milliways_bar | (no subject)

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Annie slips into the Bar after a long day at work, and we do mean a long day. She opened the bakery herself today, as Junia was unwell and she doesn't trust anybody else with the ovens. She's been up since about three-thirty in the morning as a consequence. Thank God her workers are covering the afternoon and evening shifts, or Harry and everyone else at the Wells farm would be in a very poor position indeed.

She did, however, exercise a business owner's prerogative and pulled some of the stock out of the store with her in compensation for early morning hours. Today, the sign at her table indicating that the food is both free and safe refers to apple cake, a fairly large one at that. There's also a smaller sign indicating that anyone who faffs around with her cake is going to get a spoon to the head. Annie is a little too used to Milliways not to think of that sort of thing.

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Teja never 'faffs' with any food. He would not dream of it!

And of course he remembers the baker woman whose husband is a werewolf. When he sees her today, he nods to her politely. "Greetings!"

"Oh- hallo, Teja," says Annie. "Sorry I didn't see you there. HOw've you been?"

"Well, lately," Teja says. "I have never meddled with wolfmen again, and have indeed been warning others about them. Not all of them would believe me."

"It takes some people rather longer than others," says Annie. "Cooper- one of Harry's old squad- wasn't really willing to believe it was werewolves and not lunatics with a bit of a hair and nail problem until one of them actually turned up right in front of him- and he'd seen what'd happened to Harry. People can be a bit stubborn, I"m afraid."

"Indeed," Teja says. "So was I. Ryan nearly ate me, at my second full moon in this place. But that is half a year ago, now..."

Annie nods. "That's something, I suppose," she says. "The 'nearly' part, I mean. Are you getting used to the place?"

"I am, and I have been for awhile," Teja says. "I have made an afterlife for myself, with friends and things to learn, and things to do."

"That's always something," Annie says, and then pushes one of the small plates on her table at him. "Cake?"

"Thank you!" Teja says, taking it. "One would assume it is from your bakery?"

"As always," Annie says. "We've been very busy lately. Harrogate's not that big of a city, but we've got all sorts of foreign visitors who seem to appreciate the bakery as much as the locals do."

"And if one does good work, one will do good business, also," Teja says. "It is the same for me, in the forge here."

It's not faffing.

It's eyeing.

Which is fine, really. Annie uses vague words to avoid trouble with nit-picky patronly types who might try to claim innocence under the terms of specific warnings. Cats, however, are- well, they're cats. And cats want food, attention, and to give the impression that they intended to do that, no, really, even the bit with falling off the stairs, they meant that part too.

So when this one eyes the cake Annie eyes it right back. "Hungry?" she inquires. "You do realise there isn't the slightest bit of recognisable meat or milk in it."

She doesn't really expect a response, but she lives on a farm. You end up talking to the animals eventually, answers or no.

"Moww," answers the cat, padding forward to coil about Annie's ankles with the catlike pretense of devotion and appeal. Of course he realizes... whatever the human just said. There is nomstuff. Thus, want to nom.

"Mowww." Emphatic.

Annie smiles a little at that and reaches down to let the cat sniff her hand a little before rubbing it behind the ears. "Well," she says, "if you're sure... I suppose there's nothing in there that'd be bad for a cat, really."

The ear-rubby gets purrs. Many purrs. Loud purrs. Happy purrs.

Caaaaaaake.

It's awfully hard to deny a purring cat anything. Especially when you're normally surrounded by loud, boisterous dogs the size of half-grown cattle.

"Just a bit," she says, and leaves off on the ear-rubby to slice off a small quantity of the apple cake and set the plate on the floor where the cat can reach it. "There you are, now..."

Mwahahahaha, power.

The cat bumps his forehead against her hand, purring, before going to the cake.

"Thanks."

Up goes the eyebrow straightaway.

"You're welcome," Annie says. "Are you from Narnia, by any chance?"

Earperk. "Nooo? Are you?"

"Not to my knowledge," says Annie, "but I thought I'd see if you were a Talking Cat before asking anything else. Are you a cat at all?"

She considers this a very reasonable question, given the shapeshifters she lives with and Ace's little Cheetah issue.

"In mannerisms and in current shape?" Does that count for anything?

In truth, he's more cat than even he knows.

"That's probably enough to qualify," Annie says. "All right, then. How do you like your cake so far?"

"It's delicious!" he purrs, contentedly. "You are a baker?" Because casual cooks rarely use this quality flour.

Annie nods. "Since I wasn't much more than sixteen," she says proudly. "This was made in my shop earlier today. I bring things from there now and again, to test the recipes. I'm glad you approve."

"If you ever need to try out a recipe, you can find me here," he grins at the prospect of free food.

Shameless.

"All right, then," Annie says. "I do have to warn you that it's all going to be vegetarian. I don't do sausage pies or the like. We've got werewolves in the house and there's no sense at all tempting them." She smiles a little as she adds, "Besides, I've yet to find a meat that really worked in a dessert."

"You are," he tilts his head, "of the same household as Spoon?"

The only vegetarian were Yrael knows.

"Songbirds are good as a dessert. Very delicate flavor."

"The very same," Annie confirms. "He and my husband were infected on the same night. Harry picked up the vegetarian habit first. Says it makes it easier to keep the wolf on the leash."

She wrinkles her nose a little at the songbird comment, but then pauses. "What, cooked, raw, or candied? I'm having some trouble picturing a candied wren..."

"Raw is best," he says, as a connoisseur. "The flavor suffers somewhat, being cooked. I haven't, however, had the opportunity to try them candied. Wrens, bluebirds and mockingbirds are the best, in my ~~humble~~ opinion."

Annie nods. "I'll remember that," she says, "in case things ever go strangely on a full moon night."

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