Tsubame’s first impression of MaLeila Samara was that she was potentially very powerful, maybe even as powerful as Tsubame one day, but terribly naïve without much fight in her for someone so young and her opinion hadn’t changed much when saw the girl walk into the room trying to hide her wide eyed wonder at everything that was going on before the peace talks. Another pawn of the council as far as Tsubame was concerned. Then two things happened. The first was that she deliberately sat between a man and a woman who were bound to her through a complex magic that the girl herself hadn’t cast. She’d heard of the two, Bastet and Devdan, whose names always followed closely behind mentions of the girl’s name and where the girl was, one was never too far behind. At first, Tsubame had seen it as a sign of weakness, but then again thought there might be some wisdom in using the two as a buffer when the girl obviously knew so little about the magical world.
The second thing that happened was much later in the meeting, when Anya brought up the idea of a marriage tie. Tsubame hadn’t been shocked. If anything she was surprised the woman hadn’t brought it up sooner because a marriage was a sure way to plant a spy, to maybe even get under their control another troublesome sorcerer who refused to conform. Sorcerers had been using it since the beginning of time to seal deals and sometimes even get something more out the deal than had been put on the table in the first place. After Fathi predictably said no, Anya begin trying to justify, playing with words and deliberately using persuasive language in effort to get Fathi to perhaps bend on the matter when she heard the girl scoff. No one seemed to notice except Anya, who gave her a sideways glance and continued.
Tsubame watched her closer after that, noticing that though the girl seemed more consumed with the phone hidden in her dress, she was observant, looking up every now and then to slightly narrow her eyes at something someone was saying before looking back down letting Tsubame know that she was much smarter than she had given the girl credit for. She managed to corner MaLeila after the first of what would no doubt be many meetings over the course of the next few weeks. She was with Devdan at the time, and Tsubame observed that though the girl was smart with keen instincts, she was handicapped by the man standing beside her. She would exchange looks with him when she knew what she wanted to do or say but wasn’t sure if she should, and Tsubame even saw the girl lean back towards the man, his aura mingling with hers until it was hard to recognize her aura from his.
The girl declined Tsubame’s impromptu invitation to dinner, and Tsubame had to admit that she was mildly disappointed though not surprised. She let them off at their floor and then continued up to her floor, curiously tilting her head back and forth to the side as she weighed her options, but figuring out what to do about the girl would take much more observation of her than a conference meeting where she didn’t say anything and a brief conversation in the elevator could provide for it seemed MaLeila was much more complex than most human beings she came across.
The opportunity came one day when she slipped from the confines of Fathi, his guards, and her maids. Though she was somewhat patient and a great actor when she needed to be, she still grew easily restless and needed to walk around. At the compound, she would go in the gardens that Fathi still allowed her to tend to, but here he had confined her strictly to their suite and when she got angry and argued with him, he laughed. If only he knew she could kill him without having to raise a finger. Rather than kill him though, when they thought she had retired to bed early for the evening at dusk, she put on a maid’s dress, wrapped her hair in a bun and slipped out the room when no one was paying attention. Magic would have easily done the job, but sometimes it was fun to pretend she didn’t have it.
She left the hotel without any fuss and began to walk in the direction of a market she had heard one of the maids talking about a day or so ago. The good thing about the peace talks, even though Tsubame knew nothing would come of it that both sides would be content with, was that they had to be on neutral grounds in a non-war zone, where it could be off the books; the backroom deal of sorts before the magic council let the U.N. get involved for the sake of the non-magic population. That meant they were in a city that was much more than dilapidation and ruins with no electricity or running water to explore, and it was safe enough to walk without drawing attention to herself by having to fend off a criminal.
The market was crowed, but not so crowded that Tsubame couldn’t easily maneuver. She bought a shopping bag from one of the booths and made her way through, periodically stopping to look at jewelry, particularly belts, bracelets and bangles that made noise if she were to walk with them on her arm. Eventually she came across a spice booth where she decided to smell and sometimes taste the various spices to see if one of the maids could use them to spice up her food. There was a taste she wanted that the women couldn’t quite pin down for her. It was as she was smelling a red spice that she thought might be a kind of spicy paprika that she saw the girl.
Tsubame didn’t expect MaLeila to be by herself, but she had been a little surprised to see who the girl was with. It was Marcel Brant; Council Representative Marcel Brant. Tsubame’s eyes narrowed at their intertwined hands and then she tilted her head to the side when she saw Marcel press a kiss on her lips. So the girl was in a relationship with a council representative. That was something to certainly look into.
Tsubame put the spice down and made her way over to the unsuspecting couple before they could leave. As she got closer, she began to overhear their conversation.
“This reminds me of the Farmer’s Market in Dekalb,” MaLeila said. “Except this is outside and has a few other things, but it’s still the same principle.”
“I thought you’d like this much better than sitting in peace talks all day,” Marcel pointed out.
MaLeila groaned as she picked up a random fruit and said, “Don’t even remind me.”
“It’s that bad.”
“It is when all the council is doing is bullying Fathi into their way so they can get under their control another mindless puppet who won’t know he is one,” MaLeila said.
“Oh?” Marcel asked.
“I’m not saying I agree with him or anything, but the council is like a pig. Always with their nose in other people’s slop but unable to smell their own,” MaLeila replied.
“That’s a very strong opinion,” Tsubame said, coming to stand next to the couple.
MaLeila jumped, while Marcel glanced over at Tsubame and said calmly, “You shouldn’t be here.”
“You aren’t my master,” Tusbame replied.
“True,” Marcel conceded. “But I was under the impression that Fathi was.”
Tsubame laughed. “I think we all know I have no master even if I pretend I do. But back to Miss Samara’s observations? Pigs?”
Like she had done with Devdan, MaLeila leaned in towards Marcel, away from Tsubame. Then MaLeila said, “That’s been proven more or less accurate over the years.”
“You sound like you have a lot of experience with the council,” Tsubame urged.
“More than I’ve wanted. Believe that. I suppose though that’s the good thing about other things in the world needing their attention. They don’t have to bother me. And I don’t have to piss them off,” MaLeila said dryly. “Besides, they openly call me the nigger witch. I can call them pigs if I want to.”
“Well excuse me for being confused about you dating a council representative or have I misjudged your relationship?” Tsubame asked raising an eyebrow.
“I don’t think that’s any of your business,” Marcel said coolly. “But what I do think is all of our business is that you’re here by yourself and if something were to happen to you, we can all forget about any peace talks for the foreseeable future.”
“You’re absolutely right,” Tsubame said. “So how about I join the two of you because I don’t think any of us are particularly eager to return to the hotel.”
“We’re going out to dinner,” Marcel said promptly.
Tsubame smiled. “I don’t mind be
ing a third wheel.”
Tsubame didn’t give them time to deny her and instead began to head out the market. Naturally, the two followed her. She walked side by side with them to the restaurant they had chosen, with MaLeila stealing cautious glances at her on the way. As promised, Tsubame acted as the third wheel throughout dinner but she felt far from awkward. While left out of the loop, sometimes to a point that she was sure MaLeila at the very least forgot she was sitting with her, she cataloged the girl more, mostly only confirming things that she had already observed: her disdain for the council, her lack of knowledge about how the magical world worked. One thing she did notice, but would have to further observe was that she related to Marcel in a similar manner that she had seen the girl relate to Devdan. Of course, Tsubame would need to see her interact with the other man for more than a few minutes, but if she was right, this was a situation that would prove ugly later. She cataloged it for later.
It was only after dinner was done and Tsubame was looking at them over her drink that MaLeila addressed her.
“I don’t get you,” MaLeila said, her head tilting to the side.
Tsubame mimicked the motion. “Oh?”
“And I don’t get how you,” MaLeila said turning a scowl to Marcel, “are so comfortable with her sitting here like she’s not some kind of threat.”
“Trust me when I say I’ve been in much more uncomfortable situations,” Marcel muttered.
“What do you want me to say little girl?” Tsubame asked.
“What you want would help? Because I can’t imagine being the wife or mistress of a dictator, whether or not I agree with the council’s methods, is your greatest ambition,” MaLeila said.
“It’s not,” Tsubame replied.
“Then what do you want?”
“Right now?” Tsubame offered and MaLeila nodded. “I’m watching you so I can figure out what to do with you.”
MaLeila looked at her surprise while Marcel said, “That was certainly not subtle.”
“I think you’ll find that I’m hardly ever subtle when I don’t have to be. I usually like to lay my intentions out on the table, mostly. That way there’s little room for people to say I outright lied to them,” Tsubame said. “Of course, when I need to, I can do subtlety. Like when I have to work my way up from being a sex slave to a favored mistress so I can manipulate someone to murder.”
“That doesn’t seem like something you’d want to broadcast,” MaLeila said slowly.
“Oh. It’s not. But what are you going to do with the information? Go to the magic council?” Tsubame asked and then glanced at Marcel and added, “Actually, no need for you to. The Magic Council is right here and I’m very aware that the only reason they brought you here is to be their nuclear bomb if Fathi doesn’t cooperate and I come to his defense.”
Tsubame decided not to remind the girl that her powers didn’t work on Tsubame and that the event hadn’t been a fluke.
“But I also know that you seem to be having second thoughts about it, that whatever it is you got out of the deal with the council might not be worth what they want you to do when you don’t agree with it and that it makes you feel like it might have been a ploy to get you under their thumb,” Tsubame said sitting her glass down and clasping her hands on the table to read the girl’s reaction.
At worst, Tsubame was simply throwing words in the air and MaLeila didn’t feel that way at all. But throwing words in the air sometimes was a good way to plant seeds in people’s minds, seeds that sometimes grew to Tsubame’s benefit. At best, the girl actually felt this way and would be unnerved by the way Tsubame seemed to be able to read her so well.
Tsubame had to admit, the girl had a good game face, but the way she leaned towards Marcel as though gaining some proximity would shield her, gave her away.
“But if you feel that way,” Tsubame continued, “That simply begs the question, why are you still here? I suppose it has something to do with your boyfriend here, but you don’t seem the type to compromise your beliefs for male company which means that whatever you’re getting out of this supersedes something so trivial. Which brings me back to my dilemma. What am I going to do with you, Miss Samara, when all these preliminaries are said and done?”
“Preliminaries?” Marcel asked.
Tsubame laughed. “You didn’t think that being the glorified mistress of a dictator was my endgame, did you? This was just the attention grabber. I like my opponent to get a taste of what they’re up against. Trust me, things are going to get a lot more interesting in a few days. Tell that to your council.”
That said, Tsubame stood from her seat and said, “I think I’ve intruded on you all enough this evening.”
“You’re going back by yourself?” Marcel asked.
Tsubame laughed and caressed Marcel’s cheek once with the back of her hand before saying, “I appreciate your protectiveness over me, but rest assured that I can take care of myself.”
Before she left though, Tsubame locked eyes with MaLeila and said, “I think I know what I’m going to do with you.”
Tsubame left after that, leaving the words hanging in the air. Truthfully she still had no idea what to do with the girl, whether she’d be best suited to Tsubame dead or alive, but she had learned one final thing when she locked eyes with the girl. Despite her timidity, she didn’t back down from a challenge. The girl had locked eyes with Tsubame, eyes hard, daring even, until Tsubame walked away because she had no need to assert her power over the girl with a staring contest.
Tsubame hummed. All that in mind, maybe she did know what to do with the girl.
17
MaLeila wished she hadn’t agreed so quickly to be the council’s concealed weapon as they bullied Fathi and Tsubame into agreeing to their terms. Sure Fathi wasn’t a saint, having helped wage a war in his own country with no regard for civilian casualties, but at the very least his intentions were clear. That wasn’t always the case with the council. MaLeila always had to take their word for it while being prepared for the inevitability of ulterior motives surfacing later, most times less than noble.
Still, MaLeila thought she had done a good job of hiding it except for to Devdan, Bastet, Marcel, and maybe Irvin when she got a chance to talk to him when he didn’t have to keep up appearances with his mother. So MaLeila had been unnerved when Tsubame was able to exactly peg how she felt about the entire situation, how even though Tsubame hadn’t been specific, she knew that there was something keeping MaLeila here beyond the fact that her boyfriend was here.
“I think you’re all worrying too much about Tsubame,” Marcel said to not just MaLeila, but Bastet and Devdan when they expressed concern about the fact that they sat and had dinner with Tsubame.
“I think you’re not worried enough,” MaLeila said. “How can you be so relaxed around her?”
“Because that’s how Tsubame is. She likes to play games with people. This whole thing with Fathi, it’s just a game before the real politics begin for Tsubame. I wouldn’t put too much stock into what she said to you.”
“You say this as if you know Tsubame,” MaLeila said.
“I don’t, but I’m trained to observe people exactly how Tsubame seemed to observe you. Not only did she outright say it, it was obvious. Ask Bastet, she knows how to peg people just like this. She probably pegged me,” Marcel replied.
MaLeila turned to Bastet who shrugged and said, “He’s right. I did. Besides, it doesn’t take a genius to know that you probably don’t like the council and that you might have gotten into something you didn’t count on.”
“Like we told you in the first place,” Devdan pointed out dryly.
Of all people MaLeila thought would be on her side on this one, MaLeila thought it would be Devdan. With his comment though, she rolled her eyes and made her way out the room without bothering to change out of her jeans and top, making it abundantly clear that even though they were due to have another meeting soon, she wasn’t going. Not like the Magic Council needed her in the
meetings, not to mention that MaLeila had no interest in listening to the council pretend to care about humanitarian concerns as they guided Fathi into what kind of laws and structure he’d have in his government. She made her way downstairs and into the lobby at the back of the hotel with the intention of finding the mall that she’d looked up on the internet.
She rounded the corner from the elevator, running into the back of a big man who she realized in the next few seconds was Fathi and his guard. She opened her mouth to apologize until she heard him say something in what sounded like an Arabic language that MaLeila had no doubt was rude, particularly when she heard him say “nigger witch” in his own language.
MaLeila narrowed her eyes and said, “I can assure you that I’m much more than a witch. Would you like me to demonstrate for you?”
MaLeila wouldn’t have done anything to be truthful, but Fathi seemed to take it as enough of a threat by the way he scrunched up his face in disdain at her. He said something else that MaLeila didn’t understand, but that she was sure was another insult. Before she could say anything or Fathi could say more, Tsubame appeared next to MaLeila, causing the girl to jump. Tsubame had done that at the market. It wasn’t that she was even hiding her aura, it was just that for some reason MaLeila couldn’t sense her presence until the woman was right on her, almost like her aura blended in with the magic that natural that charged the atmosphere. Only when the woman was right on her could she ever distinguish her.
“Fathi, don’t be rude to her. She might decide she doesn’t want to spend the day with me,” Tsubame said, now in orange and yellow garbs with a scarf that looked more like a very large hood.
Fathi’s face softened and he said something to Tsubame in his native tongue before Tsubame replied in kind. Then Fathi laughed in amusement before bidding the woman on her way. Tsubame locked arms with MaLeila, as though they were old friends, and they made their way back to another set of elevators where her maids were waiting.
“I’m not spending the day with you,” MaLeila said, trying to pull away from the woman.
The Immortal Queen Tsubame: Awakening Page 17