he isn't /always/ smart...

[raith_wraith]

He was good. For a while. Even if he did hang onto the card. It didn't really seem like the sort of thing he could exactly just dispose of, leaving a Faerie Queen's phone number lying around. Even if that was a bit irrational. Besides, there was always the chance it might come in useful some day. Maybe. So he kept it and went about his life

Comments

[midwintersgrace]

The phone went to an answering service, at which Thomas could leave a message. The Winter Queen smiled a little when she heard, a few moments later. Not that she'd been sitting by listening for the call; in point of fact it had been a somewhat remarkable coincidence that she'd been at the office at that particular time

[raith_wraith]

Thomas should have expected the answering service. But he hadn't, so there was a moment's pause before he began to speak. And when he does, his voice is clear and calm, as if he's simply leaving your every day message for any old person.

"If you have the time, I'd like to finish our conversation of before. There are a few points I'd rather like to have clarification on." He gave his phone number and the times he'd be available for a 'chat', though he rather suspected she needed neither pieces of information. "At your earliest convenience, naturally. Ta for now, darling!"

[midwintersgrace]

Really, Mab had no intention of letting him pick the time and place when they would speak. That would be putting far too much control (read: any) into his hands.

Which was, among other reasons, why she appeared at his door a few minutes later.

"At my earliest convenience, you said?"

[raith_wraith]

If Thomas was startled, he did well at not letting it show at all. He merely stepped back from the door to give her room with a gracious smile, "yes, yes I did."

He did not, however, expressly invite her inside.

[midwintersgrace]

She noted that with a tiny smile that was at once irritated, amused, and even a little pleased. Caution was good. Caution would keep him alive longer.

"You have questions for me, I believe." And she would rather he invited her in, but if he didn't do so soon she could sacrifice her power at the threshold. She didn't feel the need for it for this meeting, anyway. Unless he required a demonstration, in which case, he should know better, and she would point that out. And then figure out a way to counter...

[raith_wraith]

He led her to a seat in his living room. It was all very swank, out here. His bedroom? Not so much. "Naturally. One of the more important being: what exactly do you want from me?"

He could have beat around the bush, played the game, but she had asked and if they didn't get to the point, they'd both just end up frustrated. Or so he imagined. And that was the one question he expected her to answer the most straightforwardly, anyway. Since she couldn't exactly get what she wanted if he didn't know what was expected of him.

[midwintersgrace]

One eyebrow arched slightly as she took her seat; blunt, he was, but straightforward when he wanted to be and she knew he could play word games as well as any other, so she didn't mind. Too much.

He could play word games better than his brother, she noted. Although the younger of Margaret's sons had his other talents.

"Your brother may have told you that there is a position in my Court that I wished him to fill. I would like to extend to you that same offer."

[raith_wraith]

Thomas frowned slightly. She was joking, right?

"I'm not exactly human..." and he seemed to recall that being one of the prerequisites for the position in question.

Not that he was considering taking it or anything. And implicit in his statement was the other side of it, I'm a monster, even if he didn't consciously note that. It was, after all, the term he thought of himself in.

He turned the frown into a dazzlingly bright smile that would have had most women swooning at his feet, not that he expected any sort of similar reaction from Mab, "but I am flattered to hear my wondrous reputation has so impressed even the Winter Queen herself."

[midwintersgrace]

"Exceptions have been made in the past, and could be made again." She didn't exactly wave it off, but that was certainly what she was implying.

And she knew damn well he was considering it. She had laid out too tempting a bait for him to refuse out of hand. That was, after all, the point of the bait.

"Your reputation has indeed preceded you." A lot of it, really. Including the part about Justine. "You do have your flaws, everyone does. But your flaws correspond very nicely with my requirements. And I can offer you a great deal that you have not, as yet, been able to achieve."

[raith_wraith]

"Your requirements?"

She was making this sound way too easy.

But then, that was the point.

"And yes," he said drily in response to her last statement, "I did get that idea." And take it away just as quickly. He would do well to remember that.

[midwintersgrace]

"Intelligence," she told him with casual openness. "And quick-mindedness, leading to restless thought and enjoying a challenge. A touch of impatience, leading to initiative and fore-thinking. Divided loyalties, giving perspective from two different worlds."

She really had an ability to turn black into white. But then. Faerie queen. They did that.

[raith_wraith]

Divided loyalties, huh? And here he was thinking she'd expect someone serving her to be loyal to, well, her. Not that he felt so compelled to point that one out.

"That does sound rather familiar," he conceded with a nod. "And that would make a person in that position, what? Your wetworks-man? Someone who does whatever you don't feel like dealing with personally? All of the above?"

He knew, more or less, what a Winter Knight was supposed to be. But what other people thought and what the actual Winter Queen in question thought could very well be two different things.

And yes, he did quite deliberately not say and that would make me...

[midwintersgrace]

"Someone who did things that I could not do by myself," she said, and condeded his point with a nod of her own. "Sometimes, yes, that would include assassination. Someone I could trust;" although she did not add 'to be loyal.' She was buying Thomas's loyalty, which meant that someone else could do the same later down the line.

"There are ceremonial tasks, of course, the changing of the guard, winter to summer, and so on. Very few of them would require your presence. You would be my agent in the mortal realms."

"And for specific duties, there are matters that have transpired over the last few years that I would like to see investigated more thoroughly than my drunk, broken Knight can do."

[raith_wraith]

He didn't have to ask which matters she referred to. He'd helped get Molly back, after all. He remembered what her stronghold had looked like.

And that was something else to keep in mind. It hadn't been cozy.

"What about my own interests?" Not just Justine. His salon -- he'd grown attached. Harry. Even how that would change his relationship -- whatever it was -- with Lara.

[midwintersgrace]

"You would be able to maintain your interests." The artist, after all, had been able to maintain his studio. She had even permitted Slate to maintain what dubious interests he had had. She would have more accurately called them bad habits, vices, and other less savory things.

But this was about Thomas, not Slate. This was a negotiation with Slate's potential successor, and if all went well she wouldn't have to worry about that drug-addicted madman any longer.

[raith_wraith]

Thomas looked toward the window, thinking. Harry and Elaine's words echoed in his head. This was a very bad idea. Even simply having her here.

Possibly he should have actually listened to his little brother.

But he'd do anything to make things right with Justine. To protect her as best he could.

He couldn't do that as a hairdresser.