Tallo spun around on the dirt to watch the large attacker sprint to the cobblestone street just a few hundred feet away. The hubbub of the day-to-day hardly had time to register the alleyway fight, with the whole struggle lasting hardly half a minute. The more the man ran to the crowd, the more people—and guards—turned to look and see what happened with faces of fear and alarm.

Kimba clasped her arm, holding it to her chest to try and stop some of the bleeding, but she was well aware she would need stitches for something like this. Already, she felt her wound leak through her tunic and mix with the blood of the dead and dying men on the floor. Even if her cloak’s sleeves covered her arms when she was hit, it would make absolutely no difference to the sharp blade.

“Tallo,” she barked quickly. He took a moment to turn around, but his eyes glazed in shock when he finally got a good look at the two bloody heaps on the floor. The shopkeep still breathed, but upon a closer inspection, Kimba could tell he was unconscious. The swordsman blinked in and out of his struggles, until she pulled her dagger out with her good hand. His life left him when she straightened to her full height.

“Grab the sword,” she commanded. It was an odd request to me, to grab an additional weapon when the enemies were defeated. But I could tell that behind her eyes, the gears of her mind turned, planning two steps ahead. Even though the world she lived in was still being weaved, right before my very perception, she already knew it so well that she could prepare for what was to come. I knew she couldn’t see the threads, where they pulsated and flowed or where the colors grew more vibrant with each moment. But perhaps she could sense them. She watched Tallo fully, studying him, but still able to strategize. She grit her teeth at his idleness. People on the street started to shout, pointing to the scene. Every word made her tense more and more.

“Tallo!” When he looked up to her, she watched his breathing quicken. “Now is not the time to go into shock, Tallo. We have to go. Grab the sword!” Without cleaning her dagger, she shoved it back into the sheath tied at her waist, and began to shrug off her cloak to wrap around her arm completely. She pressed the cloth into her wound, hard, against the searing pain, and returned to holding her arm to her chest like a babe.

“Tallo, unless you want to get arrested or killed, grab the fucking sword.” This time, her words shook him out of his hesitance, and he finally dashed to the sword on the ground, beside the freshly dead man, and picked it up. “Come on. Stay close. Do not fall behind.” She said each word with the same intensity, watching, waiting for any indication he heard her. A quick nod released her from her rooted position in the dirt. She dashed to the door of the shop; her hand slipped against the handle, but she gripped it hard to throw it open. “Lock this behind us. I’ll get the front door.” She was lucky, that no one came in from the front of the shop, allowing her to shut the door and throw the lock into place.

The two stood at either end of the shop, at both doors, panting and staring at one another for a full moment. In that time, Tallo seemed to gather himself, standing straighter, hands trembling.

“Your—your arm,” he stammered. Kimba glanced down to see that her arm completely soaked through her cloak; for a second, her confident stature faltered. It was worrying to see that much of her own blood, even though she could feel it. And from what I could tell, with the way the threads of blood dulled as each drip of blood hit the floor, that this was not a wound she could ignore for much longer.

“F-find us some new clothes,” she said, clutching her arm tighter. “I’ll find a needle and thread.” It was Tallo that moved faster, now. Kimba didn’t have to search long; behind the counter, with scales and fabric samples and books full of transaction records, she found an unorganized mending kit in a small bag. She hardly looked into it, hardly registered the reflection of the needles in a pin cushion or the balls of different colored thread of all sizes, before she hung the handle on her wrist and looked up to her companion. Though the heaps of fabric in his arms looked random, he moved with a purpose, already heading toward the two unexplored doors in the hallway of the shop.

Kimba caught up with Tallo when he tried the first door and found only a storage closet full of brooms and buckets. The second door was exactly what they hoped for: a stairwell to the second floor, the home. Muffled shouts coming from up the stairs gave Kimba a moment of hesitation, but knocks on the back door of the store shook her to action. She took the lead again, skipping every other stair until she reached the front door.

As Kimba pushed it open, the muffled shouts came through a little clearer. The home they entered was in a state of disarray: scattered papers, a chair shoved against a door where the shouts for help came from, and the other chair toppled over. She hopped over an overturned box of baubles and a couple shattered ceramic plates. She kicked the chair out of the way, ignoring the loud clattering when it overturned a vase, and turned back to Tallo to ensure he locked this door, too. When he did, Kimba opened this one.

An elderly man fell forward, still half-shouting, but caught himself before he fell into Kimba.

“Oh!” he sounded as he stumbled. This old man straightened up as he caught himself on the doorway. His skin paper thin, hair gray and disheveled. He saw first the bloody heap that was Kimba’s arm, then Tallo across the room. He didn’t seem relieved in the least bit, though. “Are you here to rob me, too?”

“Not if you help us,” answered Kimba. As if on cue, loud pounding from downstairs meant their time was up. “Your robbers are gone. Say we went out the front—please.” Her voice wavered against her best effort, but this minor inflection seemed to take the old man’s heart in an instant, and he eagerly nodded and left out the very door Tallo just locked.