#closed view

“Mmm.. Ah!” she laughed, swiping at a windowsill. Her soft fingertips barely ghosted the surface.

Ana, cat by species and nature, was in the midst of snooping around, as she was in the middle of looking for dice! Dropped dice, loaded dice, red dice, green dice, just dice! She’d been skulking around tables and chairs, to try and find a bunch within the confines of the casino. Her reasoning? Perhaps they could be turned into a luck related spell, one that could backfire. 

There were lots of them, as well- Under poker tables, slot machines, and one little, lonely blue one without a match, sitting on the windowsill next to a scrunched-up cigar and a rusty bottle cap. That, friends, was the die that she was trying to get a hold of. She’d pushed a chair over to the window, trying to stand up on the back to grab the die.

 “HEY! Hey! You home, bokor boy?” A lilting snake’s hiss traced over the air, as the carnation skulked about the area. 

She had a hand firmly planted against her cheek, and a scowl marring her so-called sweet face. Agnes eventually settled down, her other hand against her metaphorical hip; If anyone knew anything about her teeth, by now, it was the voodoo man of Inkwell Isle.

Now, Dice wasn’t one to hop on a bandwagon so quickly. But, the rumors of a “dog walking into poles” and a real “upbeat fella” walking around Inkwell was enough to spur him on. There was only one well-known mutt on the isles, anyway. It’d been some time since they bumped into eachother.

A passing conversation in the past convinced him to snatch up something en route to where he’d heard him last. Asking around the busy city had him strolling from A to B, and the instant he caught sight of goofy green trousers and those endearing, squinty eyes, it was like striking a jackpot.

“Hey, you’re the new maestro, right?” the hellhound smiled. “We’ve been needing one for a while, now. Name’s Kerby Russ. It’s a pleasure.”

It wasn’t Kerby’s job to brief new people, but she found herself doing so each and every time. A jovial paw was extended toward the woman, her other kept still on her hip. Though, her arm twitched, and her faces froze, when heels clicked on the floor and she was gently pushed aside.

“Allow me, if ya would.. Miss Inette, if I remember correctly?” Between the ladies stood the one and only manager, a smirk on his features. “We’ve been waitin’ for ya all evenin’ long. Just call me mister King Dice- Ya new manager. Kerby here give ya the tour yet?”

“Don’t tell me. Kirby, right?” The little puffball was held in Dice’s open palm.

Small, pink, and with the vaguest scent of watermelon? Always walked in to places where he didn’t belong? Tried to pet the best bartender in this hellhole?

Fit the description to a t. Newcomers on Inkwell didn’t STAY newcomers.

“HEY!!”

She recognized that straw, that big nose, that face. Leaves briefly trembled when Agnes pulled herself up from between two trees, bristling with anger, a real floral fury.