he had been warned away from the sound, but taltos was a persistent lot, for lovely scents flowed thickly upon the wind of his home, and drove him mad. blue willow was the first object of his desire, but childbirth had decommissioned her ability to engage in physical pleasures with him, and so he set his eyes to the elusive high priestess.

she knew what she did, the vixen; she had turned her back to him at the last meeting, and and the curved shape of her rump had been revealed, with the softly veiled mouth of her sex visible in his mind's eye, and he could well imagine the pinkly ruckled flowerbud tucked above. oh she knew these things, surely! and taltos both loved and resented her for capitalizing upon his weakness, and resented too the turgid leap of his traitorous body at the sight of her in such a vision, or the mental conceptualization of her rubicund nipples.

and so he paced along the beach, not so near as to risk her wrath, but near enough to scent the briny fragrance of her pack, and lasher sought the invisible trail of her personal aroma, hoping fervently she had come into season, and would therefore not dissuade him from his pursuit.

taltos was to be given no reprieve, he noticed; no sooner had he turned his back upon the surf than a mad-hatter's cackle assaulted his ears. laying a desultory look upon the large jet avian who wheeled not far from him, the man brought his ears forward to express the mite of interest sparked within him.

once, he rasped in a voice made hoarse by unfulfilled desire. arousal thrummed through him; the scent of heady wine was in his nostrils, and the beta suddenly found annoyance beading itself in straight lines upon furrows in his brow. what was this thing, this bird, that spoke thus to him? lasher's intrigue waned, and he lifted his muzzle to taste the air for caiaphas' allure.

the pennate climatologist was given a glance gravid with a rare annoyance; lasher no longer wished to be harried by the gravelly voice of the odd corvid, and nares flared with appropriate ire. go and seek out the storm, then, if you have such an interest in it, the beast scowled with verve stamped upon his voice.

falling silent, he himself took to pacing the strand with a great deal more desperation; he envisioned the salacious body of the wench in his desire. as capacious with dislike as the priestess had been, the season was equal in its maddening affect, and taltos lustfully hoped she had succumbed to its lash the same as any other lupine.

damn it all! lasher lifted his muzzle as if to croon his desires into the infernal wind, with wonderment at the possibility of it carrying o'ertop the briny squall into the unwilling ears of the mottled enchantress. perhaps with her throng of misandrist amazons would she answer his call, with an order that the miserable throbbing worm beneath his belly be stretched and quartered without delay.

he felt he would love her despite this masochism; taltos was a disconsolate sadist where the pythoness was concerned. but he did not beckon to her through the crash of the waves; the sound trembled in his throat, its notes barren and plinking silver into a long whine the alar hunchback could hear with cocked head.

prudently lasher heeded the squawked monotone and for the first time since their ill meet the black avian commanded the focus of his fruitless intentions. he realized that the stormcloud to which the bird referred in his ugly croakings was not a harbinger of lightning and thunder, but the woman herself.

yet he was suddenly ruffled, uncomposed, unwilling to debase himself before something easily slaughtered with the click of his niveous knives. but the servant knew that if this Lauren were beneath the bridge to his fair maiden, he would do well to heap praise upon the orcish little head with its knowing and beady eyes.

i would not send you away. you know what it is i wish. the beta sighed into the salted air, scarcely recognizing himself. name your price.

an insidious cackle fit to spume from the deviant as lasher finally realized the meaning squirming behind his tormenters metaphorical conjectures, and caved under the wanting pressure of his loins.

bartok began to mutter, seemingly to himself, but it was obvious his intention for lasher to hear: "bartok would not want... dog to... moil too hard..." he slowly – ponderously – clutched the branchlet and began creeping back and forth on his perch.

after a few moments of this, bartok looked upon the suitor from on high and cleared his throat, doing his best to communicate his stipulation without leaving room for misinterpretation. with a great effort and investment in clarity, the pitch bird dropped his speech deficit and mimicked the solemn voice of someone he had once heard. "something has been stolen from her. she anguishes nightly." his whole body shuddered and heaved a plaintive exhale. he resumed his back and forth pacing. "surely she would do.. anything to get it back." he continued suggestively, glancing at lasher from the rim of his eye.

his curiosity at the bird's harshly formed words overrode the indignation at being spurned as 'dog,' an epithet which forced upward into a tizzy the guard-hairs upon his nape. but lasher refused to give the foul little capon the satisfaction of outward ire, and so tamed the flurry of raging sparks in his breast.

auds preened forward at the revelation granted by the jet minion, satanic in his ruffled and unabashed leer, and taltos pondered this information for a lengthy moment, peering down the strand as if by sheer force of will the seawitch would appear and therefore negate the dubious offer extended by the hellspawn.

very well, sparrow, he mocked, though his tone was unable to bely a great interest. what is this thing that she has lost?

when the bird had given forth its proposition, lasher hummed wordlessly beneath his breath, turning roundabout to stride down the strand and think over the possibilities.