The village resolved as they approached - dark shapes clustered together, surrounded by stone walls. Tall. Patrolled.
The Elder circled the perimeter, staying in shadow, watching the guard patterns from the darkness beyond the torchlight.
She stopped near the eastern wall - where Solstice had pointed from the hill. The massive stone barrier had failed here. Stones had spilled out from the inner layers, cascading down until they found their resting place in a tumbled heap against the base. The breach gaped open - not a crack, but a wound in the wall several feet across where the interior had emptied out.
Lumber lay stacked nearby. Piles of collected stones sat ready to be fitted back. Repair work begun but abandoned for the night.
The Elder leaped. Landed atop the damaged section soundlessly.
Solstice followed onto the tumbled stones, then up to the damaged section. Her new pads protested, but she made it.
They moved along the top of the wall, staying low, staying in the darkest shadows between guard positions. The Elder moved like water. Solstice tried to copy her.
When the path was clear, they dropped down. Inside.
The Elder moved along the base of the wall, keeping to its shadow. Solstice followed.
The village opened before them. Not crude structures, but deliberate architecture. Peaked roofs with elegant curves sweeping upward like rabbit ears. Solid wooden walls, dark and weathered. Small gardens nestled between buildings—carefully raked gravel, shaped shrubs, stone arrangements. Everything harmonious. Intentional.
Beautiful.
Lamplight appeared ahead. Moving along the wall toward them.
And behind—another light. Coming from the other direction.
Guards. Converging.
The Elder cut left, slipping down a narrow alley between buildings. Away from the wall. Into the village proper.
Solstice pressed herself flat beside her.
The light ahead stopped at a ladder. Started descending.
A rabbit climbed down - bow across his back, hands gripping the rungs. He reached the ground and stepped aside, looking up.
“Tri pli noktoj. Finfine, mi finis kun ?i tiu rotacio.”
A long polearm descended, passed down bottom-first. The archer grabbed it, holding the massive pole steady—towering above him even as he held it—with the lantern still swinging from its hook near the blade.
The polearm guard climbed down, talking the whole way.
“Lasu min diveni - rekte al Herbejo-arbaro por ?eti vian monon al La Rozo de Warren denove?”
His friend laughed as he descended.
The guard reached the bottom and took his polearm back. Both had curved swords at their hips.
Solstice watched the lantern swing from the hook, casting shifting shadows.
The first rabbit’s ears flattened slightly as he responded, defensive.
His friend’s laugh got louder, more mocking. He made a gesture Solstice couldn’t quite see, but whatever he said made the first rabbit go quiet. Serious.
They walked away from where the cats hid, voices fading. The last words drifted back:
“Vi vidos. Tri pli noktoj.”
The lamplight disappeared around a corner.
The Elder waited. Counting. Making sure they were truly gone.
“Elder?” Solstice kept her voice low. “Aren’t torches supposed to be fire on sticks?”
The Elder stared after where the guards had gone. “They used to be.” Her voice was quiet. Uncertain. “Fire held high on sticks. This is… new.”
She shook her head once, then moved forward.
Solstice followed.
They slipped between two buildings, deeper into the village.
“Why are we hunting here?” Solstice asked. “In this village? Wouldn’t the woods have prey? Deer or… or other things?”
The Elder didn’t stop moving. Didn’t look back.
“The woods are for experienced hunters. For those who understand their abilities. Who can track. Who can kill cleanly.” She slipped between two buildings. “You are capable of none of those things.”
The words stung, but they were true.
“This is a controlled environment,” the Elder continued. “Prey that won’t scatter into the endless forest. Prey gathered in one place. Easy to contain. Easy to finish.” She paused at a corner, checking the path ahead. “You need to learn to glean. This is where you will learn.”
They moved deeper into the village. Past gardens. Between wooden walls.
The silence stretched. Broken only by their pawsteps and distant sounds of rabbits settling for the night.
Solstice’s attention wandered.
They’d been sneaking for so long. Staying low. Moving slow. Her body wanted to do something. Pounce on something. Chase something.
A piece of cloth hung from a rack beside their path - drying laundry, maybe. It fluttered slightly in a breeze Solstice could barely feel.
Her tail swished.
Once.
Twice.
The cloth was right there.
Her paw batted at it before she’d consciously decided to.
The fabric slid off the pole. The wooden pole rolled in its frame, traveling outward as the weight shifted. It extended into the walkway and stopped, held by the rack but now jutting across the alley.
Footsteps. Hopping. Getting closer.
This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
A rabbit came around the corner carrying a large bundle of cloth dolls. She walked straight into that pole in the darkness - caught her right across the neck. Her feet kept moving forward as her upper body stopped, and she went down hard on her back.
The bundle flew from her arms. Soft shapes scattered across the ground. Dolls of different animals - rabbits, yes, but also mice, birds, even a fox kit. Anatomically detailed. Carefully made.
So many of them.
The rabbit scrambled up, frantically gathering them.
“Bruligitaj biskvitoj!”
Solstice pressed herself flatter. The Elder’s eyes burned into her from behind a stack of something in the alley.
She counted in those strange words, picking them up one by one.
“Dek tri, dek kvar…”
One doll rolled away from the others. Kept rolling. Right toward where Solstice was hiding.
A mouse. Grey fabric, button eyes, long tail trailing behind.
It stopped against her paw.
The rabbit was still counting. Still searching.
“…dek kvin—”
She stopped. Looked around.
One missing.
Solstice looked at the mouse doll. At the rabbit searching.
She pushed it. Gently. It rolled back toward the path.
“Jen ?i estas! Bon?anca mi!”
She gathered all fifteen dolls back into her bundle and hurried away, muttering to herself.
The Elder stepped out of shadow. Looked at Solstice.
Said nothing.
They kept moving.
“What is glean?” Solstice asked after a moment, trying to redirect attention from her mistake. “You said this is where I learn to do it. What does that mean?”
The Elder didn’t answer immediately. When she did, her voice held something different. Something hungry.
“Everything that lives wants to keep living.” She moved between buildings, Solstice following. “That wanting—that need to survive—it’s power. And when you consume them completely, that power doesn’t vanish.”
Solstice’s tail twitched. “It… goes somewhere?”
“It becomes yours.” The Elder’s eyes gleamed in the darkness. “Their strength. Their speed. The part of them that fought to take one more breath.” She glanced back. “That’s what you take when you glean. What made them alive.”
“Like the healing you did? When you gave me energy?”
The Elder stopped. Looked at her.
“That was me giving. This is you taking.” Her tail swished once. “You consume them—everything they are—and their life becomes your life. Makes you stronger. Faster. More.”
Something about how she said it made Solstice’s fur prickle.
But the Elder was already moving again.
They passed close to another building. Thinner walls here - the wood was aged, gaps between the boards.
Voices drifted through. Soft. Gentle.
A kit’s voice, young and persistent: “Panjo, rakontu al mi historion? Bonvolu?”
A mother’s response, warm but firm: “Neniu rakonto ?i-nokte, floreto. Vi estas tro juna por malfrua vespero. Dormu nun.”
Solstice slowed. Her ears swiveled toward the sound.
“?u Pa?jo estos hejme balda??”
“Balda?. Li patrolas ?i-nokte. Nun fermu viajn okulojn.”
The words meant nothing. But the melody underneath them - the warmth, the safety, the love wrapped in every syllable…
Singing started. Soft. A lullaby.
“Fermu viajn okulojn, etulo,
Luno gardas vin.
Steloj tenas vin sekura ?is tagi?o,
Mateno portas min reen al vi.”
Solstice stopped walking. Just… stopped.
Her tail swayed, loose and relaxed.
—This is nice—
Her body began to sway, too. Following the rhythm. The gentle rise and fall.
The Elder’s tail hit her shoulder. Sharp. Deliberate.
Solstice blinked. Looked up.
The Elder turned into a narrower passage.
Solstice shook herself and followed.
The singing faded behind them, but Solstice’s mind stayed on it. On the dolls scattered in the alley. On the rabbit who’d been so worried about losing one. On the voice singing to someone small and safe.
The Elder said I need to glean.
She looked ahead at the Elder’s tail swishing as they walked.
But they have homes. And toys. And songs.
The toad had been easy. Just food. But these rabbits were—
Different.
They moved. Talked. Built things. Cared about things.
Her paws kept moving. Following.
The Elder said eating them makes me stronger. But how?
She needed to understand.
“So I just—”
—Quiet—
Her tail’s warning came too late.
“—have to eat them?” Solstice finished the whisper. The sibilants hissed through the still air, carrying.
The Elder’s head snapped towards her, eyes wide.
But something else heard her as well.
“Kio estis tio?”
The voice came from around the corner. Close. Too close.
Footsteps. Hopping. Getting closer.
Jingle-jingle.
No.
—Oh fuck—
The Elder’s eyes flashed yellow—bright, predatory. She moved—not away, but across the alley. Positioning herself in shadow on the opposite side.
—Flee—
Solstice’s body didn’t move.
THWAP.
—RUN—
THWAP. THWAP.
Her legs locked. Frozen. The panic wrapped around her chest, squeezing, making everything too tight, too much, too—
She couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t think. Just pressed against her wall as the footsteps got closer, closer—
Jingle-jingle.
NOOO!
A rabbit rounded the corner. No torch. Walking slowly. Searching.
Big.
His ears swiveled, tracking sounds.
“Etulo?”
Jingle.
He stopped when he saw her.
Solstice looked up at him.
He looked down at her.
So big. Coming—no, not again.
She closed her eyes and waited for the pain. Waited for—
Please, Brother. Save me.
A memory answered—warm and safe.
The old couch. The soft one with the worn cushions. Coffey’s warmth pressed against one side, Smoke curled against the other. Smoke’s purr rumbled through both of them. The sound of keys at the door. The fathers were home.
Coffey lifted his head. Smoke’s eyes opened—alert, eager.
Jingle-jingle.
Coffey stretched, yawned, padded toward the door. Smoke followed immediately, rubbing against Coffey’s legs as they walked, weaving between his paws. She scrambled after them, tail high. Ducati spied on them from under the couch. Everyone else gathered at the door. It opened. Hands reached down. Pets and scratches and happy sounds.
Home.
Safe.
Together.
“Katido?”
Her eyes snapped open.
She tried to breathe. Couldn’t.
Cold spread under her fur.
Solstice’s eyes became huge as his ears came forward. Unblinking. Locked in the nightmare, she almost didn’t notice the one rising behind him, as the Elder’s body began to change.
She watched it happen. Saw the Elder’s bottom half melt into a dark slurry, spreading silently across the ground beneath him. Saw the Elder’s top half stay cat-shaped—connected by a ribbon of liquid shadow—rising up, growing larger as she crested like a wave, crossing the alley. Larger than she’d been. Larger than any cat should be.
Solstice’s fur exploded outward. Back arched. Tail puffed to twice its size.
“Khiiisss! FUCK!”
The rabbit heard the hiss. Saw the poof. His ears drooped. One paw lifted slightly—slow, careful—palm open.
He’s going to hurt me.
“Ho, ne timu min.”
Their eyes met, and everything went slow.
His eyes were dark. She couldn’t look away. Couldn’t move. Her heart hammered so hard she thought it might break through her ribs.
I can’t run. I can’t—
Then the Elder crashed down.
Her paws landed first—controlled, precise—bearing her weight onto his back. Pushing him down. Her jaw opened impossibly wide and closed around his neck.
The Elder’s head twisted. Slow. Deliberate.
CRACK.
The snap was clean. Precise. His body went limp as he collapsed forward into the slurry pool below.
His eyes stayed on Solstice’s. Still open. Still aware. She watched something flicker through them—confusion, then understanding, then terror.
The liquid shadow filled his mouth, his nose. His head didn’t lift. Didn’t move.
His back legs began to kick—to spasm. Not like when she attacks—something else. Twitching. Jerking.
Jingle.
The keys at his belt.
Jingle-jingle.
Her eyes snapped to the sound. Then back to his face.
The Elder’s weight pressed down on him, pushing him deeper into the void of herself. The slurry rose, engulfing the keys. Silencing them.
But his eyes. His eyes were still aware.
She didn’t look away. Couldn’t look away. Just watched until the awareness finally faded, until there was nothing left looking back at her.
He sank into it—through it—as if the ground beneath had disappeared. His last breath, his final gaze, and his entire being faded into the darkness as the slurry swallowed him whole.
Just deeper and deeper.
The Elder’s form began to shrink, as the last of him vanished into her slurry.
Two seconds. Maybe three.
Then silence.
The Elder stood exactly where the rabbit had been. Normal-sized again. Calm.
He was gone. Consumed. Like he’d never existed at all.
Solstice’s breathing came in short gasps. Her heart still hammered.
He almost got me.
She stared at the spot where he’d been. No body. No blood. Not even disturbed dirt.
Almost hurt me.
The Elder stopped him.
The panic started to ease. Slowly. Like water draining.
Protected me.
The Elder looked at Solstice. Yellow eyes cold.
“Very educational, Soft-paw. Your whisper drew him to us.”
She stepped closer, tail lashing once.
“Congratulations on discovering an additional Law of Survival.” Something sharp edged her voice. “Law Forty-Nine: If you cannot SEE your prey, assume it is NOT safe to speak.”
She turned and continued walking.
“Let us hope you learn from your discovery before it gets you dead-dead.”
I am seeking feedback. Please take a moment to answer the following questions, or share anything else you'd like. Thank you.
- When the rabbit discovered Solstice frozen in the alley—did you feel her panic with her, or did you feel frustrated that she didn't run?
- After Solstice thought "He almost hurt me"—did you feel her rationalization was understandable (trauma response) or concerning (dangerous denial)?
- When Malice scolded Solstice afterward ("Law Forty-Nine")—did you side with Malice (she endangered them) or with Solstice (she was frozen with trauma)?