Let Justice Be Done Ch. 59

Lady Eleen was scouring the garden of the guest wing, waiting for Lord Raguel and Lady Viviane to arrive so she could meet them.

She can't apologize of course, but she could...maybe try and present herself like she wanted to have them meet other Winter Fae that were interested in giving them marriage gifts? Or go right away with saying she arrange a meeting with the other Lady of the Lake present in the Winter Court?

She could say she was feeling generous, and let that first meeting be something he already forgot about, because she so kind? 

Yes, that could work!

"Oh! Hellow there, Lady Eleen." A cheerful voice said from behind her. 

"Eeeeek!" 

"Wow, that's actually kind of impressive."

Raguel was treated to the sight of a supposed refined noble lady, jumping into the air in a bashful elegant pose, of her legs folded like a Japanese seiza, that really shouldn't work in real life, but he supposed that was the supernatural jumping power for you. 

When Eleen landed she turned and glared at Raguel with pouty lips. 

"Y-You, you! How dare you sneak up on a lady like that? Have you no shame? I'm a Fae, you know? I could curse you!" She exclaimed. 

Raguel could see that, while Eleen did have fae magic, thus qualifying for the moniker, she was mostly human. But he kept his mouth silent this time. 

"Ah, I didn't meant to offend, but 'sneaking'? Isn't that what you were doing?" Raguel asked in an innocent tone. "And being in this part of the castle, why, one could almost think you were sneaking on me and my wife? So did you have ill intentions, or did you come to visit?" 

"I,I, p-preposterous! Me? Visit? After how I was treated here last time? Of course not. I just came here to laugh at how bored and miserable you must be confined to the palace without meeting anyone." Eleen crossed her arms, and huffed arrogantly. 

"Well, for people who like large companies and social gatherings, and meeting new people, etc. that would be true. Buuuut, we tend to actually like the opposite of that. So we spend all of that time together." Raguel had a mischievous smile.

"Together?" She scrunch her eyebrows at the wording. 

"Oh yes, we were, practically as the saying goes, 'held at the hip'. Just staying with each other night and day, over and over again. Honestly I would actually say, I am very glad for your actions which kept us in such. Confined. Place."

Progressively as Raguel spoke Eleen's face got redder, and redder. 

"Eeep!" She covered her blushing face, while looking between her fingers. Then she saw how close she and Raguel were, and seemed to jump away and place one of the garden table between them. 

"Ah, yes, you're right, Lady Eleen. Where are my manners? Icys, chairs, if you would be kind." Raguel spoke, using a friendly nickname to the ice spirits in the palace, and two chairs appear at the table. 

One, Raguel took and sat in, and the other appeared behind Lady Eleen, and pushed itself into Eleen making her sit in it. 

"Eeek!"

"So, Lady Eleen, what you would like to drink?" Raguel said with an 'innocent' smile, as cups appeared on the table. Being nice to the staff always pays. 

"Shameless, so shameless." Lady Eleen muttered to herself. "To just brazenly declare it like that." She said looking away, before turning her eyes on Raguel once more, expecting him to devour her or something. 

...How the fuck did this woman enter the Winter--No the Fae Court in general?

"This is the Winter Court," Raguel said, dropping the joke, out of sheer amazement and disbelief. "Insinuating something to draw the wrong conclusion, should hardly be the most deprived thing you have ever heard." 

"-Insinuate'? O-Oh!" Eleen's eyes widened, before she quickly recovered, and  flicked her hair back. "Right, of course I knew that." Then her eyes had a sultry look as she leaned forward where she sat. "Why if you want to do more than mere playful games, I could show you that."

Raguel could see her emotions, her nervousness, and the intent and reason behind it.   

Seriously. Whoever gave her the advise of flirting with me in order to get in Viviane's good graces, needs to be punched in the face. At least she's wearing something that could qualify somewhat as clothes now. 

Raguel gave her a dry look, that had Eleen lose her confident look and nervously shift in place. 

"Lady Eleen," Raguel sighed. "Do you know why I was rude to you the first time we met?" He dropped the playful, teasing act, just simply addressing her with honesty, which threw Eleen off.

"I, um, because--" 

Rather than give her a chance to dig herself deeper, Raguel continued. 

"Because it looked to me like you were bullying my wife, wanting to use your new position to humiliate and degrade her. Thus regardless of your position and it's importance to us, even if it was harmful to me, I would have retaliated on Llyn's behalf." He spoke with seriousness and sincerity. 

"That's not my intention! I didn't want that at all." At Raguel's openness, Eleen ended up being honest in turn without intending to. She quickly covered her mouth upon the words leaving her mouth. Her eyes wide with shock, and shame at herself. 

"You proclaimed yourself as her 'rival'. Within the Winter Court, that's the same as declaring yourself an 'enemy' and doing so openly because you are that sure of your power." Raguel said. 

"Wait but that's not, what she... I mean, I should have parsed the words, but...I assumed..." Eleen looked away, seeming lost in her own world, before looking at Raguel with a complicated expression. 

"How about we start from the beginning?" Raguel smiled, offering an olive branch. 

"Rather than some caricature or persona, I would rather actually get to know you, Lady Eleen. And I'm sure Llyn would rather have someone from the Courts, she could talk to without mentally playing 4D chess, just to say 'how have you been'?"

"4D chess?" Eleen tilted her head on the side, in adorable confusion. 

"Never mind." Raguel chuckled and shook his head. "So, would you like us to start over, as if we're meeting and getting to know each other from the first time?" 

"That's...not how things are done, in the Winter Court." Eleen said as if she was reciting this from memory, while looking away and back at Raguel with conflict in her eyes. 

"Well, you should always know the rules of which ever place you enter, or game you play. But knowing the rules isn't just about using them, but about knowing when to break them." Raguel said with a sly smile. 

Eleen gasped, but she had a small smile as well, she easily hid under her hand. 

"Besides, if two parties have to exchange favors, then it's better if they both feel well about the other, and the exchange, so everything ends on a well off note for everyone involved." He said, using an example that would more easily appeal to a fae. "What do you say?"

"I..." Eleen thought about it for a while. She needed to complete this assignment from the Winter Queen correctly, but she also didn't want to lower her image. Yet she sheer sincerity she could see and feel from the Archangel were...a surprising warmth in this world that she had been traversing in for quite a while now. "I suppose, to show you how generous--"

"As if we're meeting for the first time." Raguel smiled in amusement. 

"One...shouldn't just by first impression--"

"As if we're meeting for the first time." 

Lady Eleen frowned in confusion. 

"Um, let bygones be bygones and start your tour across the Snow--"

"As if we're meeting for the first time."

Lady Eleen stopped and scowled at Raguel, who just grinned unashamed in turn. 

Eleen was quiet for a while, contemplating how she should have acted based on what she was taught, and this new situation. Finally she took a deep breath, and smile in a polite manner toward Raguel. 

"Hello, Lord Raguel, I am Lady Eleen and I shall be your guide in the Snow World, during your stay here, till your appointed time with her majesty, Queen Mab." Her smile was nervous and a bit shaken, as if not putting on an act was new territory for her, yet it was the first time that she acted in a semi-genuine manner. 

"Hello, Lady Eleen! I'm Raguel, Archangel of God. Now let's go see my wife, whose probably furious at me acting on my own, thinking I've went to seduce you or something silly like that."

"Eeeep!"