Lion Head Mesa εκ νέου

OMFG i am crying

princess rhaenyra said a thousand pretty things. ramesses watched the delicate movements of her mouth as she spoke the bouncing seafarer's tongue. first she praised him, and then she spoke of 'we' while he noted again that her brother had not come, that he had not seen fit to make such an irksome journey, that the distant man appeared to be more in the business of receiving visiting kings than making his own appearances.
and that he had sent his sister, his elegant, foreign sister, to speak on his behalf, to offer their wealth, their riches, their strength, their bartering. and still she did not see that it was she who was the goods proposed, the pearl in a crown's circlet, a jewel exposed in a velvet box and passed from one man's hand to another.
but that was the fate of girl children. he had already accepted it for his own.
when her glorious courtier's speech had ended and rhaenyra stood before him glowing and proud, ramesses smiled in a long silence. "these are lovely things that you have said and that you have offered me. akashingo would be blessed to house any one of your treasures." a pause, and then "— but they are only words."
he motioned to tavina. she disappeared and a moment later two servants came and set a meal of meat and berries upon the eating-mats to the left of the throne. ramesses did not speak again until he had come to sit down there, and indicated she should sit across from him. rabbit, wrapped in its own skin. wood-goose upon a bed of its own feathers. not such a feast, but a hinting toward wealth. "you say you are unburdened by gifts as you seek to build your expansion. this means you have nothing to offer, princess rhaenyra. you offer the promise of what you will have."
he took up three berries and melted them beneath his tongue. "but akashingo was not built upon promises. it was built by word and deed. i require the same from my allies. the best way to gain my favor is to offer a marriage to my kingdom, one of high rank, with the promise of children to take the name and ways of my palace."