"I swear, she's crazy!" Faline insisted, pacing back and forth in the common room Velma had allowed Quetz to inhabit, though 'destroy' might have been a more appropriate term. He never made any attempt at even pretending he was housebroken. Which was fine, really, but NOT HELPING THEIR SITUATION!!

*Are you surprised? Everyone else ran in terror.*

Faline stopped and glared at her bondmate. "You threatened to barbecue them," she growled.

*They stood still too long!* he protested.

"Just... just..." She grabbed at her head, massaging her temples. "Do yourself and me a favor and shut up for a while about death, dismemberment, maiming, mutilations, incinerations, rending, disembowling, murdering, or squishing, alright?"

Quetz considered this for a long time. *Decapitation?* he asked hopefully.

"No!"

*Defenestration?*

Faline stormed out and slammed the door behind her, but his voice carried with her.

*Goring?*

"GAH!" she roared, and waved her hands at the air around them.

She wasn't quite fully aware of where she was walking. The mansion was practically a maze, but it was good to be away for a while. Even just a little bit. Even if they could find each other again in a heartbeat. It was the illusion of privacy that she appreciated the most.

As far as she knew, it was just the three of them - her and Quetz and Velma - in this boat on the hill. Discounting serving staff and everything like that. But Faline hadn't seen serving staff at all? Hadn't velma said she was going to send men out for Camphor? And then Camphor had arrived, but Faline hadn't seen hide or hair of people, let alone 'men'. This was all very bizarre.

As she hurried through the mansion, she considered all that had happened between now and when she started this stupid adventure with Quetz, and she was barely beginning it when something in one of the rooms caught her eye and she stopped herself short, backtracking quickly to peer inside the room.

It was a study filled wall to wall with books, the door slightly ajar, which was as good an invitation as anything Faline could have imagined. She entered and stopped dead upon seeing a woman who looked almost but not quite familiar somehow.

"Oh," she said. "I'm very sorry. I uh. I didn't know anyone was here," she stammered as the woman looked up. She was very pretty, even in her glasses, which she let slide off her nose with a smile.

"It's quite alright, Faline," the woman answered kindly.

She stared at this strange woman with a very confused look slapped on her face. "I'm sorry," she said. "I don't believe we've met."

The woman covered her mouth and laughed a little. "I suppose my secret's out," she said cryptically, then added definitively: "We've met."

Faline's brow darkened further with confusion. "I'm sorry. When?"

"Two nights ago? You staggered into the town and I brought you here?"

Faline stared openly. "Velma?" she managed with a slightly horrified tone to her voice.

The woman closed her book and set it calmly on her lap. She wasn't provocatively dressed or made up at all, and she was still an insanely attractive woman, the kind that made Faline blush with envy. She tripped over her thoughts and stared a little more. "But but... but..."

"Come sit down, dear," she said calmly. "Have some tea, but not from the green cup, if you would."

Faline continued staring as she followed these directions.

Velma smoothed the top of her skirt across her legs. "We have some things to discuss."

They'd been camped at the foot of the hill for the last three days. What it had resorted to was playing a game that Tem had taken to calling 'Are They There Yet'. What it boiled down to was this: Gershwin knew what they were waiting for, but couldn't quite describe it beyond the gut feeling he had in his head. Gleb and the Runners, being able to see were able to occupy themselves by pointing out several parties coming down the mountains and ask Gershwin if they were the ones for whom the six of them were waiting.

Gershwin invariably answered, "No."

Tem played along every now and again when no one was paying attention, catching sounds of scree falling down the path. "Is that them?" he would ask.

Gleb would answer that it was some form of wildlife. "That bein's a goat, Tem Raithcliff," he'd answer.

And on more than one occasion, Gershwin would chime in casually with, "That was a goat. Your dogs just ate it." And invariably with this corrallary, there would be the sounds of flesh ripping and tearing by the foot of the mountain.

Gleb frequently wondered aloud, "Happens they to be eatin' allverythings?"

Gershwin would shrug. "At least they don't eat us."

It was a terrible way to spend their days at the foot of the hill, but at least it kept them in some semblance of occupied.