With her ears drawn behind her and golden gaze burrowing into the turned away features of the Queen of the Edge, she hears the same whining sound from the scorpion that the painted equine does; her acid mangled ear lifts ever so slightly in concern for the small mechanical creature, not that it matters to her if Kahlua may keep her pet or not, but for the simple fact that it is one of Ulrik’s creations. Try as she might to feel no connection or bonds with the man now that she kept his child in her wake, it pressed in on her at the most inopportune moments, such as now or while she instructed Rikyn in things and saw glimpses of the shy brilliance of his sire lingering in his frame and mind.

She may has well of been speaking of the Engineer, though she was not. He’s there in her thoughts as the Queen replies, anyway, and she chases the dark lines of his storm clouds away in order to focus more fully on the conversation rather than wondering as to whether she should call him to fix something that had been meant to break. ”Indeed,” she purrs with narrowed eyes upon her smiling mask, finding the reply to her answer intriguing in its own right for it holds none of the praise for its beauty or strength that she is used to hearing. It’s no matter, really; perhaps the Sunshower is jealous of their mighty bronze guardian in comparison to her withering glass wall.

Her peace, delicately assembled and well maintained, holds fast to her through her story; there are ripples of her cold opinions in the mix of her words, to be true, but she is not as unkind as she might have been, and is honest for the most part. It is all a part of the act she has to play to make this friendship work, to align herself and Deimos as dark hearted fiends ruling over benevolent and peaceful purists and to maintain the tentative bond between World’s Edge and the Aurora Basin; what is most surprising about this act is that, while it is a ploy she holds in mind for the sake of her band of beautiful murderers, it is also one she has committed to for the soft hearts that lay among the thorns of her kin.

For Lena, Roland, Torleik… for them all she had opened the gates into their frosty home. For this, at least, she is thankful for the sweetness of the Queen, for the forgiving and noble heart of her feathered King; in the past few weeks since it has all become settled and confirmed, she has even seen a smile flashing across the lips of the Doctor, who for a long time had seemed lost in her sadness.

Cruel and unjust a woman as she is, she can see when the old laws wear to hard on her people; she has seen where the old laws will lead them.

She will not be Psyche, crownless and broken, cast out into the blustering snows.

She must be, for her son.

’And I’m not plain,’ concludes the Queen’s reply, and the Lady looks to her with a smile that says she knows otherwise, though within herself she admits that the painted woman would be quite the pristine example of a female if only she wore a crown of obsidian, or diamond; as she stood now, she was plain. Plain, ordinary; too full of hope and smiles to be much more than a pretty decoration for some charming and good looking man; to Illynx, there was no plainer than that. ”I’d have better luck counting grains of sand on a beach,” she replies to Kahlua’s inquiry as to whether or not she would truly attempt to wipe every piece of smut from the earth, sweeping the rest beneath her words as she continues, ”I am not so stubborn as my predecessors as to believe that we number enough to undo what the Gods allowed to fall into ruin with violence. I do what I can here, by providing a haven for my kin, upholding the old laws that disallow the mingling of species. In time, we will purify the world simply by remaining among ourselves.” She pauses, her smile gentle and supple on her lying face, the sound of Rikyn’s laughter meeting the silence as the scorpion darts between his legs in a mad mechanic flurry and nearly sends him toppling over as he attempts to follow its path with his nose.

”Not all here are as I am, which you know – I noticed a friendship between yourself and Lena back at the Edge,” she says this all without an air of snide disapproval or disgust, knowing that Kahlua must believe her, ”this friendship between our two herds is for my sisters and brothers such as she, who wither in the frost among all the dying trees that are myself and those who feel as I do. They lust for relationships, experiences they cannot have here and among only the crowned; those who ruled before me frowned upon their golden hearts with disdain. I look to them as great assets, for they can see Loorien as it is, rather than how some wish it to be.”

”There is strength in such light, is there not?” she asks, glancing back to her boy and wondering just how deep she should drag him into her pit, knowing she will likely take him all the way to the bottom, ”It gives depth to the darkness, and a gleam to the world.”