Free Marianne, the Matchbox, and the Malachite Mouse by Sheri S. Tepper Page B

in the morning, then offered them two pallets before the fire on which to sleep. The dog had, for some reason known best to dogs, either decided not to come in or had not been invited, which was more likely. Feeling particularly drowsy, Buttercup did not worry over the animal. Seemingly, neither did Honsl, for in a moment, lulled by the heat of the fire and the warmth in their bellies of the freshly baked marple cake, they were both asleep.
    Buttercup had very odd dreams. The nagging voice which had not lately bothered her had returned to tease at her with nebulous commands and comments. ‘I hope to hell you can get out of this’ was one, as well as, ‘You never learn, do you?’ When she woke it was with an ominous sense of something very wrong. When she came fully awake, she found herself in a stout cage behind the marple-bread cottage. Honsl was sitting disconsolately beside a tree, his ankle chained to a nearby post. The dog was nowhere to be seen, but Buttercup could hear his atrocious harf, harf, harf off somewhere in the woods. Though she was somewhat disoriented, she pulled herself together enough to address the pale young male before her.
    ‘Honsl! What has happened?’
    ‘The old witch caught us, is what.’
    ‘Not a nice way to refer to an elderly Grisl, Honsl.’
    ‘Don’t care,’ he sulked. ‘She is.’
    ‘Why in the world are we confined in this way?’
    ‘Got the – for us,’ he mumbled, the mid-part of the information lost in mid-mutter. Nor would he repeat what he had said.
    Buttercup was at first inclined to think it was some kind of joke. Perhaps the old Grisl had taken offense at the dog. Perhaps she was merely a bit scattered, as the very old sometimes become. As the day wore on, however, she began to believe that it was the old Grisl’s intention to starve her to death.
    During the day Honsl received several plates of cakes with tea. Buttercup was given only water. All attempts to communicate with the aged Grisl met with a sly smile and complete silence. By evening, Buttercup was beginning to feel slightly dizzy from hunger, and it was at that time that the dog, crawling on its belly through the tall grasses, brought to the cage the bodies of several small, juicy examples of the local fauna.
    Buttercup had been schooled to avoid raw meat. As she was about to turn from the still warm bodies in disgust, however, her interior voice said so loudly and so very clearly that it should have been audible across the clearing, ‘For the sake of good sense, Buttercup, eat the damn things. You must. If you can’t see the plot outline emerging here, I can!’
    Buttercup had no idea what was meant by this, but as things stood, she was both ravenous and had little choice of menu. Calling softly to Honsl, she offered to share the meat and was met with a shudder of rejection. An obscure impulse (Mouse, who wished to guarantee a continued source of sustenance) moved her to say, ‘Good dog,’ and she watched with interest as it wagged its posterior appendage to and fro in response to each utterance of this phrase. ‘Good dog.’
    When Buttercup had finished her meal, she tossed the bones away into the shrubbery, licked her bloody fingers clean, and lay down to sleep, aware of Honsl’s reproachful eyes upon her. She would like to have cheered him, but since he would not share the provender furnished by his own dog, there was little she could do. Now that she had eaten the raw and bloody meat, she felt much better – well enough, in fact, that she wondered why she had been taught not to eat it.
    Some days went by. The aged Grisl offered her nothing but water, but the dog brought dead animals at evening and at dawn. On the fifth day, the old Grisl began to approach the cage frequently, peering at Buttercup with wicked old eyes, totally ignoring all attempts at conversation. She was looking for something. Toward evening, when dog brought the catch of the day, Buttercup realized what the old Grisl was