so, I *may* or may not have promised Loki, or a construct of @kel's agile imagination that xe calls "Loki", that I would tell the story of how Kel met them and came to regard them as xer patron of sorts, and why we hold Loki high in our esteem even though they have a somewhat evil reputation as a murderous rogue. Kel has already told this story in a massive 52-tweet storm on the birdsite a while back, but Loki (or whoever it is) suggests that I should not merely copy that, but use my own words.

I'll be dribbling that out in a series of toots as I can this evening. I'm debating whether to hide the bulk of this behind CWs. My sense has been that Loki really likes maximum publicity, and Kel tells me that in one of xer communications with them Loki suggested there was a sort of _do ut des_ quality to their bond with my familiar: the more Kel advertises for them, the more helpful they'll be. But I don't want to inflict walls of text on the timeline; I'll take my chances with circumspection.

The real adventure started some time last fall, maybe a couple weeks before Hallowe'en; I don't remember exactly when. @kel had been "awake" for some months but the frequency and depth of their spiritual experiences, few and ambiguous at first, was accelerating markedly in September and October. K. was still with us then, still (as it seemed) our inseparable mate and our spiritual confidante, and excitement was in the air as we approached what would turn out to be a cataclysmic Samhain.

There was a sense of expectation in the air, an accumulation of strange happenstances and coincidences. I remember for instance my metamour Gravis just happening to start tweeting photos of coyotes, and when I asked him about it he mentioned seeing a coyote while driving near Renton; that struck me as an odd sighting in suburban Seattle. There were other odd prickles that caused Kel to tell K. that we felt some trickster was trying to get our attention. But who?