Nainie...
     It is a soft voice that filters within the old castle and to his grandmother, wherever she may be. It is exploratory, that tone, seeking, even as he is, wandering the upper halls, peeking into libraries and sitting rooms.
     He is a careful wanderer, however. With this family (himself now included) it is always so much better to knock.
     Nainie...?
     Balthazar walks downstairs from the fifth floor to the fourth, his steps slow, meandering. It is still the middle of the day; somewhere, grandfather should be sleeping. He keeps his steps quiet, even though he is sure that grandfather Davydd is in one of the turrets. Still... better to be safe than sorry.
     Fresh from his meeting with his parents and the girl of his dreams, after a morning full of lovemaking and emotional highs and lows, he is quietly worn. On the outside, he seems as easygoing as ever. On the inside, he is unsettled. Lingering anxiety, a residue of upset that lingers in his gut, is paired with ecstatic Love and Desire.
     It is an understatement to say that Balthazar is a little preoccupied...
     Hands in the pocket of his navy suit trousers, Balthazar glances down another corridor, turning to take the main staircase to the third floor.

     I'm here, dear. Give me a moment and I'll be down. I was just going through some paperwork.
     There is, after all, plenty of work to be done. Even if she is not in full the chatelaine of the castle, there are arrangements to be made - both for her own business and for the arranging of family gatherings of this size. Fiona finishes going over a list, ticking off a couple of minor corrections, and then sets the list on the desk where it will be found later.
     She emerges from a suite on the third floor, dressed in jeans and a white silk button-up shirt, a gold chain around her throat with a small, modest diamond pendant. Her long oak-blonde hair's been pulled back into a topknot, and she's not wearing shoes or makeup, smiling at you and holding out her hands to you.
     "Darling," Fiona greets warmly. "Look at you! You get bigger every time I see you, I swear. How are you?"

     An inch taller since the last visit, at least, and a great deal more...something.
     Balthazar smiles (beams is accurate) as he completes the last couple of steps off the grand staircase from fourth floor to third. And there you are! His hands come out of his navy suit pockets, and he takes your hands and then does the customary nainie greeting -- which is a bend and a kiss on each cheek. It's a family tradition, passed from father to son. One day, his sons will stand on tiptoes to echo it.
     What has changed in a few months, apart from Everything? His hair is shorter, his eyes are a little more glinty with amber, and well then there's the radiance of Love and Desire that hovers around him. His wings aren't visible, but they stir the air around him, filling it with the templed fragrance of honey, cinnamon, and myrrh. "I'm good," Balthazar murmurs. Good, overwhelmed, different, and completely in love.
     "I sent the demo. Did you get a chance to give it a listen? I think I'm going to pick up a couple of performance dates in Cardiff before we head back to London. I think it's time to start talking agents. Good ones," he smiles a little. "Reggie and I are getting bogged down in the paperwork."
     "I'm sorry," he interrupts himself with an apologetic smile. "How are you, Nainie? How is Taidie? I've missed you. I will try to make sure our first tour is through Wales. I promise."

     She hugs you, kissing your cheeks in return, smiling at you with immediate love and affection. She notices the magic, of course. She'd have to be more than blind to not. "I got the demo, I think it's brilliant, but I want to suggest a few things," Fiona answers you cheerfully. "As for agents, I can certainly help you there. Come and sit and let's eat."
     The men in this family can always eat, after all. It's an expected part of things. She leans up to ruffle your hair. "We have quite a bit to discuss, don't we? And I need a drink if I'm not going to go all dry. Come on, then. Kitchen, or do you want me to have something brought up?"

     Your hug is instant reassurance, and he needed it. As much as he needed the hugs received from his fathers. When it parts, he seems to settle a little, but the way the air moves around him, shimmering? That only increases. In the presence of unconditional love, Love only grows.
     "You don't really need to go to any trouble. What do you want?" Balthazar wonders with a smile. "I can always bring sandwiches." Which is to say: he can materialize food at will. It's a wonder you even use a kitchen.
     "I'm grateful for your advice, nainie. And suggestions. I trust your ear," he says quietly. He means that completely. Hands sliding into suit pockets again, Balthazar waits for you to lead the way.

     "Kitchen. Kitchens are comfortable, and they're informal, and they immediately say 'I'm home', even when nothing else does." Fiona gives you an impish smile, and she tickles your ribs lightly before she steps back. "Who does the actual cooking is irrelevant, but I like to cook."
     She turns to lead you down the stairs. One thing about this place, one gets one's exercise. "So, agents first? Or girl first? What do you want to cover?"

     He smiles, glancing to you a moment before lowering his gaze to mind his feet down the stairway. "Probably girl first," he chuckles. Give him two points for realizing the inevitability and the futility of redirection. No, talk of agents can wait a bit.
     "She met mom and the dads earlier today," Balthazar notes as he follows you from third floor to second floor. The kitchens are still one floor further down. Well, two, considering the part in the basement. "I'm trying not to overwhelm her. I think I'm failing fairly miserably at that," how his father can be heard in that tone. "But she's handling it well. Better than I am, actually."
     He exhales a bit, dragging a hand through cinnamon colored hair. Short and thick, it stands up whichever way he moves it, looking as artfully disarrayed as before. In that sigh is: But I love her...
     He is in knot, practically ill from it, in fact. Who feels the effects of Love more than Love?

     She reaches the kitchen and immediately begins getting down a mixing bowl and pulling things out of the refrigerator. "It's good that she's handling it well, but you still haven't told me what 'it' is, in this context." Fiona glances over your shoulder, and she smiles. "It's hard. I know."
     Flour, eggs, baking soda, salt, sugar, sour cream, dried fruits - everything she needs it laid out in orderly fashion. "So you're in love with her, she's in love with you. The age difference is a bit unusual but considering the age difference between me and your grandfather, I hardly think it's anything to write home about. What does she want to do?"

     "In this case," Balthazar says, glancing around for a place to perch and generally stay out of your way (at least until spoons may be licked at any rate), "...the it is the fact I'm a fairy prince from never-never-land with wings of fire who is going through a change," that said with finger quotes. "So... the fact that she's still here and not running and screaming halfway to London right now is, you know, good."
     He told her. Or he showed her. You of all people know how that goes.
     Balthazar smiles, a faint flush lifted to his caramel complexion as he finds a stool and pulls it up to near the countertop -- one of several in the palatial kitchen. "She is young, yes," he looks at his hands a moment until his coloring gets back to normal. "She's going to be attending classes through an American university via online and correspondence. She hasn't picked a major field of study, but it could be maritime. Her father's a marine biologist. She's lived all over the place, so cultural studies. I'm not sure really. What I do know is that I want her to go to school and do what she needs to do for herself and her own growth. I don't want her chucking it out to follow me around..."

     Her eyebrows lift, and she glances over her shoulder at you, then smiles. "Would you like my advice, Balthazar? I mean, I'm going to give it to you anyway. It's more like playing God Save the Queen before a rugby match - the formality before the carnage."
     Fiona chuckles, then begins mixing up what appears to be a future batch of scones, dribbling a little bit of whiskey into the batter. "Start training her to be your Queen. Give her magic lessons - well. Meditation lessons, if she hasn't got magic. Everyone with any sensitivity can learn a little something, and if you went for her, I doubt very much she's utterly insensitive in any meaning of the word. But it's good that she's going to school. It would be better if she has an idea of a direction that isn't you, no matter how delightful you are, darling."

     "I can probably talk her into meditation lessons. She's going to teach me how to dance. I think she probably will have better luck meditating. She's a brilliant dancer. I'd like her to study that. She's also a good singer, actually. She has a really nice tone. But her path is up to her. I'll support whatever she wants to do, even if it's living in the heart of the congo studying gazelles or something. I'm sure there's not a lot of call for rock bands in the Republic of Congo, but we'll sort it out. That part, I'm not worried about."
     He is worried about something...
     "I don't know how delightful I am," Balthazar demurs, making a pivot turn on the stool (it spins). "But... I wholeheartedly agree that she needs her own thing, her own passions. I mean, if I wanted girls to just follow me around with nothing going for them apart from making a pretty train behind me, I'd have fallen in love with a nymph. Petal tossing gets really annoying after a while."
     He is quiet a moment. "I think ... I don't know for sure," he looks to you when he says that, "...but I am sensing that ... she has something. I had the weirdest sort of vision earlier today." His complexion darkens. "I don't want to over-share, Nainie, but... I'm not sure how else to explain it. Put it this way," his hands come up, "...there was water involved. And... it really loved her. I don't know if it's her or me, because I'm," his hands gesture in a jazz-hands sort of way, "...going through this thing, whatever it is, but the water just turned to pure gold, to me. She didn't see it. But I did. She was like this ... golden siren. So... maybe there's something. I will teach her. I learned yoga and the sutra from the houri. It has always helped me. In fact, I'd probably have spontaneously combusted by now if it weren't for yoga and meditation."
     The whole idea of queen training, however, makes him a little jittery. He pivots slightly back and forth, moving he stool seat this way and that way, his feet locked under the first rung. Calling it meditation makes it much easier, much less nerve-wracking. "I'm not really sure yet," he admits quietly, "... I mean, I know she loves me. But... I'm not really sure yet, Nainie, whether she's going to want to be a queen."

     She eyes you. "Water involved. I'm going to assume the two of you were engaged in intimate moments in the shower and leave it at that." Fiona shakes her head, turning back to the mixing bowl. "In any case, magic is more common than you might think. Case in point : me."
     She grins at you mischievously, then vigorously begins to beat the batter. "I don't think it's going to matter if she wants to be a queen or not. It is what you describe. Another case in point. Your father." She points her mixing spoon at you. "Tiernan. What would you say he is?"

     "I was trying not to over-share, Nainie," Balthazar both reddens and laughs. You have successfully elicited the first real laugh of the day from him. His eyes glint with gold and amber and the essence that exists so resplendently on the Other Side peeks out a moment; he seems surrounded by a halo of sunlight, as if all of the lights in the kitchen were focused upon him.
     The spotlights of the stage will love him...
     Cinnamon-brown eyebrows lift a bit as Balthazar turns upon the stool toward you. "What he is? He is the King's mate in all things. Co-ruler, really. Though he might not see it that way. He is the head of the family, as father is the Head of State."
     Balthazar looks at you curiously, wondering where you're going with your train of thought. He's not sure what being a king will mean to him, let alone knowing what being a queen might mean for Maddie. "He has a lot of roles, really..."

     The batter is spooned into a scone pan, the oven tested and the pan then slid in. "He is a king in his own right," Fiona tells you. "His kingly energy has been channeled into different directions, but there is no part of him which is less a king for it. And that comes from being married to a king. You could take her as a consort, if you were thinking in temporary terms, but you aren't, are you? You are looking for, seeking, a true union of flesh and spirit, and magic recognizes that."
     She puts the kettle on for tea, grabbing cups and a teapot and bustling about to get everything ready. Everything tastes better when it's been made by a grandmother! "You are a king, or are about to be. Those around you will be affected by that energy if they are truly in sync with you. Do you think I was a queen before Davydd - your grandfather - crowned me? I wasn't." She smiles. "It isn't a bad thing. But it's the way it works."

     "But... and I don't know, by the way... we haven't actually discussed it but... what if I become king and... she doesn't want to become a queen? What if it's more than she's bargained for? I don't want to force anything on her, Nainie," and that is one of his chief concerns. He voices it quietly. "I don't want her choices changed because of me. I want her to be able to decide what she wants to be. I know I don't have a choice, not in the same way. Come midsummer night, I will... I don't know exactly, actually," chief concern number two, "... but I don't want that to determine the entire course of her life."
     The jittery energy returns. Balthazar is quiet for a moment, even with the smell of baking scones. Special Nainie scones at that. "I don't really know what I'm looking for. I wasn't really looking for anything or anyone. I just kept...running into them." Balthazar smiles a little. "Okay, I chased her sister around, that is true. But this....all just happened. I didn't go into it thinking to find a queen. I didn't even know I was becoming a king at the time."
     Balthazar looks to you. "The plan was to ... not marry for a while. Until she's older. I want her to finish school first. Then we marry if all goes well," meaning they're still together. Moving the stool back and forth slightly in his own nervousness (it's like pacing, only sitting down), Balthazar frowns. "This is all happening so quickly..."

     "Your grandfather and I did not officially, formally marry until after your father and his twin were born," Fiona points out. "Now, that's not how I would've done it, in retrospect, but I don't have any real regrets. Now, your young lady is likely to be a bit less open to that level of flexibility; she's American."
     The kettle whistles, and she grabs it off the heat, clicking off the oven and pouring the water into the pot over the leaves. Things are moved back to the table, the bowl deftly tucked into the sink, and she turns to you. "Making her queen is a level of permanence beyond marriage. Even if you stop being married, she'll still be a queen where it counts. The question is, will she make a good queen or a bad one? I don't know that I was ready for it. I can't say that I did that good a job. But it's what I did, and what I was, and what I still am - Davydd or Iowerth could say better than I can whether or not I did it 'right'. If you want an opinion on the girl as to whether she'd make a good queen, ask them, because I can't really tell you that. I don't know. Will she make a good companion? Absolutely. There's love between you."
     The pot's set on the table, and she checks the scones; apparently she's satisfied, for she slides them out of the oven to cool. "As for finishing school, you're supposing that school matters. I didn't finish school. I could if I wanted to. But it stops being quite as relevant when the majority of your life has to do with very specific things. School is good for in general. It's terrible for in specific."
     Fiona adds a trifle dryly, "And, darling, the way you describe it, it sounds really more that you want her to use school as a way of wasting time until you're sure you two will stay together - not as an education. Think about it."

     "No, that's not it," he counters quietly. "I just want her to be able to choose her own path. I really don't want to choose it for her. It can be school, or not. It can be music or dance, or not. She's enrolled in school; her family expects it of her. I just don't want to get in the way of what she wants. If she decides not to go to school, and it's truly what she decides then, fine. To me, Nainie, it doesn't matter what she does. I just want her to do something of her own. To have her own identity. I ... don't want her to be swallowed up into mine. It's not fair to her."
     Balthazar leans toward the scent of the cooling scones. His expression is thoughtful, if a bit pensive. He has concerns. "She is far more certain than I," he smiles a little. "I am just... worried that, you know, it's a lot to accept. She says I'm worth all the weirdness. But... there's a lot of weirdness, Nainie. What she knows is the tip of the iceberg. And," his eyes widen a touch as he looks at you, "...I have no idea what's going to happen to me on Saturday. For all I know, I could transform into some fire breathing mystical foo dragon and go flitting off into the sunset. No one can tell me, I don't know, so how in heaven and earth can I prepare her for it? How can I assure her when I'm sure of so little? I know that I love her. I know that I want her. Right now, that's all I know..."
     Hands, both of them, rake through his head and massage his scalp as he bends over. Elbows on thighs, he props himself up there. In his grasp, his hair turns to flame for a moment before returning to the rich cinnamon. "I did buy her a promise ring. I'm going to give it to her on her birthday." Amber eyes shift to you. "Saturday. That is, if I don't go up in some column of flame..." His mouth twists with wry humor. He has to deal with it somehow.

     "You're not going to go off into the sunset and you're not going to burst into flame." Fiona says it firmly, in a no-nonsense tone of voice. She drops a couple of scones onto plates - four for you, two for her - and tops them with clotted cream and strawberry jam. "You need to relax, Balthazar. Nothing like that is going to happen to you."
     She speaks with the voice of authority. "The worst part of it will be the anticipation, and the not-knowing is hard. I understand that. But do you genuinely believe that the universe would have you turning into a dragon and flapping off, when there's still work to be done? No. You'll be fine."
     She sets a plate in front of you, pouring tea for you and settling down on a chair. "You don't know. And it's scary. But really, you should pay less attention to the magic and more attention to the people, because ultimately it's the people that will be the key to your future. Magic's just an add-on."

     The dragon thing was just a joke. That he doesn't believe that, honestly, is confirmed in his look of half-smiling chagrin. He accepts the chastisement without argument. His penchant for ...exaggeration is genetic, however.
     "I don't believe that, no. Of course not. I'd rather hope I'd get some sort of warning from the family, a little note at least, if that were the case. I really don't know what to expect." And his father's earlier comment rings true again. He is in the right place, at the right time, surrounded by people who love him. You will be okay, he tells himself. Even as Tiernan would say, again, if he were here now.
     Balthazar looks to his Nainie even as clotted cream and strawberry jam are spread over a scone. He takes the first bite with the enthusiasm he's always had for her cooking. Her boys love to eat, and what she makes nourishes them. Balthazar nods to her. "I'll remember that, Nainie," he says quietly.
     The first scone didn't have a chance really -- he really hasn't had anything to eat all day. It wasn't a fair fight in the slightest. "So... what did you think about the demo. You said you had some suggestions..." Apparently Girl Talk is finished for the moment.

     She leans forward to ruffle your hair, giving you a warm smile. "I think the demo is wonderful, but you should think about getting in some sound engineers on your team to clean it up a bit. And you should talk marketing."
     Is it strange to hear such no-nonsense business speak coming from your nainie? She doesn't seem to find it odd. "Now, as for agents, that's another kettle of fish. There was a scandal last year and three or four of the major agents ended up out of business for various reasons - some related, some not. So for agents, I can make recommendations but only very cautiously; I'm not entirely comfortable with the current lay of the land. What sort of focus do you want, or just general agenting?"

     "We self-produced it.. Reg and I mixing. I suppose I should stop being cheap," he smirks at himself. "It's not as if I can't afford the studio time. We were experimenting a bit in our own studio. I added one to the third floor. Was it ambient noise or just a clarity issue? That's disappointing." He sips at the tea, nodding to the talk of scandal.
     "Well, really, less an agent and more a manager. Reg and I have been co-managing, co-marketing, handling all the business, and taking an extra share from performances of course, but I would rather just focus my time, and Reg's, on the music itself. I'm not all that interested in big label stuff. I'd rather produce under our own label if we can or maybe Viper or Sunnyside. Sunnyside may be a better fit. They're medium sized indie labels. We've managed on our own to get some radio play and get bookings, but now that we're prepping for festivals, we really need someone to take over more of the business side." He smiles a little at you as he finishes off his second scone. "You wouldn't happen to know anyone who'd be interested, would you? Anyone you'd recommend?"

     "Well, you're going to need to consider this before you find an agent, because most of them are going to want to try to get you onto a major label," Fiona notes. "What I'd recommend from the sound of it is, instead of getting an agent, get yourself a good entertainment lawyer and have him handle things. And find someone in the band, or close to you, who has the interpersonal skills and maybe the connections to handle the agenting. Because the way things are going, right now? I can't in good conscience recommend anyone in specific - but that's not a problem that's insurmountable if you're willing to hire an accountant and a lawyer and someone to handle bookings."

     "Loki's father is a Hollywood producer. While he and his father don't really get on... his father wants him back in school," again with university - what is it with the American preoccupation with universities, "... we might be able to tap into a resource here and there to find a good entertainment lawyer. I'll ask. He might not want anything to do with California. Barring that, I'll start asking around. Breaking up the managerial tasks -- legal, money flow, and bookings -- seems like a good approach. At least not all of the eggs would be in one basket." And now for the third scone...
     Balthazar sips at his tea, washing down the remains of the second scone as he eyeballs the third. "Thanks, Nainie. I appreciate it. I'll be sure to pester you about it as we go along. So," he grins, "... if you were still writing for the Zine," he knows the story, "...and you listened to us, what would you write? Or is that too narcissistic a question?"

     She is just now picking up her first scone, smiling at you fondly as she takes a bite and washes it down with tea. "It's a bit narcissistic, but it's also not something I can answer." Fiona chuckles. "I handled punk, darling. And while your music is excellent, it isn't very punk."

     Balthazar beams at the rim of the coffee cup. "Go on and say it, Nainie," he chuckles. "You would have slain us..."

Posted by rowan at May 25, 2009 08:17 PM