As the meal wound down, Corbyne retrieved everyone’s dishes and went to wash them, leaving the rest of the party at the table.
Miriom had retrieved the head of the slaughtered dungeon fowl, and was now gently dissecting it from a corner of the table. Claire gratefully noted that she was upwind of Miriom, and that their meal had been fragrant. She looked over her gear, checking for something that might need maintenance and finding nothing. As she goes to check again something brushes her back. Claire whirls to see Essie stepping around her, her tail swishing in the air.
“U-um, hi Essie.” Claire stutters as her partymate steps onto the bench beside her. “Is, um, is everything okay?”
Essie responds by curling up into a ball beside Claire, who scoots to the side to make room for her. “S-sorry, I didn’t mean to be in your way.”
Essie looks up at Claire, eyes full of annoyance and expectation. Claire’s heart rate jumps. She feels the world close in around her. “I-I-”
“She wants your attention.” Miriom says from across the table, watching the two of them with her chin propped on one hand. “Corbyne and me are busy, so she needs someone to pet her.”
“M-me?” Claire asks, looking over at Miriom. In answer one of Essies hands bats her thigh. Claire looks down to see Essie twisting, arching her tummy up toward her. “H-how do I?”
“Like you’d touch a cat, or a girl.” Miriom answers, her grin growing wider.
“I-I um, I haven’t-” As Claire stutters one of Essies hands wraps around her wrist and tugs.
Swallowing her reflex to flinch away, Claire lets Essie guide her hand down and onto her stomach. As her fingers meet the leather of Essie’s armor the catgirl slides her hand down Claire’s wrist and onto the back of her palm. She presses gently downward and Claire follows the movement spreading and lowering her hand until it’s flat against Essie.
“Circles.” Essie speaks for the first time since dinner, then she lifts her hand from Claire’s and looks up at her, eyes still expectant but now bereft of annoyance.
Slowly, stutteringly, braced for rejection, Claire begins to move her palm in a circle over Essie’s stomach. The catgirl shifts and squirms beneath her, pressing herself up into Claire’s touch. D-does that mean she likes it? Claire thinks to herself. Or maybe she’s trying to push me off?
Responding as though she can hear Claire’s thoughts, Essie lets out a long purr.