“Him,” Kaius urged.
Ianmus didn’t respond, but the shimmering dot did settle on the guard's thigh. The cat gave chase.
“Oh, shut it,” the other guard hissed back. “It’s just running scared. Besides, they don’t get no rabies anymore. Got stats and stuff.”
“That supposed to make me feel better? What if it’s got a taste for blood?” the first guard whined, shying back.
A howling ball of claws and fur shot towards them.
“Just let the damn thing pass!” Rodge said, scowling as the men on the roof chuckled at the scene.
The first guard seemed all too happy to comply as the cat raced into the light, jumping back as it sprinted along the base of the fence line.
He didn’t expect the thing to pounce. Outstretched claws glinted with the telltale light of a Skill as they punched through the man's thick canvas trousers.
A blood-curdling shriek echoed down the street.
“It’s got me! It’s got me, Rodge. Get it off!”
“What in the bloody hells!” his companion yelled, jumping back.
Ianmus flicked the light to the man’s belly, and the cat scaled him like a veritable titan-slayer, utterly focused on its prey. Dropping his truncheon, the gate guard grabbed for the cat — only to yelp in pain as Ianmus made the creature scrambled around to its back.
The guard reached for it helplessly, a steady stream of confused and pained curses slipping from his lips.
It was the perfect moment Kaius could have hoped for. He cast, targeting the four guards to focus on the display — though given Ianmus’s show he wasn’t even really sure he needed to. Half hysterical laughs slipped from the guards on the roof, and the unmolested gate guard lunged towards the cat that was currently tearing up his friend's back.
Infuriated at the interruption to its hunt, the beast hissed — and sunk its fangs into the man's hand.
He yelped, drawing back. “Oh, fuck. It got me Damos! What if it's rabid!”
Damos seemed far too busy with his hurried attempts to claw off his jacket to help. “You said it didn’t have no rabies!”
“Look at it man, it ain’t natural! Might have magic rabies!” Rodge replied, taking a half step back.
“Then get the fucker off me!”
Right at that moment, the second floor window slammed open, and three guards leaned out.
“Oi, what’s happening out there?!”
Kaius lurched in realisation — they’d only ever seen three guards take their breaks at the window. If they were watching, then there was a good chance that the room with the fireplace was clear.
“Demos’s got a new mate!” one of the rooftop guards howled, tears streaming down his mind.
“Fuck off!” Demos screamed back, hurling his jacket to the side. Ianmus shifted the light to the back of his thigh, and the cat followed in hot pursuit, clawing bloody tracks in the man’s pale tunic.
Reaching for his glyph, Kaius hit the latest audience members with their own casts of Compel Obsession.
“Now, Kenva!” he hissed, watching as the guards in the window stared at their colleague getting mauled for a moment, before they too started laughing.
“Gods scorn, Demos — what’d you do? Wipe your ass with cod?”
“Someone get this fucker off me!”
All of a sudden, Kenva melded into the darkness as she slipped into the embrace of The Mother’s Shadow — then she dissolved into a gust of leaves. Flowing between the hanging creepers that shrouded her alley, she joined the swirling winds — dancing with the leaf litter that swept down the street.
The unnaturally clustered leaves flew up and over the edge of the roof, sliding behind the guards who were laughing maniacly at the havoc the cat had wrought on their friend.
She slipped into the chimney a moment later. Kaius held his breath, watching as Ianmus egged the cat on for a few more moments and drew a few final yelps and laughs from the guards.
“I’m in.”
Breathing out with relief, Kaius released his spells. It barely took a moment for the tabby to withdraw its fangs from the guard’s buttocks.
“Go with the gods,” he muttered to himself as it sprinted off into the night.