Kal and Kashka approached the alley where the old cat-woman pointed. Rickety wooden shacks lined either side of the passage, many of which had holes in the walls from broken or missing boards. The gap between buildings was too narrow to walk side by side, so Kashka took the lead, sniffing the musty air. A shout came from one of the shacks ahead, and a moment later, the girl from the forest stumbled through the ragged sheet covering a doorway before falling to her knees, sobbing.
As they came within the range of the translation spell, Kal heard her fervently apologizing.
"I'm sorry, mama. I'm sorry. I'm sorry," she chanted over and over as tears fell to the dirt below. The girl appeared to be in her mid-teens, and her fur was more yellow and uniform than Kashka's, with only the faintest bands of darker skin around her arms and legs. She wore an oversized, ratty, grey tunic that looked cut for a man and hung off one shoulder. So lost was she in her mantra she didn't notice them until Kashka put a hand on her shoulder.
In typical cat fashion, the child leapt into the air, her tail bristling in surprise. But the older cat-woman matched her movements, springing upward and wrapping her arms around her. As their feet touched the ground, the girl switched to feline paws with claws extended, but strong hands grabbed her wrists and held them away from her captor.
"Please don't rip my lover to shreds," said the human holding her wrists, "I'm more fond of her skin without big gashes in it."
The girl blinked a few times as she stared at the human before bursting into tears. "I'm sorry! I just needed a few berries to take away mama's pain."
"We aren't here to punish you," said neko holding her. "We wanted to be sure you weren't eating those berries as a snack. But an old woman told us about your mother, and Kal wants to see if he can help," she explained while setting her down.
The girl stared at the ground. "Mama is dying. The berries take away her pain," she said, her words punctuated by a fit of violent coughing from inside the shack.
"We know," said the human. "Why don't you introduce us?"
The girl looked apprehensive for a moment, the tip of her tail vibrating as she glanced at the door to her home. With a slight nod, she pushed the curtain to one side and led them into the hut.
A wash basin made out of a wooden bowl sat in one corner of the single-room house, while a small firepit took up the middle. On the opposite side of the shack were two woven bamboo mats laying side-by-side on the dirt floor, one empty while the other was occupied.
A cat-woman whose color matched the girl's lay on the occupied mat wearing a plain housedress. The annoyed snarl directed at her daughter vanished as Kashka entered the hut, then returned with more intensity and anger as Kal entered. Rolling forward, she grabbed her daughter's hand and yanked her away from the human.
The bakeneko glared at Kal while shoving the girl behind her. "Do not touch my daughter," she hissed, her face becoming more cat-like. "Whatever she may have offered you to save me is not worth my life. Get out." Her threatening demeanor vanished as she bent over in another fit of violent coughing peppered by gasping breaths.
"Your daughter offered us nothing," said Kal once the fit passed, "and I wouldn't have accepted if she had. Ria, store my cloak, please," said the mage, rolling up his shirtsleeves.
"Then why are you here?" she asked as Kal knelt in the dirt next to her mat.
Kal smiled as he knelt beside her and gently but insistently pushed her back down to the bed. The woman tried to resist for a moment but quickly realized the pointlessness. "A few years ago, I wandered into a cave searching for riches. Instead of gold and loot, I met a woman from this land and spent the night with her. For my time, she gifted me some of the riches I sought.
"We quickly became lovers, and I learned I could use magic." As he spoke, Kal pulled some power from the crystals in his pouch and let it fill him as he sent a healing pulse through the woman. Spots all over her body lit up from the damage caused by her sickness, but it appeared concentrated in her lungs. "As I grew in power and skill, I decided that I would try to save those I could from the heartache I went through wherever I could.
"You see, my mother was dying from the coughing sickness, and I went into that cave searching for money to buy a potion for her," he explained, turning the cat-woman's hand palm up to reveal the white and pink streaks on it from her fit earlier. "She later passed away from other causes I had no control over, but I still remember the despair and hopelessness I felt as I watched my mother slowly waste away," Kal said with a knowing look at the woman's daughter. "Is it okay if I remove your clothes? This will be easier without them blocking my view."
The woman immediately became suspicious. "I am in no shape to give you pleasure."
"See these glowing eyes?" the mage asked.
"Yes."
"They allow me to see the magic working inside you. I can then direct the healing magic where it is most needed and heal the disease's damage. Cloth coverings, even thin ones, dull what I can see."
The bakeneko looked up at her daughter. "Go stay with Oba for a little bit, Miko."
"But I don't want to leave you," the girl pouted.
"Like the other times I've had men in our home, you should not be here to witness a man lay his eyes on my body. Go, now."
Miko glared at Kal since his presence was the reason for her dismissal but stood and darted out the shack's entrance.
"If she's Miko, then I'm guessing your name is Mika?" asked Kal once the girl had left.
"Who told you that?"
" The one you sent Miko to, Oba. She was the first to greet us when following your daughter back into the city."
Mika smiled. "She's our soothsayer and medicine woman. Oba likely knew you were coming."
Kal looked up at Kashka. "I'm about to start. This will probably take a while."
"You said the dog-girls only took a little while each when you healed them after the rescue."
"They were also within the first hours of being infected, and some may not have been infected at all. Their cases were as much prevention as cure. But Mika's body is filled with sickness, and she probably wouldn't have lasted much longer without us coming along. It will take time for the spell to hunt down and remove all of the disease from her body. I will also heal what damage I can once the Cure Disease spell is done.
"Ria, come out here. You two find an inside space somewhere large enough to set up the tent. Ria, store the library and alchemy station and set up a few more rooms. I plan on helping who I can while we are here." He turned to Kashka. As she does that, go to the docks and let Roka know what happened at the castle and what I'm doing here. Tell them we will be staying ashore for the night."
Kashka and Ria exchanged a look before nodding and exiting the shack. Kal could feel the cat's discomfort across the bond over leaving him alone in such a vulnerable position. But she also understood the importance of communicating their whereabouts to the ship's crew.
The mage helped Mika sit up. The movement set off another coughing fit, and he waited until it passed before helping her out of the housedress. After she wiggled about for a moment to get her tail situated, Kal helped her lie down again.
The cat looked over at Kal's crotch and smiled wistfully. "Once, the sight of my body could drive a man wild with lust."
"That seems like an odd thing to worry about at the moment," said the mage as he placed one hand on her shoulder and the other on her stomach. The Cure Disease rune beneath his shirt glowed maroon as it went to work on the cat-woman's body.
"I was a prostitute for many years before Miko came along," she said, "and it was the best way to make money when she was a kitten. I'm ashamed to say Oba raised her more than I did. But as she grew, some of my customers started noticing her and asking questions. I gave up my place on the edge of the slums and moved here, where humans rarely come. It has been a long time since a man last laid eyes on me." She glanced at the mage's groin and sighed, "I suppose I was hoping some of my beauty remained."
"I'm certain it is merely hidden beneath your sickness. Once I'm done, and you've had a few good meals, I'm sure you will be just as beautiful as you ever were."
"Such sweet words," Mika giggled. "Your woman is lucky."
"That we are," said Ria popping through the shack's door and flitting over to Kal's shoulder. "Oba and Miko found something like an Inn further into the slums that gets almost no human customers. Two of its rooms have monster girls with coughing sickness in them. It did have three, but one passed away just a few days ago. I set the tent up in one of the empty rooms."
Kal smiled down at Mika, "Are you up for a walk?"
The cat raised an eyebrow, "I don't doubt you are healing me, I can feel your magic working, but I don't think I'm ready to walk yet."
"That's okay," he replied, covering her in the housedress and then wrapping her in a dirty and unused kimono after cleaning it with a bit of magic. Picking her up, he said, "I'll let you borrow my legs for a few minutes. Ria, lead the way."
They caused some commotion following Ria back to the Inn. Once outside, Mika covered her head with the kimono, not in shame but to keep from spreading her sickness to others. Some of the slum's other residents mistook her for a corpse, only to reel back in fear when the muggy air beneath the robe made the cat-woman cough.
Others hardly paid attention to the person Kal carried and seemed solely intent on enticing him into bed. A few stern words or a cough from the cat usually sent them on their way, but those in the midst of their mating cycles required stronger threats. Thankfully Oba and Miko arrived to keep the growing crowd at bay before he needed to back up any of those threats. Oba's presence created a large, respectful circle around them for the rest of the journey to the Inn.
In the moment of peace after the elder cat-woman's arrival, Kal checked on Kashka. She had made it to the docks but had not yet approached any of the Scarlet Bitch's crew. A second group of guards had joined the dockmaster's men and checked any goods and anyone going onto the pier. With the heightened security, she hoped to catch one of The Bitch's crew away from the docks and alone. If that wasn't possible, the assassin would tie a note to one of her daggers and toss it onto the pier right in front of one of the crew. Kal responded that it sounded like a good plan as he stepped into the Inn.
His eyes adjusted to take in a desk off to his left with a dour-looking kappa standing behind it. To his right, the room extended into a nook with an Azumbahan low table and cushions. Up ahead, another large doorway opened into a square, poorly-maintained garden surrounded by a wooden deck with doors to the Inn's rooms around the outside.
"You pay for your room before you go any further," said the turtle-like woman at the desk. "Oba's word only carries so much weight, and I let too many stay here for free already."
"Ria, give her a gold piece," said Kal without breaking stride.
"Gold?" the woman screeched. "Do you think I'm made of silver? I don't have change for that!"
