.
	"Maybe as the ones crazy enough to go first," Dar snorted.  "Those kinds of nuts can have it."
	"If that's what they want, who are we to gainsay them?"
	"I have better things to do with my life than throw it away like that," Dar grunted.
	"Have you seen Tiella?"
	He nodded.  "She's out of the Initiate.  She decided to stay with the katzh-dashi, so she's in indoctrination."
	"What's that?"
	"The period between being an Initiate and a full katzh-dashi," he answered.  "Where you learn about the politics of the Tower and the customs and such, and where they teach the kind of Sorcery that they don't want the freelancers to know.  The Initiate concentrates on magic, and since you don't have to join the order after finishing the Initiate, they don't teach those things there.  They save that and the really advanced magic or dangerous magic for those they can keep an eye on."
	"What kind of magic?"
	"Almost all the Mind magic," he said as he washed the soap off himself.  "They don't teach Mind weaves to people that may go out and use them on people to get rich or control people.  The only Mind magic they teach in the Initiate is mostly how to defend against it and how to recognize mind-affecting magic used by the Priests and Wizards."
	"I guess that's a good idea," Tarrin shrugged.  "What else do they teach in indoctrination?"
	"Healing," he said.  "Anything that takes four or more spheres too.  The Initiate is about teaching Sorcerers enough not to get themselves killed.  They save the advanced magic for those who are willing to devote their lives to its study."
	"Don't they teach--what do they call it--oh, Circling in the Initiate?"
	"They do, because what harm can it do?" he asked in reply.  "You can only Circle with other Sorcerers, and they're not likely to find others out in the world.  There are few enough as it is, and those that leave after the Initiate often don't advertise the fact that they're Sorcerers.  Most of the world still blames us for the Breaking, so it's never healthy to advertise the fact that you're a Sorcerer."
	"I guess not.  How have the other Sorcerers handled the Sha'Kar?"
	"Pretty well, actually," he said with a chuckle.  "All the humans are falling all over themselves to learn Sha'Kar as fast as they can.  All the Sha'Kar are a bit overwhelmed by all the attention they're getting."
	Tarrin pulled the braid over his shoulder and untied the thong.   It had been a while since he'd taken it out and washed all his hair.  He'd been considering cutting the thing off.  It was very heavy and it pulled at the back of his head uncomfortably, and when it was wet it gave him a headache with its weight.  He wasn't sure why he hadn't done it yet.  Maybe because it was the only thing he had outside the brands that reminded him of everything he'd forgotten.  Without it, it would be easy to pretend that it had only been a few rides since he left home, instead of two years and more.  "Think about it, Dar.  How would you feel if living legends suddenly showed up at your doorstep?"
	"I guess travelling with you numbed me to that kind of thing," he chuckled.  "I'm used to outrageous things now."  He dunked himself under the water's surface, and then came up and slicked his black hair back from his face.  "I need a haircut."
	"I need one more," he said, waggling the end of his long, long hair at Dar.
	"If you cut that off, people would scream," Dar smiled.  "You tried once before, but it lasted about a day.  Kimmie gave you one offhanded remark, and you regrew your hair by suppertime."
	"You make it sound like they controlled me," he noted.
	"Not in the slightest, but Kimmie and Jesmind could make you do things when nobody else could," he amended.  "Because you loved them.  That let them get away with more than anyone else could have possibly gotten away with."
	"As long as I wasn't henpecked," he laughed.
	"Well, I'm getting waterlogged here, so I think I'm going to get out and dry off," he said.  "And I have some work to finish.  You don't mind, do you?"
	"No, go ahead," he said.  "I want to finish washing this, then I'll probably go spend the rest of the night with Jasana."
	Dar climbed out of the pool, and Tarrin bent to the considerable task of washing the entirety of his hair.  He debated again whether or not he should cut it off the whole time he was washing it.  Scrubbing hair longer than the height of a small child is a time-consuming task, and the population of the bathing pool completely changed, then slowly dwindled as Tarrin scrubbed from the roots of his hair to the very tips, having to gather up the long locks and keep them out of the pool to lather them.  It seemed a ridiculously boring chore, and he had all but decided that maybe something of a trim would be in order tomorrow.  Maybe not take all of it off, but he wouldn't mind losing about half its length.  It would be much lighter, alot less inconvenient, and it would probably stop the headaches.  He didn't mind the idea of having a braid, but it was just that it was so long and so heavy.  If it was neither of those things, he probably wouldn't mind it at all.
	Finally finishing, he waded towards the cooler, slightly shallower end where the stone steps leading out of the pool were located, sat down on them, and bent to the task of rebraiding his hair.  It took him nearly a half an hour, mainly because he wasn't very good at doing it to himself.  He'd braided his mother's hair many times, but it was alot different when he couldn't see what he was doing.  He had to take the braid out and rebraid it three times when he realized that it was all uneven and probably looked like a big knot at the base of his neck.  If he had to have it, he was determined that it wasn't going to look unkempt.
	At long last, he was done.  He retied the leather thong at the base of his braid to cinch it, and instead of getting out, he decided to go down towards the hot end and enjoy it a few minutes before leaving.  Most of the bathing he'd done was in cold water, and that didn't tend to make him want to linger for very long.  The hot baths he took at home didn't stay hot for very long in the winter, and in the summer a hot bath was the last thing anyone wanted.  Aldreth and Sulasia lay in a temperate zone, where the winters could be very cold and the summers very hot.
	The only problem he could see was the depth of the water.  It only came up to his stomach, and he had to bend his knees to let the water come up to his chin.  That, and he felt the strange desire to lay down in the water, to simply relax and let the water's heat soak into him.  There really was no way to lay in the water other than to swim, and that seemed like too much exertion to him at the moment.  Despite that disappointment, he found the water quite relaxing, and he was content to sort of float there with his feet on the bottom of the pool but not supporting his weight, half-floating, half-standing with the water lapping at his ears and its heat surrounding him in a most pleasing manner.
	He was so relaxed, he didn't realize that someone was pulling on his hair until there was enough force behind it to move him.  Someone had a firm grip on his braid, and that grip was pulling him.  He opened his eyes, and to his shock, found himself staring up into the amused, hungry eyes of Auli.
	He rose to his feet so quickly that the water erupted around him, but Auli had a very firm hold on his braid, and her grip on it pulled his head up short.  His head was yanked to the side painfully as he rose up over her, a mixture of surprise and shock and a little embarassment over being taken so completely by surprise showing on his face as he grabbed his braid with his free hand and yanked it free.  Auli was nude, and there was a look of smug victory in her eyes as she moved towards him.  Tarrin's eyes moved to and fro, and he realized that he and Auli were the only ones in the baths.  There would be no others to put her off this time.  She had truly caught him alone.  "Hello, Tarrin," she purred as she reached out and put her hands on his chest.  "I've been waiting a very long time to get you alone."
	Tarrin recoiled from her, not quite sure why he was doing so.  He liked Auli, he was attracted to Auli, and part of him wanted Auli.  But something else was there, and it told him that getting involved with Auli would be a very bad idea, and at the moment, that part of him was in charge.  "A-Auli," he stammered, backing away from her.  His attempt to retreat was met with her advancing, and the water slowed him as she was pulled along in his wake.  "I told you to leave me alone.  I don't want to--"
	"Of course you do," she said with bright eyes, keeping her hand on his upper chest.  "You just don't want to admit it."
	Tarrin kept backing up, but he ran out of pool.  His back and shoulders hit the high edge of the pool painfully, and in a blink she was against him, wrapping her arms around him, even hooking one of his legs with her own, locking him in place.  Thought became hard when she pressed up against him, when he could feel her body pressing against his, feel all those things he'd been dreaming about touching him in the most intimate ways.
	With a hungry look, she leaned completely forward and kissed him with the same passion and exuberance that he remembered from before, a kiss that caused what little thought he had to scatter and quite effectively subdued all those nagging warnings that were still trying to run through his mind.  So close to her, with her naked body pressing against his, with her kissing him, no amount of objection was going to pierce the powerful sensations her kiss and her touch had evoked in him.  All of Jula's advice was completely forgotten, scoured away by the power of Auli's kiss.
	He knew beyond any doubt that Auli had won when she grabbed his wrist and ever-so-sensually set his hand on her backside, and he did not move it away after she removed her hand.  But even that realization was drowned by her as she overpowered him with the raw energy of her touch and her kiss, and he found himself surrendering to her willingly, eagerly, wanting to accept the delights that she offered.  The thought that they were in a public place, that almost anyone could come down those stairs and catch them making love in the bathing pool, that Jesmind was going to try to kill her when she found out, and then she was going to kill him, that this was a terribly bad idea, all of them were wiped away, and there was nothing left but the desire to finally experience what part of him had imagined and fantasized over the days.
	To give in to Auli and let her do whatever she wanted.

	It was both everything he imagined, and everything he feared it would be.
	Tarrin didn't feel quite so good about it in the morning, after Auli was gone.  She had taken him in that bathing pool, and if that wasn't enough of a blow to his pride, she had convinced him to take her back to his room, where she was about ten times as aggressive and almost shocking in her behavior.  He never imagined a girl could act like that.  She had been--even thinking about it was both wildly exciting and somewhat unsettling.  He had been overwhelmed by her raw sensuality, her overpowering feminity at first, but it was nothing but his own weak will that had caused him to bring her back to his room afterwards, when he had a chance to think rationally.  He had wanted to make love to her, and there was no way to excuse it.  Despite all his bad feelings about it, he had thrown all of them aside and abandoned himself to the moment.
	Despite beating himself over the head for his own shortcomings, he had to admit the fact that it had been very enjoyable.  Auli was a very aggressive girl, but she had never once forgotten his needs or wants.  She had been exquisite, and just thinking about her, about holding her nude body, about finally being able to touch all those places only his eyes had enjoyed before, it was almost intoxicating.  Auli was so beautiful, so sensual, so free with herself, and so fearless, even in bed, to make love with her was almost like satisfying one's deepest fantasies and desires.  It had been nothing like he had imagined it would be.
	And that was one of the dangers he could comprehend.  Just as he feared, the night with Auli made him want to have more of them, and that was going to upset all his plans for making an unbiased choice.  Not unless he backed off, tried to forget about her, and moved on.  Auli had had her conquest, and he decided that that had better satisfy her curiosity.  He'd give her her victory this time, but there couldn't be a next time.  If there was, he was going to fall more and more under her spell, and he knew that that would be a very short road.  Auli didn't love him.  He was pretty sure that she didn't really care too much about him.  He was nothing but a toy to her, a thing, a conquest.  And when she was bored with him, she would throw him away, regardless of how his feelings for her may evolve.  And she was definitely the kind of woman a man could find feelings for, despite knowing exactly what kind of woman she was.
	It wasn't that Auli was cruel or evil, it was simply that she didn't understand.  She didn't understand what kind of an effect she had on human men, men not raised in the same society in which she had been raised.  Tarrin would gain feelings for Auli if he slept with her enough times, and he knew he would.  He knew himself enough to understand that, because Auli was already a very good friend.  He liked her.  And if she kept seducing him, kept getting intimate with him, he would invariably make that leap and decide that he loved her.  Auli, on the other hand, thought everyone would be like her, and that making love was something fun, something enjoyable, and something to be done with anyone she fancied.  That was all it was to her, a fun night of pleasure.  That it had any kind of lingering emotional attachments was a completely alien concept to her.  Tarrin equated sex with love in his mind, where Auli didn't.  It was a clash of culture, and it was going to cause him some serious problems if he didn't put a stop to it quickly.
	A flash of memory, an echo of the past, a beautiful woman with flaming red hair...and bat-like wings.  Something about her was similar to this, to Auli, but he couldn't remember anything more than that.
	In any case, he was certain that he'd better stay away from her.  What she could do to him was nothing compared to what Jesmind or Kimmie might do to her if they found out what happened last night.  Auli just didn't understand that he was staying away from her as much to protect her as it was about him not wanting to get involved with her.  Jesmind especially showed a great deal of possessiveness over him, almost jealousy, and she was alot more hot-tempered than Kimmie.  If Jesmind knew that Auli had seduced him, she'd march off, find the girl, and turn her inside out.  Literally.  He was sure of that.  So he had to keep what happened secret.
	The first step to doing that was to get her scent off of him.  He'd had enough experience with the Were-cats to know that that would give him away faster than anything else.  Auli's scent had to be absolutely all over him, and probably permeated the entire room as well.  He had to get it scrubbed off of him, and if at all possible, change the linens on the bed and turn over the mattress after soaking it in something like vinegar, something to either cover or destroy the scent of Auli.
	He moved quickly, knowing that any of the Were-cats may show up at his door any moment.  In their unpredictability they were predictable.  He threw open the windows and stripped the bed of its linens, then dressed in the same clothes he wore the day before and rushed down to the kitchens for some vinegar.  He realized about halfway into his boots that using vinegar wouldn't work, he'd need something to completely pull out the scent.  Fortunately, just such an agent happened to be next door, and at least from Dar he could expect the secret to be kept.
	It took a few knocks to get him to open the door, and he looked half asleep when he did.  His black hair was dishevelled and sticking up in all directions, and his eyes were sunken into his head in a very odd manner.  "What's the matter with you?"
	"I have a hangover, but I can't for the life of me remember drinking anything," he answered blearily.
	Tarrin's suspicions went wild immediately.  "Did you happen to meet Auli last night, Dar?"
	"Yeah, as I was leaving the baths.  She gave me--she didn't!"
	"I'd say she did," Tarrin nodded grimly.
	"That little--just wait til I get my hands on her!" he said angrily.  "She drugged me!"
	"That's not half of what she did to me last night," he admitted.
	"She caught you, didn't she?"
	A bit contritely, he nodded.  "I never had a chance.  She caught me in the baths.  I had nowhere to go."
	"You could have said no, you know."
	"Look me in the eyes and say that again, Dar," he said seriously.  "I don't think there's a man in the Tower that could say no to Auli when she's all up against you like she was me.  I mean she had me dead to rights, Dar.  Alone and naked in the baths, and she managed to sneak up to where she got a hold of me before I realized she was there.  I couldn't have said no in that situation."
	"I guess not," he sighed.  "Is that what you wanted to tell me?"
	"No, actually, I need your help," he said.  "She managed to get me to bring her back to my room, and I need to purge her scent out of it before one of the Were-cats finds it.  If Jesmind finds out about this, she'll kill Auli, so I need to get this done before Jesmind comes around."
	"I don't really know how to do that, but Kerri does," he answered.  "Don't worry, Tarrin, Kerri can keep a secret.  Let me wake her up, as soon as I find my amulet."
	Though Tarrin could tell that Dar was a little amused by the situation, he took it seriously enough.  So did Keritanima, to his surprise.  After waking her up by calling to her using the amulet, she rushed down to his room wearing nothing but a nightrobe, with Binter ambling along behind her, an eternal presence.  Wherever Keritanima was, one of the Vendari was as well.  "Alright, now what's so important that you'd wake me up at the crack of dawn, Dar?" she demanded as she shuffled off the staircase and towards them.
	Rather abashedly, Tarrin explained what had happened, which made her laugh.  "Is that all?  Good grief, Tarrin, you take these things too seriously.  It's not like Auli's going to marry you.  You didn't have to wake me up to tell me that."
	"Jesmind's already threatened to kill her, Kerri," he explained.  "That's one of the reasons why I was trying to stay away from her.  If Jesmind finds out, she'll go after Auli, so I need your help destroying the evidence."
	"In here, eh?" she nodded with her muzzle, then she opened the door to his room and put her head in.  She then chuckled humorlessly.  "Oh, Auli was in here all right, and it's obvious you and her were rattling the headboard.  I can smell it from here."
	"Kerri," Tarrin said in protest, his cheeks flushing slightly.
	"You were alot more fun as a Were-cat, Tarrin," she teased with a toothy grin.  "Alright, I'll take care of this, but I can smell Auli all over you.  Take some clean clothes down to the baths and scrub every finger of skin you have with soap twice, and wash your hair at least three times.  Auli's sweat is all over you, and that kind of a scent is very hard to wash off."
	"I was getting ready to do that," he assured her.
	"Well, Tarrin, was it any good?" she asked shamelessly.
	"Kerri!"
	"It's alright, Tarrin, I'm a married woman," she said wickedly.  "I'm allowed to talk about these kinds of things now."
	"Well, I'm not a married woman, so I'm not going to talk about it," he said adamantly.
	She looked at him and laughed, then patted him on the shoulder.  "Go get cleaned up, and I'll help you cover this up," she winked.  "But you owe me a big one."
	He didn't really answer that, taking a clean change of clothes down to the baths and getting to work.  He nearly scrubbed himself raw with soap as he labored to get Auli's smell off of him, and he had to hurry.  There was no telling when Jesmind or Kimmie was going to come looking for him, if they weren't watching him already--
	That brought him up short.  If Jesmind had been watching him last night, then she may already know about him and Auli.  If that was the case, then she may already be on the warpath.  But he hadn't heard anything about it yet, so there was a chance that it hadn't happened.  Or at least hadn't happened yet.  There was no screaming in the hallways, none of the other bathers were talking about any kind of fighting last night, so he was a little encouraged that she'd not been tailing him last night.
	He went back to it, spending nearly an hour washing Auli's scent off of him, and then laboriously scrubbing his hair for a second time in so many days.  He was waterlogged by the time he climbed out, and his skin was decidedly pink from the brisk scrubbing, but he was relatively certain that he'd gotten all of it.  That knowledge made him relax a little.  If Keritanima did her part, any scent evidence left in his room had been wiped away, and now there was nothing but him, Auli, Dar, and Keritanima to say anything about it.  He knew that Dar and Kerri wouldn't say anything, and he certainly wouldn't.  He just hoped that Auli had the sense to keep her mouth shut.  He'd have to find her, to talk to her and tell her that her life very well may depend on her keeping what happened last night to herself.
	He dressed in the clean clothes he'd brought with him and carefully wrapped the dirty ones so he could minimize their contact with him, then wrapped them in a towel and put them under his arm.  He was pretty sure that he'd gotten everything, and that made him feel quite a bit better.  He started back to his room feeling quite relieved about the whole thing.  If Keritanima finished, then all that would be left would be the clothes under his arm, and that would be easy enough to attend.  He'd burn them if nothing else.  He hurried back to his room, confident that everything was going to work out alright--
	And found Jesmind standing in the doorway.  And she did not look happy.  Her beautiful face was very tight, very flat,and her eyes were very narrow as she glowered into the hallway.  Those eyes locked on him, and she moved towards him at a fast walk that made him realize that she'd break out into a run and chase him down if he tried to get away from her.  And that would only make her angrier.  She stalked up to him, and he felt honest fear of her as she looked the slight difference in their heights down at him with that same flat, angry expression.  He swallowed reflexively as he backed into the wall behind him, out of room, and then flinched when her open hand slammed into the wall just beside his head.  The other hand snatched the towel-wrapped bundle from his hands and threw it aside.
	"I leave you alone for one night," she hissed at him, "I decide that I can trust you by yourself for one night, and this is what happens!"
	Tarrin's fear of Jesmind was suddenly displaced by indignation and not a little anger.  "I'm not your child, Jesmind," he said in a level tone.  "I didn't want it to happen, but it did.  Even if I'd wanted it or not, what I do is none of your business."
	"You'd better believe that it's my business!" she suddenly raged at him, making his flinch as drops of that dangerous spittle flew from her mouth, nearly landing on his face.  "You are my mate, Tarrin!  Even if you are human, you're still mine!  Mine, do you hear?  You're not free to go sleep around with anyone until I let you go!"  She slammed her other hand into the wall on the other side of his head, trapping him, but he did not flinch.  He looked up at her with steady nerve, the calm taught to him by his parents when facing an enemy.  Never show fear, they had both taught him.  Fear is a good emotion, but not when someone you're facing knows you're afraid. "I just want to know one thing," she growled in a very inhuman voice.  "Did she come after you, or did you go after her?"
	"I'm not going to answer that," he said in as steady a voice as he could manage.  "Because no matter what I say, it won't matter to you.  You've already made up your mind."
	Jesmind laid her ears back, and her eyes suddenly went from their normal state to glowing all green.  It was quite an unnerving sight to see, especially when those eyes were barely a nose's length from his own.  "You're right," she hissed.  And then she recoiled from him and dashed down the hallway.
	"Jesmind!" Tarrin called in surprise and worry.  He knew exactly what she was doing.  She was going to go hunt down Auli.  And when she found her, she was going to try to kill her.
	Knowing that there was nothing he could do to stop her, he instead ran to his room.  Dar and Keritanima weren't there, and the room was a disaster.  The bed had been completely destroyed, furniture smashed, sheets torn apart, even the art on the walls destroyed.  Jesmind must have come in and discovered the truth, and then ripped the room apart in her anger.
	Good Goddess!  Auli!  As furious as she was, Jesmind was really going to do it, she would really try to kill Auli, no matter who saw her or what stood in her way!
	Tarrin couldn't stop her, but he could warn someone and try to get word to the Sha'Kar.  The Sha'Kar could handle Jesmind, they could stop her and hopefully not hurt her.  He just needed to find a Sorcerer.
	He knew exactly where to go.  He ran down the hall, down to the end, where Dolanna's door was, and then banged on it feverishly.  "Dolanna!" he shouted, then he realized she wasn't there.  If Jesmind tore his room apart, she was bound to make a whole lot of noise, and that would have alerted everyone in the area.  It was why he hadn't met anyone in the halls coming back to his room.  They'd cleared the halls because they knew that Jesmind was being violent.  Or at least he really, really hoped so.
	If he couldn't find Dolanna, then he needed to find someone else, anyone else.  He scrambled down the hall and down the stairs, thinking that his best bet was the kitchens.  Someone would be there to get word to Jenna and the Sha'Kar and warn them that Jesmind was coming.  He ran down the circular staircase so fast he nearly fell twice, and he did fall when he came around the steps and out into the hall and slammed headlong into the scaly back of Binter.  Tarrin wasn't heavy enough to even budge the massive Vendari, and he ended up bouncing off of him and nearly tumbling down the stairs behind, had Binter's huge clawed hand not reached down and grabbed him by the leg.
	"Tarrin!" Keritanima called in concern, rushing over and kneeling by him.  "Are you alright?"
	"Kerri, we have to get word to Jenna!" he said.  "Jesmind's out of control!"
	"It's already taken care of," she said with a reassuring smile.  "Triana just got back a little while ago, and she's going to intercept Jesmind before she can do any harm."
	"You're sure about that?"
	Keritanima grinned.  "Nobody can get past Triana, Tarrin.  Trust me on that one."
	"That's a relief," he said with a sigh as Binter helped him to his feet.  "Did she hurt you?  Where's Dar?"
	"Dar's gone to tell the Keeper what happened," she answered.  "I figured you'd come this way, so we waited here for you."
	"What happened?"
	"She showed up while I was purging the smell from your room," she shrugged.  "She realized what happened, and about that time she had a hissy fit.  Started throwing furniture around and cursing alot.  About that time, Binter decided that it was time for me to withdraw," she said acidly at the Vendari.
	"I was not going to let you stay in danger, your Majesty," he said calmly.  "And Jesmind is family to your brother, so I was not going to stop her.  Out of respect for him."
	"I could have handled her, Binter," she accused.  "If you hadn't have grabbed me like a doll and slung me over you shoulder, I could have stopped her from tearing Tarrin's room up."
	"I have seen Were-cats fight against Sorcery before," he said, nonplussed.  "I do not take chances with your life, Majesty."
	"Someday you and I are going to renegotiate this little agreement, Binter," she said in a steely tone.
	"You are free to try, Majesty, but our oaths to you are very clear.  You are our child, and we will not let you come to harm."
	"Dar and Dolanna went to go warn the Keeper, and they told us that Triana was back on the grounds, and that she'd take care of Jesmind.  That's a good thing.  As mad as Jesmind is at the moment, I don't think most of the Sorcerers could manage her."
	"Exactly why I removed you from her presence."
	"Oh, shut up," she snapped at the Vendari.
	Tarrin was a little worried, and not a little embarassed.  All this madness was his fault, be it directly or indirectly.  And what was worse, everyone in the Tower was going to find out that he and Auli had slept together.  Auli probably wouldn't care at all, but Tarrin did.  Such a rumor could completely destroy one's reputation back in Aldreth, be it a boy or a girl.  "Great," he sighed.  "This was the last thing I needed.
	"You just never seem to catch a break, brother," she chuckled.  "Come on, let me take you down to the kitchens and we can get something to eat.  Something tells me we're both going to need all our energy today."
	"I think you're dead on, Kerri," he agreed as she took his hand in her own, and he paused to feel how soft yet rough it was, and how silky the black fur on her hand was.  Just like a fox, her hands and feet had black fur on them.  Her coloring was totally faithful to the animal she resembled.
	Things were going to get very unpleasant.  He just knew it.  And the least of it was how all this made him feel.  He was very angry with Jesmind for her words, making it sound like he was nothing but her possession.  He had his own life, and damnit, he'd been trying to be as objective as possible.  But maybe that was the problem with her.  Jesmind had absolutely decided that he was going to be a Were-cat again, and him fooling around with Auli was a very direct threat to that future.  He could see that now, and he could understand why it made her so furious.  If Tarrin got involved with Auli, Jesmind was afraid that the relationship would make him want to stay human.  It was the exact same thing he'd