“I heard rumors, but I didn’t believe them,” the tom said, addressing the cowering Smithwicks. He flicked a glance at Mhari. “Until now. This foolishness stops here.”

He leaped at Mhari and wrapped his front paws around her neck-a take-down maneuver she had seen smallcats use on each other. Mhari braced her front legs and tipped her head forward, accepting the sting of claws as he slid off. Too late she realized her mistake-this was the result the tom had intended. Now beneath her, he raised powerful hind legs to rake and tear.

But the tom did not know the ways of the Serval. Mhari leaped straight up, and the strike that might have opened her belly fell far short.

The tom adjusted with admirable speed. He rolled and got his feet back beneath him while Mhari was still gaining height. As she fell, she twisted in the air and swiped a pawful of claws at the retreating smallcat-a move she’d learned from watching someone called Derek Jeter on the talking box-and tore the tom’s ear to bloody ribbons.

The moment her paws touched down, she hopped to one side, neatly evading the tom’s running attack. She sped him on his way with a blow from one powerful paw. He stumbled, rolled. Before he could rise again, the three smallcats were upon him, biting and tearing.

“Enough,” Mhari snarled.

They paid her no heed. She stalked over and picked up the gray female by the scruff of the neck, like some recalcitrant kitten. She tossed Minx aside and glared at the gray’s two male companions, who’d left off their attack on the big tom to eye Mhari uncertainly.

“Next?” she said meaningfully.

Smithwicks edged away. “We came to your aid.”

“You fell on a wounded cat like jackals.”

“There is no need to take that tone,” he said reprovingly. “You do not understand all the factors at work. You do not understand the various factions and schools of thought among the city’s cats.”

“Explain, then.”

Frank muttered something about Bast in heat. His tone suggested that comparison to the Goddess was not necessarily a compliment. “We can stand here waiting for dawn and Animal Control, or we can do what needs doing.”

“Well said,” agreed Smithwicks. “Shall we?”

Somehow they managed to get to the zoo without further challenge. They scrambled up the vines draping a tall stone wall.

The scent struck Mhari like a blow. Not just the smell of animals-she’d caught that scent long before the walls of the zoo came into sight-but the lingering stench of too many humans, too much scat for so little territory, too many chemicals meant to clean away the odor of scat. But what struck her most forcefully was the scent of despair.

There were coyotes living wild near the Arizona ranch. One time an old, mangy dog ventured near the Serval’s habitat, probably drawn by the scent of food it could no longer hunt for itself. He’d been caught in an old, forgotten leg trap in the brush outside the habitat. Days had passed before the humans found and killed him. In that time, Mhari had learned of despair and hopelessness. Tonight, she had learned something almost as troubling.

“You smallcats can talk to the humans and bend them to your will,” she ventured, “but the greatcats cannot. That is why they can be kept in zoos.”

“That is true,” Smithwicks said cautiously.

“I cannot do what you do. If I am captured, I will not be able to escape.”

“Minx is very persuasive. She will get you out,” the black-and-white tom assured her. He glared at the little gray female as if daring her to contradict him. “We’ll make sure she does.”

Mhari turned toward the artificial cave in the midst of a steel and glass enclosure. Her nose told her there were lions within. “What of the others? The Great Ones?”

“What of them?” Minx snarled. Her head came up proudly. “For thousands of years, we cats have lived among humans. Our bonds with them have evolved over time. Our civilization is complex and powerful, and far beyond your primitive understanding.

Great Ones. Ha!”

“What Minx meant to say,” said Smithwicks, “was that we honor the Ancestors. They have a place in our hearts and our history. But they are not part of our civilization.”

“And there’s no place for them in the city,” put in Frank.

Except for the zoo.

Suddenly Mhari wanted nothing more than to be done with this. She leaped down from the wall and trotted across the road toward the long, sterile pool surrounding the tiger’s habitat. A foolish thing, since tigers could swim nearly as well as she, and it had little to do with the things that truly kept the great striped cat imprisoned, but no doubt it made the visiting humans feel more secure.

The Serval leaped the low fence and paced along the edge of the moat, looking for a glint of metal under the water. A low rumble, the feline version of a politely cleared throat, drew her attention to the dappled shadows beneath a tree. The tiger sprawled there, watching her with strangely dull, incurious eyes.

“Greetings, little sister,” he said. “How is it that you run free?”

His language fell strangely upon Mhari’s ears, but it was close enough to the Serval speech for her to follow. “A gun was thrown into this pool. I have come to retrieve it.”

“What do you want with such a thing?”

“The man who threw it away has been killing smallcats. They wish to stop him. The gun will help them find him.”

The tiger considered this in silence. “Did the smallcats free you? Is that why you do their bidding?”

Mhari was about to deny this, but found she could not. How would the tiger understand her bond with the Woman? He would see her captivity as no different from his.

She was not entirely certain he would be wrong.

A surge of water rippled through the pool, an artificial tide of some sort. Mhari closed her eyes and listened. Her large ears made subtle twitches and turns as she searched the air for some hint of her metallic prey.

There it was-a clink of metal against the metal, somewhere beneath the water. The Serval dropped into the pool and dived for the bottom.

The pool was unexpectedly deep, but the water was clear and a street lamp shone overhead like an artificial moon. Mhari could see clearly, but there was no sign of the gun. The pool’s sides were blue and green, painted in swirling stripes to resemble ripples on living water. Mhari was not troubled by color; she saw it, but she cared little about it one way or another. Her eyes were drawn first and foremost to motion. Other than the occasional push of air and water from some of the holes in the smooth wall, there was nothing to see.

She rose to the surface for air.

“Do not-” began the tiger.

Down Mhari went again, not wanting to hear what he might say. Nevertheless, she heard every word-including that which no greatcat should ever have to speak:

Please…

If water was pushed into the pool, surely there must also be a place for it to leave. The Serval paddled around the depths and watched the holes, waiting to see which pulsed with bubbles and which did not.

Yes, there it was-a round opening on the wall near the bottom, just where she’d heard the click of metal. Mhari swam toward it and reached one long, dexterous paw into the hole. She could just touch the gun, but just barely.

Twice she surfaced, and twice dived again, before she was able to ease the weapon from the drain and paw it into the sack the smallcats had hung around her neck. She rose toward the false moon and scrabbled up over the edge of the pool. The heavy sack thudded against her chest as she shook water from her coat.

“I did not mean for him to kill the smallcats,” the tiger said softly.

Mhari stilled in midshake. “You can talk with humans!”

“This human,” he admitted. “How and why, I could not say. Never before has anyone heard me, much less attempted to do as I bid them.”