Fable - Ask Past Curfew

(For those who associate as nobles, dreadlords, initiates, or other ties to Vel Anir. Slice of life thread).

Her brother, Alistair Krixus, was away. Natasha had just gone to bed and so had the housekeeper. Still, the tween held her breath and counted down from ten, straining her ears for any creaks outside her closed bedroom door for any telltale signs that someone in the house was still awake.

She was met with silence.

A triumphant feeling began to spread in her chest as she threw off her covers, dressed to go out for the night instead of in pajamas. After a few minutes of stuffing down some pillows to make it look like she was sleeping (on the unlikely chance someone would check on her) she dashed to the window of what had been her room for the past year. The once bare walls now bursting with doodles, bright colors of paint, and other designs. She'd been working on a counter to the runes she knew her brother kept on the doors and walls to alert him of intruders. She figured out a way, she hoped, to temporarily turn that off with one of her own designs. Just long enough for her to slip free of the house undetected and to hopefully get back in when she came back.

Not that she was REALLY worried.

He was gone.

And she'd never been a rule follower.

A few moments later, her booted feet touched down on the brick roadway outside their house. That earlier triumphant feeling was near dizzying as it spread and she took in big lungful of air. A pocket-sized creature that looked between a cat and a dragon with bright paint colors peeked its head out of the dark hood of her jacket as she began scurrying down the dark streets.

"See that Splat? Easy-peasy just like I said. I hope we get there before they close."

Was Vel Anir a city that never slept?

Though at a late hour, the streets weren't exactly empty. They were humming with firelight and some other magical means. It was enough to make Mariana forget any consequences her brother would bestow upon her if he ever found out.

He'd never find out.

Up ahead, an auburn haired woman got out of a carriage. And at the corner was a fiddle player who'd gathered a small crowd. There were also food vendors near by with smells of salted and roasted meat filling the air. Mariana's stomach growled in response. Always hungry. The house maid always teased that she'd eat them beyond what their coffers could pay for. Perhaps it was a side effect of the magic she used but she was always hungry.

Dark-haired head turned and she made a beeline for that meat vendor.

“But you have to add hot sauce to make it really good,” the teenager supplied to the woman in that nice dress. Giving her own kebab one
more slathering, she offered the small bottle capped with a skull to the stranger. The other woman would see that her arm was inked in various tattoos from oddly shaped runes to weapons and other tools, shapes, and some brightly colored butterflies.

She plopped down across from the woman who reminded her of other nobles she saw at parties that Alistair dragged her to. The vendor who’d been talking with her about boring stuff like money turned his attention to the other patrons in line.

If Arcadia was the image of grace and poise, Mariana was the opposite. She slouched and had a very relaxed posture. And practically scarfed down the snack.