Chapter Two

Chapter Two

            Terra sat up quickly and tried to close her throat with her hands. But there was no blood? No gaping wound, no gnashing teeth, no spikes digging out her stomach. She could still hear the sound of wetness on stone, and Norve’s realization of what she’d just done: “…Kitten?” But now there was nothing; no torn clothes, not even a trace of injury. Instead there was a cradle of roots supporting her body, and a massive tree silent and reserved behind her. She froze in place with molten bullets sweating from her skin. There was a sick, heaving feeling in her core. The gagging and burning tears all rushed back at once and forced violent hiccups to wrack her body.
            She was dying--or maybe--no, surely she had died. But now, everything was fine? Not fine; her mind was collapsing, but, she was alive.
            “Carrie…?” she called out weakly into the dark room, hearing only the rustling leaves respond overhead. When no one answered she let herself slip farther into the roots, knees to chest, waiting for something to happen. There she stayed, sleeping with the smooth bonds of a past life.

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            “Hey!” A faint voice drifted into the massive room and snapped her awake.
            “Carrie!” she shouted in recognition and crawled to her feet, tripping over the root system to meet the furry body that shot from the dark tunnel. The little one was a bit ragged and war-torn, slackening in speed to meet the girl halfway.
            They stared at each other, one up one down. There was no right way to put things into words.
            “I…” Carrie paused to battle the uncertainty. “…I think you died.”
            Terra’s face didn’t even flinch. She’d already considered that while rocking to insanity in the unforgiving roots. No matter how much sense it made--or didn’t--there was no possible way she had gotten out of that situation without dying. Terra had seen her own throat in the rat woman’s mouth. But why was she back?
            A second chance should have made her happy; she was not dead. But then, this alternative ending was even more unsettling. Everything seemed hopeless; the massive tree behind her and flashing eyes in the darkness from where Carrie had fought through.
            “Now we know,” the little rat stated bravely, “and now we have to try again.”
            If this small creature could summon the courage, then Terra had no choice but to follow. With no further words she held out her hand for her companion to crawl up and come to a rest on her shoulder.
            “Are you ready?” Carrie asked, though neither of them were. But then they were running, blindly--back through the rat tunnel, though careful this time to avoid hurting any of the little guys--barreling through the place she’d first met Carrie, even over the precarious chasm--all the way to where the three tunnels waited, the only place she decided to pause for a few quick, gasping breaths. Her mistake.
            At the first steps towards the middle tunnel, Carrie froze mid sentence.
            “There’s a leafy thing behind this ear now too, and--oh, no,” the little rat was saying before stiffening. “Run!--”
            “Well, well, well…look what has wandered into my domain--a little cretin.” The deep voice struck her to the core with déjà vu and fear, and Norve came stalking out of the leftmost tunnel. The rat-mother who had named her Kitten in one moment and slaughtered her in the next.
            “Norve,” was all Terra could say to her.
            “…So, you have heard of me?” Norve questioned in surprise. The three of them shared a moment of confusion as Norve went on, “The question is: what have you heard?” The cynicism in the rat-mother’s voice made the girl feel sick.
            “S-stay away. Please,” she stuttered almost mechanically, appalled at how Norve could act like nothing had happened? “Don’t hurt me.”
            Norve seemed caught off guard.
            “Please? Hurt you? Are you aware where you are? Everything here wants to hurt you,” she replied dryly, but it only fueled Terra’s indignance.
            “You didn’t,” Terra said with sudden and quiet ferocity that made Norve stop and blink. “You were nice--called yourself the mother of the broken--opened your sacred place to creatures rejected and hated!”
            “How would you know that, little kit?” Norve question suspiciously, dropping her voice to a threatening level. “Who sent you?”
            The fact that Norve was so oblivious to the killing she’d so blatantly committed almost brought out an accusation, but it died off.
            “She really doesn’t remember…” Carrie whispered with sudden realization. “Something strange is happening with…time--and you dying, Maybe that reset things and only we know about it.” Now Carrie turned to Norve and accused. “So, now we know what she’s really like--she killed you!”
            Norve’s expression darkened.
            “Well, which one is it, darling? Am I kind, or your killer? You must tell me how you know such things.” There was a frightening flash where the child remembered Norve leaning over her with hot breath and hot blood--her blood--leaking from Norve’s mouth and dripping onto her face.
            “Just back away, slowly. Go back across the bridge,” Carrie suggested, and with no other options she had to obeyed.
            “Oh, strange child, knowing of my kindness, yet rejecting it…” Norve said toyingly as she advanced on the girl and her rat. The nimble, rodent-feet made it easy for her to follow them across the skinny stone structure.
            “She’s going to attack, you’ll have to fight her,” Carrie warned under her breath, but Terra shook her head.
            “Just, knock her off! Nothing can survive that fall!” the little rat argued, but she still refused. She wouldn’t wish such a gruesome and terrifying death on anyone.
            “She would--has done it to you, without hesitation!” Carrie detested, but there was not enough anger within Terra. After knowing what she knew about Norve--being taken in as one of her own, becoming her little Kitten, only being punished once she’d disobeyed--maybe Terra was the wrong one here.
            “I can’t do it,” she stated finally, standing her ground before the rat-woman, who had been watching them carefully.
            “You cannot…what? Come with me?” Norve asked and got no response. “And you will not fight…” she went on thoughtfully, then smiled. For a moment, her Kitten was hopeful again. “Then, you will die,” Norve announced.
            She didn’t even have a chance to blink. A blur snapped her back across the thin bridge and pain shot through her upper body. Filthy daggers dug harmlessly into the flesh of her paralyzed legs.
            “What a shame, you would have made a nice little kit,” Norve said distastefully, standing up to her full height. The girl’s eyes rolled back and stared into the void, feeling spikes dig under her ribs and kick her over the edge. Rushing wind increased around her, deafening her thoughts and the sound of her bones being pulverized at the bottom.