some crazy bastard wants to hit me

[rathercommon]

WHO: Kitty and Mandrake
WHAT: Bickering
WHEN: Whenever
WHERE: The Gallows
NOTES: Teenagers

"I need to talk to you."

Mandrake should count himself lucky, really, that she offers that much of a greeting. She's half tempted just to slug him in the jaw by way of a hello. He'd deserve it. But he's been civil enough, and she's trying to be decent, and so she decides against the ruder start to the conversation. Barely.

She's caught up to him in the Gallows. She often endeavors to know where he is and what he's doing in the fortress - though apparently, this knowledge was quite insufficient. Apparently, she needs to force her way into his room. Because, apparently, he cannot remained unsupervised.

Her manner is disapproving, fierce, when she demands, "Have you been summoning spirits here?"

Comments

he's good deep down. in, you know, opposite land.

[rathercommon]

"He," she says, punching that word with as much gusto as one of Quentin Makepeace's sopranos hitting her high note, "is no different from you and me. He thinks and feels and he's got dreams and desires just like us. The only real difference is that he's vulnerable to your - your - " She gestures as she searches for the right words. "Wicked tools of subjugation." Which are, in her imagination, vaguely-defined chants and spells and possibly evil artefacts and things like that.

"If you don't stop - " Here's that promised threat - "I'm going to tell everyone here exactly who you are and exactly what you do. I'm sure you've noticed how they treat magicians in this place, haven't you, Mr Mandrake?"

She punctuates that with a haughty toss of her head.

yes absolutely

[cyclic]

Well, wicked tools of subjugation is just melodramatic. He continues to look genuinely offended, which is perhaps not as ideal a reaction as genuine remorse.

Because he doesn't have any, really. Maybe an inkling of — something, as he had at the mansion, when he'd impulsively dismissed Bartimaeus instead of forcing him to speak. And while she would be clearly and objectively wrong back in London, here is... more complicated. She says no different and he quickly tunes out the nonsense of dreams and desires, but it's less easy to tune out his own uncertain thoughts. The matching anchor marks on all of them, for one. That he can summon Bartimaeus, but hasn't tried dismissing him. It's a choice easy to pass off as necessity; the truth is, he doesn't want to find out what it means if it doesn't work.

Which is, again, not regret. There's still the slightest softening of his scowl before she launches into the actual threat.

"Because their magicians don't know how to control demons properly. Which is what I can do, as I'm sure you've noticed."

Words aside, she's right. Semantics may mean something to those already sympathetic; to the majority, the commoners just outside the Gallows? Unlikely. Being angry and superior is a very deliberate choice, but she won't find any cracks in it.

"Blackmail's a bold choice, isn't it? Of the two of us, you're the only one who's been tried for real crimes."

[rathercommon]

Color comes into her cheeks, high and hot. "I wasn't ever," she says, but hates the way it comes out - it's such a thin line between sounding furious and sounding flustered. Just a trick of the breath. "I wasn't ever tried. I was - was kidnapped by you - " And what a weak-sounding word, kidnapped, like she was some helpless victim instead of someone making a choice to help a friend. "And if you're talking about the trial against Tallow, it was against Tallow, not me. I brought suit against him for what he did to us. And then the high-and-mighty magician in charge decided that a commoner's word wasn't worth anything. She dismissed the case, she didn't try me for it - "

She's losing the thread. She's babbling. The problem is that the threat implicit in his words has real teeth. To be accused of trafficking with demons is enough to get Mandrake burned alive as a, what do they call them, malificar - But if he named her a criminal and a rebel, that'd be no good for her. They probably wouldn't kill her, but she'd lose all credibility and trust. And he could make up lies about her, too, and probably be believed. After all, the word of someone like him is always worth more than the word of someone like her.

"Anyway," she says, grasping desperately at composure once more, "blackmail isn't a wicked deed when it's in defense of someone's liberty. Unlike when it's done for no purpose but your own ambition, Mr Mandrake." There; a point scored upon him. She hopes.

[cyclic]

To be completely, objectively fair, Kitty Jones has been tried for crimes as much as he has — he's been a few disasters shy of the courtroom more than once, and there's no question the accusations against him would've ended in treason and death.

All false accusations, obviously. Also, completely Bartimaeus's fault.

But she doesn't know that. She doesn't know he hadn't committed to arresting her when he set out for the Frog, either. Indecision he should be rethinking now, probably, but this is still — he doesn't hate speaking to her, honestly. Even if it is unwieldy.

"My own protection, you mean. I'd hardly call that ambitious."

... although given his luck, it probably qualifies. He tempers his own voice just to strike a contrast against her flustered one, stepping idly back to the desk and running a hand over one of the books — still very generic, though this one's about magic and undoubtedly biased. The gesture is very villain chic.

"I will," he continues, and the combative and even the snide edge has drained entirely from his voice, leaving a pensive deliberation behind. There's a pause, like he's still thinking through it. "Be summoning him only when it's imperative, going forward."

He doesn't elaborate. He means absolutely crucial, life or death; if he needs to speak to Bartimaeus, he'll have to resort to the indignity of finding him. Telling her this much already feels like a compromise. He certainly won't be admitting that. He looks up, catching her gaze, and a bit of that superiority (defensiveness) slips through.

"A decision I made several days ago, by the way. Your bullying's inconsequential."

[rathercommon]

"Bullying?" The word is so incongruous, so absurd, that she nearly laughs through her rage. Bullying. Her. Bullying him. The boy who came to her house and threatened her life and all the while sneered about how grand his stupid tight pants and stupid greasy hair made him look. "I'm not entirely sure," she says, voice wavering (from anger? from hysterical laughter?), "how one would go about bullying someone like you, Mr Mandrake. I don't believe there is a single thing anyone can do to work much as put a dent in your - arrogance, your - "

His complicity in all these wicked things. She digs her fingers into her hands so hard the fingernails feel as though they might break skin. Somehow she doesn't slap him, or punch him, or throttle him. Somehow she takes a breath, and forces herself to be level and calm when she says, "Given your previous record of doing things only when you deem them necessary, I don't much trust your judgment. Given that you were able to justify kidnapping a perfectly innocent boy and threatening his life and then breaking your word and sending him off to be tortured. I think there is nothing in the world you couldn't justify as necessary."