After visiting the bakery to get Noodle something to eat, we trotted down one of Waggenrook's more idyllic areas. Noodle's tail flicked as he walked, his head bobbing along with no small amount of irritation.
"Now what?" I asked.
Mortal, that morsel was thin as a stick! How could that satisfy my regal hunger? He was barely a snack. Even if he'd been anointed with proper oils and sacrificed on my altar by a hundred howling virgins, there wasn't enough meat in his heart to rouse me from an afternoon nap!
"That's not my fault!" I waved my arms as we walked. This whole situation was intolerable. A necromantic array! In my tower! "You were just as sure as I that a baker would be wide of girth. If you're not satisfied with the selection, you must bear half the blame yourself."
I want to eat you, he growled with a surly swish of his tail. But you are not much more fleshy.
"If you do, I hope you get one of my ribs stuck in your teeth."
That's unkind, he said, sounding genuinely offended. You know I hate getting bones stuck in my teeth.
"Better than a foot in your mouth," I muttered.
I don't understand what you mean, he said slowly. But I don't think I like the sound of it.
"Feel free to go home." I was still waving my arms as I flapped down the street. A few people skipped to the other side of the street. "You don't have to come with me. I can even open a portal back to the void if you want. You can find another world to annoy."
But I like this one, the void cat said, giving a soft chirrupy mew which made several nearby young children squeal with delight. Which is probably why he did it. I wasn't sure, but I could imagine him attracting a few plump ones as a snack with hat meow depending on his mood. It has tuna.
"I'm sure lots of worlds have tuna."
And the catnip.
"That, too."
And lemon cheesecake.
"It was you!" I rounded on him, fury making my arms shake as I waved them at him. "You stole the last slice!"
I do not steal! The deceptively small black form glared up at me, its wide purple eyes and huge batlike ears doing their best to look cute. I simply took what was mine by right.
"It was mine!"
It was on this world, Noodle said with a twitch of his whiskers. That makes it mine.
Gah!" There was no winning with Noodle. And, like with most things related to the void, it only lead to insanity if you tried.
I whirled away, stomping down the street until my eyes caught sight of an odd little shop with an odd logo on the front.
A cat.
With bright green eyes.
Mixel's Taxidermy Shoppe.
I pushed my way inside, feeling hot in the ears like steam was about to erupt from them.
A small waiflike gentleman who looked to be about 2,000-years old lifted his bald head from where he was working on a stuffed old crow. "Hello-"
"Yes, yes," I snapped. "Are you the owner?"
"I am, yes." His voice was almost as thin as he was. "Can I help you?"
Was everyone in Waggenrook getting this thin?
Was there a diet plan I hadn't heard of?
Actually, I was quite thin, wasn't I?
I thought I should check the water supply. Maybe witches were putting something in it.
Again.
"I want to get a cat stuffed."
"A cat?"
"A cat."
"And what is its condition?"
"Reasonable."
"Is it recently deceased?"
"Not yet, no."
"I'm afraid I don't deal with live animals," the old man said, not batting an eye. He was holding a small brush which he'd been using to pain little runes over the beak of the crow. He used the brush to point at the bird. "I only deal with the deceased."
"Give me a few minutes, and I can arrange it," I growled as I pointed to the small cat squatting nonchalantly by my foot. Noodle was slowly cleaning his paws. "How much for him?"
The old man leaned over the counter to get a proper look.
"I don't recognise the breed," he said.
"Moggy," I said with a malicious grin. "Common alley cat."
That's not nice, Noodle sighed. I don't refer to you as a common alley mortal, do I?
"Hmm," I said. Then grabbed my temper for a moment. "He might have some pedigree in him, of course."
Don't stretch yourself on my account.
"Well, the eyes are a very strange," the old man said, pulling out a pair of spectacles and putting them on before squinting at Noodle. "I've never seen anything like it. I don't think they could be replicated."
"Just use whatever you have laying around."
I don't see why you're taking it out on me.
The old man frowned at the void cat. "Where did you find him?"
"I didn't," I admitted. "He found me."
"Have you had him tested by the Mage Guild? He looks very much like an enchanted creature to me." The old man licked his dry wrinkled lips. "They can be quite profitable if you sell them to the right person."
I frowned. "Who'd want such a thing?"
"Well," he made a show of thinking. "Certain collectors pay a premium for enchanted creatures. Their… parts can be used for all kinds of things."
"What? Like pies?"
"I was thinking more like magical rituals," he said, a little impatiently I thought. His customer service skills were a little better than the baker's, but not by much.
"I've never seen any rituals which use… bits."
"Ah," he said. "Maybe I was mistaken."
"I can believe it," I said, taking a look around his shop.
Dozens of creatures from rats to beavers were on display. Even a bear head, mid-roar. I didn't like this place. It felt cold. Animals shouldn't be stuffed, I thought. It felt disrespectful. Definitely not very gentlemanly.
I had met a few people who liked to stuff creatures they hunted.
These people called themselves gentlemen, but they were fooling themselves. At best, they were the misguided mentally unstable spawn of a proper gentleman.
At worst, they were the spawn of the spawn.
Which left them a bit sickly in body as well as the head.
But that's what you get when your grandfather marries his sister.
"How much would you pay for him?" I asked.
"Are you selling?"
Noodle continued to clean himself. He'd moved on to licking at his haunches.
"I am," I said. "I'm sort of sick of him, to tell the truth. He follows me everywhere. It's a bit of an irritation. Especially with the bell on his collar. Tinkle tinkle everywhere. Ugh."
Rude. The cat paused mid-clean and twitched his ears. I will remember this, mortal.
"You could always cut off the bell," the old man said helpfully.
"Then how would I know where he is?" I frowned. "He has a habit of disappearing and eating small mammals."
"Oh? Some people would think a cat reducing the local rat population to be a good thing."
"Rats? What?" I blinked. "Oh. Yes, those. He eats those, too."
"Five gold?"
"What?" I stuck a finger in my ear and gave it a twist. "What did you say?"
"Ten?"
"You said he was enchanted. Surely that's worth more than that."
"Twenty?"
"Hmph."
The old man sighed. "Twenty-five. It's as high as I can go."
"Very well," I said, sticking out my hand. As I thrust it out, it knocked the crow he'd been working on over. The old man lunged for it, but the bird toppled over and rolled across the counter. It fell to the ground at my feet with a muffled thump.
Noodle looked at it.
Looked at me.
"What have you done?" The old man roared, suddenly very spritely. I worried about his heart.
I shrugged. "Sorry," I said. "I seem to be very clumsy today."
"It'd better not be damaged," he scowled. "If it is, you'll owe me a lot more than twenty-five gold."
"It's just a crow," I said with a sniff. "How can it be worth more than my cat?"
"You-"
I leaned over the counter to stare into his old eyes. "My cat has decimated the rodent population within the entire city. That is much more valuable than a ridiculous little crow. Don't you agree?"
"That crow is-"
"Not important!" I roared, lifting my leg and stomping on the beak. It crunched with a satisfying crunch and a few sparks spat out from under my feet.
Noodle watched, bored.
The old man's eyes suddenly flared with rage. "That's it! I'll-"
"Infix Inna M'ff!"
Hey!
The old man's scream whooshed back to me through the void as he was sucked into the Old Twit's gleefully waiting maw. The portal snapped shut behind him as his little brush dropped with a neat wooden clatter to the ground behind the counter.
You stole my snack.
"You said the last one was thin like a stick."
So?
"This one was thinner!"
So?
"I didn't want to offend the great Destroyer of Worlds by giving him such a slender strip of jerky," I sneered as I exited the shop with a flap of my coat.
Noodle eyed me warily, unsure if I was mocking or complimenting him.
I knew what I was doing, though.
Chortling quietly to myself, I strutted down the street with a slightly happier mood.
That wouldn't last.