Snowshoe Kitty is a female Snowshoe cat. She was fourteen months old when Eile and Sunny found her after a blizzard, almost frozen to death. They nursed her back to health and she became their pet and mascot.
Like all cats in the Medb hErenn universe, Kitty is a sapient, self-aware being, but she hides it from Humanity, preferring to live as a mere pet. She even hides it from the Girls, though they know the truth, and they maintain the pretense for her sake, saying only that she is very clever. She knows English and can understand everything the girls say, but she cannot speak it, and she pretends to only understand simple commands, though sometimes she slips up. Medb hErenn is the only human Kitty interacts with as a sapient person, because the former queen was trained in the Central Mysteries of the Great Mother Bast centuries ago, and she understands both the Common and Sacred Feline Tongues. Kitty is in her fourth of nine lives, making her middle-aged by feline standards, and is well respected for her wisdom. She is able to recall some aspects of her former lives, and her personality is beginning to stabilize, rather than changing with each new life.
Though the Girls named her Snowshoe Kitty because of her coat pattern, in reality she has her own feline names. Her Face Name, the one she uses in public, translates to Snowrunner, to commemorate the time during her second life when she braved a raging blizzard to rescue three lost kittens. Her Heart Name, the one she uses among family and her intimates, translates to Butterfly Marauder, because as a kitten no butterfly was safe from her predations. She is one of the few cats to know her Soul Name, the name given by Bast, the Great Mother, to all newly created feline souls. To further add to this distinction, she learned it during her first life. However, no one knows this name except Kitty and the Great Mother, not even Medb or the High Queen of All Cats.
Kitty is devoted to the Girls for saving her life. Though she is restricted by the need to keep the secret of feline sapience, she watches over and protects them as best as she can. The only time she cannot do so is when she gets left at home or they are in the Dreamlands, but they have other protectors there. She would give her life if it would save them from danger, and she often helps Eile when she must fight some dangerous foe. Though she loves both of them equally, she is particularly fond of Sunny, because she gives her treats and likes to cuddle her more than Eile does. Even so, it is Eile’s lap and shoulders that Kitty usually lays on.
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Biography of Dr. Elizabeth Mabuse
The Adventure of the Cats' Peril Page 3