No Good Deed
Aithilin
Summary: No good deed goes unpunished.
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Rumours travelled quickly in the cat world, and they tended to move faster than the subject ever could to dispel them. Carried by the rail, the river, and, more often than not, cats "fleeing" from some "disaster" they had witnessed without knowing the full story. Only snippets ever survived to form these rumours, exaggerated beyond recognition and destroyed until the parties involved could believe that the stories were of other cats.
An accident became a murder. A fire became an arson. An attempt to help turned into the malicious desire to maim and destroy. A blessing turned into a curse. And in the life of a conjurer, all rumours created dangerous results.
He had been trying to help; trying to save the guardian's kitten like he was supposed to. But a simple mistake, a mislabelled jar ruined it all and his failed attempt to save a life had become an assassination. Was it not bad enough that he had a life on his conscience, now?
No, the story and speculation went flying well ahead of him, carried on the rail and by the cats on the river that had heard the wailing or seen the funeral. Before he had finished grinding the last of his ingredients into the ground of his ruined den, he was a murderer and an attempted usurper.
According to the stories, he had been expelled from his tribe after a fight. He had been bloodied and humiliated. Not, as had happened, threatened and told that he had to leave for his accidental "crime". He had not stolen away before he could be escorted out, it seemed.
Now his name was something to be feared. Before he had set foot on the station platform, the rumours and tales had moved ahead of him to destroy his chances.
Macavity was a murderer.