01-25-2018, 01:46 PM
Zakar made it abundantly clear this was a transaction unlike any other, which she had half expected if hoped to the contrary. Clearly he was not concerned about being linked to Winther’s downfall, thus however Jai had orchestrated this mess Zakar was aware of it, but not directly involved in it. One question answered. The fees were no problem, of course; Jai had included her own name in those inheritance notes, and she cared to keep none of it. Once the funds could be returned to her father he would receive everything, the remainder of her share included. And she would be glad to forget this whole sorry mess.
But Light’s mercy, it had to be the dark one’s own luck he would be as paranoid as his brother. She offered words plain as plain, and he still chose to see a conspiracy. Whore? She’d been called worse, granted, but she was surprised to hear the accusation so bluntly from this man’s lips in so public a setting. The implication, so close yet so far from reality, initially struck a humour that threatened to spill dry laughter from her throat. There were no rushed explanations or self-defences. She did not think they would find purchase with this man anyway, even if she were the sort to fight in stony defence of her virtue. Did he really think it was wise to insult her, though? Or was he so obtuse he did not even realise he had? It took her a second to comprehend that it was not offence he intended; just the presentation of pure fact, the way he perceived it within the frame of knowing his brother. That curtailed her amusement somewhat. She had prodded for a reaction. She had gotten one. She didn’t like it much.
“Be careful what you accuse me of.”
He stood, distracted by an arrival, and her gaze followed his rise. Civility dropped like a cloak, just like that; on one side, at least. Nythadri was thick-skinned; it wasn’t the slight that hardened her gaze and levelled her back from the cusp of amiability, it was the hostility presented in answer to her honesty. Whatever half-realised opportunity she had hoped to grasp winked out; he accused her of whoring herself out when he knew nothing about her beyond the serpent ring on her finger and the superficiality of her past, and was narrow-mindedly arrogant enough to never question the validity of the allegation. At least he’d shown his colours early. Saidar dimmed, plunging the whole world a little darker and reminding her of the lingering aches in her shoulders and neck. She had no intention of eavesdropping Zakar’s conversation, despite how effortless it would be. He was right that she’d been looking for leverage, but she suspected he was wrong on what that leverage would have been used for.
When he returned, her expression was wearily blank. Humour him? There wasn’t much to humour, but she answered with a smooth rise from her chair. The near silence as they walked didn’t bother her; it was nice to find the moment to breathe. The grandeur swept by almost unnoticed, but her pace lingered as they passed the portraits, and she did not seem to care whether she was caught staring. It wasn’t the faces. She was no connoisseur of weaponry, but she recognised the blade adorning each lap; the one Jai treated with enough reverence it might have had a soul in its own right. And no wonder. Liridia’s Warder had recognised it as Makieri steel; Jai had been defensively tight-lipped. Because it wasn’t his to inherit. Evident by the plaques naming each man as past owner. It went some way to explaining Zakar's uncompromising disapproval of his brother. A wry smirk lifted her lips as she picked up her pace to catch up. And Jai's rash flirtations with insanity probably did the rest.
Zakar’s office was disturbingly immaculate, every surface wiped flawlessly clean of dust, shining, pristine. Her gaze only took cursory stock before she sat, and declined the offer of refreshment with the same impatience that had hurried the clerk to his work. At least it didn’t take long for him to get to the point; she found his graciousness maddening when beneath he was fortified steel. Why the illusion for the sake of propriety? Not much grated more than disingenuous platitudes; she preferred that he would just be painfully direct.
Her gaze diffused past him, to what she could see of the velvet framed view of the city. Now he mentions Winther? Puzzle pieces rearranged to a tentative new structure, testing something she hadn’t before considered. Caemlyn. Her accent. Ellis. Her father would not have come to her if news of Winther’s arrest were not big enough to cast a shadow. It was a huge scandal. Something in Zakar’s wordage suggested the fortune of Matias’ Winther was new information; he even paused before forging ahead, fixing her with that calculating stare. A journeyman arrives, and suddenly the conversation is too sensitive to be had in the bank’s foyer. But if he really hadn’t known about Winther, then why had her name drawn interest in the first place? He knows less than I thought he did. But something I don’t. Only was the knowledge she lacked worth the effort to uncover? As long as her light-blasted family were safe, she didn't care about Caemlyn or the financial repercussions of Winther's downfall.
“It seems so, does it?”
Unveiled sarcasm, spat like venom. Light this was tedious. And again the blame is laid at my feet. Zakar’s apparent understanding of events was clear enough; exchange manipulator for seductress and it was not so removed from Lythia’s guesswork. He even appeared to think he had caught her out; that she was as transparent as a child seized in the most juvenile of transgressions by an elder. And didn’t even bother to ask the right questions, though funny he should ask the one question she would rather like to know the answer to herself.
Oh, she knew what had sparked the initial catalyst, but why? Bloody why? “Wouldn’t it be shrewder to ask that of him, rather than me?”
If Jai had even been back since; if he was even able. Stuffing the thoughts down, she wondered if a sense of justice was a trait the brothers shared. Not that it was something she was about to gamble finding out by confessing the same secrets she had to Jai. If Zakar had any idea how incensed she had been to receive her brother’s pendant; how furious she had been to realise how Jai had interfered, the fragile beginnings of his emergent theory would smoke to dust. Only she was not so interested in exonerating herself, particularly to a man she suspected would not so much as blink before using it against her; if he thought he had to. To think of Zakar dispassionately analysing her brother’s murder like a piece in a game made her sick. Better he think her only motives were selfish; better he think she had coveted Winther’s money entirely for herself, and that she had used Jai in the process, than for him to discover the vulnerable revelation that had cascaded so many unforeseen consequences.
She was used to being misconstrued and pandering to the roles of others’ perception anyway. Jai had been an exception, and one that was over now. Her gaze refocused. What she was looking for wasn’t here; so long as Zakar approved the account, her investment in the outcome of this conversation was done. “You’ve already insulted me once; I hope you’re not trying to suggest I’d use someone so unsuited to the task. That is the conclusion you have made, I take it: that I’ve coerced Jai into this for some personal vendetta against Matias Winther.”
And what did it matter to Zakar if that even were the case? Unless, she realised, he did not think it was a personal vendetta at all, but a strike by the White Tower. Or perhaps not thought but feared.
But Light’s mercy, it had to be the dark one’s own luck he would be as paranoid as his brother. She offered words plain as plain, and he still chose to see a conspiracy. Whore? She’d been called worse, granted, but she was surprised to hear the accusation so bluntly from this man’s lips in so public a setting. The implication, so close yet so far from reality, initially struck a humour that threatened to spill dry laughter from her throat. There were no rushed explanations or self-defences. She did not think they would find purchase with this man anyway, even if she were the sort to fight in stony defence of her virtue. Did he really think it was wise to insult her, though? Or was he so obtuse he did not even realise he had? It took her a second to comprehend that it was not offence he intended; just the presentation of pure fact, the way he perceived it within the frame of knowing his brother. That curtailed her amusement somewhat. She had prodded for a reaction. She had gotten one. She didn’t like it much.
“Be careful what you accuse me of.”
He stood, distracted by an arrival, and her gaze followed his rise. Civility dropped like a cloak, just like that; on one side, at least. Nythadri was thick-skinned; it wasn’t the slight that hardened her gaze and levelled her back from the cusp of amiability, it was the hostility presented in answer to her honesty. Whatever half-realised opportunity she had hoped to grasp winked out; he accused her of whoring herself out when he knew nothing about her beyond the serpent ring on her finger and the superficiality of her past, and was narrow-mindedly arrogant enough to never question the validity of the allegation. At least he’d shown his colours early. Saidar dimmed, plunging the whole world a little darker and reminding her of the lingering aches in her shoulders and neck. She had no intention of eavesdropping Zakar’s conversation, despite how effortless it would be. He was right that she’d been looking for leverage, but she suspected he was wrong on what that leverage would have been used for.
When he returned, her expression was wearily blank. Humour him? There wasn’t much to humour, but she answered with a smooth rise from her chair. The near silence as they walked didn’t bother her; it was nice to find the moment to breathe. The grandeur swept by almost unnoticed, but her pace lingered as they passed the portraits, and she did not seem to care whether she was caught staring. It wasn’t the faces. She was no connoisseur of weaponry, but she recognised the blade adorning each lap; the one Jai treated with enough reverence it might have had a soul in its own right. And no wonder. Liridia’s Warder had recognised it as Makieri steel; Jai had been defensively tight-lipped. Because it wasn’t his to inherit. Evident by the plaques naming each man as past owner. It went some way to explaining Zakar's uncompromising disapproval of his brother. A wry smirk lifted her lips as she picked up her pace to catch up. And Jai's rash flirtations with insanity probably did the rest.
Zakar’s office was disturbingly immaculate, every surface wiped flawlessly clean of dust, shining, pristine. Her gaze only took cursory stock before she sat, and declined the offer of refreshment with the same impatience that had hurried the clerk to his work. At least it didn’t take long for him to get to the point; she found his graciousness maddening when beneath he was fortified steel. Why the illusion for the sake of propriety? Not much grated more than disingenuous platitudes; she preferred that he would just be painfully direct.
Her gaze diffused past him, to what she could see of the velvet framed view of the city. Now he mentions Winther? Puzzle pieces rearranged to a tentative new structure, testing something she hadn’t before considered. Caemlyn. Her accent. Ellis. Her father would not have come to her if news of Winther’s arrest were not big enough to cast a shadow. It was a huge scandal. Something in Zakar’s wordage suggested the fortune of Matias’ Winther was new information; he even paused before forging ahead, fixing her with that calculating stare. A journeyman arrives, and suddenly the conversation is too sensitive to be had in the bank’s foyer. But if he really hadn’t known about Winther, then why had her name drawn interest in the first place? He knows less than I thought he did. But something I don’t. Only was the knowledge she lacked worth the effort to uncover? As long as her light-blasted family were safe, she didn't care about Caemlyn or the financial repercussions of Winther's downfall.
“It seems so, does it?”
Unveiled sarcasm, spat like venom. Light this was tedious. And again the blame is laid at my feet. Zakar’s apparent understanding of events was clear enough; exchange manipulator for seductress and it was not so removed from Lythia’s guesswork. He even appeared to think he had caught her out; that she was as transparent as a child seized in the most juvenile of transgressions by an elder. And didn’t even bother to ask the right questions, though funny he should ask the one question she would rather like to know the answer to herself.
Oh, she knew what had sparked the initial catalyst, but why? Bloody why? “Wouldn’t it be shrewder to ask that of him, rather than me?”
If Jai had even been back since; if he was even able. Stuffing the thoughts down, she wondered if a sense of justice was a trait the brothers shared. Not that it was something she was about to gamble finding out by confessing the same secrets she had to Jai. If Zakar had any idea how incensed she had been to receive her brother’s pendant; how furious she had been to realise how Jai had interfered, the fragile beginnings of his emergent theory would smoke to dust. Only she was not so interested in exonerating herself, particularly to a man she suspected would not so much as blink before using it against her; if he thought he had to. To think of Zakar dispassionately analysing her brother’s murder like a piece in a game made her sick. Better he think her only motives were selfish; better he think she had coveted Winther’s money entirely for herself, and that she had used Jai in the process, than for him to discover the vulnerable revelation that had cascaded so many unforeseen consequences.
She was used to being misconstrued and pandering to the roles of others’ perception anyway. Jai had been an exception, and one that was over now. Her gaze refocused. What she was looking for wasn’t here; so long as Zakar approved the account, her investment in the outcome of this conversation was done. “You’ve already insulted me once; I hope you’re not trying to suggest I’d use someone so unsuited to the task. That is the conclusion you have made, I take it: that I’ve coerced Jai into this for some personal vendetta against Matias Winther.”
And what did it matter to Zakar if that even were the case? Unless, she realised, he did not think it was a personal vendetta at all, but a strike by the White Tower. Or perhaps not thought but feared.