Sasrir didn't relent. "Your metaphors are as opaque as your skin. State your purpose."
"My purpose is the well-being of the garden," she replied, her tone shifting to one of mock solemnity. "A good gardener notices when a new sapling isn't just growing, isn't just settling in its' roots, but striving upwards to reach something. And she wonders, what is it reaching for? The sun? Or something shinier?" Her eyes flicked to the ceiling, a clear allusion to the throne room above.
"You seem to be suggesting we have ambitions we haven't declared," I said, walking the line between denial and engagement.
"Ambitions? Such a strong word," she mused. "Let's call them... appetites. Everyone here is hungry. Most are hungry for their next meal. A few, like our dear, exiled huntress, were hungry for something more. For a place at a table that wasn't offered." She looked back at me, her expression unreadable. "I find myself curious about what whets your particular appetite, little preacher. Is it pleasures of the flesh... or seats of power?"
"We're just trying to survive," Sasrir stated flatly, a wall of cold truth.
"Survival is the baseline, shadow-man. It's what you do with your survival that determines who you are," she countered, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial murmur. "For instance, causing a ruckus in the Eastern Sector that caused the entire local ecosystem to collapse."
I froze up at that, but hopefully managed to catch myself before I let anything slip. "What is the blazing hells are you talking about? We weren't anywhere near the place when it went up in flames."
"Oh, but you were," Seishan pressed, her full lips curving into a smile. "One of my sisters saw you returning from that direction, covering in dust and dried blood. Not your own, from the way you're looking now, so probably a monster's or a corpse's. But that old snake is very territorial and doesn't care to go beyond it, which makes the fact it died in a different zone entirely very strange. Unless it was provoked and lured there. And we just happen to have someone who can move unseen and untouchable, don't we?"
Here she focused on Sasrir, and my heart hardened. I had sent him scouting around Bright Castle of course, but made sure he specifically avoided Seishan: she had detected Sunny in the original novel after all, and I wasn't keen on provoking her. Yet it seemed Sasrir wasn't sneaky enough despite all our precautions. Well, that or she just asked any of the Hunters who had witnessed Sasrir meld with the shadows. Yeah on second thought, it wasn't really surprising she knew...
"You speak in circles," Sasrir growled, his patience visibly thinning. "Do you have a proposal, or are you just here to waste our time during our 'respite'?"
"A proposal? How dreadfully formal," she chuckled. "I am merely extending an invitation to a conversation. The guest list for such conversations is... highly exclusive. And the topics discussed are never so crude as 'proposals'. They are more about... mutual appreciation for a well-tended garden, and a shared interest in what new and interesting fruits it might bear."
"So you know nothing," I summarized, feigning disappointment. "You just have... suspicions. And you're hoping we'll confirm them for you."
"Knowledge is such a heavy burden," she sighed theatrically. "Suspicion is so much more... flexible. It allows for possibilities. For instance, the possibility that a gardener might, on occasion, provide a bit of extra fertilizer to a promising plant, without ever needing to know its exact species." She was offering help without ever stating it, admitting she didn't know our full plan but was willing to invest in it.
"And what would this gardener want in return for this... fertilizer?" I asked.
"Why, to see the garden flourish, of course!" she said, her smile widening. "And to perhaps have a favored flower remember who provided a little extra sunlight on a cloudy day when the official gardener was... distracted." She was insinuating a future where Gunlaug was no longer the sole authority.
"...You're putting a lot of faith in a flower that has yet to even bloom," I said, the suspicion in my tone blunter and more human, no longer beating around the bush. Hearing this, Seishan's smile also faded and for the first time, a cold expression took its' place on her face.
"The gardener feels they have been here far too long already, and desires to move on to greener gardens. For this, a little bit of reshuffling is acceptable."
With that, the woman turned on her heels and left, gently closing the door behind her. Sasrir and I stared at it silently for several seconds, making sure she was well and gone with no one to replace her, before I let out a tired sigh and resumed my position on the bed. "Well, that was mildly concerning."
Sasrir loomed over me. "Adam, this is no time for jokes. How did the Witch gather out our intentions? We acted strangely compared to others, but a few nutjobs isn't rare in the Dream Realm, so how did she specifically link us to regicide?"
"Seishan tends to think the worst of people," I waved away his concerns, literally, and let out a yawn. "She thinks everybody is scheming and killing because that's all she is doing. We just have to play along with her expectations and then dump her at the appropriate time. Let her little spider of a mind spin whatever reason it wants."
"You are leaving the initiative with the enemy."
"I'm confidant in my preparations."
"You-!"
Sasrir pinched the bridge of his nose before sitting down on his bed beside me. "Fine, just promise me you will be careful. Gunlaug doesn't need much of a reason to send Harus after their head, so please, for the love of God, don't provoke him."
"Pfft, who do you think I am, Medici? Relax, I have the whole thing figured out. We just need to sit back, soak in the view, and everything will turn out just fine in the end..."