He walks a few steps further along, looking puzzled, but keeping up a good pace. As the creature under his arm begins to wriggle, he brings it out in front of his chest and gently sets his forefinger against its nose, the way he had Ghost when Ghost was a pup. Might be it will stop wriggling.

“Why cats?” he asks.

He understands why people would scream at each other if they could.

“We send ravens where I come from, with scrolls tied to them, but only when the castle is important enough to have a rookery.”