#it's only my second one and I'm already MAJORLY cheating I could nOT resist

[infinitelystrangemachinex]

Arcane - jinx finds rio?

Veiled in oily Emberflit Alley fog, the door hangs ajar, not a single trap engaged. His hind brain, ever four-legged, whispers, RUN.

Familiar chittering noises waft faintly through the opening. Thugs, topside or bottom, wouldn’t have suffered a monster’s company.

Viktor walks calmly inside.

“You’ve got a freaky taste in pets, mister,” says the girl belly-down on his workshop floor, with deep approval. Across the shop, her bulk squashed belly-down in the tiny kitchen, is Rio.

“Traitor,” Viktor tells her. Rio purrs, her enormous eyes never leaving the girl’s.

She’s carefree, boots kicking in the air. “Rio isn’t a pet,” he informs her. “She’s… a stray. I take care of her.”

“Sure. Go ahead and die on that hill, pal.” Then she’s twisted to scowl up at him. With huge, violently pink eyes.

Interesting.

Viktor’s mind churns, calculating. Then he clicks the steel tines of his fingers, and Rio drags herself to him.

“She likes her head scratched,” he says, demonstrating.

“Why does she look all-”

“People hurt her, many years ago. Changed her body against her will.” The girl goes tellingly quiet. “I chose to help her adapt.”

The congress of girl and beast is like two binary stars tentatively brushing, then collapsing into one in a rush. Rio curls around the child, her head cradled between the twig legs, while the girl presses her face to the bruise-colored hide and coos. When Rio licks her face, she shrieks, “Gross!” in sheer delight.

Viktor circles them. The girl is fifteen. No, eighteen. No, older. Just malnourished. Unpredictable. Possibly manic, unless placated. He’s seen it a thousand times. Heavily armed. In the beginning, Rio broke half his ribs and almost bit his arm off twice.

“Can I help, too?” the girl whispers.

Yes. Stay. Here, I can help you.

This is the undercity. She can trust nothing that comes for free.

He says, “You wish to assist me?”

“Ye-”

“Absolutely not.” He opens the front door wide. “Shouldn’t you be in school or something?”

She tries every day for three weeks, nearly kills him five times. On the twenty-fifth day, she hauls over her entire repertoire of tools and snarls, “You want it? I can make it. I’ll prove it. So cough up, you piece of shit tin can. Whaddaya want?”

From behind, Rio rushes to slobber over the girl’s wrench collection. And Viktor smiles.