Fool's Moon, page 10
The street dogs saw the scars, too, and Ophelia saw them exchange glances again. A good fighting dog could easily take on two canines at once and finish the battle victorious. And even if the fight ended in a draw, there would be bites and blood to spare … mostly on the street dogs’ side.
After a few seconds of silence, Rally the terrier gave an exaggerated yawn.
“Whatev,” he said in imitation of young humans Ophelia had heard, waving a skinny paw. “We’ve got better things to do than mess with felines all night long. You’re starting to bore us, pit bull. Why don’t you take your black cats and leave?”
“Thanks, I’ll do that.”
Keeping her gaze fixed firmly on the street dogs, Zuki added, “Hi, Brandon, I’m your sister’s friend, Zuki. Why don’t you hop on over here, and the three of us will get out of these fine canines’ fur.”
“Sounds good to me.”
With that brash reply, Brandon backed up to the rear edge of the trash container, took a running start, and then sprang. As Ophelia watched in amazement, he sailed over the street dogs’ head and lightly landed on the alley surface a few feet past them. Never breaking stride, he bounded over to Zuki’s opposite side and said, “What are we waiting for?”
“Walk like normal,” the pit bull instructed in a low voice meant only for his and Ophelia’s ears. “If you run, they might change their minds and give chase.”
Nodding their agreement, the two black cats swung about and began padding toward the gap in the buildings where Zuki and Ophelia had first entered. The pit bull brought up the rear, though she glanced back a time or two to make sure the street dogs weren’t going to make a cowardly rear attack. Only when they rounded the building and were on the street again did Zuki quietly command, “Run!”
At that, the trio took off, flying down the sidewalk like cats and dog with tails afire. They didn’t stop until they reached the wooden bench where Ophelia and Zuki had earlier spoken with the gray-striped toms.
“We should be all right now,” Zuki panted out. “Brandon, are you okay? Those canines didn’t hurt you, did they?”
“I’m fine … but they could have ripped my paws off and I wouldn’t care. All that matters is that I’m back with my sister again!”
With a joyful meow, he jumped atop Ophelia and playfully knocked her over.
“I thought I’d never see you again,” came his happy yowl as he gripped her with all four paws and rolled about the sidewalk with her in a mock fight. “I came back for you that day we were in the box, but you were gone. I went out looking for you every single night afterwards. When I couldn’t find you, I was hoping a nice human took you home.”
“A nice human did!”
Meowing in happiness, Ophelia broke free of the play fight so she could explain about Ruby and the Botanica.
She swiftly told him the basics … how Ruby and Zuki had found her, half dead, in the box and carried her to the shelters. She also told him how, when the shelter people called him, Mrs. Givens’s son claimed he had no idea how his mother’s two cats had vanished and wanted Ophelia put up for adoption.
“When no one brought you to the shelter, too, I knew my only chance to find you again was to let a human adopt me so I could run off and look for you. Tonight was the first time I found a way out onto the streets, thanks to Zuki. So where have you been all this time? Hiding from canines?”
“I was staying with a human, too,” Brandon explained. “It’s a strange place called PAWN. The human likes me because he thinks I keep the mice away, and he doesn’t care if I go out at night. If we keep walking, we’ll go right past it. Look, you can see the sign now.”
He pointed a paw. A block away, Ophelia could see the glow of red light against window glass. If she remembered the landmarks she’d been watching, the place wasn’t that far away from the Botanica. Brandon had been in yowling distance all this time, and she hadn’t known it!
Brandon, meanwhile, had turned his attention to Zuki. “I guess I should thank you for saving me from those street dogs. Would you really have fought them?”
“If I had to do it to save you or Ophelia, yes,” the pit bull said with a small shudder. “But other than that, I’ll never fight another dog again.”
“Zuki doesn’t have to fight,” Ophelia informed him, worried that her friend was remembering things even worse than a suffocating box in the street. Trying to cheer her up, Ophelia added, “She’s the smartest canine I’ve ever seen, almost as smart as a feline.”
To her relief, the pit bull snickered, obviously amused by the compliment. “That’s pretty high praise, coming from a cat.”
“Well, it’s true.” Ophelia gave her whiskers a quick preen. Then, changing the subject, she said, “So, do you think Ruby will let Brandon stay at the Botanica, too? Remember, Ruby told Luciana that she would take him if Luciana found him.”
“Luciana?” Brandon echoed, velvety black nose twitching in puzzlement. “You mean our Luciana who lived with us in the old house? You’ve seen her?”
Ophelia nodded. “She came to the Botanica—the place where I live now. It’s a long story, and there’s some bad stuff I have to tell you. I think she’s in trouble. I know she needs help, so that’s our next job, now that we’ve found you. But we should probably go home first. Ruby will be back from the school place soon, and we don’t want her finding out that we sneaked out. Besides, the street dogs might get brave again and come looking for us.”
With that, the three trotted down the sidewalk at a quick pace, ducking into a doorway or behind a trash can whenever a human drove or biked past. Every so often, a ragged-looking person would rise from the shadows like a street dog, giving Ophelia a start. Unlike the three canines they’d just encountered, however, those people cared nothing for two cats and a dog on the prowl.
She was limping a little now. Her paws made sore from climbing the stucco wall earlier in the day were now even more raw from their mad dash escaping the street dogs. But no way was she complaining! Scrapped paw pads were a small price to pay for having her brother back safe with her.
By now, the half-moon was higher in the sky, and by its light Ophelia saw in relief that Brandon appeared just the same as last time she saw him. Maybe a tail’s worth thinner, but no scrapes or scars to show for his adventures on his own.
Still, Ophelia shot her brother a concerned look. She hadn’t thought beyond finding him. But maybe he liked this PAWN place where he’d been living and wouldn’t want to leave it. That would mean she would have to abandon Ruby and Zuki and the Botanica and go there. But then, what if the PAWN human didn’t like her?
She gave a soft, uncertain mew. Of course, she could stay where she was, and Brandon could remain in his new home, and they could visit each other sometimes. But things would never be the same. It would almost be worse than if they’d never found each other again!
“Look,” Brandon exclaimed before she could figure out this puzzle. They had drawn even with the building with the red light in the window, and he waved a dramatic paw. “We’re here. This is PAWN.”
Letting herself be distracted, Ophelia stared up at the sign made of red light. What PAWN meant, she had no clue. But then she noticed something else about the window.
“Look, Zuki! It’s the three golden balls that Philomena talked about! She really did know where Brandon was staying.”
She pointed a paw. Beneath the bright red PAWN was a dark blue bar of light. Below that bar, like oranges hanging in a neat row, were three balls of yellow light.
“Remember what she said, Zuki?”
Not waiting for a reply, she squinted her eyes as she sought the exact words.
“The three golden balls, he wanders those halls. Yes, the boy cat be all right. But finding him, ’twill be a fight,” she triumphantly recited. “The golden balls meant the place called PAWN, and we did have to fight to get Brandon back!”
Zuki shrugged. “I told you Philomena knows what she’s talking about.”
“Who’s Philomena?” Brandon wanted to know.
Ophelia shrugged. “You’ll meet her … that is, if you want to come home with me and Zuki.”
Fearful of hearing his answer, however, she distracted herself by raising up and, front paws on the windowsill, peering inside the shop.
This was a strange place, indeed! While the Botanica had long since closed for the evening, this place was lit within and appeared to be, as Ruby would say, doing business. She could see two or three humans milling about, and another two leaning over a counter near the store’s front. Like the Botanica, the shop had shelves filled with things, but the goods were nothing like what Ruby sold.
Tools and suitcases and musical instruments and even computers.
Brandon raised up and peered inside the window with her. As if reading her mind he said, “It’s a strange place. People bring stuff in, and the human—his name is Luis—buys it from them. And then after a while he sells the same things to other people. But it’s fun to wander through and see what’s there. Though he has scary stuff, like animal heads that have been nailed to pieces of wood!”
Ophelia gave a little shudder. The son had a giant fish—rather like the fish at the bottom of the pool—mounted on a piece of wood that he hung on the wall of his room at the old house. Even though she liked eating fish, something about hanging the fish’s body like a picture was frightening. She’d never want to live in a place like PAWN that had so many unnatural things.
Luckily, it seemed that Brandon felt the same way … or did he? But before she could ask him again if he would come live at the Botanica with her and Zuki, the pit bull barked, “The street dogs followed us! Quick, we need to run!”
Ten
Ophelia shot a frantic look over her furry shoulder. Two blocks behind them, but swiftly gaining ground, were the boxer mix and German shepherd, Bobo and Sammy. Rally the terrier trailed a distance behind, short legs churning as he did his best to catch up with his compatriots.
“Follow me,” Zuki woofed. “I know a shortcut.”
Once again, the threesome made a mad dash for safety, though this time the danger was far more immediate. Zuki’s earlier bluff had worked, but only for as long as it had taken for the street dogs to decide they’d been played. Apparently they’d decided they weren’t going to let this intrusion on their turf go unpunished.
“Quick, around this corner,” the pit bull commanded, making a swift right. Brandon and Ophelia banked and turned, too, though the quick spin on battered paws made the latter mew in pain.
Almost home, she told herself, panting. You can stand the pain a little long—
Abruptly, her paw caught on a bit of broken sidewalk concrete, and she went tumbling toward the curb.
“Ophelia!” she heard her brother yowl.
Help! she tried to yowl back, but she couldn’t catch her breath. But she knew she was rolling straight toward the busy street. She could hear the roar of automobiles rushing right to the spot where, at any moment, she would be sprawled. And then everything merged into a single earsplitting cacophony … a blast from an auto horn … a squeal of brakes … Brandon yowling in fear.
And then, as headlights pinned her in place and car tires spun relentlessly toward her, she was snagged by the nape of her neck and swung skyward.
In the next instant, Ophelia found herself lying in a small strip of weeds next to the curb as a small red car with one broken tail light roared past her. Zuki was standing over her, pink tongue lolling from her jaws as the pit bull stared down at her in concern. Just like that very first time Ophelia had seen her.
Brandon, meanwhile, had rushed to her side. “Zuki saved you! That car would have run you over if she hadn’t been so fast on her paws and dragged you back onto the sidewalk. Are you all right?”
“I—I’m fine,” Ophelia insisted in a valiant tone, though she had a bump behind one ear, and two of her paws were now bleeding in earnest. Then, remembering why they’d been running in the first place, she choked out, “The street dogs! They’ll catch us!”
“Not if we run faster!” Zuki shot back. “We’re still a couple of blocks ahead of them. But I’d better carry you the rest of the way.”
Before Ophelia could protest, the dog had caught her by the nape again and, with a quick move lightly tossed her over her shoulder and onto her back again.
“Hang onto my collar like last time!” she ordered as Ophelia regained her balance. To Brandon, she barked, “Stick by me! There’s too much traffic now to try to dodge it. We have to wait for the right moment, even if we lose some of our lead.”
Brandon nodded and crouched, ready to spring the instant the pit bull gave the word. Ophelia sank her claws into her friend’s collar and stayed low so that she wouldn’t throw the canine off balance. Behind them, she could hear the street dogs baying, and she dared to take a quick look back.
The boxer and shepherd were getting closer, long legs covering ground faster than the sturdy Zuki could move with her shorter limbs. Now she could see their tongues lolling and their eyes gleaming each time they dashed past a streetlamp.
Too close for comfort, the thought flashed through her mind.
Maybe too close to outrun!
But before she could warn Zuki, the pit bull gave a harsh bark. “Go!”
The canine sprang into the street, Ophelia clinging to the dog like a burr on a kitten and Brandon at her heels. The trio dashed across the first two lanes and halted on the concrete median to let a rusty blue truck and a smoke-spewing two-door car rumble past.
“Wait! Wait!” Zuki barked, while Ophelia glanced back again to see that the street dogs had almost reached their original crossing point. Then, as another gap in traffic appeared, the pit bull yelped “Go!” and took off.
“Go, go!”
Ophelia heard the high-pitched word echoing behind her as Rally the terrier urged on his faster friends. She squinted her green eyes shut. She didn’t want to see the pair overtake them, didn’t want to see her brother caught in their jaws, didn’t want to see slashes of blood on Zuki’s white fur. Before that happened, she vowed, she’d release her grip on the pit bull’s collar and let the street dogs go after her, so that Brandon and Zuki could make their escape.
“YIIIIIPE!”
The high-pitched shriek of an injured canine pierced the air just as they reached the safety of the far corner. Zuki halted on the curb and swung about. “Look!”
To Ophelia’s shock, the boxer mix who a moment early had been in full chase mode now lay in the street. Half a block down the road, a boxy black sedan slowed for an instant as a human stuck his head out the window. The head promptly vanished, followed by the squeal of tires as the sedan shot forward, leaving the injured dog behind in the gutter.
“He’s hurt,” Brandon meowed in concern. “Should we—”
“He’s just clipped,” Zuki cut him short. “His own fault for not watching for cars. Don’t worry, his friends will take care of him. Come on!”
She swung about again and started running, Brandon at her side. Ophelia managed another look back. The boxer, Bobo, was slowly getting to his paws again while Sammy the shepherd stood guard, barking at approaching cars to warn them off. She gave a reflexive sigh of relief. While neither dog would have hesitated to sink fangs into her, she couldn’t help but be glad the big mutt hadn’t been killed.
Though he definitely deserved a bruised flank and a limp!
“You dummies!” she heard Rally yapping in the distance. “You let them get away-y-y-y-y!”
By the time Zuki rounded the corner to their block, the street dogs’ barks had faded. A moment later, she dashed into the side yard of the darkened Botanica, headed for the fence.
“Hurry,” she barked, halting to let Ophelia slide off her back again. “I can hear Ruby’s car. We need to get inside the fence before she drives past and sees us.”
The doorway in the fence was still propped slightly open courtesy of the rock, just as they’d left it. Zuki shoved a big paw behind one picket and lifted the wood so that Ophelia and Brandon could crawl past. The pit bull squeezed in after them, then knocked the rock aside so that the doorway could swing completely shut. It had just settled into place when headlights flashed across the fence, and they heard Ruby’s bug car—Beetle, Ophelia heard it called—pulling into the driveway.
“Ruby’s home,” the pit bull said unnecessarily. “Quick, let’s get inside before she unlocks the door.”
A few moments later, they’d dashed from the courtyard through the dog door and were trotting down the short hall toward the main shop.
“Sightsee later,” Zuki told Brandon as he gazed about the place, nose twitching and green eyes wide as he took in the aisles of herbs and crystals and statues. “Go hide behind the counter while we figure out how to introduce you. Ophelia, pretend you’re napping or something.”
She cut short her words at the sound of jangling keys at the door and flopped onto the tile floor, feigning sleep. Ophelia leaped onto the counter and curled into a tight ball, trying not to snicker as she heard Zuki pretend to snore. Brandon, meanwhile, had followed orders and was but a shadow against the back wall.
“I’m home,” Ruby called as she pushed open the front door, letting in a swath of light from the street beyond. Swiftly relocking the door behind her—apparently the streets after dark weren’t always safe for humans either—she set down her backpack on the counter.
Zuki gave a little woof, like she’d just awakened, and extended all four legs in a mock stretch. Ophelia contented herself with flexing a paw as the human gave her a quick head rub before bending to pat Zuki.
“Good girls. I knew I could trust you to behave. I don’t know about you, but I’m starving. Why don’t we go into the kitchen for a snack?”
Zuki, who never turned down food, gave a bark of approval and stood. With a happy meow—all this running about had made her hungry, too—Ophelia scrambled to her paws as well. Letting the pit bull take the lead, she waited until she and Ruby had gone into the hall before she peered over the opposite side of the counter.
