Dromae Dreams

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Your clothes are starched with dried salt and sand. You're lying on your belly on the shore. It's a great relief to rest face-down in the sand for a moment, at least until the cold and briny waves lap up into your trousers. You're forced onto your hands and knees, and then on your feet. [[Get up.]]

You stand in your sea-soiled attire, grassy dunes before you, the shore stretching on beside you, and the insistently lapping ocean behind. [[Where am I?]]

Specifically? On a beach: the western shore of some landmass. When you look north or south you see the shore curve to the east out of sight, into the far-off atmosphere. Directly inland are long grasses and reeds emerging from the sand, a stretch of dunes separating you from lush jungle folliage. (link-replace:"Wait- Generally?")[You were sailing in the Eagle's Gulf which is a largely an eastern shoreline, so unless you're on an uncharted peninsula, you've found yourself on an island. Maybe part of an archipelago. More alarmingly, you were on a galley before this abrupt landfall. (link-replace:"Where is this galley, then?")[The //Bonne Maude// was just large enough to carry crew and cargo over the moody waters of the Gulf; it's conceivable that you fell overboard during a storm as she passed by this place...]] (link-replace:"Hold on- how am I feeling?")[Sea-whipped and thirsty, bruised as you can feel beneath your tunic, but all there. The limp will go away on its own, you think. You feel slightly sick; you might've drank mouthful of the sea on the trip here.] [[On inland, then.]]

Your eyes remain on your sandy feet for a few yards' stretch, then you look up to the tall verdant grasses, the peeling bark of gumbo-limbo, and the wide ferns fanning an enviable shade in the breeze. You're through the dunes and out of the sun, yet the heat and moist air sticks to you still, the significant sea breeze hardly cooling your tan hide. Bare-footed, you watch your step among the roots and undergrowth. You spot a brick sticking out of the mud, worn down through the ages exposed from the soil, looking like a molar tainted with moss. A curly-tailed lizard retreats on top of it, pumping itself up and down on its territory and flashing its bright crest at you. [[Just passing through.]]

You wander into the unfamiliar land, wading south through heavy brush, pushing past fallen palms, careful not to stray from the shore too far and risk losing your bearing altogether. You wrap your head in your soiled shirt and lash together some wide ferns with vine and grass to form a mantle and maybe delay sunstroke. You menace flies with a switch as you go, and nearly at dusk you find yourself curling around a southwestern bend of the shoreline, and at an estuary. You walk past the mangroves and into brackish water to cool off before following the creek up to its potable length. Squatting at its bank you take your time sipping and washing the dried brine from your long hair and dark body, restoring some lost vitality and wits. But you spot something in the silt bellow, glinting bright and yellow. [[Reach in.]]

It's an electrum coin. You know such treasures can't last long at the bottom of a creek bed yet... It looks like it has. It has a long ovoid shape, as if dragged by the waters for years and years but not completely eroding away. The face is distorted, like a lost soul trapped in this valuable alloy. Even if you knew the local history you might not be able to make out the deformed profile. [[Pocket it. You're a privateer, why let a single doubloon escape?]] [[That's some //woadun// shit, and I don't play with that. Put it back.->Put it back.]]

You fit the warped coin in your tarnished trousers, but before you remove your fist from the pocket you see more. There's perhaps hundreds of similar coins in the creek like that one, stirred in the rush of clear water passing the bank, flashing like orange lightning bugs in the setting sun's light once you remove your shadow from their twisted faces. You look around, deeper in the island jungle, at the growing shade of the palms and ferns and the purpling sky, but no sign of some wrecked ship or overturned chest: as if they were disposed of. [[This doesn't change anything, I'm still taking it.->Sighted.]] [[Well... I can always come back for it. I'll put it back for now.->Sighted.]] [[This //is// too out there for me. I'll throw it back.->Sighted.]]

You go to bend down and gingerly toss the coin back where it came from. But you notice something. There's perhaps hundreds of similar coins in the creek, stirred in the rush of clear water passing the bank, flashing like orange lightning bugs in the setting sun's light once you remove your shadow from their twisted faces. You look around, deeper in the island jungle, at the growing shade of the palms and ferns and the purpling sky, but no sign of some wrecked ship or overturned chest. It's as if they were disposed of. [[Yeah, definitely putting it back where it belongs.->Sighted.]] [[This river's rich! It won't miss one.->Sighted.]]

(if:(history:)contains "Put it back.")[You decidedly toss the twisted doubloon back into the creek with its siblings. No sooner than it falls beneath the surface of the water do translucent fingers of pink and strings of crimson float by, blood clouding the water, from an upstream source.](else:)[(set:$coin to 1)You leave the twisted doubloon into your pocket. You glance at its sibling orphaned currency on the riverbed and spot translucent fingers of pink and strings of crimson float by, blood clouding the water, from an upstream source.] (link-replace:"Look upstream...")[There you see a beast unlike anything you've encountered in waking territory, its head dipped into the water. A bird-thing the size of a horse, with small clawed forelimbs instead of wings, clad heavily all over in white pinions and feathers, brown ones on its back. An arrowhead-shaped body turned away from you, balanced by an outstretched tail and beneath it long road-runner legs terminating in black talons, one on each curled up in terrifying lunar crescents. Those feet, the down between its toes, are matted black with blood. [[Hold your breath.->...]]]

A big arch: heavily masoned from limestone, standing alone in the jungle a walk away from the creek. Maybe it stood at the perimeter of some compound centuries ago to greet guests or intruders with an impressive tableau, but now it's just a gothic, hard-hewn canopy of shade for you, maybe twenty spans high in total. The details that once menaced this decorated rock is weathered to smooth, mossy flowstone, but you can make out enough to know it was colonial in nature. You forget the name of their people or nation. It must've ended poorly for them. [[Do what you can to make it comfortable.]](if:$coin is 1)[ (link-replace: "Kiss your coin.")[You feel luckier, for what it's worth.]]

It raises its head from the water, flicking it with a clear spray. It notices your gaze. Gold eyes in a mask of black feathers, looking down its charcoal gray snout at you, crowned with white pinions. Its whole blade-like skull moves out of concert with its body, its heron neck more like an arm holding a sword than a bust supporting a head. (link-replace:"Remember to breathe.")[The feathered monster turns on its taloned feet toward you, silent as death next to the stream, and begins to close the twenty or so yards between you two, leaving bloody tracks. Its gold eyes burn as they stare you in the face from that distance. [[//Run!//->Run!]] [["Hey, wait!"]] [[Stay perfectly still; maybe it'll just sniff you and leave.]] ]

You turn and take off in a sprint; no time to second-guess instinct. First you're rushing down the bank of the creek but then detouring back into the jungle, barreling through ferns and swerving around palm tree trunks, speeding through the wilds at dusk. A wild terror and alacrity rise up in you like you've rarely felt: the bare, bestial sensation of something chasing you down, of an electric presence on your back, of an ache to get free of it. Since you left it you haven't heard it pursue, but when you turn your head to look you see it: slithering in your same path with fluid momentum, strong and clawed legs drawing it forward in what feels like total silence in the deafening beat of your heart and breath. [[Risk climbing a tree to evade it.]] [[Find someplace to hide.]]

It approaches, loping down the length of the creek and watching you closely, narrow head slung low with a piercing, neutral expression: that of an animal's. As you feel your breath draw short and your blood pound in your ears you watch bloodied talons pace toward you in a slowed suspension of time. Your body, bestially, aches to flee. You're dizzy and cold with the sensation. You're stunned most of all by your foolish reaction, realizing that you're faced with a beast that cannot be reasoned out of its hunting instincts. [[Stammer, "Uhh, oh shit, you don't talk?"]] [[Stand still- maybe it'll leave you alone.]] [[//Now// run away!->Run now!]]

It approaches, jogging down the length of the creek and watching you closely, narrow head slung low with a piercing, neutral expression: that of an animal's. As you feel your breath draw short and your blood pound in your ears you watch bloodied talons pace toward you in a slowed suspension of time. Your body, bestially, aches to flee. You're dizzy and cold with the sensation. This self-inflicted stasis is painful, terrifying, but the beast doesn't seem to be rearing up against you yet. Could you even see it snarl the instant before it flashed teeth, or its thews curl before it leaps onto you? [[Close your eyes and remain still.]] [[Whisper "Easy now..."]] [[Fuck it- //run!//->Run now!]]

You scramble up a gumbo-limbo's cracked red bark like a mast, a convergence of your life of piracy and your chimp ancestors, well into the branches above. Your footing secure in the knots and crooks you cast your eyes back over your shoulder and find, in horror, the use of those black talons in climbing: like a cat or a bird penetrating the bark, much opposed to the way a monkey would use its grip. In fright you leap to another canopy, only able to break your fall to the ground and keep running after narrowly avoiding a sprain. [[...->Chased to the shore.]]

At first opportunity you swerve past a garden of moss and double back into a rocky narrow, covered and dim in the dank undergrowth and partially full of rotten branch and leaves. Regardless of the filth you nestle there and cover your mouth with your hands to mask your hyperventilation. Heavy, clawed footfalls paced directly towards you, homing in unerringly, and your nerves give out. With a shout you sprint out from your hiding place. [[...->Chased to the shore.]]

It's within a yard, and its image overwhelms you. The subtle iridescence of the scales on its snout as it scents the air around you, the intricate mask its black down form around guileful golden eyes, and the white pinions that cut a thorny silhouette down its serpentine neck. Your eyes remain on its bust, because it looks you straight in the face. Slotted orbs within less than a yard, within reach. Right before you the beast stops and raises its head when you speak again. Its countenance shifting on its blade-like snout and flashing, slotted eyed, twisting into suspicion. That neutral, animalistic pall lightened to show an intelligent expression, if only to show its skepticism of you. "I do," It speaks with a high voice, coarse like a languidly bowed viola, and deeply accented. A thrilling, otherworldly sound, even if it's simply dismissing you. "But not to common folk. So, please leave." [["Oh, well... Fair enough." Back off, then turn and leave.->You leave.]] [["I have a lot of questions..."]]

You remain just as you were, arms outstretched, bent at the knees, your eyes remaining only peripherally watching it so to not challenge it. It's a gambit, but you know for sure that predators can't resist a chase, whether it's a bear or a moussing cat, or whatever's before you now. It's within a yard, and its image overwhelms you. The subtle iridescence of the scales on its snout as it scents the air around you, the intricate mask its black down form around guileful golden eyes, and the white pinions that cut a thorny silhouette down its serpentine neck. Your eyes remain on its bust, because it looks you straight in the face. Slotted orbs within less than a yard, within reach; it looks down your shoulder, your arm, eyes dilating as its huge head drifts toward your outstretched palm. [[...->In your palm.]]

Your bravery fails you and you turn to take off in a sprint, stumbling with a yelp as the chase suddenly begins. First you're rushing down the bank of the creek but then detouring back into the jungle, barreling through ferns and swerving around palm tree trunks, speeding through the wilds at dusk. A wild terror and alacrity rise up in you like you've rarely felt: the bare, bestial sensation of something chasing you down, of an electric presence on your back, of an ache to get free of it. Desynchronous with your own heartbeat you hear the fall of bloodied talons pacing in the underbrush, keeping up with you at a breezy pace: the long strides of a predator stalking, not even exerting itself in the chase, slowly accelerating as it drives you on to the shore. You realize you hesitated for too long, too late: there's not space between you that you could have used to shake it off your trail. [[...->Chased to the shore.]]

You remain just as you were, bent at the knees with your arms out by your sides, standing straight and alert but very, very still. It's a gambit, but you know for sure that predators can't resist a chase, whether it's a bear or a moussing cat, or whatever's before you now. It's within a yard, and its image overwhelms you. The subtle iridescence of the scales on its snout as it scents the air around you, the intricate mask its black down form around guileful golden eyes, and the white pinions that cut a thorny silhouette down its serpentine neck. Then you shut your quivering eyes. [[...->In your palm.]]

It's within a yard, and its image overwhelms you. The subtle iridescence of the scales on its snout as it scents the air around you, the intricate mask its black down form around guileful golden eyes, and the white pinions that cut a thorny silhouette down its serpentine neck. Your eyes remain on its bust, because it looks you straight in the face. Slotted orbs within less than a yard, within reach. Right before you the beast stops and raises its head when you speak to it like some spooked horse. Its countenance shifting on its blade-like snout and flashing, slotted eyed, twisting into suspicion. That neutral, animalistic pall lightened to show an intelligent expression, if only to show its skepticism of you. "What?" It speaks with a high voice, coarse like a languidly bowed viola, and deeply accented. A thrilling, otherworldly sound, even if it's dismissing you. "You're on my property. Please leave." [["Oh, well... Fair enough." Back off, then turn and leave.->You leave.]] [["I have a lot of questions..."]]

You run till you feel faint, darkness invading your periphery as your eyes come on the lapping waves again: the coast. Doomed, you shut your eyes, slowly turn to face your killer and hope your gnawed remains will be shat out in the sea where they belong, but nothing happens. You open your eyes and find that what ever it was gave up the chase. [[It's getting dark...]]

It clenches its jaw and glares at you beneath its long eyelashes, stern and strange and coincidentally reminding you how far from any place you feel appropriate in. "Again, please leave." [["Yeah, OK, I'm going..." Turn and go.->You leave.]]

(align:"=><=")[//You! These shores are not for you to emerge on as anything but filth!//] [[What? Who's talking?]]

//My foam roils and now, without vessel, witness me! AXILIATLI! Your skin and sinew are a pale, flavorless rind! CUAXALOL! Your blood thinned to nothing in my brine! IXCHELCUAZOC! Your bones picked by crabs at the bottom of my heart, barnacled and forgotten! IKZ! ILITH! Only dreaming keeps your organs in your body! BARQUALIMETZILI! It is done!// [[Wait, did I fall overboard?]]

//MARY-ON-A-CROSS! The fucked shall inherit the earth!// [[...->Washed Up]]

It's eyes come clearly upon your face and its yellow irises close to thin slots, dorsal feathers standing up like they might on a frightened bluejay. It gasps highly, gaped jaws jerking away as the beast turns from you to flee. You're struck by the fan of feathers at the end of its long tail, wobbling in place before falling on your seat more out of surprise than from the blow itself. It runs with greater haste than even when it pursued you, leaving you looking around as if maybe there was a larger predator lurking behind you. (link-replace:"...Is there?")[...There isn't, you confirm. It takes a minute to notice the long shallow gash it left you on your left forearm, bleeding brightly into your palm and stinging. [[It's getting dark...]] ]

It presses its lips to the back of your left hand, a humid blast of breath down your knuckles and your thigh as it scents you so closely. Certainly it smells your fear. (link-replace:"Let it...")[Cool scales under your fingertips as it presses up its snout into your palm and you are powerless let it examine your wrist, let it run its nose up to your elbow and back down. You cringe with every movement of this creature, your sweating skin turns to gooseflesh. You feel your thumb captured in its lips, feeling pin-sharp teeth within, its ample saliva smearing your hand. That digit pinched delicately, its tongue lashing at your print. Teeth suddenly swarm around your wrist. (link-replace:"Open your eyes!")[You see its jaws surrounding your wrist, the gold in its eyes gone as it stares forward with vacant, black disks. Saliva drips from its chin in long clear ropes. [[Oh gods no-->She retreats.]]]]

You back off and it stands its ground, rearing up its leveraged chest until you turn away. Walking back down the creek toward the shore, still trembling, you can't help but look over your shoulder for one more look at that "rational animal" like yourself, seeing its thorny silhouette stride away in the setting sunlight. [[It's getting dark...]]

It's getting dark and you aren't any closer to lodging. That stalker of this new, hostile land is gone but you're still on your own, still shaken from the encounter and a little weaker for it. What will the night here bring? Aimlessly walking by that submerged brick you passed before, you come to see the trees part around more scattered pieces of rubble, but more hearteningly, something still standing that could shelter you. [[What is it?]]

You clear out the ground under the stone arch and hang your improvised palm branch mantle up on one end to keep some of the wind out. You hope that tomorrow you'll find food and better bedding... To your surprise, sleep comes. [[Dream.]]

//A land of steps and terraces, floating gardens and steep, ascending staris, all swelling from the shore like foam. A mockingbird lands on the summit of one of this vast pagodas, the size of a galleon, shaking his charcoal and white plumes. His amber eyes peer at you, uttering a booming melody from his narrow beak. He displays his wings, raising them at three intervals before expanding them fully, repeating the gesture ceremoniously.// "Vagabond, you are on my territory." //He sings.// "Brigand, you are on my land. You cannot stay here No, you cannot." [[Alright...->Make your choice.]]

//The sun is setting behind him, great shafts of light bathing the mutant temple district in blood-red light. He stretches his right wing toward the south, saw-toothed pinions diffusing the waning glow of day. To the south is open plains. You can see many men running in a scrum with torches and implements in hand, gouts of smoke rising from burning buildings, shorn fluids and flesh pooling in craters: a wild war, basking in the heat of fright and spilt blood.// "Go the way of hand-wood and goat-skin, If you have a warrior's arm." //He stretches his left wing toward the north. Black clouds blanket the northern sky, writhing and churning as gyres of carrion and raptors brave their rains and lightning. Within the woods beneath hearth fires and bonfires rage, and dancing bodies cast long shadows over the wet earth. Weeping, singing, sighing voices fill the air thunderously with the libinous keening of the birds and insects, bringing ecstacy and terror.// "Go the way of the darkness, Tears and sighs, If you have a strong voice." [[Go to the South.]] [[Go to the North.]]

//You pace toward the plains, your nostrils filling with the scent of opened veins and musky human fear, filling you up with a deep, adrenal strength that makes your musculature tighten around your bones, makes your teeth clench in your skull.// [[Continue south.]] [[Turn back.->Make your choice.]]

//You stumble toward the dusky woods, dilated eyes watching your every step, from charcoal-sotted sockets and from the shadows and from the midnight sky. The singing penetrates you: fugues and dirges in syncopation, dithyrambs in counterpoint, the// musique concrete //of a wyrd woadun rattling your bones and sloshing the marrow within.// [[Continue north.]] [[Turn back.->Make your choice.]]

(set:$south to 1)(set:$brvt to (rgb:255, 75, 75))(text-color:$brvt)[//"AVE!"//] You wake filthy in the nook you've created for yourself, having thrashed and perspired so heavily on the ground through the night. The little bedding you had is pushed aside; mud is sticking to your swarthy and hard body, glistening with terrified sweat. You have the cold sensation that it's not your sweat, which goads you onto your feet suddenly. [[Better not to sleep at all!->Back to it.]]

(set:$north to 1)(set:$vvitch to (rgb: 200,100,255))(text-color: $vvitch)[//IA!//] You find yourself on your back several meters away from the arch you slept under, spread out like a starfish under the open sky. You rub your eyes, finding them red, still damp and stinging. Sitting up you find your morning priapism jutting into your stomach, and a whole path up the front of your torso coated with dry semen. The chilling sensation of being alone in the dark goads you up onto your feet, yet the sun is out in all its light and heat. [[What a terrible night...->Back to it.]]

You're ferociously hungry and thirsty. How your dreams made room for phantasms instead of food is a great mystery. Getting back to that creek and finding anything to eat consumes your waking thoughts. You feel like a lone doe when you creep back up to the bank of that river, the same one the bleeds out into the estuary and where you saw the other creeper of this land. Nothing joins you, today, beside the tiny anoles sunning on rocks and ibises perched in the mangroves. You wash your dreams' reverie off your body, hopefully purging it from your mind too, and then drink your fill. [[Hungry...]]

You search the muggy lowland, try to catch anoles in hopes of just a bit of sustenance. You find vines that only poisonous berries, which you shield your eyes from for temptation. Delirious, you mutter to yourself as you go, [["This land is a folly. Follyland, Follyvania: that's what I'll name it. And if I survive to claim it I'll make it a flag with some arsehole getting his pecker torn off by birds."->The House.]] [["O Dio, o gods... Please don't make this last any longer. Even if by a big bird I die, I'll accept it..."->The House.]] [["Beautiful and baren... Can't wait to find a house made of cornbread..."->The House.]]

You emerge on a narrow clearing shaded by oak branches sagging over a relatively well-trod path. You squat beside it and find it's still in use. No recent traces of hooves, wheels or boots in the clay-rich soil but... You turn over a fallen fern while tracking, and find a bird-like print pressed deep into the path. Three toes: the outer two on each print with obvious short claws, the inner third making no depression with its lifted talon. You look down those tracks, turning your head down the trail where they lead. It leads to a house. [[A house?]]

Despite the clear danger you can't pass up any sort of shelter or provisions in your state. You creep toward that house in the brush beside the path, remaining concealed behind a tree to observe first. It's a round structure, with round windows and an arched doorway, swooping awnings and ampoule chimnies. It must be adobe, mixed earth and water and hay, due to it being poured and shaped into such forms, yet it's bright white and too meticulously smooth, modestly decorated with stripes of yellow and grey paint around its circumference. Totally unlike the old colonial ruins in that way. Also, they aren't ruins. No signs of invasion, here, or negelct. [[Sneak in.]] (link:"Call out from cover.")[Nothing replies; the din of the tropic jungle continues.]

You don't hear any motion beyond the oaken windowblinds and doors, so you creep up to the western entrance of the adobe house. The threshold fits two doors that open inward, each with a strange paddle-like knob. You push through, finding a small nook lined with a woven mat to perhaps discard or clean shoes before stepping up onto the foundations proper. Currently, footwear is absent from the entryway. Beyond that is a parlor, unravaged and unpillaged, as of yet unintruded upon. [[Brush your feet off on the mat, then step in.]] (if:(history:) contains "You leave.")[(link-reveal:"Wait, shit, this is //its// home isn't it?")[ Odds are it is. Even from just the front door you can tell it isn't build for just some hermit: it's for something big and thumbless. What now, chief? [[I suppose I could turn back... Maybe it'll listen to me if I just try to talk to it again.->Turn back.]]]]

(set:$ssotbme to 'open')Your bowels churn with hunger as you step into a tastefully kempt den. The floor throughout the place is tiled with dark-glazed ceramic plates. There's a fireplace in the northern wall and an area a few steps from it is receded into the ground, smooth rock covered with finely woven blankets and lined with cushions: a conversation pit, where company is recieved and conversations are had close at hand. The eastern wall is lined with shelves and stacks of poorly-arranged books, some simply piled on the ground in contrast to the otherwise kempt parlor. A few books are left beside the pit, a stand holding one open for a reader not currently present. An open-ended and decorated brick wall divides the den from another chamber to the south; you remember from observing on the outside that another chimney leads to that part of the building. A dark oak door to the north leads to other, more dim chambers. (link-replace:"Check out the open book.")[(set:$ssotbme to 'closed')You take the book off its stand to look at the cover: //Sex Secrets of the Black Magicians Exposed.// Blimey. You accidentally close it without looking at the page that it was left at. "Shit."] [[Walk around the dividing wall to the southern chamber.->Kitchen.]] [[Pass the threshold into the northern chambers.->Quarters.]]

You leave the entrance to that home and slowly close the front door, turning to face the path once again. You swallow dryly, "One hour, tops, then I'm going in." You take a seat against the wall where the shadow of a palm falls, keeping out of the sun well enough to wait, but as soon as you sit you feel the weight of exertion come to bear on you; a few moments and you slump, eyes heavy, and you fall deeply asleep. [[...->She finds you.]]

Calling this chamber a kitchen may be generous, but it is true. There are counters for preparation, a coal-fire oven built into the exterior wall, cabinets where spices and implements are stored, but it seems not recently used compared to the lived-in den. More presiently, you find a pantry stocked with provisions: dehydrated cuts of pork hung and covered, bags of sorrel and spices, and wine. In a frenzy you fetch a knife from the cuboards of the kitchen, slightly dusty, to feed. [[Dig in.]]

In the northern chamber, curtains cover the windows, leaving it dim and cool and quiet, well insulated from the ravages of exposure; you hear your own breath slow, feel your tarnished body grow heavy, in somnambulant relief. You did not sleep well at all and your dire hunger does nothing for your vitality. The large, well-adorned circular bed at the back of this room, shrouded in sheer cloth hanging from four cast iron posts, makes this fatally apparent. It is unkempt, its quilts untucked and cushions cast around haphazardly, which makes it somehow more appealing to sink into the impression its previous owner has carved out. [[Do just that.]]

You shuffle past discarded linens and lace on the ground, an unidentified piece of clothing hanging off the edge of the circular bed. You discard your own mantle of woven fern before you fall backwards onto the lush cushion with an exuberant sigh; it's far better bedding than you would've ever expected touching in this lifetime. (if:(history:) contains "She retreats.")[The cracked laceration on your arm leaves a little red on the sheets.] Your eyes scan tall dressers and bureaus with similarly curious handles as the front door, until their lids grow deliriously heavy, gaze falling instead onto your own chest. You find, laying on your nude sternum, a large, white feather displaced from the bed. You're jolten up, taking the feather, with the realization. [[This bed, this house... It isn't human.]]

You can't suppress drooling like a hound while cutting away pieces of savory flesh. You puncture the top of a small cask of wine to slake your thirst on the tart liquor- a kind of blend you've never tasted before, perhaps mixed with sorrel. With something in you, you already begin to feel more vital if slightly dizzy too as you step out of the kitchen. You hear the tell-tale creak of metal hinges and inhuman footfalls: delicate even in the weight they carry. You turn and see the large, feathered body of that predator enter the den. Keenly that snout points your way, slotted eyes going wide in their mask of fine black feathers. "Oh!" The raptor exclaims, feathers down its meridian standing alert. [[Try to flee through the window!]] (if:(history:)contains "You leave.")[[Submit, "Please, let me explain!"]] (if:$south is 1)[[Brandish the kitchen knife. You won't die quietly!->Fighting stance!]]

The orgin of that feather is unmistakable: that raptor you met by the river. You're resting on its bed and those linens and laces... Are its clothes? Delirious tired and terrified, you feel like you are in a waking fever dream, caked in sweat and swaddled in a handsomely adorned bed. In the den you hear the tell-tale creak of cast iron hinges and footfalls inhuman: delicate even in the weight they carry. You see that same feathered, bladed body glide into the parlor, apparently home, past the bead curtain separating you and it. Perfectly still, you hope in vain that you remain unseen. Sharply that snout points your way, golden eyes dilating in their mask of fine black feathers. "Oh!" The raptor startles with a girlish exclamation, white feathers down her meridian standing alert. [[Try to flee through the window!]] [[Submit, "Please, let me explain!"]] (if:$south is 1)[[Kip up and prepare for battle with whatever's on hand. You won't die quietly!->Fighting stance!]]

You lunge toward one of the house's windows, hastily scouring the windowframe for some latch to open it vainly. Fear grips you again (if:(history:)contains "Chased to the shore.")[just as before, when it pursued you through the forest ]but, after a few moments of panic and hearing it stutter and clear its throat, you slump with your brow pressed against the glass. "I won't hurt you." It offers, voice hawk-hoarse and high, deeply accented by both her anatomy and a native language you're unfamiliar with.(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ "The way..." Its eyes land on that scabbed wound running down your left forearm, swallowing audibly. "The way I behaved before was beastly. I won't let it happen again."] [[Remain stock-still, scared and disbelieving, "Prove it."->"Prove it."]] (if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[[Grin sheepishly, "You didn't go all the way. I believe you."]]

You submit, "Please, let me explain!" You say. The raptor stares at you, shakes out some of its plumes. "No need." It says, voice hawk-hoarse and high, deeply accented by both its anatomy and a native language you're unfamiliar with. Its dark face cants slightly to the side, half-lidded eyes resting on you, and a smile appearing in the corners of its pistol-length snout. "I couldn't let a man die of exposure on my doorstep."(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ Its eyes find the mark on the inside of your forearm, widening in recognition, its feathers pluming further as it turns and step away from you. "And I couldn't... With how..."] [["Oh, OK, I think you understand me."]]

(if:(history:)contains "Dig in.")[You get low with that steel blade balanced in your practiced hand; you've only knifed people so far, but why second-guess experience now? It's one last flash or die, now.](else:)[You're on your feet in a flash and a small gale of down, low and guarded on top of the bed. Unarmed, but at least you can look down on the pony-sized predator, muscles tight as your fighting instinct surges. It's one last flash or die, now.] The raptor stares from a meter and a half away, long eyelashes set low over slotted gold eyes. "(if:(history:)contains "Dig in.")[Put that down. ]Don't be so dramatic." Her voice is the high and hoarse strains you'd expect from eagles if they could talk, deeply accented by both a native language unfamiliar to you and her more animal facial anatomy, so strange (if:(history:)contains "You leave.")[once again ]coming from that creature and addressed directly to you. But more pressing is the subtle flex in her thighs, crouching an inch lower with her fanned tail balanced behind her and her crescent-moon talons hiked over her toes. The smallest poise toward cutting you down sends a frison of terror down your back. (if:(history:)contains "Dig in.")[[[Acquiesce, dropping the knife and holding your hands up.->Acquiesce.]]](else:)[[[Acquiesce, stepping off her bed.->Acquiesce.]]]

You stand before it with your hands held up, calloused palms shown and a defiant look in your eye even in surrender. Relaxing, its head rises and cants with a smile on its long snout. "There, we're calm now, aren't we?" There's a lilt of humor in its voice, "I couldn't let a man die of exposure on my property, so I'm actually glad you came to me and I didn't have to search you out." It turns toward her den, looking into your face. "But now you're a guest, and I expect you to behave like one." [[Be its guest.]]

You're splashed awake: you arise from your curling slouch with a gasp, water poured down your face and front. Initially it's quite a fright, then rather refreshing after being left out in the tropic heat, then it's frightening again when you find who did brough that spray and you press your back flat against the adobe wall. A slurred, high voice asks you something unintelligible. The raptor by the river is staring at you, gold eyes bright in its thorny silhouette, with the handle of a pail in its jaws and the bottom of it tipped in its wing-like forelimbs. The bucket is deposited before you, between your splayed legs. "Are you alright?" It repeats, clearer with its mouth unencumbered. [[Lie through a weary smile, pulling that bucket close, "I'm fine."]] [[Forget manners and drink up.]]

It scrutinizes you quietly. Bending forward you accidentally look at the bedraggled man in the reflection of the pale's water, unable to hide a bit of horror in your expression. "You seem like you're dying, to me." It interjects, as you paw at your cheek and the large bags beneath your eyes.(if:(history:)contains "Continue north.")[ There's something wrong with your eyes...] You glance up at it, then back down at the water, then drink too-quickly from its charity. "And I can't allow a man to die of expossure on my property," It adds, "So from now on you're a guest here. Please comport yourself like one." [[Be its guest.]]

You drink too-quickly from that pale, lifting and tilting it back till it runs down your front again. The stitches and dizziness are a stark gift of survival, as is perhaps her charity. When you place the bucket down you find her eyeing you, and you fidget under the sudden scrutiny. "Better now, thanks," You offer. "Good." Her head bobs on her long neck. "I couldn't let a man die of expossure on my property. But now, you're my guest and you'll act like one." [[Be its guest.]]

The raptor bows her head, smiling pleasantly, before rising again to gaze at you again levely. A practiced, polite gesture. "I can't let a man die of exposure on my property. I'm actually glad you came so I wouldn't have to to seek you out; I want you to be my guest. I'll treat you, and you'll see I have only the best intentions." [[Be its guest.]]

"Oh, OK, I think you understand me." You say, sheepishly running your fingers through your hair. "I'm beginning to, at least," It says as it turns toward the den, head remaining in place on its high neck, staring. "You're my guest from now on. I'll be treating you and lodging you, but I expect you to comport yourself as my guest as well. Now, go wash up." [[Be its guest.]]

Her eyes brighten and swivel toward you, then back down as it bows to you courtiously. Dipping its long neck down deeply, "I won't betray your belief, then." It rises again, its long lashes lid shut. "I was going to seek you, so I'm in fact glad you found me first. I couldn't let a man die of exposure on my property, so I welcome you as a guest." [[Be its guest.]]

You're entreated to go around back to wash off. You find a brick patio under an awning, a water pump and an extra-large aluminum tub in the shade. There's what seems to be a post next to it, holding boar bristles and pumice and grooved arms from a square-cut log: some artifice for the inhabitant to clean itself, holding soap and other implements when it can't. There's a tall and broad mirror too, if you want to (link-reveal:"check yourself out.")[(if:$south is 1)[ Stepping in front of the mirror, you don't remember yourself being this lean. Dimples swim in your ruddy-mocha skin, muscle plain and jaguarine. Your dark hair bunched in a mane and hanging down over your bare, broad chest. Dehydration did a number on your figure: you've lost your handsome paunch. (text-color:$brvt)[Now you look like a starved beast rather than warrior triumphant! What a shame.]](else:)[ Stepping in front of the mirror, you hardly recognize your face. You pace closer to look: same aquiline nose, same cheekbones and jaw, but your eyes are different. Not only are their sockets bruised and your lashes long and dark, but your eyecolor is wholly different. Your irises were once dark brown but now they're... Black-blue? Almost like fish scales or puddles of oil, how dark they are. You back away. Your thin and ruddy-colored body nimble, looking a bit boyish in your malnourishment, but flushed with sweat over this surprise. "Gods..." (text-color:$vvitch)[Eyes of Night to see what is not there.]]] There's a chest beside the wide base of the washing post- unlocked, your rakish eyes gather. With a fingertip you lift the lid and find it stocked with a few soap bars organized in labled, paper-lined bins. (link: "'Returning On Shield'")[ This brick is red and smells herbal: hemp, thyme, and with a little time you get a scent of... bronze? [[Use it?->Returning On Shield]]] (link: "'In the Court of the All-Father'")[ This lemon-colored brick is worn, and a bit scratched around its center. It smells like citrus, almost pungently so, before a vanilla body. [[Use it?->In the Court]]] (link: "'Midnight Dithyrambs'")[ This dark blue brick is only slightly rounded from use. It smells bitter and earthen at first, almost starchy, almost minty, until it settles into an implacably floral scent. [[Use it?->Midnight Dithyrambs]]] (link: "What a motley crew. Are these soaps or strains of cañoma?")[ It's probably rude to use its soaps, anyway. [[Close the box without touching them.]]]

First you pull the garment down and hold it up to see how it's worn. A frisson of avarice hits you when you see the glint of it in the sunlight and feel the soft, strong weave: it's silk. You hold it out and find it's a single sheet of it with a large hole in the center, presumably for the head so to wear it like a poncho, with two holes for the wrists between the center and two of the corners.(if:(history:)contains "Fighting stance!")[ A crimson cloth decorated with uneven black rosettes like the pelt of big cats you've only seen in engravings. Small silver bells are knitted the edges, jingling lightly.](else:)[ The cloth is a rich midnight black with a turquoise stripe twisting around the inside of the sheet, laying across the midsection when worn. Exquisitvely whitesmithed silver chains line the neck and wrist holes.] (link-reveal:"No undergarments or shoes? No pants? This is //not// a sailor's dress.")[ Though, you're not really a sailor anymore without boat nor port to sail from. [[Hold on, this is a concerning line of thought...]]] [[I shouldn't complain. If anything it's too precious for me.->Return to the den.]]

You disrobe and toss away your ruined clothes, pumping a bucket of water to rinse with. So much sweat and dirt sloughs off as you scrub yourself with a sea sponge, nothing sweet-smelling on your skin. The back door opens next to you and a garment is thrown over the top of it; you hear her pace away. [[What could it have possibly have given me to wear?]]

You disrobe and toss away your ruined clothes, pumping a bucket of water to rinse with. So much sweat and dirt sloughs off as you scrub yourself with a sea sponge, and then you lather up with Returning On Shield. The scent that wafts from you when you rinse again reminds you of some cocktails made with vegetables and vodka. The back door opens next to you and a garment is thrown over the top of it; you hear her pace away. [[What could it have possibly have given me to wear?]]

You disrobe and toss away your ruined clothes, pumping a bucket of water to rinse with. So much sweat and dirt sloughs off as you scrub yourself with a sea sponge, and then you lather up with the well-used brick of In the Court of the All-Father. Creamy, lemony; it's an exquisitely clean scent, if a bit girlish to your normal tastes. The back door opens next to you and a garment is thrown over the top of it; you hear her pace away. [[What could it have possibly have given me to wear?]]

You disrobe and toss away your ruined clothes, pumping a bucket of water to rinse with. So much sweat and dirt sloughs off as you scrub yourself with a sea sponge, and then you lather up with Midnight Dithyrambs. More striking than the vegetable scent it releases in use is the feeling of it on your flesh: goosebumps wherever its foam touches. The back door opens next to you and a garment is thrown over the top of it; you hear her pace away. [[What could it have possibly have given me to wear?]]

But it's true isn't it? The //Bonne Maude// is far from here, maybe at the bottom of the sea. Her crew probably takes you for dead. There must be a port somewhere on this land but even then you're unlikely to simply get back to privateering. (link:"You're bumming me out, brainbucket.")[I'm just asking about your status as a pirate, or lack thereof. Maybe the step forward is coming to accept being a landlubber, chief. (link:"NO! A thousand times no! I have burning pirate saltwater in my blood!")[(hide:?lub)[[And I remember those days clear as the wide-open horizon...]]]]|lub>[ (link:"But if it means getting treated this well I'm pretting OK with lubbing land.")[ How long will your status as a privledged guest last, though? Surely you're not welcome here indefinitely, and soon enough the silks and soaps will dry up with your host's good will. Likely it's just fattening you up like some fairytale witch. [[Enough. This is just sad.->Return to the den.]]]]

You wash and towel off finally and (if:(history:) contains "Fightng stance!")[slip on that silk leopard-patterned mantle with its jangling silver bells](else:)[slip on that silky shawl, fitting the cool silver chains around your wrists and neck]. It luckily hangs down past your knees, so you feel well covered without breeches or undergarments to speak of. You take a long breath. You enter from the back door, seeing your host at the fireplace. A kettle is perched on hooks over dry logs and tinder. It clutches a device in its talons rested before the ready fireplace, which it squeezes in its toes, striking sparks and lighting the fire. The orange light of the kindling flame spreads over its black mask of feathers and darkly scaled snout, turning back to smile politely at your arrival. [[...->In the Den with It.]]

Square-rigged sails taut overhead, cutting through the brine on the //Bonne Maude// and the //Caterpillar// before her. Merchant scooners and navy patrols visibly shrinking away from the black flag's unfurling... And the wealth they give, hauling chests from cabooses of carvelle-built galleons, from the quarters of those fat men in silks who grimace and grind their teeth watching it all drain away into your hands. [[What is more glorious than this?]]

...And the flesh you could collect too, stealing from the beds of those cowards, or picking from the lined captives, or from the belly of passenger ships, for any debauched interest. The captain of the //Catepillar// had his nymphs, whom he'd take through his campaigns and dispose of at the ports when they grew too old for his tastes. [[Pirate life is cruel...->Snap out of this reverie.]] (link-reveal-goto:"It disgusts me, but I enjoyed it...","Snap out of this reverie.")[(set:$cruel to 1)]

(if:$cruel is 1)[That's OK, because you're many, much worse things than a liar. ]Pissed, diseased, drunk, violent, infidellious and cruel- but free. Free as winged devils on the back of Leviathan... (link-replace:"Snap out of this reverie.")[You shake you damp mane of hair. You're no sailor, pirate or whatever, and let's leave it at that. [[Return to the den.]]]

Your host is dressed, which is unexpected. White lace is fastened to it under the narrow barrel of its body with white jute string, slimming the profile of its chest and belly by flattening its plumage. Small steel coils hang on its ankles, and a violet sheer loincloth is hung by thin steel chain cinched around its tail's root. "I'm making tea," It chirps, turning away from the fire. The conversation pit at the center of the parlor has some summer sausages and charcuterie arranged on it. "Please, join me." The raptor steps into the cushioned pit with its broadside turned toward the table, settling on stomach much like a nesting hen. Its whole length takes up nearly half of the pit. [[Join it.]]

"Emanuel," She says. You look up from your plate, up her serpentine neck to the canted snout that pronounces your name, neutrally, diplomatically. "It's nice to finally sit down with you." [["Likewise, Yuca."]] [[...->"Likewise, Yuca."]]

Yuca smiles at you curtly, squeezing her eyes nearly shut and keeping her teeth sealed behind her dark lips. She keeps her head inclined to the kettle, as if willing it to boil faster. You shift in your silk mantle, sitting upright on the plush and luxurious pillows beneath you, coddled in her den. [["I got a lot of questions..."]]

"Right, of course. Please, ask away." Yuca inclines her head. In the seat next to you the end of her tail occasionally twitches: a large fan of feathers terminating that heavy lever. [["What are you?"]]

Yuca smiles toothlessly and giggles, "Oh, of course. I am a talking chiquetzal in terms of species. And, through that odd circumstance, I am the Secretary of the Menagerines by title." You must seem a little puzzled- Yuca has a gleam in her eye, beginning again. "Right, I should explain: the Nation of the Cuazolmoc Archipelago is something called a menagerarchy, which is defined by a key separation between average human citizens' state and the non-human state..." She goes on, clearly excited by the topic(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[, but not the same kind of excited you saw with her jaws wrapped around your hand, you might note]. [["Wait wait, hold on- chiquetzal?"]]

Yuca looks attentively at you once more. "You're in a vacation home near the Chicachel River in the Cuazolmoc Archipelago. It is shared between me and my colleagues, the menagerines." She smiles, wriggling an inch closer, "So, the nation of Cuazolmoc has somewhat similar to a bicameral system, except..." She goes on, clearly excited by the topic(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[, but not the same kind of excited you saw with her jaws wrapped around your hand, you might note]. [[Bobble your head and let her continue.->Let her continue.]]

"... So, what that means for- or rather," Her snout whisks and her eyes dart around before honing in on you. "Let's start here: what form of government are you used to living under?" [["Anarchy."]] [["Piracy. Pirate-archy? Pirarchy."]] [["I never really cared."]]

Yuca re-focuses on you. Her plumage smoothes itself down. "Oh, right- they are a species of large, flightless, warm-blooded raptors." She cranes and twists her head down to rub down the feathers on her face: an uniquely bird-like gesture. "Like me in every way, except I have my cognition and speaking ability." [["So they're an animal that your people are distantly related to?"]]

"Executive Secretary to the Queen. I help the leaders of the Liminal Branch organize and communicate among themselves, writing memos, handling communiques, making announcements and holding conditional courts. A position I'm proud of, as tough as it can be." She recites, poised high and aglow. [["That does sound tough..."]] [["You sound like the kind we'd rob and ransom off in the Gulf. No offense."]]

"Oh, no, well," She says, her voice growing quieter in this train of thought the longer it goes on. "I came from a chiquetzal egg. I am a chiquetzal in most ways anatomically. But I'm a person, too. Colloquially, a talking chiquetzal." (link-reveal: '"Did they raise you?"')[ You ask. Yuca lids her eyes and lolls her head to the side, like a shrug. "Best they could. They fended for me when I was a chick. I have no intimations of them, as I was taken into a town very soon after hatching." [["Oh."]]]

"Anarchy." You say with an air of provocation. "Ah, hmm," Yuca atempts to steeple her wing-like foretalons and consider. "Well the Nation of Cuazolmoc does have a central government, but it's quite different from others..." You let her continue. "There's a small, indirectly ruling governmental body called the Liminal Branch, due to being made up entirely of liminal beings like me. Then you have your normal, human branches of government that run directly: executive, judicial, and etcetera..." [["Huh."]]

You scratch your head while coming up with that one. Yuca holds her snout in her wing-like forelimbs, stiffling a giggle. "I see! Well, I can't say I know the nuances of... That." (unless:$piratetalk is 1)[Her head closes in an inch or two, looking at you directly, "What was it like in the 'pirarchic' little nation of yours? How did being a pirate treat you?" [[Deflect, "It was rough."->"Rough..."]] [[Smile curtly, "I saw the world on someone else's dime, so worth it."->On Someone Else's Dime]] (if:(history:)contains "What is more glorious than this?")[[Show your own fangs, "Glorious."->"Glorious."]]](else-if:$piratetalk is 1)[[...->Then the kettle hisses.]]

Yuca nods, sucking her teeth softly. "Ah, alright... What's important to know is that there's a small, indirectly ruling governmental body exclusively chaired by liminal beings such as me, and several strictly human branches that rule directly." She explains, for what it's worth. [["Huh."]]

Yuca bobs her head absently, shifting in her seat. "So, any other questions?" Now that you think of it, you don't actually know what a secretary is exactly. Certainly not a sailor or a cane farmer's position. [["Yeah- what's a secretary?"->"Wait- secretary?"]]

You step down and sit across from it, feeling well accompanied by down-stuffed silk pillows and embroidered cushions. You look down at the food before you (if:(history:)contains "Dig in.")[and pick at it mildly, distracting yourself from the brazen, slotted eyes bearing down on you.](else:)[and eat the charcuterie ravenously, oblivious to the brazen, slotted eyes bearing down on you until after your hunger is satisfied.] "My name is Yuca. I am a woman." She offers after a few moments, the fire growing and licking the bottom of her kettle. A woman! It fits her, now that you consider it. "And you are?..." [["Emanuel Tsueh, a man."]]

Yuca does that shrug-esque gesture again. "Like I said, it's plenty rewarding." She nods to the room, to its ammenities and its stock of books and the tea kettle over the lit fire. Her slotted eyes focus on you, narrow snout slyly smiling and inching closer. "What was your occupation before you washed up on my shore?" [["A privateer aboard the galley //Bonne Maude//."->"A privateer."]]

(set:$piratetalk to 1)Yuca laughs openly, flashing fangs from that blade-like snout. "A pirate, marvelous." Her gaze like gun barrels with eyelashes, and unavoidable. "It sounds like you were in with a rough sort, then. Privateering, I assume? Tell me: what was it like, that business?" [["Rough..."]] [["I saw the world on someone else's dime."->On Someone Else's Dime]] (if:(history:)contains "What is more glorious than this?")[[Show your own fangs, "Glorious."->"Glorious."]]

"Rough, yeah..." You sink back against the cushions of the conversation pit, as if pinned there by her scrutiny, your eyes demuring to the table. You take your time, breathing in as an answer forms on your lips. (link-replace:'"We were..."')["We were poor and angry most of all, if I'm being honest. Some of us took to it well, others... Died, basically." Yuca's eyes cast down with yours, on the way you sit. (if:(history:) contains "She finds you.")["That's... An interesting answer."](else:)["I see," She inclines her snout, shutting her eyes pensively. "That doesn't terribly surprise me."] [["Why's that?"]]]

Yuca giggles softly at that, "I can imagine," She shifts her bulk on the cushions, "I suppose we're not terribly different in that way. I also live off the wealth of my people." [["That's more honest than I'd expect."->Fair enough.]]

(link-replace:'"We did what we wanted,"')["We what we wanted. We sailed where we wanted, took what we wanted," You explain, "Without cease at any border. They couldn't catch us or stop us. I held jewels in my hands for the first time ever, something I'd never hope to as a cane farmer. The captain of my first ship, the //Caterpillar//, had a harem..." Yuca interjects, "Did you have a harem?" (link-reveal:'"No, I didn\'t-"')[ "What about the jewels, did you get to keep them?" She drawls, "Did you wear them about the decks in the heights of fashion?" (link-replace:'"No,"')["No, of course not, we sold them for supplies." She chuckles with no lack of cruelty, "Seems like glory was all you had. Tell me: was it a pleasant life, or was it a cruel, brutish, and short one?" [["Yeah, it was, rough..."->"Rough..."]] [["Yeah, y'know?- whatever, you just don't get it."->Fair enough.]]]]]

(set:$piratetalk to 1)"You didn't happen to illegally divorce other people from their goods, did you?" She teases you, from the look in her slotted gold eyes and the wavering of her head. (unless:(history:)contains '"Rough, like you said."' or "On Someone Else's Dime." or '"Glorious."')[ [["Yup, you got me."]]](else:)[["Yup, you got me."->Then the kettle hisses.]] (if:(history:) contains "I don't like to admit that I enjoyed it, least of all to myself...")[(unless:(history:)contains '"Rough, like you said."' or "On Someone Else's Dime." or '"Glorious."')[["Far more than that, miss Yuca."]](else:)[["Far more than that, miss Yuca."->Then the kettle hisses.]]]

Her head rolls slightly, still looking at you fairly closely. "And what was that like?" [[Deflect, "It was rough."->"Rough..."]] [[Smile curtly, "I saw the world on someone else's dime, so worth it."->On Someone Else's Dime]] (if:(history:)contains "What is more glorious than this?")[[Show your fangs, "Glorious."->"Glorious."]]

A lopsided grin appears on her dark lips for just a moment, exposing her teeth. "I'm sure. I've heard the reports." Her head rolls slightly, still looking at you fairly closely. "And what was that like: your time as a privateer?" [[Deflect, "It was rough."->"Rough..."]] [[Smile curtly, "I saw the world on someone else's dime, so worth it."->On Someone Else's Dime]] (if:(history:)contains "What is more glorious than this?")[[Show your own fangs, "Glorious."->"Glorious."]]

(if:(history:)contains "She finds you.")[Your hands rest on your lap, and so does her gaze. "You could've easily walked into my home and taken what you needed; the door wasn't locked or anything. I would've hardly blamed you, the condition you were in. That sounds like one of those that die, in your circumstances."](else:)[Your hands rest on your lap, and so does her gaze. "Barging in, getting what you needed: makes perfect sense." Yuca's eyes come to your face, "I don't mind the intrusion, like I mentioned."] (if:(history:)contains "She finds you.")[[[Laugh, "I don't know if you're calling me a gentleman or a fool."->Rough standing.]]](else:)[[[Grin, "That sounds like an invitation. Be careful."->Rough standing.]]]

(if:(history:)contains "She finds you.")[Yuca grins at you, "Why not both? Many of the human gentlemen I've known are." You suppose she does know a good deal of humans from her occupation, it occurs to you.](else:)[Yuca grins, dark lip wry and lax around her fangs. "Don't get too confident. You're alone with me, remember." Deeply unsettling, but true: you're just some waterlogged pirate in her home, no paperwork, no connections, no defense against her except her own personal honor. She could easily kill you, devour you, and throw your gnawed bones in the river she found you at and none would be the wiser. She must notice you expression, "I'm sorry," Yuca says, inclining her head with an embarassed grimace. "That was tasteles of me, I shouldn't jest..."] (if:(history:)contains "She finds you.")[[["Yeah, fair enough." You smile in tune.->Fair enough.]]](else:)[[[Swallow hard, shaken by the thought. "Yeah... I'm at your mercy."->"At your mercy."]]] (unless:(history:) contains "She finds you." or "She retreats.")[[[Shake off the frisson of terror and laugh, "No, you're right, I'm at your mercy. But you've been merciful so far."->"Merciful so far."]]]

(if:(history:)contains '"Glorious."')["I suppose not," Laughing, Yuca does that shrug-esque gesture again. "But I shouldn't tease you; I'm genuinely curious. We have to protect our people from pirates, but I've had the inclination to believe we could reform and assimilate them as citizens." She averts her snout, but her eyes furtively flick back up to your face after she says her mind.](else:)[(if:(history:)contains "On Someone Else's Dime.")["An ounce of humility can't hurt. Or, perhaps, shamelessness." ]She (if:(history:) contains '"At your mercy."')[shakes her feathered head, as if dismissing the grim topic, and ]smiles at you. "But, to the point at hand, and speaking of, I must be honest with you: we've had to decide about how we meet about problems of piracy in our state. I've had the inclination to believe we could reform and assimilate them as citizens." She averts her snout, but her eyes do flick up to your face after she says her mind.] (link-reveal:'"How do you intend to do that?"')[ You ask. "Well, that's the question. What do you think?" (link-reveal:'"Why should I help you?"')[ You say. "I'm just fishing for your opinion. Like I said, I wish for a negotiation rather than retribution, so you could hardly do wrong for your profession speaking to me now."] [["There's no reforming a man who's in it for the nookie."]] (link-reveal: '"Asking me for a coherent thought is like trying to bleed a stone."')[ Yuca giggles at that, but encourages you, "Please, it doesn't have to be an exquisitely formulated thought. I just want to hear your thoughts." [[Give it your damnedest shot.]]] (if:$north is 1)[["Sing to them."]]]

Yuca's tail rises and falls, its feathered tip fanning as her neck curls her back and she wears an embarassed pall. "Oh, don't put it like that! I was terribly brutish to say anything like that; we're not on the high seas. We're in settled land." You feel surprised, with how wild your introduction to this land was, and it must read in your expression. "I promise." She adds. [["I'll take your word for it."->Fair enough.]]

Yuca's neck curls her back as she smiles with some notable warmth, toothlessly. "I hope to make it a question of your comfort and not my mercy." You laugh softly, with her. [["Fair enough, thanks."->Fair enough.]]

You wrack your rum-addled brain. You imagine it smells like burnt sugar cane. (link-replace:'"Shoes?"')["Shoes? Buy them good boots? Maybe they'd lub land if they had some comfy gaiters?" You narrowly avoid saying that, sitting there running your fingers through your hair in silence. (link-replace:'"...Yeah, nah,"')["Yeah, nah, I'm hopeless in this regard." You actually reply. Yuca giggles softly, resting back in her seat, "Thanks for the attempt." (unless:(history:)contains '"Where am I?"')["Anyway, I got another question," You say, and Yuca perks, [["Where am I?"]]](else:)[(unless:(history:)contains '"What are you?"' and '"Where am I?"')[[...->Then the kettle hisses.]]]]]

Yuca blinks, her slotted amber eyes wide. "Sing to them? What on earth could you mean by that?" You explain: "Pirates love song, they sing all the time in their labors and in their restful periods. I've heard some sing in their sleep. The only way you can make a pirate give their ship is force or a siren's song, so if you're disinclined to kill them then... Yeah, song." There's something strange in her expression that you haven't seen before(if:(history:) contains "She retreats.")[ even when she nearly bit you]: something between discovery and fond amusement, focused on you almost raptly. "I didn't expect that. Interesting." She says softly. You feel a little bashful under the attention, combing your fingers through your long hair. (unless:(history:)contains '"Where am I?"')["Anyway, I got another question," You say, and Yuca perks, [["Where am I?"]]](else:)[(unless:(history:)contains '"What are you?"' and '"Where am I?"')[[...->Then the kettle hisses.]]]

"Totally savage, they are, unworkable like clay that's been baked into an awful, rapacious ceramic. The only choice you have is to meet them on the sea, to break them or be broken yourself." You claim. Yuca nods gravely as she settles back, into a long quiet. (unless:(history:)contains '"Where am I?"')["Anyway, I got another question," You say, and Yuca perks, [["Where am I?"]]](else:)[(unless:(history:)contains '"What are you?"' and '"Where am I?"')[[...->Then the kettle hisses.]]]

Yuca smiles entreatingly, "Of course, it's a topic I'm very interested in, but I imagine it's a tad abstract for you." You nod(unless:(history:)contains "Dig in.")[, biting into some charcuterie], "Yeah, I'm affraid so, miss." [[...->Then the kettle hisses.]]

You're both caught off guard when the kettle starts to whistle steam, boiling over into that fire. Yuca begins to rise from her seat and step toward the whistling kettle, presumably to make tea without the use of her hands. There's clearly some devices that allow her to do such things, but it still can't be that intuitive for her. [[See how your host does it.]] (link-reveal:'"Let me help you with that."')[ Yuca smiles, broadly and politely with her eyes shut. "I can handle it fine, despite my morphology. Please, let me be your host." [[Insist. "I got hands. It's no problem, honest."]]]

Very carefully, so it seems. Yuca has to extend her long, scaled snout into the fireplace to grip the kettle's handle and lift it from the frame that holds it over the logs. When she hoists it over the table and gingerly sets it down on a knit mat for it one side of her face is damp with steam, squinting that eye shut. "There," She says, letting the handle free. [[Let her do it...->Continue watching her make tea.]] (link-reveal:'This is nerve-wracking to watch. "Here, let me do the rest..."')[ Yuca smiles politely, "It's quite alright; I have a lot of practice doing this." [["Me too, and I also have hands. Please, I insist."->Make tea.]]]

Yuca hesitates, then settles back down on her haunches, inclining her gently smiling snout and narrowing her eyes. "Fine, then." You fetch the hissing pot from the hooks that hold it over the coals and place it on a knit mat on the table between you two. You notice in your palm the impressions of her teeth in the cork handle.(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ It's hard not to compare them to the impression she left in your arm.] "Oh, the leaves are in that tin, and the pot's just beside it." She nods toward the said box, left open next to the fireplace. [[Make tea.]]

(set:$distance to 'begin')Yuca fetches a teapot near the fireplace, placing on the table before you, and then an open tin, squeezing them between her indexterous forelimbs. Within it her narrow jaws grasp an aluminum strainer by an affixed handle, scooping a few packed balls of black tea up in it. Your host places the strain down in the open top of the teapot, then grasps the handle of the kettle, lifting it and gingerly clasping its body in her forelimbs' claws to pour its steaming contents into the pot, through the leaves in the strainer. The tea pot's closed and left to steep. After that she settles across from you, shaking out her mane of feathers and craning her neck to wipe her face on her shoulder. [[...->Brewing tea.]]

(if:(history:)contains "See how your host does it.")[Yuca settles back down in her seat, wiping the side of her face off on her feathery shoulder and laughing softly, "If you insist! The tea and the pot are just beside the fireplace." ]You rise up and smooth down that lone silk garment. Yuca points out an open tin and a rather simple iron teapot; you fetch both, sitting across from her. You find a small aluminum strainer in the tin, using it to fish out clumped balls of black tea before resting the strainer in the top of the teapot. Sitting up you lift the kettle, pouring the scalding water in through the loaded strainer, steam rising in a thin cloud from the combination. You close the teapot's hatch over the strainer, settling back down in your seat across from her as it begins to steep. All the while she watches your hands as they work.(set:$distance to 'begin') [[...->Brewing tea.]]

(if:$distance is 'begin')[You rest forward with your elbows on the table, her gaze resting on the spaces beside you.](else-if:$distance is 'neutral')[You're back to facing each other in the pit, your elbows on the table as you look around each other's shoulders out of deference.](else-if:$distance is 'close')[You fold your hands over your stomach and find yourself comfortably looking around as Yuca sits near you, her head looming over the adjacent seat while the rest of her body's nestled in the seat beyond that in the cushioned pit.](else-if:$distance is 'distant')[Yuca's neck lilts away from you and one of her forelimbs is hung up on the edge of the pit, her frame twisted away from you, her tail occasionally shivering coldly. You feel quite distant, mirroring her by leaning on the edge and looking around absently.] (link-replace: "What is she thinking about?")[(unless:(history:)contains "Let her ask it.")[(if:(history:)contains "Sing to them.")[ You catch her looking at you, Yuca's eyes very slightly widening the slots in her cloth-of-gold irises, the feathers on her meridian rising in hardly perceptible increments. She's thinking of a question to ask... [[Let her ask it.]]](else:)[You catch Yuca's eyes centering on you implacably for a moment. You avert your gaze when the attention somehow becomes too much.]]] (unless:(history:)contains '"You like to read a lot, huh?"')[(link-replace: "Look to the piles of books off to one side of the den.")[You glance at the one or two books left around the conversation pit you two sit at, then up to the stacks of books left out. [["You like to read a lot, huh?"]]]](else:)[Books are stacked or left swept out around the parlor breezily. That raptor's studiousness seems undeterred by her anatomy.] (unless:(history:)contains '"Do you do much cooking?"')[(link-replace: "Look back toward the kitchen.")[You look toward the wall that divides the den from the kitchen, decorated by a decorative bronze relief of a stormcloud, a gas lamp hanging from one of its lightning bolts. [["Do you do much cooking?"]]]](else:)[The stormcloud lamp flickers on the divide between the den and the underutilized kitchen.] [(unless:(history:)contains '"Coins."')[(if:(history:)contains "Take it.")[[[ Take out that electrum dubloon you found and do a coin trick with it.->Coin trick.]]]]] (if:(history:)contains "Let her ask it." or '"Do you do much cooking?"' or '"You like to read a lot, huh?"')[[Enough chat. Let's pour that tea.->Pouring tea.]]

Yuca's eyes follow yours to the eastern wall laden with books in haphazard stacks and in general disorder. She shifts in her seat, centering the barrel of her body and letting her fan-ended tail flap once before settling. "Oh, yes, pardon the mess. Reading comes with the occupation, but I've always found it fascinating and enjoyable(if:$ssotbme is 'closed')[." She notices the small bookstand next to the conversation pit, and particularly, that the leatherbound book titled //Sex Secrets of the Black Magicians Exposed// is closed without marking her place in it. Her eyes dart back at you and she attempts to mute her expression of surprise and embarassment with a polite smile. [[Point out that book with a rakish grin. "Learn any good sex secrets?"->"Learn any good sex secrets?"]] [[Don't point it out, but do say, "This may surprise you, but I can read."->"This may surprise you, but I can read."]]](else:)[. Feel free to peruse them yourself if you have the inclination. You'll certainly have the time." [["I just might. This may surprise you, but I can read."->"This may surprise you, but I can read."]]]

Yuca draws on a cushion with her crescent-shaped raptor talon, swaying in her seat before glancing up at you with a demure look. [[Sigh, "You want to hear me sing, don't you?"]]

Yuca raises thumbless, indexterous foreclaws. "I'm affraid not. Tea and coffee are my specialty. I suppose I could boil rice..." She looks toward the kitchen's wall. "I do have provisions though, for whenever a storm or an ailment might force me to stay indoors, including some wine or beer(if:(history:)contains "Dig in.")[, as you already know." (link-reveal:'"Yeah... Sorry about the breaking and entering."')[ "It is no problem, like I said," Yuca replies, "You're my guest and you were in a terrible way]]."(unless:(history:)contains "Dig in.")[ (link-replace:'Perk at the mention of booze.')[You perk up at the mention of booze. "Don't get too excited. The alcohol is for when fresh water is sparse," She considers, head canting to one side with a sly smile. "Or, I suppose, special occasions."]] [["So usually you just go out and hunt?"]]

Yuca inhales, then speaks in her hoarse lilt. "You've got very pretty eyes." Which catches you flat-footed, initially looking down, then back up into her gaze so she can appraise those said eyes. "Thanks." You say, remembering the rather concerning transformation they've taken on since you've landed: from the deep brown eyes you've inherited to these midnight-colored, fish-scale irridescent irises. (link-reveal:"That's not a question, dammit. Do we even tell her about that part? The whole transformation thing?")[ (text-color:$vvitch)[Don't you feel the potency of the question laden in it? "Where did you get those eyes?" "Can I have those eyes?" It is true in every iteration of that compliment, but more so in this one.] (link-reveal:"I've also been talking to myself more than usual. Do you think she knows they've changed?")[ (text-color:$vvitch)[I've said enough.] [[Let her know.]] [[Demure from it.->Brewing tea.]]]]

"You're not gonna believe this, but..." You rub your hands, looking down from her gaze. "They were brown, until I washed up here. I just noticed when bathing that they had changed." Yuca regards you down her long snout, canting her head slightly, and speaking after a hesitation. "Really?" She hums softly, knitting her brow in thought. "I've never heard of such a transformation. But, I suppose I shouldn't be terribly surprised." You muffle a smile behind your knuckles, though she still spots it and returns it with a soft giggle. Then you can't help laughing yourself with that girlish, predatory lizard across the table from you, resting laxly back in your seats. (if:(history:)contains '"Sing to them."')["Tell me," She says, "You claimed all pirates sing. What about you?" (link-reveal:'"Not a pirate, not anymore."')[ You say, "Now I'm just another land-bound man with some shanties in my dome. So..."] [["Yeah, I sing."]]](else:)[[...->Brewing tea.]]

Yuca rises quickly to grasp the book in her teeth, striding over to where her small library is piled and put it away. "Learn any good sex secrets?" Her feathers rise in a peculiar manner as you make such a coarse reference aimed at her; she pauses, faced away from you. One of her feet rises and curls her bladed toes, resting on the knuckles and shifting her weight onto the other paw as her plumage settles once again. With her in this sort of counterpoise, your eyes draw to that pinion-ringed tail and the heavy haunches it begins at, a modesty-giving garment hanging from it. The lines of her bestial legs, its powerful hamstrings, the lean, corded shape of those avian limbs...Terminating in those black feet, carrying raptorial claws with featherlight ease. The curled blade she flexes, taps her sole with- a reminder. She could pin you to an anonymous death in an instant. In this sort of counterpoise your eyes are drawn through the lines of her large, bestial legs, through the powerful hamstrings moving beneath the pure white down, up to her broad fundament and the base of her large tail ringed with pinions. The sheer cloth hanging there between her thighs keeps the modesty of something that you realize you can only conjecture about. Necessarily, back down to the black crescent she carries with featherlight ease, and could pin you to your last breath in an instant. You hold your elbow to stop a nervous, alien trembling that suddenly crawls up your body. [[...->Say whatever comes to your mind?]]

"I admit, it does. In most estimations I've heard, pirates are largely illiterate." Yuca says, turning her snout to push the book stand away(if:$ssotbme is 'closed')[, and with it, the //Sex Secrets of the Black Magicians//.](else:)[, taking care to keep her place in the open book on its surface before gingerly stowing it beneath the device with her teeth.] "Is that accurate?" She asks. (link-reveal:'"Oh, yeah."')[ "So why are you the exception?" (link-reveal:'"Does there need to be a reason?"')[ You say, shrugging your shoulders, which only makes her lean in with more interest and scrutiny. "I assume you didn't emerge literate through //gnosis//..." She says. (if:$north is 1)[[[Cross your arms and smile at her implacably.->Gnosis.]]](else:)[[Chuckle, "Nah, but it is a story."->Captive story.]]]]

She bobs her head, fidgeting with her foreclaws as she looks away. "Yes, unfortunately." (link-reveal:'"Why do you say that?"')[ You ask, scratching your cheeck. "It's just terribly messy and uncouth. Humans have such a courtly method of hunting, but the way I must do it..."(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ Yuca scrunches her brow, incling her snout away from you. "Well, you've seen how bestial I can be." You look down at the clotted laceration on your forearm, remembering the look in her eyes then compared to now, and find it hard to disagree. [[Show that mark she left on you, "Have you ever... Gone all the way, with a human?"->All the way.]]](if:(history:)contains "Continue south.")[ [["Hunting game with just tooth an nail? I think that's quite admirable."->Hunting admiration.]]] [["We do what we got to. Anyway, you clean up mighty nice."->Clean up nice.]]]

(if:(history:)contains "Continue north.")[Yuca eyes you. "An electrum coin? In the river?" She knits her brow, looking aside and scratching the front of her bespoke blouse. "Treasure comes with a price."](else:)[Yuca eyes it like a curious crow, twisting her long neck to gaze without touching. "A coin like this? In the river?" She straightens, knitting her brow and intoning. "Treasure comes with a price."] (link-reveal:'"Sometimes treasure is free, though."')[ You argue, which makes her chuckle and shake her feather-ringed head. "Forgive me for being superstitious, but sometimes these things are reasonable. Perhaps there are interlopers on my territory, one who dropped a coin..." [["Coins."]]]

(if:$north is 1)[You produce that ovoid electrum coin for her to see, her glinting eyes focused on that glistening coin. "What's that?" She asks. You answer, with a mischevious grin, by making it disappear behind you hand with a bit of ledgerdemesne, which makes her smile gently and squint as she tries to discern the trick for herself. (link-replace:"Now, make it appear from behind her ear. Or, earhole, whatever.")[You lock eyes with her and reach back towards her head, then flip the coin from behind your fingers as you've practiced many times before, with a little vaudvilleian mugging at its sudden reappearence. You both look at your empty, pinching fingers, where you just had the coin. "Where did it go?" She asks. "Did you drop it?" (link-reveal:'"No!"')[ You feel yourself begin to flush, then coldly sweat; there's no way you could've dropped it. "I made disappear, of course..." "So... What was it?" She cocks her head. [["That was a coin I found in the river."->"Found a coin."]]]]](else:)[You balance that ovoid electrum coin on your curled forefinger with your thumb couched beneath, then try to flick it up and catch it. It's shape ensures, however, that it goes sailing over the table and over Yuca's back, who turns her head quickly to watch its arc. "What the devil was that?" (link-reveal:'"Shit, sorry-"')[ You rub your head and smile placatively, [["That was a cool coin I found in the river."->"Found a coin."]]]]

(set:$distance to 'distant')"Stop it." Her tail abruptly pounds the cushions it rested on, making a startling report. Yuca sits tall and straight, snout turned away as if she's unable to look at you. Then she's gravely silent, with her jaw set tight, staring down her snout at nothing in profile from you, the light of the fireplace lighting her in the tense passage of those moments. [["Sorry."]] (if:(history:)contains "Continue south.")[(if:(history:)contains '"Glorious."')[[Press, "I'm a predator myself. Let's just be honest about it."->Be honest.]]]

Yuca inclines her head to one side curiously. "Now, why do you say that?" (link-reveal:'"It shows your strength,"')[ You say, crossing your arms, "And your resolve to live, in a way that's simply absent in hunting as us humans do. I respect it." She giggles softly, rubbing her nose on the inside of her wing-like forelimb, "Sure, I can't say I see it the same way. But I'm glad you(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ still] think highly of me, Emanuel." You're bashful, suddenly, lookng away and scratching your flushed cheek. [["Yeah, uh... I didn't say that."]]]

That gets her to smile sadly, gazing down at herself. "Thank you, Emanuel." Suddenly so soft spoken, her alert poise going still. Her gracefully set jaw screwing tight, grinding to the side and her eyes squinting worrisome in her feathery mask- she's upset, or close to be. You're struck seeing such a thing on that raptor's face. [["I'm serious: you make things pretty, and decent. I don't, and I don't have any excuses either."]] (unless:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[(link-replace:"Try to reach out to hold her hand. Or, well, forelimb.")[ Is that even a good idea, chief? Touching such a beast, and one that's so fussy about her appearance, at that? Seems like pulling back a stump isn't off the table, here.(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[A human alchemy poisons her, here. The beast retreats.]] [[I'll give it a shot anyway.]]]]

You enjoy her attention, drawing her along with a quiet, pregnant leer. Yuca's long snout hovers over the coffee table, first awaiting an answer before her white downy eyebrows raise, slowly transitioning into believing her own suggestion. "You're not serious, are you?" (if:$distance is 'neutral' or 'distant')[She slithers into a seat closer to you in the conversation pit, canting her head to listen closely as if you can only whisper such an esoteric truth.] Despite, or maybe because of, her worldliness, she seems a fairly easy mark for weird tales. (link-replace: 'Crack a grin. "Nah, just playing with you."')["Nah, just playing with you." Yuca rolls her eyes, which her snout seems to mimic the motion of, but she doesn't turn cold: remaining in the seat over from you with a tuneful smile still. "You cad."(set:$distance to 'close') [[...->Brewing tea.]]]

"Do tell." Yuca encourages, turning slightly and reaching behind her with her snout: disguising herself preening out some down. (link-reveal:'"Well,"')[ You begin, crossing your arms and looking up at the sparse and unlit chandelier overhead. "This was when I was aboard the //Caterpillar//, and we had taken the deck of an Arvan scooner. Among the spoils was a school marm and she pleaded to pay her ransom by teaching us reading and arithmetic. We humored this,(if:(history:)contains '"Glorious."')[ thinking it was just an unusual form of foreplay,](else:)[ with some nastiness in our hearts all the while, I'll admit,] but she actually made a shapely class out of us in the end. Miss Patoná: she had a talent for it. I guess that's why they were shipping her around, huh?" Yuca hums curiously and you rest your cheek in your palm, recounting more. [[Continue.->Captive story continued.]]]

(if:$distance is 'begin')[(set:$distance to 'neutral')]"Oh I would never ask something like that of you so suddenly, Emmanuel. But, I would certainly love to hear you sing." She looks down at the cushions, continuing to scribe on them idly with her claw after she admits that. (link-replace: "Smile and nod.")[You smile and bob your head. Her feathers smoothing back and her graceful neck curving low, wearing a slight smile: she's becoming woman thoroughly in this instance. Don't take such moments for granted, and never doubt the rites of the dithyramb. (link-reveal: "OK, brain, thanks?")[ [["I'm flattered, Yuca, and I'll certainly consider it."->Brewing tea.]]]]

(if:$distance is 'begin')[(set:$distance to 'neutral')]"Coins? Plural?" She goads you to clarify. "There was many coins in there, maybe like a hundred," You add, "But I just took one. Thought I'd come back for the rest when I had the means to fish them out of the riverbed and haul them away." S(unless:(history:)contains "Continue north.")[till gazing at the distorted dubloon s]he hums, "A coin like that isn't in use, and shouldn't have been able to keep its shape even this much at the bottom of the Chicachel..." (link-reveal:'"What does that mean?"')[ You ask, with a smirk, "Rebels minting their own coin? Apolitical ghasts haunting your property?" Yuca chortles, "No, no- well, maybe. It means that it should be someone else's problem and I look forward to reporting it." [["I hear ya'."->Brewing tea.]]]

"Do you just say whatever comes to your mind?" Yuca's neck curls to shoot you a cold look. (if:$north is 1)[A warm darkness between the gold chords of her irises, spreading as her gaze widens down on you, and you can do little but shift in your silk mantle, tugging at its silver cuffs, before your reply.](else:)[Her slotted irises dilate, those brazen shields cracking themselves open and flashing beneath, like a feint. You can do little but swallow, drumming your foot on the table's leg before your reply.] (link-reveal:'"I did not get here considering my choices carefully."')[ You say, adding a lopsided smile. Softly Yuca cackles, the pinions and down on her buttocks shifting as she turns fluidly back toward you and into her seat once again. "I take no offense to it," She says, swiveling on the cushions, neck straightened and head held high, with the slightest curl of a smile on the corners of her lips. "But don't overstep yourself, Emanuel."(set:$distance to 'neutral') [[Swallow, and nod your head.->Brewing tea.]]]

Yuca's head curls away, laughing with a delighted expression at your words. You imagine she's blushing under her dark scales and feathers, but can only imagine. "I'm glad you think so," Her scaled snout and feather-mask cast in the beautiful blacks of cast iron or charcoal or obsidian, standing distinct in the distant fire's light. "And while you're in my domain, maybe you could learn from my example, no?" She smiles teasingly, with a flash of pearly under her parted lips.(if:$distance is 'begin')[(set:$distance to 'neutral')] [["I'll try certainly try."->Brewing tea.]]

You lean forward and reach out to Yuca, to her nearest forelimb with its wing-like feathers, grasping her long, taloned, and thumbless three digits. They squeeze around your fingers which wraps them in leathery black scales and white down. You can't help but swallow in the quiet; the first time you touch her and she seems to accept it, holding your hand in that quiet moment. You were going to say something encouraging, but it escapes you, leaving you looking up at her with your lips slightly parted. Yuca gazes down at that meeting of digits, welcome surprise in her wide eyes which linger on your hand, before her look travels up your arm and into your face. "You're rather sentimental-" (link-reveal:"What the hell does that mean?")[ Sentimental for a pirate: she's doubting you! Thinks you're just another landlubber!(if:(history:)contains "Fighting stance!")[ Or, for a warrior. You've shown her your resolve to fight, and she's just surprised at the generosity of your manslaying hands. Something like that, I'm sure.] [["For a pirate?"]] (if:(history:)contains "Continue south.")[[Just squeeze her hand and keep steady.]]]

(set:$distance to 'close')"-for what I expected, honestly." She finishes, looking down and shifting to a closer seat in the circular pit. "Piracy withstanding, of course." You gaze at the top of her snout, which is pointed down as she gingerly steps into the next seat closer to you, her scales and feather-mask cast in the beautiful blacks of cast iron or charcoal or obsidian, standing distinct in the distant fire's light. White pinions lift and settle as she seats herself, gaze meeting you again with an orange glown mixed into her eyes. "This side of you pleases me." She says in a humming voice. You've forgotten to hold onto her; your palm rests open and her claws lay on it gently. The first time touching her felt natural.(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ Well, natural and not to the detrement of your continued life.] (unless:(history:)contains "Pouring tea.")[[...->Brewing tea.]]

You set your jaw as you look up into her face, insistent though you can't help but swallow hard. "-for a pirate, and all that I would expect given that..." She finishes, her voice trailing off as does her eyes, the white pinions down her meridian rising and falling tenderly. Those foretalonns clench around your hand and she draws it closer to her; you realize how rigid you are leaned over the table when she tries to coax you over to a nearer seat. You exhale, sinking back into the cushions before your host, looking up at her. Yuca's scaled snout and feather-mask painted in the beautiful blacks of cast iron or charcoal or obsidian, standing distinct in the distant fire's light. Foil-of-gold irises just peek at you and swivel away coquettishly, lit in writhing orange firelight. "You're making me feel positively flush." "Sorry," You let go of her forelimb, your palm and her scales slightly damp against each other. "It's quite fine," She replies, wearing a smile shy but nevertheless parted over a flash of her fangs. "This side of you pleases me."(set:$distance to 'close') [["Oh, cool, I suppose..."->Brewing tea.]]

(if:$distance is 'neutral')["Could you fetch us some cups, please? In the cabinet beside the stove." Yuca asks, and you take the opportunity to stand. "Thank you, Emanuel!" You smooth down your (if:(history:)contains "Fighting stance!")[red, jaguarine poncho with a cackling of its silver bells](else:)[nightly silk mantle with a tinkling of the chains on your wrists and nape], her eyes following you away, around the corner of the kitchen's wall. You find stout ceramic cups fired in a sandy red glaze. When you return from around the wall you catch the end of a furtive and bird-like preening, Yuca straightening right as you reappear. Her eyes seem dark looking up at you, in her silhouette: you see yourself reflected, in your strange, breezy attire, showing a lot of leg. You step back down into your seat, setting the cups down before you. (link-replace:"Pour the tea.")[You heft the kettle and pour steaming black tea into each cup, sliding hers forward as the dark aroma rises up to your face. [[Now sip it.->Outfit complement.]]]](else-if:$distance is 'close')[Yuca rises from her seat to fetch cups from the kitchen: stout ceramic pieces fired with a sandy red glaze, grasped in her forelimbs indelicately. When she returns she sits beside you and her weight makes your seat shift beneath you, and displays admirable focus in trying to place the cups down on their bases. (link-replace:"Give her a hand.")[You help her without much thought, taking the cups from her, her leathery printless pads releasing them. She leaves the two cups up to your hands with a shy glance, settling back into her seat beside you. (link-replace:"Pour the tea, too.")[As you set the two cups down and lift the kettle you feel something warm and downy dusting the back of your shoulders: Yuca's graceful neck stretches behind you, encircling your nape and watching you pour from a vantage on the other side of your body. You return a smile before pouring the steaming black tea into each cup and replacing the kettle. [[Now sip it.->She smells you.]]]]](else-if:$distance is 'distant')["I guess I'll get the cups." You mumble, coming to your feet suddenly and stepping out of the conversation pit and into the kitchen. You wonder how she looks at your back, if it's with the same squint she started to wear after your prying. There's stout ceramic cups fired with a sandy red glaze in the cabinet beside the stove, which seem appropriate, and you return with them. (link-replace:"Pour the tea.")[You lift the kettle and pour the steaming black tea into each cup before replacing it on the mat. Then you gingerly slide Yuca's cup toward her, silently looking up at her face. Her gaze lifted high on a straightened neck, dark lashes and slotted irises narrowed into crosshairs, watching you as you hold the fragrant black tea before your face. [["Are you mad at me?"]]]]

You run your fingers through your hair, looking out to the front door's small foyer. "I guess I should've known you'd be so sore about it. Sorry." She at least looks at you, considering something though her face doesn't shift at all. A log crumples in the fire and its crackling din softly grows. (set:$distance to 'distant') (if:(history:)contains "Be honest.")["I have killed. That's all your need to know." She admits; something sad enters her eyes halfway through it. You can hardly match her gaze when such a thing isn't present, let alone when she makes you feel like you've torn a wound in her like so; you look down at the tea. "Yeah, me too..." You say gruffly, scratching your head.] [[...->Brewing tea.]]

You cross your arms calmly, betraying nothing in your expression as you look at her. She refuses to face you, still. "Yuca, you have a right to know what I'm capable of, and likewise..." "No, you don't." She says, lidding her eyes. Shutting you down painfully by just returning a blank profile to your prying, utterly refusing this line of questioning without even her normal level of manners. [["Sorry."]]

"You hunt admirably," You explain, after canting your head away tapping your foot against the leg of the small coffee table between you. "But I reserve my judgements, for now." Yuca smiles toothlessly and narrowly at you, "Well, I hope to earn more of your praise, then." Certainly understanding any inclination you might have to keep her at arm's length for now(if:$distance is 'close')[ (despite being literally within reach of you, that large bird sitting just a seat over)]. But despite acting so demure, she's quick to lap up your compliment.(if:$distance is 'begin')[(set:$distance to 'neutral')] [[...->Brewing tea.]]

(if:$distance is 'begin')[(set:$distance to 'neutral')]"She slept with some of us eventually, but she was a part of the crew by then." Yuca makes a curious hum. You feel yourself flush, forgetting her status breifly, wondering if you've overstepped yourself in the details. "Well," She says, neutrally, "Intersting." (link-reveal:'"Yeah,"')[ You scratch your cheek, "I guess so." "But, forgive me if this is too probing a question," Yuca begins with her foretalons crossed, "But why doesn't your crew sleep with each other instead of relying on captives?" (link-reveal:'"Huh..."')[ You cross your arms, feeling suddenly pressed by her own foregoing of status. "Well, I guess because we were all ugly?" "Not //all// of you, certainly." She drawls. (link-replace:'Tease, "Hideous, every last one of us."')[You've really never thought about it, why you took captives... All you can do is brush off this line of inquiry with gentle teasing. "Hideous, every last one of us." To which she cackles and shakes her head. "Better to spare your wiles and spoil the school marm, in my opinion." [[Slouch, "Yeah, I suppose..."->Brewing tea.]]]]]

You lift the cup to your face and blow away the steam once, twice, to cool it. The rich musk of its leaves fill your sinuses: some fermented strain of black tea unfamiliar to you, woody, intense. You taste its bold and bloody flavor without yet sipping it. Rain taps the vaulted ceiling like falling fingernails. Then, humid wind runs down the back of your neck and you barely mask a shiver; you look back at Yuca, her long snout poised to your nape. She sighs with a soft noise in her throat, blowing her breath down the back of your silk mantle, disturbing your long black hair and making you straighten again. (if:(history:)contains "Returning On Shield" or "Midnight Dithyrambs" or "In the Court")["You got into my soaps, didn't you?" (link-reveal:'"Yeah, sorry."')[ You murmur, to which she giggles. "I'm glad; I meant to mention them to you." With her nose close to your scalp she breathes in again, then lifts her nose. (if:(history:)contains "Returning On Shield")["'Returning on Shield'... (if:(history:)contains "Fighting stance!")[A fitting blend, I must say.](else:)[An interesting choice.]"](else-if:(history:)contains "Midnight Dithyrambs")["'Midnight Dithyrambs'... (if:(history:)contains '"Sing to them."')[A fitting blend, I must say.](else:)[An interesting choice.]"](else-if:(history:)contains "In the Court")["'In the Court of the All-Father'... A delightful choice."] [["What does it mean?"]]]](else:)["I meant to offer you use of my soaps; my appologies." You look up at her with a sheepish smile, [[I stink.]]]

"The name of the soap?" She hums, "I don't know. I suppose it's just what felt was appropriate." (link-reveal:"Huh...")[ You rub the back of your neck, her softly smiling snout hovering around one shoulder and her long-nailed forelimbs by the other. Then there's a playful glint in her eye; you place your tea down. "Can you guess which one I use?" (link-reveal:'"Probably not, with how ill-refined I am."')[ You say, honestly. "Just give it a shot." She encourages you, twisting and offering a stretch of her long, graceful throat. [["Well..."->Smell her.]]]]

You lean close to that serpentine neck, close enough untill white down is covers your vision and you close your eyes. Still you can't get a good enough whiff of her and you sink just slightly further toward Yuca, percipitously drawn to her. You feel her feathers and warmth on your tan face before you catch her smell: a soapy vanilla or sweet cream infused with lemon, citrusy and somewhat girlish.(if:(history:)contains "In the Court")[ It's pretty similar to the scent of the same soap you used.] The bitter keratin of her feathered musk too: very unlike a mammalian smell, but as warm-blooded as claimed. A girl, a serpent, rich goods and fine dining... You feel right then one could know her by her smell alone. You recline, opening your eyes and mulling over the scent. (link-reveal:'"What do I get if I guess right?"')[ You ask. "One wish granted." She replies with a teasing look. Which is a local euphemism for "fuck-all" on the Coast. So, what soap does she use? [["Returning On Shield?"->Guess.]] [["Midnight Dithyrambs?"->Guess.]] (link-reveal-goto:'"In the Court of the All-Father?"', "Guess.")[(set:$right to 1)] (link-reveal:'"This is a trick question, right?"')[She laughs, "No, I used the same selections of soaps you did."]]

(if:$right is 1)["Correct!" Yuca chirps with laughter, drawn back toward the table. "I knew you had some taste. I got the bundle of soaps as a gift, and that one always fit me the best, I think."](else:)["Incorrect!" Yuca chirps with laughter, drawn back toward the table. "I wash with 'In the Court of the All-Father'. I got the bundle of soaps as a gift and that one always fit me the best, I think."] You watch her clasp the cup daintily between her winged forelimbs and lifting it, neck crooking to deliver her long snout to its rim. She blows the fragrant steam away from it with a sigh; so close, you can smell her menthol-scented breath too, gazing at her profile. That long muzzle appearing from feathers like the blade of a guandao to sip musky tea, an eggshell flash of teeth behind her lips, her eyes poised and glistening behind long lashes... (link-reveal:"Wait- what the hell's happening here?")[ What's up, chief? You two are having tea and you're looking at her right now. (link-reveal:"Yeah, that's true, but...")[ But what, chief? [[It seems like it's too good to be true.]]]]

Yuca rolls her eyes, her nose drawing a loop in the air. She clasps the tea cup between her winged forelimbs, neck crooking to deliver her long snout to its rim. When she blows the fragrant steam away from it you feel menthol-scented breath on your face. Rain taps the vaulted ceiling like falling fingernails. She sips daintily. In the intermitant silence you feel like you have to say something. (link-reveal:'"I apologized, didn\'t I?"')[ You say with an unsettled smile. She bends to carefully her cup down. (if:(history:)contains '"Yeah, I sing."')["For all that's worth." She replies, head turning fussily with a slithering motion of her long neck, and a pang passing through her expression before her eyes land on you again more kindly, lips curling. "Enjoy your tea, Emmanuel. You can appolagise with a song, later." [[Smile, swallow heavily, and do as she says.->Outfit complement.]]](else:)[Those eyes wide, damp, her dark lips parted and inhaling. A hurt expression, and angry one, devastating in the lashing light of fire and aroma of black tea. (link-replace:"Should I touch her? Like, hold her 'hand' or whatever?")[Should you touch her? Now you're asking for it chief. If she wasn't pissed at you before, what makes you think she'd invite your mits on her?(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ She might really fucking bite it off this time.](if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[...And yet, when words die dance grows stronger. Cast the knucklebones on the Cuazolmoc's ruins.]](else-if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[There's nothing stopping her from the attempt at your life. Trust in your ability to foil it.]] [[I will.]] [[Nah.]]]]]

You lean forward and reach out to Yuca, to her nearest forelimb with its wing-like feathers, grasping her long, taloned, and thumbless three digits. They remain limp under your grasp, leathery black scales and white down wrapped in your small, human fingers. You can't help but swallow heavily during the first time you touch her, holding your hand in that quiet moment. You were going to say something endearing and placative, but it escapes you, leaving you looking up at her with your jaw slightly ajar. Yuca gazes at you in a pall of offense, lips peeling back and eyes glaring with irises sharpened to black lines, and releasing her breath with a sonorous, quiet growl; for a terrifying moment you think she will, in fact, maul you. Then she laughs, a bitter edge to the hoarse sound, shaking her head accutely as if trying to regain her senses from a blow to the dome. "Gods. You really try don't you?" (link-reveal:"What the devil does that mean?")[ Try to please her, or piss her off? I don't know, chief.(if:(history:)contains "Continue north.")[ She is mistaken, though. You don't try at all: these things bubble up from you like the moon crawls up from the horizon. (link-reveal:"You're no help sometimes, brain. Most of the time, actually.")[ I believe in you, for what it's worth. [["I don't."->Trying]]]](else:)[ You try to survive, most of all. Which is not a terribly noble thing for a warrior such as yourself. You should strive to conquer and rage free, even if it means certain death! (link-reveal:"You're no help, brain.")[ Maybe you're beyond help. [["I'm just trying to make it to the next day,"->Trying]]]]]

(set:_quiet to 0)You look down at your hands, squeezing and relaxing them on the tabletop. It's hopeless to try to imagine something else to say, not in the sights of those slotted, misty eyes. You feel helpless to her moods, whether it's a cordial mood or a somber one. Suddenly she speaks. Hoarse and dry, almost a whisper. "I don't know what could possess you to talk so coldly about such things." (link-replace:'"The men I knew would speak of it warmly,"')[ You straighten to breathe, "Gladly, even... I feel that would be even more callous." Yuca remains quiet for a long interval. You focus on the sloshing of the rain and the crackling of the fire to avoid the chilly feeling you get considering her. Then slowly she stands in the conversation pit, her feathers folded down tightly against her outline, glancing at you as she steps away. "I think I will retire early. If you would, please clean up." She treads heavily toward her chambers to the northern hallway, passing before the beaded threshold and closing herself in her room, leaving you alone. [[...->Alone.]]]

You lift the cup to your face and blow away the steam once, twice, to cool it. The rich musk of its leaves fill your sinuses: some fermented strain of black tea unfamiliar to you, woody, intense. You taste its bold and bloody flavor before you even take that first tenuous sip. (unless:(history:)contains '"Are you mad at me?"')[Yuca faces the table, clasping the tea cup between her winged forelimbs and lifting it, neck crooking to deliver her long snout to its rim. She blows the fragrant steam away from it with a sigh; you feel her menthol-scented breath on your face. Rain taps the vaulted ceiling like falling fingernails as you share in that taste, eyes matching between the whisps of steam and smiling. ]Yuca cants her head. "Can you stand up, please?" (link-reveal:'"Uh, sure. Why?"')[ "I want to see how that looks on you." You chuckle, and decide to humor her. "Fair." You say, putting down your cup and stepping back out of the pit, smoothing down that mantle once again. "Turn around, too." She beams up at you as you (if:(history:)contains "Continue north.")[turn on the ball of one foot, then gaze back at her over your shoulder(if:(history:)contains "Say whatever comes to your mind?")[ with you nondominant foot resting its knuckles on the ground, mimicing the counterpoise she showed you.]](else:)[turn with sulking steps about-face, feet spread and grasping your thick wrist behind your back as if you were in a muster of seamen.] [["Like this?"]]]

(if:(history:)contains "Continue north.")[Yuca brushes an area beside the pit with her tail, canting her head this way and that. "Handsome. You make a good mannequin, I must say." She teases hoarsely, to which you reply with a sarcastic grin.](else:)["Handsome." You hear her hoarse voice behind you, her weight shifting on the cushions and the crackle of the firewood. "You've got a broad back, Emanuel. I'm surprised that fits as well as it does."] Looking down at yourself you pull at the gorgeously woven silk breast of that garment. (link-reveal:'"Does this fit you?"')[ She's quiet for a moment; when you look back at her she swallows and her eyes swivel back up to your face. "Oh, no. It's for the other menagerines when they wish to stay here." (link-reveal:'"Do they wear pants?"')[ You ask, earnestly, to which Yuca giggles softly into her forelimb. "I'm affraid not. A certain nonconformity with the human form is a job requirement." Slowly you turn back toward her, still gazing at your clothes with suspicion. (link-reveal:'"... What on earth does that mean?"')[ There's a bit of incredulousness in her look. "Well, like I said, about the Menagerarchy... We liminal beings have a significant seat at the table, and you're in our vacation home." She stretches her legs in the next seat, flexing her talons idly and repressing a yawn in her wing-arm. "A few of us have fairly anthropoid features. At least, their upper halves do, hence that garment you're wearing." [[What do I make of this?]]]]]

You're in the time-share of the monstrous politicos of the Cuazolmoc Menagerarchy: their guest, their refugee(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[, nearly their victim]. (link-reveal:"What do I even know of these liminal beings?")[(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[Of the spider women that wove the arch-curses and the lascivious coils the serpent women birthing war-gods in gouts of menstrua: those that echo the incalculable eons where magma caressed the earth and worlds came and went like the panting breaths of dogs. They are not as deadly as they are beautiful, that is the wrong way to speak it- their radiance gives and takes like the seasons.]](else:)[ (text-color:$brvt)[Of those horned and hooved man-beasts, the hybrid spawn of bestial courtships or from the //woadun//-words of jealous lips: so very little except from the tales of husbands and sailors. You've always feared facing one. What could one warrior do to an opponent like that?]] [["I don't know what to make of all that."->Monsters and such.]]]

Yuca smiles broadly, leaning forward over the table, "I can't blame you: it's a thing without much precedent at all. But that's what makes it such an enticing project for me, you see? I... Well," That long muzzle twists down, fondling her nose as her peel away to consider something. "I never thought I'd do something like this, locked up in some village stall when I was young, when no one seemed to understand me. Cane farmers seemed godlike in their power over me, teaching me tricks and gawking at me in a cage..." She trails off, mute with her eyes scrunched and growing damp. (link-reveal:'"Now you are godlike,"')[ She looks at you with a measure of surprise. "Y'know, to those cane farmers and such." You continue, toying with a lock of your hair and looking away. "I suppose, but..." Her nose dips so she can rub it shyly, eyes flicking up to your face. "I hope you don't see me in such a light." [["Godlike?..."]]]

"Not at all!" She's quick to assure with a soft laugh blustering in your hair. "You washed well, and I'm actually somewhat fond of the way humans smell." You rub the back of your neck, her softly smiling snout hovering around one shoulder as her long-nailed forelimbs hang by the other.(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ "Oh, cool..." You say, feeling a fearful, chilly sweat come on with her so close, making herself comfortable in your space. She rises her head, distancing it from your nape, maybe feeling your discomfort. "I grew up in the care of some humans. I think it must be sentiment." [["I'm glad."->Glad ape.]]](else:)[ "Don't work up an appetite." You tease, to which she smirks, as one does at tasteless but well-made jokes. "It's a bit sentimental of me," She says, her nose nearly touching your clavicle and puffing softly, "But I grew up in the care of some humans, so I think that's why I like it so." [["I'm glad."->Glad ape.]]]

Do you think she's manipulating you? (link-reveal:"No, it's not that...")[ She's withholding something from you, or flat-out lying? (link-reveal:"Well, I think she is, but that's not it...")[ So what is it, chief? You watch Yuca enjoy tea so close and you're helpless to just witness her do something so simple as that. Something so electrical and defeating rolls up through you. Distantly the sky rumbles, and it occurs to you: Yuca is beautiful. She knows too, you can tell just from the way she sips tea in a way that's so difficult to her and yet she does anyway, with intent, like a prayer.(if:(history:)contains "Say whatever comes to your mind?")[ Not to you, not some enshrined god, not to some commandment. To herself? To the tea?] One golden eye opens and swivels up at you and you shudder, your heart pounding. That predator can certainly detect your fear, your arousal, or any mingling thereof. She can sense your hesitation. (link-reveal:"Oh fuck, what do I do now?")[(if:$north is 1)[(text-color:$vvitch)[ For all the paths you've come across each other on, for all the vessels your souls have traveled on towards one another, the journey cannot go on without a bridge built in flesh. Kiss the beast.]](else:)[ (text-color:$brvt)[You've come this far, sailor. Into the breach with you: kiss the girl.]](if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ Wait wait wait, y'all can't be serious: kiss her? She almost bit your hand off! We still don't know why she didn't kill you! [["Uh..."->Kiss her.]]](unless:(history:)contains "She retreats.") [[Kiss her.]]]]]

(if:$north is 1)[(text-color:$vvitch)[White feathers, charcoal feathers, yellow eyes... Like a mockingbird, no?] (link-reveal:"What are you suggesting, voice in my head?")[ (text-color:$vvitch)[Why do we think the gods are so great and huge? Often they are small, capering creatures that seem so natural in their climes. Rocks, roots, stalks, bugs and birds. Look at her, and really look at her, so you may find what is true behind mere appearences: the miracle of her monstrosity.] (link-reveal:'"Divine, maybe."')[ You murmur, and realize you've been gazing at her with a glazed expression, her own reflecting concern. She slowly laughs, rubbing her shy snout in her foreclaw. "Are you feeling alright, Emanuel?" [["I-I think I'm a little messed up..."->Nervous]]]]](else:)["I think I see you as a woman, now." You say, rubbing your chin as you consider those words, (link-replace: '"Plenty of women started their lives in cages..."')["Plenty of women started their lives in cages. I don't know any that lived to be, uh... Secretaries. Men- my kind- usually end in cages." Then, resting back against the edge of the pit, you perch your chin on your knuckles. All of the //Bonne Maude// could be in cages. In her cages, perhaps; what a twist would that be? How many of the //Caterpillar// perished in irons to be morsals for crows? You feel suddenly moody, but vital. A fighting mood, your jaw set and your stomach tight and your shoulders squared even as you lounge leonine in silks. Yuca's gazing at you with what you initially think is a sort of shock: eyes wide and lips slightly parted, the feathers along her crown and neck rising and falling. An interest, maybe. (if:(history:)contains "Say whatever comes to your mind?")[Much like you leered at her when she was putting away that manual of magical sex-secrets, she was just looking at you. ] Yuca swallows heavily and smiles brightly for you. "Well, I'll make sure that doesn't happen here, Emanuel." [["I don't know..."->Nervous]]]]

(if:(history:)contains "Continue north.")["What's wrong, Emanuel?" Yuca looks worried. You rub your temple, combing your fingers through your hair as you feel your blood course in hard beats up and down your exerted body, through your numbed legs and fingers. (link-reveal:'"I don\'t know..."')[ "You've had a tumultuous couple of days." She says, as you slouch back and sigh. (link-reveal:'"It\'s not just that..."')[ "You're sure to feel strange, having washed ashore on a strange land." She fidgets her foreclaws together with a manicured, manic clacking. (link-reveal:'"It all feels like a waking dream."')[ As you lean askew on those cushions you shoot her a smile from beneath your spread bangs and fingers. A swooning, tender look. But when you say that she looks suddenly horrified, the feathers on her meridian hiked and her gold eyes bulging, her profile engulfed in the shadow of the firelight. "I think I should let you retire early." [["Huh?"]]]]]](else:)["I don't know..." You say, rubbing your knuckles under your chin and looking off absently. But there's really nothing left to say beyond that, you realize: you simply don't know, and don't have faith in any outcome. Yet Yuca seems sympathetic to that sentiment, head bobbing on her heron neck. "As I've reiterated, you're my guest. I'll continue to treat you as such, with all that entails in your benefit, and I'll leave issues of faith up to you." Yuca rises from her seat to step out of the conversation pit, furtively looking your way as she adds, "You're an attractive guest to serve." [[Blink, "Huh-"->Attractive guest.]]]

(if:(history:)contains "Continue north.")["I don't try..." You swallow, "I just... Do whatever feels right at the moment. If I think about it too hard, I'm guaranteed to fuck it up. And I can't afford to do that now, can I?" Yuca's face softens as her claw also seems to accept the touch, softly wrapping your fingers. That long tail twitches, the raptor looking away from your face and sucking her teeth. "How could I spurn that sincerety?" She chuckles curtly as she begins to rise and let your hand go. "I don't blame you for our inequities, Emmanuel. We come from very different stations in life; I didn't expect us to get along perfectly. But we are getting along, to the credit of your intuition."](else:)["I'm just trying to make it to the next day," You jaw tightens and you swallow. "I realize... I might not be doing a good job if I'm upsetting you." Yuca's face softens into merely being grave, then her polite, practiced smile as you speak. Her foreclaw pushes away your hand. "I understand. Trust me." She replies lowly before standing and stepping out of the pit. "I don't blame you for our inequities, Emmanuel. I didn't expect us to get along perfectly. But we are getting along. Please do not concern yourself with my feelings like a matter of your mortality."] She bows low and slowly backpedals toward her chambers to the north, "I trust you can clean up once you're done with your tea. I feel I should retire early, today. I imagine you need your rest too; there's plenty of bedding in the linen closet, over there." And then, she leaves you alone in her parlor. [[...->Alone.]]

(if:$north is 1)[Yuca stands, smoothing the breast of her garment with the backs of her forelimbs. "You're clearly drained from your experiences, and I'm fairly tired myself, so what host would I be to keep you?" She says, glancing about rapidly. "I can clean up after, if you don't mind. I'll let you finish your tea." (link-replace:"Did I say something wrong?")[Did you say something wrong? No, chief, you were pretty well-behaved just then. I'm stumped. (text-color:$vvitch)[A tide comes, a tide goes. There is a bestial riptide beneath the surface of her unusually calm waters. Don't dive in.] (link-reveal:'"OK, Yuca,"')[ You say assuagingly, "I'll clean up when I'm done. It's no problem for me." She gives you a toothless smile with her eyes scrunched closed, just as stubbornly polite as when you first sat down. Bowing she backpedals and slowly turns to disappear behind the door to her chambers. [[...->Alone.]]]]](else:)["I'll clean up when I'm done out here. I think I might have another cup." Yuca bows, "Of course. You'll find plenty of bedding you can use in the linen closet just over there; make yourself comfortable, Emmanuel." Then she backpedals toward her room, turning and closing the door behind her. No leering, no skepticism or overmuch politeness: equanimity. You've finally under a roof that doesn't feel like gingerbread. [[...->Alone.]]]

(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")["I'm glad for that. I'd hate to meet you if you didn't have such sentiments."](else:)["I'm glad you've taken a liking to us apes. We can be a brutish sort."] You drink your tea indulgently and expect a reply, but she's quiet. When you look at her you find her eyes fixated on you. Considering something with a certain breathless slackness, she wets her lips with the tips of teeth glinting and draws near. That whole blade-like snout homing in on your face for purposes you can only guess. You set your tea down. [[Stop her.]] (unless:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[[Trust, and let her.]]

(unless:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[You're trembling when you realize what you've set yourself to do, in a fatal, frozen moment, with one of her gleaming eyes peeking at you and your body interminally drawing forward toward her. She places her tea down, and her blade-like snout turns poised toward you. Timbers shivered, you close your eyes. You feel the thin lips at the end of her long snout press to your own. A rush of warmth, a moment of hesitation, and she opens to you, letting your small human mouth seal with her serpentine maw. One that, certainly, is used to kill and devour prey, one that you perhaps should have a reasonable doubt of- yet it's intoxicating to feel there. Her tongue pushes into your mouth and your own smaller one slides between, between it and pin-sharp teeth, your head canting in tune to her gracefully twisting skull.(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[As it has pierced the nape of game it kisses ravishingly: that beak of a primeval beast in ruined, vine-choked strata taking to human lovers. You are nowhere near her first.]] [[Hold her.]] [[Break it off now.]] ](else:)[You turn back to your tea, looking anywhere but at her and drinking indulgently while she remains quiet. That fresh silence seems to grow interminably long. When you glance at her you find her eyes fixated on you squarely. Considering something with a certain breathless slackness, she wets her lips with the tips of teeth glinting and draws near. That whole blade-like snout homing in on your face for purposes you can only guess. You set your tea down. [[Stop her.]]]

You flinch and guard yourself with an open palm when you find that raptor's snout closing in. Those dark scales, those pursed lips, land in your calloused palm, and when you look at her find her surprised expression and her eyes crossing to gaze down at your fingers, with her feathers pluming high in what you imagine is deep mortification.(if:$north is 1)[(text-color:$vvitch)[ Like dimes in divining pools the vision is clear to you. A hatchling in mucked stalls that seem so grand and tall to her, smiling and flush at the ranch boy that speaks idly of his labors and loves to her...]] [[Hold her face.]]

Facing her, you lid your eyes and slacken yourself to recieve whatever she has for you. Maybe she'll just sniff you again, or something as simple as that... You feel the thin lips at the end of her long snout press to your own. A rush of warmth, a moment of hesitation, and you open with her, letting your small human mouth seal with her serpentine maw. One that, certainly, is used to kill and devour prey, one that you perhaps should have a reasonable doubt of- yet it's intoxicating to feel there. Her tongue pushes into your mouth and your own smaller one slides between, between it and pin-sharp teeth, your head canting in tune to her gracefully twisting skull.(if:$noth is 1)[(text-color:$vvitch)[ As it has pierced the nape of game it kisses ravishingly: that beak of a primeval beast in ruined, vine-choked strata taking to human lovers. You are nowhere near her first.]] [[Hold her.]] [[Break it off now.]]

You keep her there, in the next seat, feathers rised and expression open, behind your halting touch. Yuca looks suddenly so full and charged, huffing into your palm, then suddenly so small, her eyes damp, hesitant, and sad gazing at you over the short expanse between you two. You slowly move you hand, brushing your fingers down the smooth dark scales of her featherless nose, over her damp lips. Your other hand rises, softly clasping the blade-like snout of that raptor, smoothing down to her cheeks beneath that black mask of feathers, inlaid with her worrisome golden eyes. Their slots widen with arousal staring at you, her lips parting and letting out a soft gasp of breath blowing against your face. You watch those sharp, pearly teeth, inches from your face. With an eerie calm washing over, (link-reveal:"you know what to do.")[ Your fingers drift to her open lips, tracing their long dark horizon, before slipping within. Feeling the tops of her teeth, damp and terribly sharp, set in vice-strong jaws but remaining welcome for you, letting you feel the smooth expanse of her tongue as you haltingly explore her maw. You feel its intentions, you feel her control and desire both within. Your hands fall from her lips, sitting facing each other, and you let come what may for the first time. [[...->Trust, and let her.]]]

You surge forward, head stretched up to meet her, the raptor's skull curling over you like a wilting wilting bloom on a high stem. Your hands move over her forelimbs, up those flightless wings to her shoulders, around the plumage of her mantle. Her claws wrap your hips as you squeeze each other close, as her tongue wraps your own and the taste of her spit dominates your mouth. You're panting when she draws her lips from your own, punctuating it with a peck before you both open your eyes. "You're shaking." Yuca whispers, and you find that true: trembling deeply against her, feeling incredibly flush all over. Her feather-crowned head slithers over your shoulder and down your back. She rubs her nose up and down your taut spine, breathing deeply into your silk garment, misting you with humid wind. You feel that narrow barrel inflate and relax under your hands, see the length of that downy pelt hike its feathers in delight, to your great relief. [["You're..."->Poking.]]

You pull back and for a moment you're just connected by her long tongue still in your mouth; she follows you, surging forward as you fall backwards into the cushions. Her lean bulk of prickling, pluming feathers clothed in a lacey blouse, and covetous, crescent-clawed feet, come down over your legs. Her forelimbs press their long nails into your clavicle as she looks down at you, with your dark hair pooling around your head and (if:$north is 1)[your darkly iridescent eyes gazing up at her sparkling and betraying fear.](else:)[your hard, scarred body bracing itself against her, beneath her.] [["You're..."->Poking.]]

"I mean," Yuca tosses her head as her feathers plume up, smiling sheepishly, "I mean that you're nice to have around. You're not a menagerine, but not a citizen either...(if:(history:)contains "Be honest.")[ You inspired my anger. Strange to say, that can be a relief when so many mince their words around me.](if:(history:)contains '"Learn any good sex secrets?"')[ You're not affraid to be bold even if it makes you look like a fool.](if:(history:)contains "Be honest." or '"Learn any good sex secrets?"')[ And y](else:)[ Y]ou've been very forthcoming about your past as a privateer. You had every right to refuse my prying." (link-replace:'"I..."')["I'm glad." You exhale, coming to rest back with your arms spread on the edge of that pit. You're more glad than you thought, or relieved perhaps: you've found some way you fit in to her little world, for now. One that doesn't rely on her honor as a citizen, but instead her desire as a person. "Very glad." You must look like you're ready to swoon, head lolling back and lids heavy as they are: you're also very tired, and just a moment of fully relaxing the tightly-wound will to survive has made it impossible to coil once again. "Oh, I should let you retire early," She laughs softly. [["Maybe for the best."->"Huh?"]]]

(if:(history:)contains "Hold her.")["You're..." You begin, but can't find anything to say, so you softly laugh into her neck. "You're hard." She notes, and you release her, drawing back to cross your legs and draw the front of your garment down. (link-reveal:"Sorry.")[ You say. Those yellow eyes glistening fully under fluttering lashes, her lips still damp and parted, her body still sitting open to you... "Perhaps we should... Consider things, for now." She whispers, with a leveling smile. It's deflating, but you must agree. "Yeah... I think so." You both turn away but sit shoulder to shoulder, squirming to hide your arousal, or trying to smooth down her erect feathers. You finish your teas quietly, exchanging occasional, coy smiles: there's so much to be said, it feels like, but you are both struck silent. Before long, Yuca stands and steps out of the pit. "Well... This was nice." She bows deeply, "I shall retire a bit early today. Don't worry about cleaning up. You need your rest even more urgently than I, I can imagine. Sleep well, Emanuel." [["You too, Yuca."->Alone.]]]](else:)["You're poking me with those..." "Sorry, I..." Yuca pulls herself off of you, talons and all, head swiveling away to her rub her nose.(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ Even as sweating and trembling as you are, how startled you were, you realize how little fear you feel. You're getting the hang of it: those jaws that pushed you inches from death, now sweetly mingling with your own. As close to equal as you can hope for now. ](link-reveal:"I just thought,")[ You sit up on your elbows in the curvature of the seating, practically panting to catch your words. (link-replace:'"Y\'know..."')["Y'know... We should take it a bit slower." Which shocks you to hear coming from your own mouth, with how little action you've got on the //Bonne Maude//, with how flush your body felt when it was under her... "Oh, yes," She straightens, smoothing down her erect feathers and adjusting her garment. "I... Feel likewise." She smiles, standing outside of the pit. "But, anyway, this was nice. I think I'll retire early." She bows deeply, beginning to step back toward her chambers. "Don't worry about cleaning up, you need your rest even more urgently than I, I imagine. You'll find plenty of bedding in the linen closet, over there. Sleep well, Emmanuel." [["Oh, you too..."->Alone.]]]]]

Rain and fire converse after your tea party abruptly ends. You stare somewhere between the space where Yuca was and where the fireplace reflects itself on the dark ceramic tile.(if:(history:)contains "Poking.")[ Slouching back into the rim of the conversation pit, your eyes run down to the outline of your prick captured in silk. You rest your head back and let out a guttural sigh, your blood still thumping an eager rhythm in you.] You drink a few more cups of tea and eat some more of the charcuterie left out for you before cleaning up(if:(history:)contains '"Huh?"' or "Poking.")[ anyway]. The rain lets up some, enough to go outside and take a leak in the musk of its wake and in the martian light of the lingering sun. The whole front of the adobe home lit up in tangerines and striped by the shadows of the jungle folliage. How to spend the rest of the day? [[Let's clean up and consider.->How to spend the rest of the day?]] (if:(history:)contains "Poking.")[[There's something I want to do...]]

You return to the den after freshening up out on the back patio. You ignite some gas lamps to help the sun to light the parlor. Then you pace and swing your arms idly, looking around at your options. (link-reveal:"Reading?")[ There's quite an admirable library here. If you applied yourself to cramming this evening, you might actually learn a lot. It might be worth it just to impress Yuca, but maybe it'll come in handy in other wise. Or maybe you're just curious. [[Let's dig into her studies.]]] (link-reveal:"Scouting?")[ Since the rain's let up you could probably take a hike back where you came, or climb on the roof and look around: any way you can get a better lay of the land. It might serve you well in an emergency to have it, or maybe just feed your inner hedge hermit. [[Let's go, nature boy.]]] (link-reveal:"Dreaming?")[ Those visions you had have haunted you this whole endeavor... Changed you, in some way infintesible and meaningful. To go back there, to that Mockingbird, might be key, but it could also be a total wash. Or worse: damaging to your already tenuous grip on reality. [[Let's deepen my interest in the occult to a worrisome degree.]]]

Staying still gets you hard again; you feel very foolish standing outside Yuca's vacation home pitching a tent. You feel very alive tasting her saliva and recognizing her smell on your arm(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ which still bears the mark of her fang: a terror you've recently pushed past. Or, perhaps, transformed]. (link-replace: "There's something I want to do now...")[Masturbate, of course.(if:(history:)contains "Continue north.")[ (text-color:$vvitch)[Like a correspondence you've been wanting to reply to, the words building in your body like the tide of a levee...]](else:)[ (text-color:$brvt)[How inglorious.]] You saunter to the wall beside the door, pressing your palm to the white adobe, a stripe of yellow and grey enamel paints circumnavigating that exterior. You fondle yourself under that silk garment before pulling its front up over your shoulder and masturbate in earnest. Normally you reach for whatever fantasm has your lecherous mind's eye when you begin, but now you're just marveling at all that drool that your limb pours into your fist with just one squeeze. Now you're feeling the sun on your back and pressing your brow to the warm white wall of her abode as you pull on your cock. When you do let down an amble stream of seed into the soil and sand and the crevice where those meet the exterior foundation, softly yelping and twitching. Your erection subsides, but you still feel like a fool. [[Now what?->How to spend the rest of the day?]]]

(set:$bookish to 1)Dig you do: it's a task to root through the piles themselves, let alone look for something that's both of your interest and reading level. But you find some choices. You should choose carefully; you certainly won't have time to sit down comprehensively with more than one tonight. (link-reveal:"//Lineages Traced with an Atlatl//.")[ An austere, buckram-covered, academic tome, but after a skim through a chapter you find it's not impenitrably written. It's a history of the peoples of Cuazolmoc by a lawyer living in Ithlatlicoatl, an empire of the Eagle Gulf. It seems extensive, if flowery, and quite possibly embellished. Even still, you'd probably learn a great deal of interest to Yuca. [[This one.->Lineages.]]] (link-reveal:"//Dromuacois du Biologique//.")[ You didn't have hopes of reading this book based on the untranslated title, but luckily there's a lot of pictures: it's the collected observations and sketches of a fellow perathallasic about the flora and fauna of the Eagle Gulf and Cuazolmoc. You don't know why Yuca would favor a non-native author in this field, however. [[This one.->Biologique.]]](if:$ssotbme is 'closed')[ You find it again from where she stashed it: (link-reveal:"//Sex Secrets of the Black Magicians Exposed//.")[ That dusky, leather-bound grimoire with such a lurid title stamped and inlaid with silver on its cover: a hard thing to pass up! It even has pictures! If you don't pick this option you're just hopeless. [[Hell yeah, this one.->Sex Secrets.]]]]

The house is too wet to climb, its smooth white adobe eluding any purchase, so no plotting a course from above. You wind up just going back the path you emerged on, plotting it as you stroll down its damp, packed soil. The gnarled and vine-chocked oaks looming overhead, increasingly dim and subterranean as the afternoon comes, the gumbo-limbo trees plentiful in the woods with their peeling flesh-toned barks, the ferns and palms nodding their elephantine leaves... You're no stranger to the plants of the tropics, but this place has a certain meanness to it. Cuazolmoc's hearty and dense folliage carries sail-like webs glistening like steel, fat orb weavers sprawling at their central point and receding when they spot your approach. Parts of the path are overtaken with a patch of long grass, untrod in the wet season; crickets scatter from their blades when you pass. You find the tightly-packed scat of an herbivore, pressed grasses and ungulate tracks. Though the sun is setting you [[follow them off the path.->Off the trail.]]

Though you've felt the abyss unremittingly yawning at your feet since you've arrived at Cuazolmoc, you don't know how you'd actually revisit it purposefully, from sitting down in a cozy and lamp-lit parlor. (if:$north is 1)[(text-color:$vvitch)[Isn't it obvious? If you want to revisit that abyss, simply leap in. Spotting those auguring birds wasn't enough, listening to one dithyramb wasn't enough, was it? You need a whole nocturne: a trip to the steppe of your smooth brain. [[Wow, thanks. But yeah, I do.->On the path back to the temple.]]]](else:)[(text-color:$brvt)[A conqueror is always looking to the horizon, like you are now. To see many grasses burn, to hear the agonized mewling of your enemy's last breath, to feel yourself engorged with blood, it wasn't enough was it? You have to ride out into the inner cavities of your bitch-self, too. [[Thanks? But yeah, I do.->On the path back to the temple.]]]]

(set:$natureboy to 1)(set:$natvr to (rgb:75, 255, 75))The Chicachel is babbling not too far off though you can hardly hear it beneath the cacophany of crickets and cicadas in syncopated chorals. The smell of your quarry hits you before you see it: the repulsive and confectionary waft of a large carcass left out in the sun for a day. The meaning of it hits you just after, and you're drawn towards it, just to get a sight. The body of a deer laid in a small clearing with its wounded and twisted neck black with rot, the latice of its bones appearing from its open chest cavity. From the long cuts on its back and the spacing of many toothmarks on its nape, you know from a distance who feasted on the haunches of this beast.(if:(history:)contains "Poking.")[ You've kissed her.](if:(history:)contains '"Do you do much cooking?"')[ You think she would be mortified, to know you saw this. To see that part of her bestial nature that she can't make cosmetic: preying.(unless:(history:)contains "What is more glorious than this?")[(if:(history:)contains "Poking." or '"Huh?"')[ Suddenly you hope the //Bonne Maude// is truly on the ocean floor, so that she cannot likewise see your uncivilized shame.]]] [[Get your bearings and turn back.->Encounter.]]

(if:$north is 1)[You percieve something stirring behind you as you slowly turn, a light disturbance of crisp grass in the din of the tropic. Too brisk, too lightweight, too uncareful to be her taloned feet. A large raven rests in your trail, long skull twisting to peer at you with each glistening button-eye, inky feathers barely reflecting the remains of the sunlight. "Fork!" It croons breathily at you, its black beak snapping in the pronunciation. "Fork!" (link-reveal:"What does that mean?")[ It's just a bird, chief. It doesn't mean anything by it. (text-color:$vvitch)[Fool! Ravens do not address us without purpose! They are lashes on the eyes of seeresses and the couriers from the crowns of life-trees, never to be taken lightly!] (link-reveal:"Alright, duely noted...")[ The raven caws "Fork!" one last time before trotting around your left side to the carrion behind you, eyeing you suspiciously all the while. [["See ya', I guess."->Returning.]]]]](else:)[You percieve something stirring behind you as you slowly turn, bestial feet pressing long grasses flat in the din of the tropic. Too blunt and careless to be her's. You face a buck, hoary-pelted and broad-necked with its dark eyes gazing implacably at you. It dips its head and its eight points of antler, nodding and stamping one foot before straightening, approaching one inch further. (link-reveal:"What does it want?")[ It's just a deer, chief. It doesn't mean anything by it. (text-color:$brvt)[Don't be fooled: it's challenging you. It thinks you're not worthy to step on its ground! What warrior has withstood the test of time without facing each and every challenger?] [[This buck doesn't want my trouble. I'll leave him be.->Returning.]] [["Challenge accepted!"]]]]

(set:$bookish to 1)You tote the tome to the conversation pit, reclining in your seat and settling in with it. Somehow you manage to be studious with so much nerves in you: reading as if your life depended on it, perhaps, or maybe it's simply a perfect distraction from your immediate concerns. //Lineages Traced with an Atlatl, or an Extensive History of the Land and Menagerarchy of Cuazolmoc Told Orally, Graphically, and Archeologically// by Teiuc Noceli Esq. ... begins with a chapter on the history of Ithlatlicoatl, the nation of the Eagle Gulf. It's a summary on an ancient empire, brief to the point of comedy: Ithlatlicoatl was roamed by mammoth-riding nomads, then they were settled (or re-settled "if you believe the Serpent Progenitor Hypothesis", Noceli adds) by a number of clans warring for dominance, with one outlier gaining military dominance over the previously ascendent families, then pressured to the coast by colonial invasion which it has since kept at bay for the last century. [[The people of the Gulf...]]

(set:$bookish to 1)You tote the illuminated manual to the conversation pit, reclining again in your seat and settling in with it. Somehow you manage to be studious with so much nerves in you: reading as if your life depended on it, perhaps. Or maybe it's simply a perfect distraction from your immediate concerns. //Dromuacois du Biologique// by Baucus Areuax, with a long list of other names seemingly thanked for the academic or material contributions that you skip over. You're unfamiliar with this perathallasic language though it comes from within a few kilometers of your origin. You could speak it in a pinch, but reading it at a high level is totally out of your abilities. But you didn't pick up the book for its lengthy introduction or perameters of study explained: there's a wealth of sketches and visual material about the natural world. Maybe not the most useful in your current circumstances, but [[whatever.->Curly tail.]]

(set:$bookish to 1)You jog back to the conversation pit and slide home into your seat with that book. You hesitate to crack it open, though. Even besides the fact that Yuca (if:(history:)contains "Say whatever comes to your mind?")[clearly has](else:)[might have] reservations discussing it with you, there's no way this text can do anything but disappoint with a title like that. It's //too// wild, //too// gnarly; no book can possibly live up to those promises! [[Well, let's see...->Exposed.]]

You retrace your path to Yuca's timeshare, visualizing a map of the area. You arrived at the western shore of this area of Cuazolmoc, which you think is a small part of the whole landmass. Walking south along the shore you soon found the estuary that the Chicachel emtpies out into, which travels roughly northeast up inland. A path leads from the bank of the Chicachel shortly east to the timeshare, presumably useful as fertile hunting ground for its inhabitant. Just south of where you met her and found those coins is the arch in the old, leveled ruins. The Chicachel would also be useful for masking your track if it came to that. Otherwise, you can't get much else from your little trek: the sun's rapidly falling and you need to get back before you get lost. [[Back to our lodgings, then.->Night in the den.]]

You raise your hands in a grappler's stance, like ten points of antler, and surge forward toward the buck. It stands its ground for a moment, but before coming within reach it bolts away with its tail hiked and flashing white hindquarters. You grin boyishly at your little victory. Triumph has been few and far between here: it's been only small steps forward. [[Time to get back.->Returning.]]

(if:(history:)contains "Reflection.")[You wash up from the pump once again, finding your garment discarded in the den during your fugue, (if:(history:)contains "Fighting stance!")[rosetted and glossy like a deflated silk ocelot.](else:)[inky and blue-flected like a collapsed pile of raven feathers.] You rub your eyes and pace with a disquieted mind. Your body bids you more insistently to rest.](else-if:(history:)contains "Returning.")[You return, pacing around back to wash up one more time before entering the den to retire. Your feet are slightly tender but tough from many similar jaunts through your life. (text-color:$natvr)[Crabs are scuttling over where you first planted those feet, nipping at logged kelp and retreating back into the tide.]](else:)[You tuck your reading away where you found it. You just sit in contemplation, listening to the soft hiss of a gas lamp's flame. A peace rare to you, but maybe common in this world.] You go to the linen closet, rolling out a woven jute mat, laying a down-stuffed blanket and a sheet over that. You tuck yourself in(if:(history:)contains "BOW")[, unsure if sleep is entirely safe. But, into the breach you must go. You'd otherwise be out of your wits tomorrow.](else:)[ to sleep.] [[Extinguish the lamp and go to bed.->Sleep.]]

Weight, suddenly, is becoming all the more burdensome; you stumble towards the cushioned pit, rolling in. Your eyes spin in their sockets and there's moments where you can't discern where the earth lays. //BOW TO HIM// More voices in your head? You got to get your gourd on straight, chief. [[BOW]]

Cuazolmoc, //Lineages// tells you, is an archipeleagic island of considerable size. Though the empire of Ithlatlicoatl could reach it by sea, they couldn't take it at their peak from the inhabitants, and neither, it seems, could the empires from across the sea. It seems absurd to you that the peoples of Cuazolmoc could stand up against multiple invaders, some bearing steel and gunpowder and galleons. (link-reveal:"That's certainly an embellishment of some sort.")[ You saw the evidence of perathallassic colonial settlments after all. Yuca speaks the //lingua franca// of the Gulf, and this very house is Ithlatlicoatlan in origin... You think, at least. But, anyway, [[the next chapter's even more colorful.->Pythomenestra.]]]

Just thirty years prior, the high priestess of the Imperial Cult of Ithlatlicoatl was exiled for familicide and blasphemy. She roamed colonized lands to the north of Ithlatlicoatl, arousing a cult following and earning the monicker "Pythomenestra". She returned to her homeland for a brief attempt at reclaiming prominence there before sailing for Cuazolmoc, where she would come to establish the Menagerarchy. (link-reveal:"She doesn't seem like the nation building type though,")[ slaying her own children in a rage, burning her life to cinders and becoming a hedge witch for years... How did she start a whole nation from nearly scratch just after that? How did she architect a novel form of government? How did she convince the Cuazolmocans to accept this nation in such a small amount of time? [[Doesn't add up, but whatever.]]]

History's gnarly, and you don't pretend to have a good understanding of it. Pretty cool, though. The minutia of the more contemporary passages doesn't interest you as terribly much, though it is when Noceli actually gets some first-hand accounts. Like Yuca explained in her own capacity, the state and the menagery form the two branches of the Menagerarchy of Cuazolmoc. The state does what you expect in forwarding the nation directly through its own branches of government, but the menargery does something else. "The menagery holds the spirit of the state, and the state the means of the menagery. A person of the state has a unique level of access to the menagery, and the menagerines can rely on the states people to protect them by the prescriptions of the law. Likewise, the people may expect access to the menagery when it is appropriate." Yuca made it seem that she had direct control over the government, but that doesn't actually seem so. She's the secretary of the menagery, which is... spiritual? It doesn't seem like a necessarily religious station either, though.(if:(history:)contains"Monsters and such.")[ You don't know why one would want access to a council of monsters, either.] [[At very least, we have a lot to talk about now.->Night in the den.]]

You open on an image of curly tails: the small, squat lizards that caper constantly through the Gulf and even here, brown and horny with a signiture looping tail that can be detatched in a pinch. Both pre- and post-disection prints are lovingly realized, a subject at rest, a subject raised in territorial display with mouth agape, a subject spread open before the viewer's eyes. Then a bird-of-paradise plant in another randomly-accessed chapter: the bush with its broad leaves producing these flowering pods that bloom with colorful, feather-like petals. Outside they must be starting to brown, this time of season. [[I wonder if chiquetzals are represented...->Chiquetzal.]]

It takes a little prodding around in the index, a little flipping around this disorganized text, before you do, in fact, find chiquetzals. Turning the young paper open to the naive sketch of a chiquetzal, one clawed foot raised as if poised to step... You sigh, with surprise: it's her. Rendered beautifully in engraving, with little doubt in your mind. Sure, you've never seen another chiquetzal before so maybe they're hard to differentiate, but you see that specific countenence she wears when she knows she's being looked at rendered there. You get a hunch, and flip back to the acknowledgements: sure enough, she's represented there too, as "Yuca de Xituada". [[But...->More sketches.]]

(if:$north is 1)[(text-color:$vvitch)[The people of the Gulf are cursed with piety. They have clung to blood and steel like a calf to a tit, even as it pains them so deeply. You've seen a man of fifteen years, face geographically lined with his piousness, a mountain fit to erupt. Empire is an incestual family, but they believe it is better than mating with the worms.]](else:)[(text-color:$brvt)[The people of the Gulf are a proud species of people, warriors unmatched around the globe. You've seen a man of fifteen years take ground remorselessly from men twice as numerous, armored and skilled, filled with a devilish power you can only admire. If only your own people looked to devils instead of steel to give them triumph.]] [[But we're not one to judge, really. What about Cuazolmoc?->Cuazolmoc.]]

You turn back to the chiquetzal section, going further into its detailed account. There's a wealth of renderings between extensive notes and queries: her taloned feet and paws fill a page each in a mileu of positions, her mouth closed and opened to reveal her teeth, her tongue. You turn one more page and find her haunches, her counterbalancing tail lifted high, and one foot curling toes to rest on its knuckles(if:(history:)contains "Say whatever comes to your mind?")[ just like before, striking that suggestive pose]. Rendered anatomically, at the center of it all is her cloaca: a horizontal crease in her downy flesh at the base of her heavy tail, spread by intangible digits to expose her in herpto-gynecological detail. [[No idea how to react to this...]]

It's too late to go back. You've seen too much. But perhaps not- it's not //her//, necessarily, but just an image. A clinical one at that. Either way, you turn the page. The exposure only continues. Like with the curly tail, there's one last anatomical image: that of a chiquetzal's breast cavity spread, its belly incized to expose the internal organs, rendered just as completely as any other part of her. A sort of dull horror spreads in you, mingling with that slight flush you had before.(if:$north is 1)[ An unreasonable, mad moment shakes you. (if:(history:)contains '"Huh?"' or "Poking.")[You want to rush into her quarters to see her whole, in the flesh.](else:)[You believe dimmly that you are in the same home as a being that can split herself as easily as she'd split you: a killing elemental.] But you're just sitting there, sweating once again, with this ghoulish, foreign text in your mits.](else:)[ You've seen it all before: the split bodies, the open breasts, the entrails, but not like this. It's somehow profaned by its hygiene, for a man to make such a thing seem reasonable and not obscene.] It's too much, especially right now when you should be feeling restful. You set the book aside and [[relax.->Night in the den.]]

You turn the rigid, black leather-bound cover over to lightly yellowed and starkly printed pages. A title page lists a plethora of authors with male Arvan names, some with titles like "Magistarch Subservient" or "Lead Tartar". The first two chapters are listed as the introduction: (link-reveal:"1.Esoerotic Initiations")[ This is, as you can tell, a kind of invocation of the muses for a lack of better words. A proclamation of claims on a variety of forces, a citing of demands, as if in exchange for a hostage. It's familiar, in a queasy way; you've never touched such texts yet already in it you're unsettled by the delirium of it, and how easily it affects you.(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[A hubris, soaring like eagles, stains these pages like a blood-soaked tunic.]]] (link-reveal:"2.Foreward(sic) on Fecal Emergence, or the Purpose of Sex Magick(sic)")[ This section is a proper forward, stating the objectives of the text. Which are, boldly stated, "...to AWAKEN from the FILTH-BODY by means of NIHILANTHIC TERREROTICISM..." "From the frozen tears of angels we seek to form a LADDER up the Chain of Command, a great CAPER to rob the VAULTS OF HEAVEN!" Which is very gnarly, barely cogent, and totally seductive to your criminal sensibilities. But it repeats itself a lot so you skim most of it.] [[Next section.]]

Now we're getting to it: real-ass sex secrets! You hope. (link-reveal:"3.The Hermetic Rites")[ Hermit, you quickly find, as in alone: this chapter is seemingly all about tantric masturbation, with accompanying engravings of men in robes dousing candles with their expulsions or prostrating themselves in mud or running pud-first into the sea. The theme of these rites seemingly to maintain that state of arousal, though for whatever purpose you don't understand.] (link-reveal:"4.The Animal Rites")[ When you get to this section, you find a tassel lodged in its pages that you initially missed: clearly Yuca didn't lose her place after all. You swallow. This chapter is about "invocating(sic) spirits bestial" into the "FILTH-BODY", though largely these are extensions of the Hermetic Rites, and the pictures illustrate the yogic and frantic motions needed to properly inhabit the animalistic state. They're divided into different animals: piscean, avian, ophidian... And one specifically for chiquetzal, that involves binding the arms and consuming raw flesh. The authors consider the chiquetzal notable in the scheme of things. They cite the phenomenon of "spontaneous ability of speech" as proof of this. Yuca's bookmark leads to the middle of a section after the chiquetzal one; you assume she's read it.] (link-reveal:"5.Seminal Divination")[ Right what it says on the tin: looking at spilled jizz for prophecy. You don't know what you were expecting.(if:$north is 1)[ The pattern you loosed this morning is consistent with rainy days(if:(history:)contains "Masturbating.")[ and the one just earlier with "unsightly revelations"], to their credit.]] [[Let's wrap it up.->Wrap it up.]]

As the night grows old you're unable to follow what tenuous sense there already was in the //Sex Secrets//, even for your casual gawking. You close the book with a long yawn. (link-reveal:"That was cool.")[ All that nihilist wizard wanking? Totally sweet. Worth my time.] (link-reveal:"That was lame.")[ What the hell is Yuca thinking? You thought she was cultured or something, but she just wants to see what some wizard jerk-offs think about her species. Not that you, of all people, blame her.] Anyway, time to put it back and [[relax.->Night in the den.]]

//You are there again. Great flagstones and monoliths bleached by a sanguine sun's unrelenting heat in its eternal setting. A city frozen in the terrified eyes of a god sinking back into the petals of a lotus, tortured to observe the last moment its people, oblivious to their forgone conclusion. HE is there again: the mockingbird knight, presiding over the tantric edge of ruin. It preens a canoe-sized piece of down, crashing through the roof of a pueblo beside you.// "You of all things return to me? Go, then, to where you have not yet wandered. Do not slouch with your servility. What I lack in patience I have in bloody-mindedness." [[...->Your paths, again.]]

(if:$north is 1)[//The bird stretches his wing to the south, the shadows of its pinions stretching like dark fingers over the towering walls and clay tiled roofs. Beyond the limits of the city in its death-like dreaming, the hills stretch on like bug-infested flesh, raised and red with irritation. From just beyond the hills, the steppe: the endless, the unforgiving, the barabarously pregnant. Emerging from behind the hills is its spawn: the beast-men, embracing the backs of animals with their legs, their muzzles with ropes, and bearing down with a festering, swarming vitality on the dreamers.// [[Run!->Old north.]]](else:)[//The bird stretches his wing to the north, silhouetted pinions like obsidian blades over the towering walls and clay tiled roofs. Beyond the city in it bloodiness, the hills and mountains lay like silent dolls of hooded figures in a great variety of sizes and deteriorations. Brooding there, frozen interminably in their contemplation as the human swarming continues at the fringes of their awareness. You're drawn up and away from your life in the frantic city, up north to the rocks and woods, to the roots and the darkness of that land. Black-winged things cavort around you expectantly and the screamed dithyrambs greet you like a long-estranged mother: you know why you're here, suddenly, and collapse into the sodden ground to become as those many hills and mountains in death-like, craggy poise.// [[Die.->Old south.]]]

(set:$south to 1)(set:$brvt to (rgb:255, 75, 75))//But it's too late. The riders swarm all around, with blazing, sulfurous weapons cracking like thunder and bodies glistening like mercury with strange armors, bristling like boars with metal needles. The rush you down, pounding you flat into the soil under their beasts. They careen through the walls of ancient architecture and blast it to ruins to greedily scour the inner vaults. They tear the black banners and drink the blood of the dreaming city. You rise again in their midst. You're at their backs like a shadow, your lividinous grasp tracing the lines of their new, impious civilization to the skies. Bringing back the black clouds of old: the smoke of witchfire, the leviathanical mensis of the sea rising to meet their bastard streets. A vantablack revenge: the warlock pressed to war. Panicked, intercontinental call-and-response draws the curtain on them. Behind the velvet, one last keening voice as the lights dim.// [[Wake up!]]

(set:$north to 1)(set:$vvitch to (rgb:200,100,255))//But that promised rest doesn't come. You are made soil, tunneled by worms and insects, penetrated by roots and mycellium as a grass grows on your heavy, fertile corpse. You grow old and all the while you only remember the anthem of that land: a single note, held by trembling silk strings weaved at the beginning of all things. It only grows more hoarse, more faint, as you age and find the Tzipultamec mountains that once seemed so firm and eternal worry away into dust. The people that you once were fall as simply and permanently as a wilted palm tumbling from its tree. You are even relieved by it: a weight off of your back. But a moment after, you scream and split. Divine things bubble up from your molten blood and beasts swarm in on these long-dead lands, dancing on their hind legs, then bite and thrash each other, then pull up your flaking skin for weapons and quarry your core for their misguided temples Then it all begins again.// [[Wake up!]]

You start awake on your front. On your belly in the sand, gasping and heaving yourself up onto your hands and knees. Shaking your head, you find dark and trembling tropical plants all around you: the jungle, brooding but there, to a strange degree of comfort. You stand on your knees to look around, on a bald patch in a clearing in the Cuazolmoc's wilds, but over your shoulder you find Yuca's house just a few yards away, dimly lit by a single gas lamp inside. (link-reveal:"What a fucked night already...")[ Hopefully you can get some rest after all that. As fatigued as you are, sleep seems no comfort. [[Return to the den.->Reflection.]]]

On the back patio rainwater pooled into a reflective surface and you look down at yourself. Firstly, you realize you're once again filthy after this phantastic episode. Secondly, you've changed. You slowly sink at the edge of your reflection to examine it. (if:(history:)contains "Old north.")[Crouching, your legs suddenly burn with exertion; your whole frame, in fact, is wracked. You look at your body caked in mud and sand and see an unfamiliar silhouette: a larger profile, distended muscles and bulging veins, a craggy abdomen, all this powerful body swimming jaguarine in your ruddy skin. Your mussed dark hair hanging over your wild fish-scale eyes, with a wolf-like and lean body... You look possessed. You //are// possessed; it's beyond evident now. Fresh from hanging jaws in cracked helms, the beligerant hummingbirds of dead warriors have made their way into you. (text-color:$brvt)[//Gloria Exercitus Piratae.//] [[...->Night in the den.]]](else:)[In your own face twinkles something so gravely alien your heart pauses for a beat. You squat low on all fours to look closely at your reflection: surely it must be a trick of the dim light, or just another phantasm. Your eye color is a dark blue, and irridescent like puddles of oil or fish scales in white sclera. Your dark hair hanging down unkempt over this face, over this scarred warlike body... You look possessed. You //are// possessed; it's beyond evident now. Cursed by some she-devil now doubt... Maybe //her//, even... (text-color:$vvitch)[//IA MARY, MOTHER OF GODS!//] [[...->Night in the den.]]]

Arms tucked behind your head, squeezing your eyes shut in the dark, sleep evades you. The air's different, smelling like dust, fire and birds. The sound's different, a tempermental wind brushing the roof and the tropical keening outside all the more alien with its distance. (if:$natureboy is 1)[(text-color:$natvr)[A hutia crosses the trail to the Chicachel; it finds your scat off the path, sniffing before hurriedly scrambling up a tree. Lividity continues its slow march over that doe's body: a cervine empire falls, a resplendent war machine having drunk what it needed and left. Arthropodic communes and corvid republics and reptile city-states vie over the remains.]](else-if:(history:)contains "Lineages.")[You think about Pythomenestra. A homicidal, half-snake sorceress... Yuca's superior. Perhaps you're incredibly lucky she wasn't using the timeshare when you washed up. Maybe you'd be boiling in a stew right now, or something equally as horrendous.](else-if:(history:)contains "Biologique.")[You try to think about the animals in the //Biologique// that you haven't drank tea with. Seeing human anatomy didn't disturb you this much. Sometimes, even in person, you'll admit.](else-if:(history:)contains "Exposed.")[You laugh softly to yourself, thinking about the "sex secrets" you learned today. Dumb.](else-if:(history:)contains "Old north.")[(text-color:$vvitch)[A hummigbird stirs in your chest, excited by the heat in your emberous body. What could it possibly have to add to our song?] (text-color:$brvt)[You don't need a damn choir, not anymore. You can trust your hardbody: your battle-won right. Your sovereignty.]](else-if:(history:)contains "Old south.")[You rub your eyes again. (text-color:$brvt)[This transforming shit? This shouldn't be happening. You're stalwart, strong, rugged. You shouldn't be affected by idle witchery. You shouldn't be...] (text-color:$vvitch)[Letting flow a brine of grief, letting your blood-slicked hands loosen on the flagpole of your national guard of one.]] But a noise stirs you. [[What noise?]]

Maybe her footfalls, maybe a shift in furniture. Enough to make you swallow and look toward the door to her chambers, where you assumed she lays sleeping but now... More: very clearly footfalls. Languid, slightly careless... Then the purr of wood being carved. A breath-like hiss, a rattle of baubles falling. She's up and about. You look at her door, expecting her to come through for whatever reason she's up at the hour. But you just hear her pace, hear a low, sobbing sound follow her steps. You're chilled and sweating in your sheets. You hear her steps approach the door and fall just short. [[Listen...->Yuca behind the door.]]

"Manny..." She calls for you, by a pet name suddenly. "Emanuel... Come to my door." (link-replace:"Go to her door.")[You crawl out of your sheets. In such a deep darkness you feel a trembling grow in you. Luckily, primeval fear is nothing new at this point.(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[You are a dark thing yourself. You are merely afraid of disturbing comrades.]](if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[It's not like you're affraid or anything, actually! You're just pumped, is all!]] You squat beside that door. You can feel her presence on the other side: a blustering breath, and adjustment of claws on the tile floor, her bulk shifting. [["What is it, Yuca?"]]]

Yuca sighs. You hear it, then a soft thud on the door: her head resting against it. "I can't sleep..." (link-reveal:'"What\'s wrong?"')[ You ask, after a moment's pause. "Well..." She speaks slowly, slurred. "It's common for me... Maybe, just my... Nature." You can feel her breath come in from under the door, can imagine her lean barrel inflating from the sound. (link-reveal:'"Should I be worried?"')[ You ask. (if:$distance is 'distant')["No, it's fine... I just need space..."](else:)["...You shouldn't come into my room... Just in case." She admits lowly.] (link-reveal:'"Alright."')[ You say. "But... So..." She drawls, swallowing. "Can you help me?" (link-reveal:'"Well, sure. What is it?"')[ (if:(history:)contains'"Sing to them."')["Sing to me, please." [["Oh..."->Sing to her.]]](else:)["Come around outside the house, outside my window..." [["Alright..."->Night favor.]]]]]]]

You stand, nerves touched by the request. (link-reveal:'"Why?"')[ You ask. "I want to see you... That's all." She admits, voice in a low hiss passed through the crack bewteen the door and its threshold, her lips near the knob. You swallow. (link-reveal:"What do I make of this?")[ I got nothing, chief. I count coins, I swab decks: this shit is way out of my league.(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[Don't you want to see her too? To know she's still there, and not yet another phantasm? Don't you want to...?]](if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[You're suspicious of her coralling you. Yet, why try to ambush you outside? Why not just pounce while you're asleep? ... I guess to not stain her linens.]]] [["Alright."->Out in the Night.]]]

You feel yourself blush. (link-reveal:'"Sing?"')[ "Yes... You said you sing, didn't you?" She breathes, becoming nearly a moan. "If so... I'd love to hear..." (link-reveal:'"Well..."')[ You clear your throat, straightening and taking a breath. [[Here I go...->"A gondolier in Taulos,"]]]]

You put on your poncho, slipping your head in its hole but leaving your hands unencumbered, and light a gaslamp. When you leave her door and her presence, she suddenly seems so silent.You have a dim notion maybe you dreamed up that encounter. It's not like her, not the "her" that exists in this house at least. The tropics of Cuazolmoc keen and thrum with life beneath a starry vault, within a palm-flagged canopy. The gas lamp lights a yard or two ahead of you, white and paint-ringed adobe stretching on into the darkness as you turn right after the front door. You swallow again, cotton-mouthed. (if:(history:)contains "Nah.")[[[...->Ambushed.]]](else:)[[[...->Outside her window.]]]

You march around the rounded foundation of the adobe home, lifting the veil of dark on its walls in fleeting increments of lamplight, the jungle around you endless waves of ink. You find the window to her chambers and approach it, two panes in their sill. Your gape-mouthed reflection first seen, then behind it you focus on the long, blade-like muzzle and the dark mask and bristling pale mane of Yuca's face. Her eyes are wide and dilated: lashes peeled back, the gold of her irises stretched back from the gaping, flashing pits beneath. (link-replace:"Reach out to the glass.")[You slowly extend your hand, her darkened eyes turning to your fingers as they approach. She squeezes her eyes shut with some effort, and as you place your palm on the window over your head she places her brow down on the other side, a sigh from her nostrils fogging a cone of the glass. (link-reveal:'"Gods..."')[ You say. "You do look... Affected." Yuca smiles sadly, staying there for a moment at the window before her eyes start darting, her nose moving, and she begins to pace, drawn away as if by an apparition. [["Yuca, wait..."]]]]

She's being assailed by something. Maybe simply her own thoughts. But you call her back, staring up at her vacant, bestial gaze. "Are you alright?" She sighs, a creasing in her brow, a sadness in her affected pall as she approaches the window again. She fishes out a ruler in the bottom of the sill, pushing her brow again the frame of one windowpane to slide it open- (link-reveal:'"Woah, wait!"')[ You're treading backwards, a rush of fear flooding you. "No, sorry... Don't worry..." Yuca turns from the open window, resting her haunches back against the sill. That huge, cantilever tail spills out, its fanning end resting in the grass and the white down along its length slowly moving as if in a current. "I just... I want you to touch me." You hold your chest with one hand as the other places the lamp down, then runs your fingers over your head. [["You scared me there... But, sure."->Touch her tail.]]]

(if:$north is 1)[(text-color:$vvitch)[You know what she wants. You've had that need too: for someone to just touch you and assure you that the world hasn't spun away without you. That there's more than just your phantasms. ]]You reach out, running your fingers over the small overlapping feathers on the back of her tail, which twitches and sways at that contact. You try to not tremble, touching her while she's in such a state.(if:(history:)contains "I'll give it a shot anyway.")[ There's something there that wasn't before. It's like you're brushing a wild animal now, not the woman she was.](if:(history:)contains "Poking.")[ If you kissed her again, would it feel like...?] When you look up at her, she's looking back. She's still, not jittering or pacing or panting. Though you can't wake her from this nocturnal affect, you can soothe her to some degree. The calm seeping into her wild pall is enough to encourage you to hold on, to be patient with her. [[Be there for her.]]

You march around the foundation of the adobe home, lighting up its night-veiled walls in fleeting increments, the jungle a total inky blanket. You find the window to her chambers and approach it, two square panes in their sill. But they're slid open, one of the curtains drawn out into the night's breeze. She's not there. She's escaped into the dark, in your midst. (link-reveal:'"Oh, fuck!"')[ You gasp, twisting about and shining the gaslamp out from your little island of light. The serpentine silhouette of her head rises from the surrounding brush, eyes flashing like coals honed on you. It could be any chiquetzal, any feral animal, but you know it's her.(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[The light of reason reached you too late, unfortunately. You might've believed your choices mattered, but the outcome was always solely her vision. You're lost in those grave-dark eyes, shining with stygian fare.]](if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[You're outflanked, but you can still fight! If you fear death then you'll certainly die, and like a mewling dog no less!]] [["Yuca? What are you doing?"]] [[Face her, keeping still.]] [[Fuck this- //run!//->Running into the dark.]]]

You figure you'll be on your feet until the sun shows again. Hand-over-hand slowly stroking her tail with your calloused palms. It's a gentle parody of dragging halyard and hoisting sail; you almost feel like you could sing a long-drag while you do so. However, before morning comes, she shifts suddenly. She lays down, the tail half-reeled in through the sill; she's curled up on the ground before her open window. You continue the caress for a short while further, before retiring back in the den. Luckily, there's still hours in the night for you to rest easy yourself. [[To bed, all of us...->Next morning.]]

The sheets are cool and soft, and you luxuriate in them; you feel at some point you're dreaming about them as you lay in them. Sleep, for the first time in Cuazolmoc, is deeply pleasurable. The sunlight leaking from blinds gently stirs you, as does the graceful tread of a large beast just nearby. (link-replace:"What's she up to?")[Yuca passes by you on her way out back. You slowly wake, trying to hear her wash, hearing her re-enter and clatter in the kitchen cabinets. (link-replace:"Oh well, back to bed...")[Poor sleep nipping your heels, you pull the blanket over your head and twist in it. You hear her return to the den, hear her light the fire and put the kettle on. You can't remain in the facade any longer when she serves tea, kettle keening, claws rattling, and the fragrance of her choice blend in the air. [[Wake up.->Morning tea.]]]]

(link-replace:"A gondolier in Taulos,")[//A gondolier in Taulos, but tonight I’m one no more, A silvery thing has me, I’m without my boat and oar. I ferried three sisters and they whispered in my ear, Flirtations and delights, and utterances of fear.// (link-replace:"Now I'm drunk,")[//Now I’m drunk in clear waters, Drunk in the canals I knew. Silver coins leap into my skin, Every one a wish from the Rue.// (link-replace:"Every day I row,")[//Every day I row, smiling and going on as if a friend, Every night at the shore, my tail growing, my clothes rent.// (link-replace:"And I'm drunk,")[//And I’m drunk in clear waters, Drunk in the canals you knew. Make a wish or check your powder, I might be staring back at you//[[...->She's listening.]]]]]]

You just went for the first sea-song that came to mind, one of many you heard in the bunks of the //Caterpillar// or //Bonne Maude//. Just singing, in the dark, with a thoughtless diligence. Like your most sincere prayers, as an abandoned cub, or when your most heartfelt couplings turned to ash in your fingers: you sang like that. (link-replace: "Oh gods, how does she react?")[You wait for a reply and get the low, languid sound of her breathing. You press your ear to the door; it doesn't budge at all when there should be a bit of room in the way it fits in the threshold, which means she's resting against it. You hear, through that medium, a deep purring in her restful breaths. (link-replace: "That's that, I suppose.")[You quietly gather yourself up from beside the door and crawl back into your bedroll. Sleep comes easily to you, too, even after that touch of excitement. [[Finally...->Next morning.]]]]

You swallow dryly, eyes welling up as you lift the lamp in her direction. "What are you doing?" You hear nothing of her movements beneath the jungle's ambience, just watching her figure and flashing eyes glide closer until the gloss of her long snout and bristling plumage catch the light. Her face drawn taut around those insideously reflective globes, around flexing jaws, a glimmering row of teeth wrapping around her snout. She doesn't answer. (link-reveal:'"Stop,"')[ You call out to her, shaking from fear or anger deliriously. "You're trying to finish me?" You point at your tooth-marked arm. "You can't kill me! I didn't do anything to deserve this!" She lowers her head, tail raising behind her in the darkness, without any change in expression. [["Stop!"]]]

You freeze, keeping absolutely still even as your heart riots in your chest, as your flesh feels perforated by your absolute fear. But there's a chance she'll come to her senses, like before. You hear nothing of her movements beneath the jungle's ambience, just watching her figure and flashing eyes glide closer until the gloss of her long snout and bristling plumage catch the light. Her face drawn taut around those insideously reflective globes, around flexing jaws, a glimmering row of teeth wrapping around her snout. She's serious. This is real. You can't just sit there any longer, or else she really will hurt you now. [["Stop!"]] [[Run!->Running into the dark.]]

You break off into a sprint toward the west, quickly into the woods. The lamp provides just enough light to avoid breaking your ankle: leaping over logs and puddles, mantle licking the air behind your neck while the rest of you is buck-naked and damp with a furious sweat. (link-replace:"Where is she?")[You have no idea if she's keeping pace: the woods and your own breathing masks the sound of her light steps, the expert movement of a lifelong predator. Your spine burns: the fever of a prey animal fleeing. (if:(history:)contains "Chased to the shore.")[You've felt it once before, because of her. This high-dread is a friend, now, a badge of resilience in daring times. You can make it.] [[Look back.]]]

(if:(history:)contains '"Yuca? What are you doing?"')["//Stop!//" You hollar. She doesn't reply, doesn't seem to recognized your plea. You squeeze your fists. Your words suddenly come hoarse, low. "You'll hate yourself for this." There's a flicker in her features, a cant in her poised head, the gold of her irises wavering over the great gaps they fill in the day. A slackening of her rictis to speak, finally. "... Then I'll have to bury you deep."] Yuca surges forward and you backpedal, your back pressed against her house. She leaps with a gout of mud at her feet. A terrifying concordance of sound: her snarl, the earth pounded beneath her leap.(if:$south is 1)[ ... Then you appear elsewhere in the night, running, that fatal moment a blur and the knuckles of your right hand smashed, its fingers askew. You're absolutely //juiced//, frothing mad and scrambling into the wild dark of Cuazolmoc. (text-color:$brvt)[Warrior: I knew you wouldn't go without a fight! Not even against her!] [[Run into the night.->Running into the dark.]]](else:)[ The moment where you could've done something, anything, to prevent what comes next has past, and it didn't feel like it occurred at all. You see her jump, then you're collapsed down into the corner of the adobe home, her feet on your chest and those huge, black talons pressed deep into you. Pain absent, but grief there, for your spread ribs and punctured lungs, grasping those crescent nails buried deep. You're forced to look up when her snout strikes beneath your chin, you feel your neck viced in her teeth, feel it torn, a marrow-deep chill sweeping your skull, your head lightening to nothing... [[...->Die, beneath the bedroom window.]]]

Yuca pins you down against the crook of the wall and ground beneath her bedroom window, your chest collapsing without another breath beneath the weight of both her feet, the punctures gurgling around her talons. Her snout clenched and growling, frothing pink as it surrounds your whole neck, thrashing about with a spritz of blood on the white adobe, with a snapping of sinew and vertibrae. You've died. She rises from your body to sigh into the night's wind, jaws dripping and flexed open in the delight of your taste, your smell, riddling her senses. She doesn't let you fester, thankfully. Your entrails born from a long tear across your abdomen, falling like jelly into the mud with a smoldering heat rising from them, picked and parcelled in that beast's discenring lips. Taking choice bites from your lean belly, your buttocks, snapping up your genitals: supping on the washed-up man, the silent carcass in the loud Cuazolmoc night. [[...->Buried.]]

(set:$slain to 1)(unless:(history:)contains "Die, in the jungle of Cuazolmoc.")[You're dragged out from the light of that gaslamp and from sight of that bloodied, discarded mantle, deep into the darkness of that wooded jungle. ]Yuca kicks up a shallow trench in the damp earth with her blood-clotted feet. You're dragged in; she takes her time gorging herself on the last morsels she might want, burying her head deep under your exposed breastbone to bite up your heart, devour it. Head rising, black with blood as she gazes on you one last time. She considers something for a long moment before she turns to the loose dirt and buries you in an anonymous mound in the underbrush of the jungle. (if:$north is 1)[(link-reveal:"What does she do after that?")[ (text-color:$vvitch)[Curious still, laid-low as you are? Well, it may be told, if you wish to dwell.] [[I'll dwell.]]]] [[END.]]

Yuca curls up near your mound in the dirt, her maw and claws caked, her plumage high and damp. She sleeps peacefully there. In the morning she lifts her head, her snout turned toward your resting place. An expression of surprise, of recognition, as if waking from some exquisite dream and searching for it again before her eyes. Yuca trots back home and washes thoroughly. She goes about her days in leisure: hunting, reading, occasionally taking guests, having correspondences. Eventually her leave ends and she returns to the Menagerarchy, to Cuazolmocan, the capitol of her nation. She leads a dignified career, bringing a level-headedness to Pythomenestra's fraught administration until her retirement. She ages quickly, from her animal-like anatomy. She's dying in a bed deep in the halls of the Menagerie's palace, breathing slower, ever slower. You think, in those last restless and delirious nights of her life, she can see you again. You know, from those damp and wide eyes, she wants to, tries to. You want to say to her, "Forget about me." [[END.]]

A pitch-black object is keeping pace, poised toward your back like an arrow loosed, glassy pits flashing near its reaching point.(if:(history:)contains '"Stop!"')[ Her snout bent and pouring blood down from skewed nostrils.] You have to do something. [[Throw your mantle, your lamp, anything to slow her down!->Throw.]]

You dash the gaslamp at your sprinting feet, a gout of flame and smoke bursting behind you. Without a further thought you pull your mantle off, twist to see her shaking her head as she careens through the cinders, and throw her own exquisite silk uniform back in her face. Now you're sprinting full-sail through the black of Cuazolmoc's woods. The moon and stars bare glimmers through the rising barks and palms of the canopy's oppression; you have a decent lead, but slow, with your arms groping out before you, to merely find your way without crashing into an obstacle heedlessly. (if:$natureboy is 1)[(text-color:$natvr)[Hutia look on from their perches at the drama, ants swarming in your footprints over one of their mounds, minoes swirling in the Chicachel...] [[I know what to do.]]](else:)[You're running blind(if:(history:)contains '"Stop!"')[, wounded] and exerted to your very limits in the deep of night, on her land... [[There has to be something I can do!]]]

A doe still molders within earshot of the Chicachel, its lividity familiar to you. A pheremone of escape. You run toward it, till the sun-rotted smell is overpowering, then toward the nearby river, babbling softly beneath your panting and the chanting of insects. (link-replace:"Save me, river!")[You near it and fall into it with little thought, gasping and splashing noisily.(if:(history:)contains '"Stop!"')[ Your smashed right hand throbs under the current.] You pull yourself up, soaked, trudging toward the oposite bank. Your turn when you reach it. Drenched in moonlight, her eyes feral and determined as she pants with wide, drooling fangs, (if:(history:)contains '"Stop!"')[her broken beak dripping blood into the water], Yuca glares at you with a supernal, unmistakable yearning. The Chicachel gilstens with haunted coinage below the flux, the stars of the undaunted night sky reflected on the foaming top of the estuary waters. Both of you stand, for a moment, hesitating on each side of the Chicachel. (if:$north is 1)[Your darkly irridescent eyes shine, gazing back, like a third night sky to join the one above and bellow.](if:$south is 1)[Your body poised and glistening, rigid muscle heaving softly, with an incredible vitality despite everything that has striated you with scar tissue.] Then you [[bolt.->Escape?]]]

You're turning, eyes wide and burning as you try to discern any way out. Your body is trembling, aching, your blood a dimming fire and sweat pouring from you into the soil. But no, there's nothing you can do now. You're at the edge, escaping only to find the precipice and its end. Sorry, chief. I did all I could for us. (if:$south is 1)[(text-color:$brvt)[It's over: there's no fight left to give. This is how a warrior's life ends: on their feet. Keep your chin up and die with honor.]](if:$north is 1)[(text-color:$vvitch)[ Life is a form of thought, anyway. After this heartbreak, you will be thinking another thought, dreaming another dream.]] [[I close my eyes.]]

You run, one hand extended and the other draw up to your chest, your eyes wide and burning trying to discern the terrain; the task seems endless, seems like your lungs might split from this eternal night, from this desperate flight. If she got you then, after everything, it wouldn't feel so bad to be put down, how sick and skewed you feel. (link-replace:"The night goes on.")[ But you don't. You find a clearing of some sort, a path, and collapse by the side of it where a patch of dirt looks particularly inviting. You're dimly aware, in the deep, strong embrace of your exhaustion, of people and voices, of grasping hands pulling you upright and slapping you, then hauling you into some sort of drawn uncovered wagon. Cuazolmocan foresters take you in, feed you(if:(history:)contains '"Stop!"')[, splint your hand the best they can]. They don't ask how you came to be like that, but they insist you leave as soon as you are comfortable. [[I'm gone.]]]]

You sense a timely arrival in the shrubbery around you, a rush of nimble footfalls. Then, a terrifying concordance of sound: her snarl, the earth pounded beneath her leap. The last moment where you could've done something, anything, to prevent what comes next has passed, and it didn't feel like it passed at all. Suddenly you're collapsed on your back in the rainslick mud, her feet on your chest and those huge, black talons pressed deep into you. Pain absent, but grief there, for your spread ribs and punctured lungs, those nails crumpling your back. You're forced to look up when her snout strikes your nape, you feel your neck viced in her teeth, feel it shredded and a abyssal cold sweep your head. [[Die...->Die, in the jungle of Cuazolmoc.]]

Yuca pins you down against the underbrush, your chest collapsing without another breath beneath the weight of both her feet, the punctures gurgling around her talons. Her narrow snout, clenched and growling, frothing pink as it surrounds your whole neck, thrashing about with a spritz of blood on the verdant staghorn palms, with a snapping of sinew and vertibrae. You've died. She rises from your body to sigh into the night's wind, jaws dripping and flexed open in the delight of your taste, your smell, riddling her senses. She doesn't let you fester, thankfully. Your entrails born from a long slit across your abdomen, falling like jelly into the mud with a smoldering heat rising from them, picked and parcelled in that beast's discerning snout. Taking choice bites from your lean belly, your buttocks, snapping up your genitals: supping on the washed-up man, the silent carcass in the loud Cuazolmoc night. [[...->Buried.]]

(link-reveal:"...")[ Years out, you're on a boat again. Rigged sails billowing and drawing the sloshing belly of the //Sub Rosa// out from port into the Eagle Gulf. Sailing from the coastal nation Ithlatlicoatl, back to Cuazolmoc for a dispensary of goods and honest trade.(if:(history:)contains '"Stop!"')[ Your hand healed crooked, which made your swordsmanship a chore, though that isn't what disuaded you from continuing as a pirate.] Perathallassic navies choke the seas now, swarm in on Ithlatlicoatl and Cuazolmoc from all sides; there's no treasure floating aimlessly from fat barons anymore. They've hammered their scores into ironclad hulls and artillery guns.(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[It's no way to fight at all. The bloody sun of our warrior way has set.]] [[Retire.]]]

You retire, in transit, to your quarters. You become more and more restless the closer you draw to Cuazolmoc. It's as if you might wake to find yourself on its shore once again, to find the //Sub Rosa// disappeared just as the //Bonne Maude//. Yet, it's not a fearful feeling exactly. (text-color:$vvitch)[Like heat, neutral and atomistic: delightful at the reaches, agonizing in its utmost intensity. You've put your hand right on the stove before, but you don't scorn cooking.] Something, distantly, yearns to return to it. [[END.]]

You sit up on your elbow in your bedding, rubbing your eyes. Yuca's smiling at you from across the table in the pit, from across a steaming cup. She's (link-reveal:"dressed.")[ Yuca wears another bespoke, backless blouse, its citrus yellow cotton clinging to her breast and belly with jute rope crossing her back, latched by large buttons. Another sheer cloth delicately arranged behind her haunches, exquisite patterns stitched into its aqua lace, cinched around the base of her tail with silver-threaded length of rope. Bangles of wood, bone and turqoise clatter around her ankles, ecclectic and rugged compared to her last steel set. A loop of cloth hangs in a bunch around her neck and shoulders, like a shawl. ]You're bare beside the sheets, you realize. "Tea?" She asks. (link-reveal:'"Sure."')[ You answer, and she pours you a cup with a slow, careful manner: kettle's handle in her jaws, its pot tilted in her forelimbs. (link-replace:"Get dressed.")[You roll over and reach for that poncho and scramble up into it. When you right yourself she's smiling around the handle. [[Get the tea.->Picnic?]]]]

You climb back into the pit with her, lured by a wonderfully aromatic cup of tea and the promise of a small amount of caffeine. You two blow the steam from your cups. "Did you sleep well?" She asks. (link-reveal:"No,")[ You admit, "But better than I expected. (link-reveal:'You?"')[ "Good," She smiles earnestly, lines of light drawn over the den from the cracked wooden shutters. "Better than normal, for me. I have you to thank, Manny." (link-reveal:'"No problem,"')[ You comb your fingers through your bedheadded hair. "We'll go on a picnic, today. How's that sound?" She says. (link-replace:'"Picnic?"')["Picnic? Sure, sounds nice. I have no other plans." You could actually make plans to find your way back to port or the //Bonne Maude// or something, but... "Good!" She squeezes her eyes shut in her smile. "We can pack after this. Get yourself washed up." [[But...]] [[Enjoy that tea and get packing.->Get packing.]]]]]]

This is an "us" thing, that's what you're picking up, chief? Another nice chat, another dining occasion. What's this all about? You take precious moments drinking tea to think...(if:$natureboy is 1)[ (text-color:$natvur)[No cumuli drift over the former pasture she chose for the occasion. The sky is as clear as you've seen it out in the midst of the Occidental Sea: a wide, open gradient, from true blue to cornsilk. The ants retreat deep in their burrows to escape the direct radiation... It's a perfect day for a picnic.]] (link-reveal:"She's gonna do me in and bury me?")[ Nah. Too well-dressed. Too genial. You don't get that impression, not even in your noramlly danger-sensitive guts.](if:(history:)contains "Poking.")[ (link-reveal:"It's about that kiss, isn't it?")[ You swallow a gulp of tea hard as you consider this. It takes your concentration to keep as light-hearted as she is, with her touch and her body and her words swarming your thoughts.(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[Look at those eyes, appraising you like fuckin' lamb hock. She wants a piece of your warrior-male himbody to chew on. In a sexual way.]]] But decision-making isn't your strong suit. And she asked you to consider one carefully, which you failed to do, of course.] [[Well, we'll see. Time to pack.->Get packing.]]

(link-reveal:"Basket-")[ a big wicker number you dust off, found in a broom closet.] (link-reveal:"Blanket-")[ hand-woven, wool, with colorful diamonds of navy and purple expanding from its center. Hardy and good-looking to you.] (link-reveal:"Drinks-")[ two hollow gourds, complete with leather straps and sealing lids, that Yuca asks you to fill from the pump. But... You also find a bottle of wine, rumaging through the pantry. Its label is yellowed and bears the hieroglyphics of traditional Ithatlicoatlan: a vineard, a date? You can't tell. The sauce itself sloshes darkly in the opaque reddish-black bottle. (link-replace:"Take it?")[(set:$picnicwine to 1)Taken.]] (link-reveal:"Food-")[ charcuterie is the law with food here: jerky, summer sausages, cased offals, which you suppose you should've expected. You find some cheese as well, though no bread or tortilla as you'd hoped.] (link-reveal:"Washed-")[ (if:(history:)contains "Returning On Shield" or "Midnight Dithyrambs" or "In the Court")[using the same soap as before,](else:)[sans soap, as before,] you wash yourself and even take a menthol chew from that bath chest, refreshed and awake. You mug at your reflection in the basin, damp black hair hanging in roughshod feathers around your ears(if:$north is 1)[ and your dark, fish-scale irsises looking more fetching with familiarity].] [[Done packing, time to go.->Walking together.]]

Yuca has another cup while you pack and wash, joining you outside in the waxing and bright morning sunshine. She curls her head down, reaching to her shawl and pulling it up and over her head with her teeth, like a hood. "Ready?" She smiles. (link-reveal:'"Lead the way,"')[ You stand by her side. "This is my first picnic. I only know about them by what they aren't, according to the skippper. 'This ain't no picnic, That ain't no picnic'." "By negation?" Yuca giggles brightly at that. She starts down a narrow path toward the east; you squint at the sun when it beams hotly through the canopy of cloudy oak tree tops and palms, which you've done at sea countless times(if:(history:)contains "Poking")[, and anyway it's hard to keep your eyes off her]. The jungle, this land, feels suddenly softer under your feet. So much creeping and scrambling and fright, then suddenly: ease. You catch up. Walking easily by her side with a basket slung over your shoulder, letting your view wander to your two sets of feet: her long, swaying gait beside your padding along. [["So, where are we setting down?"->Setting down.]]]

"A nice clearing I know of; it should be just ahead." She says, scanning down a ways in the path and sucking her teeth. "Though, maybe the way got a bit overgrown..." You follow and look around, comfortably insensible in the morning sun for a few moments. (link-reveal:'"Maybe,"')[ You say, "But we can find another place." Her beaded foreclaws rattled, fidgeting together as her head stoops slightly. "It was a nice spot... Oh well." She sighs. You grin, seeing a pout escape her mature demeanor. (link-reveal:'"I know a place,"')[ You point with your thumb over your shoulder, "A clearing that used to be some sort of structure, just beyond the Chicachel. I slept there my first night here, actually." She blinks, "Oh, that's an idea. If you wish, we could go there." [["Let's go."->That place we first met.]]]|mightshow>[ (link-reveal:'"Let\'s just walk where you think it is,"')[ You smile broadly at her, "Maybe it'll show up. Maybe we'll come across something better." Yuca smiles sheepishly, looking off the path. "I suppose, if you don't have any better ideas..." [["Yeah, let's go."->Somewhere else.]]]](if:$natureboy is 1)[ (link-reveal:'"I think I can find it."')[ You claim, offering her the basket. "Just a quick jaunt up a tree and I can spot it if it's nearby." Yuca giggles, wrapping her foreclaws around the wicker handle. "You make that sound easy!"(hide:?mightshow) (link-reveal:'"Watch."')[ You grin, rolling your shoulders and bending your legs, "It is if you come from a long line of monkeys, like me." You take a running start toward a coconut palm, scrambling up its ribbed trunk, the instep of your foot and your palms bracing each other. Like that, you shuffle up to its fruit-bearing peak beneath its trembling palms and look around. (text-color:$natvr)[The first trees you clambered up have long since fallen, used for tinder, or hovels for crabs, or colonies for termites. Kids, like the one you were, still fetch coconuts and prepare them for sale on the boardwalk, elsewhere.] When you do spot a conspicuous and familiar balding of the canopy you point it out: [["There!"->In the clearing.]]]]]]

You two trek back to her home and past, walking the path to the Chicachel. From there you head a little further southwest down the bank of that river. You realize this is where you two first met. When you look at her, she's smiling(if:(history:)contains "She retreats." or "Chased to the shore.")[ apolagetically, with her head stooped. (link-reveal:'"Still feel bad about all that?"')[ You ask. "Yes." She croaks, looking about the waters passing, her long, feathery neck slung low in contrast to her normal bearing. She didn't seem this guilty even when she first appolagized to you and took you in as a guest. (link-replace:"Pet her.")[Your mind is quiet when you reach out to her: no barks of omen or 'chiefs' or anything like that, then. You run your fingers over those many feathers, the down beneath. She walks closer to you, her gaze and shy smile poised up at you. You touch under her jaw, running your thumb over her cheek, the two of you silently reflecting each other in gradually widening eyes. [["Don't worry about it."->The ruins.]]]]](else:)[. (link-replace:"Pet her.")[Your mind is quiet when you reach out to her: no barks of omen or 'chiefs' or anything like that, then. You run your fingers over those many feathers, the down beneath. She walks closer to you, her gaze and shy smile poised up at you. You touch under her jaw, running your thumb over her cheek, the two of you silently reflecting each other in gradually widening eyes. [[...->The ruins.]]]]

You see for yourself her choice of setting: a wide-open grassland bound in on its sides by the dense woods, the low leafy ground spotted with flowering weeds, holly in bushes around the perimeter, a stream passing nearby the shade of a large, old gumbo-limbo tree, with bark that peels in red rinds like sunburnt skin. It's to that tree she goes, bobbing quickly on her cantilever gait with the basket swinging in her foreclaws, smiling back at you when she gets ahead. (link-reveal:'"Great spot."')[ An easterly wind rolls through it all, her feathers and the green in one wave, and crows call out from their murders, and there's distantly movement in the far-off woods. "Go here often?" You say, crouching beside her and unpacking. "Oh, no, not often a good occasion for it." (link-replace:"Roll out the blanket.")[You unfurl the wide yarn sheet in the shade; Yuca obscures half of it when the nestles there, tail curled around her bunched plumage with her legs drawn up closely beneath her. "Glad to make it, I suppose." You say, sitting beside her, and she rumbles softly with pleasure. (link-reveal:'"It\'s surprising how this place can look, sometimes."')[ You comment, suddenly, looking out from your little station on this blanket. "What do you mean?" She asks. (link-replace:"Shrug,")[You shrug, "It's scary, but also pretty." Yuca giggles merrily at that. "A real wordsmith, you!" You laugh in tune, bobbing your head.]] (if:$distance is 'close')[[[Break out the provisions.->She goes for it.]]](else:)[[Break out the provisions.]]]]

You gesture off the path when she hesitates about stepping off of it, wearing a smile. She returns one, with a surprising amount of unease. Yuca leads you into the densely wooded jungle, searching blindly for the spot she had in mind. You two emerge on a small clearing, barely larger than her den with a monarch palm having fallen across its center and a patch of flowering weeds trying to climb up its barrel. (link-reveal:'"Not bad at all."')[ You say, strutting into the spot of sunlight that comes down from the encroaching canopy. "It's not what I had in mind," She huffs. "But, yes, this is pleasant." You lay down the dyed yarn blanket, sitting on its perimeter with the basket. "I'd say. More leisure here than I'm used to." Yuca obscures half of the dyed yarn blanket when she nestles there, tail curled around her bunched plumage with her legs drawn up closely beneath. "Is that so?" She asks. (link-replace:"Shrug,")[You shrug, "I guess I could call swilling ale and cheap dates 'leisure', but that hardly contends to this." Yuca giggles, heartened, "Yes, well... I could see why."] (if:$distance is 'close')[[[Break out the provisions.->She goes for it.]]](else:)[[Break out the provisions.]]]

You crack open the basket, producing first a gourd to hydrate after the walk. "So..." Yuca minces her forelimbs together. "What did you do last night?" (link-replace:"Offer her a sip of water.")[You gesture towards her with the gourd, the raptor smiling before extending her open jaws for you to pour into. You do, some spilling down her chin, tossing her head after.] (link-replace:'Tease, "Before tucking you in?"')["Before tucking you in?" You tease. "Yes, before that." Yuca rubs her nose, smiling uneasily.(if:(history:)contains "Sing to her.")[ "And I slept exquisitely after hearing you... I am quite grateful." "Don't mention it."]] (if:(history:)contains "Biologique." or "Sex Secrets.")[[["Oh, I read a good bit."->Hesitant Book Club.]]](else-if:(history:)contains "Lineages.")[[["I read about Cuazolmoc."->Book Club.]]](else-if:(history:)contains "Off the Trail.")[[["I went for a ramble around the territory."->A Ramble.]]](else:)[[["Oh, nothing really. I just laid back."->Laid back.]]]

You're at the site of your first night on Cuazolmoc: that stone arch containing a good shade beneath it, the clearing riddled with small moss-covered bricks and the uneven growth of the long, tenacious grasses and weeds covered the remains of collapsed buttresses of foreign wood and pilfered stone. The ambitions of those colonistis has given way to the simple delights of a sunlit patch in the jungle, to winds in this bald clearing, to the humbly remarkable sights of ruin. //Memento mori; frui picnic.// "Quite a spot..." Yuca hums, "I'm surprised I've never found it. I must've run past it a few times." (link-replace:'"Glad you like it."')["Glad you like it. I thought it might be a bit grisly for your tastes." The cornerstones of where a foundation used to lay make a square where within is light grasses and sprouts, and where you lay down the blanket. "I'm glad you think me tastes are so sweet." Yuca obscures half of the dyed yarn blanket when she nestles there, tail curled around her bunched plumage with her legs drawn up closely beneath. (if:$distance is 'close')["I think one way and know contrary." You tease](else:)["For however much my thoughts might be worth." You grin], sitting beside her as she rumbles with laughter. (if:$distance is 'close')[[[Break out the provisions.->She goes for it.]]](else:)[[Break out the provisions.]]]

"You terrify me, you welcome me... And I couldn't be happier. I couldn't feel more clear-minded."(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[In this darkness and dirt you are purified. //IA YUCA!//]](if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[Did we win? Is the battle over, the conquest earned?]] Yuca stares at you, such a sweet expression, such a fondness coming over the raptor's snout. (if:$distance is 'close')["So... Yes, I suppose." You add, smiling and combing your fingers through your hair. "Yes." She whispers, her lips turning, her eyes lidding. [[Enjoy a kiss.]]](else:)["So... What now?" You flush, combing your fingers through your hair. "What now?" She laughs, drawing close once again, snout honing in on your lips. "Hold still..." [[Kiss again.->Enjoy a kiss.]]]

(if:(history:)contains "Stop her.")[You reach out first to that snout that wounded, that you touched within to satisfy your fear of it; it's true that she terrifies you, still. Yet the fright you feel approaching her with your own eyes lid shut mixes so perfectly with everything else. ]The end of her snout seals with your human lips once again, your head bent up under her bowing neck; your arms loop her shoulders, and her foreclaws around your flank. The warmth of it, in the sunlight, is magnified several times: your body burning and hard, her plumage standing erect, peacocking over her haunches, prickling your arms. Still the kiss feels strange, both of you pushing your bodies into each other, not quite fitting, yet perfectly so. If she were a human the whole affair might be over by that time- you can't rush anything with Yuca. You mouth over her thin, slick lips and push your tongue in, feel her own, long tongue nearly fill your mouth and make you gasp through your nostrils as she insists. You're bent back as she surges forward. (link-reveal:'"Mmhf!..."')[ You sound, and the kiss breaks, her tongue uncoiling from inside your mouth and back into her own head, menthol-scented drool dripping from your lips. Yuca's gazing at you with a sort of fury: panting and staring daggers through half-lid and damp, golden eyes. "Let's undress." [["Let's."->Undress.]]]

Yuca's claws draw your mantle taut over your back; when you pull your wrists from their holes and draw it over your head, her jaws rip it away from your grasp and discard the gorgeous garment.(if:$south is 1)[ A smooth, snorting snout draws itself down your built chest, pushing you back onto your elbows and making you squirm with these hot gouts of breath on your nipples, her lips sucking on your brown skin and kissing your leanly muscled abdomen. "Gods..." She sighs into your naval. ]You pull her shawl-hood up from around her serpenting neck, shaking her feather-crowned head and giggling brightly, the tip of her tongue sticking out from the corner of her damp lips. Yuca turns from you and her bangles tremble loudly, offering her flank close with the large, toothmarked buttons on her blouse, her jaws parted in a wide, panting grin and her flashing eyes directing your hands. You unclap this strange top, baring that raptor's downy breast below, freeing pinions to let her silhouette take her naturally rounded shape. She turns further in place, in her squating posture; her tail grazes the top of your head, lifting high. You're gazing squarely at those heavy, cantilever haunches rung with glossy snowy feathers, her hamstrings and bestial seat plush with white down. Between the huge, nearly equine cheeks hangs the sheer cloth from the base of her hiked, swaying tail. "Come on... You can touch." She coos, with a playful lilt. [[Flush, and touch her.]]

You lay your palms on her, feeling the corded-steel heat of her thighs and glutes disguised under a luxuriant layer of down. "Gods." You laugh, and she giggles, peeking back with her snout in her claws. You unclasp the veil from around the base of her tail, dismiss it. You comb her down, your heart hammering, from her taut cheeks up beneath that hiked, fanning tail. You feel her shift her weight, spread her taloned feet, as you comb away the fluff from around her single vent: (if:(history:)contains "Biologique.")[that cloaca you saw only represented in engravings, last night, now in the flesh.](else:)[a cloaca!] Drawn where the base of her tail and her body meet, a horizontal line curling up at its edges like a smile.(if:$north is 1)[(text-color:$vvitch)[ The Seat of Life.]] "Is it what you expected?" She breathes, the vent softly pulsing, as if those lips briefly pursed. (if:(history:)contains "Biologique.")[(link-reveal:'"Actually, yes."')[ You laugh lowly, "I saw it in a book somewhere." (if:(history:)contains "Hesitant book club.")["Oh my, that's right," She giggles, gazing back at you with her softly smiling snout in her foreclaws. "I hope that engraving did it justice." [["It's much more gorgeous in person."->"Gorgeous."]]](else:)[She gazes back at you, and softly gasps, "The anatomy book! Oh my, that didn't even cross my mind..." She holds her face in her claws, giggling and swaying in your hands. [["It's gorgeous."->"Gorgeous."]]]]](else:)[["It's gorgeous."->"Gorgeous."]]

"Touch it. Go ahead." She whispers. You start to run your fingers across her concealed smile, feeling those lips growing plump and warm, so curious about it, mystified by a non-human sex. Then she draws away just after you do, taking one step away on her great taloned feet, sighing so deeply it disturbs the grass. Yuca gazes at you, play in her eyes, her tongue nearly hanging free from her maw. Down, down she looks to your own lap, drawing your own attention: your penis standing at attention out from under your stomach, drooling into the fold of your uncut head, vascularized and shuddering.(if:$south is 1)[(text-color:$brvt)[ The Seat of War.]] Yuca croons huskily, "Gorgeous." A long moment draws out between you; you squating there, eager, and herself flexing her toes in the turf. [[Rest back, let her take the initiative.]] [[Pursue her.]]

You rest back on your elbows and watch her, that animal waving her fan-tipped tail at you. (link-reveal:'"Don\'t be shy."')[ You beckon, with a crooked finger. Yuca circles in place, expression palling as she descends on you, making your hair stand on end with the frightfully fast approach. A huge tongue drags up the inside of your thigh; you squeeze your eyes shut as you feel Yuca mouth over your testes, feel humid wind blow over your naked and flushed body and her downy bulk pin your feet. You peel one eye open, just to peek, seeing dark and pouty lips touch down around the base of that sex of yours, relishing you. Spotting you peek she opens her fanged jaws wide, your prick lashed up its belly by the tip of her tongue, making you wince when she reaches your unshod head. Yuca turns her head up and away, rumbling. "Can I..." She hesitates, softly squeezing your bare thighs in her foreclaws before her gaze returns, emboldened. "Can I rim you sometime, Emanuel?" (link-reveal:'"Huh?"')[ "Y'know... Lick your asshole." [["Y'know? Sure."->Rimming?]](set:$rim to 1) [["Nah, I'm not into that."->Rimming?]]]]

Yuca takes pendulous steps away even as she gaze back. You spring up on your feet and towards her, penis bobbling comically against your thighs as you hug yourself to her large haunch. (link-reveal:'"Where are you going?"')[ You mutter into her croup, grasping a fistful of down on her belly, pressing your palm up against that warm crease beneath her tail. "Oh, you brute!" She giggles, wheeling around in place with you, like a calf resisting a caballero. "Finally forcing yourself onto me?" You laugh into prickling, hiked pinions.] [["You're sick."->Forceplay.]] [[Tease, "Yes, darling."->Forceplay.]](set:$forceplay to 1)

Before you can reach into the basket she's closing in: scooting herself close, Yuca wraps her neck around your shoulder and neck like a shawl, a delighted sigh blowing down the front of your chest. You squirm, feeling a rise between your unshod thighs bellow. The basket's lid is flipped open like a gaped mouth in witness. (link-reveal:'"Hey, now..."')[ You laugh softly, rubbing her snout where it hangs over your shoulder, tracing up and down that narrow, dark wedge. "I've slept on it..." She swallows, the single slotted eye glancing down at your jaw. (link-reveal:'"And?"')[ You ask. She gazes back up at you firmly. "You first." (link-reveal:'"I insist: you first."')[ You say, a bit of challenge in your flushed grin. Yuca reels back, batting her lashes in playful offense. "You're rather dense, sometimes." Which makes you laugh, and nod your head.] (link-reveal:"I don't have much of a choice, do I?")[ You say, to which she shakes her head and softly whines. "Don't say that..."] [["I really like you..."->Yes.]]]]

"What did you read?" Yuca asks lightly as you produce a piece of jerky from the basket. You hesitate. (link-reveal:'"Oh, you know..."')[ You wave the piece of charcuterie, "Boring stuff." She grins pointedly, tail stirring around her seat, "Can't be that boring if you read it! What was the name?" (if:(history:)contains "Sex secrets.")[(link-reveal:'"OK, you got me: the Sex Secrets book."')[ Yuca laughs heartedly, tipping her snout back and plumage rising. "I thought so! Nothing boring about that, is there?" You can't help but blush. "No, I can't say so. But the pictures weren't as enticing as I thought." You two laugh in tune, the raptor gazing at you squarely, tilting her head and half-smiling, hesitating to say something. [["What?"->Her, looking nocturnal.]]]](else:)[(link-replace:'"It was..."')["It was //Dromuacois du Biologique.//" Yuca opens her mouth and whisks her snout up, eyes fixed on you down it as her plumage rises high and falls. "Ah, my. Then you must've seen..." "Yeah..." You can feel yourself flush, combing your fingers through your hair, as her gaze narrows. She speaks lowly, rasping, with a lilt of her snout down toward you. "How would you like to see it in the flesh?" (link-reveal:"Your turn to laugh heartedly,")[ still red-cheeked. "I assume you're not talking about your entrails." She bellows huskily, grinning at you for a long, considerable moment with her foreclaw tapping her nose. [[Swallow.->Her, looking nocturnal.]]]]]]

"I read up on this nation of yours: //Lineages Traced with an Atlatl//, or something like that." "Oh, I know the one. It's alright." Yuca watches you root around in the basket, and you're quiet since you know she can be rather verbose on the topic. But, now, she isn't; a long quiet follows as you produce a stick of jerky. (link-reveal:'"I thought so too,"')[ You say, gesturing with the charcuterie. "A little implausible at some parts, but interesting. Enlightening." She looks pensive, even a bit grim, regarding you suddenly. Her eyes following your hands, staring blankly into the basket with them. (link-reveal:'"Something on your mind?"')[ You ask. She looks up. "Why?" You narrow your eyes, cant your head: a look of both suspicion and fondness you picked up from experienced courtesans. Yuca rubs her snout in both her foreclaws, talons and beads clacking together. "Well, OK," She begins to admit. "I was not in the mood to discuss the nation, but... And..." [["And?"->Her, in the sunlight.]]]]

"A ramble?" She giggles behind her talons, "How did you enjoy the territory?" (link-replace:'""I enjoyed it plenty more after I was fed and watered."')["I walked to the Chicachel and back, got the wind in my hair a bit, but it was already getting late." You smile, gesturing with a piece of jerky. "I enjoyed it plenty more after I was fed and watered." "Good, good," She bobs her head. (if:(history:)contains "In the clearing.")["I can tell you are comfortable, outside like this; I don't see many men like you." (link-replace:'"You\'re used to more courtly men than I,"')["As you've said," You smirk. "You're used to more courtly men than I."(if:$south is 1)[(text-color:$brvt)[ Tell her: "I'm eight gallons of man in a two ounce bag!"] Don't say that, chief.] ]]"We should both enjoy ourselves in this little vacation of mine, no?" Yuca thrums those words, then smiles, lidding her eyes and canting her head. All while a ripple moves through her curled tail, as you percieve her tapping her flexing her talons against her breast. [["And how might you suggest doing that?"->Her, in the sunlight.]]]

"I'm glad to hear," She smiles softly, leaning to one side. "You do seem more rested today." "I do?" You tuck your bangs behind your ear, unconsciously mirroring her when you rest your weight on one planted palm. (if:(history:)contains "Old north.")["Yes." Yuca eyes your bare legs and arms before flicking back up to your face, "In your gait, your demeanor-" (text-color:$brvt)[She wants you, warrior. //Carnally.//] But importantly, chief, not for brunch. (text-color:$vvitch)[You'll be brought to her lips regardless, don't you worry.] (link-reveal:'"Thanks... I do feel better."')[ You say lightly, squirming in your seat under her barely masked attention to your body. Crossing your bare tighs and touching your hair again. She's quiet though, suddenly, and for a long interval; you just hear her breathe for that moment, looking down at the short span of blanket and whicker that's between you two. [["Is... Something on your mind?"->Her, in the sunlight.]]]](else:)[Yuca gazes into your face, scrunching her brow curiously. "Yes." You gaze back, until you realize she's looking at your eyes, those changed eyes now the color of dark skate's scales. "You seem more canny. More... Yourself, though I don't pretend to know that." She smiles appeasingly, lidding her eyes. (link-reveal:'"Yeah..."')[ You say resting back on your elbows slackly, with ease and your tan face raised to the sun. (text-color:$vvitch)[How blind, and how accurate, this Parthian: to see your growth not with the archer's eye but a different sort! By noon, believe that you will see it.] (text-color:$brvt)[I just hope there's action soon. Picnics and tea parties are for little girls, not big-titted warriormales like yourself.] [["I sure hope so."->Her, looking nocturnal.]]]]

Yuca casts her head up, thin snout letting a sigh escape, narrow torso heaving, long lashes shut. (if:(history:)contains "In the clearing.")[A wind blows through the clearing, rustling the monarchal palms and nut-bearing oaks with the sound of a whispering coloseum crowd. ](else-if:(history:)contains "The ruins.")[The arch you once slept beneath whistles as a wind blows through the old, leveled ruins, uneven grasses playing on their little mounds of burried, destroyed colonial foundation. ]Her manicured feathers bluster, pluming and catching the wind, catching the light irridescently on white and truffle-black, making her a cloudy, glossy image of a serpent. Her sigh rattling, frustrated, at its last note before her jaw snaps shut and she gazes squarely at you past her blade-like snout. Brow knit, slit eyes moist and glittering covetously, her dark lips damp and baring the shyest sliver of her pearl teeth... (link-reveal:"Wait, what the hell's happening?")[ What's up, chief? You two are having a picnic and you're looking at each other. (link-reveal:"Yeah, that's true, but...")[ But what, chief? [[There's something else going on...->2good2.]]]]

Yuca closes her eyes, neck bowed back as a husky laugh bubbles up in her. "Gods..." She shakes her head, smiling thinly, glossy plumage rippling from her crown down through her hackles. When she opens her yellow eyes upon you, the narrow slits have grown, huge dark crevaces there flashing from within. "You're so //dense//." (link-reveal:'"Huh?"')[ You swallow, suddenly feeling perspiration rise in you, feeling your heartbeat thump. That snout poised toward you, she closes in, not darting forth but slithering till you sink back on your elbows and she's hovering over your legs. (link-replace:'"Hold on- what is this about?"')["Hold on- what is this about?" You see your panicked reflection in her wide eyes before she shuts them. You feel her foreclaws clutch at your waist through the silk garment, her snout press on toward your lips untill she's nearly on top of you. "If you won't make the first advance, I will..."(unless:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ [[Let her kiss you.->Let her kiss you in the picnic.]]] [[Hold up your hand, stop her.->Picnic snout-holding.]]]]

You just look at each other, this animal she is that is blessed in so many ways, this animal you are, likewise. Yuca opens her lips, choking on some word to say, sighing again with animal jaws wide. She turns her snout away, scanning (if:(history:)contains "In the ruins.")[ the eroded stonework of some other beasts' failed conquests](else-if:(history:)contains "In the clearing.")[ the nearby grasses, while the clearing stretches out so verdantly and vitally all around you](else-if:(history:)contains "Somewhere else.")[ the weeds nearby, the fallen tree, the anonymous place beneath you]. One, then many, cicadas begin to keen like a choir warming themselves up. It occurs to you then: Yuca yearns. That woman who has so much, who is in so many ways gifted, feels doomed right there in front of you, somehow. You've felt it yourself. But instead of sighing you so often try and take what you yearn for, and ruin it. Why doesn't she try and take it?(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[Such rivers wept over such spilt milk- she is older now, grown, but the tendrils of youthful indiscretion never slacken. He is gone.]] Yuca faces you again, running her forelimbs down the front of her blouse, her gold eyes wet as if holding tears, her tail slowly unfolding from around her body as she shifts her weight uncomfortably. In the noon light, all is growing hot, panicked-feeling, goading... She gazes at you suddenly so directly, so expectantly. (link-reveal:"Oh fuck, what do I do now?")[(if:$north is 1)[(text-color:$vvitch)[ All this empty mentalism, all this flapping of gums and so little hymnal released: she wants more. //You// want more. For all the span the soul can travel, for all it can reach out, it still needs a bridge in the flesh. Kiss the beast.]](if:$south is 1)[(text-color:$brvt)[ //Action// is happening! Don't be last to act- the conquestor takes the initiative! Kiss the girl!]]](if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ Wait wait wait, y'all can't be serious: kiss her? She almost bit your hand off! We still don't know why she didn't kill you! [["Uh..."->Kiss her in the picnic.]]](unless:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ [[Kiss her.->Kiss her in the picnic.]]]

(unless:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[You're trembling when you realize what you've set yourself to do, in a fatal, frozen moment, with one of her gleaming eyes peeking at you and your body interminally drawing forward toward her. Timbers shivered, you close your eyes. You feel the thin lips at the end of her long snout press to your own. A rush of warmth, a moment of hesitation, and she opens to you, letting your small human mouth seal with her serpentine maw. One that, certainly, is used to kill and devour prey, one that you perhaps should have a reasonable doubt of- yet it's intoxicating to feel there. Her tongue pushes into your mouth and your own smaller one slides between, between it and pin-sharp teeth, your head canting in tune to her gracefully twisting skull.(if:$north is 1)[(text-color:$vvitch)[ As it has pierced the nape of game it kisses ravishingly: that beak of a primeval beast in ruined, vine-choked strata taking to human lovers. You are nowhere near her first.]] [[Hold her.->Embracing, in the picnic.]] [[Draw away.->A breath, in the picnic.]]](else:)[You turn back to the picnic basket, looking anywhere but at her. That fresh silence seems to grow interminably long. When you glance at her you find her eyes fixated on you squarely. Considering something with a certain breathless slackness, she wets her lips with the tips of teeth glinting and draws near. That whole blade-like snout homing in on your face for purposes you can only guess. [[Stop her.->Picnic snout-holding.]]]

Facing her, you lid your eyes and slacken yourself to recieve whatever she has for you. Maybe she'll just sniff you again, or something as simple as that... You feel the thin lips at the end of her long snout press to your own. A rush of warmth, a moment of hesitation, and you open with her, letting your small human mouth seal with her serpentine maw. One that, certainly, is used to kill and devour prey, one that you perhaps should have a reasonable doubt of- yet it's intoxicating to feel there. Her tongue pushes into your mouth and your own smaller one slides between it and pin-sharp teeth, your head canting in tune to her gracefully twisting skull.(if:$noth is 1)[(text-color:$vvitch)[ As it has pierced the nape of game it kisses ravishingly: that beak of a primeval beast in ruined, vine-choked strata taking to human lovers. You are nowhere near her first.]] [[Hold her.->Embracing, in the picnic.]] [[Draw back.->A breath, in the picnic.]]

You keep her there, her feathers rised and expression open, behind your halting touch. Yuca looks suddenly so full and charged, huffing into your palm, then suddenly so small, her eyes damp, hesitant, and sad gazing at you over the expanse between you two. (link-replace:"Brush her face.")[You slowly brush your fingers down the dark scales of her featherless nose, over her damp lips. Your other hand rises, smoothing down to her cheeks beneath that black mask of feathers, inlaid with her worrisome golden eyes. Their slots widen staring at you, her lips parting and letting out a soft breath, blowing against your face. You watch those sharp, pearly teeth, inches from you. With an eerie calm washing over, (link-reveal:"you know what to do.")[ Your fingers drift to her open lips, tracing their long dark horizon, before slipping within. Feeling the tops of her teeth, damp and terribly sharp, set in vice-strong jaws but remaining welcome for you, letting you feel the smooth expanse of her tongue as you haltingly explore her maw. You feel its intentions, you feel her control and desire both within, and no sooner do you let your guarding hands fall. [[Let come what may.->Let her kiss you in the picnic.]]]]

(unless:$rollover is 1)[(if:(history:)contains "Forceplay.")["I shall faint!" ]Yuca bowls herself over, thumping the grass on her side, then rolling over onto her back with her taloned legs splayed far and wide, her tail unfurled from her weighty caboose. Her neck twisting up and snout upturned, gape-jawed, with tongue leaking out the side, reminiscent of snakes that play dead. One eyelash hikes, peeking at you from beneath.(set:$rollover to 1)](else:)[You gaze at each other, flushed, breathing in sighs,(if:(history:)contains "In the clearing.")[ while the wind sighs with you through the open long grasses of Yuca's chosen picnic haunt.](else-if:(history:)contains "Somewhere else.")[ while you can imagine the jungle watching, with any number of palls on its green face, from the close, dark canopy surrounding you.](else-if:(history:)contains "In the ruin.")[ while the evidence of an empire lost remains silent, and you briefly imagine the dead jealous in their improvised graves. As, you suppose, you will be one day.]] (link-replace:"Look at her face.")[Her dark, narrow snout left in the grass and splayed wide: those rows of fangs glittering under thin black lips, embedded in the pink-peach interior, her long tongue rolled out to the side, dripping drool into the grass. Fresh-kissed, exposing herself down to the plush depth of her throat where the back of her tongue ends. [[Kneel beside her head.->Beside her head.]]] (link-replace:"Look at her feet.")[Yuca's legs extend in a 'V' from her wide berth, dimples highlighting massive hamstrings, thews bulging from under heavy down as she flexes them with a shivering, feline stretch. Her unshod feet are dark, scaled, uncurling two long toes, backward-facing hallux, the killing crescent, then clutching them and kneading the air. [[Touch her feet.]]] (link-replace:"Look between her legs.")[A pillow of white down is spread between her open legs, rising and falling with her quickened breath. At the crook of her heavy tail base that pelt is interrupted by the presence of that sex you've already touched, softly mouthing at nothing. Her tail sways as she catches your gaze, brushing the feathered fan at its end up against your hip. [[Kneel around that tail, before her sex.->Before her sex.]]]

You pull back and for a moment you're just connected by her long tongue still in your mouth; she follows you, surging forward as you fall backwards into the grass. Her lean bulk of prickling, pluming feathers clothed in a lacey blouse, her covetous, crescent-clawed feet, come down over your legs. Her forelimbs press their long nails into your clavicle as she looks down at you, with your dark hair pooling around your head,(if:$north is 1)[ your darkly iridescent eyes gazing up at her betraying fear](if:$north and $south is 1)[ and](if:$south is 1)[ your hard, scarred body bracing itself against her, beneath her]. Yuca draws away suddenly, seeing how your skin dimples under her claws. "I'm sorry, I-" (link-replace:'"Alright,"')[ You chuckle, "It's alright. I'm alright." You sit up, the raptor across from you pecking your chin. "Are you sure? You're shaking..." It's true: you're trembling like a wet chihuahua. (link-reveal:'"I am, but..."')[ What are you feeling anyway, chief? [["I'm just a bit surprised."->Close talk.]](set:$surprised to 1) [["I'm really glad."->Close talk.]](set:$glad to 1) [["I'm hornier than a two headed goat, is all."->Close talk.]](set:$horny to 1)]]

(if:$surprised is 1)[(link-reveal:"I wasn\'t expecting this.")[ You watch your fingertips run through the down on her throat. "Not to feel like this, for you to feel like this... We're very different, aren't we?" When you look back up at her face she's faintly smiling. "Are we?" She drawls, "You sound doubtful." (link-reveal:'"Yeah..."')[ You swallow, meeting eyes, remaining still. "You are not the first," She tilts her snout away, gazing from the corner of her eye. "And this reaction, this feeling, I think, is expected." "I suppose." You smile unevenly.(if:$north is 1)[ "I had a feeling that was so." She poises her snout to you again, half-lidded eyes blinking, "Oh? That I was 'experienced'?" (link-replace:'Laugh, "Something like that."')["Something like that," You laugh, "Just an intuition."] Yuca hangs her head, beneath your eye level and looking up at you through her lashes, closely. "But... Anyway... I am fond of you, Manny." She breathes carefully.] [["I feel the same, about you, and, well..."->Yes.]]]]](else-if:$glad is 1)["I'm glad. I thought I was dead when I washed up here, not about to fall into this rather fortunate arrangement. It's quite a storybook tale." Yuca's faintly smiling. "I suppose it is. Sometimes a rather frightful one I can imagine." (link-replace:'"Depends on how the tale ends,"')["Depends on how the tale ends, no?"(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[No. Tales don't end. Only cliffs, holes, vorticies... Surfaces infinitely porous, full of howling winds and flowing humors.]] She shrugs her narrow shoulders, curls her neck aside. "I was never interestd in storybooks. But..." Her snout rolls down before you, hangs beneath your eye level, Yuca looking up at you through her lashes. "I'm rather interested in you." [["Feeling's mutual, Yuca, and...->Yes.]]]](else-if:$horny is 1)[Yuca laughs merrily, tosses her head back. "What could have inspired that in you? Surely not an animal's body like mine?" (link-replace:'"Oh you\'d be surprised, then,"')["Oh you'd be surprised, then. A strong nor'easter will do that to me." You grin, grasping the wrist of her foreclaw. "You make me absolutely burn... Well, if, y'know, you welcome this..." Her head hangs, looking up at you under her lashes. "Oh it is, quite..." [["Ah, good, because..."->Yes.]]]]

(if:$rim is 1)["Can't say I've ever considered it but... Why not?" You laugh, rubbing your flushed cheeks. "Duely noted," She grins, mouthing over your hip and batting her lashes. "For when I surprise you with it." ](else:)["Just not my kinda thing, hon" You laugh, tucking back your bangs. "Duely noted." ]Yuca presses your member to your stomach with her insistently lapping tongue, pecking damply at your belly, up your breastbone, muttering. "Come and take me." Then she draws away. [[Join her.->Yuca, belly-up.]]

(if:$forceplay is 1)[You press against her, shivering and bare in the sun against her feathered leg, curling over her side and groping her to elicit more of her effecatious laughter, Yuca still turning and mock-avoiding those mitts. (link-reveal:'"You let a wolf into your pasture, my girl."')[ You rumble playfuly, stepping behind her larger, clawed foot to bring her dance to a halt. "Oh, certainly!" She chirps, "And he'll take what he wants from me, and what's a poor girl like me to stop him?" Yuca sways heavily onto one foot, swooning her head around, playing as if she'll collapse. [["Easy girl..."->Yuca, belly-up.]]]](else:)[Yuca giggles greatly, casting a felid look at you, "You are none-too-healthy yourself." Her broad hip beats against you, making you stumble and cling to her for balance. "But I do enjoy it so..." (link-reveal:'"True,"')[ You rest your foot on her own, beneath the tall crescent talon, while stretching toward her shoulder to lay a kiss in that dark plumage there. "I dunno. Hard to see you as the submissive type, I suppose." "I have my moments..." Then she sways heavily onto one foot, as if about to swoon and collapse. [["Easy girl..."->Yuca, belly-up.]]]]

You cast a long shadow over her face, a glittering eye opening against the sun to look up at the source of shade. Smiling gaped she squeezes her eyes shut, her long body writhing once in the grass. (link-replace:"Touch her.")[You rest your hand beneath her chin, feeling the flat of that long, fanged jaw, holding her snout up. Her lidded eyes relax, a sigh blustering over your bare front, as you trace the bridge of her snout from her nose, between her eyes in that mask of deep black feathers. A trilling sound rises from the back of her throat, feathers pluming as you comb them. One eye opens, swivels to you lap. "May I?..." (link-reveal:'"May you what?"')[ "Taste you," She rattles, then adds, "In a... Comfortable way." (link-reveal:'"Sure."')[ You laugh sheepishly. Open lips fall toward you, blindly pecking your thighs. You see the base of your penis rest on the flat of flashing fangs, held in her lips- making your hackles raise. She peeks again, that tongue of hers sweeping out on you. You keep your touch lightly on her crown, fingers fitting in white down, as she rises to attention against your prick. Jaws open over you, with that tongue swirling around your sex. Dark lips purse around the vascular base, her eyes crossing down toward the sight; her heron-neck writhes, pulling her snout along a bowing path, with a languid, insistent draw around your sex. Your toes curl, your kneeling legs splaying, the pleasure making you hunch over her, casting your head up. (if:$delight is 1)[[[Let her take you.->Blown.]]](else:)[(link-replace:"Let her take you.")[You let Yuca work, your delight rising in your flexing stomach, your cinching balls; she stops, pursing her lips against your head with a wet vixen smile, not going any further. You huff, and return a grin.]]] [[Draw back.->Yuca, belly-up.]]]]

You kneel beside her right leg, your mitts wide around the crux of her huge thigh and cantilever hip. You feel for yourself the heavy bindings of muscle disguised in her feathers, that limb laying its considerable weight on your shoulder, flexing tall in a burlesque of strength beneath your fingers. She draws her digitigrade leg in, hooking her knee around your nape lightly; she flexes again as you stand, your bare front tickled against that shapely collumn. In your hands you hold that grass-touched foot, that murderous thing you saw first drenched in black blood. Yuca spreads her talon, her two toes, her hallux, all those digits much stronger than your own, scaled and nailed darkly, but manicured exquisitely, even in its use, and even after your travel. "What are you doing?" Yuca giggles. (link-reveal:'"Checking out your feet."')[ You say, continuing to throb against her leg. She laughs, squirming and wagging her tail. "You quite like them, do you?" (link-reveal:'"Quite, actuallly."')[ You say, smiling sheepishly down at her, who grins flush in return. "Color me surprised. You're a brave man, Emmanuel." Those toes squeeze into almost a fist, drawing their knuckles over your belly, unfurling relaxed, as bellow you hear her sigh sweetly. [[Enjoy them further.]]] [["I was curious." But draw back from those clawed feet.->Yuca, belly-up.]]]

(unless:(history:)contains '"Fuck!"')[You draw over her tail kneeling there before her spread legs and exposed belly, peeking at you from down the length of her upturned body with a long, tuneful sigh. Your thighs and undercarriage washed with the feathers and down on the base of her tail, you stroke the insides of her thighs, making Yuca softly flex there. Between them all, her cloaca, unconcealed. (link-replace:"Explore her, there.")[You run your fingertips across those lips again, her chest rising with a savorable sigh as you do. With two fingers you push deeper into that purse, into her animal anatomy, feeling the valley clamming around your fingers and narrowing as you travel deeper within.(if:(history:)contains "Biologique.")[ It's hard to discern but you know it's a manifold of entrances and exits, engorged tissues diverting you toward the vaginal canal.] A featherlight cry escapes her upended lips as you feel her sap spreading around your fingers, feel her shift. (link-reveal:'"Like that?"')[ You murmur up at her. "Uhuh..." She replies, pointing her talons across the sky. [[Keep it manual.]] [["May I...?"->Fit yourself in.]]]]](else:)[You draw back over her tail as before, and your soft sex unsheaths itself, blushed with a glossy trail leading from her pout.(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[What a defeat on our part, to retreat the field without our triumph. A sad day indeed.]]] Yuca gazes up at you, her eyes still glowingly appraising you and half-lidded, curling her toes as she feels you leave, fangs dimpling her lower lip. "May I ask a favor of you?" She croons. (link-reveal:'"Of course."')[ You grin, "I think I know what it is, though." "Oh?" She grins in return, cocking her head. "Then if you're so confident in predicting my wishes, do them." [[Finger her.->Keep it manual.]]]

Between the very fore of her pursed lips and her long, looped tongue your cock is throttled; Yuca's eyes unfocus on the sight of your wincing stomach, her feathers rising while you rise on your knees and hunch, dark hair hanging in curtains around your face. One moment of lucidity and you can catch how poised she looks even then, nursing you with her jaws, drooling from one side of her twisting snout and down your tan flesh. (link-replace:"Cum inside her jaws.")[No stopping it now: that burning, full-body itch rising in you, your nuts cinched up flush to your loins as you feel hot coals lit near your bladder. You feel almost ill for that moment, how hard your somtach squeezes and your diaphragm flexes to its limit and your heart pounds in your ears till all but one extremity feels cold. You cum inside her like a new mortal wound bleeds. With a breathy noise you fall back on your seat and she continues, sucking noisesomely until you soften. She drinks you up without hesitation, leaving your limb limp and damp, sagging down into the grass. Yuca licks and chaps her lips, slitted eyes peeking up at you as if you just arrived, and from your panting and mussed hair, in a hurry.(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[A delightful genocide of your progeny.]](if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[You've been so afraid of her getting a taste of you all this time, but it's not so bad is it?]] "How'd you like that, Manny?" She whispers. [["Yuca..."->"Yuca."]]]

Yuca depresses your hard-on the back of her darkly scaled foot until it comically slaps back against your belly. You hold her ankle as her paw stretches open, letting you rest in the crux of those talons, drooling aimlessly into the leathery padding of one as your heart starts hammering. The image of those long, black blades poised to bear down on your member, that foot which you first saw soaked in blood. What the hell are you thinking, chief? (link-replace:"Trust her, anyway.")[Those long, avian toes close in around your prick; the loose flesh along that vascular barrel's dragged against as she lets her leg sway, first roughly, until your precum leaks into her hold. Yuca herself looks focused, stirring her coiled leg, the corner of her mouth curling as she feels your limb grow slick. She stops to squish your glans with the pad of her crescent-bladed toe. "Like that?" She coos, grinning lopsided up at you. (if:$delight is 1)[[["Yeah..."->Pawed off.]]](else:)[(link-reveal:'"Yeah..."')[ You sigh, flushed and curling your hips into her touch. But she releases you, your clear discharge webbeing her long talons and your prick together intricately. Withdrawing that touch with a pursed smile and an exchange of gazes.(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[She won't let her quarry go so easily.]]]]] [[Draw back.->Yuca, belly-up.]]

(unless:$spent is 1)[You keep stirring her, dipping three fingers into her sex and exploring her at your leisure. Yuca looks down at your wrist with an openly gaping, affected pall.](else:)[You press three digits into her, exploring that valley at your leisure. Yuca looks down at your wrist with an openly gaping, affected pall.] (link-reveal:'"You quite like this, huh?"')[ You laugh softly, her gaze drawing up your arm. "It's a rare treat..." She sighs, "Can't really please myself like this, can I?" (link-reveal:'"Hah, makes sense."')[ You murmur, her tail lifting behind your legs and drawing you nearer. You shift to lay on your elbow beside her, reaching between massive legs to masturbate her. She returns the attention by brushing your bangs with the knuckle of her foreclaw, stretching her neck down to rub her gaped muzzle on your neck. All the while prickled by the feathers of her hip, fingering her with a tell-tale sound of your blind, exploratory stirring. The really expressive, tender wriggling of that raptor subsides as your touch goes on, and her breathing steadies as it blows down the middle of your back, cooling. [["Tell me what feels good."->Get her off.]]]]

"Penetrate me?" She casts a look at you. (link-reveal:'"If you\'d like."')[ You swallow. Grinning, she coos, "Please do." You pull away damp fingers and sidle closer to her open waist, in between wide, clawed legs, as her tail curls up beneath you to draw you nearer. Your thumb opens that purse, gazing into that raptor's animal sex, inflamed insides gumming at nothing and webbed with discharge. Your hips curled forward, your belly trembling as you swallow, Yuca gazes down at your own sex with fangs scoring her lip.(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[Knit together, you beasts, no more hesitation. There is no such thing as infertility. Every moment is pregnant now.]](if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[//Finally// some hetero action. Took long enough.]] Bracing your hand on the waist of her barrel, you insteps in the grass, you arch your back and guide that limb of yours into the pouting dimple of her cloaca. Sweating as you see your uncircumcized penis swallowed by that valley in the down, you feel that large purse's loose hold on you narrow as you deepen the connection. You catch her wide eyes, staring past her bangled and drawn-close forelimbs, lips parted with her tongue hanging to one side. [[Go further.]]]

(unless:$spent is 1)["Hmm?" Yuca's snout draws back to look at you with fangs on her bottom lip, eyes wide and glossy.] (link-reveal:'"I wanna get you off,"')[ You grin, stretching up to rub your nose on her scaled equivalent. "I can't do it on my own, just guessing." Yuca rumbles, echoing sonorously in that narrow chest you're flattened too, reaching over. (unless:$spent is 1)["How could I say no to that?" She angles her hips a few degrees towards you. ]"Palm up towards me, then run your middle finger along the top-" She twitches, jaw hanging. "Feel that?" A cherry-sized lump deep in her cloaca, nearly hidden in the folds of tissue in this certain depth- the entrance to her vulva proper, your realization reflected in her expectant grin. (link-replace:"Strum her there.")[You draw your finger quickly over that spot, making Yuca wince and toss her feather-rung head back. "Not so hard..." She whines. You ease up to circle that tender organ, finding the right tempo, the right touch, to have her arching her back, hiking her cantilever tail and rolling her neck in serif-bows. Her taloned feet clutch hard in little fists at nothing, draw close and inward, every breath a high trill from her. [[Get her off.->Yuca's Orgasm.]]]]

(set:$delight to $delight+1)With one powerful kick Yuca's hips spring up from the grass, leaping, curling and thumping calamitously beside you; for a heart-pounding moment you're clinging to her side for your life, your wrist twisted sorely into her lap. She howls, a hissing high trill out into the (if:(history:)contains "In the clearing.")[wind, ravens unfurling huge black wings and taking to the air from the surrounding canopy, cicadas going suddenly silent for a long interval, a lightning-like flash of intensity making all things seem to pause for an instance.](else-if:(history:)contains "The ruins.")[open air, bucking upon overgrown gravesoil as for a moment the din of the jungle cuts out, not even the trees whistling in their sway, a lightning-like flash of intensity making all things seem to pause for an instance.](else-if:(history:)contains "Somewhere else.")[the canopy vingette crowding around you, shadowy even in the midday around you and the thrashing raptor, as for a moment the din of the jungle cuts out, not even the trees whistling in their sway, a lightning-like flash of intensity making all things seem to pause for an instance.] You're panting into her shoulder, her barrel flexing like billows with her breath hissing in your ears, before you feel her lips in your hair, dreamily pecking at your nape and shoulders. (link-replace:"Did she like it?")[You look up at her, at her slack and half-lidded expression laying thick on your face, and smile lopsided. Yuca replies with an insistent kiss and a "Needed that...", turning towards you to ride out that radiance with you, minutes passing open to the slowly returning sounds of the midday wilds. (unless:$spent is 1)[(link-replace:"Squirm.")[You squirm, branch-hard in her stiff feathers and warm down. Yuca bats her eyes, pressing your nose down with her snout and starting to again roll onto her back.|back>[ [[Draw back.->Yuca, belly-up.]]] (link-reveal:'"Let\'s just lay here..."')[(hide:?back) You sigh, clinging. "I don't feel the need to cum." "I won't argue." She smiles, turning back to you, back into your arms. [["Yuca..."->"Yuca."]]] ]](else:)[You sigh, [["Yuca..."->"Yuca."]]]]

(set:$delight to $delight+1)You feel vaguely an alien internal life around you, down there, her eyes shining. A muscle spanning her groin shivers and she points her toes far over your head. You lower yourself on top of her, feeling your cheeks burn against her white down, sealing your arms around her barrel, as far as they'll go, your legs adjusting in their wide, crouched stance. In that pause you feel her stir deep inside, feel her mouth around you with a mysterious working of her body, of her anatomy unlike anything you've touched before. You're in the midst of it now; deep in an animal's body, with her legs drawing up to encourage you with a brush of her talons on your bare glutes. A breathless sound escaping her lips, a low note blustering from yours into her chest. Something about the midday sun on your tan back makes you pause in that moment and its surprising amount of a leisure. [[...->Do that deed.]]

You feel her sigh brush down your nape, your long black hair spread over her chest as you labor. Aimlessly she strokes you with the knuckles of her wing-like forelimbs, her thighs twitching besides your rocking waist, her belly rising under your chest like billows. You feel that wet connection drag and nurse and grind, hear her stir around you, at your extremity.(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[Your ladle in a big cauldron, stirring more than offals and marjorem.]](if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[(if:$north is 1)[No, l](else:)[L]ike gouging out a lead ball with your belt buckle.]] It becomes harder to take your time, to sit on top of her and savor it. Her crescent talons trace up your flexing hamstrings, goading you to rut her and muscle in tight, your insistence pushing out a croaking note from her stretched jaws. You're crouched and clutching like a monkey, (if:$south is 1)[your body dimple and gleaming with perspiration, a bronze reflection in her wide, rocking eyes as you thump martially against her.](else:)[stiff and straining over her bulk.] You squeeze your eyes shut, hackles raised, skin trembling and goosepimpled, and a fire roiling in your guts like you might pass rum. You're far closer than you hoped.(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[No retreat!]] (unless:(history:)contains "Sex Secrets.")[[[Stay!->Finish early.]]](else:)[[[Surely that sex-secrets book gave you some trick for this, right?->Finish with her.]]]

It's just too much: that pot of hers narrowing and gnawing around you, penetrating her with all the elan you can muster to try and drag her along with you for the finale. Your toes curl in the grass and your cheek pressed to her panting bulk, you knock yourself out. It feels like you might die, how hard your stomach squeezes and your diaphragm flexes to its limit and your heart pounds in your ears till all but one extremity feels cold. You cum inside her like a new mortal wound bleeds. [["Fuck!"]]

(link-reveal:"What fucking tricks?")[ How to put out candles with my shmutz? How to roll around in muck like a pig? What a crock of shit! Your toes dig into the grass as you rut that tome's owner, head swirling with thoughts of old, erect men waist-deep in the cold sea or grinding themselves into the knots of ancient oaks at the knoll-altar of dark masses, for ever and ever... You're shocked from this lengthy reverie, suddenly, uprooted from the ground by her leaping hips, thumping calamatously against the earth. Your legs kicking in the air for that instant as you feel her spurred feet slam their heels into your back. She howls, a hissing high trill out into the wind and sun, all her plumage rising and shivering under you, her body thrashing like a massive, dying snake. You cling first with terror. Within her you feel those bestial insides roil, clutch to you in turn, clamping just like toothless jaws, and you're loosed. When the balls of your feet reach the ground again, your cheek pressed to her panting bulk, you knock yourself out: all your dog-like hammering is hardly your own. It feels like you might die, how hard your stomach squeezes and your diaphragm flexes to its limit and your heart pounds in your ears till all but one extremity feels cold. You cum inside her like a new mortal wound bleeds.(set:$delight to $delight+1) [["Fuck!"]]]

(if:(history:)contains "Finish early.")[(set:$spent to 1)You exclaim as you're hit by a wave of sensation, toe-curling pleasure before a weighty, burning exertion, collpasing between her legs with a grunt. Yuca laughs breathlessly, curling thighs close around you and rubbing the backs of your numb legs with the pads of her avian feet. You're rocked up and down, laying slumped over her narrow barrel and panting, overcome in her down, as she still tenderly squirms and sways her tail. "Tender, were you?" She hums, running her foreclaw through your hair.(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[Mocking you, of all things! Calling you soft!] (link-replace:'"No, not tender."')["I'm hard..." You mutter into her feathers in protest, which makes her laugh again and plop her feet against your bare ass. "Oh I know, dear!" She lays her lips to the top of your head, slithering her hips side to side beneath you, carrying you along with them.]] (link-reveal:'"Sorry..."')[ You breathe. "It's been a long while since... And you are..." Yuca laughs again, breathing into your crown and hugging you with her legs tightly. "Do not fret, sweet. Take your time." She says, as she mouths near your temple and you feel the black nails of her feet softly rake your hamstrings. Always slowly moving, dancing, squirming inside in out, as you soften inside of her.] [[Draw back.->Before her sex.]]](else:)[(set:$spent to 1)You exclaim while Yuca's outcry spreads out, dies down into a low, breathless keening and terminates in quick, canid panting. Her talons press into your buttocks, curled and shivering; when the opiate feeling of orgasm being fading you feel just how painfully tight you're grasped. (link-reveal:'"Ow ow ow,"')[ You rattle, and Yuca gasps, pulling her talons away. "Sorry!" She croaks. You're panting, drooling into her feathers; not only fatigue but an exertion spreads through your whole body like acid in your veins. You're limp, floating on her heaving belly with her halberd-heavy legs resting crossed over your back, as jelly-boned as you are, the whole heap of you two slouching to one side. "Manny..." She giggles quietly, wearily peeking down her downy breast at you. [["Yuca."]]]]

You lay together in congenital and solar glow, not moved to act except to look at each other, to run your fingers through her feather or to squeeze her foreclaw, or to curl her neck around your shoulders or her tail up over your legs.(if:$natureboy is 1)[ (text-color:$natvr)[Elsewhere ibises flock in the limbs of a mangrove at the bank of the Chicachel, immaculately white with black-tipped wings, grooming themselves and each other with their long, caliper-like beaks.]] Yuca breaks the seeming interminable silence. "Your back will burn, if you..." She warns softly. You grunt but don't hardly move; she stretches her neck to pull your mantle up over your back. The two of you, from there, drift into the saccharine haze of a midday nap. [[...->The den again, and afterglow.]]

Your pud disappears under that wide black fist, peeking unshod and glossy from around her raptorial toe when she draws one way, showing its veiny midriff when she draws the other. Yuca has the hang of it, bangled ankle clattering loudly; you feel her eyes honed in on your face as you squeeze your eyes shut, standing wide-stanced and shivering every time she reels her foot before you. (link-reveal:'"Pretty good at that."')[ You laugh breathlessly. "Thank you," She thrums, shifting her hips and pursing her lips. "I've never done anything like this..." (link-reveal:'"Do you like it?"')[ You smile, "I won't force ya'." "You //couldn't// force me." She shoots you a grin. "But, yes, I do... Watching you stand and shiver... Putting on a brave face like that." Yuca pulls down on you, drawing a red line beneath your navel with her raptorial claw. Making you stand attentively and goosepimpled, grunting through your teeth. "You are quite a delight like this, Manny." A pearly smile aimed up at you she bicycles her foot quickly around your sex, hastening you as she so openly drinks in you flushed, defeated expression. [[Give in to it.]]]]

You thought she might tire with this quickly but she's intent: grasping you in that upturned paw and circling it quickly, insistently, for minutes. You demand yourself to stand upright, feet dug into the grass in a widened stance, hunched forward with your dark hair hanging in a veil over your face. You feel flushed- far warmer than you expect. Is it the sun on your back? Cuazolmoc's heat? Are you embarassed?... "Will you come now, hmm?" Yuca hums occasionally in her hoarse, accented lilt. Unhurried, but goading, fangs in her smile. "You look like you need it, friend..." (link-reveal:'"Yeah..."')[ No stopping it now: that burning, full-body itch rising in you, what feels like hot coals lit under your bladder. You feel almost ill for that moment, how hard your stomach squeezes and your diaphragm flexes to its limit and your heart pounds in your ears till all but one extremity feels cold. Your head thrown back in a libidinous gasp, shivering and taut and perspiring there; when you look back down you see another taloned paw spread, trying to catching your arterial spray, gouts of pearl flying over black pads and running down between raptorial digits. You cum like an opened wound, opened by experienced clutches. (link-replace:'"Oh fuck..."')[ You exclaim. Yuca giggles greatly, tail thumping the ground as your orgasm dampens her claws, letting you ride it out weak-kneed until you soften, until feet are kneading the air decorated with your semen and beaded anklets. "My, Manny..." She croons. "Never dull company, you." You lay on your hip beside her, laughing softly in reply. You two are quiet, thrilled, breathing in tune as a neighborly wind passes you by. [["Yuca."]]]]

It's afternoon by the time you walk back to Yuca's vacation home, enjoying what you packed to eat as an afterthought. She hangs close as you trace your path back to that adobe house, hanging your arm over her back and sharing pace, sharing laughter, sharing touch, in the lively wooded land. You enjoy the relative cool of the den once you return to it. Yuca is quick to go out back and wash. [[Join her.->Wash with her.]] [[Wash later, give her some space.->Hang out.]]

You follow her, straight through the front door out the back, dropping the basket on your way, and leaving all garments dispersed on the ground. You can rather expediently bathe yourself, lathering and rinsing with the same soap, washing and untangling your hair, but by the time you're done she seems only halfway: soaking in fragrant water after arranging the post with its brushes and pumice stone, and huffing once, looking away from you. (link-reveal:'"Need some help?"')[ You offer. "Don't you dare." She grins crookedly. "I'll meet you back inside. Go clean up in there." (link-replace:'Laugh, "Aye aye."')["Aye aye." You laugh, sauntering past her in her huge aluminum tub.(if:$rim is 1)[ Abruptly you feel breath on your damp haunches, her narrow nose running between your glutes: Yuca long, firm tongue drawing from taint to tailbone, flicking its tip against your anus. You stop, pidgeon-toed and shoot a look down at her from around your hip. (link-reveal:'"You sure you want me inside?"')[ You say, seeing her golden gaze sparkle, her blade-like snout pressed in against your seat. "Did I stutter?" She breathes against you, and pecks the back of your testes. "See you inside, hon." [["See ya'."->Hang out.]]]](else:)[ [[Back inside.->Hang out.]]]]]

You're more tired than you thought. After cleaning the basket, picking up the clothes, you're feeling it. How sweetly this new exhaustion contrasts with the fatigue you arrived with: well-fed(if:(history:)contains "Fit yourself in.")[, your thighs and buttocks tingling with exertion]. When Yuca finishes washing and returns, she slumps in the conversation pit, resting her long neck out over its edge. Feeling it too, apparently. You enjoy a languid afternoon together, touching each gradiation of feather and pinion and down, feeling fingers on scale and a smooth mammalian body mingling, limbs outstretched around, past, over each other's naked and mismatched bodies. [[The day goes by.]]

Afternoon darkens, kettle steam, and you have a far quieter time drinking tea. She reads(if:$bookish is 1)[ and you read beside her calmly, for its own pleasure.](else:)[ and you rest against her mutely, sometimes watching her sometimes peeking at the words she scans.] When night begins to fall she excuses herself to her chamber again. "We'll see how I sleep. Today was very relaxing; I don't think I shall disturb you again." (link-replace:"Was yesterday so taxing on her nerves, I wonder?")[Maybe so, chief. Maybe something's on her mind?(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[You are an invader, a savage from a different land. You'll always be a problem, even if a fetching one.]](if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[You've breathed a spirit of remembrance into her, and blown dust free from old tomes.]]] (link-reveal:'"No worries."')[ You run your hand down her neck, which makes her head hang and her smile shy. "G'night, Yuca." "Good night, Manny." She heads to her room. You don't stay up much longer, yourself. [[G'night, me.]]]

And, you find, you might actually sleep soundly after all. No frightful stirring in the middle of the night, no need to come to her aid.(if:$natureboy is 1)[ (text-color:$natvr)[Crickets strum in fugue, on long grasses and bobbing palms in the nightly gales. (if:(history:)contains "The ruins.")[A panther pads circuitously through the old ruins, sniffs the fallen down and crushed grass where you two laid before passing on.](else-if:(history:)contains "Somewhere else.")[The weeds continue growing up that fallen tree. Three more blossoms appear; tomorrow the bees will clutter them all.](else-if:(history:)contains "In the clearing.")[Ants have come and gone over your detritus in the clearing; an iguana scattered them, nipping at them in the grass and glacially crawling in the sun. Now it nestles in the warm crevace of a mangrove's roots.]]] It occurs to you that you may never "sleep with her" like you've heard couples do. [[Not true. You napped together after fucking.->Third morning.]] [[That is kinda sad. But whatever.->Third morning.]](set:$sleepsad to 1)

All your considerations leave once you peacefully slip from consciousness, and you're indeed unidisturbed through the night. By the time you are roused, you've been dimly aware of the sunlight slipping in between the cracks in the blinds. Yuca's foot lightly depresses your lap through the blankets, and you squirm like a suddenly pinned butterfly. "You're hard." She notes, indeed pressing the ball of her avian foot against your erection discomfortingly, then asking with narrow eyes: "What have you been up to?" (link-reveal:'"Sleeping!"')[ You say, clasping her ankle. "Good morning by the way!" She laughs, jabbing her snout down toward you, interrogating. "Good morning, scamp. Have you been rooting around where you should not?(if:(history:)contains "Quarters.")[ Snuck into my room again?](if:(history:)contains "Sex secrets.")[ Rereading the Sex Secrets?]" (link-reveal:'"Wait- do you not know what morning wood is?"')[ Yuca raises her eyebrows, "Morning wood? What on earth is that?" You laugh openly. "It just happens, every morning. You really never heard!" She withdraws, hiding her smiling and mortified snout in her foreclaws. "No, I haven't." (link-reveal:'"Haha! No worries, girl."')[ You sit up, let loose from her paw, and you reach out to her, patting her feathered crown. (link-reveal:'"Anyway, putting on some tea?"')[ You ask. "Well, I was thinking about it..." She hums, looking up and around but not at you. (link-reveal:'"And?"')[ "I was hoping you would do it."]] [["Sure, I'll do it."->Put the kettle on.]]]]]

Yuca dips her head under her forelimbs to smooth her feathers. Her eyes follow you conspicuously as you rise, your own "forelimb" wobbling between your thighs as you fetch the kettle. She's in the conversation pit, fitting and poised in its curvature. "So," She says, as you crouch beside the fireplace, striking the kindling with her foot-operated flint and setting the kettle over the freshly changed logs. (if:(history:)contains "Lineages.")["You read //Lineages//?" [["Yeah,"->"Skimmed it."]]](else:)["Slept well?" (link-reveal:'"Yeah, you?"')[ You say, standing and straying back toward the pit. "Yes, though I missed your company." Her eyes graze on you from your thighs up to your face, punctuating it with a canted smile. [["Well, here I am."]]]]

"Skimmed it, of course. But I was very curious, very drawn in by it." You smile, sitting on the edge of the pit. "I got plenty of questions." "It's very questionable." She giggles, "Between the state censors of Ithlatlicoatl, its author's fancy, and my own colleague's obstinance- it's difficult to get straight answers." (link-reveal:'"Colleague?"')[ You ask. "Pythomenestra, our queen." She smiles cooly. "I suppose it's not very couth to speak of her idly. But she's quite a character, and a dear friend." (link-reveal:'"And you are her subordinate?"')[ You ask, "It doesn't sound like it, to me." Yuca smiles, snout poised to the stacks of books, tracing them with her eyes. "Technically. Here is something you will hear many times on Cuazolmoc: there is no precedent." (link-reveal:"I think I understand,")[ You swing your feet in the pit, "But also, I was thinking, [[what happpened to the native Cuazolmocans?"->"What happened to the native Cuazolmocans?"]]]]]

Yuca purses one side of snout, looking for a span of time down at the cushions beneath her. "Who remains still live in Cuazolmoc." She answers. (link-reveal:'"You subjugated them?"')[ You ask. "No- by the time Pythomenestra came to the archipelago their numbers had dwindled. They lacked the means for dealing with perathallassic disease that Ithlatlicoatl had, and what remained after that colonial interests further drained. That's what I gather from having spoken with the Haig themselves. But," She taps the seat with her tail, her head rising with a brightened countenance. "They live much more secure and plentiful lives now."(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[A not-so-woeful vanquished, but vanquished nonetheless. A humiliated state. Better to die by the sword, one and all.] Can't say I agree, chief! Live to fight another day, that's what I say.](if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[This is the slow, insidious death of mankind. An imperial march, a war machine barking to life and shuddering forward, the earth heaved upward and the sky brought down. Progress: aren't you happy now? Aren't you content? You should be glad you're under my heel. I shall spit! Let black mud rise instead.]] Before you can think to say anything more, you hear the creaking of a carriage's suspension rolling out outside the front door. Yuca's eyes peel back wide. "Hide!" [[Hide!]]]

You slide into the pit and that raptor slithers up over you at her leisure. A bulk of feathers covering your face, making you laugh and muffling you, your shoulder grasped in clawed fingers and your lap burried between massive, coiled legs. You hear the empty tea table clatter, pushed aside by her tail. (link-reveal:'"Mmhf!"')[ "This erection works like any other, yes?" She rumbles as you feel that said thing ground into down. (link-reveal:'"Mmhm."')[ Your arms reach around her waist, the balls of your feet finding purchase enough to push up with your waist- blindly punctuating that affirmative with aimless grinding. Yuca lifts from her crouch on top of you, letting you align and clasping around your face with her jaws, kissing you with a ravishing note. Rising over the sound of your breaths and pounding hearts and shifting, reeling bodies, something is heard outside. The suspension of a carriage aching in approach. Yuca's eyes peel back wide and she rips her face away. "Hide!" [[Hide!]]]]

You peel off toward Yuca's room, but then she shouts "Your bed!" (link-replace:"The bed!")[You peel out again back to the bedroll and linens laid out for you in the den, collect them in a bundle, speed toward the linen closet- The front doors swing open with a loud whine of hinges. (link-replace:"No time- into the closet!")[You cram you back into the bunched blankets and cushions, closing the door against your body, latching shut quietly. Frankly, I don't know why we're hiding chief, but I don't want to find out now. Thankfully the door is slatted and you can peer out at the main room of the timeshare, into the den, and hear as well. [[Spy.]]]]

A blustering from the front door, a languid groan: a female voice with inhuman depth of diaphragm, calling out after a brash exclamation in perfect enunciation. "Aahh! I am growing less supple and more fat every year." Yuca has comported herself calmly and acts duely surprised, no more, no less, and never lets your position draw her eye. "My queen! A pleasurable surprise," She stands, stepping out of the conversation pit and spreads her winged forelimbs in a deep bow. "I hope the journey wasn't too uncomfortable. You look shapely as ever, to me." You hear no footsteps, just a low, sonorous friction. Out from the side of your view a massive figure slides into view: scales glistening deep sages and barks and lunar limes, red and burgundy silks hanging from her in bloody, coifed pleats. [[Who the fuck is that?]]

A nightmare. A fever-dream. A menagerine most certainly. //The// menagerine: the queen of that Liminal Branch you know of only through Yuca. (link-replace:"What does she look like?")[A huge, brawny woman with the head of a snake, swaying on the long coils of a constrictor slithers into the den. She's so enormous that she doesn't seem to stop entering, more and more rosetted length tensing and pulling itself through. Her eyes are baby blue and crone terrifying- like Yuca's, but the sockets they're set in wrinkled with decades of fury, surrounded by darkly painted scale in a broad, reptilian pall. (link-replace:"She wears incredible, awful jewelry and a silk gown...")[She wears a silk gown, cut low around her shoulders and chest, with a glinting halo of lace and crinoline arranged behind her back, and long sleeves pinned up around her biceps which trail sinewy tongues of immaculate red cloth. Her wrists and neck and brow are decorated with platinum, shaped into the forms of sacrificed detritus: rotten cornicopias with lapis lazuli berries and diamond maggots forming a torque, fly-eaten skulls with saphire eyes over her brow.] (link-replace:"She has a weapon, an ax.")[An iron weapon in her hands makes your heart sink: a long hafted labrys, so brutish in design and wear, but wielded casually, lightly, like a schoolmarm would handle a ruler.] She yawns, and says something. [[What does she say?]]

"Morning tea, is it?" The snake-woman unfurls a finger from the stem of her weapon towards the kettle. "Oh, yes. Please join me, Pythomenestra!" The raptor smiles up at her, eyes squeezed shut and straightening in her seat. Pythomenestra slithers closer, into that pit and setting that crude weapon aside. The snake fills most of that circle with most of her length to spare, barrel-thick coils of patterned serpent bundling in her path as the door closes.(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[...] (link-reveal:"Why are you so quiet all the sudden?")[ (text-color:$vvitch)[...?] (link-reveal:"Yeah, you!")[ I figured you'd have atleast something to say about this woman. (if:(history:)contains "Lineages.")[Some wisdom about the great sorcerer-queen, witchy beseeching or warning. Seems like your kinda thing.](else:)[Some veiled warning or beseeching about the regal snake-woman, y'know. Seems witchy, like your kinda thing.] I could really use the help! (text-color:$vvitch)[...]]]] [[Watch them talk.]]

Yuca's snout tilts away and her queen reaches out, a finger under the raptor's chin to realign gazes. Those slotted, golden eyes submitting when turned back up to the other. "How has your sleep been, Yuca?" "Same as always." She replies with a curt laugh, pulling her face away. "Does it show?" "You look fine." The corners of that heavy snout curl, and she claps her paw on the back of Yuca's shoulders. "I think the sabattical did you well." "Haha, well- I couldn't help my thoughts." Yuca admits. Pythomenestra closes her hand, resting her jaw on her knuckles, her broad arm propped on the edge of the pit. "About affairs?" Yuca nods deeply. "Which ones?" [[Which ones?]]

"The ongoing national response to piracy. I can't help but want to feed Nochiminatl my ideas about it." Yuca says. "I might discourage any other menagerine from influencing the state so forwardly." "Special among the liminal- you flatter me." Pythomenestra's low laughter fills the room without effort, running her knuckles down the meridian of Yuca's spine. "In matters of state, at least. But please, tell me your thoughts on the piracy situation." For a flash Yuca's eyes turn towards you in the linen closet, but Pythomenestra doesn't seem to avert her gaze from her at all. [[What does she say about piracy?]]

(if:(history:)contains '"Sing to them."')["Well..." Yuca twists her snout up higher, lidding her eyes, sighing. "It's not a terribly developed idea, you must understand, and to explain it to you under such unexpected circumstances-" Pythomenestra gestures with her spread fingers. "I understand. You have my rapt attention." Yuca smiles at her, then looks up again in concentration. "There is something to be said about the typical pirate's attraction to song," The queen's monstrous and icy eyes widen at that opening, "They sing as they work and as they rest, and in legend the Sirens lead them to their doom by the song as well. There's some power in that, one that's perhaps untapped by us. Perhaps we can lure them ourselves, towards or away... That's the soft influence of the Menagerie, isn't it?" [[How does she react?->Singing?]]](else:)[Yuca cants her nose up, taking a moment to think. "My opinion still stands, that I voiced so strongly before. There's no reason why we couldn't assimilate them as citizens, and indeed it would be a boon for us in many ways, not just a mercy. To commission more privateers of our own, to begin investment in a navy-" Pythomenestra bobs her heavy head, scratching her bare breastbone, and interjecting. "So how do you propose we do that? What would you say to President Nochiminatl?" [[What's her proposition?]]]

Slouching back in your previous seat, arms spread, Pythomenestra mulls it over a long moment. You seriously hold your breath in the intervening silence. "A very novel idea! I'm indeed surprised to hear it from you, with how you normally shun the arts." Yuca gives a head-lolling shrug, quietly. "Perhaps you found your muse?" Pythomenestra teases, then suddenly rises from her seat all at once, sliding toward the kitchen. Then, the kettle hisses. That snake-woman returns with cups and the familiar tea tin. She hefts the kettle from the fire and onto the knit mat at the center of the table, and then tosses the leaves in to steep.(if:(history:)contains "Make tea.")[ (link-reveal:"She's doing it terribly.")[ You did it much more elegantly, chief. //You!//(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[It's just tea. Won't taste better if she handles it more womanly.]]]] Yuca is silent. [[Does Yuca need my help?->Does she need my help?]]

"Maybe, hmm... Give them generous mortgages on houses? A galleon buy-back program? Maybe they would enjoy the land better if they had better shoes?" (if:(history:)contains "Try your damndest.")[(link-reveal:"Oh gods, she said that out loud.")[ Pythomenestra laughs heartily; you feel tail thump the ground outside of your view. "An unabashed statist!" She jostles Yuca's shoulders, that flustered smile remaining stationary on her balanced bird-like head. "I don't doubt it'd work, even." Yuca hangs her head, "Do you like it at all, as an idea?" "No, I fucking hate it." Pythomenestra says without malice. Then suddenly she rises from her seat all at once, sliding toward the kitchen. A moment after, the kettle hisses. That snake-woman returns with cups and the familiar tea tin. She hefts the kettle from the fire and onto the knit mat at the center of the table, and then tosses the leaves in to steep.(if:(history:)contains "Make tea.")[ You are strangely annoyed by how cavalier she is making tea. You did it much more elegantly. //You!//(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[It's just tea. Won't taste better if she handles it more womanly.]]] Yuca is silent. [[Does she need my help?]]]]](else:)[(link-reveal:"Huh?")[ Pythomenestra laughs heartily; you feel tail thump the ground outside of your view. "An unabashed statist!" She jostles Yuca's shoulders, that flustered smile remaining stationary on her balanced bird-like head. "I don't doubt it'd work, even." Yuca hangs her head, "Do you like it at all, as an idea?" "No, I fucking hate it." Pythomenestra says without malice. Then suddenly she rises from her seat all at once, sliding toward the kitchen. A moment after, the kettle hisses. That snake-woman returns with cups and the familiar tea tin. She hefts the kettle from the fire and onto the knit mat at the center of the table, and then tosses the leaves in to steep.(if:(history:)contains "Make tea.")[ You are strangely annoyed by how cavalier she is making tea. You did it much more elegantly. //You!//(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[It's just tea. Won't taste better if she handles it more womanly.]]] Yuca is silent. [[Does she need my help?]]]]

How could you possibly help, chief? Leaping out to make her rhetorical conclusion for her?(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[Abolutely!]](if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[...]] (link-reveal:"Y'know? Maybe.")[ It's at least worth considering. Though, chief, who knows what'll come up in conversation? Make an entrance at the right time, and it could work.(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[And make it big.]] [[Watch them pour tea.]] [[Fuck it. Time to make an entrance.]]]

Pythomenestra picks up the cast-iron pot and swirls it around, goading it to steep faster. "Why so quiet?" She asks Yuca, who is looking off pensively, who replies with her characteristic shrug. "I suppose I'm still waking up." "I've put you in a bad mood, haven't I?" The serpent grins, stooping close. "You've been a bit too isolated out here." "I can thrive in quietude, but I have been anxious about getting back." Yuca admits; her queen remains quiet for a pregnant moment, pouring dark tea into their cups with drafts of steam. "There's been something on my mind, Nestra." (if:(history:)contains '"What happened to the native Cuazolmocans?"')[[[What's on her mind?->With Regards to Native Peoples]]](else-if:(history:)contains "Coins.")[[[What's on her mind?->People in the Territory.]]](else:)[[[What's on her mind?->Reminiscing.]]]

(link-reveal-goto: '"Show Yuca some respect!"',"The Entrance.")[(set:$respect to 1)] [["Did someone say 'pirate'?"->The Entrance.]] [["What's up sluts."->The Entrance.]](if:(history:)contains '"Sing to them."')[ [["Muse incoming!"->The Entrance.]]] [[Actually nevermind, these all suck. Maybe I'll figure one out later.->Watch them pour tea.]]

You step out of that linen closet with a start- (if:$respect is 1)["Show Yuca some respect!" Your heart pounds, sinks, when their pairs of eyes lie on you regardless of what you just said.](else:)[whatever words you had formulated turned to ash and blew out your ears when those pairs of eyes lie on you.] Yuca's flashing and scrunched, almost a scowl- Pythomenestra's ice blue eyes both squinting and laughing at you. "Uh..." You and Yuca both try to say something, glancing at each other. "You've finally come out to join us?" Pythomenestra grins, furled blade-long fangs visible now that you can look directly into her face. She rises from her place, darting forther toward you leaning forward in transit like a missile, her bulk stopping shortly before you. You back into the linen closet, shadowed by her looming frame. You swallow, look down- faithful enough that Yuca would stop her. [["You knew?"]]

"With regards to the Cuazolmocans," Yuca begins. "I feel more should be done on our part to preserve their original ways." Pythomenestra rolls her icy eyes. "For what? The antiquarians and historians? The natives have a decent lot in the bosom of our cities and towns, as citizens with all the honors and privledges of such. What else can we do?"(if:(history:)contains '"What happened to the native Cuazolmocans?"')[(if:$north is 1)[ [["I'll stand up for them!"->The Entrance.]]]] [[How does she reply?->Yuca, against the royal regime.]]

Pythomenestra abruptly looks down at a nearby loop of her snake lower-half. She shimmies closer, reaches among them, produces that coin you lost during your own time drinking tea there. Squinting one eye, holding that warped electrum dubloon up in the light.(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[...]] Yuca looks at it too. "I found that in the Chicachel River, with many others. I think we may have people in the area: smugglers, rebels maybe? I haven't found anything conclusive." "You'll have to show me exactly where you found it." "Oh," Yuca swallows, "I lost the spot exactly. We could look for it..." Pythomenestra fixes her eyes on her. "Hmm. But no need for us go searching- I can send some gendarme to look." [["I found it- I can show you."->The Entrance.]] [[...->The Coin in Her Hands.]]

Yuca brushes her snout with her paw. "I've been thinking those earlier years in the nation. Reminiscing, perhaps." Pythomenestra rumbles with laughter.(if:(history:)contains "With Regards to Native Peoples")[ "You're in a strange mood, aren't you? You're far too young for sentimentallity." Yuca doesn't uncover her snout, pausing. "I suppose..."](else:)[ "Unlike you, to be so sentimental. You're far too young for it." Yuca sighs and sways, resting her shoulder closer to one large loop of serpent. "Don't remind me."] [["No- I'm to blame. I've upset her."->The Entrance.]] [[What is Yuca Reminiscing about?]]

"I am disturbed, hearing you say such. Has not Ithlatlicoatl and Arva said the same of us? We should enjoy our lot in the empire?" There's fresh barbs in her voice, but she quickly rolls them back. "It's just been on my mind. You call me a statist, but I am devoted to the Menagerarchy as whole, the State and the Menagerie. I don't want to see it slide into another royal regime... If we do not apply an ethic evenly toward the citizenship, toward the ways of life of them all, are we not a regime like any other empire we've set out against?" Initially glaring, the serpent-queen softens, sighs deeply. "I know... How do I say this?" She cups her tea in both hands, straightening, the sprawling coils of her lower half drawing a few inches nearer in this long moment. "I value you, in this way. Your considerations. Your ethic, sometimes. As much as it pisses me off..." She swivels an eye to her supposed subordinate. "You're probably right. I'll support you if you re-open the Haig question, as much as I'd resent another few years of deliberation and controversy about it." Yuca smiles up at her, and she replies hesitantly. "Say no more." Pythomenestra smiles in kind, drinking her tea in gulps, unharmed by its boiling temperature. (if:(history:)contains '"Coins."')[[[...->People in the Territory.]]](else:)[[[...->Reminiscing.]]]

Pythomenestra(if:(history:)contains "With Regards to Native Peoples")[ finishes her tea in one more gulp](else:)[drains her tea completely, unharmed by its blistering heat] and wipes her mouth on her wrist. "What about, in particular?" (if:(history:)contains "Trying." or '"Huh?"')["When I was younger, and you had just came ashore with those marauders you called your 'students'. Do you remember when you came to my village, Xituada?" Yuca says. "Of course. If a tad faintly. In those days we had to rely on extortion to get by- hardly anything resembling a nation. Just tents on the dunes." Pythomenestra smiles at her large ringed fingers. "And Xituada gave me up for payment. The talking chicachel. It was a step up from being kept tied up in a stall, but..." Her head sways. "You never saw that boy again." They meet eyes. Yuca looks like she's on the verge of tears, suddenly. A sad smile crosses between them both, before Yuca looks away bashfully. Her queen pats her cheek, speaking, "I remember you wouldn't talk to me, and I was furious- I was about to go back to let blood for payment. But then you stopped me. We were so barbarous then!" She laughs carefully. "We may still be." [[Are they?]]](else-if:(history:)contains "Poking.")["I was thinking about our first days together. I was young and terribly upset. You were so full of anger. We didn't get along at all." "And do you remember that night we did, finally?" Pythomenestra grinned warmly, teeth glittering in a beam of sunlight. "Oh yes... Your retinue of guards were singing a baudy song while they bathed, and you had the idea to sneak out and listen to them." "And watch them-" The queens interjects, making Yuca cant her head with a bashful smile. "And dance together, in our own, halting way." Yuca says. "That's when you told me about it. The Sound." [[The Sound?]]]

Pythomenestra holds the oblong coin between her thumb and curled forefinger, rolling it over her swollen knuckles. Her eyes dart to the other hand and suddenly, inexplicably, it's there instead, beginning the roll all over again on that hand.(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[Coiling her thumb under her fingers to launch it once it's completed its circulation over the knuckles- tricky.]](if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[...]] "Though, if you'd welcome the stroll," Yuca says, "I'd be glad to facilitate such. I was planning on it anyway." "Some other time. I'm too done-up for it." The queen smiles, tucking the coin into her cleavage. "In a contemplative mood, are we?" [[Are we?->Reminiscing.]]

"The Menagerarchy of Cuazolmoc," Pythomenestra sighs deeply, looking up to the vaulted ceiling. "A barbarian in repose. Alba and Arva can't get enough of the Continent, Ithlatlicoatl will die to the last to defend it- I can't see a future with us not getting involved." Yuca's head hangs, as if she's looking for something lost on the tabletop, with her brow scrunched and her eyes worrisome. [["There must be a way!"->The Entrance.]] [[...->Yuca's Foreign Policy.]]

"Ah... That Sound." Pythomenestra sighs and looks up into the vaulted ceiling. "That comely aspect of the night and the delight of gods, that singing mud, that sighing earth-" She looks down at her companion. "You were not terribly interested in it, I remember. Dimissive, even. Why do you bring it up now?"(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[...]] [[Why bring it up?]]

Yuca's eyes dart over the table, her foreclaws rubbing her inclined snout and slowly dripping down her lips. "I don't know what we'll do then, honestly..." She sighs. "You're right, to believe we couldn't remain impartial in territorial struggle. But do we throw in with Ithlatlicoatl? The native empire as opposed to the foreign one?" Pythomenestra lids her eyes. "Opening diplomatic channels between us and them was hard enough. They had every right to demand my extradition, and did-" Yuca stares at her. "And we couldn't allow that to happen." "Am I worth the compromises?" Yuca looks away, the both of them suddenly silent for a long interval. Your lover blows over her tea, clasping it indelicately and sipping, steadying it and straightening in her seat, putting it down with a soft chime from the porcelain. "How do we win a compromise, if the goal of a compromise it to meet both parties' demands in an equal degree?" Pythomenestra opens an eye. Yuca smiles up at her toothily. "We demand more to begin with, Nestra." [[What is she proposing?]]

"What do you propose then, Yuca?" Yuca stands from the pit, her taloned feet picking over the massive dispersed coils, pacing amidst her queen's monstrous body. "What was your purpose in Ithlatlicoatl, before they cast you out?" "High Priestess to Drotzlanti- you know this."(if:$north and $south is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[...] (text-color:$brvt)[Is that someone we know? Sounds familiar.]] "The most venerated god of the Ithlatlicoatlans, as you've said yourself! We can use their religiosity against them, threaten with profanity or desecration-" Pythomenestra's length winces, Yuca dancing around them, halted in her scheming. "Stop this." The former high priestess says with a hand raised. "I won't participate in the destruction of their culture, of //my// culture. And more importantly, I won't profane Drotzlanti, whom you seem to think is some sort of illusion." Yuca stumbles back to her seat, plumed up and unsettled, hanging her head. "Isn't he?"(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[No...] Pythomenestra narrows her eyes at Yuca, but then suddenly peel back again, icey slotted vessels swiveling toward you. [[Oh, shit.->Found.]]](else:)[ Pythomenestra glares at her, cold eyes narrowed to seething blades. Yuca squirms. "I didn't mean it like that..." [[...->It gets more personal.]]]

"Well... I don't know.(if:(history:)contains "Sing to her.")[ I suppose its value as an idea only just occurred to me. I am rather dull to the humanities, like you said." She shrugs with a sheepish, inclined smile.](else:)[ I just remember you mentioning it then, is all. One of your many eccentric ideas." She shrugs, grinning.] "The Sound wasn't just an idea," Pythomenestra smirks down at her, a finger raised. "It was a real thing, real as any nation. Real as any song." She sighs, sinking back in her seat, pushing a length of her coils up out of the pit like froth foaming over the edge of a cauldron. "But it left us, I can no longer hear it- or, more likely, it was just another delusion of mine(unless:(history:)contains "Sing to her.")[ as you implied]."(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[No...] Pythomenestra's eyes go wide, icey slotted vessels swiveling toward you. [[Oh, shit.->Found.]]](else:)[ "I didn't mean it like that..." [[...->It gets more personal.]]]

Pythomenestra springs from her seat toward you, leaning forward as her coils propel her like a missile skimming the earth, stopping short of the linen closet. That slatted closet door is whipped open. You wince, that hulking, monstrous silhouette looming over you and staring down.|tadaa>[ (link-reveal:'"Tadaa~"')[(hide:?wait) You wag your open hands weakly. "Did you say something?" She asks hoarsely. [["Uh, besides 'tadaa'?"->Besides that?]]]]|wait>[ (link-reveal:'"Wait, please don\'t hurt me!"')[(hide:?tadaa) You guard your head with your arms. "Did you say something?" She asks hoarsely. [["Uh, besides 'please don't hurt me'?"->Besides that?]]]]

Pythomenestra half-scowls at her for a few moments more in silence, Yuca remaining acquiescent under her gaze. The serpent crosses her brawny arms, the whole room seeming to sigh as she exhales conspicuously.(if:(history:)contains "I'll give it a shot anyway.")[ You peek at Yuca's hang-dog expression, her darting eyes, senseing her thoughts racing. Slowly, carefully, she scoots closer to Pythomenestra. (link-replace:"She/'s got a plan...")[Yuca rests her brow against her queen's shoulder like an amorous cat, and you grin discreetly at that. It's your strategy, chief. The dumbass charm-offensive. Pythomenestra's expression softens, looking down at her subject. "What are you doing?" "I'm sorry..." Yuca opens an eye, though she can't meet her gaze for long. "My ways for coping are more in negation, skepticism, cunning... I get ahead of myself." A scaled hand unfurls from under her bicep to stroke Yuca's feathered neck and brush the black mascaro that stands around her eyes. "Yuca... You are acting so strange today." She says with humor but no laughter. The weathered hands of the sorceress hold that raptor's face, whos lashes flutter, seeming helpless in that touch. "What is on your mind? Tell me." [[What's on her mind?]]]](else:)[Your lover lets her head hang limp, in still suplication as long as it must seem necessary. It's a scene that feels familiar in how well they fit their rolls: the wrathful queen, the patient subject. Neither of them enjoying the performance. Pythomenestra's eyes swivel up toward you. "Let's address a present matter, then." [[Oh, shit.->You, the Present Matter.]]]

"You knew?" You mumble.(unless:(history:)contains "It gets more personal.")[ "It was... fairly plain." Yuca says sheepishly from behind her queen. "I could see you through the slats."] (if:$south is 1)["Look at this creature-" Pythomenestra's eyes widen, crawling down your uncovered body. "Let me get a look at you." A massive, clawed hand grasps under your jaw, leading you out from your ill-considered hiding space like a stud out of a barn.](else:)[Pythomenestra grasps your shoulder in her huge paw and pulls you up and out of your ill-concieved hiding spot, long black nails on your nape.] Your breath quickens and your squeeze your eyes shut. You hear Yuca's feet- she rises, and you hear her breath too. [[Just be still.->What will she do with me?]](if:$south is 1)[ [["Hands off!"]]]

You're marched out into the den's floorspace, holding your palms up placatively. "Please..." Yuca sighs.(if:$south is 1)[You feel Pythomenestra's clawed fingers run down your firm abdomen, making you grunt and wince and squeeze your hands. "Such a comely body, every cut of meat parcelled before the eye- look, he's got that 'V' thing!" She traces it with her dark nail. (link-reveal:'"Please don\'t touch my \'V\'!"')[ You plea, which falls on deaf earholes. Both her paws clap around your cheeks and you let out a startled sound- her thumbs pull at your lips, appraising your teeth, and then gazing into your wide, frightened eyes.(if:$north is 1)[ "Oh my, I've never seen such a gorgeous shade in an iris. Like a rare unguent or oil- gorgeous!"] "My queen..." [[...->Let go.]]]](else:)[Both her paws clap around your cheek and you let out a startled sound- her thumbs pull at your lips, laughing as she appraises your teeth, as she gazes your widely peeled, frightened eyes. "Oh my... I've never seen such a gorgeous shade. Like a rare unguent or oil- gorgeous!" "My queen..." [[...->Let go.]]]

You smack away the queen's hands with a jangling of her jeweled wrists. You escape the closet and give her a shove- your palms clap against scales that feel like they cover a stone pillar and you send yourself reeling backwards, tripping over one of her coils and sprawling in the den. (text-color:$brvt)[Gods no- not infront of womenfolk! Ask her to kill you instead of living in this dishonor!] Pythomenestra's rumbling with laughter, snout upturned, knuckles on her hips. "Hot-blooded! I like it." Her subject rises, plumed with nerves and gripping her snout.[ (link-reveal:'"Kill me! Do it!"')[ You cry out with earnest challlenge and despondence, which just makes her laugh more.]]<killme|[ (link-replace:"Make for the door!")[You scramble toward the back door but find yourself sprawling again- purposefully tripped by a thinner tip of her length. "No you don't."]]<scramble| (link-replace:"Strike her coils!")[(hide:?killme)(hide:?scramble)You reel back to throw all your weight behind a downward blow from your elbow into her huge coils. "Ow!" They spring up all around you, hopeless to avoid hundreds of pounds of predatory muscle bearing down at once- you cry out in fright as you're captured in writhing, oiled constrictor, suddenly immobilized. "Stop it!" Yuca cries out the next moment, standing with her head thrust foreward and her claws wide. Her queen remains in profile to her, swiveling an eye her way. [[Stop.->Stopped, all three of you.]]]

(if:$south is 1)["How have you not taken a little taste of this body?" Pythomenestra coos hoarsely(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ until she snatches your wrist, holding that mark on your forearm up to light, "Oh, I suppose you have!" she laughs. You pull away and she lets you stumble out of the closet and into the den.](else:)[, before you wriggle and she unhands you, letting you stumbled out of the closet and into the den.]](else:)["What ravishing eyes! Are you trying to undress me with them?" She bares her fangs in an open grin, gripping her ornate crimson vestments. You shut your eyes and stumble out of the closet, nearly tripping on your way out into the den.] "Stop it!" Yuca cries out, starting onto her feet with claws squared out and jaws snapping forward. Her queen remains in profile to her, swiveling an eye her way. [[Stop.->Stopped, all three of you.]]

(if:(history:)contains'"Hands off!"')[You strain with all your might against what feels like stone encasing you up to your shoulders, red-faced and gasping and trying to squirm out of the top of that coiled sarcophagus- then all at once you're released, slumping and coughing over an untensed length of snake. ]"My..." Pythomenestra hums a sonorous note, tapping her chin, her gaze drifting from you to Yuca. Yuca grits her fangs. Her inclined head shading her eyes, her plumage aroused, tensed under this scrutiny. She remains silent. "What is going on here, exactly?"|love>[ (link-replace:'"We\'re in love."')["We-" Pythomenestra's palm claps over your mouth.(hide:?hospitality)(hide:?burglar)(hide:?voice)]]|hospitality>[ (link-replace:'"I washed up on the beach and she\'s given me hospitality."')["I-" Pythomenestra's palm claps over your mouth.(hide:?love)(hide:?burglar)(hide:?voice)]]|burglar>[ (link-replace:'"I\'m a simple burglar. Just found this house on my drifting and set to rob it."')["I'm-" Pythomenestra's palm claps over your mouth.(hide:?hospitality)(hide:?love)(hide:?voice)]](if:(history:)contains "Besides that?")[|voice>[ (link-reveal:'"Hold on- what\'s this about a voice?"')["Hol-" Pythomenestra's palm claps over your mouth.(hide:?hospitality)(hide:?burglar)(hide:?love)]]] [[Let Yuca explain.]]

Lashes flutter over rolling eyes. "Yes, besides that. While you were in there spying on us." (link-replace:"Shake your head.")[You shake your head. When she doesn't seem to recognize the gesture, you say "No, I kept hush." Pythomenestra's lips part- you look up into her darkly painted mouth, see the roots of tucked fangs amid rows of sharp teeth, unsmiling. "It wasn't your voice. Was it?" (link-reveal:'"Huh?"')[ "Huh?" She mocks, stooping and widening her eyes. Then Pythomenestra grins toothsome, straightening and touching her stomach. "Not terribly bright, are you? I tire of seeing you there, holding your breath in the corner of my eye." [["You knew?"]]]]

Pythomenestra reels toward you out of her seat, leaning forward as her coils propel her, stopping short of the linen closet and whipping the slatted door open. You wince, looking up at her, that hulking, monstrous silhouette looming over you and staring down. [["You knew?"]]

Yuca plumes up hen-like, rubbing her snout. Her voice fraying childishly, unlike her. "He was starving and dying of thirst when I found him here, so I invited him to stay. He didn't have any clothes, either, so we had to make do..." "And that's it?" Pythomenestra sways, turned away from you. You can feel the heat of her body, in the shade of her crinoline collar and hanging sleeves. "He, I-..." She brushes her snout against her shoulder, flustered. (if:(history:)contains "Sing to her.")["He sings me to sleep..."](else:)["He helps me sleep..."] Slowly the queen folds her arms, smiling implacably. Then she thumps you with her hip. "Go to her." [[Run to Yuca, embrace her.]] [[Walk to the conversation pit, sit beside her.]] (link-reveal:'"I go where I please."')[ You stare up at her. To which she replies with her palm on your cheek, to push you stumbling towards her like and indolent beast.]

Yuca's snout swivels in the socket of Pythomenestra's palms. She makes a hesitant sound, opening her eyes, turning them toward your linen closet. "I thought so." Her queen rumbles, lips curling in a broad grin. That icy gaze coming to you, blade-long fangs visible now that she smiles at you. The snake rises from her place, darting forther toward you leaning forward in transit like a missile skipping off the ground, her bulk stopping shortly before you to throw open the slatted closet door. You back into it as far as you can, shadowed by her looming frame. You swallow, look down- faithful enough that Yuca would stop her to protect you. [["You knew?"]]

You bound to Yuca's side, sliding into the seat next to her and throwing your arms around her shoulders without a thought. Squeezing her, feeling her pinions rise and the warm down beneath and her coarse breaths- you feel welcome there, even as she doesn't reciprocate the gesture. "Rather close, aren't you?" Pythomenestra says; you look and see her smirking down at both of you. [["We're in love."]] [["We are."]] [[Let her speak.]]

You stride to Yuca and take the seat beside her, folding your arms and looking sternly up at the queen. You feel Yuca's heat, hear her breath- a small comfort. Pythomenestra's eyes fall on you- large discomfort. "Is this the whole truth?" [["No- we're in love."->"We're in love."]] [["We're close..."->"We are."]] [[Nod your head, then look back up at Yuca.->Let her speak.]]

"We're in love." You proclaim, to which Yuca cranes her neck to aim her wide glassy eyes down at you. "Manny..." Her feathers rise, precipitously high and diffuse around your embrace. (link-reveal:'"It\'s true, isn\'t it?"')[ Those golden eyes wet, her snout dipping beside your face, almost hiding from her queen vainly behind your cheek. (link-replace:"Comfort her.")[You stroke down the meridian of her long skull, from white pinions down dark charcoal scales, nearly motionless against you beside her disturbed breath. "Well..." Pythomenestra sighs deeply, regards you with her large arms crossed. Her breath feels like a crosswind moving through the house. "This is quite a development." She moves silently around the pit to a window on the western wall. Opening the wooden blinds, letting reflections from the light-soaked world outside shine on her. (if:(history:)contains "Found.")[[["What now?"->The Voice.]]](else-if:(history:)contains "The Entrance.")[[["What now?"->Your Topic.]]](else:)[[[What now?->Just you.]]] [[Let Yuca speak.->Let her speak.]]]]

(if:(history:)contains "Run to Yuca, embrace her.")["We are."](else:)["We're close."] You say, looking up at Pythomenestra with a renewed sense of challenge. "What the hell's it to you? Just because you're a queen you think you can dictate our lives to us?"(if:(history:)contains "Run to Yuca, embrace her.")[ Yuca squirms in your hug, curling a forepaw around your wrist.] Pythomenestra puts her knuckles on her hips, looming forward and glaring razors. "It's //illegal// for a menagerine to relate closely with a citizen." (link-reveal:'"I ain\'t your citizen,"')[ You reply, "And even if I was I wouldn't give a shit!"] [[Let Yuca speak.->Let her speak.]]

Yuca looks at you for a long moment, sighing shallowly, before rising her head. "Listen, Pythomenestra- he's not a citizen. He's a pirate, and if need be would could extradite him," (if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[Fucking snitch!] ]She breathes in through her nose, sighs again. "But, I- I want him by my side...(if:(history:)contains '"We\'re in love."')[ I think we //are// in love, I think it's true...]" (unless:(history:)contains '"We\'re in love."')["Well..." Pythomenestra sighs deeply, regards you with her large arms crossed. Her breath sounds like a gale moving through the house. "This is quite a development." She moves silently around the pit to a window on the western wall. Opening the wooden blinds, letting the sun shine on her reflected from the light-soaked sights of the morning outside.](else:)[Pythomenestra nods her wedge-shaped skull heavily, absently, for a long moment.] (if:(history:)contains "Run to Yuca, embrace her.")[Yuca pulls your arms from each other, holding your hand in her foreclaw.](else:)[Yuca clasps your wrist in her foreclaw suddenly.] You try to keep a brave face; Yuca wipes her wet eyes on her shoulder. Then you both turn your gazes back on the queen. (if:(history:)contains "Found.")[[["What now?"->The Voice.]]](else-if:(history:)contains "The Entrance.")[[["What now?"->Your Topic.]]](else:)[[[What now?->Just you.]]]

Pythomenestras twists around and sinks closer toward you, her intricately scaled face glossy in the firelight, backlit by rays from the window, platinum and jewels casting prismatic flecks around her crown. "Speak to me in that voice." She says with all the intensity of a command. (link-reveal:'"I don\'t know what you\'re talking about,"')[ You say, then can feel her watch your adam's apple wobble as you swallow. "This voice, you said, when I was in the closet? Could it have come from outside?" Slowly the serpent shakes her head. Yuca glances between the both of you quizzically. (text-color:$vvitch)[...] The queen reels closer in her frightening quick manner- twisting her head towards you as if listening. You shift, can hardly muster breath that doesn't sound wavering. (link-reveal:'"..."')[ You gape your mouth fish-like, about to make some protest, unable to complete it. (text-color:$vvitch)[...] [[C'mon, speak up for her! Get me out of this bind!->Speak up, Northern Drotzlanti.]] [[Keep quiet. Who knows what she has in store.->Speak up, Northern Drotzlanti.]]]]

Pythomenestra twists around toward you suddenly, her big mits tucked behind her back. "There was some topic we were discussing when you stepped out. What was it, again?" (if:(history:)contains "Are they?")[(link-reveal-goto:'"Uh... War."',"Matters of State.")[(set:$war to 1)]](else-if:(history:)contains "Reminiscing.")[[['"Yuca was upset..."'->Just you.]]](else-if:(history:)contains "People in the Territory.")[(link-reveal-goto:'"Intruders? Coins?..."',"Matters of State.")[(set:$intruders to 1)]](else-if:(history:)contains "With Regards to Native Peoples")[(link-reveal-goto:'"The Cuazolmocans, the Haig I think you said..."',"Matters of State.")(set:$natives to 1)](else:)[[["Pirates, I think..."->Pirate Matters.]]]

(if:(history:)contains "Your Topic.")[Pythomenetras closes her eyes and turns back toward the window ](else:)[Pythomenestra just closes her eyes, remaining profile to you ]bathed in light, silent. You look to Yuca, who queasily massages her foreclaws together, and looks to you again, as if you have a solution. Which is laughably hopeful, on her account. Well, do you, chief?(if:(history:)contains "Run!" or "Try to flee through the window!")[ (link-replace:"I could run!")[I could run, but I wouldn't get far. ]](if:(history:)contains "Try your damndest.")[ (link-replace:"I'll grab her wrist and look her in the eye, make her understand with my blunt manly charms!")[I couldn't hope to touch her, not like Yuca. She covets my body but has no sentiment for me myself. ]](if:(history:)contains "Fighting stance!")[ (link-replace:"I'lll fight, if I have to!")[(text-color:$brvt)[No way could a manlette like you take her(if:(history:)contains '"Hands off!"')[ as amply demonstrated by your embarassing display earlier]. ]]] (link-replace:"I\'m at her mercy- there\'s no way around it...")[Once again, you're on your back foot, at someone's mercy... [["What now?"]]]

(if:$natives is 1)[You look up at her, finding any inquiry of her intentions bouncing off an ironic, scaly expression. "The native people here..." You look away, rubbing your neck. "I don't know. It's a rather sudden thing that occurred to me, I-..." Pythomenestra slithers silently closer, lowers to listen to your halting voice. "I feel to dismiss the original peoples isn't just pig-headed, it's dangerous somehow." "You think they'll revolt?" She cants her head. "No, not dangerous in that way. A danger of the spirit. Precipitating a certain sentiment in people..." The queen is listening to you earnestly- it makes you squirm and sweat, such sudden pressure, yet she is granting you some space. (link-replace:"Look to Yuca.")[Yuca looks at you with wide eyes, also in wait for you to finish your thought.] [["It's just evil, I suppose..."->Colonial Rot.]]](else-if:$intruders is 1)["I could show you where the coins were scattered- I found them." You look up at her, finding any inquiry of her intentions bouncing off an ironic, scaly expression. "And?" She asks. "Well- I figure you want to know if there's truly intruders in your territory..." You say, rubbing your hands. A smile carves its way across her wide snout, uncanny and breathtaking, suddenly. "Intruders?" She coos, slithering toward you, lowering on her legless lengths. "I don't think either of you know what you're talking about." You chill, hackles rising, unable to meet her penetrating eyes. Her hand, runs up her belly to fold in between her breasts and produce that twisted electrum piece between fore and middle digits. "Would you like to know?" (link-replace:"Look to Yuca.")[You look to Yuca, in time to see her birdlike throat swallow. "To be frank, it seems unsettling to consider intruders over morning tea..."] [["Sure..."->Shine of Electrum.]] (link-reveal-goto:'"No thanks."',"Shine of Electrum.")[(set:$shine to "no")]](else-if:$war is 1)[You look up at her, finding any inquiry of her intentions bouncing off an ironic, scaly expression. "It was about the other empires, their wars," You say. "You can spare yourself from them- you should..." Pythomenestra slithers towards you, arms crossed over her chest, levered forward. "Do you have any notion about the complexity and obscurity of what you're talking about?" (link-reveal:'"No, but, y\'know?"')[ You stammer, crossing your arms too and straightening, "I've gambled enough to know a crooked dealer when I see one."(if: $south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[You're insufferable right now, I hope you realize.]] Craned forward and looming precipitously over you Pythomenestra's eyes widen, and her lips crease with a lopsided smile. "But, y'know?" She drawls, mocking you, "You are very perceptive, and correct. If only men like you existed hundreds of years ago when your ancestors decided the world they had wasn't enough. It's //too late now!//" She exclaims, whirling her arm out wildly from her chest. "There's a monkey on their back and they can't stop. They're biting our backs too, forcing us forward. //Forward.//" [["Forward..."]]]]

"Pirates," Pythomenestra reiterates, circling her hand in the air, "So what compelled you to speak up so?" You rub the back of your head, (link-reveal:'"Well, being one, I suppose."')[ Pythomenestra's eyes flicker wide, "Oh, that explains it," Yuca swallows close at hand. "A pirate washed ashore on my vacation home! What a lovely premise." She clasps her hands, "But, to the point:](if:(history:)contains "Sing to her.")[ what do you think of that singing proposal?" (link-reveal-goto:'"Well..."',"Pirate Consultation.")[(set: $muse to 1)]](else:)[ what would you propose to curb piracy, as a pirate yourself?" [["I don't do free consultation, lady."->Pirate Consultation.]]]

(text-color:$vvitch)[...] "Perhaps you need some encouragement?" Pythomenestra gazes wantonly into your face, straightening. Her sizable chest heaving, her coils inflating with a deep inhalation from the monstrous queen. She places her hands over her tense belly, her painted piercing eyes going slack. Yuca swallows heavily, squirms beside you as her eyes dart between you. Her plumage on-end, her mouth pursed as her mind races futily to understand this exchange. (link-reveal:'"..."')[ Pythomenestra speaks then, her voice rich as elbow-deep soil in wine country, bear-husky, sonorous and clear like passages from the body of a cello, pulsing through the whole home it feels. "Let those words turn to ash in time," (link-replace:'"...?"')[(text-color:$vvitch)["Whose enunciations bore,"] "Let their charcoal fertilize the mud," (link-replace:'"Wh-what\'s happening? Why did I say that?"')[(text-color:$vvitch)["Or the belly of a whore."] You clap your hands over your mouth, shaking and clammy. Yuca gazes at you, her fanged mouth gaped. Pythomenestra laughs, her paws smoothing from her stomach to her broad hips. "Oh, wonderful!" [["Wonderful?!"]]]]]

Then even her eyes are wet: the piercing blue eyes of Pythomenestra damp with tears laughing, blotting her painted lid with her finger. "Gods..." A groaning sigh rolling up through her coils and out her fanged mouth. Yuca stands in her seat, glancing between the two of you. "What's happening? What did you do to him?" Pythomenestra lays her palm on her snout, bidding her to sit again. She opens a hand for you, bidding you up. (link-replace:"Stand.")[You stand, stepping up out of the pit before her. You clasp her hand for balance, broad paw lightly damp from her tears. She lowers herself to look more squarely into your face. Your dark irises reflected in her own, her other hand coming to hold your shoulder. "You're haunted. You must be in no small measure of discomfort, hmm?" (link-reveal:'"Yeah..."')[ You release her hand and fidget with your hair. "Just... Totally uprooted. Sometimes I just want to grip the grass and shut my eyes, so that maybe things will seem sane." A more earnest smile than you've yet known from her appears on Pythomenestra's lips. (link-reveal:'"But, well..."')[ You look back at Yuca, warming. "There's been some comfort, lately." The raptor smiles as she rubs her snout in her foreclaws, still at attention if flush with your implication. "When's the last time you've danced, darling?" You almost answer but realize it's directed to Yuca. [[What does she say?->The Last Time She Danced.]]]]]

Pythomenestra cants her head almost imperceptibly, with a wry curl in the corner of her lips. "I believe you," She coos to Yuca. "If you didn't have some place in your heart for him he'd be dead, no?" Yuca leaps to her feet snarling, her tail and forelimbs flagging out around her in a display. "How //dare// you imply that!"(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ You lean away from her, massaging that shallow wound she gave you and swallowing, gazing up at pinions bristling in the fresh, pregnant quiet.] "How dare I." Pythomenestra rolls her eyes, hip cocked out, before a glacial blue pupil hones on you. "What do you think, treat? Do you think it never crossed her mind to eat you and bury your carcass? She could get away with it, you know. Easily." (if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[(link-reveal:'"I uh..."')[ You run your fingers through your hair. You feel prickling and cool sweat trickle up from your skin, tears well at your eyes under the scrutiny. (link-reveal-goto:'"I think you\'re right, Pythomenestra..."','"Absolutely not."')[(set:$trauma to 1)]]](else:)[(link-reveal:'"I uh..."')[You run your hand through your hair, chuckling uneasily. (link-reveal-goto:'"I think it was on the table, honestly..."','"Absolutely not."')[(set:$onthetable to 1)]]] [["Absolutely not."]]

"(if:$shrine is 'no')[Too bad, we're talking about it. ]Where do you think coins came from, boy? Originally." Pythomenestra holds that coin before your eyes, her own irises behind it like objects in orbit.[ (link-reveal:'"Someone smarter than me?"')[ You say, which makes her rumble with laughter. "A good guess! But I'm afraid not."(hide:?god)(hide:?thief)]]<smart|[ (link-reveal:'"Someone better at thieving than me."')[ You say, which makes her rumble with laughter. "A good guess! But I'm afraid not."(hide:?smart)(hide:?god)]]<thief|[ (link-reveal:'"Some gold-god, I suppose?"')[ You say, making those slotted eyes perk.(hide:?smart)(hide:?thief)]]<god|[ The queen rises once again, the coin held away from her. "Debts necessarily point to the future: one day they will be fulfilled, like any mortal looks off toward their death. The mortal view of time is colored like their perception of anything: what time //is// changes, might forever be obscured except to the most fortunate and diligent of magi. Yet, what do we have here in the average dollar? A debt that is now immortal, that extends itself infinitely to support the mass-markets I've watched grow and succeed the power of the crowns. No- capital is not the work of a current individual, but a thing to come." You scratch your head, and Yuca looks attentively at her co-conspirator. (link-reveal:'"No, please, continue."')[ You goad. You're glared at. "Something is //coming// by way of this, something with an immortal sense for time that can bring about its own existence retroactively," She gestures with the warped doubloon, "And we have no idea what it is." [[Blink.]]]]

Pythomenestra gives a pursed-lip smile down at you, her knuckles on her hips, but suddenly, you're speaking again. (link-replace:'"An evil..."')[(text-color:$vvitch)["A pathological evil, a disease that blacks and bruises the sky, an amnesia of woven blankets and indigo, a rapacious bursting of the thallassic veins and rubicon erasure of ley lines- //no, a thousand times no I won't countenance it!// To turn my face away from plague, to blanket my nose and mouth politely with my handkerchief, to roll my eyes at the reeking rot of those pederasts- //no,// I will blanket the nose and mouth of the purveyors of nation until their ghosts leak from their ears!"] You realize you're standing, you're squeezing your fists- at the end you remember in those moments Pythomenestra's face twisting into a kind of bluntly shocked expression, which means you were staring her in the face for the interval. "Gods... That voice..." You hold your hands up to your mouth sinking back trembling into your seat. She wheels forward quickly, "No, please," Pythomenestra bids, "Speak again." [["I-I don't know why that came out like it did."->Speak up, Northern Drotzlanti.]]]

(if:$trauma is 1)["I think you're right... She considered it. But, y'know, she didn't go through with it in the end." You stand, "But the thought's left her now, surely."](else-if:$onthetable is 1)["I think it was on the table, honestly." You stretch, "Why wouldn't it be? But the thought's left her now, surely."](else:)["Absolutely not." You stand up, gazing up at the queen of Cuazolmoc and setting your jaw. "She's a gentle woman and likes gentle things.(if:(history:)contains '"Do you do much cooking?"')[ She doesn't like to kill at all, she only does it when she needs to.]"] Pythomenestra grins mightily, her head lolling back as she gazes at you two. You turn to Yuca(if:(history:)contains "She retreats.")[ who's deflated from her openly wrathful stance, wing-arms drawn to her chest, head hung low and tail tucking. Her plumage almost seeming to grey drawn close to her skin, even in the brown feathers on the saddle of her back seeming somehow dusty.](else:)[ who's slowly deflating, from a poise fit to dismiss her queen's goading to a lilting, like an aged flower in its pot, her plumage laying itself low to her flesh and seeming almost to grey, dusty. Her head, on its stem, hanging low.] Yuca's eyes are squeezed shut tight- you see tears running down her inclined snout, and you feel your heart chill, your body iced and tingling suddenly. [["Yuca, what...?"]]

Yuca's head rises and cocks back, gazing up at her queen. "Danced?" She muses, eyes darting, "I suppose, now that I consider it, last time I danced was with you. Your majesty." The said majesty sinks closer, surprising her subject with a tap between her distracted eyes. "Then you haven't danced at all, I believe. I can't dance, not really." Pythomenestra reels back, hands fitting around her waist and smoothing down the intricate pleats of her red vestment, down her broad hips that end where serpentine coils begin. "I have no feet, no real ass to speak of- I could sway to a rhythm or hoist my arms around, even enough to hold you close and hum a song and swing to. But it's not //dancing//, not in its most archetypal form." Yuca cants her head and smirks. "I disagree. But what is this? What are you getting at?" [["Yeah I'm confused too."->The Sound, The Steps.]]

(unless: $muse is 1)["Especially not," You gesture, searching for a word, "You all!" Pythomenestra rests her cheek in her palm and its congruent elbow in the other hand. "You heard how Yuca talks about pirates. Seems like a parley to me." Yuca just looks between you two. You cross your arms tightly around your chest. (link-reveal:'"Why?"')[ You ask. "Just out of charity?" "A permanent solution," Yuca pipes in, distancing herself from you a step. "Not just tamping down punitively on the pirate problem but eliminating the need for people to be pirates based on their own interests." You bob your head. (link-reveal:'"So, how do you suppose you\'ll do that?"')[ Yuca shrugs heavily and sighs. "I feel like my best ideas have been cut down by the state and the Menagerie, outwardly rejecting mercy over base punishment..." Pythomenestra makes no move except to wriggle the tip of her tail. [["Punishment is the only way."]]]]](else:)["I thought of it. I'm the 'muse' you could say." Yuca looks down hearing this. "I'm sure she just took credit to protect me." Pythomenestra rests her cheek in her palm and its congruent elbow in the other hand. "So, what's the logic of this proposal? It's very novel. But it doesn't seem workable now, does it? To sing away our enemies?" The queen pitches forward fluidly, almost imperceptibly changing posture and gazing spearheads at you. "Are you just feeding my secretary shit so your boys get a better chance?" [["N-no of course not!"->Innocent Muse.]]]

"I have... Considered it. Even this morning..." She croaks, and sniffles. Her shudders stifling a sob, your lover still except the confession tearing itself free from her. "I've done it before... Eaten a man, eaten a lover. And I //loved it//, too..." Yuca shakes her hanging head, tears falling freely onto the silk cushions. Yuca cries, a shrill, shallow chirping sound. Your sight of her flattened pinions, her sobbing, wilting body, swirling with your own tears. (link-reveal:'"Yuca, I..."')[ You what, chief? You had your suspicions but now she's admitted it: she's a literal man-eater. She's a monster after all, she can't control herself. Murdered and eaten men like you for pleasure, and got away with it.(if:(history:)contains "What is more glorious than this?")[ (link-reveal:"Am I so different?")[ With the things I was complicit in on the //Caterpillar//, the //Bonne Maude//? Maybe I deserve to be fucked and killed and devoured, with nothing left to be ashamed of behind... C'mon chief, it ain't like that...]] [["I..."->"I don't care."]]]

"The Sound, the steps necessary to court it... You have it." Pythomenestra wags her finger towards Yuca, who swallows and glances at you. (link-replace:"Shrug.")[Your shrug, and feel a chill when the queen glares at you. "What about you? When's the last time you've danced, toy?" (link-reveal:'"Oh, can\'t be terribly long ago,"')[ You say, tapping your chin. "Mopping it up and throwing it down at a pirate juke. But what's this about, anyway?" "Singing- what about that?" She insists. (if:(history:)contains "Sing to her.")[(link-reveal:'"The night before last..."')[ You rub your arm and flush, Yuca squirming at your side with her own hesitance, mirroring each other. "I sang her to sleep. She sat behind the door and I just let a sea-song go." The Queen of the Menagerie smiles broadly, clasping her hands together beside her cheek. "My... (if:(history:)contains '"We\'re in love."')[You //are// in love!](else:)[You //are// close!] This is perfect, for our purposes." [["So, what purposes?"]]](else:)[(link-reveal:'"Must\'ve been, like,"')[ You think, rubbing your chin. "The night before washing up here. Pulling rope, spitting a tune." Her head bobs heavily and eagerly. "Good enough, for our purposes." [["So, what purposes?"]]]]]]]

"So, what purposes?" You say with no lack of exasperation. Pythomenestra 'stands' tall, looming in the air statuesque and pointing down at you with a glossy clawed digit. "I'll tell you, toy. You may be menagerine material." You blink, then look to Yuca, who's fully plumed and her snout hanging open. (link-reveal:'"Uhm, I am? But I\'m just a human."')[ You say. "That..." Yuca breathes, brows high as she regards you. "(if:(history:)contains "Let her know.")[Makes sense. He is... Slippery, in a certain way." (link-reveal:'"Slippery?"')[ You huff. "Do explain, Yuca." "He claims his eye color changed when he washed ashore. That his eyes were brown when he sailed, and are what they seem now only after he arrived here." "And, might I add," Pythomenestra grins, arms crossed. "He's charmed you." That raptor squirms beside you, puffing from her nostrils. "... I suppose." "That's the least of it." Pythomenestra speaks. [[...->The Sound and the Voice.]]]](else:)[I don't know... What do you see that is so monstrous in him?" Pythomenestra jabs toward you with a talon, "Those eyes of night- I can't help but feel their significance, first of all. Second, he's seemed to have charmed you pretty well." Yuca squirms you, puffing from her nostrils and gazing down her snout at you. "Sure, but..." "That's the least of it." Pythomenestra speaks. [[...->The Sound and the Voice.]]]]

"I don't care." You say. Pythomenestra breathes in. Yuca looks at you with one swimming eye. You continue. (link-replace:'"I..."')["I... I'm a bad man. I think I'm worse than you. You can eat me if you like, if you'd love it." You say, haltingly. What hell are you doing, chief? You're giving her //permission to eat you?// (link-replace:"Yeah...")[Yeah, I am. Fucking- why? (link-replace:"Why the fuck not?")[ "Manny." Yuca speaks sternly, suddenly. Her head rises with tears streaming down her cheeks and a centered expression. "Do not throw yourself at my feet like that. Do not say such things, I do not..." He eyes dart around. "I mean, I want you by my side..." (link-replace:"Look at Pythomenestra.")[Pythomenestra shrugs and bugs her eyes out at you silently, as if to wonder why you'd look to her for help.] [[Embrace Yuca.]]]]]]

You blink at that coin (if:$north is 1)[ sweating coldly, and ]letting your eyes dart between it and her. (link-reveal:'"What does that mean?"')[ She cants her head slightly. "What makes you think this little piece was //left// in the river? What if it was always there?"(if:$natureboy is 1)[ (text-color:$natvr)[Mineral flowing from the crags inland down and over millenial depositing in the riverbed, clumping together beneath the soil as ferocious storms and downpours and rooting plants stir the lively gravel, suck the loam. Up comes coins: grown, like fruiting buds.] (link-reveal-goto:'"That\'s..."',"Making Sense, Making a Disturbance")[(set:$riverwise to 1)]] [["That's ridiculous."->Making Sense, Making a Disturbance]]]

Yuca looks surprised, so you go on. You cross your arms, stoop your neck. "Y'know, I've known these men. They're awful and you don't want them in your society- these churlish, evil men. They'll just fuck it all up, like they always do. It's better to push them away, keep them out, punish them." "Manny..." You look away from her as she starts gazing into your face. (link-reveal:'"What, Yuca?"')[ "Whatever you might have done, however you have lived... It's not a permanent condition of your virtue." You feel her breath on your cheek and feel you must look at her from the corner of your eye, to see how pouty you look reflected there, to see how openly warm her expression is directed at you. You feel it penetrate you; you have to turn away as you feel tears in your eyes. (link-reveal:'"What the fuck do you know?"')[ You say, your voice breaking as you feel your throat grow tight, your eyes sting as you rub them. Yuca shimmies closer and her long serpentine neck loops around your nape and shoulders, drawing you into her warm downy breast and masking your outburst in her embrace. You cling to her, under the eyes that still regard this all coldly. [[...->Share of Sin.]]]]

(if:(history:)contains "Embrace Yuca.")["A popular sentiment in this room, it seems."](else:)["We've done our share of evil too."] Pythomenestra speaks up. "It seems like you need sin to be at home in Cuazolmoc..." Yuca sighs in your ear before she replies. "I don't know... It sure seems that way." You (if:(history:)contains "Embrace Yuca.")[slacken](else:)[put] your arms around her shoulders and keep quiet.(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[Fleeing back into the bossom of some woman to make yourself feel better about your work- fucking pathetic. You're just running away from what you are: a lifetaker, a rapist, a warfighter.] (link-reveal:"Shut the fuck up.")[ (text-color:$brvt)[What did you say to me?] (link-reveal:"I said shut the fuck up.")[ Can you hear yourself right now? How fucking awful you sound? Do you ever think about what I need? Maybe if you had a body of your own and didn't just mooch off mine you'd understand. You've never had a woman comfort you- you don't even have a mother! (text-color:$brvt)[...] (link-replace:"Listen,")[Listen, sorry, that was harsh, but I'm not who you think I am. I'm not going to be that guy. I know you're trying to help but, fuck, dude... (text-color:$brvt)[Fine, OK, I get it. Whatever.]]]] Why did you do those things? Just to fit in? Are you still just trying to fit in? Is there anything wrong with that necessarily?] Yuca runs her nose between your shoulders and you both [[look up at Pythomenestra.->So Frail.]]

You straighten at attention as if goaded with a switch under her accusation. She laughs languidly and it seems to crash like thunder all around. "I'm on to you." She teases with a lopsided grin and a waggling of her taloned finger. "But seriously- you were playing into her preconcieved notion of mercy. Just with a novel means. I understand. But do you really believe it could work?" (link-replace:'"Like I said to her,"')["Like I said to her, pirates sing when they work and when they rest, in their dreams too, and if you want them to crash their ships you sing to them from the shores like the Sirens. I suppose it's a trope but that's so for a reason..." You rub your arm. The queen bobs her head, releasing her cheek. "So, what song would you use to lure a ship to its doom and release its crew?" You swallow. "D-do I know a siren's song? Is that what you're asking?" (text-color:$vvitch)[...] She gazes at you narrowly down her broad snout, at your mouth particularly. You realize she's been inching closer for the last few moments. Pale eyes flick back up to your own, her darkly painted lips going slightly slack, parting. You hear Yuca clear her throat but her queen doesn't seem to pay it mind. "I do. Sing it for me. Use that voice of yours..." [["I, uh, don't know those songs..."->Speak up, Northern Drotzlanti.]]]

You close in toward Yuca and throw your arms around her feathery narrow shoulders- a heavy sob comes from beneath your touch as she reciprocates eagerly, neck coiling around you. You cling, her forelimbs clutching tightly at your hips, and with your face buried in her fragrant down, you too are weeping, damping feathers. (link-reveal:'"I\'m sorry-"')[ You sob softly, "Rude of me to..." She squeezes you tighter, pricking you softly with her claws. "No, Manny, I understand..." (link-reveal:'"We\'re bad for each other, aren\'t we?"')[ You say. "If so," Yuca loosens the hug enough to look you in the eye. "I don't want to be good." [["Yeah, me too..."->Share of Sin.]]]]

The Queen of the Menagerarchy is crying too, you realize. Her python pall lifted toward the ceiling, her cold and painted eyes squeezed shut and draining down the intricate paths in her old sockets, her scaled cheeks. "Gods..." She whispers, grimacing as she wipes her eyes with the back of her fist. Yuca rises up from beside you to go to her friend, but Pythomenestra pushes her away, "No, please, Yuca- Don't comfort me. Don't leave him for me." But the raptor insists, stepping forward again, met with a broad hand on her brow. (link-replace:"Stand.")[You stand from the conversation pit, naked before the strange and stirring tableau of monstrous friends. "Let me in. I'm leaving no one." Yuca protests. "I'll never let you suffer alone, not after what we've been through." The raptor hops onto one of Pythomenestra's loops, taloned feet clinging to serpentine coils and you're overcome with a strange frisson of recognition- you clutch your naked arms to cover the goosepimples appearing on your skin. Pythomenestra crosses her arms and turns away from her friend who still perches on her lower half. Yuca rests her chin adorably on the turned shoulder. Your lover murmurs against her temple lowly, closely. "Don't push me away, darling... You don't need to. I'll help you, support you..." (if:(history:)contains "Lineages.")[(link-reveal:'"So the stories..."')[ You swallow. The queens nods her head gravely, letting it sag against Yuca's brow. "Sad and true, largely. Familicidal, thanatomaniacal... That's me." She holds herself much like you do, then.]] (link-reveal:'"You\'re pretty close yourselves."')[ They laugh lowly together, meeting eyes- Yuca insisting, Pythomenestra acquiescing in a way that is clearly rare. You smile at that, feel eased by it. [["So... Tea?"->Today.]]]]

(link-reveal:'"Where have I heard that before?"')[ You straighten in your seat, sucking in air deeply through your nose, lidding your eyes. "My bosuns, rousing us to take the deck, to raid the shore when the initial show of force failed... Forward into their shot and pike. Laying ourselves down for a chance at... Whatever." You wave dimissively. "You wouldn't understand the sacrifice of some monkey like me fighting for fortunate. At least as a pirate the baselessness of it was laid bare- no national ideology, no anthem, and hardly a flag. We fought for things we could cling to and carry away and scarf down."(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[So glorious, to throw oneself forward! To die in a flash or live in robbery!]] You're looking away from them, from the monstrous nobility of Cuazolmoc both, overcome with a kind of tooth-grinding disgust. Pythomenestra grabs your shoulder- you try to pull away with a sudden revoltion but find it stuck there, gripping tight. You glare at her, but her reply down at you stops your struggling. "I see." She says, then swallows whatever other words she had in her mouth. You look at the hand, its crocodillian scales, its firmness and coarseness. (link-reveal-goto:"Touch her hand.","Lay Arms Down.")[(set:$touch to 1)] [["Let me go."->Lay Arms Down.]]]

(if:$riverwise is 1)["That's..." You sort your hair, looking off. "Making more sense than I'd like to admit." Pythomenestra straightens, rumbling and tucking away the coin again. "You are wiser than you look. Those that live by the coin love to think that they control it somehow."](else:)["That's ridiculous," You say, looking down at sorting your hair. "Just, like, it doesn't make sense..." Pythomenestra reels herself up, lidding her eyes and shrugging heavily. "You'll have to learn to live with things that don't make sense, one way or the other."] You can hear the clackng of foreclaws off to the side. (link-replace:"Look to Yuca.")[She's regarding this all nervously, snout swiveling with her darting eyes. (link-reveal:'"What do you think of this?"')[ "I uh... I'm unsure." Pythomenestra crosses her arms heavily, "You don't trust-" "No! It's not that," Yuca interjects and leave a quiet moment in its wake, looking up at her queen. "It's... These ideas disturb me sometimes, regardless of their truth." Regarding her, the serpent swallows and nods shallowly. [["So... What are you getting at?"->To Purge the Shrine.]]]]

(if:$touch is 1)[You touch Pythomenestra's clawed hand, which outweighs your own starkly, finding yourself gazing at the cords down its leathery back and running your fingers down them to the wrist as she slowly releases you. (link-reveal:'"You see?"')[ You say, "You mean..." It's obvious, touching those built digits, their coarse knuckles and age-old callouses. "She was an heirophant and warrior for Ithlatlicoatl." Yuca explains, and falls abruptly quiet. Pythomenestra lets her hand hover before you and strangely, you hold it in both of your own. Rough, killing hands, laborious hands, thieving hands, sacred hands, mingling in equanimity despire their gulf in strength and poise. Still gazing down at them(if: $north is 1)[, reflected in your dark eyes,] you say "And you still want war?" You feel her sigh touch your bangs, hear it roll all around you through her. "I wish I could say 'no, it's an awful, terrible thing I wouldn't ever wish for'. But I want them to pay." Just as your thumb sweeps beneath the thick flesh beneath her knuckles that paw slowly squeezes shut into a blocky fist, a terrifyingly tight thing, cords swelling up her wrists, trembling with an awful power under your fingers. "And I'm not alone." [["No, you're not alone."]]]](else:)["Let me go." You say, trying to shake your shoulder loose but finding her paw outmatching you, "You don't understand!" She releases you and lets her open palm hover over your face, built digits extended, age-old callouses beneath their knuckles. A killing paw, built for hafts, gesturing to the deathly glare of the sun, pouring salt in the fields. You feel stunned, cold, gazing closely at them. "You..." She withdraws it, holds it close to her chest with head hanging suddenly. "I do understand." You screw your jaw shut, squeezing your hands, (link-reveal:'"And you still want war?"')[ Her sigh rolls all around you through her. "I wish I could say 'no, it's an awful, terrible thing I wouldn't ever wish for'. But I want them to pay." She holds out both her hands, those taloned things squeezing shut into massive blocks, cords swelling through her wrists, trembling slightly in their awful power. "And I'm not alone." [["No, you're not alone."]]]]

"What am I getting at?" Pythomenestra beams, as if you reminded her of something. "Yes- that thing, it needs to be met out in the field. Just as this god lumbers towards us in all its gravity for a coming day of judgement, we need to seek out its future temples to loot them before they can be built, to drag them back into the past. Accelerate their appearance and expose the lie." You scratch your head, (link-replace:'"Just make it happen quicker?"')["Just make it happen quicker? That seems counter-productive." Pythomenestra shakes her head slowly and you exchange skeptical glances with Yuca. "That's where you're wrong," The queen says, "It's a thing bound to kill itself. That's its destiny, I believe." "//You// believe..." Yuca mutters under her breath, thankfully unheard. (link-replace:'"I suppose..."')[ You scratch your head. "Expose the lie, like you said, sooner rather than later." Yuca interjects, "But that is wild conjecture when livelihood is on the line for our citizen, for the world. What if it doesn't kill itself off? What if dying is what it wants and we're simply wracked with the consequences? I don't believe- I strongly disagree with this course of action."] (link-replace:'"But what if we just cut if off now?"')[ You say. "Strangle it in the cradle, so to speak." Pythomenestra grimaces slightly. "It doesn't obey time like we do." (link-replace:'"Well-"')[Your reply comes quick, "Well, it needs us to work through, so it must on some level." You shrug. Yuca nods confidently listening to you. [["Think about it,"->The Consequences.]]]]]

[(if:$south is 1)[(link-replace:'"I\'ll fight with you."')[(hide:?peace)"I'll fight with you." You say. "I want to fight them." Pythomenestra raises her scaly brow. "Why?" (link-reveal:'"Why?"')[ You stoop forward, gazing up at her with your shoulders tight, your fists pushed down into your thighs. "I've fought these empires all my life. Fought savagely for my freedom. But all I could come away with is jewels, captives, empty spilling of blood, in the end... I don't want to be just dancing around the flame any more. I want to be free. I want to rip their banks and courts and churchs out of the earth and dash them on the rocks. I want them to pay, too..." Your head hangs, your hair veiling you as you squeeze your eyes shut, as you bite your lip. "For what they did to the //Caterpillar//, to all my mates..." You're shaking, holding your mouth,(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[Don't you dare.] ] as tears stream down the back of your hand. "Manny..." Yuca closes in and loops her neck around your shoulders, drawing you into her warm downy breast and masking your outburst in her embrace. She fails to make you bend towards her, while Pythomenestra privately smiles, which is not lost on her secretary. "Shame on you," [[...->Shame.]]]]] ]<fight|[(link-replace:'"We all want peace."')[(hide:?fight)"We all want peace. We want to lay down arms..." You hold yourself, looking up at the vaulted ceiling of the den, savoring a moment to collect yourself. (link-replace:'"I remember,"')["I remember when I first was welcomed into a crew, young as I was, on the //Caterpillar//. First just hauling the powder for them during exchanges, cleaning and cooking, but I always wanted to start pulling line with those guys I admired and sailing proper. I loved the way the ship looked fully rigged, the sails in the wind. I wasn't big enough, though." You palm your mouth, thinking. "So they promised me I could be a sailor if I could pass this one test. They had kidnapped a working woman and put one of their sabers in my hands, and had me use it..." It's too much, too quickly. Pythomenestra's expression doesn't change regarding you but you look down anyway, squeezing your eyes shut as a bonechilling remembrance washes over you. You're shaking, holding your mouth,(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[Don't you dare.] ] as tears stream down the back of your hand. "Manny..." Yuca shimmies closer and her long serpentine neck loops around your nape and shoulders, drawing you into her warm downy breast and masking your outburst in her embrace. You cling to her, under the eyes that still regard this all coldly. [[...->Share of Sin.]]]]]<peace|

"Shame on you, Pythomenestra... You just want people to feel as wretched as you do!" You hear her in your ear, massaging your own hands and looking into your lap with swimming vision. "Shame... I suppose so." She replies cooly, a sigh heaving through the room. "You just hold these vendettas so close, for ages, and spread them far and wide... Did you found Cuazolmoc just to get back at //them//?" Yuca cries to her. "...Yes." The queen says, and you look up, watching her arms slacken from the cross over her chest, her shoulders stoop, her expression soften gazing at you two mingling together. "But, gods, Yuca... You showed me what it could be." [[...->So Frail.]]

"He's got a Voice in him, this boy of yours. The Voice of Northern Drotzlanti. It haunts him, speaks to him, tempts him. And if you listen real close, you can hear it, burbling in the back of his throat." You hold your neck, suddenly very uncomfortable, suddenly goosebumped. Yuca gazes at you, still open with her surprise. "Manny..." "You're a good pair, you two. I know you have a Voice of your own." At that Yuca looks away, her feathers dampened. "Tell him, I don't want to speak for you." The queen says tersely, crossing her arms.|I>[ "I..." (link-replace:'"You don\'t have to explain."')[(hide:?Explain)"You don't have to explain if you don't want to, Yuca." You touch her lips, "I, uh... Y'know, we all have our secrets." She gazes at you with her brow scrunched low, hot breath blowing into your palm. "I... Alright, I will refraim. It is what comes to me in the night. I will leave it at that." [[...->The Proposition.]]]][ (link-replace:"Let her explain.")[(hide:?I)"I... Hear it in the night. I think it's related to my sundowning, in that way. Maybe as a result of it, or maybe the other way around..." She dips her head beneath her foreclaws, stroking herself carefully before raising again. "Olo- that's its name. But everything else, the language it speaks... Everything is so indistinct. It wants me to be closer, to you, to humans, but also to... I cannot say, truly." (set:$olo to 1) [[...->The Proposition.]]]]<Explain|

"Think about it," You gesture to clear a space for your thoughts, "How long will it take for it to burn out and what will it take with it? Certainly me, and all my mates who live and die by the coin. It's already taken..." You find yourself trailing off suddenly, your breath coming up short, your body weighed upon by something.(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[Shake it off.]] (link-replace:"What's this feeling?")[You focus on breathing, on trying to not make your chest feel so tight, but then you feel this swelling behind your eyes. This shiver of something passing up through you like a rising chill wind. (link-replace:'"It\'s already taken so much."')["It's..." Your voice wavers, you hold your hand to your mouth and squeeze your eyes shut, holding something back. "So," Pythomenestra squares her shoulders. "Do you want a begrudging peace? Or do you want to take it all back?" [[What do I want to say?...->"No, you're not alone."]]]]

Pythomenestra seems to smoulder with a kind of excitement, tall overhead and her tail twitching all through the den. "Hear my proposal, now." You and Yuca look at each other then her, wide-eyed. She raises a taloned finger, conducting it absently. "Every voice is a living dream, even the ones unexpressed, living just inside your thoughts. The ones within you have something to say. Not through speech, but dreaming. It is their right, our privledge, to hear them." Yuca sighs, letting her head roll loosely toward you, even as she clearly feels such tension. "Such a conjunction is not unheard of, especially in Cuazolmoc. Yuca has these sundowning experiences as a result of her anatomy. It's a perfect rift into the greatess of the night, as a result, which you shall explore." You bob your head, and you feel Yuca's forelimb squeeze your thigh tensely. [["OK... What does that entail?"]]

Pythomenestra turns profile, one slotted eye swiveled toward you. "Have you two fucked, yet?" Yuca plumes, head cocked back on her serpentine neck. (link-reveal:'"Yes,"')[ You flush a little, looking at her. "We have." "Good! Well, you need to do it again, but at night." Yuca looks up at her with ungarnished panic. "Wait- at night? But I can be violent, there's just no way that's feasible-" (if:(history:)contains '"Hands off!"')["Oh he can be violent too, when he wants." She grins at you.](else:)["I'm sure he know how to protect himself. It's been in his livelihood."] (link-reveal:'"I\'ll do it."')[ "Manny!..." She exclaims, and you look at her, unable to mask your turmoil with the eyes of your lover welling with tears there, as if you were leaving her. (link-replace:'"I know, it\'ll be dangerous,"')["I know it'll be dangerous, but..." You reach to her cheek and she presses into your tocuh, her tears running down your hand. "Does it scare you so much?" "Endangering you?" She says with no lack of emphasis, her voice quickly turning to a sob, "Of course it scares me! I could hurt you, I could kill you, and..." Yuca trembles softly beneath your fingertips, trembling in sympathy. (link-reveal:'"Maybe."')[ You say, holding her face and looking into her crying eyes. "But I want to hurt, if it's you hurting me. If I die... Well I risked it for far uglier masters. If I'd die for you, for your people, it'd be nice." Yuca squeezes her eyes and shakes her head free from your hands, sighing a deep, wavering note. She rests her brow against your own. "OK... Yes, then, if you agree to it, I do too." [["I do. I agree to your proposition, Pythomenestra."->Tonight.]]]]] (link-replace:'"Yeah this seems... Unreasonable."')["Yeah this seems... Unreasonable." Pythomenestra turns toward you, hardening. "It's an initiation, since I must spell it out for you. No menagerine is without theirs: those mad leaps into the dark. I decide who has made that trip. This will be yours: a grand production, dangerous indeed, but great in its reward." (link-reveal:'"And if I refuse?"')[ Pythomenestra scoffs and folds her arms and turns up her nose. "Then... I will be disappointed. And you couldn't be a menagerine, but... I suppose I will have to figure something out to keep you at Yuca side. However I can't promise much. Certainly not the comforts of the menagerie." [["I'll turn down this proposition, then."->Today.]]]]]

Tea goes quietly without much conversation. You can tell that Yuca, pressed up against her, is keeping tensed. Pythomenestra attempts to share some charcuterie but you both turn it down. Just before noon arrives the queen dismisses herself: "Anyway, I'll go out for a ramble in the wagon." Then you're sitting across the table from Yuca again, fondling the squat wood furnishing or looking up into the beams in the ceiling. Anything to avoid the look of worry and burden on her, which you feel you've given her, which you can't appologize for because the deed has yet to be done, which you may not live to appologize for. (link-reveal:'"...I\'m sorry."')[ You say, suddenly. She smiles wearily. "What for?" (link-replace:'"You don\'t want to do this,"')["You don't want to do this, tonight..." "We both agreed." (link-reveal:'"Yeah but..."')[ You scratch your mane of hair. Yuca stands. "Don't waver now, Emanuel. We're doing this." She strides out of the pit, into her room. [[Sigh.->Thinking of the Night.]]]]]

(if:(history:)contains'"OK... What does that entail?"')[... ]The three of you sit together for tea. You find some narrow place for yourself between strong feathered haunches and huge coils. The morning is filled with animated conversation- you see them again at that ease they had when Pythomenestra first arrived, that salacious wit and width and kindness they share for each other, and occasional turn on you. Though you can't imagine what they are like in their courts, the negative image of high society is palpable: a release from their duties, from the public gaze, even if just to be a bit more coarse for a while. "Oh let's picnic, Yuca. It'd be a shame to stay inside during this outing." Your lover titters a chirping note, which makes you laugh, and in turn she giggles louder. "Let's." She says. [["Let's."->Another Picnic!]]

Alone, you pace the vacation home, only the scantest notion of the monsters around. (link-reveal:"Am I really going to die tonight? Is she really going to hurt me?")[(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[It's possible. She's an animal first and foremost.](if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[And so are you: the human beast. Forever changeable by variety of means.]]](else:)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[There will be change- perhaps a scent of rain and frizzy hair, perhaps a deluge.]](if:$natureboy is 1)[ (text-color:$natvr)[A small drizzle passes over the southwestern portion of Cuazolmoc. An eagle dips when the drops hit it, passing beneath the vision of the waning moon. Vipers curl in with each other under the stringy roots of a mangrove. A mockingbird sings alone- from a displaced diaspora from the mainland. Look very closely at where its small, black claw is perched, at the green vine shoot there. Given a week further it'd tie it in place.]] (link-reveal:"I hope you really appreciate this.")[(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[I admit: if this works you'll finally be worthy in my eyes.]](if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[From the bottom of my bowels a littany of your praises.]] (link-reveal:"What\'ll happen, if it all works?")[(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[Fuck I dunno. You win?]](if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[What happens in every estuary? Admixture.]] Time crawls. You try to get some sleep. You wash, you drink water. Yuca slinks out occasionally to do the same- you give her an unsure smile and she looks away. You care for your breathing until eventually the sun is hanging low. [[Alright, well...->Into her Chambers.]]]]]

The wagon that brought Pythomenestra deep into the Cuazolmocan preserve is huge, as you expected. An excessively wide and architectural-looking cabin, white and stuccoed with red curtains blowing free from its windows. It's pulled by kulauquetzals: reptilian beasts of burden native to Ithlatlicoatl, a draft breed at that with dinnerplate hindpaws pressing into the mud and their brachial horned head nodding, or reaching into the brush to snatch leaves with their dark tongues. A fair and slight person waits in the driver's seat, dipping their mane of platinum hair to you all, black dress shocking in the contrast. Pythomenestra calls them "Mead". Even in the breadth of the well-cushioned and acquainted cabin you all have to squeeze in, hearing the massive wheels and buttress-like spine of the vehicle protest. You're half-sitting on one of the queen's muscular loops, partially pressing against Yuca, and hanging out of the open window, like a morsal in an overstuffed tin. From there you can (if:(history:)contains "In the ruins.")[[[guide the driver to your spot.->Back at the Ruins.]]](else-if:(history:)contains "In the clearing.")[[[guide the driver to your spot.->Back at the Clearing.]]](else-if:(history:)contains "Somewhere else.")[[[guide the driver,->Back at the Clearing.]] though Yuca pipes in with directions to her first choice.]

Twice again you're back at those ruins, amid its heaps and grassy uneven mounds and that stoney arch you gazed up at once in feverish sleep. "Gods," Pythomenestra purrs, fanning herself. "You'd choose a charnel house for picnicking? I feel seen." "There's no remains here, I don't think!" Yuca protests.(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[There are.]](if:$natureboy is 1)[ (text-color:$natvr)[There are.](if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[Jinx.]]] Yuca trots on her own in the space, turned away and lowering her head. She sniffs the earth, levers her head up to scent the air. Completely naturally, and yet, you realize- (link-reveal:'"I\'ve never seen you do that."')[ You observe, which makes her suddenly straighten and compose herself. "It's just- sometimes I do it out in the wild." She stammers. Pythomenestra laughs, "Oh she's shy about her little animal quirks. But they're cute, no?" Yuca plumes up, mock-glares at her queen. (link-reveal:'"Yeah,"')[ You agree, laughing as you whip out the blanket. "Well, usually!" As you order the picnic basket you glance over to see Pythomenestra at her secretary's side, an arm over her back, a coil behind her heels, brusquely teasing that raptor. "Touch her just right and it's easy to forget she can talk and think and balance our schedules. It's like fucking an animal." "Rude!" She chirps, with a suppressed giggle. [[Laugh, "You're too much."->Picnicking.]]]]

You're back at the open clearing, the wind rustling through its wild grasses and long weeds, whistling through the branches of the surrounding forestry with a somnabulant peace. Pythomenestra stops short in her slithering when you enter the clearing- you glance at her, seeing her clasp her hands before her stomach, her face squinting in the sun, but also from holding something back. You enjoy stretching while you can before hauling out the picnic basket. When you turn to walk into the clearing Pythomenestra grabs your wrist and you let out a surprised sound. "This way." She says, slithering toward the gumbo-limbo tree beside the stream. (link-reveal:'"Hey!"')[ You protest lightheartedly. Yuca giggles as she follows, watching you stumble. "Hey. Set up under that tree." Nestra demands. (link-reveal:'"Why?"')[ "Because I'm queen, of course." She turns to you, free bejeweled hand on her vast hip and a smirk carving her lips. "Because of sentiment." Yuca pipes in. "Her and Mead first met on one of those trees!" (link-reveal:'"Feelings? You?"')[ You match Pythomenestra's grin, "Are you coming onto me?" "Hah!" She sends you stumbling towards the destination, releasing you. "You could trade a kingdom and I wouldn't spit in your mouth." "Don't worry, she said something similar to me first." (link-reveal:'"You\'re too much."')[ You laugh, as you [[set down the blanket in the shade of the gumbo-limbo tree.->Picnicking.]]]]]]

The last time she goes to wash she leaves her door cracked, leading into her dim room, growing dimmer as the dusk settles into dark. (link-replace:"Push the door open.")[You push the door open. She's finishing a ginger sweep of her room, the sheets haphazardly arranged on her bed, no down or discarded clothes left out. She's pushing something under the bed with her snout; the door's creaking alerts her and she straightens. There's jelly in your legs. You realize you're leaning on the doorframe. To see her look at you like that, unclothed, upon your naked body- in that moment it's like washing up all over again and meeting an unfamiliar beast. Somehow the eyes of warmth and kinship and a mingling of fear frighten you more than those blood-caked talons. (link-reveal:'"Are you ready?"')[ You ask. "As best I can be." Yuca sighs, turning her face from you. (link-replace:"Approach her.")[She stands in profile with her neck woven away like a feathery ribbon, her broadside bared to you, its pinions white beside the saddle of truffle brown. Her tail twitching the fan on its end. [[Touch her.->Touch as the Night Comes.]]]]]

You run your palm down her spine, feeling the knots of lean muscle beneath her manicured pelt. Yuca turns her face to you, those worrisome eyes in a dark mask, seeking you. (link-reveal:'"See? We\'re fine."')[ You say, feeling her feathers rise and fall, out of synch with the breath coming quickly in her frame. Standing close at hand you can feel her warmth, her weight shifting from foot to foot. "Sure..." She hangs her head, massaging her snout. "Touch me, down there..."] (link-replace:"Grope her.")[You reach around Yuca's thick haunch, fingers lacing with feathers and into the soft down beneath, gripping a corded hamstring with fingers yearning further beneath her tail. She makes a soft, hesitant sound, rests her weight on the opposite leg to relax where you touch her, if so gently, so recedingly accepting it.] [[Kiss her.->The Night Setting In.]]

You lean over her shoulder, reach to hold her chin, lid your eyes for a kiss that's just started to come easy to you two. She turns her snout into it, matching the gesture- her lips pressing to yours, parting. Gaping, then, pressing her long dark tongue deep into your mouth, her jaws spread around your cheeks pricked by her fangs. You're stumbling backwards as she writhes on her feet and the beast presses into you- your tailbone clatters against her bureau, forced to sit on its surface as a jewelry box is overturned. You grip handfuls of her pelt on her cheeks and neck and gag on her invading tongue. Facing you, foreclaws rake your naked thighs and make you gasp sharply. Yuca rips herself away with a short cry- your bust is drenched in her spit, long lines of it strung between you and her frightened pall. (link-replace:"Assure her.")["Shhh..." You hold up your hands, reaching to her neck, but she backs further away- such a panic in her eyes that grow wider, grow dilated.] (link-reveal:"What did she call you- Northern Drotzlanti?")[ (text-color:$vvitch)[Northern Drotzlanti! Of the Veins Weeping into the Loam! Of the Jade-Bright and Far-Away! Of th-] (link-reveal:"I need some help here!") [(text-color:$vvitch)[What? Why?] [[//Why?!//->Aggression.]]]]

Yuca leaps and your heart follows- a terrifying instant with her eyes flashing and her preying bulk springing. Her talons crunch on the oak bureau on each side of your hips, biting into the wood through the varnish as you're suddenly eclipsed. Overwhelmed in heaving, bristling, downy breast, your arms fright-rigid and grasping her foreclaws by the wrists. You feel her drool into your hair as you peel your head back for breath. (text-color:$vvitch)[All dies eventually. What privledge yours will be!] (link-replace:"Not funny!")[You struggle to keep a foreclaw pressing into your left breast, rigidly groping at you. (link-replace:"I'm not dying tonight!")[ (text-color:$vvitch)[Then do as you've been told.](if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[Fuck that! Get aggressive! Counter-attack!] [[Yeah, aggressive!->Get Aggressive!]]] [[What the hell does that mean? What I've been told?->A Voice in the Dark.]]]]

With a kick and a shout, you make room enough between you to slip down between her legs and away. Stumbling toward her bed, taking a fighting stance(if:(history:)contains "Fighting Stance!")[ nearly like before] on your trembling and tightly coiled legs, dripping with her spit and feeling a warm trickle of blood from your nose and a puncture on your breast. (link-replace:"No hesitation! Leap onto her!")[You charge with a cry towards Yuca- she whips back around, snarl low, claws spread. In your zealous leap you soar over her crown, landing on her saddle, your cheek on the back of her hips. You find yourself suddenly clinging to her like an unlucky rodeo clown, tossed onto the back of a raging bronco. She bucks and your head claps against her pelvis, eyes swimming with lights, but you remain. One of your arms reaches beneath her tail and the other around the waist, "collar-tying" as your heels pinch her ribs. (link-replace:"Bite her.")[Yuca stumbles aimlessly, as you feel from just the churning in your stomach. You sink your teeth into the base of her tail, past rigid pinions, into softness and hot, lean flesh. You smell her, feel her cloaca press hot and damp against your clinching forearm- you can't tell if she's slavering wet or if it's just your panicked sweat. She bucks again- you grunt with the impact to your breastbone, then you feel both of you slipping, capsizing. [[We need to fuck, right?->Ground Game.]]]]

(text-color:$brvt)[I'm scared.] You and Yuca sprawl on your sides on the ground, clinging desperately to her. Feathers bristle up all around your naked and wet body, and you feel suddenly that you're tingling with pleasure, with a heart-pounding, painful adrenal high, the head of your sex burning and drooling in her down as you cling to her back desperately. Your head swims as you crane it over a massive, flexing thigh, gazing there: those lips into her cloaca pouting, gnashing and damp under your wrist and within a forest of down... (link-reveal:"Wait-")[Wait- //you're// scared? Go fuck yourself! You curl your fingers in beneath that gently bleeding tail's base, into her vent. You can hear her caw and trill bestially, and her snout curls around to bite at your thigh- it would be a fatal blow, but it stops short when your hammer three digits into her cunt, her arousal flowing freely in the spaces between your knuckles. Yuca lifts her dripping fanged maw from your haunch. You feel hot breath bluster over your buttocks, a light sob from her open lips.(if:$rim is 1)[ You feel suddenly, graciously, a long tongue trail up from your thigh between your glutes.] You glance back and see a little softness in her pall.(if:$rim is 1)[ You shiver, drooling blood and spit from your face, precum into her feathers, as you feel the tip of her tongue flick up and swirl against your own hole.] (text-color:$vvitch)[The dreaming wavers.] [["That's it girl, calm down..."->Finger for Dear Life.]]]

(link-reveal:'"Yuca!"')[ You call out to her in a choked voice, past suffocating feathery weight and the exertion of keeping her foretalons from pushing into your ribs. (link-reveal:'"Yuca, please!"')[ You look up at her seeing her squeeze her eyes shut and hit her brow against the wall over your head, flecks of drool falling.(if:(history:)contains "Sing to her.")[ "Please please please..."] (text-color:$vvitch)[Please please please yes yes yes...] You curl your legs up between you two, pressing your heels under her legs and pushing against her hips with all your strength, releasing you in her moment of hesitance. You scramble, reeling away and getting your footing again, drooling blood from your nose and a cut on your breast, greased with her own spit. (text-color:$vvitch)[Ah, now what? An open weeping your divinity? Or will the beat carry on?] (link-reveal:'"Dancing..."')[ Yuca turns to you, gape-jaws and drooling and such a flashing ambiguity in her wide eyes, beholding you, shambling off of her bureau. [[We gotta dance.->May I Have This?]]]]]

You extend your palms, ready to catch another leap however you can yet it doesn't come. Yuca gazes at you with that feral kind of neutrality in wide abyssal eyes. You both pant, and bleed, and the room fills with the scent of your chaffed and battered bodies, your wrought breath and fear. (link-replace:"Approach.")[ She begins to circle, and then you follow suit, watching every twitch of that animal's body through your raised hands, feeling the slippery tile floor beneath your feet. The space between you feels dense- some part of your tries to reckon depth, wind current, smell. You find something different there. You pace around each other, Yuca's lips trembling in a brief snarl and her foreclaws stretching. You feel your hands press against a tangible density, like a silk sheet raised between you two. The air distends like oily bubbles and your mind's too jarred to recoil from this alien sensation. The veil stretched, its reflections turning from a solid glass pane to a mosaic of sacred jewelled light. You percieve Yuca doing the same: pushing through a substance. (link-replace:'"May I have this dance?"')[(text-color:$vvitch)["May I have this dance?"] Your fingers reach, her claw extends- there's a glowing ozone between them flashing when you finally touch in a wave of numbness and blindness. [[...->Touch.]]]]

You hammer your three digits into her nook, wrist straining as her tail hikes and shivers against your face, as Yuca's neck bend back and she rattles a deathly exclamation. Those legs coil, drawning near and butterflying, shivering as she rolls a few degrees more onto you. Then she shrimps: talons blasting back out into a point and back springing into lordosis, the power of that abrupt, snapping power slamming her pelvis against you. You go sprawling over the ground, once again rattled, staggering, reeling- clamouring slowly back onto your feet. She'd be on you again if she weren't still there sprawled in afterglow: squirming and heaving, her drool puddling beneath her head and in her damp downy groin. But it doesn't last: she eventually settles at the same state, climbing back onto her clawed feet with eyes still widely dilated and honed on you. (text-color:$vvitch)[Ah, now what? An open weeping your divinity? Or will the beat carry on?] (link-reveal:'"Dancing..."')[ Yuca turns to you, gape-jaws and drooling and such a flashing ambiguity in her wide eyes, beholding you, shambling off of her bureau. [[We gotta dance.->May I Have This?]]]

You and Yuca once again sit with each other on a knit blanket- the Queen of the Menagerines lays laxly in a coil of her own body, arms tucked behind her head, eyes nictating in the sunlight, her exquisite dress wrinkling beneath her. Her ease is contagious. (link-replace:"Pet Yuca.")[You stroke your lover, running your fingers through the pinions on her nape down that sinuous neck, which turns into your touch with relish, which hums with comfort, until it twists to let her plant a kiss on your lips. She pushes her feet against the blanket to rest against you more flush.] (link-reveal:"Wait- do they fuck?")[ One might be lead to believe so. (link-reveal:'"Are you two, y\'know..."')[ You begin. "Intimate?" Yuca hums, a little rise in her feathers. "Oh quite." Pythomenestra grins. "Nothing terribly romantic. We just fit together so nicely." "And, honestly, trust each other more than some other menagerines, in our friendship." Yuca adds, tucking her snout against you. "That's sweet." You conclude with a smile.]](if:$picnicwine is 1)[ (link-replace:"Reveal the wine you stashed in the basket.")[It's still there from that first picnic: a nice bottle of wine you stole from the kitchen. You husk it from the cloth you bound it in and hold it up to the sun. The red glint of it catches their eyes covetously. "Where'd you find that?" The queen prods a finger toward the bottle. "Stole it from my kitchen, you rake!" Yuca giggles. (link-replace:'"I brought it the first time,"')["I brought it the first time, but we never got around to it." Yuca smiles and lashes her tail. Pythomenestra bids you to give it to her so she can push the cork through wih her thumb- lacking cups you just pass around the bottle.(set:$wine to 1)]]] (link-replace:"Look outward to the surroundings.")[(if:(history:)contains "Back at the Ruins.")[You see inky-winged crows lining up on the arch your slept beneath, peeking over the remaining masonry. Four in all, and associating closely as if having their own outing, you can imagine.](else:)[Your eyes unfocus and only then can you see the wind clearly, moving in a sensual wave from the southeast through the land, bespoke in the drifting clouds and eddies of long grass and the tolling of branches and palms. You shiver; Yuca curls her long lever tail around your seat and smiles down at you.]] [[Carry on.->Carry On with Life.]]

You're taken by the mood. Suddenly you're standing, pacing away from the group. You look at the grass beneath your feet. It's Cuazolmocan grass, Cuazolmoc itself too. Storied and yet so impartial. Giving all so many have known for generations, and yet yielding none to a casual guest like yourself. You cannot think straight about it.(if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[To name is to lie, but no great sin.]](if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[What's this feeling?]] You turn back to your company. They are smiling at each other, thinking of something appropriate yet complimentary to say. You catch their attention by your poise.(if:$north is 1)[ (if:(history:)contains "Back at the Ruins.")[["This land isn't ours, is it?"->Toppling the Arch.]](if:(history:)contains "Back at the Clearing.")[["This land isn't ours, is it?"]](if:$south is 1)[ [["I want to protect this land."]]] [["Cuazolmoc's a nice place."]]

You see a myriad of images, scattered and disorienting, refracting themselves, reflecting each other, distending infinitely on the empty canvas... Yet the further you look the more you realize it's because all of your eyes are distributed on a single surface, like moss. A single plane on an uneven map, twitching and darting vision blurring, then clarifying. A vastly different world: pink-hewn skies and polyhedral suns and pastel grasses over vast hills, strange things in repose far in the distance- it is too much to consider. Especially in your condition. (link-replace:"Look at myself.")[You look at yourself: a dark mat of lichen made of your long, black hair, stretching through and hanging from the branches of a tree. Your oily blue-black and glistening eyes like that of a shrimp, dotting the masses. The tree you call home is old, desicated, dead. That same numbness and brightness- the tree falls. A wind blows. Lightning cast from the chubby hands of a pale infant. You are face-down in the earth. Your tree is smoking tinders. [[What do I do?->Pirate Moss.]]]

You do nothing- you're moss. An invasive species at that, happening to find a wooden perch in a foreign place to breathe and feed on. Now you're dashed to the ground. The earth beneath you is coated in white grasses, long white blades sparsely mixed with toffee-colored stems, and closer to the soil matted with soft down. The stems extend black leaves, long and hooked. Ants crawl up and down them. You spot the roots of one of these plants, churned up by the crashing down of your tree: deep red cassava roots, thick and plump and bleeding openly. It's beautiful to behold- your hairy moss collects over the grass and cassava, mingling with it, tying together plants and fungi and all. (link-replace:"Look.")[You look up for the first time. You see gargantuan buttresses and collumns in the distance, stretching up into the satin atmosphere, where beyond clouds you can barely percieve frescoes painted on the interminably vast vaults. You can see, in waning spacial sense, a gumbo-limbo tree overlooking your mingling on the hill. (link-replace:"Feel.")[You feel, as it goes dark, the rise of rich, black mud from the torn earth: hot like estrus and washing over the dead tree, the displaced moss, the lovely yuca... [[...->Stepped On.]]]]

Yuca's clawed foot stamps on your own and you flinch, softly yelp into her down, feeling its blade scrap your shin. She makes an apologetic sound. You're pressed together, drifting through the room. You hear some pulse guiding you. You smell volcanic mud and the cool ground of the timeshare feels hot under the balls of your feet. You brushagainst a wall and feel it perspiring. (link-replace:"What the fuck is happening?")[You don't know what's happening. (text-color:$vvitch)[It fills you with the terror of the first birth. It fills you with its joy, too.] Yuca's lips draw wetly down your nape and she whispers something unintelligable but metered, beautifully rendered in her hushed, husky voice. Something has been keeping every tendon in you taut in alarm and readiness, and it suddenly slackens, a diastolic bliss rolling down your body, descending tones croaking out from both of your mouths, and you know now: You're both feeling this. Clinging like fire to each other, making the building burn, making the earth bleed. Glimpsing the vault. Raising the dead and making them bow. [[I can't do much now, can I?->No You.]]]

No. You're leaking away. There might not be much left, soon. Your cup runeth over! Luckily, it's all smooth sailing from here. That mockingbird's swarming your vision, its feathers like so many blades of so many hammers' designs, like so many reeds of so many lips' piping, burning eyes of petrified sap gazing down at the world and giving life with the unsheathed gleam of its perception, to the blooms that scatter themselves to the earth. Everything mingles: these eternal things with the caress of your lover's lips and down and claws which feel so fleeting in the night, the dim vision of her shoulder pressed to your nose, the sound of her whining breaths... [[And,I faint...->Found in the Morning.]]

... Late into the next morning you're dimly aware of being underneath Yuca, who's curled up into a feathery, sighing torus on top of your naked body, pinning your legs and using your chest as a cushion for her peacefully sleeping and slobbering snout... You're jolted awake after the sunrise- a searing pain on your breast. Pythomenestra looms over you, her nail burning like coal and caughterizing the wound there. You're numb somehow, but not enough to not grimace and startle at that. "Easy now..." The queen murmurs, cocking a smirk. "You're in bad shape. I've got you charmed." You try to sit up and can't- exertion and a narcotic sensation has you. You gently squirm as your breast is patched with sharply painful fire. (link-reveal:'"Gods-"')[ You gasp. "You're wondering what happened?" You try to nod. It works. "I don't know exactly, but it did something. I suppose, at very least, you earned your way into the Menagery. One miracle, one proof of your supernal nature, and how could I say no in your case?" She looks up from her work. You realize you're in the den, on your back. [["Yuca?..."->Yuca, After the Conjunction.]]]

You call out. "She's resting. Far better off than you are, don't worry." You're flipped onto your front brusquely and she works on wounds carved into your hip that you didn't even notice until now. You hear the door shouldered open and heavy footfalls. "Manny!" You can't see her but recognize that high, hoarse voice. (link-reveal:'"Hi~..."')[ You croak. "I'm so sorry I hurt you and I almost killed you I almost- And I couldn't live-" She sobs, and Pythomenestra stops working on you to attend to her. (link-replace:'"I\'m fine, really."')[You murmur something into the ground, try to lift your head but feel a feverish rush lay you back down. You're not fine. You spend some time taking stock of your fingers and toes. "Easy, Yuca." You hear Nestra's consoling and muffled cries, the soft chafing of her big hands running down her feathers. "He's gonna be OK. You were incredible, there. I love you." "I love you..." She moans in reply. [[Sigh.]]]]

Pythomenestra turns back to fixing you, her brusque touch sealing and washing and bandaging you on the den floor. You're narcotized and sat up beside the soiled wash basin and a open leather bag with a variety of medical instruments, slowly clearing your head, glad to be alive and tended to, even as the pain and exertion returns. It's Yuca that holds you up. She's curled behind you, letting you lean on her feathered, warm mass, recently bathed herself. You're peppererd with kisses, chatted up with a kind, beautiful voice even if your own is still so weak. "I love you." Yuca purrs into your ear. "I love you." As she pecks your temple. [["I love you too."]]

(link-replace:"Wait, what about those other voices?")[(text-color:$vvitch)[I'm still with you.](if:$south is 1)[(text-color:$brvt)[For what it's worth, me too.]](if:$natureboy is 1)[ (text-color:$natvr)[Grass grows, birds fly, the beat still goes on.]]|released>[ (link-replace:"Honestly? I was hoping you all were released.")[(hide:?glad)(text-color:$vvitch)[Satiated, certainly.](if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[Rude!]](if:$natureboy is 1)[ (text-color:$natvr)[Hopes moulder in soil like anything else.]] [[Well, time to rest up...->Where It All Stands.]]]]|glad>[ (link-replace:"I\'m glad. I always liked the company.")[(hide:?released)(text-color:$vvitch)[You can't see it, but I'm smiling.](if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[...]](if:$natureboy is 1)[ (text-color:$natvr)[Many things are proximal to you now.]] [[Well, time to rest up...->Where It All Stands.]]]]]

Your health slowly returns through the day, resting in the midst of your patient lover, her queen, while you take in food and water. Largely blood loss and concussion is what laid you down in the first place, wounds that will close with just some time and care you've been assured. Pythomenestra prepares dinner: her own provisions profered from her carriage and prepared by the Mead character that drove it here. Tortilla, mustard leaves, berries, flowers, fat tomatoes- all a welcome change from Yuca's purely carnivorous pantry. It's there, arranged in the conversation pit with them again, you wonder. [["So... That's it? I'm a menagerine?"]]

Pythomenestra smiles, "Well, there's a lot of pomp and circumstance to be lived through. It's a job: there's training involved." "Etiquette is key." Yuca adds.|fucked>[ (link-reveal:'"Etiquette?!"')[ You rub you head in your hands. "I'm fucked!"(hide:?change)(show:?assure)]]|change>[ (link-reveal:'"This\'ll be an interesting change,"')[ You rub your chin, "I've never been in a position that required... that."(hide:?fucked)(show:?assure)]]|assure)[ Pythomenestra laughs brusquely, "Oh if I found my way I'm sure you will too." Her palm lands on your shoulder, squeezing. Yuca rests her fluffy haunch against your opposite side. "Not all menagerines are under equal scrutiny, don't worry. You won't start at the level of cabinet member- maybe just a shrine tender or a local ambassador. I'll take you under my wing regardless!" You look between their faces, glancing to each other with familiar wit and, with a generosity that seems miraculous, sometimes to you. Feeling a warmth, you [[sigh.->Too kind.]]]

(link-reveal:'"You all are too kind."')[ You say, immediately feeling tears spill over, wiping them on your wrist. Yuca pecks your cheek and coils you tightly with her neck, sealing it with a sigh of her own. "You are... Far more than I, kind." [[Smile...->Epilogue.]]]

You step away from the pair, smoothing down your poncho. You approach the arches you slept beneath, its gothic surfaces weathered down to flowstone. You run your fingers down the masonry, the stubbornly standing edifice, the greed-sown stone. "This land isn't ours, is it?" You hear the pair shift, huge coils in the grass and feathered body straightening. "What do you mean?" Yuca asks.(if:$natureboy is 1)[ (text-color:$natvr)[The crows take off in a raspy chorus of protest, leaving the arch. Nothing relies on it now. It gives no shelter, no solace, no place.]] (text-color:$vvitch)[Show them.] (link-replace:"Show them?")[You swallow, putting the thought out of mind. You press both palms flat to the old architecture, the ill-thought thing that gave your shelter. One of its legs cracks with a dramatic report, dust and chips shooting as if from a wound. A little press, another breakage opening- and it comes down. "Manny!" The women behind you gasp and call out to warn you- it heaves away from you, that massive stone piece hitting the earth with a calamitous, earth-shaking //thud// that has you reeling back onto your seat amid a gust of chalky, choking dust. You sputter, waving your arms to clear the air. "I'm alright!" They're at your side quickly- you're white with dust, wiping your eyes clear of it and looking up at them and their surprised expressions. [["My b."->Epilogue.]]]

You pace, straightening your mantle, squaring your shoulders. "I want to protect this land." You turn abruptly to Pythomenestra and Yuca, at attention. "I'd even serve you, to do so." Yuca gazes at you with mist in her lunar eyes. Pythomenestra smiles solemnly at her, and you. "Why?" The queen pronounces, her lashes pitching down. (link-reveal:'"Why?"')[ You parrot.|yuca>[ (link-reveal:'"Yuca loves this nation, and I love her."')[ Yuca laughs with exasperation, shaking her snout. "Manny, you don't-" (link-reveal:'"But I want to,"')[ You interrupt. "To fight. I don't find shame in it. It's something I've done for far more base reasons, and now that I have a high one I want to fight, for the first time."(hide:?feel)(show:?answer)]]](if:(history:)contains "Shame.")[|feel>[ (link-reveal:'"I feel it. What you feel, that is."')[ You nod your head to her, "What Yuca has made us feel. That this place could be more than just another empire clawing up the earth. That there's something more to the Menagerarchy, even if it's just to spit in the face of the other countries."(hide:?yuca)(show:?answer)]]] |answer)[Pythomenestra laughs huskily, shrugging her shoulders, stooped in her lavish dress. "Well..." She sighs. "I couldn't say no to that." You gaze at her with some surprise, and she rises on her coils, surpassing your height. "How's the navy sound?" You swallow, [["Aye aye."->Epilogue.]]]]

"Cuazolmoc's a nice place." You smoothe your poncho's front, turning as you look down at the grass. You're gazed at curiously by picnicking pair. Pythomenestra scratches her throat, and Yuca speaks up. "Will you stay?" (link-reveal:'"Will I stay?"')[ You muse aloud, rubbing your hands.(if:$south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[Stay. They need a strong warriormale at their side.]](if:$north is 1)[ (text-color:$vvitch)[The climate and candor, its soaring vaults and winged glory- who would not, even if it is doomed to fail?]](if:$natureboy is 1)[ (text-color:$natvr)[Fruits hang, ready to drop and spread their seed. Blossoms droop, ready to scatter themselves to the wind. Humans perspire in their labors to keep their kin fed, like any other.]] [["I will."->Epilogue.]]]

You smooth your poncho to your chest as you walk out into the clearing. "This land isn't ours, is it?" (text-color:$natvr)[A farmer stops tilling the earth and hefts back its hoe, perceiving a growing crack in its steel head. It must mend it to continue carving the soil and planting seeds and harvesting plants. It would defend its colony like any ant, like wolves leaving urea on bark to delineate... Something.] Yuca and Pythomenestra shift behind you. "What do you mean?" Your lover asks. |animals>[(link-replace:'"We\'re like, animals," ')["We're like, animals, really. Dogs and such. Property is just some... Justification, and a strange and harmful one at that." You say, as a wind blows in from the east, a thing murmuring past palms and displacing two geese that take to the air over the vast, grassy terrain. They chase each other overhead, their braying echoing in calm counterpoint over it all. "I dunno." The queen sighs. You turn back to them, see Yuca laying her head on her shoulder and smiling at you dreamily. "I understand." She says.(hide:?none)(hide:?stolen)(show:?sowhat)]]|none>[(link-replace:'"No one should have it," ')["No one should have it," You say, as a wind blows in from the east, a thing murmuring past palms and displacing two geese that take to the air over the vast, grassy terrain. They chase each other overhead, their braying echoing in calm counterpoint over it all. "It's... Beyond property." The queen sighs. You turn back to them, see Yuca laying her head on her shoulder and smiling at you dreamily. "A beautiufl sentiment." She says.(hide:?animals)(hide:?stolen)(show:?sowhat)]]|stolen>[(link-replace:'"It\'s stolen," ')["It's stolen," You say, as a wind blows in from the east, a thing murmuring past palms and displacing two geese that take to the air over the vast, grassy terrain. They chase each other overhead, their braying echoing in calm counterpoint over it all. "And, well, if we can't give it back... I don't know what to do. I just don't like it. Maybe I'm just too much a sailor." The queen sighs. You turn back to them, see Yuca laying her head on her shoulder and smiling at you dreamily. "Perhaps, but a beautiful sentiment either way." She says.(hide:?none)(hide:?animals)(show:?sowhat)]]|sowhat)[ "So, what?" Pythomenestra thrums. "Give it all up?" [["Nah."]]]

... (unless:(history:)contains '"I want to protect this land."' or 'Too kind.')[Thus begins a career in the Menagerarchy as fraught as it is utterly lovely. Your position in the state apparatus is expertly massaged by your lover to keep you at hand while justifying your closeness to a high-status menagerine. You take on "consultant" and "subaltern" and "municipal ambassador"- learning as much as you can to be relevant to your work. But, you're most relevant to her. To adoring the talented and brilliant Secretary to the Queen of the Menagery. To easing her burdens until her final breath, which, due to her animal physiology, comes far too soon. Cuazolmoc outlived you though, and you're forever thankful for that.](if:(history:)contains '"I want to protect this land."')[Thus begins your career in the small and dedicated navy of Cuazolmoc, exciting and heartbreaking, yearning and violent to its bitter end. You quickly find yourself in the admiralty and coloring the island nation's naval warfare with the darkness of your former flag: padding your forces with stolen ships more than even building your own, engaging in swarms of small armed schooners to overwhelm the proud and galant galleons of monarchy. It is glorious in a way only you could've provided them... And you go down with it, a lead ball in the left shoulder embedding sepsis too close to your heart. As glad as you are to have served her, her nation, her ambitions and brilliance in your own way, in those final hours you wish you could've spent more time with Yuca herself.](if:(history:)contains "Too kind.")[Thus begins your career as a menagerine. It's a strange experience, one you never would expect: you're somewhat of an idol, a divine fool, as well as a functionary in this ambiguously governmental body. People adore you, and you're taught how to keep their attentions, keep them at the appropriate distance, to speak to the state parallel to the Menagerie. You live beautifully. You contend with the dreams and divinity that saturate the world. You share it with Yuca who seems so worldly, who grounds you so ably. You share it with Pythomnestra, who is far more learned in these paths. You watch Cuazolmoc flourish in numerous ways, the dance of an urchin spreading across the sees, the words and deeds of its people intoxicating the world. You don't know why. You hope you have changed the world, in your small way. But you thank Drotzlanti, of the Darkness, Tears and Sighs, of the Chalk and Scattered Blossoms, and you thank Cuazolmoc.] It was an incredible and terrible privledge. [[END.]]

(link-reveal:'"Nah."')[ You sigh. "Someone worse would just swoop in and fuck it harder." Pythomenestra gutters with laughter. "You flatter me!" (link-replace:'"What we can do, I guess,"')["What we can do, I guess, is take it on. Be responsible for it..." "Organize in respect for the land," Yuca hums, "For all it gives, has given. In memory of all it's taken on, including its peoples, sins and all." You both smile at her. [["Yeah... Something like that."->Epilogue.]]]]

(if:$slain is 1)[Yuca, in the end, decided to have you as a meal rather than a lover. You were never //simply// a guest there: she was going to have a piece of you either way. It turns out you were tastier than you were charming! Between you and me, though, there was a lot more to be had. Give it another shot why don't you? ]EMANUEL TSUEH You were a(if:$north is 1)[(text-color:$vvitch)[ Haunted]](if:$south is 1)[(text-color:$brvt)[ Brutish]](if:$natureboy is 1)[(text-color:$natvr)[ Outdoorsy]] Pirate. Rest in Peace. (align:"=><=")+(box:"X=")[END.]

(align:"=><=")+(box:"=XXX=")[#(text-colour:#c864ff)[(text-style:"bold","smear","expand")[DROMAE]] [[play->Beginning]] #(text-colour:#ff4b4b)[(text-style:"bold","smear","expand")[DREAMS]]]

"So vain, us!" She jests, hefting the ax over her shoulders and yoking her arms around its long stem. Her bluntly wedge-like snout grins, her blue eyes flitting about and making you shrivel with fear. "I suppose round is a shape and not a terrible one at that."(if: $south is 1)[ (text-color:$brvt)[I like this broad. No legs and yet she swaggers like a rooster.]](if:(history:)contains "Lineages.")[ You recognize her: the founder and queen of the Menagerarchy, Pythomenestra.](if:$natureboy is 1)[ (text-color:$natvr)[Starlings scatter in chevrons, ibises leap up from their grazing into the highest branches, then away to the sky. Only crows remain in the canopies, watching over the double-wide carriage and the fair-skinned driver waiting with the reins in hand.]] "Not at all." Yuca says simply, smiling up at her. [[What are they doing?]]]

You're under her looming maw, stepping close to her breast with her claws clutched to your bloodied chest. You both sway, first at your own times, growing more together till you tick and circle at the same, slow beat. The room grows night-dark and your eyes strain to see it beyond her broadside. Instead... [["What do I see?"->The Spheres of You All.]]