(As always, text enclosed in /text/ is italicized.)
-----
For hours that night, Alexastra lay cuddled in Drift's arms. Wolfram had
raised a scandalizing smile when he'd heard Drift offer his bed for the evening
rather than have her fly home so tired, but once Drift had ever-so-politely
told Wolfram what he could do with his innuendos, the ram had left them in
peace. Drift had been true to his word, of course, and had pulled out a woven
floor mat for himself in spite of her protests. He'd even provided her with a
screen and nightclothes that he had thoughtfully purchased several weeks
before. His bed was soft and warm, but she'd soon left it. Drift's nightmares
tore at her and she slipped down to his side to soothe them away, waking him
just long enough to wrap herself in his arms. It felt… special to be held like
that. Not until nearly morning did she pry herself away to repair the damage
her hex had done to his vest.
Once that was done, she settled back into her Edward's sleeping embrace and
started laying new plans. Dangerous plans. "Be careful out there on the ice
today," she said to him that morning after dressing in fresh clothes that Kyia
had thoughtfully provided. "I have to go on a short trip this morning, but
I'll be back as soon as I can." Smothering his protests with a kiss, she
continued, "I know I promised I'd come see your ice-carving crew. I'll be
there just as soon as I get this finished. Don't worry…" She reached up to
scratch behind his ears, smiling as that dopey grin of his showed up again, and
then kissed him again. "I know it's cold out. I'll bundle up."
Bundle up she did, once she got out of Kyia's view, in the white fur and
form of an ermine Keeper. Disguised thus by the ice and snow, she was quickly
up and over the town wall without being spotted, and out into the woods a
moment or two later. She sensed what she needed out there among the trees: a
ripple in reality, a nascent rift to the Dreamlands. It was the work of a
moment to tear it open and step through, changing as she did to her
raven-haired human form.
Shooing away a circling pixie with a fair-skinned hand, Alexastra cast her
senses wide. It did not take long to find what she sought. She turned to the
west and started running with one goal in mind: to gain, by whatever means
necessary, an audience with the Lady of Dreams.
-----
"A servant of Agemnos?" Nocturna remarked, her voice resigned and a bit
annoyed. She gently shooed away the fae deer she'd been tending and turned her
full attention on the creature before her. She stood slowly and turned to
regard Alexastra with an expression crafted to show curiosity, boredom, and a
deep-seated annoyance. “What scheme of his might it be about this time?"
Alexastra, still on bended knee, checked for the sixth time for scrying eyes
and felt none. "Lady of Night," she replied in her most polite and formal
tone, "I beg a boon of you, but I would prefer to make it in complete privacy.
If it would please you to ensure that privacy, I can repay your courtesy in
short order."
"Are all of your master's servants rewarded according to the number of words
spoken?" Nocturna asked, raising her hand languidly. With an effortless sweep
she banished the night-silvered forest, wrapping the two in a veil of
impenetrable darkness. “I am listening, child.” Slender arms crossed over her
breast as she regarded the kneeling woman.
The moment Nocturna's privacy ward was in place and while her attention was
still elsewhere, Alexastra did something none of her kind had done since the
very first spymaster had awakened to power: she dropped her masks. All of
them. Broad bat wings wrapped around her like an ebon cloak, partly flesh,
partly shadow. Dark hair and dusky skin framed eyes like chips of coal.
Around her swirled an aura of twisted fates, of tightly hoarded secrets, of
swift knives in the darkness… and of carefully, deliberately concealed power.
Nocturna watched this transformation without moving, only one slightly
raised brow revealing her surprise. Compared to her, this display of power was
as nothing, but the daedra beneath all those masks was one for whom she'd been
searching for quite some time. "Alexastra. I -thought- that was you under all
those veils. This puts a different spin on things."
Alexastra suppressed a wince. Lord Agemnos had warned her to avoid the
Queen of Omens because of her talent for divination and foresight. A spymaster
with no secrets had very little with which to bargain. Still, she had already
accepted that this was likely to happen and, however weak a hand she'd been
dealt, she would play it to the best of her ability. She had to. Drift's
life, and possibly even his soul, depended on her success.
"Lady Nocturna, my plea is this: I ask-"
The Queen of Omens speared the creature before her with a glance. "You ask
my protection so that you can rebel against your lord and master. You desire
my aid so that you can wrest a mortal target from his commanding grip, when you
were the one who put that mortal there in the first place. You would have me
prop you up in the face of a hurricane and possibly risk my sworn neutrality."
With each sentence, Nocturna leaned forward and her scowl deepened. "In return
for this mighty boon, you would propose -what- as payment? You have nothing
with which to bargain."
This time it wasn't a mere wince that she pressed down, but a full-on cringe
away from the daedra lady's precisely accurate revelations. Each was a
deliberately calculated strike at her pride, her talents, and her prestige, and
she knew it.
"What could you possibly offer me, imp of Agemnos?" Nocturna repeated.
Summoning up the entirety of her skill as a negotiator, Alexastra looked up
into Nocturna's eyes for the first time in the entire conversation and replied
in a voice as calm and level as a pond on a windless night. "I could tell you
a story." Cupping her hands, Alexastra raised them skyward as if throwing
something. Sparks flew from them, arcing outward to fall in a circle amidst
the enshrouding darkness. Where they landed, they flickered and multiplied.
They looked like so many candle flames, for that's what they had become:
uncountable candle flames, stretching away as far as the eye could see. "I
would tell you a story of candles in the dark." Rising to her feet, she
circled around the inner edge of the lights, her hands folded at the small of
her back as she admired them, flickering in all their millions. "They're
beautiful, aren't they? So fragile that a breath could extinguish them, so
short-lived even when sheltered, and yet how brightly they shine in their
short little span!"
"It's a well-crafted illusion," Nocturna replied, her voice flat and
unimpressed.
Alexastra fixed the goddess of dreams with a hurt little moue over the faint
praise and stooped to pick up one of the candles, shielding the candle flame
with her hand as she brought it to the goddess. "Perhaps a closer look might
shed some light on my meaning?"
Only at the last possible moment did the young daedra's hand drop, and
Nocturna startled in spite of herself. It was no ordinary flame that danced
atop the candle, but an image of her beloved Malger Sutt, playing his flute
among a merry crowd. Its light flared brighter as the image shifted to a
different scene, the marten shouting with fury as his twin blades danced
through a fight. When the scene changed again, dimming and guttering as he
fell ill with a fever, Alexastra asked, "How far would you go to stop someone
from- urk!"
Nocturna's hand closed tight around the young daedra's throat, choking off
her air before she could blow. "Not even in an illusion," she warned, her eyes
narrowed. Taking control of the illusory candle, she plucked it from
Alexastra's hand and sheltered it away from any fickle breezes. "I would
advise you to take more care with your stories, child. You tread on very
dangerous ground."
The goddess startled anew when she felt an unexpected touch on her shoulder.
An exact duplicate of the young daedra stepped around from behind her. "I do
it only to make a point, my lady," she apologized, cradling a second candle in
her hands. It was a match for the one that Nocturna had taken away, save for
the shape of the flame: instead of a lean and sinewy marten, there flickered a
sturdy canine form swinging a smithing hammer. "You go to great lengths to
protect yours," she said, her voice soft with commiseration. "Do you think I
wouldn't do the same for mine?"
Now Nocturna had to be impressed. "Sight, sound, scent, and now touch,
too?" she asked the Alexastra still seized in her hand.
"Projected directly into the mind, but only when I'm in physical contact
with the target," replied the illusory second, mirroring the calm collectedness
of the first. Both of them then turned that patient look into a small, almost
playful smile. "Speaking of which... may I please have my neck back now? This
is somewhat uncomfortable."
Nocturna let go and broke into a soft chuckle. "You are very, very good,"
she said, unable to keep the admiration out of her voice as realization dawned.
"You -wanted- me to grab you, and set me up to do so."
"It seemed the most efficient and memorable way to demonstrate my potential
usefulness to you," the real Alexastra replied, massaging her throat before
taking the candle from her illusory 'second self', who vanished like smoke in a
gust of wind. All the candles around them flickered in that wind except for
the two held sheltered by their respective protectors. "I would hope that it
helped me plead my case as well. Please. I know the odds are next to nothing.
All I ask is a chance."
The Queen of Dreams pondered for several long moments, one slender brow
elevating ever so slightly while she regarded the clever daedra underling
before her. Slowly crossing her arms, she lifted her chin to gaze at her,
forcing herself to draw back emotionally. As much as she owed Agemnos a thumb
in the eye for what he'd done to her by this child all those centuries ago,
this still required careful handling. "If all it took to achieve something in
the Hells was raw courage and brass," she said at last, "I would dare the dark
lords to gainsay you. Unfortunately, such is never the case."
Unfolding her arms, Nocturna held up the candle with which Alexastra had
taunted her and focused her attention upon the minstrel's fiery form as he
danced a silent pirouette. Plucking the flame from its wick, she cupped it
between her palms. "In these flames we are alike, and for that small spark of
sisterhood I will hear your plea." The burning minstrel danced along her
fingertips as she raised her gaze back to the daedra spy. "I will do what I
can to guide the path you follow, that at its end you find that flame you hold
dear. But beware, seeker, for nothing is ever guaranteed." Her hand closed
slowly, the fiery minstrel disappearing but for a flickering glow. "Now, tell
me what you intend."
-----
Lord Agemnos leaned back in his throne and contemplated his former servant
for several long minutes. His silence weighed heavy on the room as he
considered the offer that she had just made, but its weight and the force of
his scrutiny seemed not to affect the she-daedra at all. She held her
supplicant kneeling posture without flinching or fidgeting, the calm of a
practiced negotiator. /Good/, he thought. /After all the effort I put into
raising and training her, she had better be able to hold her calm at the
negotiating table. This might actually prove interesting enough to keep me
from strangling her./ Not that he had any qualms about eliminating the
traitorous wretch, but paying recompense to Nocturna for killing her newest
servant would be a bothersome hassle.
"You intrigue me, Alexastra," he said finally. "I've noticed your
reluctance to move against Snow for some time now, but never before have you
openly asked for him to be removed from the equation. Therefore, before I
decide upon your request, I want one question answered. Why?"
"My lord?"
"Why are you doing this? Why throw away everything you've ever gained, and
all that you stand to gain for a very long time, for the sake of this one
meaningless mortal?" His voice took on a curious, almost inviting tone as he
spoke, but it still kept a diplomatic distance. Both of them knew it was a
question he did not expect would be answered. Information of that type was
beyond precious.
She hesitated. "You want to know my motives, my lord?" she asked finally,
clearly stalling for time. "Is that part of your price?"
Agemnos smiled. He had all the cards in his hand. He could ask whatever
price he wanted. "It is."
"On one condition."
She hadn't even blinked. The speed with which she'd responded surprised
him, because it suggested that she had anticipated his insistence. If her
voice or her posture had been different, it might have been desperation, but
no. She actually thought she could predict him! The sheer effrontery of it
was amazing, but her calm manner in doing so piqued his interest. He sat back
and gestured for her to continue. "Name your condition."
She produced a small parchment and offered it to him.
"You audacious minx!" Agemnos exclaimed, leaning forward in open
astonishment. "You dare to write a contract for me? You forget your place!"
Alexastra drew her hand back as if both surprised and startled, and her face
turned perfectly guileless as she unrolled the parchment. It was blank. "A
contract, my lord?" She flirted her free hand in a throwaway gesture. "I
wouldn't dream of it. I had hoped for your written vow that, in the interests
of courtesy, what I reveal of my motives shall remain personal and private.
However, since you react so poorly to the idea, I would be gladly willing to
accept your given word."
The Lord of Avarice regarded his wayward spymistress for several long
moments, pondering a particularly messy dismemberment, and then did something
most unusual: he sat back in his chair and applauded. "Very well done, my
dear. You goad me into a reaction and then set yourself up as the faultless
party of reason, thus mentally improving your bargaining position. Beautifully
maneuvered."
Alexastra bowed graciously low, her long black hair sweeping the ground
before she rose again. "I studied at the feet of the master," she replied, the
offending parchment vanished away by some sleight of hand.
Agemnos rose to his feet. "Normally, dear Alexastra, I would have you
executed where you stand for your temerity and rebellion," he said as he
stepped down from his throne, "but you appear to have guarded yourself well
against my wrath... for now. You must have bargained quite well indeed to gain
Nocturna's favor and protection. To set yourself so clearly against me..." He
paused to stroke his chin. "One might almost think you mad. Still, you have
provided me with more amusement in these past few hours than I have had in the
past several years, and done it while still technically honoring my ethos. I
suppose I should consider it a compliment." Agemnos reached his scrying pool
and began to stir it into a lazy swirl. "Very well," he said finally. "I
won't demand to know your motives, not at this time.
"Instead, I'll make you a deal. If you can keep your precious toy alive and
out of my direct control for two full months- let us say until the midnight
stroke at the end of February, then not only will I declare him safely
off-limits for the full span of his natural life, I will forgive your rebellion
and accept you back into my employ with no recriminations if you should ever
choose to return. I will also see to it that, whether you return to me or not,
you are promoted to a higher rank as a reward for your ingenuity and cunning."
"That is exceedingly generous, my lord," Alexastra replied with a grateful
smile, but a shadow of worry crossed her face immediately after.
Agemnos allowed himself the merest hint of a smirk. "You sense the other
hand starting to close. Good. You are correct: it is very generous. If you
manage to succeed, without violating Nocturna's desire for neutrality and thus
voiding your own protection, then I clearly must have underestimated your
talents and been wrong about the potential of your mortal toy. Ignoring errors
and misconceptions is bad for business. You'll have done me a favor worthy of
magnanimity on my part." He sketched a partial bow, allowing even perhaps a
bit more of a smirk than earlier. "Let it never be said that I am ungracious
in defeat."
"And if I lose?"
All levity vanished from the daedra lord's tone with the speed of a
scourging whip-lash. "Then you will leave Nocturna's employ at once, get your
presumptuous and traitorous hide back here, and accept full punishment for your
hubris and defiance." His eyes narrowed. "I assure you that said punishment
will be neither pleasant nor brief. On that, you have my sworn oath."
Finally, a genuine shudder from her. It was about time the little wretch
realized just how deeply in trouble she was. Still, she recovered her calm
well and quickly, which Lord Agemnos noted with approval.
"Lastly, oh prideful daughter of mine, should you now decide that you don't
want to risk my deal..." Agemnos ceased stirring the scrying pool and an image
of Snow's ice-carving crew swam into view, preparing for a day's work on a
small, curved lake near Metamor River. Snow himself was out on the ice with
them, reviewing the tasks of each team member if his gestures were any judge.
Then the daedra lord snapped his fingers and the image in the pool flickered
and changed, with fire-red lines appearing like a crazed spider's web beneath
the ice. "It doesn't quite have the panache of Linafex putting a sword through
his back," Agemnos mused, "but I know your toy can't swim. Even if he survives
the ice breaking up beneath him, I have plenty of ways to make him dead before
you can get back to him." He paused for effect, his hand poised over the
scrying pool. "Accept the deal and I will give you a head start."
Alexastra didn't hesitate. "Done."
"Good," Agemnos replied, keeping his right hand hovering above the scrying
pool while his left gestured to the door. The golden portal swung open as if
of its own accord. "You'd better hurry," the daedra lord added, allowing
himself the pleasure of twisting the knife just a little bit deeper as she made
her escape. "I won't wait long."
"Fortune to you, father," Alexastra said from the doorway.
"And to you, daughter."
Neither said which kind of fortune they wished the other.
-----
!DSPAM:4d20ce1588491795620989!
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