The instant he feels her recoil, Dick twists his own wrist protectively up and away from hers, guarding the little serpent up close at his breast. It (she) s-curves through the rings tiered on his knuckles, and Richard gives Miss Poppell his most severe look yet, exasperation tight in the lines around his eyes.
They are, of course, still linked.
“She’s harmless,” he assures, only once Wysteria has started to settle her own nerves, and with patience he’s used the delay to dig deep for. He further waits for her to outstretch her fingers to turn his hand over next to hers.
The snake is slender and unassuming and no more than a foot long all told, her dark scales ribboned with lines of pale gold from tip to tail. As before, the barely-there wisp of her tongue precedes a (cautious) attempt to bridge herself up into the splay of Wysteria’s fingers from Richard’s. This time, he is ready to lift her away less theatrically in the event of overwhelming horror.
“I hadn’t spoken to many of the other rifters,” he tells her (more amicably) in the meanwhile. “Apart from one meeting with Madame de Cedoux. Did you mean for us to have this conversation here?”
no subject
They are, of course, still linked.
“She’s harmless,” he assures, only once Wysteria has started to settle her own nerves, and with patience he’s used the delay to dig deep for. He further waits for her to outstretch her fingers to turn his hand over next to hers.
The snake is slender and unassuming and no more than a foot long all told, her dark scales ribboned with lines of pale gold from tip to tail. As before, the barely-there wisp of her tongue precedes a (cautious) attempt to bridge herself up into the splay of Wysteria’s fingers from Richard’s. This time, he is ready to lift her away less theatrically in the event of overwhelming horror.
“I hadn’t spoken to many of the other rifters,” he tells her (more amicably) in the meanwhile. “Apart from one meeting with Madame de Cedoux. Did you mean for us to have this conversation here?”