Cat chases sunbeams into the dark

The sun had sunk nearly to the tops of the western hills, signaling the start of the hottest hour of the day.

With a sturdy staff in her good hand to steady her, Catan toiled uphill and down, around massive boulders and over fallen pines, until she had left all but the echoes of her sister’s splashing and laughing behind. Neither the heat nor the effort nor the skirt-​​snagging stems of woundwort and dead-​​nettle slowed her at all. Like any self-​​respecting feline on such a golden afternoon, Cat was chasing after sunbeams.

At first the rocks and blooms and pools the slanting rays had pointed out to her had proven to be unworthy of their brief, shining splendor. Then, before she had quite tired of the game, she found what the sun had been hoping to show her by laying out these disappointing milestones along a tricky path.

A sheaf of sunlight had lit upon an ivy veil that hung before the dark face of the rock. The ivy waved slightly in the breeze, and canny Cat knew this to be remarkable on two counts. It meant that the ivy hung freely and had not attached itself to the cliff; but more importantly, since the ivy was lifted up and away from the rock, it meant that there was open space behind it – an open space deep enough to breathe in the hot June air and exhale a cool breeze.

Canny Cat, who knew well the craggy hills of her own country, recognized the hidden mouth of a cave.

Ordinarily she did not venture into caves without at least one of her sisters, but there would be no time today to return to the pool to fetch Flann and their maids, then return to the cave, and then return home again in time for supper.

But she told herself she could at least step down into the entrance, pull the ivy away, and try to determine what sort of cave it was. After all, it would be silly to bring Flann all this way if it were only a foot-​​wide crevice in the rock.

But it was not.

The mouth of the cave did not face directly west, and the sun’s rays only skimmed across the entrance. However, some of the light of day still lit up the first few yards of a steeply descending passage, easily wide enough for a pair of girls to pass single file.

Beyond it there was an echoing space, and a mass of cold air met her face as she went down. She knew there was a chamber not far from the door, and as soon as her eyes adjusted to the dark she would try to see what there was…

But just as the narrow walls of the passage opened out at her sides and left her standing free, a pair of strong arms closed around her and held her captive.