One lovely afternoon Miles gets a rather urgent call from Ivan.
"For which I'm sure he'll be very grateful. In a minute. I speak from long experience. The first thirty seconds after a broken bone are not a time to try to talk to me even if you lead with very good painkillers."
Shrug. "Okay. Any other tips on introducing myself? He's probably heard of me, I'm a princess."
"I don't know enough about your world to have specific suggestions. But he should be getting more amenable to conversation right about now."
And she steps through the door and disappears -
- and lands right next to the local one of that guy whose name she really should have gotten. [Jane, what's the guy's name?]
"Hi. Want some help?"
"That... might depend on the exact nature of the help," he says. "And on what obligations I would incur by accepting it."
Glass laughs. "I'm not trying to trick you. I'm Princess Bella of the Enchanted Forest - welcome, by the way - and I've just met an alternate universe duplicate of you who you might want to meet with fewer broken bones."
"Oh. Well, in that case, sure. I was getting tired of them already," he says with a wry grin. "Prince Milo of Raxwell, very pleased to meet you."
She fixes his bones. "Likewise. I can put your horse in our stable and bring you to meet Miles?"
"An enticing prospect. But, um, my cousin might be worried whenever he stops talking to that girl," Milo waves vaguely behind him, "and tries to catch up with me..."
"Could leave your horse here with a note. 'Princess Bella has borrowed your cousin, do not be alarmed'."
A small grey cat chooses this moment to climb onto Milo's shoulder. He stands up and dusts himself off.
"Hullo," Bella says politely to the cat, as she reaches into her sleeve for paper and writes a note to attach to Milo's horse's saddle. Tweaking a forest thread will suffice to keep the horse in one place. "Anything else before I whisk us away?"
"Miles, your alt Prince Milo of Raxwell. Milo, your alt Miles. And incidentally my alt Empress Bell of Atlantis, while we're making introductions."
"Pleased to meet you both."
"Okay, I'm sorry to make this my first question, but - what's your excuse?" asks Miles, gesturing to Milo's recently broken ribs.
"Everyone, this is Cath," says Milo.
Meow meow.
"She'd like to know if she gets an alternate universe duplicate too."
"She looks a little templatey but not one we've met before. We can sweep for more of her. ...Uh, but, I can tell you aren't a witch...?"
Cath meows declaratively and at some length.
"She says it's not all that difficult to get her point across these days, but she wouldn't recommend it to most people because of the effort involved in getting to that level of understanding."