"Now, let's see... some auras, I guess?"

4th Litordae, 25th day of the month of Semens (Sem), the 3672nd year of Salvation's Landing

"Ok, this ability is actually innate in every person. It's just that, not many people have much interest being this in touch with their feelings... Especially you menfolk…" Tabitha gave a false scowl at Reglin with that last line.

Reglin had a lot of questions in his mind right at that moment, and almost none of them were regarding auras. They were almost all about Tabitha. She was being playful with him. ‘Playful?’. Yet another thing in this miraculous day that he swore that he would never see. Was she being this way because she was just covering Reglin in all kinds of mana? Could that have ever happened without him having this artifact in his possession? If he were to lose it, would she keep moving forward in this trajectory that would lead them to being lovers, and not just of the carnal variety?

This thing was causing a bit of a crisis of conscience, but it was his burden to bear. He knew that Tabitha would try her damnedest to alleviate him of it if her were to ask, but she had already done so much… 'Wait, knowing her she knew what would happen were she to give me this artifact and she did it still. Was that a kind of sign of desire for things to move forward? Ahh! Too much mental tumbling. Have to tell my mind to shut it for a while so that I can learn…’ So, he focused in on what she was saying and gave her a small snort of a laugh at her scowl. All that was but a moment in his mind.

With her playfulness acknowledged, Tabitha moved on, “It might come across as contradictory, but if you let yourself think about it, it’s not. Mana is always an intangible energy around us that derives from some feeling mostly. The elements are an obvious exception on face value, but they too are tied to emotions more times than not. But anyway, to see what are basically feelings around us, you must see what thoughts and emotions you are putting out into the world.” So far it was making sense to Reglin, oddly enough, ‘More than likely due to my new gift’.

She continued after Reglin gave a small nod, affirming his understanding, “There really isn’t much to it besides searching yourself and finding those feelings. It sounds like a huge task, I know. But, with practice, you can see auras in a moment’s time. Like with everything, it just takes practice, right? Now to start off, I recommend losing the idea of seeing at all. You should close your eyes and feel. It will take a bit of soul-searching, and maybe admitting to some things you might not be proud of, but you have to reconcile those feelings in order to see your aura and the aura of others.”

Reglin gave another nod, “Okay, so close my eyes and think about? Basically, every emotional attachment I feel toward someone? Is that what I’m looking to accomplish? You’re right in that it does sound like a near impossible task.” But Reglin did what was advised and closed his eyes.

‘Emotions… emotions…’ The obvious ones to qualify were the ones attached to woman he shared this office with. Respect. Affection. Loyalty. Lust was there definitely. Hope? Yes, of course. For quite a few different reasons really. Curiosity. Reglin did not even know how old Tabitha was! She held herself aloof throughout the past as though to cultivate that mystery.

Love… Of course, he loved Tabitha. How could he not for all the things she had and has done. But there was that childish crush of his… Was that truly love? If it wasn’t, maybe it was time to let that go. Stop thinking about who she used to him and think about what she was now.

Tabitha was a decidedly feminine woman, as he had found out today. Before, she was a kind beauty who took pity on a poor messenger boy. Today changed so many things in his mind. It was time to let go of the childhood fancies. She was woman, who very easily could be reciprocating most of these feelings that he had for her. It was time to sate that curiosity of his and learn about this kind, beautiful, mysterious, funny, loyal, optimistic, aggressive, submissive… could she be both? On this day, she certainly had been. People were complicated it turns out.

‘I think I have the feelings I have for her figured out.’ But then Reglin noticed something. He had no negative feelings for her. He knew that she had frustrated him beyond comprehension just minutes ago, yet there was nothing there. No animosity for slights of the past that might have happened. No jealousy of her time. None of it…

“I think I’m a cheat again…” He said aloud as he opened his eyes slightly. He looked at her through hooded lids.

Tabitha’s brow raised, “Oh? And why do you think that is?” She wore a very subtle and knowing smile.

He blew out a deep sigh, “This governor thing… It protects me from myself even? I thought about you. And I know that you have driven me to think negatively of you, yet, as I think about you, none of them are there… I can remember feeling a certain way, but it just doesn’t matter in the end.”

Her knowing little smile widened and a little snort of a laugh, “That didn’t take long. I’m impressed. I was almost sure you would be looking got phantom emotions for a while at least.”

Now Reglin raised his own inquisitive brow, “Why is that? And why are not surprised that I can cheat at this too?”

“Because I can see your aura, imbecile… There are none of the colors or patterns that represent those negative feelings. I figured that your condition was the reason behind.” She patted his cheek affectionately, “Now as to why I thought you would be chasing bad things? Because you’ve shown yourself to be a very conscientious individual and that you would need to do your due diligence to find every anchoring emotion you have.”

Reglin nodded thoughtfully, then looked ahead again, “So, one down, who knows how many more to go… I am going to get back to it.” She nodded and returned to reading and Reglin closed his eyes once more.

Now that he knew that nearly half of these feelings just weren’t there to be found, it sped things up quite a bit. Next was Asha, due to her place in his mind. After he finished cataloguing his feelings for her, he moved on to his family. His parents were easy. Oldest sister Datine, she’s pretty easy too. Family seems pretty straight forward. He sorted through his brother, Gand. Last one. His slightly older sister, Lisse. Just like the others…wait. Desire? That was so long ago, and it wasn’t like he had always longed after his sister. He just happened to see her in her small clothes and was utterly impressed with her figure and musculature. Well, there really isn’t anything to do about it. He accepted that he has desires for his sister, however long ago. He doubted that those feelings would present themselves in current day. But he had to sort it out… Moving on.

He went through the palace guard, his old witchhunter squad, the rest of the palace staff. He then got to the Royal family. He had a sense of duty to them. It was his job to protect them, but it was more than that. The Polivanders had, by extension, set him on this path. Gratitude was the major feeling there. But then there was Yelena, the middle daughter. He had played with her a handful of times as a kid living within the palace walls before the forbidding. He saw her occasionally, among the palace. Thinking on her now, he felt… pity. They had fun as kids, but society forbade her to associate with people like Reglin. How sad. To not be able to play with who you’d like. He remembered that she did not grow much. She ended up being very petite. That made him protective almost inherently… So he had some feelings beyond the norm for Yelena. Interesting.

Doing a mental jog through his mind, Reglin could not think of anyone else that he had laid down some sort of feelings for. And so it was time to give this a try. He opened his eyes and saw Tabitha, still reading, “Ok…”

She looked up from her book, “Done already? That seems like something that should’ve taken a bit longer than roughly twenty minutes.” She closed her book after putting the cloth in it to mark her place, “So we want to see if we can get it?”

“Well, when you are as emotionally stunted as I am, apparently it’s pretty easy to square everything away.” Reglin said snarkily, “I would like to see what all the fuss is about, I guess.”

Tabitha chuckled at his dismissive choice of words, “Not that big a deal, I suppose. I only know of maybe three men who can do this, but no, I’ll try to make it so you don’t fall asleep with how boring it is.” Dry, dry, dry… Burying that one deep, it seemed to Reglin.

“That would be awfully nice of you. How you want to do that? Perform in your smallclothes?” If she wanted to play that way, Reglin would give it his best effort right back at her.

Muttering under her breath about her smallclothes being the first thing she would get rid of if it were her choice, but then she decided to change it up on him like she had all night, “Okay. Now you are going to go through all the people you came up with, all the emotions you have tied to them. Once you’ve done it, you may be able to go days, weeks, even months without really having to inventory yourself with people you see rarely.” Tabitha gave an apologetic smile to Reglin then, “For others, it might be a near-constant upkeep…” He knew she was referring to herself, given the day’s course.

She got out of her seat and stood directly in front of him, “Okay… Seeing your own aura is a little tricky at first. I want to keep your head straight and forward…” Raising her hand up above her own head and nearly at the edge of his peripheral vision, “But I want you to look at my hand. When you see it, it’s almost always like your eyes are playing tricks on you initially.”

Reglin’s forward stare was literally right into the slight Arcanist breasts, but as alluring as the thought of those mounds might be, the fashion did nothing to really help those thoughts along, ‘I guess it’s functioning as intended then’. Once Tabitha raised her hand and gave the instruction, Reglin had no problem following direction. Head forward, eyes forward, but pay attention to the periphery. Now, go through the exercise he just went through. The mind computes at an astounding speed, especially if you have done some preparation as Tabitha had taught him. In but a few moments, he had gone through that list, all the way down to the people he had met today. Fellow guardsmen, Asha, and Princess Katya and Lady Wilmyna, but he saw nothing. He let out a long exhale through his nose.

Tabitha knew what that meant and gave the advice of going through it again. And so, he did. Again. And nothing. To her credit, Tabitha stood perfectly still for several minutes, doing her best to not distract him, but give him a focal point.

Reglin was finishing up his mental list for the fourth time and was just about to throw his hands in frustration, when, there right at the point where Tabitha’s hand was, he saw a myriad of colors coalesce into vision. He could only relate to how you can’t really see the fog you are in, but the fog in the distance is crystal clear. It was like being able to see the fog all around you… If that fog were a psychedelic kaleidoscope of colors.

Looking at his eyes, Tabitha knew that it had finally worked. She knew it wasn’t the first or the second time, but she didn’t know how many times Reglin had to do the exercise, ‘Good. I don’t want things coming too easily for him all the time.’ She smiled at that thought, given the exercise she had taught him she had seen practitioners try for days without success, and here he was in half hour or so, “Good… A bit to take in at first, isn’t it? Put out your hand and look at it…”

Doing as he was told, Reglin raised his left hand and dropped his eyes to it. He just realized that he pretty much put his hand out directly in front of what should be navel height on Tabitha. He decided to not move it though, after all he was looking at himself at this point.

Looking at his hand, Reglin could see all those whirling streams of mana originating from inside him. The most prevalent colors that he saw were a pure scarlet red, a sky blue, and a green the color or grass. There was an abundance of those tendrils of color, and most wound their way around his and then trailed off, like smoke carried off by the wind. Not all of them though. When Reglin looked at the end of his fingers, he saw sky blue in a large number stretching out and wrapping around Tabitha. The least in numbers were the red tendrils. Reglin noticed that the streams acted differently as well. The blue seemed as though they were embracing Tabitha in a hug of sorts. The red moved about her slowly, in what he would call a caressing nature. And then there was the green. It darted about at a more frenetic pace and spent a bit more time loitering around Tabitha’s nether region and breasts.

“The green is lust or desire, isn’t it?” He said looking up into her face. She had lowered her hand, it no longer being necessary. “Oh? Why do you say that?” She wore that knowing smile again both of her brows were raised in question.

“Because… The blue acts like it just liked being around you, hugging to you, maybe acting a bit protective. The red acts like you are a delicate piece of glass, almost afraid to hurt you. But the green…” Reglin paused to choose his words.

“Go oooon…” Tabitha drew out her word and her face looked like she was very interested in what Reglin observe.

‘Do it with confidence, she said’ Reglin thought to himself and he rose from his seat. Bringing his hand up to her face, he looked down at her now while she looked up. Had her breathing increased? Interesting. Taking his forefinger and middle finger together, brought them to her lips, “They almost fight one another around you, darting frantically. But they spend a good bit of time here…” and he pressed his fingers to her lips. Her lips parted slightly to allow him more of her lips. Her eyes were completely focused on his face, but his eyes followed his fingers that were now just slightly between Tabitha’s lips. They closed unconsciously, giving the fingers in them a teasing kiss. That caused Reglin to look into her eyes again. Her breathing was speeding up now that he had decided to pay attention to it.

It was time to push boundaries and be bold, Reglin decided. He took those fingers and slid them further into Tabitha’s mouth, causing her eyes to widen in surprise, “But they really want to be in here…” She closed the lids to a hooded look as her lips enclosed around his fingers. He felt that tongue of hers begin to twirl itself around his digits and there was that deep, throaty purr of hers that put him on edge. Reglin decided though that this was to be true to what he saw in his aura. If he could tease her while doing so, all the better.

After some seconds of Tabitha doing wonderfully sensual things to his fingers, Reglin decided to move on with his observations, withdrawing his fingers and tracing them down her neck, “They do like this spot as well, though it does seem to be more of sensual road for them, winding about…” He moved his fingers from her throat, back toward her ear, then detouring briefly to go back toward her mouth, “Going either, here…” his hand dropped quickly then, down to the bosom of her dress and suddenly cupped her right breast with a slight bit of ****, trying to replicate how he saw these tendrils act, “or here… They spend even more time here…”

Tabitha’s breathing was laboring at that point. What was happening? This was supposed to be a period of instruction on auras and here she was on the receiving end of some erotic aura reading. How could Reglin be what he claimed? He acted as though he knew just how her body would react. It sent chills through her, the possibility that he might have some insight into her wants and desires. As wet as she was from what Reglin’s hand were doing, she was equally excited over the possibilities.

Reglin’s hand cupped and squeezed her tit through the bulky garment, not really being able to see what he was doing to them, “I think your dress frustrates them… and me…” He looked up to her face with a sneering smile. Her own eyes still wore those hooded lids, like she was focusing on feeling rather than seeing, but she gave a small nod and said, “I agree with you both, but there’s nothing to be done for it… for now.” The voice was low and breathy.

Giving a small shrug as Reglin squeezed her breast one last time, his eyes going back down and stopping quickly on her neck, “Well, this in interesting… They were not doing this a moment ago… So many questions keep rising…” And with an abrupt move, his hand was at her throat, opened and gripping in tightly. Tabitha gasped and closed her eyes, “So, MY mana streams of desire are now winding around and squeezing your neck. Does that mean that this is something that I desire and have just become aware of? Or do they interact with your own and act in a way that would most affect you?” He had brought his face very close to hers when asking, their lips just inches from each other.

Having to suppress some of the noises that yearned to come from within her, Tabitha closed her eyes to gather herself, “Both, I think… To my knowledge, these streams interact of their own. So yes, my desires would reach to take hold of yours and show you what I enjoy.” She let’s out a deep breath, Reglin’s grip does not impede her in any way really, but it is secure, and she likes that, “You have to believe me… I wanted to take you into the waters of sensuality as you would take a child to the beach and let them put their toes in. But you… You are a child that gets to the coast and sees the pier and goes running to jump off of it into the depths… I’m sorry. I wanted these first moments to be something of… I don’t know... Purity? Romance? I was not expecting you to see me so thoroughly in but a day…” Her eyes drop, looking down, obviously disappointed.

The grip on Tabitha’s throat tightened and Reglin leaned in to kiss her cheek tenderly, but when he spoke, there was an edge to it, “Are you going to deny me lessons now? Because you are being selfish?” The somber demeaner she just had was almost entirely wiped away with an action and a couple of sentences. Reglin realized that Tabitha was a lot more volatile in her personality than she ever let on in his youth. So many layers for him to unwrap. It was exciting. And for response, Tabitha gave just the smallest shake of her head. Reglin nodded and squinted his eyes in thought for a moment. Thinking about the origins of this desire of hers. But that was for later, he thought. Too many distractions. He squeezed her throat just a bit harder still, enough that it might actually be impeding breathing slightly, “So, shall we continue with my lesson in auras?”

Tabitha nodded vigorously at the recommendation, “Please! It really is a good lesson, believe it or not. A lesson in which the teacher learns a bit as well.” She kept her hands at her sides remaining perfectly still. The idea that Reglin would use her body as something of a display model excited her. Advisor to the King of Polivandria, one of the most powerful Arcanist in the kingdom, and nothing more than a tool to display what his desires were. Her breathing being as heavy as it was, was not because of the soft ****, that was for certain. ‘Dear Gods, how much time is there until the fourth smallbell?’ she thought.

“Continuing on then…” Reglin said as he released his grip, but maintained pressure as his whole hand slid back down the front of her, “For refreshing purposes, some of the horny green tendrils spend some time here…” And his hand moved to squeeze each of her tits with an increased amount of **** as he looked down, “Oh, if I can maintain this, this will be quite beneficial!” He cupped her left breast and squeezed harder still, seeing more green tendrils migrate to the tit with the action, “What you like to call these?” He asked during the gripping of the mound.

Having to collect herself once more, Tabitha took a quick breath, “Clinically, I refer to them as breasts. If it is a relaxed, fun setting, I call them boobs. If I am having them pawed at and squeezed in a very sexy manner, call them tits…” She displayed a bit of backbone, since Reglin had relinquished a bit of the dominance in the scenario.

And just like that, he reclaimed it with a harder squeeze, “You really like your tits mashed, don’t you? I see more every time I squeeze harder. I suppose that once I find that threshold, those green tendrils would start to retreat?”

All Tabitha could do was nod in agreement, but after a moment, she caught her breath, “I do not think you are far off though… The cusp of my pleasure, I mean…”

“I think I will wait for the time when these damned drapes are not impeding me so…” Reglin’s voice could not keep out the frustration he was feeling. He grew impatient, and his hand moved in accordance with the mana streams, shooting down between her thighs that parted immediately for his hand. It was accompanied by a startled gasp, but Reglin went on, “And what do you want me to call this?” he said as he cupped her pubic mound from over her dress. He couldn’t feel anything definitively, but he did feel heat.

“ahh… ahhh…” Tabitha’s recovery times were extending the longer this went on, “I-It depends once again…There are all kinds, but in the most cases, including in bed, I prefer ‘pussy’. But…”

“But right now, you are being possessed, being owned… Right now, I should be calling your pussy what?” Reglin said with insistence.

Tabitha gave off one of those slight shivers again, “Cunt, or twat… I find them. Dissociative. It makes it seem like that it longer is a part of me. That is something for anyone to possess…” and she took another deep breath.

With a sudden burst, Tabitha’s eyes returned to normal, present and aware. She bolted from beneath Reglin’s grip and started for the door, “Lesson’s over! I have to attend to something!” And just like that, she was out the office door with Reglin going from ‘Confident Dominator’ to ‘Confused and uncertain’ in the blink of an eye.

~This is knowledge for the Reader~

The Affection Multiplier

~Mana: 388 (+26) 414~

~Mana Channels: ~Labiae Passionii (Lips of Passion) free, ~ Corpu Vigorii (Vigorous Body) 100, ~ Uirtau Proelium (Martial Prowess) 100, ~Mensu Lucidae (Bright Mind) 100

~Tabitha~ Affectionae: 100 Erosii: 25 (+8) 33 Libidae: 60 (+18) 78
~Lim~ A: 26
~Boll~ A: 15
~Grahm~ A: 28
~Lina~ A: 29
~Asha~ A: 25 E: 2 L: 2
~Princess Katya~ A: -63
~Lady Wilmyna~ A: 1
~Princess Katya's Entourage~ A: (+11)