Clarence became aware of his differences quite early in his life. For one thing he was much smaller than any of the others in his clan. He was also rather lacking in the claw department. He had claws but they were delicate things that retracted rather than the fearsome talons wielded by others in his clan. He also came to realise that he was much smarter than they were. That’s not to say his fellow dustcats were stupid, they had considerable cunning, but they were limited in their understanding of certain things that Clarence was increasingly curious about.
Clarence had been born in the library. This may have something to do with his differences but it may not. Dustcats like libraries, libraries have large collections of books and books, as anyone with a reasonable collection of them will know, collect dust. Lots and lots of dust. But Clarence discovered that libraries also contain words, lots of them, almost as many words as the dust. Words liked to gather in groups. Some of the words were a bit standoffish but most of the others were perfectly happy to whisper their sibilant secrets to Clarence. A few were a little offended that Clarence couldn’t be something called “possessed”, they never did explain what that was, but on the whole the words seemed to enjoy Clarence and he certainly enjoyed them. Sometimes the words asked Clarence to do things for them and where he could arrange things for them he did. He wasn’t sure why the humans were so upset by these things as they didn’t bother to explain themselves and treated Clarence as an annoying pest in spite of his genius. There, I’ve said it, Clarence was a genius, the sibilant words all agreed with this conclusion, and such beings are usually misunderstood. The words, however, encouraged Clarence to explore and find new pockets of dust for his clan and new gatherings of words to learn from. Soon Clarence knew the secrets of the library better than any other being that lived there and that’s when things really started to get interesting.
But that’s another story.
(Pauline wrote the text and made the adorable needlefelt dustcat!)
Yes, they’re real. No, it they aren’t painful although they was when they started. And yes, I know they look odd but I’ve grown used to them now and trying to remove them is incredibly painful.
It started with a sore throat, nothing unusual about that you might think and normally you would be right but this wasn’t normal. I didn’t know that at the time but it wasn’t at all normal. Just a scratchy sore throat that steadily got worse over a couple of days. I decided to try and numb it with a bit of medicinal potato vodka as you do. I wasn’t worried about the possibility of glowing eyes, I figured that wouldn’t last long if I did get them and it would be a small price to pay for the potential result. So I had a medicinal drink or two and went to bed.
The next morning I woke early with a sore head as well as a sore throat and the beginnings of that stuffed up feeling you often get with a head cold. Oh, and my eyes were glowing enough for me to see more clearly in the darkened room than usual. I didn’t worry about the glowing eyes. Maybe I should have done.
The pain in my head and the stuffed up feeling got worse over the next couple of days. The medicinal evening drinks helped a bit with the sore throat but it didn’t go away and neither did the glowing eyes.
What? No, they don’t glow as much now, hardly noticeable unless I’m in a much darker place.
Anyway, the next thing that started was the coughing. You know the type of thing. Felt like my lungs wanted to jump out my throat sometimes. The medicinal drink helped reduce that a bit.
A week later and I wasn’t any better. I thought about maybe going to see Doc Willoughby but I didn’t want to be told I had something fatal so I didn’t bother.
Then just over a week after the sore throat had begun I felt severe pain in my ears, under my eyes and in my nose. I started coughing really badly. I struggled to breathe I was coughing so hard and that’s when I first felt them. My right ear popped first. I screamed with the pain and started shaking. Then my left ear popped and I felt something dripping out of my nose. Or at least I thought that’s what was happening. I coughed something up but it got stuck and wouldn’t come all the way out.
I know it sounds disgusting! It felt disgusting too!
I think I passed out then.
When I next opened my eyes the room was dark again so I must have been unconscious all day. I felt awful, really stiff and a bit cold but the head ache was finally gone. That sense of pressure in my head was gone too. In fact as I sat up I realised most of the pain had finally gone. I felt weird though. I could feel something around my nose and mouth and an odd sensation at the back of my throat as if something was stuck there. I reached for the glass and bottle I kept by the bed. That’s when I noticed the glow form my eyes had changed a bit too, it was a bit greener than before. Anyway I poured myself a bit of medicine and knocked it back but the feeling of something stuck in my throat didn’t go away. I also tried wiping my face as I figured it was probably a mixture of snot and drool from being unconscious all day.
That was a mistake I can tell you!
I felt like my face was on fire so I quickly stopped rubbing and began to gently prod at whatever it was. That’s when I realised it wasn’t normal. I felt something tickling beside my ear and went to brush it away. There was something there too, but I didn’t feel any of the excruciating pain I had felt before I passed out so that was an improvement.
I climbed out of bed. I was stiff from lying there so long I guess but other than that everything seemed fine. I went over to the dresser and picked up the hand mirror. I dropped it when I saw what was on my face. It took me a while to get up the courage to look again. One of the tendrils growing out of my ear waved. I carefully put the mirror down and went over to get another dose of medicine. Maybe this batch of vodka was a bit stronger and I was hallucinating. I had another drink. I carefully picked up the mirror again but I looked the same. I put the mirror down and just sat there.
I think I sat there the rest of that night because the next thing I remember is that it was light outside so I got dressed and went downstairs. I had some breakfast, I was very hungry but then it had been at least a day since I last ate anything. Then I very carefully reached up and felt round my face and ears. Yep, they were still there. I had tendrils growing from my nose, ears and out my mouth. I tried pulling on one and soon stopped as that was incredibly painful. So I left them. They didn’t seem to stop me doing anything else that day. The next day they were a bit longer but other than that I was fine.
So here I am. They seem to like a drink as they grow a bit more afterwards. Other than that the only other thing is the glowing eyes when it’s very dark. Oh and last month there was a flower, a pretty thing, it didn’t last long though.
The illustration with this post shows me as a crow queen. It’s part of the image we’ve been using this year with The Ominous Folk.
There’s something evocative about the queen of crows, something that speaks to more people than just me. One of the people who has found the idea meaningful is Pauline Pitchford. In the video below, Pauline explores the idea of crow queens from the perspective of a member of The Hopeless, Maine Scientific Society. It’s a beautiful piece, full of magic, possibility and menace.
