The spot was brown, oval-shaped, and the size of a small cat, a flaw in the perfect green texture that carpeted this enchanted forest. Upturned blades of grass drifted down lazily, coming to a rest as the forest grew quiet and still again.

It was the vestiges of the wreck that had just transpired.

The silence was short-lived as Verne let out a muffled groan, her face still planted face-down into the earth. She lay next to the spot, the outline of her small calico body aligning with the spot like a puzzle piece.

“I really did it this time,” she mewed to no one in particular, spitting out blades of grass as she turned onto her side. She arched her back against the earth, trying to loosen the stiffness growing in her shoulder.

She’d challenged the cat known as Elizabeth to a race, after the two she-cats had almost come to blows over a piece of prey (which Verne had caught justly, mind you). To the ruins and back again, Verne had declared, her voice coming in the velvety accents of the Loch. But Verne was back again, and the smokey-furred assassin, and her prey, were nowhere to be seen.

The face-plant had come in her moment of glory, just as she’d crested the hill, the great stony towers of the mansion looming above, like caorunn, the god-tree itself. No one ran faster than Verne, her sister could attest, and no one’s mind was more fleeting – the mansion had captured her mind just as her legs had reached full gait, and a stray root sought to spoil her triumph.

But Verne couldn’t be deterred; she climbed to her paws as her shoulder protested, her golden eyes seeking out this Elizabeth, and the missing prey she’d rightly won. If the assassin aimed to cheat her, she’d get her prize back in blood.