oneman_onevote | Extremely melodramatic AU: The revenge!

The castle is chill, in the hallways, and dark apart from pools of light created by torches placed at wide intervals on the walls.

Havelock is moving, if possible, even more silently than usual. He'd be twitchy if that wasn't a surefire way to mess up your stealth. The shadows are blending obligingly around him, more strongly here than they had in the bar.

Puck can take care of himself, he knows that, but also holds out no hope that any of this is going to be particularly pleasant.

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"Vhy yes," Margolotta says. "He is most handy vith a needle. And... other instruments, of course."

(Speaking of the weather, there is an ominous rumble on the horizon.

...Welcome to the land of weather that is even more psychosomatic than in Milliways.)

"... Really?" Puck says, entirely straight-faced.

This is a hazard of exchanging bon mots with somebody with the approximate mental maturity of a twelve-year-old.

"How marvelous for you."

As one who has been once accustomed to overcasting the night, the thunder does not unduly faze him; he does, however, admire its narrative timing, and wonder briefly if Margolotta also controls the weather.

Margolotta nods graciously.

"Vhy are you here?" she asks with what is apparently mild curiosity.

As it happens, no she can't - it's just a peculiarity of Uberwald, although it has been known to follow various member of the undead community around just in case they really need a melodramatic audible backdrop.

Strange but true.

Puck smiles faintly.

"You seem more than passing clever, mistress." That much he will give her, especially when it aids him rhetorically. "What do you suppose?"

Margolotta waves an elegant and vaguely irritable hand.

"Yes, yes, you followed Havelock from somevhere or other," she says.

"Perhaps I should have phrased it- Vhat do you think to achieve here?"

"Achieve?"

Puck looks very mild.

"I am not one overly given to accomplishment, I'm afraid ... but in this case, I think I already have."

He comes slowly, as if drawn by the inexorable power of pink, towards a chintzy armchair, and runs a fingertip slowly over the back.

And smiles again, brighter.

"In some small part, at least."

She raises an eyebrow delicately.

"Oh?"

That being to irritate, and slow down her progress in teaching the Vetinari boy?

Hmm.

Puck looks thoughtful for a moment, in the general direction of the armchair.

He seems relaxed enough; but he still has yet to give her his back.

"I seek," he says, slowly, and glances up at her.

"To recall to him who he is. Not that he is in danger of forgetting-- of losing faith, perhaps."

Margolotta snorts lightly.

"If he does that, he vill not be half the man I thought he could be."

She watches his body language in faint puzzlement, but her voice is didactic.

"He is pragmatic. He saw the advantage, and so I did not make him subservient. I vould have done so if there had been no other vay, but that vould truly have been a vaste."

Puck's head tilts to the side, smile absent.

"Beg pardon-- if he does which?"

"Loses any of himself to a new nature," she says, as if this should be perfectly obvious.

"Do you think I turn just any young man to vander past my door?"

"I think it hardly proper to speculate," Puck informs her solemnly.

"... Except, perhaps, on precisely how the lady chooses to define the word 'wander.'"

Does the 'v' make the difference between carelessness and kidnapping, he vonders?

Margolotta shrugs gracefully.

"He is different to the others. It stood out."

Clearly is was innocent and idle curiosity that led her to kidnap him!

"Such has not escaped my notice," Puck says dryly.

"As it happens."

"No," she says, drawing it out.

"It seems not. I doubt you would even be here, othervise."

He laughs.

The sound is, unlike his earlier one, perfectly human.

"I yield, madam, to your analytical powers."

Margolotta rolls her eyes.

"Indeed?"

Idly she stroll in the direction of the sword rack to put hers away. She passes close by.

"Your primary objective seems settled enough. Vhat else are you here for?"

Puck does not shy away from her-- but there is something tense in his muscles, almost thrumming with potential energy.

Just for a moment.

"You think so, mistress?" he laughs. "What else might I be here for, then? I hardly care for you or your house, welcoming though it is."

She slides the sword away with care and turns to face him, still close, her own stance poised, but like the cultured host of a party, not a combatant.

"You are quite velcome to leave or stay whenever you care to," she says coolly.

"Havelock may not go, of course. But do not get in my way, and I shall not stop you."

Puck's smile is absolutely unshaken.

"Havelock may not go," he repeats thoughtfully, giving each word equal weight as if they were stones in the palm of his hand.

His smile spreads, and for a moment it is--whether by accident or design-- apparent that his own teeth are. Quite. Sharp.

"And what shall I say falls under the category of 'getting in your way,' madam?"

"Not until his training is completed to my satisfaction. And his."

She smiles back politely.

(Only the tips of her teeth are visible against the red of her lower lip, but Puck might still get - aha - the point.)

"Oh, let us say... anything hindering his progress. He has forever to live and grow accustomed to vampirism, of course, but only a little time before he must return to his city. I vill not have that time wasted."

Puck sniffs, folding his arms over his chest.

"'Tis Havelock's satisfaction I look to, and no other's. I shall make no promises to you."

Her smile doesn't waver.

"I think you shall find we agree on this. He has not tried to escape me, nor will he until we are done."

(Up to a point, she is right.)

Then she shrugs.

"I care not for your motivations. That we understand each other is enough."