That claps some of the shade off him -- mid-swallow, even, a small sip turned into a longer pull, his brow furrowed in the vacuum of whatever technicality he’d intended to disarm. Had he assumed Ellis didn’t have a family name?

It seemed as likely as any other explanation.

“Atheris,” he replies, compelled, for whatever reason, to keep things even.

Thot closes her eyes, piano wire muscle abuzz with her purr under the velvet of her hide.