Chapter Fourteen

A cat Baron had never seen before was with the king when the group entered. He appeared to be very old, his fur lined with a soft light gray, and wearing a purple robe and spectacles. He gasped and jumped back at seeing Haru.

"Hey, I remember you…forgot the name, though." She seemed to be taking his fear in stride, sitting in the chair Baron offered her.

"N-natori, Lady Haru. I see now that the restraining order was the best idea the former king had, concerning you. He may have lost his head again at seeing you now." She waved her hand dismissively, a grin still on her face.

"Stop with the flattery; I have a boyfriend. Why did you bring him out of retirement, Lune?" The king grinned at Baron, happy that Haru had finally admitted what everyone had been suspecting since the orange cat arrived. He grinned back, even happier than Lune was over the new development.

"He knows the land better than any other cat, and was the only one that had the knowledge you requested to make the plan work."

"Oh, good. You can stop looking at me like I'm going to eat you, Natori. I wasn't really going to do everything I was considering out loud. I was just venting steam." He blinked, and sighed in relief.

"Ah…right. I have wondered how you were planning to do the thing with the chain saw." Baron cocked his head at her as she struggled to suppress her evil giggles.

"Is he referring to your speech?"

"Yeah, I'll explain the chain saw thing later. I would have needed a cordless one to pull it off here anyway. Is Muta coming?" Lune answered her.

"My daughter's getting him. She's grown very close to him, says that hanging out with him is a lot like hanging out with you Haru, except with more kitchen appliances." She smiled indulgently.

"As long as she still likes me, I can handle the competition. Muta and I really need to talk about his culinary knowledge." Baron shook his head in amazement.

"I don't know what's gotten into him since we came here. At the Bureau, the only thing he'd ever make was angel food cake, and I had to promise him four whole ones in order to get him here. He hasn't grumbled a single word about not getting them yet, and he's been keeping the cooks in line with and iron fist and a steel whisk."

"Maybe he's maturing," Haru offered.

"Muta?" Baron was a bit skeptical.

"Someone called?" The large cat came through the curtain, the princess swinging happily from his paw. Natori shifted his gaze from the Demon-Cat to the intruder, and his face wrinkled in vague recognition.

"I got him, Daddy! It took a while, since he was busy making codfish puffs."

"Codfish," Natori murmured, his eyes glazing over a bit. Then he jumped into the air again, an expression of horror on his face. "Guards! Renaldo Moon has the princess!" Two huge cats burst in, but stopped, confused at just seeing Muta.

"Calm yourself, Natori. Muta's not Renaldo Moon; he's a trusted family friend." Lune tried to soothe Natori, who refused to be.

"I'm telling you, your majesty; I came past the remains of the tower while coming here and saw that cat's likeness on the walls! He is the foulest villain of all Cat History!" The princess started giggling.

"Muta may look like Renaldo Moon, but he's too nice." However, Haru had been keeping her eyes on the white cat's face, and knew that something was wrong.

"Muta? You did say that the maze wasn't built last time you came to the Cat Kingdom." He couldn't look her in the face, and she knew Natori was telling the truth. Without skipping a beat, she knew what had to happen.

"Natori! Calm down!" Everyone jumped at her shout, half because of the memories and the other half because she had never spoken at that level in their presence before. She had stood up from her chair, and the look on her face was enough that the old cat sank into his chair, terrified of her all over again. Now that he wasn't calling for guards, she faced the large white cat, who had released the princess so she could sit on her mother's lap. "Muta, did you really drain the sea last time you came here?" He snorted in contempt.

"Of course not. You were right; no single cat could pull that off if they spent a lifetime trying. I'll admit to making fish a rarity for a while, but I didn't do it for the infamy."

"Than why did you do it?" He looked at her, an unbearable amount of loneliness in his eyes.

"Because my wife had just kicked me out of her and my daughter's life, and eating always helped soothe my soul. I'm still working off the weight because no amount of eating could have made me feel better." Her eyebrows shot up.

"You were married and had a kitten?" He continued to look at her, his expression unreadable.

"No, not a kitten, although she was as cute as one." Haru absorbed this before her mind gave a mighty shudder. Sniffing beneath the fish smell that always stained his fur, she found his blood scent, and her mind reeled in shock. Baron noticed the similarity of their brown fur, and he gasped. Muta's nerve broke at the sound, and he nearly ripped the curtain out of the hinges in his eagerness to escape the red flames in the Cat-Demon's eyes.

"Oh no," Baron groaned as Haru ran out of the room to follow the terrified cat.

"Baron, what's going on?" Lune was a bit scared; he hadn't seen that look since she handed his father's dignity to him on a silver platter.

"I just remembered something Muta told me when he first came to work at the Bureau. We may want to stop Haru before she does something permanent to him."

"I don't get it; why would Big Sister want to hurt him if they're friends?" Baron gravely answered the princess.

"They're more than friends. I should have seen the truth immediately."

ooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

"Muta!! You get back here!!" Every one in the castle looks up, knowing too well who was shouting. As the stamping of feet came closer, all the cats fled to keep out of Haru's sight and out of her way as she stormed past, her eyes on fire as she hunted down the large white cat. He could hear her screams, and jumped out of the courtyard to escape her notice, but failed. He tried to run outside the gates, but she pounced on his back and forced his face into the soft ground. Parents turned their children's eyes away as the more religious ones began to pray for Muta's soul. Baron and the royal family didn't have to see what was happening as they ran to the white cat's aid. They could hear Haru long before she came into view.

"Why didn't you say anything?!!" She yelled as she held one paw behind his back, her comrades appearing through the entry to witness the proceedings. "You even heard me say that I would like to know! Were you ashamed that I turned into a bloodthirsty military figure?!" Muta managed to work free from her grasp and faced the demon-cat.

"How could I be ashamed of any girl of mine that could turn a kingdom upside down and force a king into renouncing his throne by mere intimidation when it wasn't even the goal? I'm proud of you, Chicky!"

"Then why didn't you say anything?" Her voice had lost several octaves, and she was beating softly on his enormous belly, tears streaming down her face.

"I didn't want to ruin your reputation-" She looked up at him fiercely.

"Forget my reputation!! Everyone here would agree that my being the daughter of Renaldo Moon would explain a lot, and they all think I'm a demon anyway!! I've wanted to know my father all my life, and now that you're here, you wanted to deny me the opportunity to know the real you?! You jerk!! You big fat jerk!!" Muta was about to protest again that she was why he had gained all the unnecessary weight, but decided to hug her for the first time in years as she cried into his fur. If Haru had been anyone else, the pressure Muta was exerting would have killed her. But being his daughter, she could handle it and squeeze back. "Those fish crackers were from you, weren't they?" Her voice had lost its savagery, now so soft that Muta could barely hear. He tried to rub the tears from her face, only to have them replaced by an endless salty flood.

"Just because I couldn't talk to you didn't mean I couldn't spoil you when I had the chances. Your love for those crackers meant that a part of you was still my sweet little girl. I felt so terrible, finding out that they were why you were taken here, like me." She looked up into his face.

"What happened?"