Private Tales Dances With Thieves

She looked in the sack again and blinked at the gleam of bright silver and reddish copper.

It was more money than she'd ever had before. She still wasn't entirely certain how much it was, or what she could get with it. She had come a long way in the many months spent in Alliria; at the start she had been an unwashed, uneducated, poorly socialized and barely a person. Now she was none of these things, or at least she was less of all of them except for the last.

She walked a market just outside the Shallows, head and eyes dancing all around at all the trinkets and pretty things on display for sale. Most of everything here was glass or lacquered wood in brilliant colors; the people here were too poor for jewels and gold. It was just as well she didn't really care about money or jewels. Shiny and sparkling was good enough by her lights. She probably couldn't tell the difference between a ruby and a piece of red glass, anyway.

She towered over most of the crowd, a slim and girlish shape clothed in simple grey tunic and trousers among a sea of adults. There were oddities about her, though. She was human looking, at least. Except for yellow eyes and an uncanny, almost feline grace in her movement. Except for the long incisors. Except for the uncomfortable aura of null, faint though it might be. There were hints of womanhood, but they were faint. Incomplete, as though she were a child despite being over six feet tall.

Listening to her talk sealed that deal.

She stopped at a table that was covered in bangles and necklaces made of brass and copper and set with cunningly cut glass so that it sparkled and gleamed in the late afternoon light. She was staring at a particularly gaudy looking choker with a ruddy imitation ruby, the proprietor of the table anxiously taking in her threadbare appearance. She pointed at the choker and opened her mouth to speak-

-and then found herself staring up at the table from the ground as someone or something cannoned into her at speed. She offered a grunt as the only initial reaction, and then quickly got to her feet afterwards. She started to turn back to the table and its ridiculously gaudy jewelry and then stopped.

The sack with the coins in it was gone.

She looked at the ground round her and saw nothing. She stopped, faced scrunched up with the effort of thought, and then her mouth slowly fell open as it dawned on her that she had been robbed. Bamboozled.

Filched!

"H-hey!" Her head snapped left and right, and caught sight of a fleeing shape running down the street. Whoever it was already had two streets of lead on her.

With a huff, she took off after the thief. Probably thief.

There wasn't so much anger on her face as determination to get back what was hers.

If there hadn't been other people in the way, the thief would never have had a chance to keep ahead.

Fiery long hair flipping about in a tangled, haphazard mess behind her, Maranae belted along after the thief. Some part of her 'ancestry' - whether she wanted it or not - could scarcely resist giving chase to a fleeing shape to begin with. That same part of her was built to hunt. Her eyes locked in on the flicker of red-brown hair, the diminutive shape going in and out of sight as various people got in the way.

Many of them darted out of her way. Just as many stood their ground, anger evident. Maranae did not stop or apologize or excuse herself. She didn't even think of doing such things, anyway; all she thought about was what was hers and what had been taken and that she wanted it back.

What she would do if she actually caught the thief was a problem not yet considered. She could figure that part out when she did because there was no way that the one running could outpace her.

And then she outpaced her. One moment, there was a short thief scurrying along, and the next there was only the crowd.

Mara slowed and stopped, confusion on her face. Where did they go? It was too loud for her exceptional hearing to key in on anything. There were too many people and too many scents wafting through the air to pick out any individual one. She also did not have the thief's scent, anyway.

She stood among a sea of uncaring people, head cocked to one side as her head swiveled...

...and caught sight of an alley.

With an odd sound at the back of her throat, the redhead barged through the crowd and slipped into the shadowy space between buildings. Almost immediately, she found a short, ruddy haired youth standing with a sack...

Mara's mouth fell open in surprise, before snapping shut. An unfamiliar emotion swirled in the back of her head as she pointed a long nailed (was it clawed?) finger at the stranger. "Give it back! That is m-mine!" The words were sharp but delivered with a deliberate pace that made it clear speaking was not one of her strong suits.

The sharp scent of fear filled the alleyway.

She stopped some distance away from the urchin, poised to dart forward with her own burst of speed if needed. "Coins not food," she said in reply to the statement, then cocked her head to one side as she remembered something else. Coins could be used to buy food,

It was almost a requirement in a city, unless one liked the flesh of thinking, talking creatures. Maranae did not.

"Go out of city, catch food," she said. The edge was gone from her voice. The words were slow and deliberate, as if each had to be thought of before stringing it with the last. Her teeth got in the way of forming some sounds, too, giving her words a thicker sound than they might otherwise have.

She extended her hand, palm up. "Mine. Give to me," she repeated. She made no threatening gesture, other than a look of discontent on her childish face.

"Scarier than I am?" She grinned widely, displaying long incisors and canines. Her mouth looked like it belonged on a predator.

The veiled threat was clumsy and as transparent as glass. Maranae had no guile whatsoever. Unless this waif raised a hand to hurt her there was absolutely no chance of the chimera actually hurting her. She was still angry, though. Angry and not entirely sure what she could do about it.

"Make a stabber," she said slowly. "Learn how to make, to catch, to hunt? This city," she stumbled over the word, "is more scary than outside." Truth, too. At least animals were honest about their intentions for the most part. Humans could look you in the eye and smile while reaching round to stab you in the back.

Even as naive and slow as Maranae was, she understood that.

She held her hand out again. "Give. Then yes, she will ... I will show."

Maybe not hunting; it was far to the wild lands outside of the city. But she could certainly make something the youth could use to secure food. Or something, anyway. Maranae could not really think a great deal ahead. It was difficult to plan a few steps in front of her. She lacked the imagination, perhaps.

She knew what would be best. She perked up a little, a grin spreading across her face. "Take you back to shop. Make you a stabber." She paused. "But what is mine, back first."

Maranae danced a little caper when the little purse was handed from the nameless urchin back to her. She didn't even look inside to see if it was all there; she couldn't count, anyway, so it would have been a pointless gesture. She offered Ivy a big, toothy smile that was much brighter and friendlier than anything on display so far.

"Come on," she exclaimed after thinking a moment. Her own stomach rumbled, her face crumpling with hunger she hadn't realized was there until just then. "We can go back to my master's place. And get something to eat on the way!"

She was imagining meat, dripping rich bloody. The city lacked any significant population of prey animals, so she had to settle for what the people in the city considered to be food. And so long as it wasn't green or cooked too much, Maranae did not care.

"Come, come, lets go!" It almost seemed as if the offense of having stolen from her in the first place had been entirely forgotten.

"Ivy!" Maranae exclaimed in her lively voice, slurred by teeth that were more suited to a big cat than the human she almost looked like. "That is a pretty name," she said with an ear-to-ear grin. The girl practically vibrated with untapped energy, like a child that had eaten too much candy.

"My name is Maranae," she added as they walked along the road. "I am learning to make things with fire and a hammer," she chirped. "I like it more than..," she began. Her face fell for a moment and a shadow paced across her features. Only for a moment, though; the sun broke through the clouds and the shadow passed. Whatever she had been about to say was left in the gloom. "I like making things."

She paused.

"And food. Is Ivy hungry? Mara is hungry." As if to emphasize the point, her stomach rolled loudly.

She nodded, fiery mess of hair flipping about as she did. "Never enough food," she agreed. The truth was that she had eaten not long ago. By her lights, it had been a very light meal She could eat half her own weight in a single sitting when the mood struck her so; where all of it went was a mystery that had no answer.

There were a lot of things about Maranae shrouded in mystery, and many things she would not answer.

She knew where there was a butcher shop, and that was the way she led. She chattered as she walked, delighted to have someone that would talk to her more than about work and whom didn't seem to find her either odd or worse.

"Not like green things," she said as she mentioned the butcher shop. "Not food. Only meat is good." She paused, and cocked her head to one side as she pranced along. "Also pie," she added judiciously. It was probably made of something she didn't like, but it was sweet and she very much liked sweet.

Maranae continued the inane chatter as they worked their way through the city. Her teeth got in the way of her speech enough that it was sometimes difficulty to understand her. She pointed out interesting things that Ivy probably wouldn't care so much as a fig about - the jewelers shop for the pretty (and shiny) trinkets; a greengrocer which she spoke in hushed and mildly disgusted tones (who could possibly trust someone that sold lettuce?); a farrier shoeing a horse.

The butcher she had spoken of gave the pair of them a side-eye when Maranae stepped up. "Leg of lamb, please," she had asked and then paused and grinned. "Two, actually." He looked about to tell them both off until she offered coin. Ultimately, Maranae paid more for that meat than she probably should have. Math was neither a strong suit for her, nor was money.

She handed one piece of wrapped meat to Ivy and grinned. "My master will... cook that," she said with a note of disgust. It was one of a handful of things that neither her master nor anyone else had ever made her get used to.

Even as she said it, she partly unwrapped the other piece of meat and, without any consideration for what it might look like to others, tore a piece of it off with her teeth. There was every evidence that not only was this not a problem for her, but that she liked it. "Not far," she said round a mouth full of bloody meat.

The trip through the crowd was swift; by the time they had arrived at the forge the redhead was gnawing on the bone, every last trace of flesh gone. Her teeth managed to score pieces of bone free, and she at those too.

The ringing sound of a harmer working on an anvil rang through the still air within the forge. It was hot, much hotter here than it was out of doors. Nearly pleasant, given the crisp edge of fall lingering in the air. The furnace and bellows were in the back, several anvils arrayed near the open yard to the rear of the business. A counter up front held examples of several items that the Master made and sold; blades and horseshoes and nails and hammers and bits of tack lie scattered throughout the shop in neatly organized chaos.

"I am back," Mara announced as she slipped behind the counter that served as a place for meals or breaks more than anything. The Master stopped his hammering for a moment; he was working on some kind of steel device, intricate and unknown to Maranae. His eyes swept over her, and then raked across Ivy as well. His opinion remained inscrutable as always.

"Found a friend did you?" He stood straighter and knuckled his back before turning to face the girl, noting the cut of meat in her hand. "Names' Half," he told her with a neutral expression on his face. "Only thinks with her stomach, so I can guess what is in the paper. Set it on the anvil over there."

Mara grinned happily at the Master.

"What is your name, girl?"

"Pretty name," he said. He stepped round from his anvil, looking the girl up and down. "Another stray. Too many of you in the city anymore. World keep spiraling down," he said and shook his head. He took the chunk of meat from her hands without another word, and gestured for her to follow.

"Kitchen's in back. If you want to eat, you'll have to help out some. No free lunches but the work is easy enough."

"Work?" Maranae cocked her head to one side, face scrunched up. "But she does not know how to make things," the chimera said.

"There is more work than just hammering steel and iron and stoking fires," he said as he opened a door in the back. The forged served as both a business and a residence as was so often the case. Beyond the door was a cozy space meant for people who spent most of their hours working and only returned when they were eating or sleeping. There was little in the way of leisure except a handful of chairs and some ragged books. "She can help clean up around the place while I make this."

"On the shelves," the smith said as he bent over a small iron stove to light it. A few minutes later, he was dicing up bits of carrot and potato from a sack brought up from the cellar, humming to himself contentedly and ignoring the girls at their work.

"Those go here," Maranae said as Half went about his own work. She pointed to the shelf above chairs in one corner of the room. There were spaces just large enough to accommodate the tattered tomes; the books were all simple things suitable for a child just learning their letters. They were Mara's, of course; among many other things, her master was teaching her to read and write.

It was not an easy or quick process.

"Do you know how to make words from these?" she asked as the smell of food began to fill the air.

She didn't know what to say immediately to it. It would be a lie to say that it was easy to learn things like flat letters on paper and how they could translate into something more meaningful than mere words on paper. She didn't even know why her Master - and others, in a line stretching into the misty near-distance of her limited memory - thought it was even a useful skill.

Words on paper did not bring food. Words on paper did not make things.

She paused, and then smiled and patted Ivy on the shoulder in an affected manner. "Mara cannot read words on paper well, either," she said around her teeth. "Master says it is important...so sh- I, I try." She looked away as though embarrassed about something.

"Do... do you want to learn?" Her eyes had swiveled back to Ivy's, and they glowed with an inner light. She cocked her head to one side, uncertain.