Werecat Choice

Chapter 3. Mignis

Marianne knocked on the heavy door. The knock was muffled. Marianne took off his mitten and knocked again. His knuckles ached, but this time the knock was louder. No sound came from behind the door. The young man pushed the door, and it yielded.

– Is anybody here? Marianne asked. There was no answer. Then he cautiously went inside and looked around. There was no one in the house, but the burning lamp was alarming. “Someone lit it.”

The room was small. Unpretentious furniture made of rough boards: table, bench. Marianne closed the door behind him.

A mouse sat behind the leg of the bench and looked at the guest. Black eyes gleamed from the lamp. And when this only inhabitant of the house noticed that they were looking at him, he immediately began to scratch behind his ears, rub his face and, in general, show with all his appearance that he did not care about the guest.

The lamp stood at the edge of the table. She flickered with a yellow light in the window. The light from the lamp itself was barely enough for half a room. It was cold in the house. The hearth stood out as a blackened spot against the wall. Logs lay near the hearth. One fell under Marianne’s foot as he came closer. Wood chips were scattered across the floor. The young man looked under the bench: the mouse was no longer there. Marianne looked around for a match, but in vain. He threw off his backpack and in a small side pocket immediately found what he was looking for. Lighter. He bent down for the chips, and a couple of minutes later cheerful tongues of flame danced in the hearth. First, Marianne warmed his hands by the fire, then looked around again. The room looked a little better. In the far corner, the darkness dissipated, revealing a shabby, dirty chest and a wad of rags.

The house looked abandoned, but there was no better place to wait out the night. There was only one room in the house, and not a soul. “Where is the one who lit the lamp?” Now this question worried the young man most of all.

Marianne sat down on the bench and put the mittens beside him. The dust on the table was disturbed. The marks of small paws and thin grooves were clearly visible near the lamp itself and on the edge of the table by the bench.

The mouse slowly crawled out, carefully treading with its paws. She picked up her tail and climbed onto the bench with lightning speed. She was not afraid of the person and behaved quite confidently. As a hostess. Marianne recoiled at first from the dark woolen ball, but then saw in it a mouse and calmed down. And she looked attentively with her eyes, in which the light of the lamp walked with sharp sparks, and moved menacingly towards the mittens. Marianne found this scene comical. After all, the mouse was very small.

Suddenly, a faint, thin voice, like the creak of old door hinges, said:

– Paul, by the way, is cold! Move over and don’t crush me inadvertently!

– What? – From surprise Marianne nearly fell off the bench.

– Winter outside, as you can see. You didn’t think that I would sleep in an ice-covered hole, did you?

Marianne instinctively wanted to grab the mittens, his hand was already reaching for them, but he thought that the beast might bite, and withdrew his hand. The mouse settled comfortably on the mitten and froze. From such insolence, Marianne was speechless. He wanted to object to something, but there was no limit to the surprise at what the mouse was saying. Marianne could only open his mouth.

– Have you ever seen talking mice? Asked a faint, quiet, thin voice. “Does she also read thoughts?”

Marianne said doubtfully somewhere into the room:

– You say?

And, to my surprise, I heard the answer in the same thin voice:

– Who’s talking? What does he say?

– Can you talk? You’re a mouse! – Marianne expressed his thoughts aloud.

– Mouse, mouse! The mouse undoubtedly said with feeling. – No respect, no courtesy. By the way, I have a name! Mignis. And I don’t remember being called a mouse.

Mignis drilled her guest with beady eyes, stopped rubbing her nose with her paws. Marianne burned with curiosity, looked at the mouse with an open mouth, bent over and hunched over, trying to see it better, but kept his distance from the unusual rodent.

“What if he still bites? Doesn’t all this seem to me?”

– What surprises you?

– No, nothing … – Marianne lied.

– What is your name? The mouse asked.

– M-marianne, – answered the young man, and he himself thought, is it really all this happening to him or is he dreaming? “Maybe I’m dreaming?”

“Mimariann,” the mouse repeated quietly under her breath. Probably to remember.

– Marianne! He said more confidently. – Not “mi”, but “ma”.

Mignis ignored the comments and squeaked:

– Move the lamp to the edge of the table. It will be warmer.

Marianne obeyed, though he doubted it would make it warmer. The mouse seemed to be sulking at him.

He felt disposed towards the mouse. She was small, but rather brave. Talking to a person bigger than you, with a stranger! How would Marianne feel if he were in her place?

– Tell me, Mignis, who else is here?

The mouse looked at Marianne and hesitated to answer, as if pondering what to say.

– You see that only we are in the house?

“Who lit the lamp, Mignis?

“Yes, Mignis,” said the mouse. Marianne did not understand the answer.

– So someone is about to return? Probably gone to get some brushwood or water?

Mignis looked at the door.

– If anyone comes, then Yakov. Now is the time for him to appear.

– Who? Who?

– Jacob. The old hunter. – The mouse turned its nose to Marianne. “He comes almost every night if the lamp is lit. Somewhere in this hour.

Mignis looked at the wall. A dusty clock hung there. They seem to have stopped long ago. The hands froze at five to eleven.

“So you’re not alone here. Does Jacob live here?

“No,” the mouse answered shortly. – Does not live.

Marianne thought Mignis was not that talkative.

– Maybe it’s coming to light? Or can’t find the way without it? A thought struck Marianne. – So he wanders around here?

The mouse didn’t answer. She wiggled her mustache listlessly. She seemed to doze off. Marianne looked at the mouse for a minute and said quietly:

– I saw someone here. I couldn’t really see it myself. “And I thought to myself: “Is this old man sane? And then, the mouse called him a hunter. This means that he knows everything in the neighborhood like the back of his hand. Maybe ask him about Wolf Mountain? Or at least the direction to the north.”

The door trembled, the window pane creaked in the wind. It probably would have rang if it was not almost completely covered by snow. There was a heavy, muffled knock on the door and a knock on the threshold outside. Marianne froze in place with horror. A figure seeped through the door, huge and broad-shouldered, gloomy, like a transparent shadow. The ghost was tall, dressed in a fur coat, and this made him look shaggy. He moved silently around the room, ignoring Marianne. The ghost swam through the air through the room and froze, bending over the chest. As if tormented by his thoughts, it stood like that for a minute. Marianne was afraid to move, where to run. Numbness and terror seized him. Goosebumps ran down my skin, my blood froze in my veins.

Mignis did not react in any way to the appearance of another guest.

Suddenly the ghost turned to Marianne and looked at him. His beard was tousled. Black holes gaped from beneath thick and knitted eyebrows. The ghost had no eyes, but Marianne did not doubt the severity of his gaze. The mere presence of this disembodied creature made it noticeably colder in the house. And the thought that the ghost was looking into your eyes made you feel uneasy. Marianne regretted that he had wandered into this house, that he was sitting next to a lamp that perfectly illuminates it. In the twilight of the night he would not have been noticed.

So another minute passed. And then Marianne thought with hope that the ghost did not see him.

It was hard to tell if he was looking at Marianne or at the table, whether he was a threat or not. But the realization that there was a ghost in front of you imposed a mute numbness and icy fear. “The mouse was talking about a lamp. Is he looking at her?”

And then Yakov went to Marianne, turning first sideways, then chest. There was something unnatural in his movements. Legs moved limply above the floor, but did not touch it. The ghost held an ax in his hand. Marianne shuddered, and the heaviness in his muscles eased slightly. He got up and took a couple of steps back. Then another step and another, away from danger. The back rested against the wall. There was nowhere to retreat. He and the ghost were only three steps apart. A massive figure moved closer, enveloping the room in darkness.

Then, in the blink of an eye, a dark figure lunged at Marianne. At the same moment, the front door flew wide open and hit the wall. Outside, a bright light jumped across the snow. A loud hum, a metallic rumble burst into the house. The flames in the hearth dived down behind the logs, and fiercely jumped there, thinning and melting before our eyes. All the air shuddered, white snowflakes swirled, turning into clouds of white mist. Marianne squeezed into a corner and raised his hands in front of him. The ghost froze in front of the young man. A little more – and would have touched him with his huge chest, but turned around at the sound.

Then, for a reason known only to him, the ghost quickly flew out of the house, passing through the wall next to the door, while issuing a hoarse half-roar, half-voice, in which Marianne caught sight of the word: I-ako-ov!

The rumble died down, darkness reigned in the doorway. Stumbling, Marianne ran to the door. On the rails, the train swept away, casting rectangular patches of light beside it. Another second, and he disappeared behind an invisible bend, leaving behind a whirlwind of snowflakes. Marianne closed the door, bolted it and said, rather to himself:

– Wow, Jacob! How frightened! – Marianne was shaking. – Yes, and the train made this noise. – And then he added: – Maybe just by the way! After all, if not for this trouble with the train, Jacob would have attacked me.

It was not a question, but the mouse responded in the same thin voice:

– I do not know. I’ve never seen him like this before.

Mignis was still sitting in her place.

– What a warm wool! – quite quietly she said, sniffing the mitten. Jacob’s arrival did not interest her at all.

Marianne drew back from the door, listened, and, hearing nothing from outside, sat down again on the bench next to the mouse. The bravery of the little animal was admirable.

– It seems he’s gone. What can a ghost do? Is it worth fearing them?

– It is only worth being afraid and avoiding that you do not know. That’s how the spirit world differs from the shadow world, you say?

– Isn’t it the same thing? Ghosts are ghosts.

“No,” Mignis said very quietly and cautiously, as if some other ghost might hear her. “And I think both of these worlds are both interesting and have dark energies. Sometimes this energy is released. Especially when these worlds intersect.

Marianne was amazed at Mignis’s response as well as the appearance of the dreaded Jacob. And the mouse, not noticing this, thoughtfully said:

– A manifestation of these forces is a rare, dangerous, but bewitching phenomenon.

Marianne did not like the answer and generally the topic of dark ghosts. To distract himself a little, he stirred the coals in the hearth and threw in fresh logs. Then I decided to see what he had in his backpack. He reached under the valve and pulled out a plastic water bottle. Only when he saw the water did Marianne feel how much thirsty he was. He hastily unscrewed the lid. Breathing heavily after long gulps, Marianne noticed that the mouse was looking at him strangely. The guess immediately flashed through my head. He carefully poured water into the bottle cap and placed it in front of Mignis. She sipped water, closing her eyes while drinking, then began to diligently rub her muzzle with her paws. Marianne was a little touched by this sight. He liked the mouse more and more. He smiled.

“This is much tastier than melted snow,” said Mignis, seeing Marianne’s incomprehensible smile.

Marianne continued to investigate the contents of the backpack. A package of sliced bread, ten wagons of cheese, cracker packages, about ten chocolate bars, and a second plastic bottle of water. They ate dinner with sandwiches. Mignis, however, ate quite a bit of cheese. She only smelled her own piece of bread and did not touch it. He had to be put back in his backpack.

Chapter 4. Dark Energy

There was a knock on the door. Marianne’s heart sank into her heels.

“Jacob is back!”

Marianne was confused. Now he is trapped. This time, nothing will distract Jacob. Then he will kill Marianne. The knock was repeated. And oddly enough, now at its sound it became easier. The ghost would pass freely through the door. Marianne dared to come closer. Someone pushed the door, then the words were heard:

– Open it! Let me in, please!

“A living person”.

Tired quiet voice. Marianne opened. A stranger wrapped in a fur coat quickly entered the house. He closed the door behind him, took off his hood and exhaled heavily.

– Uh-uh, finally warm!

He threw off his burden and sat down by the hearth to warm his hands. He had a short beard and bushy eyebrows. He looked Marianne up and down and said:

– Didn’t expect to meet anyone here. – Then he looked around the room and continued: – My name is Viator. And you? How did you get here?

– I’m Marianne… strayed from my class.

– Well, you look like a student. – Viator looked at Marianne’s jacket. – Are you alone here? – asked the guest, making sure that there was no one else in the room.

– Yes…

Viator was thinking about something. Marianne asked:

– Are you a hunter?

– Am I a hunter? – Viator almost laughed. – You can say so. Better tell me: how did you get off your own? And where are those of yours? Do they walk anywhere nearby?

– No. I’m lost, “Marianne said partially. Then he wondered what else to answer? Can’t he say that he has a “hidden beast” in his blood? Viator gave Marianne a displeased glance.

– My class and I went on a hike, and on the way back I fell behind. And then he fell off the hill. I went to this house by rail.

– On a hike? – asked Viator. – Nobody has been here for a long time. Especially on hikes. And how did you fall?

– I went to the edge of the mountain and stumbled. I was washed down by an avalanche.

– Yes, it happens. And what kind of school?

– Saint Elvis. I recently entered there.

Viator nodded.

– Yes, there is one. She’s a little south of here. I heard that the disciples there are called “saints”. And yet it’s just wonderful that you got here.

Marianne had never heard anyone call him or another student “saint.” It seemed to him that this was an unflattering nickname, and he looked at Viator in surprise.

– Wild lands here. You could freeze to death. … Well, I’ll help you.

Viator looked around and went to the chest in the corner. He put his backpack down next to him and began examining the insides of the old chest. Marianne hesitated, and then asked a question that was tearing him to pieces from the inside, although he felt that it was better not to ask:

– How did you end up here? Are you hunting here?

Viator chuckled to himself again. Marianne was embarrassed, and he decided not to say anything more. At least until the morning.

– I’m lost too. Just like you, – Viator smiled at his joke. – I walked with a friend to the east. We wanted to get to Esterby. His brother lives there. But they quarreled as soon as possible, and parted. I chose to walk along the railroad. And he – directly through the forest. Here’s a story. Now you can’t tell who was right. I’ll have to spend the night here with you. And he is probably already in Esterby. Sleeps, snores in a warm bed, my old friend. Like this!

Viator slammed the lid on the chest. Noticing Marianne’s questioning look, he explained:

– I left something here. Last time.

Then he fixed his gaze on Marianne’s backpack. Viator’s eyebrows came together on the bridge of his nose. He walked thoughtfully to the hearth, sat down by the fire and began to put logs. His face, lit by flames from below, looked stern and hard.

Marianne saw that Mignis was no longer on the bench. Looking more closely, he noticed her under the bench. She diligently dragged the woolen mitten into her burrow.

Marianne called out to her, but stopped short. He didn’t want Viator to see her. The man stared inquiringly at Marianne. Mignis disappeared into the shadows, leaving her mitten behind. Of course, she will come back for her.

– And how did you go hiking without snowshoes? – suddenly asked Viator.

Marianne shrugged.

“Lost,” he thought quickly.

– You are probably already looking for? – Viator took the phone out of his pocket and looked at the screen.

– I could tell who needs to, call the school, but there is no network. There is no signal at all in this area. Nowhere. Wow, it’s almost midnight. – Tomorrow I’ll show you the way. Don’t worry, go back to your school. Go to bed now. I’ll settle down on the bench. Not against?

Marianne settled down near the hearth. It’s warmer here than anywhere else in the house, he thought. Having warmed up by the fire, he felt an overwhelming weakness. Thoughts were confused, eyes closed themselves, the crackling of wood in the hearth soothed.

“And what tomorrow? Walk a little south until this Viator disappears, and then immediately north?”

Through sleep, Marianne felt someone nearby, a careful rustle and fuss. Something touched my ear. But the young man did not pay attention to it. “Mignis, I guess.”

Suddenly the dream washed away. Through the veil of slumber, Marianne heard a muffled exclamation, full of fear and horror. A yellow flash before his eyes seemed to burn his eyebrows. A strip of steel from a long knife blade flashed overhead. An indistinct black figure hovered in the air. And at the same instant fell on him. Marianne leaned to the side. The knife hit the floor where Marianne’s head had been a second ago. Ragged breathing smelled in my face.

A new acquaintance attacked him. Marianne covered himself with his hands, preparing to reflect the next blow, but Viator only managed to swing his knife.

A shadow slid from under the table. A wide, shapeless and dense haze, from which the hair fluttered as if from the wind. She crashed into Viator’s figure, and he crashed to the floor. Then she dragged him to the corner of the room. There were screams of terror and the noise of a struggle. Viator frantically waved his knife, trying to wound the ghost, trying to get up, to break out of the mortal grip. But Jacob was much stronger. He pushed Viator to the floor and sat astride him.

Marianne jumped up, throwing things that fell under his feet, and drew away from the fighting.

Suddenly, Jacob’s shaggy figure rose to the ceiling, while the ghost wheezed in a low, terrible voice, and once again fell upon its victim. Viator died down. A faint groan of exhaustion completed the cacophony. Jacob slowly, not paying attention to his victim and not noticing the frightened Marianne, slipped through the wall. In his hand, Marianne made out an ax.

For a minute, Marianne stood still, recovering. Then he moved slowly towards the shapeless figure in the corner.

– He is dead? He asked barely audibly. He took a step towards the body, which was sprawled on the floor, and noticed that blood was slowly spreading across the floor. I did not dare to come closer. He knew he couldn’t help. And Marianne felt sorry for Viator, despite the fact that he tried to kill him in his sleep.

– If not for Jacob, Viator would have killed me, – whispered bitterly in Marianne’s voice, after thinking a little. And then he turned around.

“Where is Mignis?”

“If you hadn’t fallen asleep so soundly, you would not have killed,” came the voice of the mouse. – I tried to wake you up. Yes, it’s good that Yakov was under the table all this time. I didn’t like this “hunter” right away.

– He saved me? Marianne marveled, not entirely sure what had happened. – It turns out that Yakov saved my life?!

Mignis crept slowly from under the bench.

– He took a picture of you.

– What? – did not understand Marianne. Mignis was looking not at Viator’s immobilized body, but at a rectangular object nearby.

Marianne approached cautiously, recognizing the familiar outline.

Marianne picked up the phone from the floor. Password protected. Graphic key, standard lock screen. Marianne ran his thumb across the screen, connecting the dots with lines to form the letter O. Nothing happened.

“I don’t know the key,” Marianne said.

Mignis ran to his leg and squeaked:

– Give me.

Marianne put the useless device in front of the mouse and turned it to face her, not understanding why and following Mignis with interest. “What’s the use of this? She doesn’t know how to use a telephone, can she?

Mignis touched the screen with her small paw and slowly traced it over it, forming a “Z” shape. At the same time, she had to climb over the phone twice on outstretched legs, which looked very funny. The lock screen went out, and the application icons appeared on the background of a bright picture of the sea and clouds.

– Wow! – Marianne sincerely admired. He fell on his knees in front of the mouse and looked at the phone. – Mignis, you are a miracle!

– Come on, – Mignis was shy, but was very pleased with the praise. – I saw how he ran his finger across the screen.

Marianne touched the middle of the touchscreen and brought up the downloaded app. A white and yellow picture with lines of different thickness opened.

– It’s a map! – The scale was too large to understand what kind of terrain. – There’s a marker here. Goal. Yes exactly. Look, here are the coordinates displayed. Marianne pointed to the corner of the screen. – The phone is receiving GPS signals. Navigation software. I have one on my phone. Hmm, looks like a laid out route. This line shows the path traveled. This point in the center is the current position of the phone. Yes exactly. This line is a railroad. So this is our home. It is not on the map.

Marianne was silent for a short while, then said:

– The target on the map matches our position. It turns out that he was heading here. This place is the goal of his path. And he was talking about Esterby.

“Look closely,” said Mignis. Marianne tilted his head to the side. “What else is there? The map is unmarked, there are no names nearby.”

“Viator told you he was heading east. East is on the right side of the map. He came from the east. And he walked west.

Marianne quickly zoomed in on the map. Mignis was right. Viator came from the southeast. And the starting point of the path also did not have any settlement nearby.

Marianne sat down on the floor and thought. “Viator lied about Esterbi! What for? What did he want here?”

“He also talked about his friend,” Mignis said. A sense of renewed unease swept over Marianne.

“Of course, Viator could not be alone!”

– Right, I also don’t like Viator and what he told me. Marianne looked around the room. The lamp did not burn, the hearth was almost extinguished. The backpack is in the same place.

– I have to get out of here! – Marianne perked up. He had long forgotten about the photograph he wanted to find on his phone. He didn’t like this house any more.

– How far are you going? Mignis asked with a plaintive note in her voice. – Take me with you.

Marianne stared at the mouse. This thought did not occur to him, although he did not want to part with Mignis. She was the complete opposite of the gloomy house and became a friend in the last hours.

– Of course, with joy! – blurted out Marianne and smiled at Mignis.

– I’m hungry and cold here. Let me out in the first warm house. And even better – in a hotel or in a tavern. Or wherever you want. I’m not demanding at all … – said the mouse quickly, as if Marianne was trying to persuade.

He nodded, wondering where to put the mouse.

“Shouldn’t I put it in a backpack?”

But Mignis was already climbing up Marianne’s clothes with her tenacious paws. He pressed his head into the collar as it climbed onto his shoulder. Then Mignis went down to her breast pocket, opened the valve with her nose, and climbed inside. Marianne listened, expecting what would happen next. Inside the pocket, Mignis seemed to be digging with her paws or biting something. The fabric twitched. Then a small hole formed at the bottom, in which a mouse nose appeared for a second and then disappeared. “Mignis can look outward through such a hole with only one eye,” Marianne estimated when the mouse looked out of his pocket.

“Don’t forget the mitten,” she squeaked and disappeared into her new hiding place.

A mitten lay in the middle of the room.

Stepping to the door, Marianne touched something with her foot. The object bounced off and rang across the floor. Viator’s Knife. The young man recognized him with disgust. But then he decided that the knife in the forest was a useful thing, and he picked it up. And from Viator’s belongings, Marianne took snowshoes with him.