A Private Dining Room, The Estate, Glacia

[glacial_queen]

The small dining room that Karla had set aside for her 'out of town' guests to dine in tonight was one of the ones they hadn't gotten around to denuding of Ludmilla's and/or Hobart's horrible taste in decor yet. Karla had chosen it deliberately, figuring her friends might get a kick out of how completely hideous it was. Everyone knew that extravagantly tacky surroundings aided digestion, right?

Well, Karla was a Healer. She's swear to it, anyway.

And, who knew? Maybe she'd give everyone a souvenir or something! 'I came to Karla's coronation and all I got was this ugly figurine.'

This was how they knew she cared!

Tomorrow was for long, boring speeches and painful formality. Tonight, she was looking forward to just hanging out with friends, having a good time, and threatening to make people sleep in some of the bedrooms that had thus far escaped redecoration.

Any question where Glacia's treasury had wandered off to?

[Open for pretty much anyone who wanted to be invited for the coronation that's absolutely not happening tomorrow! Up early for mega SP, because SP is wonderful. NFB for off-island shenanigans.]

Comments

[glacial_queen]

If it made him feel any better, the odds were fairly good that it would make Karla sigh, too?

"Jack!" Karla bounded over to him to grab him in a tight hug. "Are you saying you don't like it? But I had picked this room out just for you!"

[bitten_notshy]

Jack squeezed her back, equally firmly. "I love it. Everything else will look charmingly simple after it. And hello, your highness."

[glacial_queen]

"Does that mean you'd like to take home a bit of the decor?" Karla asked hopefully. "Because you can, you know. As a sign of love."

From him to her, for deigning to take something so hideous off her hands.

"And I'm assuming by 'charmingly simple' you mean, 'not painful to your eyes,' then you're right. We had enough rooms cleared that no one has to sleep in rooms this ugly and the official chambers were cleared out first."

Because Karla wasn't about to meet with people looking for justice in a room that looked like Versace and Versailles's bastard child.

[bitten_notshy]

"Maybe that vase as a souvenir," Jack said, pointing to one monstrosity. He'd give it to Derek as a late birthday present.

"And I'm glad to know our bedroom won't be quite this bad. I'd be afraid the little statues would attack while we slept. Was the whole house like this when you moved in?"

[glacial_queen]

"You may have it with my compliments," Karla said, magnanimous. Because it was one less eyesore for her to avoid. And giving away horrible vases in the name of friendship was a habit near and dear to her heart! He could just ask Ben!

"Not all of it, thank the Darkness," Karla said, trying not to whine and only mostly succeeding. "The servants' wings and most of the unimportant areas were ignored." Like the library. "But the public rooms and the suites that housed the Court and important visitors, those were decorated with a most...liberal...hand."

Which was why everyone was sleeping in modest bedrooms, instead of grand, sweeping chambers. Because Karla cared.

[bitten_notshy]

"Decorated by people with more money than taste?" Jack asked archly. "No, I'm sure you'll make it look wonderful. Thank you for inviting us, by the way. I've never been to a coronation."


{OOC: NIGHT!}

[glacial_queen]

"Look at this place," Karla said. "It's not even the room that good taste forgot, it's the room that good taste threw up in." She curled her lip. "And this is only one of my uncle's travesties."

Specifically, the one she could joke about.

"And, of course you'd be invited. You can take credit for being one of the reasons I'm a better Queen now than I would have been, otherwise. And I'm counting on a running commentary from you and Emma to keep me awake through the entire thing. Otherwise, I'll have to resort to pinching myself and having bruises up and down my arms doesn't send the best image during the ceremony."

[bitten_notshy]

"I think you would have been a good queen even without our interference, but I'll never turn down credit," Jack answered. He said it lightly, but the pride in Karla behind it was real. "And I'll do my best to think amusing things at you. I take it it's a long ceremony?"

He might need to drink a few gallons of coffee.

[glacial_queen]

"Mallory is planning a dinner break," Karla said, wrinkling her nose. "A bunch of speeches, some musical interludes, more speeches and more I don't even know what. I've been tuning him out when he goes on about it. So long as I nod when I'm supposed to, I'm fine."

At least until the parts that actually concerned her.

"You sure you don't want a contract? After dinner, I'm expanding my Circles. Now's not too late to decide you want to sign up!"

[bitten_notshy]

"Maybe it's an endurance test," Jack suggested. "If you make your way through all that, you're definitely fit to be queen."

He hesitated at her other question, giving some thought to it before he ran a hand through his hair and answered. "Get me drunk enough and tell me I don't have to move here for good, and you might get me to sign on," he said. "No promises, though."

[glacial_queen]

Really? Karla hadn't been expecting that! She'd mostly been teasing him, but if he was thinking about it, she wasn't going to argue.

"Of course you don't," she said promptly. "Jono doesn't."

And she was signaling one of the liveried footmen to bring Jack more wine.

No reason.

[bitten_notshy]

Jack could tell he'd surprised her, and his hope of that had something to do with the fact he'd done it at all. But he'd spent most of his life in service; signing on with Karla made a certain kind of sense, looked at that way.

He took the refilled wineglass without a second thought.

"Of course," he said, "I'm going to be terribly American about it. 'What's in it for me?' and all of that."

His American accent had not much improved, and still sounded like a cowboy on powerful narcotics.

[glacial_queen]

"I don't force any of my Court to take home a hideous statue," Karla teased, even as she swatted at him for that atrocious accent. It was almost as bad as her British one. "And there's the usual things. Money, prestige--" within Kaeleer anyway "--fabulous jewelry..."

She figured that might be one of his sticking points. Emma got to wear her ring on her finger. Karla hadn't commissioned any finger rings in men's sizes.

[bitten_notshy]

"Ah. That." Jack hadn't actually thought about the jewelry in years; now that he was reminded of it again, he found that his tolerance of the concept had grown, but not enough to get him past the gut-level no.

"Then I might need to be even drunker than I thought at first," he said lightly. "Though the money and prestige almost make up for it."

[glacial_queen]

"Getting you drunk shouldn't be an issue," she assured him. "We have plenty of alcohol that you won't find anywhere else in the multiverse."

Save for other versions of Kaeleer, of course, but that could just get complicated.

"And...I have no idea what else to offer. Save not filling your bed with statues in the night in addition to not making you bring them home?"

[bitten_notshy]

Jack smiled tightly at that. "Let's not make it about bribes," he suggested. "You have your court, and my days are full as it is. But I'm not closing the door on the option at all."

[glacial_queen]

"If you wanted to fill your bed with figurines, Jack, you only had to ask," Karla teased. "That can absolutely be arranged."

She laid a hand on his and looked into his eyes. "Thank you," she said softly, all teasing gone. "For even considering it. It means a lot."