[Dean is fully aware of the nature of fairy tales, and how things being made up doesn't stop them from doing a number on the unwary. Apparently, sometimes the impossible doesn't give much weight to the fact that it can't exist.
At first, the surrealness of it all is almost too much for the hunter, the Marquis telling him a fairytale, and he's about to ask if something is wrong, trying to figure out if he can surreptitiously check the network for a flood or something without interrupting or giving himself away. He feels alright for himself, but then he usually does, for a given value of alright. More alright right now than in a while, certainly.
That lasts until the Marquis gets to the first mention of de Carabas, and Dean almost misses it. He doesn't even hesitate, doesn't hitch or emphasize, just throws it out there, casual, like a discarded glove; Dean visibly comes to attention, sitting up straight in his chair, tilting his head and not interrupting.
He doesn't even think about interrupting despite his habit for doing so. He's collecting the bits and pieces as best he can, trying to read between the lines and not sure what it means that he almost can't. The Marquis keeps flashing smiles and little side comments but Dean knows that dance, he knows to ignore the bells and the whistles without ignoring them at all; he knows how often the most glaring issues is the one with the brightest bauble tied to it, laid out in plain sight.
There is no moral. What was good for him. Clothes make the man. The Marquis who does not exist and the miller's son who does not matter. Dean picks his way through all of it, not minding that the bare, functional cogs and gears of his own personality that he normally keeps hidden beneath brass and varnish are laid out and plain; the Marquis already knows. Dean is convinced that's at least part of what this is, but he doesn't know what the other part is.
He does know two things: one, he's on uneven ground here, lost among metaphor and literary contrivance. Two, he wonders who this is costing more, and where their ledger will be at the end of it, if the meter is running and which way it's turning. He has no patience for either of these things.
So the teasing cockiness is at an ebb for the moment, dark hazelgreen eyes serious below bemused eyebrows, his mouth a crooked line of consideration.]
That's an awful lot of talking without a point about a guy who, in the end, doesn't exist and doesn't matter.
[Dean believes none of these things and has no thought to hide it.]
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At first, the surrealness of it all is almost too much for the hunter, the Marquis telling him a fairytale, and he's about to ask if something is wrong, trying to figure out if he can surreptitiously check the network for a flood or something without interrupting or giving himself away. He feels alright for himself, but then he usually does, for a given value of alright. More alright right now than in a while, certainly.
That lasts until the Marquis gets to the first mention of de Carabas, and Dean almost misses it. He doesn't even hesitate, doesn't hitch or emphasize, just throws it out there, casual, like a discarded glove; Dean visibly comes to attention, sitting up straight in his chair, tilting his head and not interrupting.
He doesn't even think about interrupting despite his habit for doing so. He's collecting the bits and pieces as best he can, trying to read between the lines and not sure what it means that he almost can't. The Marquis keeps flashing smiles and little side comments but Dean knows that dance, he knows to ignore the bells and the whistles without ignoring them at all; he knows how often the most glaring issues is the one with the brightest bauble tied to it, laid out in plain sight.
There is no moral. What was good for him. Clothes make the man. The Marquis who does not exist and the miller's son who does not matter. Dean picks his way through all of it, not minding that the bare, functional cogs and gears of his own personality that he normally keeps hidden beneath brass and varnish are laid out and plain; the Marquis already knows. Dean is convinced that's at least part of what this is, but he doesn't know what the other part is.
He does know two things: one, he's on uneven ground here, lost among metaphor and literary contrivance. Two, he wonders who this is costing more, and where their ledger will be at the end of it, if the meter is running and which way it's turning. He has no patience for either of these things.
So the teasing cockiness is at an ebb for the moment, dark hazelgreen eyes serious below bemused eyebrows, his mouth a crooked line of consideration.]
That's an awful lot of talking without a point about a guy who, in the end, doesn't exist and doesn't matter.
[Dean believes none of these things and has no thought to hide it.]