Welcome to Gaia! ::

She had in a way half-expected immediate disaster to befall her. That had been the general tenor, lately, of - well, everything. She had arrived with one hand firmly clasped around the whip at her waist, just in case it needed to be deployed.

So it was a relief to be met with this, instead. She instinctively classed the man before her as a conman - moved by little but her own cynicism and that voice he was using - and this was almost as comfortable a situation as shopping.

"Oh," she said, not even trying to keep the pleasure out of her voice and dropping her hand to lean on the table instead, politely looking but not touching. "Wonderful. The world's smallest farmer's market. Do you take Venmo?"

Her handshake was firm, businesslike, and accompanied by dimples appearing in tandem with a sudden and very genuine smile full of very white teeth.

"Joyeuse Garde, if you don't like me. But Joy, if you do. I didn't realize that saving the world came with a day job." It was as much of an acknowledgement as she was willing to make of what looked like gratitude. Elaine spent too much time dishing out unnecessary praise in her daily life for Joy to feel much inclined to do more than acknowledge that someone had done what was, obviously, needful.

She returned her attention to the table as she said it, eyes roaming over the table with curiosity. "It's like those old commercials - what do you get for a woman who has everything?" The answer, of course, came to her almost immediately. She hesitated, and while she considered selfishly pushing the thought away, it occurred to her - with some discomfort - that if she was truly being selfish, she'd follow the thought to its conclusion, since nothing else would make her happier. "Maybe you've got something for a dead man who has nothing."

She didn't know how much Almadel knew about her world. She knew almost nothing about Almadel. But instinct told her that he might know at least enough to sort out why she was asking, and she was in no mood to provide clarity. So she asked it with sincerity, but with a playful sort of smile turned back up to him, not even remotely suspecting that he might actually be able to accommodate her - an idle comment, without expectation in it. "I'm not usually so self-sacrificing and noble, if we're being honest," she confided. "Maybe you're a bad influence - all that heroism moving me to emulation. Or maybe I just know that I don't have much to barter with. Not that I'm willing to part with, at least."

The comment about wrestling a man down got a wry laugh, and a sort of if only you knew expression. “Well,” she said, “I don’t pretend to know what your motives were. But even if they were selfish, I very strongly believe that selfishness can be heroic and that heroism can be selfish.” Which was a good thing, as a selfish person.

She passed over the compliment with nothing but a return of her dimples. “As to speaking in riddles - do I? I don’t mean to. I mean what I say, very literally. I’ve been spending a lot of time with a dead man - the last Joyeuse Garde, if you could ever use the term Joyous on that sour b*****d - and he’s got ******** all, haunting a dead castle and having to watch it fall apart around him. Turns out ghosts don’t have a lot of ways to spend their time well. And turns out hanging out with a ghost isn’t always time well spent either, although God knows I try,” she added, wrinkling her nose a little. “So if you have some ideas for how we could spend our time well, please feel free to share.”

She hesitated, running her eyes over the wares on the table, and if those eyes lingered briefly on what looked to be an unstrung instrument - well, that might as well be because it was one of the largest things on the table, or because she - with her tattoos of swords and her clinch-cover damsel hairstyle - had particular aesthetic inclinations. Or maybe it was the way of the destiny in Destiny City’s name, those ineffable and inexorable little cosmic push-and-pulls towards what one needed, even if it was against their will.

“Maybe he doesn’t have time to spend, really,” she said, and she reached into subspace as she said it, procuring first the omnipresent bag of cherries, which she placed down in front of him with a vague “help yourself” gesture before beginning to mentally rummage around in the interdimensional backpack. “During the - the storms, you know? - it was different for a second. He got very, very real, in a sense, but it didn’t last. There and gone with the lightning. Maybe you know something about that, though?” This, with a momentary quickness of her hitherto-languid eye turned on him. “I’ve been looking for someone who might.”

She began pulling things out of subspace, laying them down on the table: first, a ring of gold with a red stone, which she almost as immediately put back again, as if wishing it unseen; secondly, a couple of rolled up lengths of gold-shot silk, elaborately embroidered on one side. “Those,” she said, by way of an aside, “had some sort of purpose once, but I don’t know that they do anymore. I don’t know what it was. I’m not sure if I’m supposed to let them go, at least until I can figure it out.”

And then, thirdly, a length of ribbon, beautifully worked, which wafted some wonderful perfume as she held it up between her hands in a playful gesture that might as much have been an offer to tie it around a wrist as garotte someone with it. “But this - well. It doesn’t look like much,” she said. “But it’s more than it looks like, I think. A favor. You know?” This, with another smile. “For a Champion, if the word hero’s too much.”

"Doesn't seem like a very fair price," she observed calmly, and whether she referred to the ribbon for the lute or all the catastrophe of the Hollow for a single life was not clear. Not that it needed to be, as both applied, albeit in opposite directions.

"He doesn't know," she said bluntly. "Even though they came from the Wonder that used to be his. He gives me whatever I ask for, if he can." This, thoughtlessly, without pausing to reflect on that little inconvenient fact. "I think by the time the Garde fell into his hands its knights had decided on a more practical way of dealing with their role. If it doesn't have a pointy end to stick into someone's ribs I don't think he knows anything about it." She smiled, then, her own voice just as sweet. "But now you're the one talking in riddles, you hypocrite."

She offered him the ribbon as she continued, already reaching out to put one hand on the lute in a possessive gesture. No reckless romanticism here: one man was not worth an apocalypse. She would have killed thousands, if she had to, even if she'd loved all of them; she did not even love this one. Nor was this some grand gesture of affection. Her thoughts were only that maybe giving him something to keep him busy would keep him from hounding her quite as persistently - like distracting a needy dog.

"I'm unwilling to find some way to negotiate with apocalyptic death-snakes to try and get my hands on a life that was wasted the first time around anyway." She gave a little shrug, with a smile that was almost apologetic. "He had a choice. He's a good man, and I'd help him if I could. But not at that price. But if you know more about those -" with a gesture at the blindfolds "- I'd appreciate it if you told me, since you're so honorable and all. They're nice for sleeping," she added absently, her attention more on the lute than the silks. "But that doesn't seem like enough to justify all the pomp and mystery, unless you've got one hell of a case of insomnia."