[quote]"My, what is going on?" she asked, turning to the girl to see her picking up pieces of the mess. At that, Kahya knelt as well, using her good hand to gingerly place a few pieces in the girl's hand.[/quote]

The young girl thanked the stranger, soon collecting a precarious pile of ceramic pieces. She glanced behind them at the open doors and the retreating sirens, and the gaggle of cafe patrons who craned their necks to perchance see the same. "There's quite a bit going on, I'm afraid," she admitted, "but no one has yet determined the cause."

A bucket was provided, and the clumsy waitress swept up the rest of the dishware in a flurry of apology. "Oh, Mayor Thistlecatch! Please leave the cleanup to me, I'm so sorry!" She extended her hands, and the mayor accepted the help to climb to her feet, smiling. The waitress immediately reached down to Kahya with the same offer. "Miss, I am so, so sorry, I'm suck a klutz! And here I'd hoped to make a good impression on you. Welcome to Winding, haha. Let me get you a stack of pancakes and a mug, on the house. I insist."

The waitress insisted that Kahya take a seat at the counter, then disappeared to retrieve a specially made breakfast from the kitchen.

The mayor continued to stare out the open doors for awhile, hoping for some sign of what was happening or for a report from the Pooths, at least -- but it seemed she would have to wait. There was another matter at hand that required her attention. She climbed into the seat next to Kahya, curious and concerned.

"I'm Rune Thistlecatch," she said with a gentle smile, and accepted a mug of tea that the cook had slid into her hands. "It's a pleasure to meet you. I mean not to pry, but you're not here as a tourist, are you?"

A fresh stack of blueberry pancakes, a saucer of butter and a boat of syrup appeared in front of Kahya, soon accompanied by a generous mug of coffee. The blueberries in these pancakes looked bigger and slightly more violet than the average fruit, and had a strange yet delicious aroma that begged to be drizzled in apricot syrup.

The mayor continued: "Please allow me to assist you in any way I can."

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[quote]His hand was trembling, but he took a deep breath and pushed a button on the handle of the net. Suddenly, the handle extended, putting the cat right in range. In one swift motion, he brought the net down, shrieking, "Begone ye vandalous beast!"[/quote]

The Father had rushed out of the shop, followed closely by Miss Agatha, toward the smoke on the horizon that marked the burning shrine -- but this was far from the most alarming of disasters for the day. A [i]cat[/i] had snuck into the Niche!

The net swung down, and the cat reacted. In a split second it grabbed the sandwich between its little sharp teeth and scrambled out from under the net in the nick of time, flinging bits of cheese and crumbles of bread in all directions. The demonic feline streaked like a furry cannonball across the room, slammed into a shelf-ful of gadgets with a cacophonous clatter, launched into another direction, vaulted onto another shelf and toppled a collection of Very Important Merchandise, scrabbled and leaped again, which might have upset the entire shelving unit had Nich not been clever enough to secure it to the floor and ceiling. By this time, most of the sandwich had been left behind in pieces throughout the disheveled store, so that only a morsel was left in the cat's mouth as it darted past Nich's feet, bounded up onto the mantle and dove into a brass-framed mirror on the wall.

And then, it was gone -- gone through the mirror as easily as if it were an open window. There were no ripples, no magical lights, no odd colors, nothing remotely out-of-the-ordinary to indicate that this mirror was anything but a mirror, and it was as solid as could be -- but if Nich were to ponder it, he might find that he would not quite remember where this particular mirror had come from, nor how long it had been hanging on the wall. It seemed to have always been there, and yet maybe he had never seen it before. The mirror showed his reflection, and the reflection of the ransacked shop, as clearly as any mirror should, save for one minor detail.

In the mirror's reflection, the cat was curled up on the windowsill behind him, munching on the sandwich remains -- but in reality, the windowsill was quite empty, and the cat was nowhere at all.