wc: 400
Dusk. The world was pregnant with expectation, the sky heavy and lidded with the incoming bruises of night. The buildings of Halifax city soared, scraping heaven with rusting and crumbling claws or iron. The corpse of the city surrounded her, it's husk empty in the twilight, the peculiar mingling of day and night that set all predatory senses alight with sometime instinctual, something that stirred deep in the gut as mineral canine eyes reflected the dying light.
But still the sun clung to the horizon, a desperate golden eye glaring out at the city in blinding spears of light. The woman walked silently, her footpaws ghostly on the old bitumen that snaked with weeds and crawling tendrils. Thick auburn curls tumbled, unbound, down creamy shoulders, died blood red by the setting sun. She moved with the poignant grace of a dancer, her small, lithe body pausing only to cast brilliant emerald eyes to the horizon. Home, the Chien Hotel, waited for her beyond the city, but something drew her to remain in the cradle of Halifax. Night was not a terror to her, it was a blessing, as was the way of most of her kind. There were no human associations of evil to accompany the darkness, and animal eyes could adjust so as to see almost perfectly.
Though bare of all clothing, a leather strap ran over one shoulder, between two humble breasts, ending in a bulging leather pouch. It's content clinked faintly in the silence, the soft cacophony of small glass bottles dancing against one another, muffled only by the smothering of various leaves and materials and tools. The bag seemed heavy, but the collie-woman bore it without thought, a familiar and comforting weight that bumped at the curve of her hip. Right at the bottom of the leather satchel, Alaine had fastened a small pouch made of sheep intestines, beaten till the skin was smooth. It contained a necklace, the likes of which had never been matched in quality the entirety of her life. Alaine had almost forgotten it's origins, but it had remained with her always, and held great sentimental value to the Apothecary.
The stars began to blink, winking down knowingly at the solitary wanderer. Momentarily entranced by their beauty, she climbed a fallen pylon to sit atop a tall concrete slab, the sun at her back at the moon lighting her surprisingly young face.
Speak think walk
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