StrangerThanFiction

From IMiA

Juliana leans close to Rod and whispers, "We should walk. The Miss has the fire, after all."

Rod offers her his arm, "Yes, but it may be all brain and no soul. That was a rather clinical reaction to Weirmonken." he replies in a matching whisper.

"Your pardon, your highness," he asks the Prince, in normal tones.

Bleys simply nods.

Juliana smiles at Prince Bleys and the lovely young lady, looking perfectly comfortable with her hand on Rod's arm.

Rod and Juliana walk off speaking in quiet tones.

Juliana stays fairly quiet. "So why did you decide to come home now?" she asks.

"My deep and enduring love for Carnival, of course."

Juliana laughs. "You're a liar. Why won't you tell me?"

"Tell you that I'm a liar? But you already know that..."

"I'm glad you're back anyway. Amber has need of her sons,I think," she says lightly. She takes a moment to peer up at him. "You should have a small army of ships by now, well, I suppose it would be a small navy, wouldn't it? Or do you still have just the one?"

"I have no more than one navy at present."

"One navy is enough - but I hope by navy you don't mean that one *little* ship."

"It's not the size of the ship, but the skill of the master that makes all the difference."

Juliana smiles. "Well, that's true enough, I suppose. What have you been up to all these years, beside getting richer? Surely you can tell me something."

Rod frowns and his lower lip dips petulantly. "I thought the entire point of small talk was to avoid telling you something. Have I been doing it wrong all these years." He smiles, then. "No matter, I'm sure I will grasp the concept eventually. Did you know my parents, Juliana?"

"No, darling, I didn't move in those circles back then, and since then I've been out of town."

He nods. "They are such small circles. And they face entirely inward. My father had no siblings, but many cousins. I inherited a slew of relations in various states of repair. I spent most of a year at one point negotiating a peace treaty between a second-and-third cousin and his his own niece." Rod shakes his head, ruefully.

Juliana chuckles. "I married into a family something like that, except they all get on remarkably well. They're rather alien to me, that way."

"I thought the rumor that they were aliens had been thoroughly discredited."

"How do you disprove something like that?" Juliana smiles. "It's just like discrediting the notion that a nobleman would actually pen a book."

Rod's eyebrows lift. "Now that's just too outrageous even for fiction. Fiction has more restrictions than reality, you know. It has to make sense."

"I've noticed that, for all my meager reading. I do like that about reality though. Sometimes the most outrageous things turn out to be true."

"Good fiction, fiction that makes a difference, can change the world by changing how people think. Reality is harder, and more prosaic."

"Don't I know," she laughs. "But it can be done."

-- Main.LizTrumitch - 09 Apr 2005