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“Of course.”
“Do you know where I can find more metal?”
The cat turned a neat circle, looked Wistala up and down. “You’ve got short thick claws. Almost badgerlike. How are you at digging?”
“I—I don’t know. I’ve clawed through ice.”
“The rats have a place under Tumbledown here. They call it Deep Run. A network of tunnels. Not built by them, of course. Supposedly there are outlets in the swamp, but no self-respecting feline will traipse around in there for fear of the channelbacks. I know a hole that leads to Deep Run. If you enlarge it, I’ll show you some metal coin. It’s old and crusty, but metal nonetheless. Nice little mouthfuls. Of course, you’ll have to dig again. I don’t think you’d fit.”
Wistala considered. At the rate she was going in the ruins, her improvised nose bags would take days to fill. The men had obviously picked the surface clean of anything useful.
Anything worth the having is worth the effort, Mother used to say.
“It’s a bargain.”
“It occurs to me,” the cat said, “that once underground, you could make a meal of me.”
“Can you keep something from the birds earthbound and ditch-gossips?”
“Of course. Felines are full of secrets.”
Wistala drew herself up on her stubby legs. “I’m a dragon, feline, and I give you my word as Wistala Irelianova that I’ll keep a fair bargain if you will.”
Whiskers twitched. “And what would a dragon be?”
Wistala froze for a moment. The cat seemed perfectly worldly, well-spoken and felicitous of fang. Apart from the chopped-short neck and face, she was almost drakine after Jizara’s elegantly limbed fashion. How could she not know what a dragon was?
“We are old, falling between mountains and man, gifted by the Four Spirits with strengths to order the world.”
The cat’s back rose in a graceful arc. “Order? Order is the enemy of the feline. We thrive on chaos, and if there’s not enough about, we instigate some. I hope you haven’t come to bring order to Tumbledown.”
“Nothing like.”
“I should think a creature meant to bring order to the world would be bigger.”
“I’m young.”
Yari Sunwarm Fourth Orangedaughter turned her alarmed pose into a casual stretch. “Make me this hole, Wistala Irelianova, and I and my kits will be in your debt and keep your secret that a dragon has come to Tumbledown.”
“Bargain.”
“Then let us touch whiskers . . . errr . . .”
Wistala extended her griff. “Will these do?”
“How beautiful! Yes, of course.”
The cat approached and stood nose-to-nose with her, then put her head alongside Wistala’s. Wistala felt the cat’s whiskers tickle as they flicked along her scales and probed the gaps. They prrumed at each other, and Wistala felt a warm affinity.
“I fear I shall have to like you for your mind, Wistala Irelianova. You are too hard to perch on for a comfortable nap and smell like that furnace the men use to cook their metal.”
“It’s Tala to my friends.”
“Then I’m Yari-Tab to you. Follow.”
The cat jumped away, tail flicking this way and that in excitement. Dragons and felines must be related somehow! Even their naming customs bore some resemblance.
“What’s catspeech like, Yari-Tab?”
