My options for rescuing my boy were vanishing as I watched. I had no more time to plan. I waited for Johan to pick up my little prince when I leapt. His neck fit neatly in my mouth and I bit down. He probably felt very little pain, if any, before I broke his neck in two. I rolled when I landed and then sprang back onto my feet.

The three drunkards hadn't even noticed anything amiss yet. I trotted back to my boy. His eyes were wide with fear. I licked his face to reassure him. I then picked him up by his collar and started to drag him away. The drunks heard the dragging noise and turned.

"Ahhhhh! Mountain cat!"

"We're going to die!"

"I can take him," the shortest of the three pulled out his sword.

I put the prince down gently and started a sprint at the drunks. The man with the sword screamed, dropped the sword, and went running down the hill. I let out my loudest screech, making sure to show all my teeth. The other two turned and followed the first.

That was a lot easier than I thought it was going to be. I dragged the prince several hundred yards before I stopped to chew the ropes off him.

"Oh Fuzzy," he reached up and hugged me around the neck, "I thought I was going to be dead. They were going to put me in a cage with a bear, you know, one of the ones they use for bear-baiting. They wanted it to look like a wild animal had carried me off."

I chuckled since a wild animal had just carried him off, namely me.

"Hey, Fuzzy?"

I looked at him, tilting my head in question.

"Can you understand me?"

I nodded.

"Holy Mother Goddess, no way! You really can understand me."

I nodded again.

"Fuzzy, someone wants me dead," he looked upset.

I nodded a third time. I needed to shut him up so I could get him to shelter before the sun went down. It was late enough in the afternoon that the shadows were starting to get long.

I cleared the dead leaves off the ground and drew a very crude stick-figure drawing of a person on the back of a four-footed animal. He walked over to my drawing on his knees.

"Oh! I get it. I can ride on your back?"

I nodded. Then I laid down so he could get on me. He had to struggle to get his leg over my back but he managed. I stood up without dropping him and then I walked through the forest to the base of the escarpment.

The first time I made the jump into the spring cave, he fell off my back. I looked back down and he appeared to be fine.

"Hey, warn me before you do something like that," he complained. Yes, he was fine. I jumped back down. Clearing another patch of dirt, I drew a really poor drawing of a person wrapping both arms around my neck. He stared at it for several minutes until he figured it out.

"You want me to hold onto your neck?" he asked. I nodded.

The second jump was successful. I now had him up on the little ledge leading into the cave. He balked at going in because it was dark. Poor human, he couldn't see in the dark.

I decided that the spring cave would be a good place to hide my boy. Looking at the cliff face from below, there was just a cleft where a spring came out. It put out a lot of water that fed a little stream. I liked the spot because deer, also known as my favorite meal, came to the stream to drink. I just hung out on the ledge and bided my time waiting for dinner to show up and then I pounced.

The entrance was a little constricted, which was just fine as far as I was concerned. No bear would ever be able to squeeze inside. So I could sleep soundly without worrying about visitors that I couldn't dispatch to the afterlife on my own. That also made it a safe place to hide the Prince.

Once inside, the cave widened out into three chambers. There was more than enough room for both me, the prince, and the area I wanted to designate as our waste disposal repository. I just had to hide him long enough for all the searchers to go home. Then I would visit the good priest for advice on a long term strategy.

The short term presented its own problems.

"Fuzzy, I can't see."

This was followed by: "I'm really hungry. I haven't eaten for a day."

And then, "Is there somewhere I can go to have a bowel movement?"

It was going to be a long night, and the sun wasn't even down yet.

I took him back outside so he could empty his bowels and bladder. Then I jumped him back into the cave. I waited for him to fall asleep and slipped out. It took me no time at all to run to the village. The manor was all lit up but it was a normal quiet night in the village. I waited until the tavern shut down and all the lights went out in bedroom windows.

I ran from shadow to shadow silently until I was under the priest's bedroom window. Folding myself into a pocket of shadow, I tapped on the window with a claw.

Tap...tap...tap...tap...tap.

Tap...tap...tap...tap...tap.

Tap...tap...tap...tap...tap.

I heard motion and then grumbling.

Tap...tap...tap...tap...tap.

Tap...tap...tap...tap...tap.

I heard Father Garshom say something that he certainly did not learn in seminary.

Tap...tap...tap...tap...tap.

Tap...tap...tap...tap...tap.

The window flew open and I spotted the tip of a quarrel loaded on a crossbow.

"Meow?" I said

"My lady?"

In reply, I purred.

"What are you doing, your insane beast?"

The crossbow vanished and I heard it creak as he unloaded the quarrel and released the string tension. He opened the window as wide as it would go. "Can you get in through the window?"

He barely had time to get out of my way as I sprang inside. The fit was tight but I made it in with just a scratch. He closed the window and pulled the shades.

"Now, why are you tapping on my window in the middle of the night? No, wait. Let me make this easier for you."

In his nightshirt and bare feet, he entered a room off the hallway. He was back out in seconds with a board. He put it on the floor in front of me. It was the alphabet with both regular and capital letters. I remembered that one of his duties was teaching the village children their letters and math. Of course, he had a teaching tool like this.

"Now, my lovely lady, just point at the letters and spell out the words you want."

So I did.

N...e...e...d...b...l...a...n…k...e...t...b...r...e...a...d...b...o...w...l…c...u...p…c...a...n...d...l...e...m...a...t...c...h...e...s...s...o...a...p…

"Wait! You found the missing prince?"

I nodded yes.

"And you have him in a safe spot?"

I nodded another yes.

He surprised me when he dropped to his knees and hugged me, "oh, thank you, thank you, thank you, you big gorgeous pussy cat you, thank you!"