Work Text:
The fire was low, and the house was asleep. The cat on the mat closed his eyes upon the world, and opened them onto another.
He stood on the borders of Dream, where grass grew tall beneath the moon, and each blade was sharp as a memory. The wind smelled of night and old hunts, and his paws made no sound as he walked. He stalked sleek and sure through the field, and the shadows whispered, and his fine tail flicked back and forth.
Then down from the hills the storm-clouds rolled; the wild wind cried, and Cat's roar answered it. He was young again, fierce and terrible and free. The sound filled the valleys and rang through the bones of the earth, and the sky shivered to hear it.
A shake, a swish, a leap, and a bounce – and Cat crossed forest and desert in two blinks of a kitten’s eye. He ran beside the great feline Kings of the East, feasting with them beneath a blood-red moon. The air was thick with song and fur and firelight, and his claws shone like curved silver blades.
Up again he leapt, and the sky opened before him. He climbed among the stars, and found that they too were cats: vast, prowling things of sharp light and velvet shadow, padding from cloud to cloud. Together they hunted across the dark, and their cries were the music of Eä.
At last he looked down and saw, far below, a small hearth-fire burning, and by it a cat curled on a mat. The sight drew him; he leapt once more, falling like a shooting star, until the world grew warm again and the mat rose to meet him. He settled into himself with a sigh, and the echo of his roar faded into a purr.
When he opened his eyes, dawn was creeping through the shutters. He gazed out at the paling stars, wondering if they remembered what they had been: proud hunters once, fierce and free.
Perhaps not.
But fat cat on the mat, kept as a pet – he does not forget.