Elspeth Starkenburg's Arc

Chapter 5 of 10

Apple had slept the whole night by the fire. In the morning Elspeth walked her back to the barn, the way the deal required. The cat trotted ahead, nose down, hunting mice among the feed sacks. Elspeth waited by the door. She wanted to be sure Apple remembered the cottage. She wanted to be sure Apple would come home again at dusk. Heinrich came around the corner with a bucket in one hand. He wore his straw hat low. He set the bucket down and looked at the cat, not the girl. "She's back early," he said. "I brought her to hunt," Elspeth said. "Then she comes home with me tonight. Like we agreed." Heinrich nodded slow. He watched Apple slip into the dark between the sacks. "She was born here," he said. "Under that trough. This is her home." He looked at Elspeth now. "A cat drifts back to where it belongs. She'll leave your cottage unless it gives her a reason to stay." Elspeth's stomach dropped. She thought of the crate, the sardines, the feather. She thought Apple had chosen her. But Heinrich said the barn would always pull the cat back. If that was true, every night would be a fight she would lose. Elspeth stood there and thought hard. Her father used to say a place is home when it holds what you love. He said that once about their old chair by the window. Not the wood. The hand that rested there. Apple did not need the barn. She needed something in the cottage that was only hers. "She likes the warm spot best," Elspeth said, half to herself. "Not the crate. My pillow." Heinrich raised one eyebrow. "Then give her the pillow." Elspeth watched Apple hunt a while longer. She made up her mind. She would stop leaving the cat in the crate by the fire. Tonight she would lift Apple onto the pillow, next to her own head, where the blanket held the most heat. She would make her bed the warmest place in the whole cottage. Warmer than any trough. A spot Apple could not find in the barn. At dusk Apple came out from the sacks and rubbed against Elspeth's ankle. The girl carried her home. She did not put her in the crate. She lifted the cat onto her pillow and lay down beside her. Apple sniffed the cloth. She kneaded it once, twice. Then she stretched out against Elspeth's cheek and closed her eyes. Elspeth held still. Heinrich was right about one thing. The barn would always be there. But now the pillow was warm, and it smelled like her, and Apple stayed. The cat did not drift anywhere. She slept pressed to the girl's face until morning. But in the gray light Elspeth woke to a low, rough sound. Apple was not asleep. The cat crouched at the window, staring out, her tail lashing.