Vix oogled over the wall filled with plants and fungi.

Tod and Kitt stood flabbergasted still, but silent. Their eyes glued to Ophelia. Not the reaction she tensed for, but she still didn’t know how to process it. What was worse, really, screaming or silence?

Ophelia moved to the kettle and picked it up with her off-hand. When she reached over to lift a cast iron pan, she strained. It made Kitt and Tod jump. They ran over to her and tried to pry it out of her hands.

“I’ve got it, mam,” said Tod.

“Sit, we’ll tend to ye.” Kitt pulled her to her table and yanked out the chair. He helped her down, though she didn’t need it, and moved to an open shelf where he pulled plates and cups.

Vix turned to the boys and rolled her eyes. She leaned into the table across from Ophelia. Her hands stained with street muck wrapped around the edge of it. “Don’t mind them, don’t liken they’ve ever met someone like you.”

Ophelia rubbed her wrist. “I’ve had worse interactions.”

Vix nodded. “Yeah, I know. Gots to keep my hair up or else.”

The knot in Ophelia’s stomach tightened ever so slightly. She knew, too. It caused her to pause, before: “I can help you with that knot.”

There was a clattering behind the two girls. Tod and Kitt fought and hissed at one another. In feverish debate, they snapped and quarreled over who got to cook and who got to tend to Ophelia. It made her snort a laugh.

Vix put her fingers over the knot and pulled. “At this point, I’ve kind of grown to like it. Named her Lola, and all. Besides, she’s a toughie. She ain’t going no where.”

Kitt hissed at Tod before letting go of the things. He stuck his tongue out to his mate before turning to the table. He smoothed his hair and straightened his coat by the sides of it, before he strolled over to Ophelia. He sat across from her, pushing Vix out of the way.

“Me thinks it’s time we talked, mam.” Kitt leaned into her with his elbow. He tried to look dashing and charismatic. Tried. “Now, I know it’s ye own business why ye wanderin’ all abouts the back-districts, my districts, and I ain’t sorry for it, only that I hope we reach an understandin’, is all.”

Vix scoffed and moved to help Tod heat up whatever portions of food they could find. She took a bite of a mushroom, chewed it, then let it fall off her tongue in disgust.

“And what is this understanding?” Ophelia turned her attention back to Kitt

“No good deeds should go unnoticed, me thinks.”

“You really have no idea who I am?”

“Mam, ye look like a statue from inside those fancy gardens in the Vista. I thought ye were made of marble.”

“...I don’t know how to take that.”

Vix turned over her shoulder with: “he thinks you’re pretty.”

Kitt sneered. “Can speak for meself, thanks, and I’d never use something so weak for this vision.” He threw his hands towards Ophelia and then realized what he had confessed aloud.

Tod turned around and pointed a wooden spoon at Kitt. “You swore!”

Kitt waved his hand at them as he sunk into the other for a moment of embarrassment. Then he perked up and resumed as if nothing had happened. “No, I haven’t a clue who ya are, mam. Don’t even know yer name yet.”

“Ophelia,” she said, “The Honorable Ophelia.”

The three stopped and turned to her in silence. “You gots a title?”

“I do.”

Kitt lowered his gaze as he thought before he rolled it back up to her. “Ye work for Goldie, don’t ya?”

She pulled her hands to herself, shrinking. “I do.”

“I tried to join her, she said I was a wee-one. Piss and Vinegar, I say. So, I started me own gang.”

“The Reynard’s Skulkers?”

He nodded and scratched at the dirt pretending to be his scruff. “Sure am, mam.”

“Is there a Reynard?”

Tod leaned towards her with a smirk. “We’re all Reynard.”

Kitt motioned to throw something at Tod and stiffen a finger. “Hush.”

Vix lifted the pan with both hands to the table. Some once dried meats, a bulb or two of garlic, unpeeled, and some other smattering of pieces of food around her kitchen sizzled. Kitt pushed the plate to Ophelia.

The smell of it was overwhelming, but her stomach grumbled. “There’s bread in the hutch.”

Tod grabbed it and a knife. Then they sat on the bench around her table. Tod sliced. Vix scooped. Kitt poured.

She stared at the food. Her arm ached. Her stomach rumbled. Her heart felt warmed, so much, that the longer she stared the more her eyes started to well.

“Somethin’ wrong?” Kitt ducked and tried to look at her face.

“Are you intending to burgle me?”

“Why’d we do that?” Tod said utterly confused. His head turned ever so softly.

She put fingers against her budding tears. “I don’t understand, why would you help me?”

“Ye were lost, and ye were hurt.” Kitt reached a hand to her shoulder. “Don’t know how ye do it in the Vista and such, but down here, we have ta look out fer one another.”

“You’ve been around the Mafia too long, mam,” Vix added.

She looked across the table to them all. To the package. To the tea cup left cold.

The vision of green eyes looked her over. Radiant as he sat in the chair in his office, his voice calm as it always was. Ophelia chewed on his words and the growing guilt in her chest.

Then she reached out and picked at the food on her plate.