The key turned in the lock and they were able to look into a room whose walls were composed of shelves, each of those loaded with jars and bottles. There was a scent of spice, of herbs, a large stock of the small bottled jams and jellies.
Jennie paid no attention to any of those and luckily Hob-Khon had not yet carried his program of breakage this far. The maid hunted out a bunch of leafed stems which had been hanging from the ceiling on a cord and swiftly made her way back to the kitchen, taking time only to lock the door behind her.
She laid her trophy on the well-scrubbed table and Thragun did what he had never dared do here before, jumped up beside it, sniffing inquisitively. He sneezed and raised his head. There was indeed a strong strange odor, but it had nothing of the dark about it.
"HE won't come just to be laid, milady," Jennie observed.
"Probably not, Jennie. But what do they say tempts Hob's famous appetite? Cream, is it not? And surely something quite out of the ordinary to be added on this occasion. Hmmm-"
She looked about as if waiting for a suggestion.
Jennie had gone to fetch the cream. The only other object on the table was a covered bowl. Thragun sniffed it-Great-Aunt Amelie took the cover off.
"Why, it is a Christmas pudding! I thought that Mrs. Cobb had not yet begun to make such! And this one has een steamed ready for the table, though it is cold." Lady Ashley pulled the bowl closer.
"Oh, milady." Jennie was back with another bowl, the contents of which made Thragun's whiskers twitch a fraction. Certainly its contents were more to be desired than this Christmas pudding. "That was sent up from th' village just this evenin'. Thomas brought it in on th' cart from Windall. Cook, she an' Mis' Davis over at th' Jolly Boy 'as been for years now a-talkin' 'bout which Christmas pudding be the best-them with brandy or them with rum. So this year Mis' Davis up an' sent one of her'n over for to give us a taste like."
"Bring a plate, Jennie." Great Aunt sat up straighter. "And then turn the pudding out. We'll just see if Hob has a taste for a seasonal dainty."
So the table was set, the bowl of cream, the pudding on a plate. Under Lady Ashley's direction, the bits of rowan were placed around three sides of the offering allowing only the fourth to be open.
"Now we shall have to leave it to Hob. He has no desire to be seen, or so I was always told. Come-"
With Emmy before her with the lamp and Jennie still holding the toasting fork at ready to help her, Lady Ashley went slowly out. They had left Jennie's lantern sitting on the ledge of the cupboard shelf and Thragun remained where he was, on the table well away from the rowan.
With slitted eyes he looked to the fireplace. There had been more noise from the forepart of the house, not muffled by the length of passages and rooms in between. He thought that Hob was still busy at his destruction and that he was doing more than ever to cause all the damage he could as he went.
But after the others had left there was silence. What new mischief was the Khon about?
Out of the fireplace sped a shadow and Thragun subdued the hiss he had almost voiced. He did not know how the preparations Lady Ashley had made would act. But he sat up on his haunches and with his forepaws made signs in the air, following as best he could his memories of what was done to discourage a Khon in his old home.
It was Hob in form who squatted on the table top, grabbed the bowl of cream in both hands and held it high, drinking its contents in a single slurping gulp. Then he swung about to look at the pudding.
There was a crinkling of Hob's wrinkled face as if he were in pain and his two claw hands at the end of spider thin arms patted his protruding belly which looked as if he had already swallowed the bowl along with what it held.
Thragun did not hesitate:
"You are Hob, the thewada of this house-"
Hob's head was cocked to one side as if he did hear and understand, but his eyes were all for the pudding.
"Hob's Hole-Hob's own
From the roasting to the bone.
Them as sees, shall not look,
Them as blind, they shall be shook.
Sweep it up and stamp it down-
Hob shall clear it all around.
So Mote this be!"
Hob's one hand went out to the pudding, though his other still rubbed his middle as if to subdue some pain there.
"Hob's Hole alone-Hob shall hold it!"
Thragun snapped at a piece of the rowan in spite of the fact that it scratched his lips. With a jerk of his head as if he were disposing of a rat, he tossed that.
Hob threw up an arm but, by fortune, the rowan sped true, striking against that round ball of a stomach nor did it fall away.
With a screech Hob leapt up. One big foot touched rowan and he screeched again. Then he began to shake as if some giant hand had caught him and was determined to subdue all struggles.
Hob's mouth opened to the full extent as if half his jaw had become unhinged. Out from between his small fangs of teeth came a puff of sickly yellow as if somewhere within him there burned a fire and this was smoke. His head, flying back and forth from the violence of that shaking, sent a second puff and both struck full upon the top of the pudding.
Now that shivered and rocked. Thragun, not knowing just why he did it, threw a second sprig of rowan and that touched, not Hob, but the pudding.
There was a howl of dismay and defeat. Hob was loosed from the shaking, to crouch on the table. The pudding was gone. A shimmer of the yellow Hob had been made to disgorge hid it completely. That faded, seeming to sink into the ball of dried fruit and flour.
Hob, his head now in his hands, rocked back and forth. But Thragun pressed closer with a third sprig of rowan which he laid on the top of that ball. Only what stood there now was a teapot-a fine brown teapot, its lid crowned by a sprig of rowan also frozen in time and place.
The cat gave it two long sniffs. He could smell none of the evil that other pot had cloaked itself in. It must be true that the magic of this land was indeed more than even a Khon could fight.
Hob straightened, rubbed his stomach, and there was no longer any sign of pain on his withered face. With a swift bound he reached the fireplace and was gone into his own hidden ways again.
Thragun regarded the teapot critically. It was certainly far more innocent looking than it had been in its other existence, and by what all his senses told him its evil will was firmly and eternally confined. He yawned, feeling all the fatigue of the night, and jumped from the table.
The lantern flickered and went out. But the pudding pot remained to mystify Mrs. Cobb later that morning and many mornings to come.
The Queen's Cat's Tale by Elizabeth Ann Scarborough
I've held my silence long enough and see no reason why my story cannot now be told. My children are grown, everyone concerned save only my lady and me has passed beyond, and though you'd never know it by looking at me, I'm getting on in years. So is my lady, drowsing now beside the fire. Her hair-that smelled so like wild violets that I delighted to roll in its spring-bright strands during those long months when her lord was campaigning and we lay together for comfort. Ah her hair-where was I? Oh yes, (how one does wander as one gets on in years) her hair is now white as that cold stuff-snow, it's called-that sticks to the paw pads and inevitably comes around whether it's wanted or not.
Just like some people I could mention. But more about them later.
As I was saying, it's peaceful here in this simple, quiet place, and although it is drafty, my lady always has a nice fire. Of course, the idea is that we live here with the sisters because my lady has been humbled, you see, and they, she and the sisters, are supposed to be all the same, but snobbery springs eternal and my lady's rank gets us our little fire and the choicest morsels and never a cross word about me even if I choose to sleep in the chapel. A queen-even a former queen, even a disgraced queen, is still top cat.