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It's an ordinary, quiet night. The . . . patrons, or whatever they are, of the lab equipment shop downstairs, took off about forty-five minutes ago.
There's silence, mostly. You can only be out at night in Sothis if you have business. But there's some business. Every so often a party passes under Katie's window. Their conversation is mostly what Katie has become accustomed to thinking of as "focused", though occasionally some is just downright tense or revelrous.
Wind. Distant insects. Dogs.
Something shuffles downstairs.
And continues to shuffle.
"Are we good?" The voice is insistent, alto, and right underneath Katie. And it's female.
"Yes, fine". Higher. If Katie knows what female halflings sound like, it sounds like that.
The shuffling moves deeper into the shop. A glass clinks. Laughter starts, whispering at first, then merely hushed.
"Oh my god." A third voice.
"All this stuff is fake, you know. This and this and this used to be one bespoke fixture."
"Fuck."
Whoever it is is going through the merchandise.
Expensive, heavily regulated merchandise. Katie's parent have only been in Ulunat for two weeks, but she's picked up that the proprietors of this place have gone to a moderate effort to secure it against thieves.
<Message@(Katie+Ran)>"You might think, Ran, that this means she's read only propaganda books, but apparently you can read just about anything as a minor princess in the River Kingdoms. She just fancies Teg."</Message>
<Message@(Tazich+Ran)>"How couldn't I? She's so angsty and tortured and have you SEEN her thighs?"</Message>
She shoots a look at Ran.
This, she whispers, privately, to Katie. "'Angsty and tortured' is appealing to you?"
"I just wanna hold her and kiss her and tell her everything is gonna be alright and she deserves better."
"Right answer."
Right, of course, that's what an Evil deity would say. I was just testing you.
#$@^%
"Yeah. And snacks. Gotta replenish all that blood. I wish I could give Teg some cuddles but I assume it's not safe right now."
"It is not! Fuck, did she get to you, are you feeling okay?
Do you want me to tuck you in while I go grab you some food?
After we nap we can go spar in the cellar. Well, you with the practice dummy mostly. And I can teach you how to nock and draw, at least. There's somewhere we can go to practice shooting, later, if you're up for it."
"What do you mean, get to me?" Katie wiggles excitedly at the prospect of sparring. She hopes the 'mostly' means she will in fact get to get her ass kicked by Tazich at some point.
"I'm practically a skeleton, when don't I feel faint? But seriously though, I'm a little woozy maybe, but I'm fine, I just need snacks and cuddles."
"That, I can do."
She ferries Katie back to the bed and balances her in fireman's carry while she re-fluffs the pillows, then nestles her in, runs off, and comes back with three plates of wolf and two of sour berries [ the wolf mostly dry-seasoned, so it's easier for Katie to eat in bed ].
"Sorry, I wish I could get you some milk -- do you like milk? -- but Teg drinks it all."
She grabs a handful of berries. "Not straight up. Also, if she can derive nutrition from milk, why does she need blood, and if she can't, why does she drink it all?"
"You can derive nutrition from cabbage, so why do you eat anything else? And if you can't derive nutrition from cabbage, then why would you eat it if you were starving?"
"Ah, okay, that makes sense. So sensually handfeeding her regular food is an option too?"
"It would be funny to watch you sensually handfeed her the equivalent of tree bark." She skewers a piece of wolf on a thin knife and handfeeds it to Katie. "Which is the status, to vampires, of most regular food. I guess milk is the least-bad pinch blood substitute. And still terrible." Shrug.
"Blood supply." She's scooted in under the blankets; she wriggles her hips against Katie.
"Figures. Don't get too used to being her favorite, though. Pretty soon I'm gonna be making your fat ass look twiggy. Girl's gonna be eatin' good."
She growls, not unlike Teg -- although Tazich's growl seems somewhat more at home coming from something Tazich-sized.
And wiggles, and starts forking the wolf into her own mouth, instead.