It was just past midnight, and the only life present in the sorcerer’s sanctum was the cat who called it home. The real master of the domain, one might believe.
Purring madly, the cat rubbed against a weathered jewelry box which had been left on the edge of a counter by a distracted apprentice earlier that evening, each pass of its body nudging it just a little closer to the edge.
Purr, nudge. Purr, nudge. Purr… crash.
The cat peered over the counter, staring with wide golden eyes as the box hit the ground, bounced once, and flew open, its timeworn latching mechanism no match for gravity and physics.
“Free!” boomed a voice, as a cloud of smoke and fire billowed forth from the box to coalesce into a humanoid form. “At long last!” The form shook and shimmered as it resolved even further into that of a sturdy, bronze-skinned, proud-featured man dressed in old-fashioned dark robes—clothes last popular decades ago. “Mortal, you have freed me, and by ancient laws, I am bound to grant you three wishes! But there… are… rules…” He trailed off, finding himself staring not at an easily impressed human, but at a small orange tiger-striped tabby, who, disregarding the gravitas of the situation, was now grooming itself.
“Oh,” said the genie.
The cat extended a back leg to vigorously, intently, lick its nether regions
“Oh no,” said the genie.
There were rules, indeed. Rules about raising the dead and compelling love, rules about turning back time and how many wishes could be granted. Rules that said the genie had to serve whoever freed him. Rules passing the genie from one master to the next for centuries.
Nothing in the rules said anything about cats, though. There’d always been the unspoken assumption that the genie would exclusively serve humans.
The genie glanced into the ether, wondering if “accidental freedom” was an exploitable loophole. Surely there were provisions for that sort of thing. But no, there it was—the invisible tether between him and the cat, binding them until his obligations had been met.
“What is your first wish?” the genie asked the cat.
The cat paused its bath, regarding the genie serenely. “Mroawr,” it said.
The genie’s magic allowed him to speak every language known to mankind, even the long-dead ones.
It did not work with cats.
The gift of tongues granted the genie at the spark of his creation had not included animal speech—a grievous oversight which clearly no one could have predicted.
The genie made a try of it anyway. He repeated his question in a dozen different tongues. The cat remained unimpressed and profoundly unhelpful, eyes wide and bright in the sanctum’s dim light.
The genie frowned and took a wild guess at satisfying the cat. With an artistic flair, he summoned a silver bowl filled with meaty broth. A gold dish covered by a sampling of gourmet delicacies—chicken, tuna, beef, all fit for a king. The cat ignored the broth and sniffed at the food, taking tiny nibbles before fang-yawning widely in disinterest.
The genie frowned again. He snapped his fingers, conjuring a cat bed of impossibly exquisite craftsmanship and comfort. It was deep, plush, and warm, a bed far better than any human had ever enjoyed. The cat nudged it a few times before it toppled from the counter to land upside down on the floor. The genie poked at the tether again—no, he hadn’t satisfied even one of the cat’s unspoken wishes yet.
“Mroar,” said the cat, bumping its head against the genie’s arm, none too gently.
Cautiously, the genie stroked the cat’s head, his feline master going slit-eyed with happiness, its purr low and deep. The genie continued to pet the cat even as he racked his brain and his centuries of experience for solutions. He was used to masters who made their desires and demands perfectly clear. He knew how to satisfy base cravings for power, wealth, respect, revenge. He knew how to exploit loopholes and inaccurate wordings when necessary. He could tempt and taunt and goad masters into making foolish wishes, or guide them into making wise ones, depending on how they treated him. He’d raised kings and toppled emperors, brought success to the kind and disaster to the wicked, but it required a certain back and forth between both parties…
What to do with a master whose wishes went unspoken?
The genie was so deep in thought, it took him some time to realize that at some point, he’d picked up the cat and was now stroking it. The cat snuggled happily into his arms, paws kneading, a low purr setting its entire body to vibrating happily.
“No, this simply won’t do,” said the genie, dumping the cat back onto the counter. His dark robes were now covered in fine orange fur, utterly immune to magical removal. Startled awake, the cat flicked its tail grumpily, turning its back on him. The genie glanced at the sanctum’s window; the sun was just coming up outside, and he was no closer to a solution. This mystery would require more thought when he once again had privacy and time to experiment. With a sigh, he dismissed his rejected offerings, and prepared to return to his home to reflect upon this predicament. It was kind of relaxing, he thought briefly, to have a master who didn’t make ridiculous requests, outrageous demands, impossible wishes. It was a little freeing, and certainly there was no hurry to end this arrangement. Best, it preempted any other claims to his services. He could take his time figuring it out. But even as he dissipated back into smoke and fire, he realized that…
…the cat was already curled up in the jewelry box, having somehow arranged its body in an upside-down half-twist, looking both quite comfortable and extraordinarily smug.
“Oh,” said the genie.
There really was nothing in the rules about this.
Michael M. Jones lives in Virginia with too many books, just enough cats, and a wife of great cunning. He’s a professional book reviewer, the editor of several anthologies and his stories have appeared in venues such as Hexagon, Metastellar, and Worlds of Possibility. For more, visit him at www.michaelmjones.com.
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