I decided that I needed to be creative. We would go to Granger Hill to the South of town and do a painting of Zanesville. As a kid I'd always been a pretty good artist, but the last couple of months I'd not exactly had the opportunity to indulge.
Naturally Brook was with me, although he was rather more concerned with trying to entice me into a romantic encounter than any stupid painting I wanted to do. The only solution, other than allowing myself to be seduced, was to get him to pose for me.
He stood before me hand outstretched as if introducing me to the city. He was wearing a cropped T-Shirt and jeans. For my picture I imagined him clad in beautiful silken robes flowing in the wind, like Laurence of Arabia, but showing more leg, the clothes almost identical to those I'd seen him wearing in my precognitions of the far future.
Soon Brook was bored with the posing and was sending pleading wheedling pleas that his muscles ached, poor darling.
The first sketch outline in pencil was only half way complete so I was forced to bribe him with the promise of the best aruna of his life if he kept still for a few minutes more.
As I said this, I felt the familiar shiver up the spine of deja vu. Setting down my brush I focused inwardly trying to remember what it was. My eyes widened, the deja vu led way back to my memory of a precognition.
It had been back when I'd been a boy-child exploring my human sexuality for the first time (with my hand). That first time, I realized, it had felt better than it should have...seven times better in fact. Not five times better, but seven.
The memory became very clear in my mind, those first feelings had not originated back then, they had the aura of precognition about them. With my now experienced mind I could tell that my younger half-self had been caught in the turbulent backwash of an erotic arunic event from some point in my future.
No wonder girls had never satisfied my needs, I was an aruna addict before I'd even gotten to first base. I couldn't help thinking that somewhere The Aghama was out there with a smug enigmatic grin on his face. Ol' Einstein reckoned God doesn't play dice, well The Aghama, he definitely plays and the dice are his special loaded pair.
I blinked trying to refocus on the here and now. Brook was out of his pose and looking at me with concern.
"Just remembering a precognition I had when I was young... Back in pose you!"
"Anything important?"
"Naah!" I replied blushing
"You're blushing"
"Its nothing" I replied blushing with greater vigor
"Share breath on that?"
"No!"
Share breath or I will tickle it out of you he replied applying a tickling mental caress to my inner thigh through the link that we shared
"No!" I laughed.
The tickling restarted immediately, his real fingers joining the mental ones. Before long I was on the ground with his fingers playing across me like a musician extracting a concerto from his instrument.
That we were in a public place, in daylight where humans might see us, just didn't matter. my half finished portrait lay on its side, knocked over by my thrashing foot.
"Tell me" he insisted, rolling on top of me so that his weight pinned me down.
His lips were close now, ultimately tempting. Priorities got rearranged in my head, my artistic ambitions set aside as I surrendered, leaning up slightly so that my moist lips touched his.
As we shared breath, Brook sucked the knowledge from me, experiencing my early fumblings and the echo left by the seven waves of arunic pleasure that had lashed through my immature mind.
seven? Not five? he thought I guess we've only ever got to third base so far
It seems so I replied
The sharing deepened as we both had the same thought. If a sixth and seventh level of aruna were possible then we both wanted to attain them, and right now.
Brook slid his soft fingers into the waistband of my pants and jerked them open ripping the buttons loose one at a time in a series of deliberate jerks.
A very small part of me wanted to say 'not here', 'not where the humans might see' but it was only a small part, our shared intention was far too great a thing to be denied by the possible presence of another species. Indeed there were parts of our shared mind that reveled in the dangerous edge to it.
I don't remember ripping his T-shirt open nor quite how his jeans were reduced to rags. Perhaps the potency of his ouana-lim burned through the fabric as if it were a bar of white-hot steel..it didn't matter how, the mechanics of it were unimportant once I had opened myself up to his most intimate touch, and the concerns of the physical world began to recede.
It would have been a simple thing to merely lie back and let my ravishment take its usual luxuriously lazy course, but I sensed that if we were to 'do a seven' it had to be more controlled than that
Wait I instructed, positioning my butt at a more comfortable angle, using the fullest extent of my mental discipline to prevent myself from giving in to pure animal lust of the basest sort.
Less disciplined than I, it took a few moments to slow the tempo of Brook's passion, by which time the first of the five pleasures had burst like a star within us.
slowly I soothed, breathing the command firmly into our shared mind.
<- he replied sending me the primal ouanaic emotion unmodified by words.
Here... I sent follow the my memory, let it guide you
My sending worked, with the template of the precog-memory to guide him Brook was slowly bringing me to levels of pleasure beyond those that our previous fumblings had ever achieved.
The unspoken reason for caste progression suddenly became crystal clear to me. A hara's mind needed to be strong enough to remain coherent under the onslaught of distracting pleasures that swirled through him with the force of a New Orleans hurricane. Four fires burned within, burning brighter whenever Brook's Ouana brushed against them.
I could feel the agmara energy building within me, ready for release, like a pressure cooker building up a head of steam ..then it occurred to me a Wraeththu’s body generated agmara during aruna. But why? Bodies don't do things for intellectual reasons, they do things because they needed to. The agmara we'd been using for our majhahn rituals was really a part of something biological then.
I could feel Brook reaching for the fifth point, deep within me; the star that would release the agmara in a blastwave of pleasure. As soon as he touched that I would detonate and my energy would dissipate.
I craved a still deeper penetration but knew that, impressive as it was, Brook's beautiful Ouana was not long enough... unless... of course!
Suddenly it all clicked into place and I began to visualize. Only this time, instead of creating a beach, or a meadow decorating hara's perceptions of the outer world, I turned the visualization inward; creating the etheric space within my abdomen, allowing all of the agmara that fizzed through my limbs to implode into the self contained ether stretching it into a bubble of etheric reality
Deeper I demanded
?
visualize it. you can be as large as you need to be in here.
Brook nearly failed, he didn't quite get it. Fortunately we shared that mind link thing that acted a bit like a permanent sharing of breath. I could sense the instant that he got it.
Suddenly Brook was surging forward, reaching the fifth point that had always been the ultimate summit. This time he flowed onward, like freight train rushing past the platform, entering the special place that I'd visualized. When he emerged into the new reality he was not shaped like a man, but instead like a beautiful rainbow serpent.
The sixth level of aruna washed over me, it was a feeling of victory, of ultimate anticipation and profound longing. Where the fifth level could render a har unconscious with the potency of its pleasure, the sixth burned through like a nuclear explosion stripping away every last scintilla of memory.
I existed. That was the only thing that I knew. Even the awareness that there was a real world was gone. Curious, I began to probe my environment, it was a place of pearlescent every shifting color formless yet infinitely intricate.
Time had no meaning, I was not even aware of its concept. I floated enraptured by the beauty of that place for an eternity that lasted no more than an instant.
My beautiful safe environment shattered as another entity surged dominantly into it.
We touched, both fearful and both overjoyed to have found a companion to share this adventure with. Where we touched, we mingled. It was a new and exciting thing, playfully we mingled further, letting ourselves get lost in each other.
An instant later our universe began to fade, the glowing edges of reality becoming dim. We mingled tighter each equally determined to hold on to the other and resist the forces that would pull us apart.
For one dizzying instant I realized that there were no longer two of us, I had become whole, my essences inseparable and indistinguishable.
My joy knew no bounds, pulsing outward and ripping reality to shreds.
I exist!
---
The feeling of grass against my ass and shoulder blades brought me back to reality.
Woah! I don't think we can do that every day thought Brook, his mind link somehow stronger than ever before.
Maybe next week then I replied lethargically
We shared breath again, this time filled with a lazy feeling of satiated achievement.
It took a moment for the real world to fully impinge on us. It looked as if some agmara had leaked our from our lovemaking, tiny flowers and new green growth had occurred within twenty feet of us as if our pleasure had given extra life to every living thing within range.
In the back of my mind I could hear Gyvon's mind touch getting our hara to check in trying to find out what had occurred.
I ignored him, my full attention was still pretty much fixated on Brook.
I noticed that there was something around my ankle and looked down to see that I had put my foot through the canvas during our aruna.
"Oh well, I guess I can't do any more painting" I said pulling the canvas loose
Brook snuggled close looking insufferably smug.
"Just hold me forever" he commanded
"Ok...I can do that" I agreed
For the next hour or so we simply held each other, experiencing a perfection where nothing needed to done to improve anything.
Eventually a small cloud skittered across the sun, reminding me that the world existed and needed attending to. I was about to say something profound when I noticed a movement out of the corner of my eye. I sat up, pulling my ripped pants closed, whilst poor Brook wrapped the remnants of his t-shirt in front of his intriguingly large ouana.
There were five of them, boys no older than twelve, positioned in a circle around us, their hair bound into dreadlocks that reached down to their waists, despite their obvious Caucasian origins.
Bring them hissed a sibilant reptilian voice.
Instead of moving to grab us the boys began to sing. It was without doubt the most beautiful poignant sound I'd ever heard.
I became lost in the song almost instantly. I didn't mind when a small hand held mine and began to pull me along away from our picnic, the car, the art supplies and the town.
Soon we were into the deeper Wilds, our route meandering as it avoided the occasional trailer-trash habitat.
We must have walked for about an hour, the singers weaving their song so that when one voice began to tire another would seamlessly join his voice to the chorus and take over the purity of the mind numbing melody.
In theory I could have broken free and sent for help at any time. The problem was that the song was just too beautiful to disrupt. By the time the song did stop I was certain that even Gyvon wouldn't be in range of my sending.
Our destination, it seemed was a small waterfall at the end of steep sided, heavily wooded, ravine. The spot was beautiful, had it been more accessible, I felt certain that the teens of Zanesville would have used it for a swimming place.
I counted another ten lost-boys either posted as lookouts or tending to chores around the flat slab of rock that formed the shore of the waterfall's pool.
Now that we had arrived the five boys of the capture team ended their song and I was able to concentrate more fully on our captors.
Each boy was clad in skintight snakeskin shorts not dissimilar in pattern to cycling shorts. Around their shoulders they wore forest-pattern camouflage cloaks complete with branches and twigs laced in to break up the profile. I had no doubt that each lost-boy was armed and knew how to use it.
Wraeththu? sent Brook
I looked closer, I ought to have been able to sense it easily if they weren't human. Now that I knew to look, I could definitely see something un-human in the posture, the flick of the head and the delicate gesture.
Singing...kids...it suddenly all made sense. These were the 'kidnapped' choristers that had made caused the Home-Sec security sweeps a couple of weeks ago.
The thought that boys so young had been incepted was sickening.
The ten-year-old boy-har leading our party whirled around to face me, his face a mask of rage.
The Phylarch is-ss NOT a pervert! he hissed silentlyAruna is-ss only necces-ss-sary for adult ins-ss-cepteess not the likess of us-ss
The boy-har's mental tone allowed for no uncertainty. This tribe had evidently mastered the ability to incept without the need for aruna to 'fix' the mutation. I still wasn't sure how wise it was to kidnap younger humans, such an action inevitably provoked a reaction. But at least the Fagin wasn't a sexual deviant.
I apologies. We were not aware that a different procedure was possible.. Tiahaar..? I asked, trying not to think judgmental thoughts.
Jimmy s'Har Colurastes. We use our old names until we are old enough to become Tiahaar. At that point our real names-ss are revealed to us-ss
Interesting...So...Why did you rooning kidnap us Jimmy?
"That was on my instructions-ss I'm afraid" said a voice from behind the waterfall.
I glanced in that direction and watched the waters part to allow the second most beautiful har in the world to emerge without getting wet. I made a point of glancing at Brook to reassure him that he was in my opinion still the most beautiful person in my universe.
This one was tall, as pale as a ghost, and like his boys, possessed of extremely long black hair tied in dreadlock braids. Each braid ended in an arrowhead-like clasp wrought in silver to look like a snakehead. For clothes he wore a magnificently skintight catsuit of what looked like Rattler skin.
"Tiahaar Phylarch, I presume." I said bowing slightly
"A pleassure to meet you at lasst Ladylord sSixteen Har Tuaththua and Tiahaar Brook Har Tuaththua" he replied bowing his head in reply.
The use of the word Ladylord was delivered with a slight mocking quality that I didn't care for. It wasn't as if I'd chosen it as a title or anything.
"You may addresss me as Massasauga Har Colurastes. Phylarch is my title, it means that I speak for this nest of the Colurastes tribe" he added, his hand gracefully indicating his child-hara
"Let me repeat then, Phylarch Massasauga. Why have you kidnapped us? This is twice I've been kidnapped in two days, and to be honest its getting old."
"Kidnapped. SSuch a harsh word my dearss." he replied with a slight smile that could have rivaled Mona Lisa in the enigmatic stakes.
"What word would you prefer... darling!"
"Guessst, would be my word of preference" he replied sibilantly "Be assured you may leave at any time, should you see greater advantage in doing sso."
"Glad to here it!" I snapped, still feeling annoyed. Had these Colurasteans not interfered Brook and I might still have been enjoying the afterglow of our special moment.
Massasauga raised an eyebrow.
Brook squeezed my hand in warning. The boy-hara were looking surly, angered by my disrespect for their leader.
"You are angry, my dear, I foresaw this. Perhaps a gift of clothes will ease your mood" replied in a conciliatory tone. Elegantly signaling two boy-hara, who scampered back into the cave behind the waterfall's roaring white wall.
I refused to glance down at myself. I knew full well that my pants and shirt had been victims of my earlier passion.
The clothes were soon brought before us, glistening from their passage through the plummeting stream of water. As soon as I saw them my hostility toward Massasauga eased considerably.
The clothes were magnificent, snakeskin pants and a jacket for Brook; and for me, what looked like an ankle length evening gown, cut so that my legs would visible up to the thigh and held together from hip to armhole with a criss-cross of leather laces that would leave me looking seductively naked if viewed side-on.
It was immediately evident that no human hand had been involved in the making of these. My gown was designed for a harish figure, each snakeskin somehow merging seamlessly with the next, and embossed with swirling serpentine patterns that reminded me of the Celtic artwork the O'Hara hara had inherited
"Thanks! Its beautiful!" I gasped in delight, hurriedly discarding my human-made rags to try it on.
"A Ladylord should look the part, should he not?" replied Massasauga
I looked up sharply, it was incredibly difficult to get a grasp on The Phylarch's mood and personality. Was he mocking me, or trying to boost my ego? Or both? Suspicious or not I decided that the best course was to be honest.
"Really, these clothes are extraordinary. But...I'm sure that you didn't bring us here, in the way that you did, purely to give me a drop dead roony gown."
Massasauga's eyes twinkled and he allowed his mouth to twitch slightly into a smile.
"One should never asssume that Coluraste motives are simple or straightforward. Like our Ophidian cousins we tend to move sideways in order to move forward. On another occasion I might indeed kidnap you just so that you can model for me...but not this time. Today we have many things to discuss and perhaps a relationship to forge."
Brook leaned close to the junior har "Ophidian?"
"Snakess" replied Jimmy scornfully as if anyone was expected to know that.
I finished tying the laces and glanced back at Massasauga. "Well, you have my attention. Unfortunately I have no gift to give other than my presence. Perhaps you could explain what it is you do want"
"I've been watching you for some time Ladylord Sixteen, you are a quite remarkable Har. You have managed to gather a large Phyle about you, avoided the tendency for such groups to fragment, remained hidden from the humans, and frankly, done things that by rights are beyond your caste level."
"You know a lot about me."
"I've had you watched closely." he replied flicking his fingers to summon a second har.
Like Massasauga the new arrival whore a skintight catsuit of snakeskin and had his hair braided into extraordinary ankle length dreadlock.
"Pony!" exclaimed Brook
I looked again, Brook was right, the new har had once been Brook's friend.
Pony glided his way to Massasauga and draped himself possessively around his Phylarch.
"Nice-sss to see you again Brook." He hissed in imitation of his leader. Blinking seductively
"Allow me to introduce Slide Har Colurastes. My Chesnari." said Massasauga
"Slide" I nodded "I guess you no longer suspect me of foul play then"
"Not sSince Massasauga showed me my true path." he grinned kissing his lover's ear.
"So, you've spied on us and incepted my lover's friend away from us. Why? Am I a threat to you? Is that it?" I asked
"Threat? I hope not. I would hope that our relationship would be more mutually beneficial than that. It would have been a simple thing to have kept you ignorant of sSlide's exisstance. He is here to demonstrate our honesty with you."
"Ok...point taken. Sorry. What did you have in mind then?"
"I wish to propose a few understandings that may benefits both our tribes." He replied as if it were some small matter rather than something important enough to kidnap hara over.
"But my mannerss are appalling" he continued "What musst you think? Come inside, Slide has been preparing a banquet in your honor"
Brook and I exchanged glances as we headed toward the waterfall.
looks like tribal loyalty trumps childhood friendship Brook sent with sour regret
You knew that already. Useful to know the extent though I replied
Inside the cave several more of the too young hara were busy with what looked like an effort to depopulate the region of its snakes. Twenty or so rattler skins were pegged to a blue plastic washing line, whilst yet more were being gutted, the various parts separated into piles. The har doing the gutting looked no older than nine years old and showed no unease with his task.
My eyes widened slightly when I noticed the puncture wounds that dotted his arm like bad acne. Were we immune to rattler venom? I wondered.
The cave was lit with candles, each one held in a snake skull candleholder. To the rear of the cave a space had been set up with an extravagant amount of cushions and was clearly the Colurastes lounge
Massasauga draped himself on the cushions, looking almost like a python in the dim light.
We made ourselves comfortable and Massasauga summoned another of his hara with a plate of diced meat. This one looked older, having the gangling look of a teenager. He glanced at me and blushed furiously before hurriedly departing back into the dark.
Like, whatever. I picked up one of the raw, meaty chunks and popped it in my mouth, it tasted a bit like uncooked chicken, but saltier.
"Not bad" I complimented "So... to business then. What exactly is it that you want of us?"
"Several things. Most importantly, we wish peaceful coexistence with you. You clearly intend to harvest Zanesville of its young males. I want to stress that we are not in competition in this. We Colurastes target the younger ones as you see. We propose that you let us have any younger brothers that fall into your hands."
"Can you assure me that they will not be interfered with sexually?"
"I will share breath on it"
I nodded, there was no higher assurance. Nohar could deceive another if they shared breath on it.
"I think I can accept that. Provided that the humans you take agree to be taken..volunteers only, got it?" I replied.
He hesitated and then nodded slightly, conceding the point.
"What else?" I asked taking another cube of meat.
"As I've said, we've watched you, You've done remarkable things. Because you have no caste, you do things that are beyond your caste. This is not ssafe, you might try to do something that will backfire badly. So I offer you training up to Acantha level along with some useful magaric training that your warriors may use." replied the Phylarch Massasauga.
It sounded too good to be true, I'd keenly felt my lack of knowledge ever since Ash had left us. We desperately needed every trick we could find if the tribe was to thrive. And suddenly here's a guy offering everything I could want. There had to be a catch.
"That's an interesting offer, but what would you have in return? I'm not selling my soul here"
"I wish to observe you at close quarters for the next couple of months. You've done things even we have not, we need to understand them. Particularly the agmara generating ritual you did this morning, that was-ss sSignificant " he explained.
"Agmara generating...oh!" I blushed, he was referring to our seven-orgasm trick.
Sure it had been an intense experience, but it didn't seem that great a deal, yeah we'd generate
scad-loads of agmara, but we'd used it all up in doing what we'd done. If that was all the Massasauga wanted it wasn't that big a deal.
"Sure. No problem, you have a deal"
"sShare breath on it?" he asked quickly, like a striking viper
I nodded and he exhaled, breathing his truth into me.
Massasauga's truth was startling, he'd been prepared to offer nearly anything to find out about the erotic majhahn that Brook and I had performed. Whatever it was we'd done, Massasauga hoped to monitor and document 'the results' as they manifested.
Before I could focus further on that aspect, he shared instead the reassurances I'd demanded about the way his harlings were incepted, allowing me to experience the ceremony and its consequences. I wasn't comfortable with the whole snakegod thing, but He'd told the truth about the harlings, they'd not been molested.
Just as the sharing ended he did something odd, blurring my memory of the entire thing. I still understood that I'd been shown the truth but the details of the inception ritual and what it was Massasauga wanted from me became shrouded in mental mists.
"Hey!" I protested
"sSorry, that ritual is sSecret"
I thought about it and nodded. I could still feel the emotion of secretness that had clung to whatever it had been that I'd just experienced.
"Sixteen?" asked Brook
"We have a deal with the Coluraste." I replied leaning back and running a reassuring finger down his arm.
"Thank you" replied Massasauga graciously
"I guess we've got enough unoccupied cabins out at Hill-16 that we can house your tribe."
"That won't be necessary" he replied "The Coluraste will sStay here and care for the Ophidia. You need only concern yoursself with me."
In some ways I was relieved to hear it. The snake fetish didn't fit well with my ideas on how a tribe should be run; and on a purely selfish level, it meant the Home-Secs weren't going to be finding any incriminating harlings on my turf.
At least now that I'd shared the Phylarch's mind I could relax. His methods were damn odd, but he wasn't an enemy.
"If you don't mind..." said Brook "I'd like to share breath with Slide. I've known him since kindergarten."
"..And you want to see how much was burned away during his insseption. Go ahead. It would be best for Ladylord Sixteen if I start him on the path to his caste ascension anyway"
Go for it I sent to Brook
Once Brook had departed, I turned my attention to the sinuous har.
"Caste Ascension then. What do I have to do?"
" First I must learn your natural aura, the way that you are when at rest. Stand and allow yourself to be perfectly calm. Don't try to visualize anything."
I did as I was told and watched as he ran his hands over me without actually touching my skin. After a while his hand reached the space between my Ouana and bellybutton.
"Remarkable" murmured Massasauga cryptically, hesitating for several seconds before moving his hand onward.
Remaining calm and blank turned out to be quite a challenging exercise and I found that I was perspiring freely by the time Massasauga indicated that I'd done enough.
Glancing at my watch I realized that another half hour had passed.
I recalled that Gyvon had been getting people to call in right back when we'd achieved our Seven. That meant as far as our tribe were concerned, Brook and I had been missing for nearly half a day.
"It’s getting late. Our tribe will be getting concerned." I said apologetically
"Of course. Jimmy s'Har Coluraste will lead you back to your car. I shall join you at your residence in two dayss" replied Massasauga smoothly. His attitude had changed yet again, I now got an aura of dismissiveness as if I were no longer interesting.
---
It only took a half hour to sprint back to where we'd left the car. Jimmy set a blistering pace that would have matched a human Olympic sprinter. I was pleasantly surprised that I could not only match his pace but also keep that pace up for several miles. I'd not ever tested my endurance that way...and now that I had, I planned to order my hara to go on a quick sprint around the lake's eight-mile long shoreline ...on a daily basis.
Something was bugging Brook, I could sense it, but he was determined to keep it to himself until Jimmy had jogged back into the forest.
"Speak it. He can't hear at this range" I said as I collected my scattered art supplies.
"Pony's completely different. I didn't recognize much of the boy I grew up with."
"You never shared breath with Pony the human. All you ever saw was his outer shell, perhaps he wasn't quite the person you thought"
"I know that. But you're forgetting, I've got brothers. Petreon and Amnil are pretty much the same personalities as Peter and Jurgen were. Slide isn't Pony."
"So what's different?"
"When he was ten he got bit by a timbersnake, spent time in hospital. He couldn't go near them after that. He even got detention for refusing to enter the reptile house when we visited the Zoo."
"And now?"
"He worships them Sixteen. He's training to be a Snake Handler and he gets roony just thinking about having Rattlers slithering all over him."
"Ok. That’s different" I conceded
"And there's something else. In Slide's mind I could see that until this morning Massasauga didn't want anything to do with us. He was happy having the Tuaththua take the blame for any kiddy disappearances. Massasauga changed his mind like that (snapping his fingers)...he sent the other adult coluraste, a Tiahaar Sliss, away with a message and ordered Jimmy to bring us to him with his next breath. Slide is only an Aralist, but he knows that his Phylarch is very, very, excited about something we did."
"You think I shouldn't take caste training with him?"
"I think you need to have Daananan watching over you when you do. Sixteen...I don't want them turning you into some kooky snake worshiper" he replied
I laughed and hugged him reassuringly. Me? Get aroused by a serpent? Never happen!
---
Naturally everyhara was relieved to see us alive and well. Our snakeskin clothes caused a great deal of envy and as soon as Massasauga showed up he was deluged with a variety of trading offers with my hara offering everything from money to arunic favors in trade.
Massasauga turned out to be a sharp trader. Very few snakeskin garments changed hands, all of them small...and the price...don't go there.
Whilst I found that I was gaining a vast amount of self-discipline and learning some pretty cool magari, I never forgot Brook's words. Massasauga was interested only in what was good for Massasauga. Whatever was going on, the benefits to me and my Tuaththuans were purely coincidental.
My hara picked up on the vibe I was giving off, and the Colurastes were regarded as 'them' rather than 'us'. In some ways that was a relief, there was no chance that Massasauga would be usurping my authority.
My vague precognitions of unease continued to grow, but now there was also a feeling of anticipation, there was something good coming my way...perhaps my caste progression, yeah, that would be good.