perpendicular to the ground. 

I reached out and tried to grip onto the furniture or door knobs I flew past with no avail. Looking downward I saw a red door coming up fast.

Suddenly I remembered what the old man who tended to our ritual bows used to say. 

“When I was your age I practiced kissing with my granpapy’s taxidermy!”

No not that.

“To survive falling from a great height the best thing to do is go as limp as my rod! Kekekeke!”

I winced at the memory but heeded the old man's advice anyway. I closed my eyes and relaxed every muscle in my body. Imagined I was nothing but a rag doll.

This better work you ol pervert.

I slammed into the red door which promptly ripped off its hinges before finally smashing into dirt ground below.

I had landed in a beautiful idyllic clearing within a forest so perfect and lush it looked ripped straight out of a perfect painting. There wasn't anything like this in the dark and sinister forest of the cauldrons. God rays danced between vibrant green leaves and lightly kissed the ground speckled with flowers of impossible colors.

Unfortunately the moment was completely lost on me.

“OHHHHH GOD OOHHH GOD!” I wailed in pain at my crumpled body. Sharp waves of agony ripped through me as I gripped my broken ribs. “I'll kill him! I swear to God I'll kill that sad old fucker!”

The Bogmogog Witch may be ugly, but she’s not a he. Oblegaimon admonished from where he sat, prettily, amongst the wildflowers. 

“No, not…never mind.” I stayed crumpled on the ground for a moment, letting the pain ebb. 

Eventually I rolled onto my back. Opening my silver and gold speckled eyes, I gasped to see only wide, blue-bird sky above me. No tunnel hallway or dark drop. I sat up, with a wince, and whirled my head around. My wretched curls bouncing lightly over my thin, narrow shoulders. 

“Where are we?” I asked, feeling a bit fed up with the continuous location changes. I couldn’t keep having things happen, and then narrowly escaping them, unresolved, by being magically transported somewhere else.  

We’re behind the stove, of course. Obie said, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. We’ll be safe here for a bit.

“For a bit?” I looked around nervously. 

Well, until we get hungry. And you didn’t eat much of your stew…it’s not easy for a cat to carve up a wolf and make it into soup, you know. Obie said with a wink. I’ve explored this place for hours, and I’ve found nothing but weeds and flowers for miles and miles. He lifted a small black paw and pointed it behind him. You’re covered in soot and grease. There’s a creek over there. Why don’t you wash up and I’ll explain some things that I didn’t explain.”

“Things you didn’t explain?” 

Stop parroting the last thing I said back at me.

“Back…at…you?” My head was spinning, and not from the fall.