Return of the Cat
Chapter 12: Revelation

Kohari: Ha! I didn't take a long time to update!

Maroon stepped out of the shadows. Lune was in his clutches, a dagger pressed against the young ruler's throat. The red cat chuckled, certain of his victory. Baron frowned, trying to formulate a plan.

"How did you get here so fast?" Haru demanded, surprised.

"I used to live here, human," Maroon replied, to Haru's amazement. "I know all the tunnels leading in and out of the palace. You should have known that, Lune."

"Are you going to kill him, Maroon?" Baron asked calmly.

"I should. In fact, I really want to," Maroon confessed, sneering. "In fact, it would be better for me if I did."

"What are you talking about?" Haru wondered aloud, confused.

"The throne should be mine! Mine!" Maroon shouted angrily. "This was MY birthright! Not his!"

"Now, I really don't understand," Haru said.

Baron tried to step forward a little, testing Maroon's awareness. Maroon noticed what Baron was doing. Lune flinched as the blade lightly broke the skin under his chin. A small bit of fur floated gently toward the floor. "Don't get any ideas," Maroon snarled.

Baron halted, knowing the disaster that could result from carelessness.

"What do you mean the throne should be yours?" Haru asked, with the intention of both relieving curiosity and stalling for time.

"The throne should be mine!" Maroon repeated himself, directing his attention at Haru. "I should kill this stupid, treacherous little weakling for what his family did to mine!"

"What did his family do?" Haru egged him on while Baron thought.

Maroon sighed, then prepared to go into a long lecture. "Three generations ago, the king of the Cat Kingdom had two sons. Twins."

"Well, that's not really unusual, is it?" Haru inquired, confused.

"The royal family has been afflicted for years by some strange, incurable disease that makes it generally impossible to have more than one kitten at a time," Baron explained. "And for some reason, these kittens are always males."

"But this king had two," Maroon emphasized, "and each was equally eligible, in his father's opinion, to take his place."

"So how was the succession decided?" Haru pressed.

"It should have been the cat who was the first to be birthed," Maroon growled, "just like it had always been. But no, the king decided to have a contest when each was of age."

"What kind of contest?"

"The maze," Maroon replied. "The two of them made it to the end at the same time." What Maroon didn't tell them was that the elder brother had followed the younger brother to the end, and then raced him to the exit. Although the youngest twin had the head start, the eldest one was faster, and so both reached the exit simultaneously. The older brother had predicted that very occurance. "They decided to fight it out." The older prince had a nasty trick up his sleeve - a gift from a witch doctor. "My grandfather won." By splashing a potion into the eyes of his brother, the first son was able to gain an advantage over him. "My great-uncle lay in bed for days, injured."

The young prince was taken into the care of doctors. They thought that perhaps the older twin had hurt his brother's eye in the fight; it explained the blindness that the second-born was experiencing. But a week later, he recovered eyesight in one of his eyes. The other eye could hardly see. And the color had changed. The doctors gasped upon removing the bandages. What would their king say? (Maroon's grandfather's coronation had been postponed until Lune's grandfather's recovery.) What had caused this dreadful mutation?

A witch doctor was called in to explain. It was the same witch doctor who had given the eldest prince the potion that had done the damage. The damage was permanent, and the same eye combination would appear in the prince's kittens due to damage to the DNA. Although he did not reveal that the older son was responsible for the mishap, the vial that the potion was contained in was found in the once-soon-to-be-king's room, and its contents rapidly identified.

"My grandfather was accused of cheating," Maroon continued his story. "He was stripped of his right to the throne and banished from the kingdom, along with his wife and newborn son. My father grew up in the outskirts of the kingdom and married my mother. For years I was told the story of my birthright. Of how my great-uncle lied to gain what was rightfully his brother's. I didn't believe that my own family would do such a thing. It wasn't until I heard that Lune would marry a human that I realized that they were, indeed, shameful and prone to treason." (A/N: Maroon was the one who grew up being lied to. His grandfather wasn't going to admit that he had, in fact, cheated.)

"I had to do something," Maroon justified himself. "And now, I'll restore this kingdom to its rightful rulers," he declared, fully prepared to kill Lune in the name of revenge. He direction his attention now at his target, completely corrupted by fury.

Kohari: I know, I know. It was short. But I plan to update again soon. Please review! (Oh, and yeah, I know that none of that explained how Maroon knew his way into the palace. I'll explain that next time.)

Note: Not proofread.