Dæmons Love Forever
#4 of One Shots
Dæmons Love Forever
(No one is allowed to take credit for this work apart from me. If you want to use it somehow, I would appreciate it if you were to get in touch with me first.)
(This is a sweet little story that kind of just came together when I wasn't expecting it. Of course, it's not happy-smiley the whole way through-after all, I am crunker. It's a bit dramatic, but it's got a very good feel to it, in my opinion. There's nothing inappropriate about this, so it should be good for all age groups.
I'm not going to give the plot away, but I will say that this is hopefully the first of a few relatively brief oneshots that I've been planning out for some time now. Also, this one goes out to my friends from the UK-what can I say, frozen little islands are great for dystopia and sorrow! The writing style I'm using in this piece is quite different from what I'm used to using. This piece is more about ambience than details, so many points are summarized rather than specifically written out. You'll have to let me know how it works out.
Anyway, there's not much more to say here. I didn't plan it, of course, but it looks like I've released this just in time to celebrate a great victory in the struggle against militant Islam. Kiss a CIA operative, if you're an attractive lady-if you're a guy, a fist bump will do. Let's rock and roll.)
It was raining when he arrived, but that wasn't unusual. It was always rainy there, on that frozen island northwest of the contiguous European continent. In fact, he counted himself somewhat lucky that it was raining rather than snowing, otherwise his flight would have touched down even later than it already had. He was upset because of that, and the budget airline he'd used was sure to receive just another disapproving review online.
Then again, it wasn't as if he had any engagements that had to be fulfilled at a specific time. He was returning to the UK for the peace of his own mind, and for no other reason.
And so, somewhat less upset, he walked out of the airport. He turned up the collar of his trenchcoat to protect his body from the rain, and then he and looked around. Dreary buildings and streets that were quiet and at the moment untrodden looked back at him, along with a rush of nostalgia-he'd been away from home for a long time.
He was in Oxford, England-one of the best-known towns in the entirety of the United Kingdom. He'd frequented the airport, or at least the area around it when he'd lived there, but now, it took him some moments to get his bearings. It had changed since he'd last been there, significantly-but then again, he hadn't visited once since he'd left. Since she'd...
He shook his head and started to walk. It was raining, true, but he didn't let that disturb him. Although he had left Oxford decades before, he had never forgotten the rain, nor the cold, nor the dull, dark gloom that settled around the city when the weather became foul. He might have moved to America and he might have spent the better part of the past five years in a land many times drier, hotter, and sunnier than any part of England, but he had never forgotten Oxford.
He had never forgotten her.
Oxford had changed with time, but he still knew exactly where to go-he still knew exactly where he wanted to be. And so he didn't bother to call a cab or consult with the smartphone in his pocket-he just walked, silently, and thought. Oxford, after all, had changed with time and so had England in general. Back then, back when he had been a cub, his species was quite uncommon in the UK. But now, they would become an ethnic majority any day.
He was a tiger, and completely dissimilar from the red-furred vulpines that formed the native population of the United Kingdom. In contrast to their lean physiques and pale hair and eyes, he had been a striped lad with a big, muscular body and inky black hair and brown eyes. It was true that nowadays he was skinny, but at a few inches over six feet tall, he was imposing regardless-or he would have been, if he wasn't an old man.
He had stopped pretending that he was still young years ago-decades ago, in fact. He'd entered his middle ages with a melancholic sort of acceptance; after all, what could he do about it? Regardless, melancholic acceptance was the general emotion with which he faced things. He was never there, he was always somewhere else-he was always thinking about times long lost and forgotten by everyone on the planet except for him.
Well. He might not have been a perfect-anything-but he wasn't completely without merit. Despite being well into his seventies, he was still fit, and his hair was still that perfect shade of black-true, his fur had faded somewhat, but adding a little bit of tonic to his comb when he groomed his ruff and cheeks made that slight flaw invisible to the naked eye.
And he was a thoughtful man, as well. And a smart man. He'd been the best of the best of the best since he was a lad, and that's why he had several millions of dollars to his name already, with many more assets waiting for him when he finally retired. Or at least, he had-but then, life never worked out perfectly. There were difficulties everywhere, and he refused to let them get to him now-not now, when he was walking down the road in a city in a country a lifetime removed from the man he had become.
The UK had not fared well in his absence. Many members of the native population had left, either to the US or Canada or to other parts of Europe when his own ethnic group had started to swell in its numbers. A generation before, ultranationalists had managed to convince the beleaguered vulpines left in the UK to procreate more and more and more-but there were just too few of them, by then, to stand up against the tigerish onslaught.
It used to be that he feared running into a gang of foxes on the way home from school. Now, foxes didn't dare to enter the neighborhood he was making his way through, just then, with his back hunched and his eyes unfocused.
He hoped it was still there, he genuinely did. He'd never gotten rid of it, after all, and although he had done his level best to make himself untraceable-that didn't mean that the state would demolish it, would it? And surely his own people would respect it-after all, he'd been well-known in the area, and more than a little feared as well. But it had been years since he'd been there... many, many, many years.
He turned and walked through an alleyway, taking a shortcut to his destination. It was a bit drier there, but fat drops of rain cold enough to make him shiver under his fur and coat continued to fall from the sky. The sky itself was in turmoil; various shades of black and gray mixed and mingled and sometimes rejected one another with violent electric discharges.
But he just kept walking. He just hunched up his shoulders in an attempt to keep his face dry and he kept walking.
And very soon, it felt like he was walking into a dream.
The UK had changed, and England had changed, and Oxford for certain had changed-but the moment he left that dark, lonesome alleyway, it felt that he had taken a step back in time, although that simply could not be. Once he left the alleyway and entered the road, everything was the same-more or less. True, the pub was now a kebab house and the Anglican church was now a Sunni mosque, but apart from that, everything was the same.
The sleepy little houses with their neat, sloped roofs; the flats-at least a hundred to a building-affordable sources of shelter and hearth to thousands; and the road. The road was still cobblestone and seemingly in a state of perpetual disrepair, although he and all others that called that area home knew better. The road was just like that, and it had never failed to provide a medium of transportation, or a great place for an impromptu soccer match... or a great place to greet a loved one so rare and seldom seen that jealous eyes peered out at one from hundreds of yards around.
He walked down the road, he realized, for the last time in his life. The risks he was taking by re-entering the UK... he shut his eyes, for a moment, until he overcame the desire to turn tail, take a cab to the airport, and jump on the nearest plane back to America.
After all, he owed it to her to be there-or, rather, he owed it to her memory to be there. Because she was gone-she was as gone as he had been when he left the UK without looking back, all those long years ago.
It didn't take him long to arrive at his destination.
After walking down that old, nostalgic cobbled road for a distance of roughly half a kiloyard, the tiger had made another turn and started down another road. And by then, his striped, cuffed tail had started to twitch, just beyond the lowest fringes of his coat. He was anxious-no, he was afraid. Not of her, nor particularly of being caught-but of himself. Of the memories he'd hidden deep within himself.
Just walking there was sending chills up and down his spine. He half-expected her to strike him-to attack him from beyond the grave-but she didn't do that. And she wouldn't do that, he realized, because she was a gentle being. A gentle, loving being-especially to him, although... he had not always treated her in a reciprocal manner.
But he couldn't do anything about that now. He couldn't do anything for her now-he just wanted to remember her, to feel some connection with her, just one last time-and then he'd leave again, and this time, he truly wouldn't look back. He'd spent most of his life trying to forget her, but now, now that he was an old man and again without any sort of attachment-now, he really would forget her. Now, he really could forget her.
It was with that thought that he passed a gate so rusted and gnarled and twisted that it looked like he should have at his age. But then he paused, stepped back, and used his paw to flick a tattered bit of oxidized iron off a mailbox-and then he walked on again before anyone saw him.
Though he doubted that many he had grown up with still lived in the area and that even one of them was likely to recognize him after so long, he didn't want to take any chances. And he didn't want anyone to connect the sight of his lone, darkened silhouette walking along a path long forgotten to a house long abandoned with the lone name etched into the side of that mailbox: Alex Nawaz.
By the time he had entered what had once been his house, the weather had worsened. Now, it wasn't just raining and now, it wasn't just every few moments that the entire city would flash with white light before thunder roared through the sky-now, it was pouring and it was windy and it was freezing cold. And despite all these things, the lightning continued and so did the thunder. With startling frequency, skyborne shrieks of energy and noise and intense electricity seared through atmosphere before piercing the ground with the practical effect of a massive lance. It was only due to good luck that no fires had been started, but Alex knew that sooner or later, Oxford's good luck would run out.
He noted this, but only on the periphery of his consciousness. Being there, in that house-it made him short of breath. It made him feel numb and woozy and dreary and cold and stifled all at once, and it wasn't just because of the dust. And there was a lot of dust; at least an inch of it had made its home on the floor and the furniture and all other upward-oriented surfaces.
It seemed that his home had been left alone, despite the fact that he'd left it nearly five decades before. Fear, it seemed was every bit as effective as respect in earning the right to be left alone-and that, for him, was the most valuable right of them all.
He walked around, drawing his coat close to his form to try to conserve the warmth produced by his body. His fur was usually enough to keep him warm-it always had, back in the States-but now he was in the UK... and now, he was an old man. Perhaps it was simply the flow of time, then, that made him so uncomfortable. Perhaps it was that he was there over forty years later, not that he was there.
He had made many memories in that house. Many, many memories. In fact, he'd spent more time there than he'd spent at any other single location, and that's why even decades after leaving it, he had to consciously will himself to think of some other construction when he considered the concept of "home". He'd spent his cubhood there, after all, and a significant part of the formative years of his young adulthood.
But then, everything had fallen apart.
He walked into the living room-and, unexpectedly, a burst of emotion knocked him to the side and forced him to use a paw to prevent himself from falling down. His claws dug into the drywall-half-rotted and weatherbeaten by the years-and his eyes shut tightly. But that didn't keep the sounds out, or the images-the screams, the blood, the terror, the heartbreak-and what he'd done next...
He didn't regret it, even then-after all, what else should he have done-what else could he have done, and what else would a reasonable man do? It didn't make sense to allow himself to be thrown in jail for decades, potentially, for something that wasn't even his fault-and it wasn't his fault. He'd replayed those events in his mind, a thousand times over, and he knew that it wasn't his fault.
No matter how often he acknowledged it, though, he couldn't prevent her from visiting in his dreams-in his nightmares. She would approach him unexpectedly and then he would wake up in a cold sweat, struggling yet again to save her from a fate that was inexorable as the rain in Oxford.
Time had not treated his house well, he realized. It felt unsafe enough downstairs, but when the tiger started to make his way to the first floor (or what he'd come to refer to as the second floor, after spending so much time in America), he truly began to feel concern for his own life. The stairs themselves threatened to give way under his footstep, though he didn't weigh thirteen stone-he simply relied on the feline agility and liquid grace that had kept him safe, down the years, to again protect him.
After all, she was no long there to protect him. She wasn't there to catch him or to cover him in kisses and licks and help him up when he fell, so he had to be his own protector; he had to vindicate his own safety. Because no one else would.
Walking upstairs, however, did not protect him from his own memories. When he emerged from the maw of the staircase, again Alex couldn't help but wincing and gritting his teeth so tightly that his gums began to bleed. He was less than five yards from his room, and hers-where she'd looked after him since the day he was born.
But then he had to smile. Because even then, after five decades of complete neglect, the door still bore their names. He'd gotten an expensive wood carving, just for them-there was really no purpose to it at all, but it looked nice, and she'd liked it. She always got so happy when he showed her his sentimental side, and she'd always told him that he was a lot sweeter than he liked to pretend.
Now she was gone, though-as lost and forgotten as the young man he had been when he had left the UK for the first, last, and only time.
He didn't realize it then, of course-he still intended to go back to America, or, failing that, to some other Western nation. Perhaps France, perhaps Germany, perhaps Spain, perhaps Scandinavia-it really didn't matter. He'd already created a new life for himself once and he was willing to do it again, if it would bring him any sort of peace of mind-because that's what he'd really missed over the years, apart from her. He'd never been able to truly feel at ease.
He'd never even had a good night's sleep-ever. Often, he spent entire nights awake without even blinking his eyes. And everywhere he went, no matter how many people were around him or happy he was-or ought to be-he always felt that something was missing. Something terribly, terribly important.
They once said that people like him, who were lucky enough to be born with Dæmons, always experienced unease like that if their life-partners were lost. But he'd never bought that entirely, because she had been more than his life-partner. She had loved him from the moment he had been born and she had said as much to him as often as she could, and almost as often she said that when their lives were over, they would not part ways. She would be with him, she'd always said, forever and ever. The unease others felt couldn't possibly compare to the lack of certainty, of happiness, of hope that he had experienced his whole life through.
He opened the door, then, and stepped into his old room. And the first thing he realized was how utterly cold and lonely it was without her there.
The windows were still intact, as were the walls and most of the insulation within them. But when Alex stepped in, he couldn't help but shiver even before he looked around and saw his possessions, forgotten and alone, untouched for decades, save for the clear inch of dust on them all. Here was a photo album she'd made for him; there was the first pound he'd earned, framed and mounted on the wall. There was a scarf she'd bought for him, and right at his feet was a picture of the two of them, side by side, roaming around some park in Scotland.
He remembered that picture-he remembered the very moment they'd taken it. He'd tried a few times to set up a time-delay and get into position for a shot, and failed, and then a kind old man had offered to take the picture for him.
He'd refused, at first-but then she'd rebuked him with a sad frown. She had seen what he would never admit-that he didn't trust the man because of the animosity between their races. Alex was a tiger and the old man had been a fox, and now... after five decades, things had changed. Now, Alex was the old man and part of the dominant ethnic group in the UK, and now, young vulpines on the street would be suspicious of him.
He thought of none of that, though, the moment he saw the picture-the moment he saw her face. Although it was dark in his room, in his old, forgotten house and his vision had worsened somewhat over the years, he froze where he stood.
She was beautiful, as always, even on that tattered, yellowed scrap of paper. He bent down to pick the picture up, and a moment later, he was holding it in shaking, twitching fingers.
Her face was covered with dust. He cleaned her off, ran a finger across the sleek contour of her face-but he couldn't feel her, because she was dead and she had been dead for fifty years. She was gone and he was left there, all alone in his room, to stare at a picture of her, longing for days long lost.
He shivered. He couldn't help it. All he could do was put the photo in a pocket close to his chest and look through his room for anything else that he might still find precious after so long.
Five minutes later, Alex had recovered everything he desired. Under his arm he had tucked the album she'd made for him, and he had slipped other things into the inner and outer pockets of his coat-a Zippo lighter, a switchblade knife, a string, a bit of chocolate in tin foil that still tasted delicious, a necklace, sunglasses, and a small, engraved piece of stone that had been the state's only means of knowing what his name was.
After all, his parents had died-or vanished-before he was even a conscious being. If it hadn't been for her, he would have been alone from day one, and would probably have simply ended up as another failed product of the UK's grim orphanage system. But she... had been everything for him. She had been his mother, his sister, his greatest friend-in fact, she'd been his only friend. Alex had always been an odd one and without parents-without history, he was never really accepted by his people.
And in those days, native Britons hadn't been much better. Alex had once gotten close to a vulpine, a nice brown-haired vixen with pretty eyes and a tendency to smile easily. Their friendship had lasted right up until the moment her parents had found out that her best friend was a tiger-and then moved to Canada.
He'd gotten close to her so quickly, he realized, because she had been a lot like her-his Dæmon. She had always been pretty, and it wasn't just that she was obsessively clean, as all felines were. She was beautiful-she had sleek features and the softest, sleekest fur he had ever seen. Whenever they went out together and came across cubs, Alex was always forced by social convention to let them stroke her, and pat her, and rub her under the chin and toy with her ears until she laughed and told them to stop.
She always was a tolerant one, he realized. And not just of others-she was tolerant of him. He was an eccentric guy, and a little... well, a lot on the cold side. He'd told her to leave him alone many times, and she had-at least for some time. But she had always returned to him whenever he needed her and she never asked him to apologize. She was loyal to him, right until the very end-right until she could return to him no more.
He was downstairs, he realized, and perhaps that was a good thing. The wave of pain that struck him was more like a lance than anything else, white-hot with guilt and regret and aimed directly at his heart. It pierced his soul with such force that again, he swayed on his feet; only by placing a paw on the wall was the old tiger able to prevent himself from falling.
And if he'd fallen down upstairs... well, that might have been the end of him. As he struggled to compose himself, he recalled, vaguely, that a few of the steps he'd taken on the first floor-second if he was in the US-had involved stomping right through the floor itself.
His house was breaking apart. The process had started when he'd left, when she'd died, and, perhaps not coincidentally, that's when he felt that his own life had start to fall apart as well.
He didn't even know what had happened to-he winced when he imagined it-her body. Once he'd left the UK, he had left the UK. He hadn't allowed himself to look back until just over a week ago when he'd lost what few things and people holding him to the US. But until then, he'd barely spared a thought on her. He barely had a thought to spare on her, because if he thought about her much, if he considered the angel that he'd killed-that he'd lost, he reminded himself, then he would go insane.
And now that he was here, back in Oxford, back in the house of his cubhood and young adulthood, he could do nothing but think about her. And he believed that as a result of that, he really was starting to go insane.
But for the moment, he hung on. He had to know-he had to find out what had happened to her. And so he called for a cab and slipped out of his house, as quietly and innocently as he'd entered-but no one would have noticed him even if he'd been more obvious. Because now, it was raining harder.
He didn't mind, though. He didn't have an umbrella but he didn't mind, nor did he make an attempt to find shelter. He simply turned up the collar of his coat and let the rain manipulate his hair into dark, wavy locks that reached down to his eyebrows before tapering off into nothingness. It was cold-cold enough that exhaling caused a semi-transparent cloud of vapor to appear in the air before him, but he didn't mind that, either.
He had always loved the cold and the wet-and the darkness, too. Or perhaps not always. Perhaps his tastes in environmental ambience had settled after she'd died.
By the time the cab arrived, Alex had formulated a reasonable course of action. He slipped into the vehicle and muttered his destination in an accent that had only been dampened the slightest amount by fifty years out of the UK and then he sat down and pulled out his phone.
The cab started to move, driving through the waterlogged darkness with its headlights and wipers on at full power. The orange beams of light were broken up by the dozens of gallons of water falling from the sky so that by the time they struck anything of note, they were darkened and diffused. The reflections caused by the hundreds of distinct raindrops themselves were disorienting, and for a moment, Alex wondered how the driver made sense of things.
His curiosity quickly faded, however, as he did an internet search for an establishment he hoped still existed. It was a pub of sorts-alcohol was served, but that wasn't the real purpose of the establishment. It was where older people went to chat about days old and new and meet with anyone that needed wisdom rather than smarts. Alex had gone there several times for advice... but now, he was old enough to be one of the men that simply sat there for hours or days on end and shared what they had to offer without any strings attached.
It would have been nice, he mused, to have been able to go there in his older years, and just talk without reservation or agenda to anyone that was willing to listen. It would have been even nicer if she was there to spend those days with him-if she was there at his side with his hand on her head, gently stroking at the soft fur next to her ears, then he'd be able to consider his life worth living.
Now, at over seventy years old, Alex wasn't sure if his life had really been worth it. True, he'd raised two sons and a daughter, and true, he'd seen the world and created millions of dollars of wealth for his cubs-but just thinking about his cubs brought with it a fresh wave of regret, and so he forced the course of his thoughts to alter. After all, of course he loved life. He'd... done everything that anyone could have expected him to, and then some. Of course he loved life. But he loved her, too, and he had to know what had happened to her.
He realized that he was approaching his destination a moment before he arrived. After paying the driver and giving him a nod of thanks for his work, Alex stepped out of the cab, and with his shoulders hunched up, made his way toward the pub itself. According to the internet, it was just another hole-in-the-wall; just another place to take drinks and meet people. Perhaps, then, the real purpose of the place was a local secret?... or perhaps time had changed the pub as well. After all, the changing demographics of the area meant that even those that did drink were unlikely to be tolerant of a monument, effectively, to alcoholism.
Regardless of all that, Alex simply crossed the street and paused under an awning, briefly, to give his coat a shake to try to get the excess water off of it. And then, he was inside a place he thought he'd left for the last time fifty years ago.
Well, at least it smelled the same. And it looked the same, too. Rather than the heavy stench of alcohol and excessive perfume, the pub was vaguely reminiscent of pinecones and other hearty, earthy scents that reminded one of hearth and home. There was music as well, but it was so soft and distant that even the keenest of feline ears couldn't tell much about it.
The lighting was brighter than was the norm for a pub-but that was only to be expected. After all, they said that the first thing old age took was night vision. As it was, Alex was quite lucky to have been able to navigate around his own house without a flashlight. But even he, at seventy-some years old, was a young kitten compared to the ancient tigers and foxes that frequented that pub.
Some of them were ninety, some of them were a hundred, and some of them would have had their own places in Guinness if they'd so desired it-but none of them did. They all seemed to enjoy life, and one another, and the frequent young person that came by for advice or wisdom or just stability, serenity, and an indefinable sense of hope. There was no need for national or international recognition, especially not when many of their descendants would have disapproved of the idea of any race-mixing at all-even simple mingling.
The pub's days were likely numbered, but then, so were the days of its primary attracts. And then, so were Alex's, probably. He had no idea if he had the genes to remain in good health for much longer, and he had no delusions-if his body ever fell into disrepair, that was it. No person or nation would care for him. He only had so much time in his life left, and that through made him set the steaming mug of hot chocolate he'd been nursing down. He stood up and walking to the oldest, most obscure-looking table in the entire pub.
He sat down without a word of greeting, but that was just the convention of the place. The three old ones there-two vulpines and a fair-furred tiger-finished their conversation, and then looked to him.
"Afternoon, lads," Alex said, although he honestly wasn't sure if it was more afternoon than evening or not. "I was wondering... if any of you had some information I was having a bit of trouble finding."
That was all part of the game. Dancing around the issue made the old ones sit up a bit straighter and lean forward, sharing grins and gestures too slight for Alex to understand. If he could, he would have spent several years there as an apprentice before becoming a full-fledged old man-capable of communicating anything to any other old man in the pub with no more than a moment's worth of nonverbal signaling.
"And... what sort of information are you having difficulty coming across, my young friend?"
The other tiger said that. And Alex took the slight jibe-at his age-for precisely what it was: a reasonable parry to his own offensive.
"Oh, it regards a very obscure topic," Alex replied. "I doubt anyone here is old enough to be helpful." He paused-gauged the affectivity of this new advance-and then spoke again. "Perhaps I'm just wasting your time, gents."
After a moment, that caused a round of low, somewhat raspy chuckles to dance around the table. Alex smiled, but inwardly simply grew more serious as the old men complimented him on his ability to play a good game of verbal chess before meeting his eyes and waiting for him to tell them what he wanted to know.
"I'm looking for a... someone I once knew, an old friend. He... I haven't been able to find him, but there's some indication that... ... I'm looking for a ceyardy... for his Dæmon."
Alex had expected the response he received: gasps, blinking, and cautious glances shared between the aged trio. Dæmons were a taboo subject all over the world with few exceptions-the only ones that really talked about Dæmons were those that were lucky enough to still have them. In the US, Dæmon prevalence was greatest among Orthodox Jews, the Amish, and a few other communities-in the UK, Alex wasn't aware of any groups in which a child born with a Dæmon was more than a freak of nature.
The shock continued for a moment. And then a waiter delivered drinks to the table-more hot chocolate for Alex and tea for the rest of them. The foxes shared a glance, though, and a moment later one of them reached into a pocket on his thigh and spiked both of their drinks with something poured from a sleek, metal thigh flask. Even the other tiger looked a little envious, for a moment, until he remembered that he was bound by his faith to never touch alcohol.
Alex took a deep sip of his drink, mostly to give the older men a moment of relative privacy. When he was finished, he cleared his throat and set the mug down, marveling at the stained, polished wood of the table surface for a moment before looking up again. He made eye contact with each of the older men in turn-they seem to have come to a decision.
"It's been decades since I last thought of Dæmons," one of the foxes said. "Decades." He paused, taking a sip of his tea. After pulling a face either due to its temperature, or sweetness, or the spirits mixed in with it, he faced Alex again, and looked him up and down for a long, careful moment.
And Alex was honestly concerned. Fifty years changed people, and memories, too, but that this fox might be the parent of an old classmate or a relative, or simply someone in the street that he'd once been familiar with was not impossible. And Alex still looked more or less the same-true, he was faded and more lean and thin and weather-beaten, but he was still tall with dark hair and eyes... just like hundreds of other old tigers in Oxford.
His shoulders slumped an imperceptible amount, and then he simply waited until the fox decided to speak again.
"I... and this was years and years ago," the red-furred male began, "I once heard of a ceyardy for Dæmons not far from here. It's outside of the city-hidden on property on the Thames. My cousins went there once." He paused again. "It begins as a normal ceyardy, but, they said that... if you cross a row of trees..."
His voice faded and then broke off entirely. Perhaps he saw Alex's tail twitching in excitement behind him, or perhaps Alex's ears had perked up just a little too much. Or perhaps he simply wanted to take another sip of tea so that alcohol would lower his inhibitions again, or perhaps he was reading the way his tigerish friend curled a lock of his beard with a finger.
"Anyway, I don't know for certain. In fact, I don't know at all," the fox said. "And if your friend is Muslim, then you may be out of luck." He paused, and glanced to the bearded tiger whose eyes hadn't left Alex since the moment he'd mentioned Dæmons.
"Those Allah gave Dæmons don't follow normal burial laws," the older tiger explained. "It's... not natural for someone to be apart from his Dæmon, and it's not right for a Dæmon to be buried with people without them. So... what started to happen many years ago... one of our bigger mosques in London issued a fatwa. From now on, people are to be cremated with their Dæmons. I can personally guarantee it's what the Prophet himself-peace and blessings be upon him-would want. It's just... Dæmons are such a wonder. Not even the Prophet himself could have foreseen them when he wrote the Koran."
"That's alright," Alex lied easily. "My friend was a Christian. But do any of you know-what might happen, for example, if a Dæmon were to... to pass--if that Dæmon couldn't be identified, and its person couldn't be found-would it still be burned?"
He realized his mistake not a second after he finished speaking. If "his friend" was a Christian then there was no danger of his Dæmon being burned. But Alex couldn't swallow his words or think of a way to backtrack, so he simply took another sip of hot chocolate and hope that the other men, as old as they were, hadn't noticed his slip-of-the-tongue.
And so Alex put his mug down just a heartbeat too late to see the look of dawning comprehension that passed between all three of the other men. When he faced them, their faces were as neutrally curious as they'd always been.
"I doubt it," the second fox said-he hadn't spoken until then, but when he did, he used a tone so gentle and welcoming that Alex couldn't help but feel himself calm down. He smiled-Alex reciprocated the smallest amount-and then explained. "If there was a question about its person, then the state would simply conserve the body. Dæmon cremation is something that Muslim families request specially... at least, that's how it once was. If an unknown Dæmon were to die today, well..."
He sighed and brought his tea to his lips-but then he seemed to think better of it, setting it back down and favoring Alex with another smile. But already the tiger was standing up and drawing his coat up around him-he had all the information he needed, and as per convention, he paid for the drinks along with a hefty tip. He smiled at the older men and muttered a word of farewell and tried to leave before he could be stopped-
"By the way," the first fox said, "welcome home."
For a moment, Alex froze. He turned, slowly, trying and probably failing to keep his face neutral-but when he looked at the fox, the red-furred male was simply smiling.
"I can tell from your accent," he said. "I've met many Oxfordish expatriates over the years, mate, and I can tell who's faking and who's not. You must have been away for a long time... but if you stay around, who knows? Perhaps you'll get it back entirely."
Alex forced a laugh-it came out just a little too high-pitched and loud to be natural-and shook his head. "Not likely, lad. I'm... I have to go again... very soon. I've-I've got to go. I'll-thank you all so much," he said, and he meant it. He might have been walking backward even then, as if pulled to the door by his tail-he couldn't have stayed if he'd wanted to, because he had a chance-the slightest, smallest of chances but a chance nonetheless-to see her again.
The old men in the pub recognized this. And they watched Alex as he turned around, shakily, and all but ran out into the rain again, leaving them with another word of farewell. When he was gone, they all sipped at their drinks for a moment, tracing that lone, striped figure in the darkness and the wet for as long as they could.
And then, when he was gone, they all murmured the same words beneath their breaths, so softly that even if he had been there, fifty years younger, with the sharpest hearing known to nature, he wouldn't have heard them.
"Goodbye, Alex Nawaz. I hope you manage to see her again."
He hadn't blinked since they'd told him where he might find her. After leaving the pub, he'd all but sprinted to the nearest bus station-he'd been lucky enough to catch one just before it left. On the way to his destination stop, Alex had taken out his cell phone and used the internet to locate the only ceyardy in the area the men had spoken of, and satellite imaging told him that its grounds matched the description he'd gotten entirely.
There were several thousands of graves directly behind a large funeral home, but beyond them was a large plain, and then perhaps fifty yards of trees. And then, beyond that, were more graves, buffered from view from anyone on the Thames by a fence and a large forest.
It was the perfect place for a ceyardy for Dæmons-close enough to the city for friends and family to visit, and directly adjacent to the final resting place of the people the Dæmons had belonged to. And yet it was hidden, out of the way and out of view to avoid vandalism or tourism.
If the tabloids caught wind of it, there would be no end of trouble. But Alex wasn't going to tell anyone-his only purpose was to see her. Just one last time.
And so he disembarked from the bus at his stop, conveniently just five minutes' walk from the funeral home that owned the ceyardy itself. Again he was all alone on the road and in the wind and the cold and the rain, but he didn't mind. And even if someone was out and about and was kind enough to offer an old tiger a ride, he would have politely turned them down. He wanted to be as alone as he felt-as he had always felt, ever since she'd left him.
It was relatively easy for Alex to slip past the funeral home and get into the ceyardy, but getting through the ceyardy to the distant treeline that buffered the Dæmon ceyardy from view was another matter entirely. True, it was rainy and dark and it was unlikely that anyone in the funeral home had anything but tea and biscuits on their mind, but the last thing Alex wanted was to be caught.
And so he half-crouched and darted from position to position, hiding behind the larger and more ornate of displays whenever he saw a flicker of motion inside the increasingly distant house. Within moments he was soaked-the storm wasn't particularly violent in that the wind was fairly tame and only sporadically did bolts of lightning strike down from the sky, but the sheer amount of water being dumped on the greater Oxford area was stunning.
Alex got to about a hundred yards from the funeral home, and then he simply stood up. He could only barely see the silhouette of the large structure, so there was no point in sneaking around anymore. There was nothing holding him back from finding her at long, long last, except for his own hesitation and fear.
But he overcame that all in just over a second, and started to run. His knees hurt a little bit and his heart quickly began to race, but he ran regardless. He pushed his old body to the very limits of its normal capabilities, and then further still. He could only see streaked shades of gray in the world as the rain washed away all the color and happiness and life that Oxford had to offer-but if he looked carefully he could see her with his mind's eye, laughing and smiling and loping toward him.
There was an explosion of heat and noise, then, and Alex fell to the ground. His was breathing heavily and that he hadn't suffered a serious ailment already was a miracle in itself, but it seemed that he'd just survived a lightning bolt as well. Oh, it hadn't struck him directly, of course, but the ground not twenty yards from him was a hole, scorched and giving off an acrid, burning scent that made the tiger's snout wrinkle in disapproval.
How close he had just come to death, Alex barely registered. He just stood up, used his paws to brush some of the mud off his coat, and kept running. And what really struck him, a moment later, was another burst of memories, this one many times more potent than the last one.
She had been loping toward him in the rain. And then, all at once, she had been on her side, bleeding heavily and crying in pain. Alex had tried to help her but then he had seen the blood on her fur and his paws alike and he had realized that there was nothing he could do for her-nothing. And if he stayed, then it wouldn't matter that it wasn't his fault-it wasn't his fault, damn it-he'd go to jail forever. And she wouldn't want that and so he'd ran out as quickly as he could without even stopping to say goodbye to her.
She had called out after him as he'd left, he remembered. She'd screamed his name as loudly as he could, crying in agony until her voice was overwhelmed with incoherent shrieks.
He'd blocked out that particular memory for all those fifty years, he realized. Because it was so powerful that it didn't matter that it wasn't his fault, that that life was another one-it would make him cry no matter what, just like it was making him cry then, as he muscled his way through the brush and the trees-and then came upon the only Dæmon ceyardy in all of the south of England.
His heart hammered in his chest. Directly before him were several dozen headstones, small and distantly spaced and engraved with names and dates and more names. Dæmons-Dæmons and their birth and death dates, and the names of their owners. They were all there, right there in front of him-and that meant that she was there, too, not fifty yards from him for the first time in as many years.
He wanted to go on and yet he didn't want to go on. It was only after clenching his fists so tightly that his claws came out and dug into his flesh that Alex was able to swallow, wipe the rain out of his eyes, and begin to methodically search the ceyardy for her grave.
He started at one corner and began to walk up and down the rows. There were many names listed, but Alex recognized some of them-those with Dæmons found those with Dæmons and those with Dæmons tended to stick together. There were rumors of entire communities exclusively for those with Dæmons abroad, mostly so that negative discrimination could be avoided... but also so that the special genetic makeup that made the existence of Dæmons possible might be preserved.
He'd once suggested finding one of those, but she'd disapproved of the idea. She'd follow him wherever he went, of course-to the ends of the Earth and beyond-but she wasn't like him. She loved people and she loved different people, and she loved to meet people that were against Dæmons and show them that, really, Dæmons were people too...
He was searching feverishly now. He was glancing at names so rapidly that he sometimes had to backtrack and then look again to make sure that he hadn't passed her in his rush-but he hadn't. He hadn't found her yet. And there were only a few graves that remained...
The rain had relaxed, but the thunder and lightning had not, nor had the wind. Although Alex had already been soaked to the flesh where his fur was exposed, and some places where it wasn't, he appreciated not being doused every second. Instinct made him jump, just a little, whenever there was a particularly loud or close rumble of thunder, but he ignored that. And he ignored the wind, too, except for when it was angled at him and so strong that he had to close his eyes or risk destroying his vision.
He had to find her, and she had to be there. And yet, there was the last grave... and the name marked on it was not hers.
For a moment, Alex was overcome with a feeling of uselessness. He'd abandoned her and done his damnedest to forget about her for fifty years, and now he couldn't even find her? Well... perhaps that was just his fate, then: to wonder what had happened to her until he died. Maybe she'd survived and found a way to defy nature and take on another person, a more deserving person-maybe he wouldn't even find out what had happened to her after death.
Maybe he'd just wander England forever, in life and beyond, peering into lost ceyardies and searching for her name. Or maybe he'd go back to the US and try to piece his life together again-he'd just lost everything for the third time.
And then something occurred to Alex. "Unknown"... that wasn't a name, was it? And that message, etched into the obsidian just below a question mark and a hyphen and a date forever burned into Alex's memory-that couldn't be something of significance... could it?
Before he realized it, he was on his knees and staring at the headstone again.
"Name unknown, birthday unknown... death date, May Fifth, 1960..." Alex murmured. His heart began to quiver in his chest as he read on.
"Transferred to authorities under the condition of anonymity days after death. No identifying marks or possessions. Believed to be from Fox Chase... Oxford..."
Alex felt numb. For a full moment, he was so still that he might have been frozen solid. But then, a drop of rain struck his eyebrow and then followed a furrow etched into his fur by drops before it. It crossed his tear duct and then continued to flow... and then, he began to sob.
He hugged the stone in front of him, the only marker of her life that existed. He had been on his knees to read what had been written on her headstone, but in seconds, he was on his belly, holding that stone tightly in his arms and rubbing it with his cheeks, his snout, his head. He'd found her at last, God damn it, and now he was crying his eyes out over her grave.
"Rachel," he cried, "I'm sorry. I'm sorry-I shouldn't have left you. I should have stayed, and saved you-or taken whatever punishment they would have given to me. I killed you, Rachel-I'm so sorry. It was an accident, Rachel; you know I wouldn't hurt you..."
But even that wasn't entirely true. Even as he sobbed those words, he realized that they weren't entirely true. He couldn't quite recall actually striking her, ever... but he knew that he'd raised his paw at her more than once. And that wasn't all.
Many times, he'd shouted at her and cursed her with language so foul that it had made the fur on the back of his neck stand up. And several times, he'd told her to get out of his sight, that he never wanted to see her again-and she'd always obeyed him. No matter how much it hurt her and no matter how many tears came to her eyes, she'd always obeyed him. Even if she hadn't been bound to obey him, she would have obeyed him anyway.
She'd always returned, of course, the moment he wanted her back. He didn't have to look for her or call for her-all he had to do was reach some sort of trouble or feel some regret and then she'd be there, at his side, as if she'd never left.
He'd tried to apologize to her... most of the time. But she had always just nuzzled his paw and said that it was alright, that she loved him no matter what and that it would be best if they just forgot things and moved on.
She was the most tolerant of beings, the most loving of beings. She had been his entire family, and much of his social group as well-she had raised him, she had taught him to read and write, and she was the one that he wrapped his arms around when he had a hard day and wanted nothing more than to lose himself in her white fur... and her cooing, and purring, and the loving, tender way she licked his head.
She gave him advice that no one else had the guts to. She did it timidly and gently and she rarely ever forced him-only once, when he had been on the verge of literally drinking himself to death had she take his paw into her mouth and then shook him until he dropped the bottle and passed out, only to wake up hours later to the warmth and softness of her embrace.
The love she'd showed him from the day they both came into being was beyond words. And it was beyond time, too, according to her-she'd always promised that when the bitterness and solitude that was the fate of an orphan drove Alex to thoughts of death and despair. She had always told him to love life, but never to fear death, because no matter where he went, she'd find her way to him somehow.
He'd once asked what would happen if he went to Hell. How would she find him then-because if he went to Hell, she'd be in Heaven. And at that, she had just reared up, wrapped her forelegs around his neck, and kissed him on the forehead.
She'd said that if she was without him, even the most Heavenly of paradises would be her own personal Hell. And in that manner, they'd find one another very quickly indeed.
He was undeserving of her love. He always had been, even before he'd so coldly left her to die alone in his house. And that thought made him sit up, again, releasing her stone from his arms, and simply sniffle to himself. He tried to dry his eyes with his palms, but it was still raining-so it didn't even matter.
He looked at her grave again. He placed a paw on the ground, as if he was trying to touch her fur one last time-but he only picked up a pawful of mud and grass.
"Rachel," he murmured, "you... always were a playful one. That's why I used to tease you-you blushed so much when I called you a housecat. Do you remember? You always used to say that you weren't-but then all I'd have to do to prove my point-I'll show you."
He reached into his pocket, grinning, and a moment later Alex had a length of string in his paw. He shook it once, so that it danced in the air-and then he tossed it, some yards away... before he realized that she wasn't going to rise from her grave to chase it. He didn't even feel her spirit attacking the length of yarn...
"Oh, Rachel," Alex sighed, "you really were a housecat. With your... soft, high-pitched voice, and... the way you used to squeal and cheekrub everything. And you even used to catch mice, too-but you never killed them, because you were far too gentle. You never did a violent thing in your life, except... when I absolutely needed you to. And you kicked ass, Rachel." He laughed once and tried to dry his eyes again. "You were so brave. And so powerful..."
Emotion began to fade, taking Alex's fantasy with it. Nostalgia arouse in the tiger-before that too left, replaced only by a dull, aching hole punched directly through him. He'd lost her, fifty years ago, and since then life had been nothing but fake, frivolous, and pointless. Every woman he'd held in his arms had been a slut, and ever friend he'd made had left him when someone more useful came along. Every did he did went without a reward or punishment that actually affected Alex overall.
He'd spent most of his life, he realized, hiding from the world. That was the only way he could have lived without losing his mind-alcoholism, workaholism, and a metallic sort of numbness had ruled his days ever since he'd left Oxford. He'd hidden from the world because without her, there was literally no one he wanted to see and nothing he wanted to do. He'd spent most of his life trying to ignore these facts...
And it seemed that he'd been successful, right up until that very moment. Right up until he realized that she was his life and refused to flinch before that fact-and then, he knew that he simply couldn't consider being as he was... a pathetic, miserable, shell of a being without any dreams or desires of his own.
With her, he had lost the desire to live. It had simply taken him over fifty years to realize it-but now that he did, his course of action seemed obvious.
"Well, Rachel," he said in a businesslike tone, as he reached into his coat, "you always said there's more to being wise than being smart. I suppose I understand, now."
He wanted to say more-but it didn't matter. It didn't matter at all, because no one was there to hear his last words.
Alex had taken his knife out. It took him a moment to remember how to open it, and when he did, the blade sprang open with such force that he dropped it. He grasped at it in the air, grabbing the still-sharp end in his fingers, and that hurt-but that didn't matter, either.
For a moment, Alex looked at the blade. The sleek, metal surface reflected light and so he saw himself, albeit darkened thanks to the backdrop of clouds and rain and storm and wind-and then, he looked beyond the blade and at Rachel's headstone again.
"At least I won't have to miss you anymore," he murmured.
And then he plunged the blade of his knife into the side of his neck.
Shock and fiery pain lanced out from the center of the wound, but Alex gritted his teeth and forced himself to go on. He grasped his knife in his paw and forced it to turn and slice and rip and tear, and since the tip of the blade seemed to have caught within his vertebrate, it was easy for him to literally cut his throat wide open. He went a little farther and then his jugular was opened-
And he fell down.
Losing so much blood so quickly had sapped the tiger's strength, and he was too old to force beyond the agony more. But it didn't matter-the job was done. It was likely that he'd pass out and struggle to live for some moments before he finally perished, but it didn't matter. Ever since he'd left Rachel, nothing had mattered.
Wind howled through the trees and somewhere in the distance, through the rain and darkness, the cemetery gates were opened and thrown about by the power of the storm. Alex's last thought was the hope that someone would figure out who he was, and that she was his... and that their bodies, at least, would rest together. Because they'd never be together again. Never...
There was a tiger that was not Alex in a world that was not Alex's.
Hers was a world of white clouds and light; his was a world of rain and darkness. And he was a ruddy-furred male with a big, bushy ruff-she was a pale female with sleek, luxurious fur covering her from head to toe.
But apart from their obvious differences, there were similarities. Alex was tall and she was a big Siberian, and they both had almond-shaped brown eyes. And their mannerisms were quite similar as well-Alex was prone to sitting quietly for hours when he was busy or had something interesting to do, and, in time, she had come to share that trait with him. In fact, she'd come to expand upon it, because Alex had never sat quietly for years at a stretch-but she had.
Even their tails acted similarly when they were distressed or anticipating something. Their tails both remained more or less still, except for the tips, which twitched and squirmed and flittered about as if with lives of their own. And just then, she was both distressed and waiting for something-something that would come soon, she hoped.
No, in fact, she didn't hope it would come soon-not at all. She winced and berated herself mentally, for a moment, and then she got up and walked around to calm her nerves.
She couldn't go far, though. In fact, she couldn't do much more than turn around and pace back and forth over the same few hundred square feet of space-any more than that and she'd fall, or else go beyond, where she couldn't receive what she'd been so patiently waiting for.
After a few seconds, she sat back down again. Her forelegs trailed off the clouds into open air and in a moment she was on her side, simply relaxing and breathing in a slow, deep, rhythmic pattern. She was lonely, and she had been lonely for a very, very long time, but that was alright. What she was waiting to receive was worth waiting an eternity for.
Or... then again, maybe it wasn't. Maybe waiting where she was for so long meant that she couldn't go beyond, ever, even when she did get what she was waiting for. Maybe it would be able to go on without her-maybe that meant that after a few precious moments together, they'd be separated again. But this time, their separation would be permanent.
That was okay, she reasoned. Of course, the idea of spending anything less than an eternity with God's gift to her made her sad, but it was alright. As long as she could have it for just a few more moments, it would all be okay.
Then again, maybe it wasn't going to come at all. Maybe it had gotten lost. Maybe she would never get what she was waiting for.
There was a noise, then, that made her ears perk up. A moment later she was on her feet and staring, hopefully, at the first set of gates-the set of gates that she'd passed without thinking. The second set of gates was just behind her but in all that long time, she'd never gotten closer than a few feet from them, because they scared her. She somehow knew that if she passed them, there was no turning back, and there was no chance of ever getting what she was waiting for.
But now it seemed that it had arrived-or had it? Were her senses just tricking her? After all, it had been so long and she wasn't that patient, no matter what he said-maybe she was just mistaken. Maybe he wasn't coming after all...
The gates-the first set of gates, just in front of her-opened, and stayed that way. But even after staring for a full minute and waiting with a held breath... nothing passed through them.
It was another false alarm, it seemed. Just another false alarm. They'd come less frequently as the years had passed by and people like them had met their ends, but every now and then she was roused to her feet by the appearance of people besides the one she was waiting for.
She'd always greeted them enthusiastically and explain that it was alright, even though they were dead-they were in the right place. All they had to do was pass one set of gates, then the other, and then they'd be happy and together forever.
Most of them assumed that she was an angel of some sort-a reception committee of one. But now and then, a curious duo would ask her who she was and why she was there, and she'd explain, shyly, that she was still waiting.
They'd pat her, then, and look at her with expressions of such awe and sadness that it made her blush. But they were wrong, all of them-she was dedicated and perseverant to be sure, but she wasn't crazy. She knew that he would come, someday. And, someday, they'd find one another again and they'd be together again, this time forever. She was willing to wait for him as long as she had to, because she knew that Dæmons couldn't find their people beyond the second gate. Beyond the second gate, people could find people, and people with Dæmons could find people with or without Dæmons, but lone Dæmons couldn't find anyone.
And she didn't want to be alone.
But then again... she already had been alone for so long. So maybe this false alarm was just His way of telling her that it was time to move on without him, because for one reason or another, he wasn't coming. She looked at the first set of gates for a moment, and then beyond them-and then she sighed and faced the second set of gates.
She wiped her nose with a paw and considered that maybe... maybe it was time to give up. Maybe he wasn't coming. Maybe he would never come.
There was a sudden commotion. Something had fallen down the flight of stairs leading from the first set of gates and landed right next to her.
She'd been facing away, though-and despite her size and great physical prowess, she had always been something of a 'fraidy cat. And so she followed her immediate instinct and reacted by skedaddling, sprinting across the full length of the intermediate zone before diving behind a cloud to take cover.
The cloud wasn't large, though, and she knew that it was semitransparent and that it wasn't perfectly white-it was tinged with yellow and gold and orange and pink. And so there was a strong chance that whatever was there between the gates could see her regardless. Curling up and staying still was useless, then-she had to see what was going on to figure out what to do. And if it really was dangerous, then she could simply get away by diving through the second gate. The flash of light that always occurred when people passed it would cover her escape, no doubt.
And so she turned around, as covertly and quietly as possible. She then peeked out to see what was going on-and nearly jumped out of her skin.
"Alex...?"
He irritably rubbed his head with both paws and winced to himself in more annoyance than pain. How on Earth was he supposed to walk on a cloud-it didn't even make sense that he was on a cloud in the first place. Clouds were just accumulations of airborne water vapor-how could such a thing possibly support his weight?
And yet, it was hard to imagine that he was surrounded by anything but clouds. Waving his paw through the structures that formed themselves in the air around him destroyed them and pressing into the "floor" beneath him got his paws in a few inches, and taking them out again made him note that there were little water droplets stuck to his fur.
Nothing made sense, the old tiger noted with not a small amount of frustration. He stood up, cracked his back, and tried to figure out where he was, what he was doing, and what on Earth was going on.
Five seconds later, he'd failed utterly on all three fronts. He had no idea where he was, and he couldn't think of anything he ought to be doing in a real of clouds and Sunlight. He had no idea what was going on either, as he couldn't qualify a single thing around him-not even himself.
His clothes had changed, he realized. He was wearing clothing that was nothing like anything he'd ever worn before-and where had he purchased such robes from? It certainly wasn't acceptable for an old man to go around, dressed as he was... then again, they were very nice robes. They weren't made of silk because they were too thick, but they were soft and light and kept him at precisely the temperature he wanted to be.
He began to stand up-and then he realized that he didn't need to plant his paws on the clouds and press upward to avoid straining himself. He realized that... his chest was no longer scrawny and his fur was no longer faded. He looked at his paws and then his forearms and he felt his fur and the hardened flesh and muscle beneath-and he realized that... he wasn't an old man anymore. He was a lad again, a big, muscular lad with strong arms and hands and sleek, rich fur.
Alex looked up from himself, and then he started to look around. After registering happiness-just for a moment-he felt only fear. Where was he, and what was going on, and how could he possibly be a young man again-
"Alex!"
At the sudden call of his name, the tiger almost jumped out of his skin. No one in the UK knew his name; no one was supposed to-he had to get away before he was caught and thrown in jail for murder and so he started to run.
He didn't get far, though. He couldn't get far. Something big and heavy and strong pounced on him from the back and wrestled him to the ground. Normally, Alex would have fought back, but despite how strong he himself was, he knew that he couldn't win against a force like the one attacking him. He screamed for help and prepared to be stabbed or shot or mugged or beaten-
And then he realized... he wasn't being attacked. He wasn't even being fought. He had been tackled to the ground, sure, and he had been muscled around until he couldn't get away-but he wasn't being hurt. He was being hugged... he was being hugged by someone gentle and strong and with white, striped arms who was crying his name into his back. Someone whose arms were more forelegs than anything else, and someone whose paws really were paws, not removed from feral appendages in the slightest.
Without realizing what he was doing-he was shocked to the point that his mind was numb-he managed to sit up and turn around. And just like that, there was a big, feral white tigress head in his arms, his lap, nuzzling and licking him and crying and saying his name over and over, and purring so powerfully that he felt it more than he heard it. He wanted to pet her-no, she wanted him to pet her because she was using her jaws, ever so gently, to place his paws on her head and neck and ruff.
But he couldn't pet her. He couldn't touch her-he wasn't touching her. None of this-none of anything Alex was seeing was real, because it was impossible. And so despite her affections and her happiness, Alex just shook his head and spoke softly.
"This can't be real," he murmured. "Rachel died years ago... I'm dead. I... stabbed myself in the neck and cut my throat out, so... this must be my imagination. I must be... just barely clinging on to life. Can't be real," he repeated, dryly. "It's impossible."
But she was shaking her head. She was shaking her head even as she pressed her face against his chest, rubbing at his torso with the smooth, soft bluntness of her head.
"No, Alex-I waited; I waited for you, and here you are! Alex!"
She was too happy for words, it seemed. She tried to say more, but then she gave up and simply nuzzled him again, so roughly that he almost fell over. And so she didn't feel him raise a trembling paw and set it on the back of her head until a moment later when he started to speak again.
"Can't be," he mumbled. "It's impossible..."
She looked up at him, and he looked down at her. In her eyes were tears of happiness, but his eyes were dull and lifeless. He didn't believe what he was seeing and she wasn't convincing him by doing what she'd always done to show him that life was worth living-covering him with physical affection until even the sullen tiger smiled and told her that he loved her.
She shut her eyes, then, and nipped her lip. What if... he didn't believe her, and went on alone? She couldn't let that happen, no matter what, and so she subtly rested her forelegs on the clouds again, on either side of Alex's body. If he tried to get away, she'd be able to stop him in a moment-but she wanted to convince him that she was real. She had to convince him that she was real.
"You... were gone ages," she said. "I missed you, Alex."
She looked up at him, but he didn't respond. Instead, he brought his paw forward and stroked her head, gently, and then rubbed her in a slow, wide circle with his palm.
Reflexively, her eyes shut and her ears flattened. She went quiet and she purred, and then nuzzled against his petting appendage in a manner that no other person or Dæmon or feral could do. But he still said nothing-so she did.
"I'm sorry that you're dead," she murmured. "I hope it didn't hurt..."
She looked up, then, as Alex winced and put a paw to his neck. She didn't understand why, but she knew that he felt sad for some reason-so she leaned forward and licked him from his collarbone to his jaw. When she did that, he stiffened up, and for a wild moment she feared that he was going to run-but then he just faced her, and for the first time, she saw some of the Alex she had known return to his eyes.
"It was... alright," the tiger murmured, and Rachel knew that he was hiding something from her. But before she could ask him to explain, he gave her a brief, tiny smile. "I missed you, too," he breathed. "Rachel..."
He tried to pet her again, but this time, she tilted her head to the side and looked up at him sadly. Her ears were still flat, but not because he was stroking the top of her head. They were flat because she was sad.
"Why did you run away, Alex? I needed you so much, and you ran away... why?"
Her question made pain sear up and down from the center of Alex's chest. He'd hoped that she might not ask him that, at least not so soon-but he wouldn't refuse to answer her. After all, he'd hurt her-he'd let her die. She had the right to know.
He leaned forward, then, and was grateful to feel her forelegs wrap around his chest. He hugged her back, as best he could; it had always been difficult for him because she'd always been so much bigger than him, even when they had both been cubs.
"I'm so sorry, Rachel. I didn't-I didn't want to go to jail," he said. He pressed his face into the soft fur at the side of her neck so tightly that for a moment, he couldn't breathe. "I should never have left you, Rachel. I should have-I should've let them take me," Alex said. "Because it was my fault you got hurt, Rachel. I was the one who killed you-"
But the tigress just shook her head when he said that. She nudged him with her paw until he was sitting down again, and looked into his eyes. She tried to smile, but she just shivered until she instinctively pressed herself close to him so that they could share body heat.
"I was scared, too, Alex. And lonely," she murmured. She fell silent again as Alex's strong arms held her close and she simply shut her eyes and let him hold her as tightly as he wanted to.
"I was lonely too, Rachel. Fifty years without you... it wasn't easy," he said.
A moment later, the tigress hadn't replied. But even though they'd been apart for fifty years, all she had to do to communicate with him was to think and will her thoughts to enter his mind. She looked up at him and she tilted her head, and a moment later, the bond they'd always shared was strong enough for Alex to realize what she wanted to know.
"After you died, I went to America and started life over. I got... fake documents, and went back to school. I graduated early and got my Master's within another year, and that was that," he said easily, as if he didn't particularly care about his academic accomplishments. "I married two years later, and I had three sons with my wife, and another with someone else. She cheated on me as well," Alex explained, before Rachel could register true shock and disappointment. "In fact... she was never loyal to me, not even at the beginning."
He sighed.
"Things went on normally for some time. Couldn't stop thinking of you, but I did my best to be a good father and husband."
"You mean you... left you wife and kids behind?" Rachel asked. "Alex, you shouldn't be here; come on, let's see if you can go back-"
But the tiger just ruefully shook his head and laughed. "She left me years ago; I haven't spoken to her since then. My sons don't talk to me, either. Maybe I... wasn't such a nice father." He laughed again, sadly, but this time, Rachel was there to soften the blow of his sorrow by nuzzling him under the chin.
"But you should still be with your family," the tigress protested. "You should love them, and cherish them."
This time, Alex just shrugged. "Last thing I heard, my wife had taken up with some canine." He winced at that, and Rachel couldn't help but rolling her eyes. Some of Alex's closest friends had been canines, but he was always severely affected by the idea of a tigress being with a canine in any sense.
"I already gave my sons money and their own businesses and everything... they don't need this old bag of stripes anymore. I haven't said a word to any of them in five years," he sighed.
Rachel sighed as well. It seemed that after she'd left, Alex's life... hadn't really been worth living. How he got through things, how he kept himself alive each day... all at once, her time in the clouds seemed like a very long, very boring vacation. She brought her head up so that instead of simply resting in his lap, she was facing him again. And, slowly, she rested her paws on his thighs rather than to the sides of him-she wasn't worried that he'd try to run away anymore.
"Well... you're here now, Alex, and that's all that matters. We're together again," she smiled. "And that's how it'll always be... right?"
Alex was nodding already. He paused-and then he leaned forward and planted a kiss on Rachel's forehead. When he sat normally again, he saw that she was blushing and he couldn't help but grin and stroke her striped cheek until she purred and purred and licked his arm in thanks.
"I won't leave you again, Rachel," Alex murmured. "I promise."
He paused, and for a moment, the two striped cats simply held one another. Neither of them were wildly happy, as she had been when she'd first seen him, but both of them were healing one another and rekindling the flames of the long-lost relationship that only a Dæmon and her person could share.
"So... where exactly are we, Rachel? I don't really understand... how are we walking in clouds?" Alex asked. He let the tigress go and then stood up, testing the "ground" by stepping forward and seeing if he could force through it-but he couldn't. He tried harder, and almost fell, and that made Rachel laugh and headbutt his hip, before rubbing her entire long, striped form against his leg.
"We're in Heaven, Alex," she said. "Or something like it, anyway. I'm not really sure how it works, but I'm sure we'll find out soon enough. And stop looking so surprised," she laughed. "I always told you that you were a good guy at heart. You always had a place up here."
He didn't reply to that, and she didn't blame him. He seemed to be overcome with emotion, which was quite rare indeed for him. It was only after a moment of nuzzling at his hip that the tigress was able to make Alex blink, wipe his eyes with the back of a paw, and then look down at her.
"It must have been boring for you," the tiger said, "to be up here all by yourself for so long. I guess... you can't go back through the first gate. I was sort of... booted through it, but I think I know that we can't go back. That would be like coming back to life, wouldn't it?"
Rachel nodded. What he said just felt right to her, though neither of them had any way of knowing for sure what laws governed the afterlife. It seemed that in cosmic terms, they were the both of them just wide-eyed cubs, waiting to be filled with knowledge.
"So... what happens when we go through the second gate?" Alex said. He turned and for the first time, faced the second pair of massive, gold-colored doors not fifty feet from him-and he was intimidated. He took a step back and if he didn't have her there at his side, he might well have tried to find a way out.
But now, he had Rachel again. He could rest his hand on her powerful shoulder and feel her strength enter his body and he could feel her love for him, her passion, her determination, and the optimism that he'd never been able to perfect on his own.
"I don't know, Alex," the tigress admitted. She felt a bit guilty and a bit foolish for having been there for so long but not figuring out what lay beyond the second gate. "All I know is that whenever someone walks through, there's a lot of light, and then... they vanish."
"So-do they die?" Alex asked, but Rachel just shook her head.
"No, Alex... they're already dead," the tigress said. "I think... they go on, but I'm not sure how. And I think... they're happy to go on. Whenever they go," she swallowed, "it's almost overwhelming. I can feel their happiness, Alex, I... I've almost followed them, a few times. But I didn't-I stayed back, I waited, so that when you came... we could go on together, and never be apart again."
She hadn't meant to touch Alex so much-she was just explaining her understanding of the world beyond the intermediate location they had both been in for several minutes by then. But her ear flicked-she looked up, though not quite quickly enough to see Alex fall to his knees and wrap his arms around her chest, burying his face into her side. She heard him thanking her repeatedly, kissing her and nuzzling into her fur-and then she was knocked to her side when Alex suddenly decided to test out strength he hadn't had in decades.
They fought, then-roughly, but playfully. Neither of them had to exert conscious effort to prevent their claws from coming out, because their bodies had been attuned to one another since before birth. True, they nipped one another and true, Rachel did hold herself back somewhat to not simply dominate Alex-but now that he didn't have to worry about the struggles of life and living, he seemed much faster, stronger, more agile, and more determined to enjoy existence.
That was why, at the end, Alex was victorious. That was why for the first time ever, he'd defeated Rachel without her simply allowing him to. He'd earned his victory and he'd earned the ability to hold her down and snuggle against her as much as he wanted until she mrowled and struggled and wriggled until he laughed, relented, and let her up to fix her fur.
He watched her lick her paws and use them to straighten her coat out from several feet away, and he couldn't help but smile. She was beautiful, yes, and she was a lot stronger than him-in many ways-but she still felt like a housecat. She still felt like his little kitty. He mentioned that, some moments later, and she reacted as she always did: she blushed, furiously, and tried to growl, and then she just whined that she was a tigress and deserved her dignity and respect, and then they hugged and that was that.
He suspected that underneath it all, however, she liked it when he called her his little kitty-at least, when they were alone. In public, she did have a sense of propriety; she did conduct herself with the nobility and grace that was generally associated with her species. And that was fine with him, because he loved her and he loved it when she was respected by others and herself. What happened between them stayed between them, and that was how it had always been.
"I had a string for you," Alex said, and despite everything, Rachel couldn't help but look up suddenly with her ears perked-but the male cat shook his head, sorrowfully, and showed that his paws were empty. "I couldn't bring it here with me. I'm sorry, Rachel."
"That's alright, Alex. I'm glad you thought of me," she said, padding over to share a series of affectionate nuzzles with the tiger before he, too, stood up.
All at once, there was silence. It didn't feel like there was anything more to do there, in that strange half-world between Earth and Heaven, and now Rachel felt the desire to go through the second gate. They both stared at it with equal parts trepidation and a need that was too deep to be called hunger-and then they looked at one another again.
"You know, Rachel... when we go through, we... might just cease to be," he said. "We might never see each other again, if we go through those gates."
"Maybe," the tigress admitted. "But... I think that now that we've seen one another again, it'll be alright. Even if everything ends here, right now... I know I'll be happy, Alex." She smiled at him and nuzzled his hip so roughly that he had to take a step back to stay on his feet.
"I'll be happy too, Rachel. But... if it's alright with you... we died apart, and for fifty years we've been apart, so... I'd like to pass the second gate with you. If it's alright," he murmured, but he needn't have asked. She already smiling, and nodding, and kissing at the fingers he'd slid into the fur on her cheek.
"I'd love to, Alex. I love doing anything with you... I love you, Alex. You know that, right?" she said, half-purring the whole time. "No matter what happened, or how lonely I got... I loved you the whole time."
He rubbed her under the chin, then, just the way he could-just the way that made her shut her eyes in ecstasy and purr and hum and press herself close to the greatest source of warmth, of love, that she'd ever known.
"I loved you too, Rachel. But I have to know... why did you love me? I'm not... the nicest man, or the tallest, or the strongest, or the smartest, or anything. I'm... just me. I'm just Alex. Why does someone perfect like you love a guy like me?"
He'd never asked her that before, she realized. Sometimes, he'd asked her questions around that issue and she'd always answered briefly and honestly. He'd always been touched by her responses-or at least, that's what she thought, because he never said as much. But he always did take her out for ice cream after she told him why they were so close-he always did show her that he loved her to, in his own gruff, curt, Alex sort of way.
"I love you..." Rachel said carefully, a moment later, "because... you're you, Alex." She looked up at him and then stepped forward with a massive yet dainty paw, and rested her face against his torso.
"I love you because I'm your Dæmon, Alex," the tigress said. "And Dæmons love forever."
He simply stroked the back of her neck, for a moment-but then, Alex caressed her head in his arms. She was too big for him to hug properly, but he didn't even need to touch her for her to understand him. She'd known him since before he was born, so she knew that no matter what, or when, or where, he loved her. After all, she was his Dæmon.
Several minutes passed. Alex stood up straight, and so did Rachel. They smiled at one another, and if she was bipedal then they would have held paws. But she wasn't, so Alex simply rested his paw on her. He turned, then, and looked at the second set of gates, so big and mighty and yet so welcoming. They drew him in, and he knew that now that he and Rachel were together again, it was time for them to go on.
"You know... I never thought I'd be here," the tiger said. "In Heaven... or right at its gates, with you, Rachel. I'm.. so happy."
She didn't respond verbally-she just smiled at him, before nudging his thigh with her cold, wet nose. It really was time to go, it seemed, so Alex drew his robes around him a bit more securely and began to walk toward the second set of gates.
He was nervous-what if he was rejected? And what if he simply faded away, and what if he and Rachel were separated again? What if-
And then the second set of gates opened. Alex's paw gripped tightly at the fur on Rachel's neck-and then he realized that the light he was looking at was not an attack. He wasn't in danger. It was just that that bright, white light was shining on him to welcome him in by showing him its beauty and serenity without the slightest adulteration. He was being beckoned in, now, with open arms-and he saw that Rachel would be there at his side for all eternity, just like that indescribable light.
Wetness collected in Alex's eyes. Rachel was pressed close to his leg, as if she was afraid-but she was purring loudly, madly, and the only thing that was keeping her from racing forward in jubilation was the fact that Alex's feet were rooted to the clouds. She was waiting for him, yet again, and for that, Alex promised he'd never look away from her-ever. He'd spend all time with Rachel, loving her, playing with her, and, maybe once in a while calling her his little kittykins. And he'd enjoy every second of it.
He started to walk, then. At first, his gait was slow, but then it was fast. And then, he was running, and then he was sprinting with his Rachel, his tigress, his Dæmon at his side. He kept sprinting, faster and faster and faster and faster and then he saw that the light was right in front of him. He looked to make sure that Rachel was still there and when he saw her at his side, loping forward and laughing, he knew that all would be well.
Alex jumped forward, and so did Rachel. The light engulfed them both, and the gates shut behind them.
They were precisely where they belonged: together, forever.
(I guess the ending felt a bit quick, but there it is. This story is just under sixteen thousand words, which makes it short in my opinion-so, what did you think of it? I've not done something like this in ages. How did I do?
Most people would put the dedication here, but I won't. Good luck in finding your Dæmons again, guys... Fais out.)