FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

We danced on the streets as the city burned around us. Ash billowed to the skies and rained on us like grey snowflakes, soft and flaky and stained our fur. Flames licked the night, sweeping away the signs of the plague and cleansing the diseased charnel streets. Just the two of us were left, already succumbing to the late stages of sickness, the feverish energy brimming through our long suffering bodies being the final outburst of our departing lives. We kissed and laughed and embraced each other, whispering confessions of love that no-one would witness.

“We will meet in the next life, and love again", we said to each other, and at that moment we truly believed it. The all-consuming release roared around us and glimmered in our eyes, making the world ever so beautiful for us. We watched the blazing false dawn, waiting hand in hand, and were lulled into sleep by fire.

--

The desert stretched around Aldus, hot and featureless expanse of loneliness. He had been sent to this godforsaken frontier to dig the ruins of an ancient beastfolk civilization, partly because of his professional skills, but mainly because of his sharp tongue. His short tenure at the the imperial academy had been a troubled one despite being a descendant of an old, esteemed family. At his late twenties he was the youngest doctor ever to have been admitted to the hallowed ranks of academia, and already he had made enemies of most of his superiors who had been reluctant to admit his self-proclaimed brilliance.

Thus he was stuck in the desert with only a humorless woman from the northern colonies for company. Ingrid was an aspiring researcher who took their mission--like everything--very seriously, and had little patience for social graces. Aldus theorized that the coldness drove any mirth out of the bones of the northerners, and settled in permanently in its stake. She had been preparing the site for over a week before a local guide and his donkey had dropped off Aldus there, and her very first words had been where they would start digging that day. The quality of their terse conversations did not improve after that. Aldus could not tell whether she resented him in particular, or the world in general; considering her status as an outsider and her chosen profession, most likely both.

They were scraping out their latest find painstakingly slow under the sun's piercing rays. Even though they wore rugged field clothing that shielded them from the worst, the heat radiating from the ground still baked them like in an oven. Aldus had a slender build and the copper skin and black curly hair of a heartlander imperial, yet even for him the hot air felt oppressive. Pale skinned and stocky Ingrid fared visibly worse, and she powered through the days huffing and sweating with her face constantly beet red seemingly through simple anger alone.

What had drawn them to the desert was a nameless city, struck down struck by some disaster in the ancient times, completely forgotten by history and even stories and legends. It had been a bustling center of trade before burning completely to the ground, and over the weeks they had uncovered remains of a rich, vibrant culture built by beastfolk hands. It had been a blow to their sensibilities that the savage races had managed such a feat far earlier than humans, but in the end Aldus's professional pride had won him over. It did not make him love the place, but made him hate the thought of leaving it unexplored even more.

That day they had gathered around a skeleton of a beastfolk male, feline-like and little shorter than Aldus, embedded in a layer of solidified ash. His trowel scraped the earth and removed the past painstakingly, etching out the shape like a sculptor discovers a statue from a block of marble. As the bones slowly emerged from the soot stained ground Aldus was struck by a strange thought. He sat still and stared, and realized how graceful the creature must have been in life, lithe and quick predator with soft step and delicate touch--even handsome, perhaps?

Ingrid grunted and rose up, shaking him out of his fickle reverie. She pointed out that it was time for lunch, and started lumbering towards their tents. Aldus sighed and followed her. Trying to make small talk with the dour woman had become his only source of amusement in this inhospitable place. Coaxing conversation out of her was as hard as digging the ground, and at least she would be stuck accompanying him while finishing her meal.

They had their break in the shade of a large canvas tarp, sitting on tall camp chairs. Aldus looked through the notes and drawings of that day's dig site and furrowed his brows.

“Something's missing."

“What you mean?" She shoveled beans into her mouth without letting the words interrupt her.

“Look at this skeleton. Doesn't it resemble something in your mind?" He flipped the notepad with charcoal sketches so she could see.

“A dead cat."

“No, I meant its pose, the way the arm and leg bones are nested, how the neck is craned… it's clearly hugging someone!"

“Pfft… maybe. It is just as likely curled up from the heat post mortem. The signs of fire are unmistakable."

“Come on, think of two lovers holding each other at the moment of their demise? It's the oldest story…" His voice traveled into distance along his gaze, but the desert horizon looked back flat as ever.

“Our job is to bring history up from the ground, not put stories down in there", she quoted a familiar lecture, “you are just seeing what you want to see. Anyhow, what you believe is missing then?"

“The other body. There's nothing there."

“See? Just like your theory."

Aldus did not reply but just stared at the burnt colors on the paper. There was a missing piece here, one that he could feel it even if he could not explain it, like a memory of a word taunting him at the back of his mind. However, the drawing refused to reveal its secrets and they ate in silence, accompanied by the desert wind and dry chatter of ash.

That night Aldus had a dream.

--

I stood on the nightside desert without seeing or hearing, abandoned in perpetual darkness without even starlight to guide me. My breath billowed in the freezing void, but I did not feel cold; I felt nothing, not even the weight of my own body in the absolute stillness. The passage of time was a mystery, a cruel riddle, as hours and eternities mingled into one another with little to tell them apart. Had I died yesterday? A thousand years ago? Impossible to tell.

I was alone and I did not understand why. There was no sign of my love, and the anxiety clenched my stillborn heart in my hollow chest. Had he already passed by? Was he about to arrive in the very next moment? Impossible to tell. I wanted to follow him and wait for him, indecision gnawing me like rot and making me pace around in ever tightening spirals.

Sometimes there would be flashes of places and people making their presence known before my unseeing eyes, brief visitors breaking the monotony of doubt, but they never stayed even if I called them out. The world out there reminded me of its existence, but I could not make up my mind whether I should stay or go, not as long as there was even the tiniest chance of missing the one I wanted.

Then, for no reason other than my prayers there was a light.

A single flicker lit up in the vast expanse of nothingness, an unclear shape that was unmistakably his. I was drawn to it like moth of dust and shadows, and it burned my very being with its radiance. I had not felt cold, but now I felt the absence of heat. Desperate I lunged at it but was repelled by the flame, its roots firmly in the world of living inimical to my flesh of whispers. I howled and raged with grief at the edge of the light, yet the barrier held fast; I wanted to shout my love at that man, but my ghostly voice could not be heard by him.

I sat down by his light, defeated and crying, remembering how his beautiful face had looked, his proud feline cheekbones and elegant jawline, his tiny sharp teeth and their loving nibbles, his large eyes that had room only for my reflection. I wanted to see it again, but I was seared into nothingness when I even looked at his direction. Why was he not a bodiless spirit like I was? Why had I crossed the threshold to the world of the dead only to have him appear to me in the world of the living? Impossible to tell.

Eventually I realized that he was sleeping, his dreams seeping out and painting his surroundings with glowing tendrils of light. I could make out a tent and the canvas bed he rested on, a desk and strange looking clothes set aside on a chair. As his presence illuminated his surroundings they grew around me, and after a while I was sharing an echo of space with him. It stilled my unbeating heart and I felt a little better. Without thinking about it I started to sing our song, the words distant and carried by a soundless tune, and kept watch over him through the entire night until the dawn arrived and I was left with just the bitterest sliver of hope to hold in my chest.

--

“You look haggard", Ingrid stated matter-of-factly when he saw Aldus the following morning.

The man rubbed his temples and blinked his bleary eyes. “I feel like I didn't get any rest. It's like some bug's chirping kept me awake even while I slept, if you know what I mean?"

“No it don't."

The woman turned away to make make notes. They were standing at the edge of their dig, where remains of buildings and streets were uncovered and laid bare from the depths of the earth.

“The level of sophistication is surprisingly high for a settlement this ancient. There's signs of extensive irrigation, sewers…" Ingrid collated a list.

“I've always said that you can tell the quality of an empire by its plumbing." Aldous sounded surly and smacked his lips. He felt like he was about to remember a long forgotten tune, but could not tell where he had heard it it. It annoyed him.

“My apartment at the capital doesn't have one." Ingrid sniffed and furrowed her brows.

“Exactly."

She stopped and set aside her pen, looking at Aldus with a chilly gaze. “I'm surprised to hear such speak from you. If you weren't born in the heartlands I might even suspect you of harboring separatist sympathies."

“Don't be bothered by it, a colonial like you wouldn't understand the love-hate relationship we sons of the empire have towards our terrifying, victorious father. That's why we wage so many wars: we grow uneasy when he spends too much time at home." Aldous sipped his coffee from a tin mug to hide his expression. “And that would make the empress-"

“Blessed be the empress."

“Blessed be the empress."

Both of them spoke out in unison and without sarcasm. Even so far from home the habits of a lifetime were hard to break.

“Our mother, who watches over us with a steely gaze and steely grip", Aldus concluded.

“I tire of such talk. You should not talk of the fatherland with such tone."

“Why? It wasn't your fatherland just a couple generations ago, northerner."

“It is now. I am a loyal citizen."

“So am I, and look what rewards we have reaped for it." Aldus spread his arms wide to point at all the plentiful nothingness around them.

“You talk too much and dig too little."

She hunched her shoulders and shut Aldus out, bristling her impervious shield wall of single minded determination against his wit. He sighed and finished his drink. It would be a long day of meticulous labor for both of them, and his headache showed no signs of quieting down.

He did not usually remember his dreams, but for some reason that detail made him now restless, as if he had missed a momentous find. He was drawn to archaeology because he loved solving puzzles, piecing together little shards of history and reconstructing some long lost story, but this mystery eluded him. He could not touch it yet he felt touched by it; a tantalizing promise that it all would make sense if only he could find the one missing piece.

He found himself returning to the skeleton from the day before, as if watching it intently enough would make it tell its tale. Its bony arms reached out blindly for its lost lover, forever stuck in that questing pose, a mute witness to some forgotten tragedy, and Aldus could not help but feel sympathy towards that long dead being. A wave of pity and sympathy welled up in his chest, and when Ingrid was not looking he reached out and patted its bony head still half buried in the soil.

“There, there, it's going to be alright", he said and suddenly blushed red from his silliness. What would some old pile of of bones care for his consolation! However, a strange thrill lurched in his stomach as if touching it had brought him closer to understanding. Aldus licked his lips nervously and looked around feeling guilt from something that he had not even done yet.

--

When he returned to his tent later that day he was carrying the detached skull of the cat-beast skeleton in the crook of his arm. He had wrapped it in rags to hide it from Ingrid, but now that he was alone he unfurled the cloth and turned it around in his hands. He could not tell why he had taken the skull against the protocol and good sense; he had been struck by an unspeakable impulse that did not leave him until he had acted upon it.

Aldus brushed the skull's smooth surface, tracing his fingers over the cheekbones and jawline, touched its little teeth still sharp after all this time. It felt solid but light, polished by age and dried by heat. Its empty eye sockets looked into the eternity silently, and as he stared into them he felt inexplicable yearning to cross the barrier of time to meet its gaze.

He set the skull on his desk wordlessly, and went to rummage through his trunk of personal belongings. He returned with two large drops of amber, mementos from his first field trip to the northern shores, and set one each in the hollow sockets of the skull. He lifted it up poising it carefully on his fingertips, and beheld it close to his face like a rare flower. The gems glittered in a crude approximation of feline eyes and he shivered, both from the sheer unwholesomeness of his own macabre behavior and a strange sense of recollection that crept along his spine like a ghostly hand.

As if in a trance he brought the skull to his lips, and kissed the tip of its bony snout. The taste of bitter ash spread on his tongue and along it a memory flooded his mind like arctic waters when the ice breaks.

--

The next night my love had dreamed himself awake, and was waiting for me sitting on the shadow of his bed. His light had dulled and was less firmly rooted in the world of the living, but was still bright enough to hurt my body made of moth whispers. I could make out his shape and it looked strange, bulky and oddly proportioned. Why would my memories betray me so? I was certain that it was him, yet I could not recognize him!

He spoke to me in a language I did not know yet one I understood, and being addressed by him beyond such a vast gulf made me giddy with joy.

“By god, it's true", he said with astounded voice, “but how?"

“I promised you that our love would be for ever", I said holding back tears. Why was he so surprised by me keeping my word?

He shook his head, his shoulders deflated. “No, none of it makes sense… it's just a dream, a heatstroke delusion…"

I flung myself at his feet in desperation. “Do not doubt yourself, my love! Come to me, I've yearned for you for all this time… join me under these starless skies so we can be together at last!"

He did not reply but sat silently like a tombstone for our reunion. I reached out to touch him, my fingers shriveling up like dry husks in his presence, and at that moment he lifted his face so I could see him clearly--a human, impossible!

I shrieked in dismay and the dream was cut in short, the dull blade of sorrow ending it for us both.

--

“Wake up!"

Ingrid was in Aldus's tent and shook him looking livid.

“I'm up, I'm up!" The man sprung from his cot, still wearing yesterday's clothes. “Well, this is unusual. What brings you to my humble abode?"

“You've slept late--but never mind that! What on earth were you thinking when you removed that skull from the dig site?" She pointed at his desk and the condemning evidence stared back at her.

“What's the problem? It has been properly cataloged and the site has been marked and drawn." He sounded defensive at first, but started to gain confidence in his lies as he spoke. “Besides, we need to take out the bones for packaging them anyway, so there's no harm done. I just wanted a memento."

“This is highly unprofessional!"

She walked past Aldus and snatched the skull off the desk, sending the pieces of amber clattering to the ground. Aldus yelped and grasped her wrist without thinking, and stood there wild-eyed and panting. His other hand was curled around the skull, his fingers digging into its hollows like a man hanging on for his life.

“Are you out of your mind?" She sounded more incredulous than afraid. “Let go. You're hurting my hand."

Aldus was startled as if realizing even himself for the first time how he was acting, and released his grasp on Ingrid. He sounded conciliatory when he spoke again.

“Please, it's important for me. I had a dream--I know how that sounds--but it's going to help me to solve the mystery, I can feel it!"

Ingrid gave him a look between pity and disgust. “The only mystery is what has gotten into you. You have grown increasingly lax with your duties over these weeks, and this latest… obsession, it is simply too much." She squared her shoulders and straightened her back into a formal pose. “I am sorry, but I have to report this to the academy and request that you are pulled from this dig."

Aldus did not know what to say, and simply cradled the skull in his listless hands. Ingrid turned to leave, but stopped to look over her shoulder.

“You know, I once looked up to you. When I entered the academy your theories were new and exciting, and I thought that you were a genius." She sighed. “I don't see anything left of that now. You're a burnt out husk of a man."

The tent's flap rustled as she stepped out.

--

Aldus dug. He knew that his time was short, and cared little about Ingrid's disapproving glances whenever she happened to pass by. The supply caravan had visited them on schedule, and had left carrying Ingrid's letter and his inevitable fate sealed within. He knew that the academy was already fed up with him, and would use even the slightest cause to fire him ignobly, and that would be the end of his career. She avoided talking to him, perhaps out of guilt or simply because of the awkwardness of their situation, but it was not a big loss for him. What he needed was not conversation, but closure to set his mind at ease.

The spirit did not approach him when he slept, but kept itself hidden in the corners of his dreams, a faint presence that left him wondering if he was just imagining it when the dawn broke and he was dragged back to the world of the living. He remembered a conversation but not what had been said, echoes of profound sadness without a reason, a sense of returning to a place where he never had been in. It inflamed his restlessness more than any looming news from the academy, and fed his desire to understand before it would be too late.

He was filled with new determination, the hollow kind of perseverance of a man with nothing left to lose. He ignored common sense and struck the earth away from the buildings, away from the hidden troves of priceless artifacts, instead focusing on worthless dirt with only one clue to guide him: he dug in the direction where the skeleton's pleading arms pointed at. He attacked the soil with shovel and feverish vigor, ignoring the diligence and care his profession had taught him, but Ingrid did not stop him from following his obsession--he was not causing damage to the real dig site, after all, and it kept him busy.

He toiled to scrape away the dry soil, uncovering nothing but the layer of burnt ash. He moved farther, towards the desert where the signs of the ancient blaze grew thinner and fainter. Sand chafed his eyes and sun drank his sweat as he staggered further into the wasteland, a lone exhausted figure digging hole after hole in the vast emptiness. He ended up at the bottom of an old river that had evaporated ages ago, far away from the sight of the camp and any safety, and there at the edge of collapse he struck something hard.

--

I was woken up by a spirit in the desert, in the shape of my lost love. He was made of the soft glow of the moon and no longer burned my very being with his existence, but I was still wary of springing into his arms. I recognized his feline eyes, perky ears, elegant snout and its boyish smirk that had made me fall in love long, long ago. It made my knees weak and set my muted heart to flutter, just like the first time under the festival lanterns when I had first met him.

“Is it true", I asked and reached out with trembling hands, “have you returned to me or is this yet another ill dream?"

“It is true and it is a dream", he said with a sad smile and pressed my hand against his chest.

I did not understand and shook my head, but his ghostly body felt real and firm under my touch.

“I found my memories", he said and kneeled down. I looked and saw a pile of bones at his feet, a haphazard collection of feline remains tossed aside with little care for the dead. “A flash flood, one happening perhaps once in a decade when all the conditions align. Rains fall from the skies and make the desert bloom, fill up the groundwater reservoirs--and wash away a lone catfolk corpse from the arms of another."

He stood up and his shape sloughed off like a butterfly emerging from cocoon, his discarded skin dissipating under piercing radiance that hurt my eyes. He was an ugly human again, and spoke with a voice filled with regret.

“I waited for you and couldn't find you and didn't dare to leave my spot in case I missed you." He looked towards my resting place, so close yet unseen, and laughed mirthlessly. “And in the end I decided to move on."

No, no, no, it could not be true! I fell to my knees and crawled up to him, my eyes smoking and fingers burning into cinders. “Why", I demanded, “our love was supposed to be eternal!"

He shook his head slightly and crouched to pet his old, old bones. “Even eternal love doesn't last forever."

I collapsed and felt my spirit catching fire, like it once had in my life, my ghostly form blazing in the darkness. I wanted to disappear, to have my existence scoured away by cleansing flames. “Then there is nothing left for me. There should be nothing left of me."

But my betrayer love stepped away and spared me from his searing presence. A final act of cruelty on his behalf? Why was he tormenting me so? Impossible to tell.

“That's not true, you silly cat." It was what he had called me after our first, drunken kiss in the gardens, hidden from the chill moonlight. “I still am, and will be for you again."

“Look", he said and pointed at the sky. A single star shone there, bright and welcoming. “I'll be waiting for you there. Please do not take long."

“But it'll be different!" I protested, wild eyed and afraid to move. I did not love a human, I loved him!

He laughed again, but this time genuinely. “It wouldn't be the same if it wasn't different."

He rose higher and his light grew brighter, as his desire to return to the land of the living became certain. “I love you", he said with the warmth that he had never lost, “so I will learn to love you again." He soared upwards, tracing a brilliant streak of light across the void, vanishing but leaving behind an unerring compass needle towards my destination.

I took the first step.

--

Aldus said his goodbyes to Ingrid. She was curt, but he wished her luck with her endeavours nevertheless, and then mounted the donkey that had brought him there so many months ago. However, before they had taken even twenty paces she called them to wait and ran after them. When she reached Aldus she stood unspeaking for a while, panting with indecision and questions. She settled for the simplest one.

“What are you going to do next?"

“I'm heading east", he replied with an amused tone of voice. “There's a tribe of catfolk living there, and I wish to spend time with them."

She frowned. “Why? Those savages don't have a need for an archeologist!"

Aldus mused for a moment before replying. “No, but they have a need for someone who can bring up stories from the ground."

He flicked the reins and trotted away light-hearted and laughing, leaving Ingrid staring at his back under the burning sun.