Vhadya & Velocity (Closed)

[Mordelain]

“Then we are settled, then?”

Mordelain blinked.

“I beg your pardon?”

“I am happy that I have been bested by my son at last. We have been waging a silent war amongst the echelons of culture in Fallien for the better part of two decades. It was only a matter of time before he overcame his inadequacies.”

“Inadequacies you inspired, no doubt. You are a despicable man, Mariachi, and I seldom resort to such petty comments after knowing someone for such a short amount of time.”

“Yet,” there was malice in the curl of his lips as he leant back from the table, his duties tending to the hosting done, “you trust my son without ever truly questioning his motives.”

“Mark my words Mariachi, Suresh will answer for his Machiavellian impulses soon enough.”

From his expression, Mariachi evidently missed the reference. Mordelain tried her luck with a more immediately relevant metaphor. She had been to Earth, but the people of Althanas would never know of those wonders witnessed on the continent of ‘Europe’. “You will be glad to know that I will make sure he is put before the Common Law and answers for his politick in due course.”

Mariachi raised an eyebrow. “I have greater chance of dying from a thimble of Niphena than my son has of being punished for his victories, Mordelain.” The old man waited, head cocked for the dancer to make sense of the poisonous comment. It was another attempt to gull her.

Fortunately for Mordelain, she had paid attention during her lectures, especially during those which pertained to the qualities of the countless poisons she might encounter in the course of her duties. Niphena was utterly harmless in small quantities, though immensely addictive. She smiled warmly. The freckles on her cheeks fell into the cavernous dimples that formed.

“I will ensure its three thimbles worth, then.”

This dose would cause his cold, infinitely black heart to stop beating in an instant.

“That’s more like it, a feisty, Fallien spirit,” he chuckled.

Mordelain could not quite work out why she hated the man so much for a simple theft. Had she longed for a new home so much in the absence of Junkyo that she had succumbed utterly to the laws of the desert? Was she bound in obedience with unquestioning fealty to the iconography of the Abdos, of Jya, of the Keep and the Mother Goddess?

“We do not have long left,” she gestured towards the tent, where Suresh was gathering various plates of food onto a large tray. He would have insisted he carry it to the table himself, his desire to respect his elders as stubborn as hers to upend Suresh in public was.

Mariachi looked out to the Oasis wistfully.

“It has been illuminating, to say the least,” her tone softened. “I will forgive Suresh for whatever tricks he has pulled, for whatever sheep skin he has tugged down over my eyes up until now, because whatever you did to him all those years ago has turned him into something you will never be.” She poured herself a dose of by now luke warm and thickening coffee. She swigged, rolled the cup in her shaking fingers, and then dropped the silver vessel to her lap where she ran her index finger over the mould.

“What might that be?”

“Suresh has become an honest man, something rare in this fucking city.”

Mariachi puckered his lips.

“I will admit I did not expect this coup to be so exciting. I will sacrifice myself to bring the Freerunners down; you remember that, Mordelain, swiftest of heretics, when the il’Arkmanham dances on your festering grave.”

The tension began to spark in the air, settling down between their glares only when Suresh returned to earshot. They instantly relaxed, let out a duet of false laughter and turned to their mentor and son respectively.

“I have brought us such a lavish array of the finest goods it will pale in comparison to whatever foul concoction we end up eating in the bazaar this evening,” he stooped to slip the tray onto the plate, and Mariachi and Mordelain both thawed at the sight.

For now they would eat as a family, before tearing one another part as the game of thrones continued.