"Okay, thanks for bringing up a basket of potatoes!" Chiaki said, kissing Curtis on the cheek. She took a stone knife and began peeling them. "Here, we'll add the peels to tonight's dinner."
"What are you doing with the insides?" The snake asked as his mate peeled and sliced the tubers.
"I'm going to let the starch come out in the water." She pointed at the pot of water with the knife in her hand. "With basic starch I can dry it and add it to melted fat and make fat that will hopefully last through the winter in jars."
"So... this is rendering fat?"
"Hm, no. We will render the fat by heating it slowly and making it melt. The water in it will evaporate and we can scoop the impurities out of it. Then let the fat cool and harden again. That's how we will render the fat." She pointed to a cluster of small hand sized clay pots. "Once the fat is ready to cool we'll pour it into those."
"So... what are the potatoes for again?"
"Starch. Instead of just pouring the melted fat into jars to cool, I want to mix it with dried out potato starch and keep some of it that way. Just, keeping it in different ways in case one way ends up not working in the clay pots." She handed him a potato. Curtis nodded and joined his mate in her work as he'd promised to do. After a few minutes she spoke again. "How's Winston?"
"The tiger put a few things in the empty room beside the one your cub sleeps in. I haven't seen him after that."
"Hn. Okay." She paused. "Speaking of Kimba, Qianhuang said he was asleep when we got home this morning?"
Curtis nodded. "The cub was asleep in his hay pile with a belly filled with food bigger than his head." He chuckle as he remembered the sight.
"I'm glad he came home and went to sleep. I'm not ready to have the birds and bees talk with the baby." She paused. "Sex talk, Curtis, I mean sex talk."
The snake grinned at his mate. "You knew it was coming."
"Yes!" She said in exasperation, but there was a smile on her face. "Sometimes I forget this is a different world too."
"So, you don't want to talk to your cub about mating?"
"Not yet, I mean is it something I'm suppose to do? Do beast-men have instincts about that sort of thing?"
"Snakes do." Curtis said with a frown. "I think... I don't want you talking to our offspring about it."
"Kurt." Chiaki said softly.
They sat in silence. He focused on peeling potatoes for a few minutes, gathering his thoughts. "If he... matures... while you are still in his life, I don't know how he will respond. He'll be able to remember our lovemaking up until the time you conceived. He'll remember it from my point of view, AS me... he'll feel like he is me in that moment and he might become violent towards me, maybe even you." Curtis shook his head. "I don't want you to have to see that. The memories can be overwhelming." He trailed off.
"You really think so? Curtis, how old where you when you matured?"
The snake shrugged. "Somewhere in my teens."
"Then we have a lot of time to make sure our son has his own self firmly grounded in his mind, okay?" She put a hand over his.
"I'm afraid for you." He said almost too lowly to be heard.
"I'll be okay. I promise you, we will raise a son together that you will never have to abandon."
Curtis let out a shaky sigh. The more they talked about his offspring the more worried he became, but his mate kept her calm. Could they really raise children together like a normal mated pair? He wanted too. He wanted to try. The memory of his father hiding the nest of eggs containing Curtis' egg and his brothers flashed through his mind. The man looked at the eggs with disgust. Was that the feeling pushing him? The feeling his father held for his offspring... was complete and utter hate.
The stone knife in Curtis' hand slipped from his grasp. It clattered to the floor, shattering.
"I believe you."
