 but if you have what it takes to return to where all the world knows your name,
then que sera, let's go sailing on
“I quite agree, my Lord,” Mallos transferred the phone back to his left ear so that he could use his right hand to jot down a note on the paper in front of him. “With our mutual sympathies, we should have no difficulty coming to an agreement.”
He rolled his eyes at Sperantia, who was curled up on top of a filing cabinet, and mimed hanging himself. She snickered softly and shifted her position slightly, tucking her tail underneath her chin.
Mallos’ too-tidy nature, as Morgana would have called it, was emphasised by the lack of mess even in spite of the fact that he had spent all day in his office working. The ‘office’ was actually a living and general function room, the same room which connected his suite to the rest of the castle, while his bedroom led off to the right. Since Mallos didn’t receive visitors (except in his bedroom now and again), the living room had been partially converted into an office with a desk and a number of filing cabinets. Only a two-seat sofa, armchair, rug and low coffee table in the corner, all furniture provided by the castle, suggested that it had ever been a living room at all. Wooden filing cabinets stacked against the spare remaining walls, which were otherwise undecorated apart from two tapestries which had already been there when Mallos moved in, and the mahogany wooden desk sat in front of the window. Interestingly, next to the window there was a door. There couldn’t possibly be anything on the other side of the door, since it was an outside wall, and it hadn’t been there before Mallos had assumed occupancy.
Clean, tidy and impersonal were the only words which could really describe the living quarters. Apart from rearranging the furniture and adding the desk and cabinets, Mallos hadn’t made any changes or personalised it in any way. The desk and cabinets themselves were undecorated and standard issue, if high quality solid wood. The only mess at all was on the desk, where several papers were spread out. Two paper trays kept most of the paperwork orderly, and the pens were very precisely lined up on the edge of the desk, but the most recently used papers had not yet been tidied away. As a matter of fact, the only indication of personality in the room at all were what was on the papers. Most of them were clearly unofficial documents since they had been scribbled upon in shorthand hieratic (a quick-to-write version of the ancient language), but down the edges of most of the papers were endearingly artistic doodles. A pair of horses pranced across the top of one, some birds were taking flight across the bottom of another and, down the side of a third, there was a fairly distinctive image of a woman shooting with a bow and arrow. Scrawled along other bits of spare space were lines of musical notes; many of these had been scribbled out or corrected, indicating Mallos had been absent-mindedly composing while he’d been on the phone earlier.
The paper in front of him was entirely devoid of doodles. If that wasn’t enough to convey the seriousness of this particular phone call, all trace of humour and light-heartedness had been stripped away from the normally fun-loving deity’s face. The voice he used was professional and polite, and he had toned his accent down so well that it existed only as a trace. Mallos had learned long ago that basic accent imitation made other people more cooperative.
His forehead creased slightly into a frown when the door knocked, but he didn’t answer it. The only people who ever knocked on his door were chambermaids, and they were easily dispensed with a single look when they did poke their heads in. He had the look all ready when the door swung open to admit his daughter.
Excluding Sperantia, Mallos had spent the better part of the last three weeks on his own, and never expected to see much of other people when he was in his rooms. Consequently, his expression converted to one of mild surprise before he could stop it, but held its serious tone. The only person who had ever visited him was Tsi, once. Before she even started speaking, he had stopped listening to the lord wittering away in his ear. His eyes flicked over her, taking in her expression, posture and outfit, drawing the immediate conclusion that something was very wrong. Morgana wasn’t particularly inclined towards precision in her presentation, but she did know how to keep a neutral face - which she wasn’t presently wearing. She seemed on the verge of tears, although whether tears of fury or tears of distress, he couldn’t yet gauge - probably a combination of the two.
There was a long silence after she spoke, broken only by the murmuring from the phone. Mallos held her gaze with a largely unreadable expression which had changed only subtly to a slightly more grim one.
“A most unfortunate situation,” he said finally down the phone, still employing his professional voice. “My deepest regrets and apologies, Lord Dahshoor, but I am afraid we will have to reschedule our discussion. An urgent personal matter has just been brought to my attention.”
There was a pause, in which Sperantia unfurled herself on the top of the cabinet and leapt lightly down onto the desk, keeping one blue eye trained on Morgana. Mallos tapped the desk gently with his pencil while the voice on the other end of the phone lifted heatedly in what was obviously an aggressive complaint. He didn’t interrupt, but broke his gaze with Morgana for a brief moment in order to add another, small note to the bottom of his paper. Only after a few minutes, once the man on the other end of the phone had apparently run out of steam, did Mallos respond in the same, courteous tone.
“I understand perfectly,” he replied with a twinge of sympathy, although his voice hardened a touch on the last syllable. “Now understand me. There is nothing you have to say which is more important than what’s standing in front of me right now. May you live, prosper and be healthy; goodbye.”
He took the phone, which was muttering furiously, away from his ear and held it in his hand over the desk. The words regret and unacceptable could just be heard before Mallos tapped the red button on the touchscreen, reducing the room to silence. Sperantia sat down on the edge of the desk and curled her tail over her feet while Mallos placed the phone carefully down, in line with the paper in front of him.
“I think,” he said quietly after a brief moment, reverting back to his usual voice and accent, “that you had better tell me exactly what is going on.”
mallos
there's a wise man in every fool
|
|