The cat with his lunar moth markings and river eyes would pummel her with his wide white paws at her belly, her breasts, and her temples. He pushed and pulled at her with the force of infant and beast, demonstrating a delirium that both thrilled and comforted her. His claws stained with wandering would rhythmically tangle through her hair lulling her to sleep.
Each dawn after the cat had leapt out the window at the setting of the moon, her snowy coverlets and silken sheets of forty thousand silk moths would be marked with the imprint of his muddy paws.
The residue of hushed night roses.
She always denied having anything to do with the mess when the maids came to change the bedding. She claimed the cat was possibly a conjurer and had come in through the window to mark her with a dark spirit as she slumbered. But it was she, who would arise in the moonlight and open the window upon hearing his cries. Cradling him in her arms, she would bury her face in his fur, that smelled like dampness and woodsmoke and secret wild places, and she would transport him ceremoniously as one would a demigod to her chamber of whiteness.
