bass-boosted whitney houston intensifies in the distance;

[doggish]

Comments

[illithidnapped]

Not as much as you might think. Heirs are vital commodities, after all.

Though with as much as my parents struggle to get along the only real shock is that they've managed to touch one another long enough to have two of us.

[doggish]

Is it arranged? I thought that was an archaic practice.

[And then, on the heels of that:]

Are you fated to have such a marriage?

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[illithidnapped]

We're nobility. Miserable archaism is practically synonymous with catnip to us.

Remember that one time the Duchess Coveyette's niece claimed she unearthed the 'ancient ritual for beauty magic' using boiled chimera piss ?



ah. right.

I'd forgotten you weren't in our employ yet.

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[illithidnapped]

But yes. Eventually.

[doggish]

[Oh.]

When?

[For what is there to say? His heart does not so much drop as plummet, icy shock swiftly giving way to a deadened sort of disappointment. He should have expected this. He should have known from the start, but oh, they never think of the future, do they . . .?]

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[illithidnapped]

Well we might be archaic but we're hardly barbaric, for the most part. No elfblooded line with any self-respect plans on marrying off their whelps before they've come of age.

2/2

[illithidnapped]

Plus it certainly makes things that much harder when the eldest of one's line happens to enjoy weaving together a gratuitous trail of ruin wherever he may stride.

I might even stand more chance of being assassinated than wed off at this point.

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[doggish]

Barbaric, he says, to the person currently bedding said whelp.

[doggish]

[But no, he knows what he's doing, and it is a comfort. It doesn't erase the pain in his heart, but it does ease it.]

You stand no chance at all of being assassinated, little brat. But I will trust in your poor reputation and propensity for ruin and mayhem and destruction to carry us for as many decades as we can manage. Who knows? By the time you reach a century, perhaps Dalyria will be the only one to have you.

[illithidnapped]

And leave the poor girl standing at the altar when it comes time for me to flee? Not a chance.

I like the wretched thing too much to do that to her reputation.

[doggish]

She could always leave you. It would be your reputation in tatters, admittedly, but that seems to matter less.

And to what tropical isle will you demand I spirit you away?

[illithidnapped]

My reputation will be in tatters the moment I am spirited away regardless, though I've always been more partial to the romantic notion of faking one's own death. Attending one's own funeral. That sort of thing.

[And it's not (is) because he's addicted to attention in even the thinnest of senses. Let him be a little vain.]

The rest depends on how much clothing you'll wear when the sun is beating down on us. Because if the answer isn't 'I'll be naked at all hours', then I doubt the sweltering tropic heat will be worth the cost. But I hear Rialto's nice this time of year. Or Rivain. Or if we're keen on getting lost in a crowd there's always Athkatla- I expect the lack of magic in the latter might appeal to your preferences.

[doggish]

The heat would be worth the cost, and I could even be persuaded to wear nothing at all, depending on circumstance— but watching you turn bright red and fret over sunburn for weeks on end would not.

We will go to Rivain first, so you can swoon over the pirates and learn any number of things that decidedly don't befit your station. Then Athkatla, for I have heard of their lack of magic, and it seems a far more restful place than here. But we will end in Rialto, for there the climate is mild, and the food— while a bit aggressive when it comes to garlic— is good. And there we will stay, for Rialto is a place that knows it's best not to ask too many questions, especially about one's past.

And I will watch as you grow into your first century, and tend to you as you bemoan all the aches and pains that come with being an adult. You will stay as a magistrate, I imagine, and I will protect you from all the criminals who might think of retribution.

[illithidnapped]

[It takes a moment— twenty minutes, he'd said, before needing to return. (Wasn't it twenty? Maybe it was thirty.) Either way, it's come and gone, much like his own sense of balance as he slips back against the wall with his phone cupped tight between his palms, melting from the inside out. His pulse: melting. His expression: melting. His sentiment: molten. His will to return to his own chambers—

Gone.

But at least his lonely little heart somehow resists the urge to wet his eyes in public, against all given odds. Because he wants that. More than anything, he does.

And if they're lucky, that'll all be in the cards.]

Maybe I want to be a pirate.

[He doesn't.]

[doggish]

[Sweetheart. Sweet, petulant darling. Fussy, bratty magistrate that has his heart and his devotion, and whose pause signifies any number of things, but none of them rejection. He smiles when he feels his phone buzz, and feels a soft warmth flood through him at the response.]

You want to dress as a pirate, you mean, and strut around on deck, barking orders and posing with a sword.

[I know you, little love.]

But if you truly find you have a sudden hankering for dirt and sweat and endless toil under the sun, I will make it so.

[illithidnapped]

Well of course I do. Not ALL pirates toil.



[A long beat, before:]

do they?

[doggish]

It isn't a pleasure cruise.

Do you know what Isabela told me they do with stowaways that cannot pull their weight?

[illithidnapped]

no, but start by telling me what happens to stowaways who own the entire bloody ship

[doggish]

They're thrown overboard to drown, for they're at sea with no witnesses. Especially arrogant young pups who strut around and think owning things commands respect.

I would not let them, but we would have to kill the entire crew, and I cannot sail. Nor can you. So keep your dreams of pirates to bedroom games.

[illithidnapped]

[Tsk.]

well that's bullshit. Has no one ever told them that obviously owning things commands respect? that's how the whole damned world works!

[doggish]

I truly cannot tell if you're joking or not sometimes.

[illithidnapped]

:]

would you care to guess?

[doggish]

I would not. I do not play guessing games. But I will assume you're joking, for you're normally far smarter than your peers.

[illithidnapped]

Indeed I am smarter, and it's because I am that I

2/2

[illithidnapped]

what do you mean 'normally'