The street outside is still quiet. Ace, hat jammed low over his eyes so he can gnaw on his lower lip without anyone noticing, is still leaning up against the rail like he's just taking a nap while waiting for someone to come out of the bank. Which except for the nap part, he figures he pretty much is.
He scans the shops in front of him. A woman with a young child clutching at her skirts moves slowly past, keeping her steps small to allow the boy to keep up. Two young men discussing the probability of work in Cuero lean up against a storefront, hands moving animatedly. The wind catches their voices intermittently so that Ace can only hear a word here and there.
Arrow drops her head and nudges at his pockets, clearly bored. Her tail swishes flies off her flanks with just a little more attitude than is really necessary and he turns half an eye to her, finding the ticklish spots under her chin and forelock where scratches will distract her from whatever trouble she's thinking of. The feeling of her breath on his fingers calms him as the woman and her child move out of range, the two young men (boys, really...) still talking. Across the way a lawman moves with a slow and purposeful gait in Ace's general direction.
His fingers freeze, and his breath with them. He can see the gun plain as day holstered low on the man's hip and knows what he's there for. Should he call out? Wait? The snakes come to life once more low down in his belly and the moments crawl past like molasses as the man comes closer, and closer still...
...and passes through the door to the apothecary, shutting it softly behind him. The tension moves out of Ace in one long wave and leaves his knees suddenly weak. Not coming for him, after all. They're still safe.
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He scans the shops in front of him. A woman with a young child clutching at her skirts moves slowly past, keeping her steps small to allow the boy to keep up. Two young men discussing the probability of work in Cuero lean up against a storefront, hands moving animatedly. The wind catches their voices intermittently so that Ace can only hear a word here and there.
Arrow drops her head and nudges at his pockets, clearly bored. Her tail swishes flies off her flanks with just a little more attitude than is really necessary and he turns half an eye to her, finding the ticklish spots under her chin and forelock where scratches will distract her from whatever trouble she's thinking of. The feeling of her breath on his fingers calms him as the woman and her child move out of range, the two young men (boys, really...) still talking. Across the way a lawman moves with a slow and purposeful gait in Ace's general direction.
His fingers freeze, and his breath with them. He can see the gun plain as day holstered low on the man's hip and knows what he's there for. Should he call out? Wait? The snakes come to life once more low down in his belly and the moments crawl past like molasses as the man comes closer, and closer still...
...and passes through the door to the apothecary, shutting it softly behind him. The tension moves out of Ace in one long wave and leaves his knees suddenly weak. Not coming for him, after all. They're still safe.