“I might’ve talked a bit of shit about someone’s pet project,” pun intended, “until simply the only thing left to do was put my money where my mouth was and do better.”

It scarcely even needs asked if she had done. Just look at her pride and joy over there, raccoon bones and human vertebrae and all, gleefully snagging the edge of Manfred’s cloak with a soaring pounce— only to go scrabbling across the table with a hideous grinding sound of delight, halfway between a graveyard groan and a cat’s chirrup.

“Attaboy,” loyally, even as she begins to rise at Emmrich’s prompting. She offers him her mostly emptied cup, but, “Here to me,” must be for Nuggalope, who rights himself and hurries to harry her ankles, stretching up on his hind legs against her calf in an effort to be picked up instead of put back in his box.

Once he’s ensconced amongst the peacock feathers that edge the remarkable lapels of her jacket — impressive for how they’ve not displayed more of her than they already do — she says, “My sister’s admired your work for years,” conversationally. “Athaliah Tavarys.”

Her work is respectable, quiet, consistent; she’s earned her own reputation for excellence, even if it’s more often than not overshadowed by her older sister’s bigger swings (the better and the worse). If Athaliah were the only Tavarys, she’d probably experience her time in the Mourn Watch differently than she does as the younger of two.

“I’m looking forward to getting the opportunity to pick your brain, myself.”