"Lady Margolotta von Uberwald is here to see you, your Lordship."

Lord Vetinari, Patrician of Ankh-Morpork, looked up. "Ah yes. And fashionably late as befits a lady too, I see. Very well, show her in, Drumknott - after the usual waiting period, of course."

The clerk nodded and left as silently as he had arrived.

At his desk, the Patrician stared contemplatively at the quill he was twirling slowly in his fingers, a wry half-smile on his lips as he wondered what was currently going through her ladyship's mind. A lot, probably, and most of it directed at him. In unprintable language too, if he knew anything.* This would be about the Klatchian business, and make no mistake. She had a right to be angry and she was - the lady had organised the meeting as well, or, rather, demanded an audience in a quiet but brittle voice, or so he had been told. Anyone else attempting this would have been able to consider themselves lucky to be leaving without their request granted, since it meant that they were leaving at all, but foreign dignitaries, especially when they were highly bred nobility, Uberwald's Current Ambassadress and, last but certainly not least, a vampire, had to receive certain courtesies.
*And he knew a lot more than just that.

However, there was a limit to even that. Vetinari had instructed Drumknott to grant the audience her Ladyship had quietly demanded, but had been told to inform her that his Lordship was a very busy man and the only available slot where she could be 'squashed in if you insist' was the very last one of the day. If she had been angry before, this snub would make her furious - and Vetinari was more than curious to see exactly how she would react when she arrived. He'd had a rather trying day and could do with some amusement.

The doors banged open and shut again and angry footsteps approached. Lord Vetinari didn't look up from what he was industriously writing, but he did think to himself: just under five minutes, my goodness, she knows me too well.

He did look up, however, when two dainty white fists banged down on either side of his paperwork with surprising force. He'd lifted his own hands from the table in time to prevent any unsightly ink splotches on his paperwork then kept them there, an unspoken request for the fists' owner to kindly get them off his desk, while he looked up at her.

"Havelock, I demand an explanation for this inexcusable behaviour of yours!" she snapped, before he'd had a chance to so much as open his mouth.

"I do not recall having asked you to come in, but since you are already here: good evening to you too, Margolotta."

"Don't try and skim around the issue at hand, Havelock. It won't work." Margolotta hissed through gritted teeth. Havelock noticed that her murky green eyes were starting to show flecks of red around the pupils.

"And what, pray tell, is the issue at hand?" he asked evenly, slowly setting his hands back onto the table and dropping the quill in the inkpot.

"You know as well as I do." she said coldly, straightening up and folding her arms.

"Well I can only assume you're referring to that regrettable little… incident in Klatch, but I have no idea how that would involve me. I read about it in the Times the same as everyone else. Oh, and where are my manners, please, take a seat." he waved a hand at one of the chairs in front of his desk.

Margolotta had opened her mouth to say something concerning the first two sentences, but the third had followed too quickly for her to do so. She shut it again and then, shooting him a quick suspicious glance, slid elegantly into the chair. "Yes, I'm sure you would be calling it little, wouldn't you? And I'm equally sure the outcome of this… little incident, as you put it, was a very advantageous one for you, not so? Very advantageous indeed."

"These things do happen, Margolotta. It is regrettable, but true." Vetinari said calmly, steepling his fingers and staring thoughtfully at something invisible in front of him.

"Yes, I'm sure they do - especially when organised by you!" she said accusingly.

"Margolotta, I am told it was a burglary by locals, thus, if you hope to get further on this point, you should actually be speaking to a specific handful of Klatchian thieves, and not me."

"You know, I'm surprised you still have the face to try and tell me they were just Klatchian thieves!" Margolotta said hotly, her voice rising to match her temper, "Although, come to think of it, why should I be surprised - you've always been such a-"

"Before you become overly agitated, I have a better idea." Havelock cut in calmly, "This whole conversation is showing signs of becoming exceedingly undignified, ending in name-calling, and that sort of thing is not done between politicians, not now at least,". He smiled thinly, "although I appreciate that there may have been incidents in the past requiring a more robust approach."

Margolotta said nothing, her chest still heaving from trying to force down the impending outburst, but she managed and calmly looked at him, one eyebrow raised. Not done between politicians? The hell it wasn't!

"I suggest," he continued, standing up, "that we continue this conversation in a more civilised manner. That is to say, we sit down over a drink and discuss this like the rational beings we are, hmm?"

"I thought you didn't drink." Margolotta turned slightly in her seat to watch him walk to what she assumed must be a drinks cabinet. The suspicion was still evident in her voice.

"Not usually." was the reply, "The fad for giving dignitaries beverages of an alcoholic nature as gifts faded a while back, but I'm almost certain there's still a bottle of that excellent Genuan red left…" His voice trailed off as he poked around in the cabinet. "Ah," he said after a while, "it appears to be gone. Oh yes, of course, Archchancellor Ridcully was here on Tuesday. However," he straightened up, "there is this."

"What is it?" Margolotta asked, staring at the clear liquid in the unlabeled bottle Vetinari was holding up.

"It was a gift from King Verence of Lancre." Vetinari answered, picking up two tiny glasses and walking back to his desk, "Apparently it's a local, home-grown speciality."

"Oh." said Margolotta, "And what is it like?"

"I don't know," said Havelock, putting down the glasses, "Let's find out."

"Ah."

Vetinari opened the bottle and poured some into each glass. They each took one and Vetinari held his up. "What shall we drink to?" he asked amiably.

"To a quick settlement of this little, shall we say, dispute." Margolotta said firmly, raising her own glass.

"Ah yes. Of course."

They both drained their glasses.

Margolotta coughed and set her glass down, "Gods, Havelock, what on the Disc is this?"

Vetinari smiled slightly, "It's scumble," he said, refilling their glasses, "Made mostly, I understand, of apples."

"And the other bit?" Margolotta asked suspiciously.

"I find that best left to the imagination, and for the imagination in turn to leave it be."

"I see." she said, still somewhat suspicious, then, after a beat, added, "Then why in heavens' names are we drinking it?"

"For lack of anything else." Vetinari replied evenly, reaching for the bottle of clear liquid again.

"That doesn't sound very much like you at all, Havelock."

"Quite the contrary, really - when you've been Patrician as long as I have, you become very good at making the best out of what is at hand." he replied, refilling their glasses.

Margolotta accepted the glass held out to her, "Point." she said, then raised the glass, "Za Vas."

"Cheers."

They both downed their drinks, pulled slightly stretched facial expressions for a moment, and set their glasses down again. Vetinari picked up the bottle and made to refill them. Margolotta watched him, licking her lips thoughtfully.

"You know," she said, after a moment, "it rather reminds me of that strange herbal medicine back home in Uberwald."

Vetinari didn't look up from pouring. "Hmmn?"

"I'm not sure exactly what it's called, but it's been around for years, the recipe handed down from generation to generation. It's supposed to be excellent." she said, picking up her glass.

"Oh. I had always thought that herbal medication was pretty much on a par with the other sort."

"Apparently this isn't ordinary herbal medicine. There is a difference."

"And that difference is…?"

"Well it's made with herbs as well, but that which makes this particular kind so special is the fact that the less herbs that are used, the stronger the resulting medication." She thought for a moment then added, "Which is unsurprising given the fact that the balance of the medication which is not herbal is usually alcoholic in nature. However, it's really excellent stuff. Said to cure anything, interestingly enough, even insobriety." she explained.

Vetinari smiled slightly. "Hmmn, interesting. Although with that combination I'd imagine the thing it cures best is sobriety."

Almost an hour later, they were well down the level of the bottle, and, with it, well down memory lane.

"Do you remember, Havelock, that night the doggies tried to attack you vhile you vere out the castle…?" Margolotta began, as soon as she'd gotten her breath back from the last laughter interlude.

Vetinari nodded somewhat muzzily, "Ah, yes! How could I forget! That was real fighting-for-survival, not the theoretical kind I have to contend with these days. You know, Margolotta, I almost miss that. Miss the simplicity of it all." he sighed, turning the crystal glass in his hand this way and that, admiring the tiny fragments of coloured light it gave off. "I killed one of them and wounded another," he continued, "and then just as I was getting close to the castle it caught up with me again, and then turned up, and you killed that one too." he reminisced.

He paused for a moment, then continued, "I think that evening, between us, we took out two of the most important members of the werewolf clan and there was nothing they could do about it on account of them having attacked us first." He chuckled, "I suppose they didn't bank on having their furry arses handed back to them."

Margolotta laughed as well, "Ah yes, the dear little doggies. Life - or, rather, unlife - vould be almost intolerably dull vithout them. Those vere indeed good times though." Margolotta murmured, smiling at something in the distance. Extended exposure to scumble was bringing an Uberwaldean tinge to her speech again.

Havelock nodded, "Mm-hm."

"Ve vere younger then too."

"The world was younger then too, less complicated. No Patricianship, no Temperance League."

"And yet, somehow no matter how good things then seem now, I don't think either of us vould choose to go back, no?" For a quite a long time, actually, silence reigned as both of them were suddenly quiet, staring into their respective glasses and recalling the past.

"Good times." Vetinari repeated, almost to himself.

Margolotta nodded mutely, then looked up, a more cheerful expression on her face, "But who says those vere the only good days ve'll ever see? Personally I prefer to look on the brighter side, so: here's to an even better future." she held out her glass.

"Here, here." Vetinari agreed, grinning. They leaned in across the desk again to clink their glasses, but Havelock either misjudged the distance or the force with which to meet the other glass. It hit the desk with a dull thunk, splashing its contents on his robe and on the polished woodwork, which bubbled gently where it came into contact with the liquid.

Margolotta, who'd managed to salvage her glassful, now set it down with extra care.

"Oh dear. Sorry about that." she said, with a chuckle that, were it any higher pitched, would have run the risk of becoming a giggle, "Here, let me get that for you."

She stood up and produced a white, presumably silk, handkerchief from a pocket and began to mop up the scumble. It left a bleached stain on the surface where it had been. She then moved on to daub at Vetinari with the handkerchief, but caught the toe of her shoe on one of the ornate feet of the chair, stumbled, and, with a small cry of surprise, landed heavily - but, being a vampire, still elegantly - on Vetinari's lap.

Who didn't bat an eyelid. "Careful now." he said mildly, pulling her legs across his so that she was now effectively sitting on his lap. Margolotta merely returned his smile and reached for the scumble bottle, which, on the third attempt, she managed to grasp hold of.

Very, very carefully, she poured out two more glasses.

"Vot vos it ve vere drinking to? I can't seem to remember." she said, handing him one.

Vetinari thought about this, "Neither can I, really. Doesn't matter though, we'll think of something else then." Again, he gave this a moment's thought, then: "I think we've rather exhausted all the other- what are they called, again? - oh dear….. ah yes, options. " he said.

Now it was Margolotta's turn to give the subject at hand deep thought. "Vell, then ve'll just start at the beginning again. Vot vos the first thing ve toasted?" she asked.

"Haven't the faintest idea." Vetinari announced blithely.

"Vell, votever it vos, here's to that!" Margolotta said, aiming her glass at the one of his that was most likely the real one, missing and then bursting into laughter with Vetinari as he did exactly the same thing. They did not, however, have any problems navigating their glasses to their mouths and subsequently draining them. The shot called for a second, and then a third until the fourth was called to a halt on grounds neither of them being able to guess the right glass to pour into of the three their vision suggested.

Eventually, they gave up. The bottle was very nearly empty anyway.

A moment of silence, then: "You don't think, perhaps, zat this is… improper?"

Vetinari narrowed one eye, laboriously bringing Margolotta's face into focus. "What do you mean, improper?" he asked.

She shrugged, "Vell, you know… ve're supposed to be dip-lo-matic am- amba- ambasss- oh, vot the hell, I can't remember ze bloody Morporkian word for it, but, you see, Havelock, the point is this: ve're supposed to be proffesh- professionals, and ve're sitting here like this." she managed.

"Ah, I see. So you think" he squeezed her knee for emphasis, "this is improper?"

She grinned. "Vell… yes, I suppose." An uncertain pause and then, "Vouldn't you say?"

"I'd say no. I'd say'd take more'n just enjoying a drink together after a long hard day at the office to be improper."

Margolotta nodded, smiling in a vaguely unfocused way. She held up a finger. "So vait - let me get this straight. In Uberwald, this'd be considered improper, yes?, but in Ankh-Morpork s'alright?"

Vetinari nodded happily. "S'right."

"So…" she shifted closer, her grin changing shape ever so subtly as she did so, "S'this improper then?"

Vetinari's smile now mirrored her own. "I'd not say so, no." He recognized the way things were moving - scumble didn't cloud your ability to do that, if anything, it helped it along - and raised the stakes. "This isn't either, by the way." he added, running a seductive hand down her curves from waist to knee.

"Really? Vhy, fancy that!" The smile on her face was positively predatory now. She moved in closer, her nose barely an inch away from his. "And this?" she murmured, wrapping her arms around him and leaning in against him as she kissed him full on the lips.

A kiss that meant business too, Vetinari noted, when they eventually separated quite a few moments later.

"Alright." he murmured, slightly breathless, "So maybe that then… but I shouldn't let that worry me, 'fi were you." he said, before leaning in to kiss her this time.

"Not bad, young Vetinari. Not bad. You are getting there." she said, teasingly patronising and somewhat breathlessly.

Vetinari laughed faintly, "Y'know," he began, mirroring her tone, "I was once your student, and I don't believe you can teach me any more than you already have, m'lady."

For the slightest of moments, easily missed, Margolotta's eyes flashed blood red. Then she grinned, displaying a pair of delicate white fangs. "Oh, I vouldn't bet on that, young Vetinari, I truly vouldn't bet on that."