Neil

Of course I had known she would have to go back home sooner or later. Hell she had spent a lot longer here than I had thought she would and her family was likely missing her. It was just for the first time in a while I was enjoying someone's company and I would be sad to see her go.

“What are your people like?” I asked, I had wanted to talk to her more before this, but until my Lamianese skill had leveled up these last few times I didn’t really have the ability to ask too many questions or understand many answers.

Shassala still laying beside me had been running her fingers up and down my chest, the question caused her to pause the motion before she resumed it as she spoke. “We live in a village between the river and this mountain. It’s one of the larger villages in this area almost 400 people. Three days travel from here up river is a city, I’ve never seen it but I heard that Lamia have lived there for centuries and built amazing buildings.” Shassala said her voice going from one of wonderment to much quieter by the end. “When I was younger I had always wanted to see it.” She trailed off after a moment staring at my chest.

It was pretty clear that something was on her mind but I really had no idea how to broach the subject. I was actually pretty bad with women, if it wasn’t for the fact that for almost a third of the year Banff was almost a drunken orgy where even I could meet women I would probably have almost no experience with the opposite sex.

As it was the longest relationship I had ever had was just over four months and ended on a fairly positive note when she left the country. That wasn’t sarcasm, her visa ran out and she had to leave, aside from that though it had been great.

As the silence stretched on, I decided to try another question. “Is it a nice village?” Damn that was lame.

In spite of the terribleness of the question Shassala answered it anyways. “It is ... small. I know everyone there, and everyone knows me. We are all family. My father was killed when I was very young, but I live with my mother and my father's family. I have many good friends there.”

“What about your mother’s family? Were they not there?”

Although Shassala didn’t move very much I could tell from the smallest hunch of her shoulders, and a hitch in her tail that she didn’t like this question. Oh for two so far, good job.

“They aren’t from the village.” Sitting up Shassala looked down at me. “I don’t want to talk about that. I want to hear about you. Where are you from.”

“Me? I’m not interesting, why do you want to hear that?” I knew why she wanted to hear stories from me, if her village was just 400 people then I was probably the most entertainment she had ever had, I was just fishing for compliments.

“Because you can tell me about far off lands, and things I’ve never even dreamed of. Things I’ll never be able to see.” She said with a small smile.

“Well I am from a land so far from here I couldn’t even begin to tell you how to get there.” And so I talked. I told Shassala about hiking in the woods, the rain and thunder, and then suddenly being here. I even told her about the boxes in the air. She had never heard of anything like that before and agreed to keep them a secret for me. I even told her about my parents.

“So they made some kind of potions?”

“Boot Leg alcohol isn’t really a potion.” I said looking at her. “It was dangerous and my parents worked with a lot of people who might hurt us. I always hated it and they knew that, so they hated me for hating it.”

“They did that to provide for you though didn’t they?”

“They did it to provide for themselves. If I was lucky I got some old clothes, if I was really lucky one of the neighbors would invite me over for dinner. The only thing they ever really did for me was let me use their old camping gear. Our house was in a small town in the middle of nowhere, so in the summer I lived outside in the woods for weeks at a time. I used to pretend I was on an adventure, kind of like how I am now.”

Shassala who had been regarding me quietly up to now leaned forwards and gave me a kiss.

“After I was old enough they told me to leave and not come back, so I did. I moved far away and got a simple job. I spent as much time as I could doing the things that I liked but... I just...”

“Never felt like you belonged?”

“Not at first. At first I loved it and I made great friends. But it’s a town where people stay for a short time to work or go on trips to. Then they leave, so by the end of the 2nd summer and my new friends were leaving again, I just stopped trying to really get to know people very well. After that it started to get a little lonely.”

“Do you wish you could go back?”

“No. At least not now. I haven’t seen my family in years and I don’t ever really intend to. I’m mostly trying to look at this as an opportunity and an adventure. It is hard to be confident about the future though.”

Shassala listened to me patiently before responding. “I’ll be leaving my village soon. It’s an old tradition, every year some young women from each tribe are selected to go to another village, and other villages send women here as well. That’s where my mother was from. When she was my age she came to our village to and married my father. She likes it here I know, my grandmother and grandfather treat her well, but she misses her family.”

“You don’t have a choice?”

“No. The elders of the tribe decided it a long time ago. It’s important to help keep the peace between the different tribes, it keeps us all as one family.”

It probably also helped avoid inbreeding, I thought to myself but didn’t say out loud.

“I don’t know anything about where I will be going except that its far from here. We are the most isolated tribe so we don’t see many of the other tribes very often, so I will be sent far from my home and my family in just a few weeks. As soon as the Kroklock mating season is over I’ll be leaving with some of the others. My best friend Talass, my mother, and grandparents, everyone will be sad to see me go, and I know that I’ll miss her and the others.” Shassala trailed off looking almost guilty. With a sigh she continued. “But at the same time, it’s an opportunity, I’ll be able to go to places I never would have been able to before, see things, do things. I feel...” Shassala finished trailing off.

“Guilty for wanting to leave?”

Her nod against my chest seemed to convey both sadness and guilt.

Hugging her closer to me I said. “I understand, when I first arrived, I thought about that too, but it was a lot easier for me. Some of my coworkers and people that I live with, I know that they will worry about me and if I could I would let them know I was ok. But I have to think that if they knew they would be happy for me being here. And I’m sure your friends and family won’t think less of you for being excited for the future. It might even make them feel better to know that this isn’t something you’re worried about.”

Shassala lifted her head up and looked down at me like she hadn’t really seen me before. “You are very smart for a man, is this the power of the blue boxes making you wiser?” She said with a small smile tugging at her lips.

“No, I’m just naturally smart and wise.” Giving her a kiss we both laughed a little. “Do you think you could introduce me to your people?

“I think it would be ok, especially if I talked to them first. We don’t have a lot of visitors but we are not violent people Neil.”

“I didn’t mean to say you were, I just noticed the other day that you stopped your friends from meeting me.”

“You were covered in blood. It would have been an awkward meeting don’t you think?”

“Good point.”

“I need to go.” Shassala said with some regret in her voice. “But before I do, there’s something I’d like to do, something I’d like to touch if I could.”

The way she looked at me took my breath away and all I could manage was a nod.

With a Cheshire grin Shassala pushed herself up, her breasts swaying tantalizingly in front of me. With a twist of her hips Shassala turned around and I saw her head move down towards my lower body. As her fingers moved down my legs I tried to guess what she was doing as her upper body was blocking my view. Once her fingers found their target I started giggling uncontrollably as she started touching and poking at my toes.

I managed to get out “What are you doing?” between bouts of laughter. Shassala was poking and prodding each of my toes one after the other.

“Stop wiggling.” She shouted at me. “What are these and why do you have them?”

“Their, ha haha, toes. They help me walk.”

Sitting back up she looked at me and said. “And I thought your penis was strange. When will it go back inside of you?”

“What? It won’t, why would it?” I asked feeling aghast.

“Really? It’s just there? Flopping about? Doesn’t it get in the way?”

“No, well sometimes it does, But not often. Male Lamia penises go inside them? Weird.” While Shassala was distracted I took the opportunity to touch the end of her tail which had worked its way up near my head. It kept flipping back and forth making it tough to touch.

The two of us started laughing, and then looking at the sun in the sky we got our clothes on.

As we got dressed our conversation turned light and fun with just an undercurrent of flirting. Before too long I was standing at the side of the mountain giving Shassala a small goodbye kiss, which she forcefully deepened, pulling away with a smile.

“I’ll tell the others about you and convince them to let you meet them, is it alright if I tell them how you came to be here?”

“Sure, if you can tell me how I came to be here too I’d appreciate it, I’ll see you in a few days then? Just keep the boxes a secret for now, it just seems like something I don’t want to tell anyone about for now.”

“I understand, be well Neil. I will see you soon.”

And with that she turned and started sashaying down the mountain.

I was sad to see her go, but I also had a few things I wanted to do. There were more potions to try and make, magic to attempt and abandoned underground ruins that I could explore.

Busy busy busy.