Come away little lost come away to the water,
To the ones that are waiting only for you.
Come away little lost come away to the water,
Away from the life that you always knew.
-Come Away To The Water, Glen Hansard
The process of uprooting Cariad's life is a slow one. There's no feasible way to shepherd dozens of kits across town simultaneously, so they segment and splinter the group. They're taken in threes, fours, swept into the mouths of strangers before they're hurried down the street. It's two at a time, five at a time. The only cats Cariad knows are being taken away in portions, and he doesn't know where they're going. But that's not strictly true. Looking around, he can't see Khia. She stands below him, and he thinks perhaps that Ru will never let her leave.
He doubts she ever would've been picked; the kits have been judged on the merits of their muscles, and it doesn't matter if she's smart, if she can pick her way through the house with her eyes closed or tip toe with the best of them. She's not what's wanted, and Rhydderch must be relieved. He likes her, and he made a promise. A promise that may somehow extend to Cariad, but it seems the russet tom has forgotten this. They're too different, for him to like Cariad in the way he cares for Khia. He's too surly, too quiet, too complacent.
Cariad looks around, paws frozen to the wet cement beneath him. Ruari and Brine stand with him, huddled together in a mesh of brown and grey. He feels excluded somehow; they've at least got each other, in a familial sense. They're a pair- Ruari and Brine, despite missing their third- and they'll continue to be, long after they reach wherever it's intended they go. Cariad is a lonely singular half. Guess he'd better find a friend.
He continues to peruse the faces around him. It's odd. He feels he can barely recognise them here in the light, so used is he to squinting in the dark. Cariad has adjusted to features in the shadows, but the daylight is blinding, and everyone is brighter. He's still squinting, as though nothing has changed. Sure, he dreams in colour, but it's a different kind. It's not harsh, and it doesn't hurt his eyes.
He knows he'll adjust, because there was a time where he lived upstairs, and there was light enough.
Around him, kits sit in various states of shock. Some seem fine- they're out, and alive, and for them that's enough. He knows some- like CillĂn, a tom he's tussled with on occasion, and Iiro, possibly one of the loudest kits to ever grace the basement. Unlike most of the group, he's being loud right now, small voice echoing down the empty street. The adults present- four or five- watch him, but none make a move to quiet him. They look alienated, if anything, because it's more likely than not their job description is usually a little more thrilling than kitsitting.
Iiro is tumbling with a bright ginger tom; they seem as energetic as each other, and neither's the worse for wear after their sudden eviction. Cariad senses immediately that they'll be the cocky, arrogant clique, brawn to boot. Maybe he ought to introduce himself. Maybe later. They're flashing their claws now, tiny even as they are. Cariad may be their size, but he doesn't mix with violent tendencies. This does not make him a coward, he is certain.
Another pair catches his eyes; they're vaguely familiar, for a reason unknown. Sure, he must've seen them in the pen sometime, fleetingly, but they feel fresher in his memory. One is pale grey, and one is a sandy golden, a small she-cat with a ruffled pelt and narrow green eyes. He pairs her with the tiny scabbing cut on his cheek, a low and venomous uttering of oaf. Of course. She's the small abrasive creature he knocked over, not even an hour ago. Cariad thinks she might truly hate him; she seems the type, that harsh acerbic type. Though he doesn't know her name, he knows her, in an inane instinctual way.
Cariad turns back to his cousins. "Wonder where we're going," he says, by way of conversation starter.
"Dunno," says Ruari. "Does it matter?"
"Sure it matters," Brine argues. "Do you want to go back? Anywhere is better than here."
Cariad thinks not. The basement's a hovel, a pit, a hell, but he'll never be as safe as when he was safely secluded between its four dank walls. Khia forewarned him; he knows that a revolution is intended by the very cats who possess him. Who own him. He's a pawn, and a cheap one. He understands that much, thanks to his sister. He thinks she'd much rather be where he is.
"Are you guys excited?" Cariad asks diplomatically. He hardly wants a rift, however menial, between his two anchors to his old life, a life that's still warm and twitching and within an inch of death.
"Nah," says Ruari. " I want to say goodbye to Arrah. I want Etch to come with us." They baby their sister, and they can hardly coddle Cariad.
His brother looks genuinely upset at the mentions of the family they've been herded from. Distantly, Cariad registers the removal of Iiro and his boisterous ginger friend from their group, along with several others. They're hustled away.
He shrugs in an attempt of placation. "Maybe they'll join us," he suggests. This earns him twin glares; evidently his cousins place no faith in his words. He doesn't believe it himself. There's no way Khia will be joining him, pinned under Ru's watchful eye. The one way out of the house is consistently guarded, warded. It's watched, day after day, with eyes of amber, green, gold. Khia's sneaky, Cariad knows this, but she's not invisible. And that's not even counting the burden of their smallest cousin.
"That's ridiculous," a small contemptuous voice asserts behind him. Cariad turns around to see the golden kit standing behind him, her grey friend hovering at her shoulder.
"Az, please," he says beseechingly, but she ignores him. He's larger than she is, and could probably bodily pull her away from this undeniably unpleasant encounter, but he seems a little apprehensive of his companion. Cariad doesn't doubt it's for a good reason.
"Yeah?" he snaps back, by way of retort. Words were never his forte, but this might just be a new low. He'll know he has a problem if he starts replying to all insults with one word that sounds almost acquiescing. Hey, could you move your fat tail any slower? Yeah. You stupid? Yeah. You call that shuffle a battle move? Yeah? Honestly, this is how he sees his induction to his new home; a whole barrage of insults and scorn, just waiting to push him over. No one will have his back because the only cat he'd ever trust with it is going to be locked in a basement for the rest of her life.
"That place is in lockdown," Az- he knows this must be short for something, but he hasn't figured it out yet- replies snootily, ignoring the fact they've just sauntered out of there without so much as an eye twitch. Admittedly, they no longer belonged to the Bayard, but that didn't matter because lockdown was locked down.
"You don't know my sister," Caraid growls, a kind of safety statement. He knows Az is in no position to make judgement calls on a kit she's never met.
The grey kit whines, "Azazel," and she shoots him a sour look.
"Fine. Just don't expect to see your sister any time soon. We both know how that house works." Roughly nudging her friend's shoulder with her own, she turns. Caraid notices several adult cats return. He can't work out if they've been bought, like him, or if they're serving the duo out of the goodness of their own hearts, the fire in their own bellies. It's probably the latter. Street cats hold grudges, or so he's heard, and PureClan must be positively swimming in them.
Azazel is taken with the next group. She's meek, suddenly, swinging in the mouth of some grizzled tabby she-cat. Caraid watches her leave. He watches a kind of timidness he didn't expect to see in such a cat, so when they take him, he isn't prepared.
He's swept from the ground with dizzying speed, and teeth gripping his scruff harder than strictly necessary. Cariad goes limp- it's instinctual, but it's not like he could fight anyway. Instead, he takes his fight within, and quashes the voice inside him that tells him every step taken is just another splinter driven between him and memory of his sister.
And so he's back in the dark. His moment in the sun and smog has come to an end, and here he is, surrounded by the shadows again and even lonelier than ever. They haven't locked him away to rot on his own, of course, but he doesn't know these cats. They smell like home, but that's as far as it stretches. He thinks one might be the kit from before, Iiro's friend. They eye each other in the darkness.
"Hi," says Iiro's friend. "Call me Thad. This is Elettra." He gestures to the sorrel she-kit beside him, who is resolutely trying to clean saliva from the back of her neck. She pauses to nod at him, but it's clear some stranger's spit warrants more attention than he does.
"Caraid," he says in return, a little uneasily. He wasn't expecting to make any friends. There's another pair of cats, but they huddle together and don't speak a word.
Thad bounces on his paws, but he's looking a little lost for words. At last, he says, "So, this is exciting, right?"
"My sister thinks we've been bought for a rebellion." No, this is not exciting, it's a predictable death.
"Your sister is the one that sneaks out, right? I've seen her." Thad nods sagely. "She here with us?"
Caraid's throat closes over. He wishes. He can't wish enough. "No, she got left behind." How many times will he admit this to himself? He can't repress his hope, however, that Khia will find her way out. She's small and smart, and her only anchor to Tillman's has been set adrift. Even if stupid Azazel doesn't think so- but whatever she thinks doesn't matter, because she doesn't know Khia at all.
Thad blinks at him. "Shame. I got someone left behind too."
It's more than a shame; it's the worst thing that has ever happened to him in his life. But he can't expect this tom, who has his friends and his surety, to understand. Someone else will slip into the gap beside him, and before he's murdered by PureClan, perhaps he won't even remember that someone at all.
The door above them, just a metal hatch, is slid open. Caraid flattens his ears as the metal scrapes over concrete, the sound harsh and raw. Small objects are dropped to the floor; some kibble; a mouse; a blackbird. A face looms over the empty space left by the grate; it's the tabby tom who picked him for his doom. "Dinner's up," he calls. "You'll be briefed tomorrow, and then your training will start." With a clang, the door is shoved back into place, and Caraid scrapes together a mouthful of a meal. It's no better than he expected, and no worse than what he's already had.
okay. it's here. yes, it's late. sorry. cariad as a pov is just so painful to write, i hope it doesn't read like it though. sorry it's taken so long. on the otherhand i wrote a human au where strong died. probably from alcohol poisoning. next up is i don't have a clue, that's how long it's been. next update might be a while, and exams are just around the corner. but you never know, the crippling weight of everything i have to do might motivate me to write ttatt. typical.
