“I don’t think so.” The snake is snuggling in as she’s wont to do once she’s comfortable, looped and curled securely between and around splayed fingers, with the wedge of her head centered in Wysteria’s palm. “All of the viscera seems to be present, but she doesn’t hunt.”

Richard’s never really thought about it. He isn’t even really thinking about it right now, busy weighing instead exactly how much he should elaborate, or if it might behoove him for him and his snake to keep a secret or two.

Poppell saves him from weighing the risk by spotlighting him.

“She was a gift.” Easy.

He is measuring her again -- not entirely unlike the inspection she just put his snake through. There is a similarly instinctive distrust at its core, walled up and guarded behind his natural reserve.

“You could sense that I had her.”