#earthrunes

"Maybe." A hint of sulk.

"It sounds as if there is more there." The pale librarian goes over to her sideboard, tending tea.

A shrug. "Like you said. Not one thing or the other. People and not people."

"Now, wish you to be a sidhe - or a noble?"

"Both."

"Ah, so. Why?"

He looks at her blankly. "Wouldn't you?"

"No."

"I have been a sidhe, as a feat of magic - albeit temporary, aye, but a true change. And I prefer to be myself. As for title..." A sniff. "Nay. I have turned that down."

The boy looks amazed. "Why?'

"Because there is a price for everything."

"And I want no part in the noble game of chains and leashes. To be a sidhe is not to be noble - most are titled, aye, but not all - and no less an elf for it."

"Chains and leashes could be....uh...." He drops that. "I still want to be."

"But do you want to pay the price?"

"Want To? Depends on the price. Willing To? Yeah."

"Mmm."

"You say you want a house that is a family - but to be a noble, to seek a title, means placing politics ahead of family. You will have masters to answer to."

"Houses shouldn't be that way. "

"Should or shouldn't, nevertheless, they are."

He slumps into a chair. "Crap. "

She offers him a cup of tea.

"We are an imperfect society. But not, I think, quite excrement."

"Not like I have a choice anyway." Glum.

"No?"

"Now that - no, that I am certain is untrue."

"You cannot be forced into a house, nor a title."

A tap on the door frame, soft, and startling, for Zara did not hear it

"Everyone says I have a Sidhe soul now, and I look like I'll be Fiona."

"Feh."

"That cannot be forced. The soul... it may blossom, aye. It may not, since you have been enchanted yet it slumbers. But no, the house? That is your choice." She goes to check the door.

Grand Dame Bondraste waits at the door. The sidhe woman looks silver haired and blue eyed, a soul so strong that it fills her old shell wtih a radiant defiance of time. Once, she turned every head in the room and men gave their hearts to her, now, that is filtered through her elderly body, and yet she still carries the echo of that past power like a mantle.

Zara may have seen her at the celebration, briefly though she was mostly attached to a chair someone had gotten her. She leans against a thin staff of pale polished wood with a Lioness face at the end of it. Graceful yet precarious

As if she might take flight... or fall over.

"I was just going to enter, but I heard a conversation, or rather a part of it and realized I should announce myself," the old woman says

"Dame Bondraste." She inclines her head.

"You must be Miss Zara, the librarian." Ack. Folks are too free with information, but then, she IS the librarian

"So I must."

"I thought I would check out something in your library" The woman says with a smile

Adam sighs in thought.

"Aye? And what do you seek?"

"Adam" The old woman says. Her beauty is dimmed by age, at least to most. To a sluagh she might seem even more lovely, the veil of decay.

"Ah. He is here, then. Tea?"

"oh my, why miss zara, i would be flattered."

Zara nods, and pours a second cup for the sidhe - Adam may or may not have sipped his.

The boy looks up, stops. His mouth drops open slightly.

"Uh. Oh." Softly.

Grand Dame Bondraste moves to the chair and looks to Adam expectantly , "Adam, a lady is about to sit down. Do you know what's normally expected?"

"Y...yes. Lady." And he gets her chair, holding it for her to seat her.

"Thank you, Adam" She says and sits down.

Zara is absolutely sure- the woman's feet have not made a sound. She steps silently. Utterly silent.