She stared at the picture for a good ten minutes before crawling back into her bed. She didn't have any idea what to do.
Jemima pulled the blankets up to her chin. She breathed slowly, trying to calm her stomach, which was tossing madly about within her body. Feeling somewhat calmer, she lay down. Her breath slowed until it was almost soundless, not the loud, heavything it had been before.
Yet still she heard breathing. Open-mouthed breathing, rushing as someone panted. Something shiny hovered above her.
Jemima was up like a rocket. Dimapax dropped her knife in surprise.
"I knew it was you!" Jemima yelled. "I heard you talking - you were talking to someone about elliminating me!" she gasped as she came to a conclusion. "You were talking to the Lungoth, weren't you? Where's Firarth?"
"Dark side of the moon," Dimapax said. "As for you, my work is done here."
"What?" Jemima breathed.
"You've been yelling in your room about the Lungoth. Firarth was last seen with you, but is now missing. And funny, Dimapax seems to have died just after you visited her."
"I - I ---"
"Circumstantial evidence, yes, but that's enough here." Dimapax smiled evilly and jumped out the window. She landed on the top of some sort of flying ship, and took off to the moon.
"No," Jemima murmured softly. "No!"
She took a step directly out of the window and into the sky. Her wings caught her, and she pushed hard, flying as fast as she could. They were straining greatly and screaming with pain when she was not halfway there. She was breathing; it was a Quithtalent.
"I have to help," she thought, pushing her last ounce of strength into her wings. They flapped a few more times, then faltered.
Jemima passed out from exhaustion.
Lungoth sighed and turned to Dimapax. "I thought you finished her!"
"I - I left her surrounded by evidence ---"
"That wasn't enough! The little brat followed us!"
"What?!"
"You're starting to really let me down, Dimapax," Lungoth said, looking her in the eye with his cold ones. Then he lookedaway. "I'll deal with you later. Now, I need to turn my attention to this Xelya. She could cause real trouble for us - especially if she can find the ex-queen's staff." He looked at Dimapax warily. "You *did* take care of that, didn't you?"
"Y-yes," Dimapax said. "I hid it right ---"
Lungoth held up a hand. "No, no, don't say it. We've got this moron on board, remember?" he said, indicating to Firarth.Firarth resented that remark.
"Dimapax, get her. Pull her along, and make sure she doesn't get lost."
"But why?"
"Are you questioning my judgement?!"
"No! No, never!"
"Since you asked, I'll tell you," Lungoth said. "She follows, she winds up just outside here, she goes back, it buys us some time, plus, what do you think the first thing she'll say will be?"
Dimapax thought. "Help?" she offered lamely.
"No!" Lungoth said, frowning. "'They've got Firarth at the moon!'"
"Oooh," said Dimapax, nodding and smiling. "Right."
Lungoth buried his face in his hands. "How…?" he muttered.
Something whizzed by, shaking Jemima awake. She looked around. "How did I get here?" she wondered. She planned to go to the castle - but remembered what Dimapax had set up. "I can't go back! But…. What should I do?"
Looking down, she saw something small and red being forced to walk and was guarded heavily. "Firarth!" she murmured.
Without much of a second thought, she zoomed down into the territory of her worst enemy to help her friend.
The airless space whipped over her wings, making such a high-pitched screaming noise Jemima was sure she was breaking several eardrums. Firarth smiled his rare Quith smile as the guards around him clamped their paws over their ears in pain,dropping the weapons.
Jemima grabbed Firarth and turned hard up, getting whiplash as she did so.
Her head hurt terribly.
"Thank you," Firarth said, pulling off the rest of his ropes and flying with his own wings. Jemima smiled.
One Tom managed to grab his spear gun as they raced away. He aimed it blankly at the sky. By pure chance, it shot through Jemima's left wing. She screamed and stopped flying - just hung there inspace.
"Xel!" Firarth yelled. He turned hard and picked her up, taking on the form of a red Quith-Feline hybrid. They flew back to the castle; both incredibly exhausted when they were there. Jemima pulled the spear out of her wing and threw it on the ground. She looked at the hole - a paw's width. While she waswatching, it began to heal.
"H-how'd I do that?" she asked.
"Quith," Firarth answered, changing into plain energy to relax. "We can heal our minor wounds faster than others."
Just then Sifarow came running up with lots of her guards and…Dimapax.
"There she is!" Dimapax yelled, pointing an accusing paw. "She just came from the moon; she works for Lungoth!"
Sifarow looked at Jemima with saddness in her eyes. "Xelya, is this true?"
Jemima didn't know what to say. She opened her mouth partway and looked back and forth, from Dimapax to Sifarow. "I…."
"See?" Dimapax said. "Guards, lock her up! She's a traitor!"
The guards began chaining Jemima. She looked to Sifarow.
Sifarow was crying. "G-go," she managed. "I c-c-can't argue with the f-facts."
"But that's wrong! It wasn't me!" Jemima wailed, wings flapping uselessly. "I swear! I swear!"
Sifarow looked away. She began walking back to the castle, face hidden in her paws. Dimapax, however, didn't every try to hide the smile she wore. Jemima struggled more, but it was in vain. The guards carried her away.
"It wasn't me!" she screamed as she went. "It wasn't! I'm trying to help!"
The dungeons were dank and dark. Only a few had a tiny, narrow window that no one could possibly fit through. Shehappened to get one of these.
Jemima sat on the damp floor, drawing designs in the scum. Her wings were strapped to her back, and one itched horriblybecause it was trying to heal.
She wondered what would become of her. Maybe they would kill her. Maybe she would have her wings amputated and her star surgically removed. Maybe they'd just leave her in here forever, until she went insane and claimed she was a bunny, eating nothing but carrots till she died from bad diet.
Sighing, Jemima tried to remember how this had all started. Her mind worked its way farther and farther back - then sheremembered the locket.
"Firarth, where are you?" she asked. "You know I'm innocent, why don't you help me?"
"I am trying. Let's see you squeeze all your energy into something small enough to fit through a two by one inch window."
"Firarth?"
A small red snake slithered in. "It'sss me," he answered.
"Oh, thank you!"
"Don't thank me yet," Firarth muttered. "I have sssome ssstuff to tell you."
"And that would be? Why did you come, I thought I was inferiour."
Firarth turned into a dragon - I believe he would have chosen that as his body, had he the need to chose only one.
"The first reason," he began, "is that Quith are loyal. To everyone worth it. The second reason is, you're the last hope of these poor Felines, and I pity the weak. The final reason is…." He took a breath. "You're my half sister."
Jemima made a strange sound, sort of like a water balloon when you're filling it up. "Is that possible? How do you know?"
Firarth sighed. "I was born to two Quith. My mother died. My father fell in love with your mother, a Feline, and they had you. Then your mother got sick…. After she died, my - our father couldn't take it. I was left with you. I gave you to Sifarow's mother for fostering, but soon after that Lungoth came. She sent you to the Jellicles on land, and then we needed your help…." He shook his head, as if her was clearing away the memories.
"Dimapax has alerted Lungoth that we are minus our goddess," Firarth said, pulling himself back on track. "They'll be attacking within the hour. We have less than fourty minutes to find the ex-queen's staff and get you up there with it in your paws." He looked at her. "Any ideas where Dimapax might've hid it?"
Jemima thought for a moment. "No," she said reluctantly, "but we've got to search. And if we can't find it, I'll be going intobattle alone."
"Very well," Firarth said. He pushed the window larger with his dragon arms.
"Let's go."Jemima slammed a trunk closed. "Nothing. You?"
Firarth sighed. "Nothing. Come on, I have one more idea." He led her down a few halls to Sifarow's room. He tapped on the wall, pulled open a hidden panel. After a moment of feeling around in the dark, he pulled back his hand with a depressed lookupon his face.
"That was my last guess," he said. Suddenly a huge vibration wracked the castle. A purple brick fell out of the wall."Lungoth's attacking!" Jemima yelled. "We need to get out there!"
"Right!"
They spread their wings and flew out the window - breaking it as they did.
Outside, Lungoth was terrorizing everyone. He had somehow managed to grow to twice the size of his usual self, and was now about three feet tall. Cats and Quith ran everywhere, trying to avoid him.
Lungoth saw Jemima. "Xelya," he said, wrenching his face into what I think was supposed to be a smile. He reached down with a massive hand and pushed Jemima into the ground.
Gasping for air, Jemima lifted her head up. Lungoth hadn't thought correctly about the build of this island - she had merely fallen through. Her wings flapped hard to steer around the stalagmites of earth hanging from the bottom. It was there that she found the staff, strapped to the underside of the island. The staff was beautiful. It was shiny silver with a black crystal at the top, rounded evenly into a perfect ball. When Jemima held it she could feel the power stored inside. She gave it a little test wave. Nothing happened. She tapped the crystal, then tried again.
"Ahh! How do I work this thing?" exasperated, she aimed it at a stalagmite.
"Just - just blow that stalagmite away. Now."
A bright light shot from the crystal and blew the stalagmite to dust.
Smiling, Jemima flew back up to face Lungoth.
Sifarow's guards were running about, trying to rescuse everyone. Sifarow stood in her tower, crying. "What am I to do? I'mpowerless!"
Jemima's heart broke. "It's okay," she said, flying past the window. "I'mhere."
Sifarow looked, but saw no one there. Yet somehow, just the words made her feel better.
Lungoth was still destroying everything. Jemima gave the staff a little shake, so a strong, bright ribbon flowed out of the crystal end. She flew in circles, binding Lungoth in this. "What are you doing?" Lungoth asked boredly, but she could feel he was afraid.
"I'm stopping you, like I promised I would, and as I would do anyway," she said, concentrating her energy.
Lungoth laughed - at least, I think that's what it was. "Right. You, stop me. Look at you. You're puny, you little freakishmistake!"
Jemima tried not to let him see the words had hit home. "What?"
"You're a cross-species! Pitiful! Nature never meant to have your kind exist!"
"Apparently Mother Earth did - I'm here, aren't I?" "That's right, keep him talking," Jemima thought.
"Xelya, you are a disgrace to both Felines and Quith. You know what the first letter in your name is? X! As in crossed-out!"
He laughed again, then tried to grab her. What he didn't realise was all this time she had been tying him up.
"Wha…. What did you do to me?" he asked fearfully, struggling.
"Lightbond," Jemima answered. "Positive energy, compressed into a solid which can be molded any way the creator likes." She mentally stepped back - how had she known that? Suddenly she realised - Firarth was with her in her mind! He was lendingher some of his energy to help.
"Thank you."
Lungoth pulled more and more, losing his balance as he did so. He toppled over the edge of the island.
Jemima dropped all her lift and went into another ear-splitting dive. She was praying she could make it to the ground beforeLungoth. "#%*@," she yelled as she chased him down, "he's heading for the junkyard!"
The atmosphere came rushing into her lungs and she gasped. She hadn't breathed such thick air in days. It was also raining here, below the clouds.
Her screaming wings attracted the attention of all the Cats in the junkyard, and they raced outside to see what was making thenoise. Not a smart thing to do. Jemima landed on the floor neatly and held the staff high. She had, oh, maybe, three seconds before Lungoth smashed into the ground and killed everyone - including she.
"Jemima?" some Cats murmured. This was a different Jemima than they had been looking for - she had wings, her face had been decorated with black - and what was this large grey lump falling for their heads?
"Move, you morons!" she yelled shrilly. She felt Firarth explain to her what to do, then leave her mind. The Cats scattered, but kept their eyes glued to the scene.
Jemima let loose a scream she never knew she could manage. It was higher than she had ever sung, even in Memory. And in a way, it was low as well, so low no one but elephants would have been able to hear it. She felt the vibrations flow through the air as clearly as if she saw them. They hit Lungoth and suddenly he made a change of course and shot up, up, UP through the clouds and slammed into the moon.Panting and exhausted, Jemima collapsed.
Jellylorum ran to Jemima. She stared for a moment, trying to takein the wings and all. It turned out she didn't have to do anything, for Sifarow came down then. Firarth had let her and her scribe ride on his back.
"Xelya?" she asked, running over. The scribe followed, Firarth watched.
There was no answer from Jemima's body.
"Who are you?" Munkustrap asked, eyeing Firarth-the-dragon warily. "This is not 'Xelya', this is Jemima."
"You are mistaken," Sifarow said, glaring at Munkustrap a little. "This is the mortal body of Xelya, Goddess of Protection."
"Jemima," Munkustrap retorted.
"Xelya," Sifarow insisted.
"Jemima."
"Xelya."
"Stop," Firarth said, stepping forward. "Watch."
A glowing form of Jemima stepped out of the body. She looked around and tested her wings, as if she had always beentransparent. The wings on Jemima-the-solid-one misted and disappeared. The star on her forehead melted away. In a moment, she was the same Jemima the Jellicles had known. She sat up and rubbed her head.
"What happened?" she murmured."What is your name, One?" Sifarow asked.
Jemima-the-solid-one stared. "I feel as though you asked me that before, but I cannot remember you. My name is Jemima."
Munkustrap got a "hah, told you so," look on.
Jemima-the-transparent-one picked up the staff. "I am Xelya."
"The strain on the one form was too much," Firarth explained. "She has parted and become two, each exactly as they should be for their part in their lives." He held our his hand, and Xelya took it.
"This is our Goddess, Sifarow." He helped Jemima up."And this is your Jemima."
A blinding flash of light exploded from Xelya's staff. Everyone blinked.
None of the Jellicles remembered a thing. Xelya, Firarth, Sifarow and the scribe stood on a fixed island, with a perfect castle. Everything was to its place.
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