Private The Trenches Nowhere To Go But Everywhere

Asta stood on the tips of her footpaws atop the bar of the Thorn in the Side, paws reaching to affix the homemade, painted cloth banner on a forged hook hammered into the ceiling joists.

"Got it!" she cried triumphantly. "Does that look straight?" She turned to the beasts assembled in the tavern for confirmation of her success.

The banner read "Happy Birthday, Caden" in neat, curling script of purple, splashes of red flowers dotted around the letters. Several tables had been pushed together to make a long table in the center of the room, which was decorated with vases of gold and purple flowers. The tavern itself was empty of patrons save for those invited to the small party. Asta and Daniil had been careful to cover their tracks the past several weeks as they planned the event for Caden's birthday, and it seemed the marten was still none-the-wiser.

---

The marten in question had taken some coercing by Daniil to leave their home early that evening.

"I do appreciate that you would take me out to dinner," he said to the todd as they walked through the Trenches. "But given how things seem to go for us whenever we go out, I'm somewhat worried we're pushing our luck, even if we are going to Kaden's tavern. Besides, Asta is gone for the evening, which would give us the run of the house, and all that can entail."

He gave the fox a suggestive smile and lift of his brows, though refrained from any physical contact that would be too indicative of the nature of their relationship.
 
Daniil smiled at Caden's suggestion, blushing a bit and instinctively glancing around to make sure they hadn't been overheard as they walked the streets of the Trenches. The Vulpine Supremacist attack on the Opera House had left him a bit jumpy; he'd been increasingly paranoid of the possibility of being attacked in the street, no matter that things had actually been rather quiet after the attack as both sides licked their wounds and prepared for the next strike. As Caden had pointed out, their luck was such that they'd probably be right in the middle of it.

"Much as I'd delight in that," he remarked, keeping his voice low and quiet, "we don't get out nearly enough, and at least we know Kaden's tavern is safe. There will be other nights for us to stay in together. Just once, I'd love a night out with you." His paw twitched like it might reach to take Caden's, but then stilled itself, resisting the impulse.

~~~

Bezine had thrown herself into decorating with a fervor, her deep appreciation of bright and bold color let loose after decades of minimizing that side of herself. Eirene took care of picking up the flowers, carefully arranging those, while Morgan and Vihma helped with maneuvering the furniture into position, at least when Morgan wasn't busy telling her girlfriend as many dirty jokes as she could think up based on whatever furniture happened to be at paw. Bezine had given up chiding her for it; Morgan was an adult now, like it or not, and was clearly going to do her own thing no matter what her mothers said.

Bezine stepped back, making a box with her pawfingers to examine the banner. "Sì," she confirmed at last, "is good. Well," she amended, "maybe a bit 'igher on ze left, but only... Um, 'ow you say un pollice?"

"An inch, mother," Morgan called, then grinned as she added, "though in the Imperium, I think they call it 'Mar'kan's pe-'"

"Kacha!" Eirene rebuked at last. "Honestly, you are worse dan a teenager sometimes."

"She still is," Bezine pointed out.

"Only for a few more months," Morgan grumbled, her fun clearly ruined. She glanced up at the banner and added, "The banner's fine, Asta. Mum's just a perfectionist, that's all."
 
“Aye, it looks just fine by my eyes.”

With a couple of fastidious twitches Tanya adjusted a small arrangement of her own as she placed the flowers down and moved on to grab a couple more chairs for the long table. Her injuries, particularly from the fight with Sean, still nagged now and again but for the most part the wounds were healed. The vixen’s bruised ego and thoughts on the brewing situation, however, had failed to settle.

Tox was no stranger to violence: the assault had not left her wary of returning to life in the Harbour but it had served to instigate a fresh round of paranoid contemplation. She truly was home. Initially the thought of attending this party had filled her with unease, still uncertain of the delicate relationship with Caden and if he truly had come to understand her, if not forgive. Furthermore, her life on Kutoroka had been a relaxed one with few true formalities: attending a party with a contingent of strangers felt alarmingly foreign. Dinners in the Ministry always had proven so much more torturous than warfare. At the very least she’d managed to get something presentable tailored in by Kinza in time for the event.

“For what it’s worth,” she muttered in passing Morgan as she carried the chairs, “I think they was being generous with the inch.”
 
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