A Hound Should Never Want for a Fox

Chapter 8

You'd think a Village with not one, but two Dog Clans would be more willing to let animals into buildings.

Tsume made a show of sucking on her—very sharp—teeth as she stepped over the shop's threshold. In her arms, Kiba picked up her agitation and growled. His toddler voice was squeaky and usually invited coos and pets from well meaning civilians. Coupled with his mother's scowl, however, it just highlighted the difference between the Inuzuka and literally everyone else. Tsume didn't scold him, this time. Children could get away with a lot more than adults. If she couldn't express her irritation, then her kid could do it for her.

She normally wouldn't come to a place like this—civilian run and weird about dogs—but it was the only furniture shop that made large items out of ironwood. Sure, other places had a few things in stock, but most people preferred oak or other, prettier woods when shopping for furniture. The Inuzuka weren't most people.

Kiba bit into her shoulder, reminding her why she needed ironwood furniture, in the first place. The brat was teething. On everything. And everyone. Tsume's skin was thick enough to take it, most of the time, but her couch...

She'd grown complacent in the years since Hana's birth. Oh, how she cursed her younger self. What was she thinking, giving her ironwood furniture away to one of her pregnant cousins? She still needed that, dammit!

Of course, her younger self hadn't planned on having any more children. Tsume conveniently chose to forget that fact. Her new little tyke was totally expected and eagerly anticipated.

Ahem.

Tsume walked over to the counter. Her wallet already wept over how much the furniture would cost her, but it had to be done. She wouldn't make the mistake of giving it away, this time. By the time Kiba was done teething, Hana would be getting her ninken and puppies always chewed up a house. Then, Kiba would get one, too. No, she'd be using this furniture for a long, long time. That alone made the expense worth it.

There was someone else already standing at the counter. Tsume didn't recognize her immediately, and she still couldn't place her after the quick once over she usually gave civilians. A stranger?

She immediately began taking proper stock of the woman in front of her. She was short with a pear shaped figure and she wore her long hair unbound down her back. She was dressed in a long sleeved tunic dress with embroidered hems and loose fitting white pants. She wore shinobi sandals. That set off a few alarms. Nothing in the way she stood said shinobi, but she could be a better infiltrator than Tsume ever was. Then again, a good infiltrator would never wear shoes like those.

A face popped up over the shorter woman's shoulder and Tsume's hackles relaxed almost instantly. The child staring at her with big blue eyes had hair almost the same shade of gold as the woman's and a quick inhale told her they were two different people, not clones, and this was far from their first meeting. They were smothered in each other's scent the way only parent and child could be, though there was also a layer of...fox?

As if reading her thoughts, the child wrinkled its nose and bared its teeth at her—almost a full set!—and growled.

Like Kiba's, this child's growl was squeaky and not at all threatening. It was, however, entirely unexpected. Tsume watched as the child's mother adjusted her grip, now carrying the child under one arm like a sack of rice, butt facing Tsume, and continued speaking to the civilian clerk as if nothing had happened.

Ha! How many times had she done the same thing with her children? Sage, she was sure any Inuzuka could relate with this exact scenario, right down to the wriggling child desperately trying to escape an indifferent mother's grasp.