Quitxi emerges into the street considerably more laden with goods than before, and smiles prettily over her shoulder to the heavily-armed, and still faintly blood-spattered, girls behind her... daylight, something she feared not seeing again, despite the days of uninterrupted sun they'd experienced.<br/><br/>"I know a few traders who skipped town when all this..."  she gestures at the immobile sun, "... this started."  Heading through a twisting series of back-yards and side-alleys, they work their way a couple blocks west to a row of well-spaced bungalows, separated from the street by sandstone-mortar walls, reinforced with palisades only<i>partly</i>for show, and gates with stout sliding bolts and hinges for linchpin-locks.  They wouldn't stop a unit of troops, surely... they wouldn't stop a determined thief, either, nor a petulant child with no fear or retribution.  But they make it more difficult to consider entry... except, perhaps, that she knows this one of these houses quite well...  She's done a couple of odd jobs for the family before-- though, evidently that professional candor doesn't count for when they're out of town.<br/><br/>Quitxi leads their trio to the small home.  No one seems to see their approach, except for a dog some three houses further down the street who begins ceremoniously barking for attention... not insistent enough to draw eyes, not close enough to raise an alarm.  She looses the already-worked pin with a simple twist of a loosened bar and-- click.  They're in the walls, provided with enough privacy to drop their guard, take a deep breath, and survey the chalet, which looks far more grand than it actually is thanks to the atrium it's built around.<br/><br/>"The family's gone until the end of the world, I suppose."  She grins at her compatriots, smiling faintly.  "There's water, beds, some grain, tools... we should be alright here, unless we attract too much attention."  She deftly hops onto the outstretched arms of an obsidian-colored statuette of a lion by the door, her leather-clad feet gripping its surface as she stretches, lifts the edge of a clay tile on the roof, and lifts a small brass key from beneath before replacing the tile... thus providing a lovely view before she hops silently to the smooth-stone walkway, hardly making a sound among the rounded stones.<br/><br/>She unlocks the front door and they enter, finding themselves in the shadowed porch of the atrium's fringe walls, facing two doors on each of the three facing walls, leading, evidently, to bedrooms, a parlor, and a kitchen and larder in back.  In the midst is the house's most prestigious and pretentious feature: an atrium garden and bathing pool, with a stone fountain of replenishing in its midst... a meager knock-off of elven artwork being the center of the enchantment-- a rearing stallion that purifies and cools the water, as well as draws it from the air via condensation at night.  Utterly wasteful, but... nice in the desert.<br/><br/>Quitxi steps over to the octagon blue and white stone tiles that make up the courtyard path and drops her pack.  Only now does she release the pommel of her scimitar.  "Chateau de Quitxi, for now."  She winks at her compatriots.  "Make yourselves at home."