[b]Chapter 5: Like a shadow[/b]

There was something about that lost blond-haired young man that stirred up the cat's interest. He said he was heading to Violet Hillock… the village of mages. That meant that with a very high possibility he was a wizard. Maybe he would turn out to be useful. The cat knew that by himself he probably couldn't be able to seek what he needed, but maybe with this young man… There might be a chance. The cat was running out of time so he didn't really have the luxury of getting picky about how to enter Violet Hillock without looking suspicious.

The curse was growing worse day by day, even without noticeable changes. And who knows how much permanent damage had been already done? He had to act as soon as possible. And this young wizard seemed to be his key to obtain the antidote. If not… It would be a huge waste of time and he couldn't really afford that. But he had to risk it.

So, the cat spent the night near the road that led out of the town, hiding in the shadows, waiting for the young man he had met. And when the sun had started to climb the heavens, shedding its golden rays to the world below, the cat saw the young man walking toward the exit of the village. And he wasn't alone: some middle-aged man was with him. No matter. That didn't really change anything. Thus, the cat waited for a while in order to take some distance from those two travelers and then slinked after them.

The cat followed behind like a faithful shadow. He knew, however, that he had to show himself at some point to the men. But the time for that was yet to come. There was something he had to do before exposing himself. Though, it had to wait until the night would wrap the world in darkness. And so, the cat spent the whole day lurking behind the young man and his older companion.

When the nightfall came, those two travelers decided to rest and set up a camp. They were currently going through a forest, so it was easy for the cat stay hidden from their sight. For a little while the cat remained unseen in the middle of some bushes, stalking the men. They were both exhausted and didn't talk much. Nothing noteworthy, anyway. And after few moments passed, both of them began to sleep.

This was a perfect time for some investigation. After waiting for a little moment, the cat snuck out of the bushes, tiptoeing through the camp. But then the young wizard made some noise. For a second the cat got startled and was ready to dash back to his hideout of plants. However, he realized soon that the wizard had only mumbled something unclear in his sleep. The cat was relieved and gave one more glance at the young man's face before continuing his task.

He walked away from the two sleeping men. When the cat thought he was far enough, he stopped. It was time for summoning. And for that he needed a form of skin and hands, not these paws and fur coat.

So he began to transform. His size became larger, his fur vanishing and he took a shape of a young man. However, his form wasn't complete human. He still had a bushy black tail and his ears belonged to some other furry critter. Those were the most noticeable things in his appearance that made him different from a regular human.

The small bones that were tied to the shreds of his vest clattered as he moved. He took a moment to just stare at his hands. It had been quite a while since the last time he was in this form. His true form. The hands were still his, but for how long? When would it happen that he forgets what he was supposed to look like? How much time did he have before he would lose completely his humanity?

The young man shook his head, as if doing so would throw away such depressing thoughts from his mind.

He took a deep breath. And focused.

He raised his hands pretty close to his face, his palms facing each other. Then he started to mumble something with a low voice – something that weren't meant to be heard by common men. And at that moment, a purple spark appeared in between his hands. It was feeble and small, like a candle's light, but as he kept mumbling those strange words, it was like he was feeding that sphere with his voice. He started to make movements with his hands, circling them around the purple orb. And as he was doing so, white threads started to appear on the sphere's surface. It was like he was nurturing it. The color of the orb deepened, a little hint of blue now dancing with the purple in its core, and the size of it was now as big as a crystal ball which fortunetellers were commonly using.

Now it was ready for its task.

The young man went silent. And waited. The sphere had captured his gaze, and he stared at it with such intensity that it seemed like he was hoping to find answers for life's greatest mysteries from it. Which wasn't far from the truth. Soon he started to hear whispers. First, they were rather quiet and he couldn't really figure out what they were saying. So, he just kept concentrating. It was always something like this when trying to listen to the whispers of the dead. Their speech tended to be rather incoherent, so you had to be patient while waiting for them to answer the things you wanted to know. Regular humans probably wouldn't understand what they were saying, and no wonder: they were now basically residents of another dimension. But the young man knew how to listen to them carefully.

After listening for a while, answers started to swarm his mind. He had wanted to know things about those two travelers and now the dead had helped him to get a basic idea of who they were. The young one was indeed a wizard. Based on what the young man had just learned about him, he seemed rather boring and bland country boy. The older man instead… he had pretty interesting background.

He had got what he wanted. Now it was time to cut the connection. And so, he stopped using his magical energy. The sphere started to shrink, and soon it began to fade away, snatching the voices of the dead with it.

Then the young man was alone in the silent night.

He didn't hesitate to transform back to his black cat form. He felt more comfortable in the fur coat anyway. After that, he began to wait for the dawn.

And also started to think what to do with the knowledge he had just gained.