[Mkguild] Musicat and the Wolf

[Stealth]

Story for Lance, the guy making music for the game, based on his
Artist Type and listed Species on FA

http://www.furaffinity.net/user/rourkie/

Musicat and the Wolf
Copyright (c) 2010 Michael Nastov


	“Curse indeed!” He exclaimed, tuning his instrument. Rourke Danyals,
the great bard had been all about the western kingdoms of Galendore,
through wars and unrest yet he’d always been able to play, where ever
and however long.

	Silly mages threatened to turn him into silly monkeys and mice and
melons but they never did. He’d heard it all... albeit the inn keep
where he was now staying was a 500 pound bovine.

	‘Leave now’ they said, ‘you’ve been here all but two weeks’ they said.

	But it still didn’t faze the bard. He had other instruments. Gags,
party tricks, whatever the situation called for. And here he had the
perfect thing.

	In his hand was a scroll of parchment. He opened the spell, and found
it to be the wrong one. Rourke set the ‘big-titty-man’ spell aside and
found the right one. Yes! This is the party trick, this one will do
nicely.

	He didn’t chant or draw things on the ground, light candles or
meditate for 8 hours; the bard merely threw the parchment in the air.
As it sailed down to the ground it expanded, it grew bigger and bigger
like a big pastry and then it sailed around him, continuing to stretch
but wrapping itself around him like a blanket. First around his head,
then it spun around his chest, legs and feet before it came to a halt
on the floor, looking like an ordinary, small parchment once more.

	Once the spell was complete, Rourke went to the mirror to see the
results. A house cat of snow white fur greeted him. He still had his
apple-green human eyes and short brown hair on his head but the rest
of his body was that of a humanoid feline.

	“Perfect! Try to curse me now!” The cat purred. “If the silly curse
affects humans then I am human no more.”

	His first task was to remove the thick, fluffy tail from his
pantaloons and fashion himself a makeshift tail hole and was quite
happy to find that his claws sufficed. Rourke took his cittern in
hand, also the brass fingers, lest he get a claw stuck in the strings
and whisked out the door, to the inn’s commons down below. He’d
promised the inn keep music and song in exchange for food and bed.

	The bard felt excited and intended to give his audience a show they’d
neer’ forget!

-------------------------------------

	The mule was packed with keepers and travellers from near and far.
Despite his feline senses, Rourke tuned out to the audience, to the
drunks and the hecklers and the odd trouble makers who got themselves
into brawls as he played his cittern. A wolf was in at one time or
another to provide a duet but he’d long since gone by the early hours,
perhaps away to a lady wolf.

	For most of the night the ‘musicat’ played and sung as people drank
and ate and waiters ran all about. He continued to play till only a
handful of drunks remained, and the inn keep nudged him to stop.

	It was three or more hours past midnight and Donny finished counting
up the coins and the tabs. The doors were barred and the seats were
up, save at one table where the bull sat down to dinner.

	“How long did you say you’ve been a bard?” Donny asked between sips of mead.

	“Just these past seven years or so.” Rourke shrugged.

	“Then ye’d been more then a minstrel.” The bull mused. “If you’ve
only been doing it the recent years of your life.”

	“And what makes you say that?” The feline asked, giving his cittern a
cursory tuning.

	“I thought you young when I first saw you, perhaps it’s just the
light but your fur is a shade of gray.”

	“By the gods!” The cat spluttered and noticed the fur on his arms had
gone from their pristine white to something more silver. Was the spell
failing or was it something else? Rourke took a sip of his chocolate
to calm his nerves.

	“Granted I didn’t see any hair on you this morning when you came in!
And it’s not the work of the curse you claim.” Donny mused.

	“A cheap spell, I’ll admit... must be losing it’s sheen.” The feline
answered and took a long sip of hot chocolate. Be damned if he’s going
to down a mead at this hour and wake with a belfry in his head.

	The sweet beverage seemed to have done the trick as he began to feel
himself relax. “Tell me, inn keep,” He said slowly, “how did you come
to run a place like this?”

	The bull shrugged, “I’m not much for words or any good at stories, my
father ran the tavern before me.” He answered, eating his soup, “He
hid us in the cellar the first time Nasoj attacked, though the wizard
never entered the keep back then, the second time I was of age and
there was a hoard bearing down on the walls, I fought and became a
beast of burden.”

	“Master Donny, you are no beast anymore then I but that sounds more
like a story of your curse.” The feline countered tiredly.

	“Please forgive, these stories of years past always entwine
themselves with the curse,” Donny shrugged, “My father passed on long
before that happened though, taken by illness, I’ve been running the
place ever since.”

	“I’m feeling peckish...” The bard whispered, his eyes sagged and in a
moment he collapsed.

	The bovine blinked and sniffed the chocolate drink, “And here I am
drinking weak mead like a child.”

	A waitress prodded and examined the passed out cat and went pale, “He
hardly has a beat!”

	The bar staff promptly rushed the bard to the infirmary...

-------------------------------------

	“Where am I?” Rourke asked himself.

	“Chocolate is NOT for canids.” A harsh voice answered, “You near
stopped your heart.”

	“Canid?” The bard grumbled as he stirred, “I’m a man with the
disguise of a cat!” He said and shot up out of the bed, “And the
spell’s long since worn off by now! See?” He said and waved a furry
hand at his... furry body, “Oh... bullocks.”

	Coe rolled his eyes, “I do detect a whiff of feline but also canine,
or more accurately wolf.”

	“I’m a cat-wolf?!” He spluttered, “But I should be neither! I beat
the curse! I beat it and danced on it’s grave!”

	“Mr Danyals, I’ve no idea what you’re saying but you most certainly
did not ‘beat’ the curse, you are a cat and a wolf and will be so till
the day you die, you are not to go near chocolate, is that
understood?”

	Rourke said the only thing that came to mind, “Where’s my instrument?”

	“It’s next to the bed,” he pointed, “A more pressing question would
be what will you do now? Should you need help adapting or finding
accommodation, we can...”

	“What will I do now?” The bard interrupted confused and picked up his
cittern, “Healer Coe, my body has changed but not my spirit, you of
all people should know that,” he quipped, “or maybe you’d know this,
where can I find a tavern in need of music and song?” The musicat-wolf
spun on his foot paws and departed the infirmary.

	He always did want to try new instruments and write new songs, and
right that moment, he fancied a howl.


Musicat and the Wolf
Copyright (c) 2010 Michael Nastov



-- 
My Fur Affinity page - http://www.furaffinity.net/user/stealthcat/

My Deviant Art page - http://stealthcat15.deviantart.com/

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