she's a one way ticket | any

[Gallows]

I bite the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing, but amusement is shining in my eyes. Fennick seems utterly confused, and Everdeen has just revealed that she has fangs beneath that sweet exterior. Good for her. It wouldn't do to let someone else establish dominance over you so early in the game. You'd spend forever trying to build yourself back up to a position of power. I nudge Fennick with a grin as he recovers from Everdeen. I respond to his thoughts out of habit, not immediately realizing he wasn't pondering aloud. "Don't worry your mind about it, dear. I call all men little. It's a deplorable habit, but at my age I'm not about to change it." Not that I look my age. Immortality does have its perks, and one of them is the appearance of peak health until the day I decide I've had enough. Which I really don't see happening in the near future. Life still has so many lovely twists and turns. I sigh, a teasing mockery of regret. "It's deplorable that you went unacknowleged for so long, Everdeen. I apologize for that. I fear in the shuffle of rulers quite a few tasks went undone." Fennick's question makes me pause, but I have a fairly ready answer. This is not a subject I am unfamiliar with, and I feel a bit of deja vu. Perhaps that is simply what happens when you've lived so long. "You can have ambition without power and power without ambition, but I tend to think of the two, power is a better choice." I grin at Everdeen. "Still, it generally takes ambition to get there. And it's much wiser to go after one or the other, than chase the pretty boys. They always know they're pretty, don't they? And that rather spoils the mood." Social conventions are so confining. If we were following them, the next steps would be inane conversation about one's home and family and background. But I don't do small talk. The details are trite (of course, that is easy for me to say when I can have instant access to almost anything I want to know) and I much prefer the depth of a conversation. "So share, my friends, what you would have the Valley defined as for the rest of Beqanna? Was that what you drew you here?" I'm always curious about other's relationships with the Valley. She has been my mistress ever since I was three years old, untraited, and following around behind my twin brother because I had nothing better to do. G A L L O W S We must all hang together or, assuredly, we shall all hang separately.