Thea never intended to stay long after she did a handoff with Tesera. But she never managed to stick to it, either. Tesera found details to ask about she couldn't possibly actually need, and kept trying to draw Thea out to get her to ask questions. Which she rarely did, to deny her the satisfaction and opportunities to flirt. Somehow, it always stretched from five minutes to forty-five.
And she always left annoyed.
Thea stops. Looks at the soft-looking girl in the floating chair. A little puzzled, a little disdainful.
"What do we have to say to each other?"
"I don't know if you've noticed or if you're as oblivious of it as her, but Tesera's more than a little infatuated with you."
"She fakes it. Wants me to want her, and it's easier if I believe she reciprocates. Don't tell me she couldn't do that if she wanted to."
"Oh, she can. She isn't, though. I've seen the difference up close. The visit where she switched from enticing me strategically, to actually wanting me even if I burned out my magic suddenly and got brain damage, was noticeable. Subtle, but noticeable."
"Ah, but for secret reasons I forced her to acknowledge me as paying her back in bed. Whether or not she wants to count it."
"Then for the same secret reasons she'd really regret it. I doubt I could destroy her coven. And I don't really want to. But I could wreck a whole lot of it."
"Me neither. And I'm not sure about you. Despite the very clever infinite mana hack."
Thea considers the rusalka, who looks... mostly just like a nerd. There's a laptop hanging off the back of the chair. A tray that folds out in front to hold the computer, a tarot spread, or both. Basia's fingers are stained with lab residue, in amounts that suggest, to someone who's made a lot of handoffs bartering tech for potions in back-alley labs, that she's not very good at getting efficiency out of her brews despite being an Academic with an intuition for it.
No sign at all that she's dangerous. Or exceptional in any other way.
Which is a weird sign in itself. Tesera wouldn't awaken a third-rank witch and then take her as her personal favorite bedwarmer just because she was cute and blushed pretty when bossed around. She'd probably get off on it, but Tesera never does things for one simple reason like that. That's half the problem.
"Okay. I underestimated you. Still not sure why I should believe you."
Basia shrugs. "I don't know what proof would even look like. You could watch her interact with Marco. I promise she doesn't care about him."
"Well, also, she gets wistful when she talks about you. So unless she's playing a long game where she fakes me out to subtly persuade me to try to set you up, which I don't think she could pull off, I'm pretty sure it does here and now."
"It doesn't really matter. She's not going to leave Hespatia, and I'm not going to accept it."
"The best a Hespatian coven can be, is cover for the others who are worse. Up until the Crowns give an order."
"You know about Anoush and Saralysse. You cause her no end of trouble. You think she couldn't remove the obstacle if she was willing to?"
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