The room was as I had left it, save for the piles of smoking debris where each communication device had been sitting. Matriarch Klaeris stood and stretched. Olezhka rushed to my side.

"It's okay," I said, scratching Olezhka reassuringly behind his ears. "Everything is okay."

"I take it things went well then?" Klaeris asked.

I nodded. "Yeah. And I have a proposal to run by you."

"Shall we talk here or in my office?"

"Office," I confirmed. "It's a sensitive ...