Catt turned randomly down side streets, unsure if she was being pursued. After a few minutes, she spotted a shop on a corner with two open doors, one facing each street. She stepped inside. This would be a good place to wait. If the man caught up with her, it would be difficult for him to corner her.
The shop seemed to sell every sort of woven thing from tapestries to hammocks. Catt pretended to be browsing the wares. She had rolled up the shirt and wrapped it in a knot around her wrist.
After a few more minutes, Catt was sufficiently confident that she had shaken her pursuer– if he had even actually pursued.
Catt spotted a shelf with some wicker baskets. They looked similar to what a porter might use to carry food. She picked out a medium sized one, big enough to look plausible, but small enough to not be cumbersome.
Catt toyed with the idea of stealing it, but decided that she had already been lucky enough, and she didn't need to push that luck any further with unnecessary risks.
She paid a few Thorbs to the shopkeeper, and left with the basket.
Stopping in the shadow of a stairwell on the side of another shop, Catt unrolled the shirt, and pulled it on over the top of her not-a-dress bodice. It smelled faintly of sweat and smoke. Her dancing greaves were hardly an ideal match for the porter's disguise, but based on her previous observations, she concluded that the flame-shaped guild badge was the most important part, followed by the basket. Nobody was likely to take excessive notice of her rather unusual trousers.
Hefting the basket, Catt continued walking briskly back towards the palace.
Realizing that if she held the basket in her arms it would obscure her badge, Catt switched to balancing the basket on her head, as she had seen some porters doing. The tapered base of the basket nestled nicely between her little horns, which gave it stability, but she kept one hand on it anyway, to add to the illusion that it was heavier than it really was.
Catt walked with the purposeful stride of someone who had to bring a hot delicacy directly to the King before it had time to cool. When she reached the square of Old Bakak, she headed unhesitatingly for the back of the palace.
Spotting a couple other porters with baskets, she adjusted her pace to follow close enough behind them that she could imitate their entry.
Up the stone steps, a sharp turn, and in through the archway of the door. An executioner was posted there, sitting on a stool, but they seemed to be paying little attention to the porters who preceded Catt, and a moment later, Catt was inside the palace, having been accosted by nothing more than a polite nod from the wooden mask.
She followed the other porters, hopefully towards wherever the meals were being staged for presentation to whoever was dining at whatever meal the King might be hosting.