She's got the devil's eyes
She had never been a woman to sow discord without a very compelling reason. And now, she had been given that reason in spades. Unluckily for those who might oppose her, her time had not been spent in idle silence. There are many who no doubt believed it had been such, but they would be sorely mistaken.
And truthfully, what had those coming for her expected? After all, friends do not flee allegiances simply based on the word of a woman like Heartfire. She simply has the ability to locate cracks in those foundations and apply the appropriate amount of pressure.
The thing about doing that is that it inevitably does not just cause one crack to split wide, but instead creates a spiderweb of interconnecting fissures that spreads much wider than any one eye can see. And only a fool would not take advantage of such a thing.
Heartfire had always kept herself well-versed in the goings on of Beqanna as a whole, and so Ilma’s separation from her former home is no secret to her. There are those that had taken Ilma’s kindness as weakness, but Heartfire is not among them. Perhaps it took those with gentler souls a longer period of time to reach the threshold for action, but once reached there was no more righteously determined foe than one who’s generosity had been extended beyond their very limits.
“I can imagine,” she agrees wryly to Ilma’s comment about having things to process. Though she rarely discusses the things she is privy to, she knows Castile had not been especially kind to her.
And the lack of such things on Castile’s part, not just with Ilma, but many, many others, would ultimately lead to his downfall. Heartfire may not be particularly kind herself, but she does at least have an understanding of the art of not alienating those who could be one’s allies. And any olive branch she might have offered to Castile had been as handily swept beneath the rug as Ilma’s had. Just as many others had.
All of that, to bring them here. Two unlikely co-conspirator’s standing before one another, as different as the day is from night.
“You’re not mistaken,” she affirms easily. Of course, anyone who paid even a small bit of attention would know that. She had grown much less quiet in her dealings of late. “Though I think it is not so much a matter of whether I will have you as it is a matter of whether our immediate goals align.” Her lips twitch faintly at that, blue eyes gleaming as she peers steadily at her companion. “And if you’ve come to realize a warmonger could never truly understand peace, then I believe we’ll do just fine together.”
She pauses then, giving Ilma the time to formulate a response before pushing onwards. “I do think your suggestion would prove… beneficial. It would be good to know if any unrest might be brewing on that front.”
It went without saying that was the last thing they needed at this point in time. Not that she hadn’t the ability to bend such things to her benefit, but simplicities sake, she hoped it wasn’t necessary.
and they'll cut you like a weapon