You? Your hands are soft as butter! The Vala longed to say, but instead he smiled and made a most courteous display of spreading his arms. “I can think of nothing more fitting than to have the item made by one bearing my Lord Tulkas’s moniker! Thank you, your highness.”
Artistic advice… fah. Hammer it out of dung in the shape of a wilting prick for all I care. “The Champion of the Valar should have some noble, mighty creature as his door handle— perhaps a lion, or a boar? Your assistance will not be forgotten, I promise you!"
Melkor outstretched a golden claw and placed it on the prince’s shoulder carefully, inclining his head close to brushing Findekáno’s ear. “Honor may compensate the spirit, dear prince, but never filled anyone’s purse. If there is any little favor you need done, only ask it of me. I do still have some influence in the world.”
The answering grin on Findekáno’s face must have spread as wide as Melkor’s arms. His offer had not been turned down!
But his purse, as it happened, was filled with trinkets—keepsakes from friends, interesting items plucked from the places he visited. Some of these things he’d pass on to his friends and family, or discard them when he no longer found them inspiring.
Melkor most likely was not intending to give him trinkets.
"What are you offering me, exactly?” Findekáno asked, making no effort to mirror the subtlety the Vala showed him. He did glance down at the hand at his shoulder, though. If he had somehow been in doubt as to what he spoke to, the difference between that golden limb and a soft Eldarin finger would have been a sharp reminder of its origins. Those hands could raise mountains as easily as they could tap his arm, a thought which was both awe-inspiring and frightening.
Fear was not an emotion Findekáno was used to, but it had a certain appeal. “I can think of nothing I could not get myself, or that would be refused to me if I asked for it,” he continued. Nothing except for particular circumstances surrounding a romantic entanglement, but not even a Vala could help disentangle that particular set of troubles, and perhaps it was better that none of them try.
“Truly, I would ask for nothing more than the honour itself,” the prince repeated, looking up with his most wide-eyed, innocent expression.
“Ah, dear prince! You truly live a blessed life!” Melkor curled a smile, patting Findekano’s shoulder. "You may indeed be free of wants for the moment… But in my experience, one can never tell what one desires, until one lays eyes on them for the first time…“ He winked. "Perhaps you will think of some favor to ask of me, when the day comes that the object of your yearning is beyond your royal grasp.”
The Vala would not so easily let the prince write him out of this transaction as a mere messenger. If Tulkas’s errand boy he must be, then no opportunity would be wasted to put down roots in garden of Eldar politics.
He did not very much care what the prince’s wish might be, on some unforeseeable day in the future; a door opened, a meeting arranged, a distracted uncle at a specific hour, a lock of rosewood red hair– he doubted that it would be of great consequence. Whatever it was, he planned in all earnestness to fulfill it to the letter. No genie’s tricks; his price for favors now was not a lump sum, but an accruing one, payed slowly in trust and familiarity.
“I will take this news to Lord Tulkas at once. If it pleases you, let us meet tomorrow at your forge to discuss the finer details of the device. I am sure the Champion will be very pleased with our arrangement.” He made a low bow, foxfur curls falling between the golden thorns on his shoulders. “Good day, your highness. My Father and Siblings keep you well.”
MisbehavingMaiar: Tumblr Archive 