Note: In case it’s not clear, dialogue between arrows <like this> is spoken in another language.
Personally, she was just glad that yelling was all he’d done – she’d had coffee cups and soda cans thrown at her from cars before, batteries a few times as well. Usually, though, that only happened when-
She raised a hand to her head, and then cursed as she realised she’d forgotten to put her hood up.
Stupid, Zarah. She flipped it over her head and pulled the drawstrings tight so that the breeze wouldn’t pull it down again. Stupid.
Kihri would have reminded her. Or, at the very least, yelled at her before it became an issue. Funny, how between the two of them, the dead one was more grounded in reality.
“<So funny,>” she muttered to herself in Pashtari. “<Hilarious.>”
Kihri would’ve chastised that too-
But Kihri wasn’t there, so Zarah trudged on alone.
Chapter Two: So-Called Friend (in which a loss is mourned and information is gained)
(Read the entire chapter at once)
“Let’s fucking go already, asshole.”
“<Good morning to you too,>” Zarah groaned, rolling over and away.
“Hey!” The brief appearance of spectral fingers in front of her half-closed eyes was the only sign that Kihri had attempted to hit her, and passed straight through. “None of that shit. I let you get away with way too much last night.”
Zarah groaned again, more insistently. “<It’s just us! Why bother?>”
“Because it’s good practice, dumbass. And if you did it more, you wouldn’t sound like a fucking automaton.”
“So like you I should talk?” she shot back, annoyed.
“’So I should talk like you?’” Kihri corrected. “Subject, verb, object. And yes; everyone should talk like me, cause I’m amazing. Now come on, let’s go already, I hate this fucking place.”
Our Lady Full Of Grace Shelter, or just Tavesh after the street it was located on, was towards the outskirts of Kaila, and thus was generally more likely to have a free cot than ones further in. The city centre and financial districts were the best spots for begging, busking, and applying for jobs, so shelters around there tended to have trouble making enough space for everyone.
That’s not to say that Tavesh was empty, though.
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