Chapter 2: If nothing else a chahat has no taste in music.

 

“D-did, did that just happen?” Lupix stuttered.

What she was speaking of was how her father the King of Wolves, had randomly, or perhaps not so randomly shown up, placed a geas on her to take up her royal duties as a fire howler and give up her band, or to sing. Then, as abruptly as he had appeared he left, claiming that what he did was ‘for her own good’.

 

“Did he seriously just place a geas on me?”

He had, in elcon a geas was a great charm a compulsion to abide by a rule set by the caster. It was a powerful form of magic, and to break a geas was either impossible, or if you did it would be at terrible costs. Such was the fearsome reputation of a geas that few had ever felt the magic of it working against their will, most abided by the rules of their geas of their own will.

 

“Just who does he think he is?” Lupix said indignantly.

Koul couldn’t resist.

“I believe Princess, he believes he is your Father, also your King.”

 

Lupix decided to ignore that.

“What am I going to do? What are we going to do?”

“Give up?” Mik suggested.

“Yeah, sounds good” Specker answered.

“All in favour say aye!” Am ‘P’ finished.

 

“hhhhheeeey!” Lupix interrupted the democratic motion to install her in her rightful position as ‘tyrant’s kid’.

“Don’t you guys care about the band? Didn’t you go through many troubles to be able to play music? You are just going to give up like that?”

“Yup” Specker affirmed.

“I’m too cool and good-looking to die” Am ‘P’ boasted.

 

“Well, I mean, we can keep playing music, just you that has to quit” Mik claimed.

“Then I can take centre stage” she muttered to herself.

 

Lupix hung her head as her traitors discussed what kind of music they’d do and what they’d call themselves. They had zero loyalty to Lupix and were of course cowards. Koul seeing where this was headed, and feeling a bit of sympathy for his rebellious charge, decided to help Lupix out.

 

“Well, I wish you three well in your music” He said casually. “I’m afraid I won’t have time for music again, what with aiding the Princess in her royal duties and guarding her”

 

He was lying through his beak but the three conepeople didn’t know that, and when silent and pale at the thought of a band without Koul. At first they had been frightened by Koul but they got to like having such a strong protector around, added to that was Koul’s skill at his rockshake drums.

 

Am ‘P’, Specker and Mik turned round to each other, muttering this and that, finally they reached an agreement and turned to Lupix, all smiling.

 

“We could never abandon the leading lady of our band” Am ‘P’ claimed, in spite of them having just discussed doing so.

 

Lupix gave a heavy sigh and sat down on a curiously seat-like protruding root.

“Don’t stress yourselves” She said dryly. “I mean if I could sing, wouldn’t I just be abandoning the band for Opera?”

 

The conepeople grew solemn, forgetting their earlier treachery.

“They use trumpets in Opera don’t they?” Mik asked, spinning the little cap trumpet on her point.

Lupix laughed.

“Yes, they used lots of instruments, oh if only you could have heard it.”

Lupix had talked of the pomp and glamour of the Wolfhiem Opera before, though she had only been a very young pup when she had seen it. Koul could remember that, he could also remember so much more, he was saddened that Wolfhiem was no more. The conepeople loved to hear about it. Their earlier disloyalty was mostly a fear of what it could take for Lupix to sing safely, or of what would happen if she just tried to sing.

 

The conepeople conferred among themselves again, then turned to Lupix.

“We’ll help you sing in Opera!” Specker said.

“You guys…” Lupix said touched by their turnabout of loyalty, tears in her eyes.

 

Koul however ruined the moment and coughed.

“Well, this is all very well and good, but how are you going to sing, I don’t think I could fight off all of the Firelord’s Snuffers, Princess, and I definitely couldn’t fight the Firelord himself”

 

“I don’t know” Lupix said plainly, then her brow furrowed. “Wait… why didn’t I think of this before? We could ask the Spirit of Wood!”

 

The three conepeople and even Koul looked at her nervously.

“Actually you did think of it before” Mik said. “Except you know, we didn’t try because the Spirit of Wood is in the centre of the forest and that is really dangerous.”

“Yeah, super dangerous” Specker affirmed.

“That said, you are in a desperate situation now, and it wouldn’t be as dangerous as simply singing without precautions” Am ‘P’ concluded.

 

Lupix nodded, she was about to speak, when Koul did so instead.

“Speaking of dangerous, we’ve been in one place for too long, we’ve been surrounded”

 

In the Great Snowy Forest, some places were safe to stay in, other however were the roaming grounds of fierce predators or things of a more sinister nature.

“Chahahaha!”

A mocking laugh came from the treebranches around them, more quickly followed.

They had been encircled by chahats!

 

The chahat were one of several animals known for their mocking laugh. A chahat was some manner of purple furred feline beast with a round ball like body, fat stubby arms and paws with long claws on the forepaws. Its head is roughly the same size as its’ body. Great wicked orange eyes and a huge mouth filled with razor sharp teeth dominate this animal’s face.

 

Their main method of movement is their long fuzzy prehensile tail, with which they grip branches and swing about the forest, sounding their horrible laugh. Their tail is highly prized by elconic denizens. Some rare chahats possess a darker almost black tail that simmers like a midnight sky filled with stars, however these chahats are known to teleport and thus are quite difficult to hunt.

 

Another thing belonging to chahats that is prized, though in this case by a small number of crazed collectors, is their hats. Now it might seem odd that an animal that spends most of its time upside-down should make and wear hats of twigs and leaves or whatever they can get, but they do it, holding the hat in place with their stubby little arms and long claws. There is however a practical use, apart from using hats to determine hierarchy, they also carry their young in their hats.

 

It was commonly agreed that it was best to get chahats on the ground before seriously fighting them. A chahat couldn’t move well on its stubby legs. Their general method of hunting was to batter their prey with their bodies, swinging themselves about like big toothed wrecking balls.

 

“Chahahaha!” They laughed again, then swung in at Lupix and her band.

 

The conepeople when between Lupix and Koul, who stood back to back.

Koul gave his drums a mighty bang, buffeting the chahats back. They laughed nervously and resumed swinging around the band, waiting for an opening.

 

“Chahahaha!” The chahats laughed, most denizens agreed that it was a very annoying laugh.

 

Lupix put her hands to her thunderlute ready to blast the chahats with sound.

“They’re just animals! Let’s play some music and scare them off!” She shouted.

With that she plucked at her thunderlute, starting a song she had made that her band knew as ‘Rumbling Clouds of the Heart’.

 

It was a song that began strong, establishing the feeling of dark clouds in the heart, rumbling noisly then giving way to great claps from Koul, and big peals from Mik’s trumpet cap. Specker generated a feeling of rain with his Conish bandball, making a constant background pitter-patter that followed Lupix’s lead. Am ‘P’ lent the clouds body with his xylophone, somehow making round fluffy noises.

 

It gave a strong troubled vibe as well as a bit of hidden fear.

 

Of course, if Lupix had known more about chahats she wouldn’t have tried this. A little known fact is that chahats loath any music that isn’t either terrible and prefer a kind of dreadful tortured cat style of music. It has been observed that chahats aren’t terribly pleasant creatures.

 

This in mind, it isn’t surprising that the chahats attacked screeching in fury. Koul managed to block them all, but the beastly cats bashing against his drumarmour messed up the beat of the song. Lupix hearing this, grabbed the neck of her thunder-lute and still playing, hit the closest chahat with the lute, making a gonging noise, and that signalled a change in song.

 

Whether she realised it or not Lupix was now ad-libbing a battle song. In Elcon, a battle song was not merely a morale lifting thing, it was a song that wounded the enemy. The clouds of the previous song grew up from mere rumbling clouds to mean thunder clouds, and at first, Lupix’s lute and Koul’s shakeclubs were the lightning.

 

Then their music brought forth clouds of notes, that shot black lightning of notes at the Chahats!

The Cats were just simple predators, and this had passed way beyond what they were willing to deal with to get some food, thus they swung away in terror, their frightened laughs echoing in the distance.

 

Lupix and her band finished their song of course. They searched for a small stream to drink from to recover, then gathering themselves together, they began the journey to the centre of the the Great Snowy Forests.