Written By: Cherry Leung
On Fisher’s Isle, the Good Witch sings
for mother Sea to bless and bring
dreadful fates for faithless mates
tangling her own with curses
With pearl and twine she soaks in wine
bless her shores and rob her blind
from dusk till dawn, she works to die,
but a new witch will always come by.
A rugged cat lived in the old witch hut by the shore. There, she wove by claw each knot, each spell, and each talisman that the villagers wore for plentiful catches, safe travels, and faithful mates. On her curled back she carried their fate. When she stretched her stiff limbs, her bones crackled bak! bak! bak!
No villager dared approach the Cat Witch to love her, for she was at once sacred and unclean. The ground her paws struck would sprout mushrooms and strange blooms, and all who spited her feared her vengeance. But the good, kindly witch only wove at her bench from dusk till dawn. Bak! Bak! Bak!
All who came to the Cat Witch came with offerings, which she accepted, whether trash or treasure: seaweed, misshapen pearls, and live fish—the island’s great treasure—which she thus released back into the ocean. She refused fish presented to her cooked, roasted, steamed or otherwise, and she would not go to the fish market herself. At the sight of their corpses, she wept and fled in terror. No, she did not eat fish at all.
“But you simply must, Pipou,” said the trickster fox, a newcomer to the island who called herself Nano. “All cats are born liking fish.”
“I will not. That is my choice.”
“Does it sicken you so?”
“The very sight of it! Now, leave me be.”
Nano loved to terrorize her. She peddled her ocean wares from dawn to dusk, trinkets that ranged from legendary pirate treasure to fishbones. But beside her trinkets of poor quality control, she peddled fish. At times, the small cod that swam unknowingly into her net, at times shark twice her length. This time, a great whale wound into her web–the greatest whale the village had ever seen.
It was this grand whale, sleek skin marbled black and white, that Nano brought to the doorstep of the cat witch, Pipou, hoping to gain her fancy.
Pipou eyed carefully the beached behemoth. The sun was setting soon, so it should not dry, but it was shivering against the cooling sand. And Nano wore the greatest grin a fox had ever worn, because it was the grandest gift, by far, that anyone had ever offered Pipou.
“And what great gift do you desire for this creature?”
“Nothing,” the fox sneered, which was the most fearsome desire of all.
For her troubles, the cat witch ignored her advances, which also meant sparing her life.
Pipou called the tide forward to sweep the creature away. As soon as the whale touched water it shot off like an arrow. Sighing Nano, seeing her gift wasted, tossed in a cod as apology for taking up the whale’s time.
After the spectacle was over, Pipou quietly returned to her humble hut. She felt eyes searing behind her.
As she lay in her straw bed, the first vision came. She found herself as the stranded whale, and Nano across the shore, stalking her. The tide only rescinded further.
Crash. Crash. Crash.
In the days and months that followed, Nano tried a variety of other offerings. She came to Pipou with a jar of shells, all of them shining, and some coated with cooking oil to give it greater sheen. Another time, Nano came with an innocuous jar of sea glass shimmering like false emeralds, which Pipou observed for a long time before accepting it. Now, Pipou, who often scoured the beaches alone for material, could not tell why Nano mixed trash with treasure, but she could not say Nano was scamming her, for Nano always refused her services.
Was her home being used as a receptacle? She could not tell, for the fox loitered anyway. In the day, she stretched and set to her loom, and Nano came knocking. The fox sprawled herself over Pipou’s couch, weaving riddles as the witch braided bracelets.
She spun tales of the town—what crude gossip was kept from the Witch’s ear—but the best tales were her own. With flowery words she spoke of traveling on a fishing boat alone, and how the trade winds felt in her ruddy fur. In other lands, she was a princess. In other stories, she was a vagabond captured by pirates. Now she is a merchant, and a rugged survivor watching a tired cat sew together talisman after talisman.
At every tale’s end, Nano cried: “You should have been there. Oh, I wish I could take you to my city!”
Pipou’s two feet planted on the ground. Shaking her head always, she wound beads into dead knots and stretched her threads so taut they snapped. By nightfall, Pipou closed shop, and Nano slinked away. As she lay in her straw bed, the second vision came.
A great beast, with a sleek red snout and eight bushy tails, would come and eat her, tearing her flesh into red kelp strands.
Pipou awoke in cold sweat, swearing to protect herself. But she was brave, perhaps reckless, and would not deprive herself of Nano’s winding tales, her singsong lilt. Day after day the fox returned, and Pipou, ear craned for adventure, listened with little a sound. But still her curiosity piqued of Nano, and she asked, good-natured but crudely:
“Do you not have a home? Why do you linger in this hut, shower me with gifts, and all for nothing?”
The fox’s bushy tail shuddered. “Is my company not good?”
“I only dislike not knowing.”
In Pipou’s own couch Nano shifted, her characteristic grin drawing long, the way it did before entering a tale of mischief.
“Let’s play, then. You tell me your secret of secrets, and I’ll tell you mine.”
“Have you not talked my ear off enough?”
The fox cackled. “You did ask first.”
“What are you so curious to know?”
“Why do you fear eating fish?”
The answer was simple, but Pipou’s heart twisted this way and that, refusing to release her long-nursed fear. Torn, she could not say it.
“I cannot stand killing the poor creatures,” she said, telling only half the truth.
“But you let others kill for you,” said the fox. “You freed the whale, but the whale will kill other fish.”
At that, Pipou’s heart hardened cold and blue. “They must eat,” she said, “and have no choice.”
Nano refused to relent. “With your claws you craft something beautiful to keep fishers safe, and more fish die. They offer you their catches for you to only set them free. You do not come out to the market where they lay on ice, but in your heart you know they are there, and there will be more tomorrow. Why are you a witch, if not to let it happen?”
With Nano’s shining fangs looming above her, Pipou felt her fur stand up on end. “They must eat,” she muttered, “and have no choice.”
Nano leaned closer, curious eyes blinking. “And you, the good witch, view eating fish above you?”
“Out,” she gritted. “I am closing.”
The next day Nano returned, her triumph tempered by the guilt at her offense. She returned with a black pearl, moon-round and silken blue by dawn’s soft glow, and even better, a grandiose saga of how she rescued the poor oyster who carried it from the market, then returned it to the sea, alive. Pipou softened despite herself. Nano was devious, and perceptive, but not at all subtle.
By then, Pipou had decided it best to no longer pick apart the fox, or from where all her treasures came. And quietly, Nano did the same.
As the seasons passed, the sun lingered less, and so did Nano, whose daily visits retreated to Sundays. Winter neared, and the warming talismans on the hut’s walls were not enough. The cat pondered upon it for a long time, and decided she had not given Nano enough for what friendship she offered.
When Nano knocked at first snow, Pipou hastily received her to wrap her in the cozy shawl.
Nano admired herself in wonder. Sizeable holes speckled here and there, and Pipou’s own fur had wound up in the yarn. “What is this?”
“A warming talisman,” said Pipou.
“It’s a regular scarf.”
“Then why did you ask?”
But Nano glanced at her scowl, and burst into laughter. At last, Pipou felt her own nose crinkle up, and the first cackle hurled from her lungs. It felt good to be a cat. It felt good to let go.
During the cold winter days, Pipou often fell asleep at her loom. There was less commotion at her door, less material to use, and she could not help but wonder why no villagers came for warming talismans. Nano entered without knocking one morning, and Pipou was shaken awake.
“Good gods!” cried the fox.
“What are you doing here?” mumbled the cat.
“Where is the fire? I thought the cold killed you!”
Pipou watched the fox run about, gathering stones and a clump of dried kelp. “Must you always answer my qu-questions with more questions?”
“Save your yapping! I’m building a hearth.”
“Hearth?”
Nano looked at her like she was delirious, ignored her, and struck the fire.
Pipou had never before seen fire: a glorious, golden pyre, red and bright, like the sun. Pipou reached out a paw, but Nano smacked it away.
“It’ll burn you.” But Pipou was hypnotized. She felt warm all over, and Nano looked almost in awe of her awe. “You do not know fire?”
“Fire?”
“Do you know nothing of what normal animals do?” The fox shook her head helplessly. “What do you eat?”
“Kelp.”
Nano stared at her. Then she followed her gaze to the fire, or rather, to the kelp stack keeping it burning.
“My dear, are you cat or catfish?”
The fox first taught the witch how to create a spark. Holding steel in her mouth, she bent over to strike a piece of flint beneath her paw. This is not magic, she pointedly spoke. It is common sense, which all animals have. Pipou watched with delight, and sat beside it, watching the flames distort the air like how water bends sky. When Nano was not there to fuss, she stuck her paw in, and hissing, shook off the flame. With her own salves, at least, the burn faded in hours.
The next morning, the fox brought some broth. Chicken broth, she announced, and Pipou believed. It was easy on the tongue, and soothed a craving she had not realized.
By and by, through wintry storms, the fox brought fowl to cook for her. Your back aches constantly because you eat no meat, nagged Nano, and this and that. This cures the flesh, makes it good. She’d fixed a hook into a crag of the hut, where a griddle could hang over the makeshift hearth. The fox was crafty by her own means, plucking and chopping here and there, and picking out the best within Pipou’s collection of herbs to sprinkle over.
The fox had never worked so hard. She fell fast asleep by the fire, covered in soot. Pipou clambered over, watching the flame light her soft fur red, until she too, fell asleep.
By morning the fox had slipped out to hunt, and in the eve, she made supper. Night after night this warm scene replayed, the days growing longer, and the humble hearth warmer.
By Spring’s arrival, Pipou again dreamed of the whale. She was in the ocean, but not as herself, for in place of her silken fur, she sported shiny scales, for paws, frail fins, and the great beached whale loomed over her like a massive mouth.
“My child,” bellowed the Whale. “Why have you not heeded my warnings?”
Pipou opened her mouth, but only bubbles came. Suspended in icy waters, she clawed for a floor that did not exist. Her gills filled with ocean as her lungs crumpled against what felt like a stiff iron cage.
Her body was wrong.
“You have forgotten yourself,” the Whale continued, “trading your form. Now, you work magic to betray the sea. I ask you—why do you hate your home so?”
“I want to be free!” cried a bubbling Pipou. “You gave me my carnivore body, so I will be free. You gave me magic, so I will be free. I have freed you, so I will be free.”
The great whale approached, and Pipou froze. “The smell of fish lingers on your tongue. Tell me, Little Cod, how do you love your kin?”
And then, Pipou knew what she had done and what that meant.
“Little Cod,” the whale spoke, “the smell of fox lingers on your fins. What shame have you not?”
The little fish calmed herself. “I am no cod. I am Pipou, the name the fox gifted me, and witch of the Isle. Eaten I may have, but only what the fox has given me. No killer am I, but a fisher’s guide.”
The whale’s laugh hummed through the water and rippled through her unnatural poise. How Pipou was nearly torn in two!
“Fine, Pipou has saved as many great creatures as she has doomed the smaller ones. For your goodness, the fox will take your fate. But for your crimes, you, unnatural creature, will be doomed to live as a regular, land-locked cat.”
The next morning, the hearth had turned to ashes, and Nano was gone. Pipou searched beneath the couch, behind her loom, and up the hearth. But not a single red hair was found.
Pipou next searched the town, and found it strangely barren. She even gathered her courage to search the market, but there was nary a soul nor fish in sight.
At last, she went to the harbor, where a crowd gathered.
There, the great whale lay on the sand tangled in eight fisher’s nets. She wove through the surrounding crowd, her heart rising in her throat. But the great whale was shriveled and stung in rows, no longer breathing, and the fishers were carving out its flesh and fat and bone.
Then a villager cast his eyes upon her and cried:
“The Cat Witch!”
Thus began the torrent: “My dowry! My ship! My gold and pearls, they’ve gone! You’ve done this, your spells, you hack, you devil!”
With their claws they grabbed at her, with their jaws they tore. But cats are nimble and relentless, and little Pipou slipped out of the villagers’ tangle. As soon as her paws grazed the ground she sprung to flight. She was not used to running on four legs, but how like the wind she felt!
On Fisher’s Isle, the new witch sings
for mother Sea to bless and bring
an old love’s soul to shore and find
a way to tether a heart to mine
The new witch whistles, scarf in tow
boat against shore and off she rows
the sun weeps gold on russet fur
searching, searching, for one not lost
For the old witch is free,
to roam the earth
away from the ocean
to collect her own mirth
And though supper only comes by chance
Ever does her red fire dance
Listen now—you may hear her sing:
“No warmth akin to mortal flame
No joy akin to nature freed
How vast the sea—and land is same,
so never shall I end up tame.“
Oh, I say, and say again: never shall I end up tame.