Rhiow smiled. She said the word that released the air from solidity: upward and behind her, the strings faded back into the general fabric of things from which they had briefly been plucked, and the air dispersed with a sigh. Rhiow walked by the garbage bag toward the streetward wall and the gate in it, still smiling. She knew where this one was. Later, she thought. Rats were smart, but not smart enough to leave garbage alone. It was two days yet until collection. The rat would be back, and so would she.

But right now, she had business. Rhiow put her head out under the bottom of the iron door, looked around. The sidewalk was empty of pedestrians for half a block; most important, there were no houiff in sight. Not that Rhiow was in the slightest afraid of houiff, but they could be a nuisance if you ran into them without warning—the ridiculous barking and the notice they drew to you were both undesirable.

A quiet morning, thank Iau. She slipped under and out, onto the sidewalk, and trotted along at a good rate. There was no time to idle, and besides, one of the first lessons a city cat learns is that it’s always wise to look like you’re going somewhere definite, and like you know your surroundings. A cat that idles along staring at the scenery is asking for trouble, from houiff or worse.

She passed the dry cleaner’s, still closed so early, and the bookshop, and the coffee-and-sandwich shop—open and making extremely tantalizing smells of bacon: Rhiow muttered under her breath and kept going. Past the stores were five or six brownstones in a row, and as she passed the third one, a gravelly voice said, “Rhiow!”

She paused by the lowest step, looking up at the top of the graceful granite baluster. Yafh was sitting there with a bored look, scrubbing his big blunt face: not that scrubbing it ever made much difference to his looks.