Welcome to Gaia! ::

Tam looks up from where he is kneeling by the youngster and sighs. "Traumatized but recovering... Bez kind of took him by surprise, he wasn't shielded."

Bez nods with a final shudder then gives them all a weak smile. "Sorry... didn't mean to put a damper on everyone's meal... and it still smells good." He looks over at Passura and flashes him a weak smile. "Ye ok, Kid?"

The small serpentine nods solemnly then scoots behind Kerobian, peering around him in curiosity. He's never had anyone afraid of him before.

Tam pretty much does the same, though from time to time he looks to Bez and you feel a subtle undercurrent of conversation, more emotion than conversational. Once while this is happening, Kero catches Passura looking at them intently. The small serpentine feels Kero's eyes on him and turns with an embarrassed grin. Then he gets a tight burst of mental speech, so fast it almost leaves him winded. Passura is tellinbg him that the bond between the two angels runs deeper than the deepest ocean.

Passura's eyes widen. "You have brother?" he sends back with excitement. Then he begins to tell him all about his brothers, all twelve of them, when suddenly he remembers he no longer has any brothers and falls deathly silent, sitting at the table, staring at his food.

Tam is at his side in a second and embraces him from behind. He is speaking with him, in that fast rapid mind speech, telling him that his family is happy where they are and that someday he too will get to be with them, but only if he works very very hard at being the best kind of person he can.

Bez flashes Kero a tiny smile and sighs openly. "Ai always has to give that little extra moral push. It used to make me so mad...."

Tam's glare tells Kerobian that even though he may not have understood every word, he did hear enough to catch the drift of the mage's intent.

"Kerobian was foolishly enough to place himself in my keeping, Passura... and I tried to make a better person of him... failed horribly, I'm afraid... can't improve on something that perfect... a perfect mess that is..." he sends in a broad wave so that everyone hears it.

Tam smile is like a shining star, radiant and beautiful. "You do know I was only teasing you?" he says gently giving the little serpentine a hug. He looks down at the boy and sighs. "In a way, you and he have something in common, you have both experienced the loss of people who were very close to you. The circumstances may be different, but the loss is very very real and identical... He needs you right now, Kero... not me. Why don't the two of you take some of this fine meal home to eat on later and do a bit of talking. He needs to face what happened and learn to accept it. He keeps blocking it out and someday it's all going to come down crashing on him... no doubt at the one moment he needs not for it to happen."

Tam beams at him and nods to the cradle. "That is one request I will never refuse... just try not to wake them, Kero... I really do want to eat a meal without having to juggle them both."

A much subdued Passura follows him out of the cavern, a far cry from the laughing eyed creature Kero had seen helping Tam in the kitchen just a few minutes earlier.