Macavity entered the room and walked over to the table. He placed himself at the short end of the table, so he could see everyone. Or, as Rumple thought, so everyone could see him. He started looking down at his paws, and Rumple soon realized that he was holding something. It was a charm, on a necklace. She glanced at the other cats, still no one touched the food and most of them were watching Macavity. After a long silence he finally broke it.
"What is this, Samerry? He threw the necklace at a big orange cat that quickly caught it in his paws. He looked at it for a moment before he answered.

"A necklace, sir." Rumple heard from his voice that he was a bit nervous.

"Indeed. Is it valuable?" The tone Macavity had said that he already knew the answer. The cat named Samerry watched the necklace closer.

"No, sir."

"So why would I want it?" Rumple could see even from that distant that Macavity's eyes where as if they could look right through the orange cat's soul.

"Y-you wouldn't." Macavity got an evil grin on his face. He enjoyed this, to see the nervous cat trying to come up with the answers that he thought Macavity would want to hear.
"Then why would one of my agents bring that to me?" Samerry looked down at his paws.

"I- I don't know, sir." Macavity reached out his paw and Samerry gave the necklace back to him. Macavity looked at it once more for a few second, and then he looked up at the white queen.

"Griddlebone", he said and threw the necklace over to her. She looked at it and then handed it over to the tom that was sitting next to her. He, in turn, handed it over to the tom that was sitting on his right, and so it continued until the red queen next to Rumpleteazer handed it over to her. She looked at it and then looked up again, only to realize that everyone was looking at her. Was she supposed to continue passing it? She had no idea. Macavity, who had been inspected his claws, noticed the silence that took place when everyone stopped moving. He looked up and looked right at Rumple, whose heart jumped a bit.

"That's right, we have to new members here." She could see that the other cats' eyes shifted from looking at her, to looking at Mungojerrie and back again. "Mungojerrie" Macavity continued. Rumple could see that he jumped a bit when he heard his name. "What do you think of my place?" he asked the calico.

"It's… it's very nice" he answered.
"Very nice?" Macavity repeated. He measured Jerry with his eyes. Then he turned to Rumple. "And what do you think?" She tried to keep her voice steady as she answered.

"It- It's probably a lot better than it was before you came here." Macavity looked at her for a moment, and Rumple tried her best not to look away. Then his face broke out in a wide grin.

"Very true. Orion here knows better than anyone what the place looked like before" he made a gesture towards the grey cat that was sitting on his left." Just when he finished the sentence a brown tom entered the room. He whispered something in Macavity's ear.

"Well, bring him in." Macavity told him.

"Yes sir" the brown tom answered and left the room again. Macavity turned his face once again to Rumpleteazer.

"Necklace." It took a while before Rumple understood that he wanted the necklace back. She handed it back to the red queen at her left, and the chain of handing it over to the next cat started all over again. Just as Macavity got it in his hand, the door opened and three cats entered. It was the brown tom again, a brown, black and white tom and between them they held a smaller, black and white striped cat. They threw him on the floor in front of Macavity.
"Hello Trigger."
"H-hello sir." The small tom answered, with his voice shiver of fear.
"Trigger, is this valuable?" Macavity held up the necklace, while asking the question he already knew the answer of. The small tom looked even more scared.

"N-no, sir."

"Then why have you brought it to me?"

"I- I didn't. It's mine." Rumple noticed that the other cats glanced at each other.

"It's yours?" Macavity asked him with a harder tone in his voice. The striped cat's eyes widened as he realized what he just had said.

"I didn't mean like that! I just meant that it wasn't supposed to get to you." He started to sound desperate, as he realized that his one sentence was worse than the other. He continued to try to explain himself, but it only got worse. Soon Macavity let hear a snarl, and one of the toms that had dragged the striped tom in went over and clawed him. Rumple jumped a little at the sight of this, but she saw that no one else was reacting.

"I know you haven't been here for long", Macavity said. He had a look in his eyes that worried Rumple. "And newcomers tend to make mistake. I am aware of that" Rumple could see that the striped tom got a look of hope in his eyes.

"Oh thank you, I will never do it again, I'm going to-" he started, but Macavity interrupted him.

"However" he continued. "We must make certain that this doesn't happen again." The fear in the young tom's eyes returned. Macavity looked at the two toms that had brought Trigger there. "Take him down to Mortisse's people. They know what to do to make him remember."

"No!" Trigger shouted. "Please, it was a mistake!" But Macavity just waved his paw, and he the little striped tom was dragged out of the room. Rumple looked over at Mungojerrie, and he had the same shocked expression she had. Macavity now reached out his paw and started grabbing some food. The other cats followed his example. Rumple and Jerrie looked at each other, and then slowly took some food. As they ate Macavity started talking with the grey cat at his left, Orion, and soon everyone was having conversations with each other.

"Hey, you did okay" a voice said. It was the red queen on Rumpleteazer's left that had spoken.

"We did?" Rumple asked surprised.

"Yes, I have seen quite a few newcomers who did much worse. I remember once, it was a young queen, she was so nervous that she ended up running away, crying."

"I did fumble with the necklace though", Rumple remarked.

"Oh I think it was brave of you to hold on to it, and just not passing it on like everyone else."

"I was everything but brave. I just had no idea what to do with it." The red queen laughed.

"I'm Leona by the way"

"Rumpleteazer. And that is my brother, Mungojerrie."

"It's very nice to meet you both." A movement draw Rumple's eyes to the other end of the table. Macavity had got up, and together with Orion they went out through the door that they had come from. Only moments later the white queen left the table, accompanied by the two toms. Rumple saw that her brother followed the queen her with his eyes.

"I must leave you now" Leona said. "Maybe we'll se each other around sometime."
"Absolutely. Have a nice day." And so she was gone, and the dinner with the higher cats was over.