Chapter Text
“I’m not in the running for the Entrepreneur of The Year, Cersei” said Rhaegar with a smile as he motioned for her to sit down. “Not yet”, she replied, “but you will be. I’m sure the nominations are still being filed. You could still apply.”
If Rhaegar was a little more imaginative he would see the starry shine in Cersei’s eyes, but he wasn’t so he didn’t.
“I don’t think I am worthy of even being nominated for it”, he said as he sat himself down at a nice little table in a formal business lunch place. “But let’s talk of other things, like the pre launch buzz around the Silver Stag.” Cersei’s slavering grin went down a notch, but then it beamed right back up. Some men found competence hot. May be Rhaegar was one. She dove headfirst into publicity figures around the car, and by the end Rhaegar seemed suitably impressed, but unaffected by her charm.
“Was your lunch successful Ms. Lannister?” Her insipid secretary was an old woman hoisted on by Dad to spy on her, and she always tried to get in with her boss by pretending to be nice.
“Yes it was, Joceyln.” She rolled her eyes at the insipidity.“ Send Lyanna inside in ten minutes.”
Cersei went through the sheaf of papers that had arrived on her desk since her absence. The Martells had asked for a quote for publicity of the empire’s young star Elia. The dossier Joceyln had prepared for the actress was a brief and crisp one, and as she went through it Elia seemed to be the Maddona mother figure type. She made mental notes to ask for a romantic figure in her life as it would fit in well with the rest of her image.
Lyanna sailed into the office with all the drama of a suffering artist. “What up, Cers?” she asked as she sat and swiveled on the office chair in circles.
“I wanted to know the status of artwork for the next round of Silver Stag promotions. Be brief, don’t take much of my time and I’ll give you a cookie.”
“Yes boss!” sang Lyanna. She giggled and then cleared her throat in an exaggerated manner, and then dropped the act altogether. “I met that oaf Robert, who is on point for the project from Targ Corp and that fucker is the worst lecher I have ever seen, so I don’t know if he agreed to my sketches because he liked them or my tits”, she mimed gagging, “But it’s progressing on schedule for now. The still details are mostly ironed out except for a few things which I’ll decide in the moment on the day of the shoot. And I have nothing more to report.”
“Succinct and evocative.” Cersei made a pleased face, and went on. “Have an imaginary cookie and write up the details. I’ll be on location for the stills, so I want to know each and every detail.”
Lyanna frowned in one part disbelief and three parts resentment. “Are you planning to micromanage my shots? I’m not letting you do that.”
Cersei grimaced, already on the defensive. “You are not letting me do anything. I’m your boss and I can oversee what I want to. I hope you’ve gone ahead on the Beesbury honey ads and wrapped the shots up?”
“Yes it’s done ,” Lyanna replied sulkily.
“I let you have free rein over it. You win some, you lose some, little wolf. Get over it.”
Lyanna bowed in mock servility, and left in response.
Such a talented girl but a debilitating lack of manners. I would be her mentor if she’d let me.
Cersei thought of the lunch with Rhaegar with greater satisfaction, knowing that the publicity stills for the flagship car Silver Stag from Targ Vehicles Corp will be done well as she’d oversee them. The next major project would be the Elia Martell brand establishment and publicity. There were some other papers which needed her perusal, which she decided to handle before delving into the facts about Brand Martell as it was now. Some letters of invitation for parties which were sent by uppity social wives trying to aim high for the names in attendance. She had her own shorthand which her secretary would decode and write replies accordingly. One party was a social mixer at Targ Corp, with a plus one date. Rhaegar might be there. Acpt, she scribbled. Finishing with her correspondence, she turned her attention to the Martell project. She studied the dossier in greater detail in preparation for the meeting with Elia and Lewyn, which would be soon, having written a figure for her secretary. She worked on it for a bit, scribbling away in the margins about possible events to generate necessary publicity buzz.
“Joceyln”, she called out loud.
“Yes Ms. Lannister?”
“Deal with all of this correspondence and send off a reply to the Martells couched in beautiful terms but do not brook any words about the quoted figure.”
“What if they choose to go elsewhere?”
“Then let them. They’ll be leaving the most premier PR company because we don’t haggle like fishwives.”
“Yes Ms. Lannister.” She withdrew softly.
Cersei smiled. Today had been a productive day. Now to the task that she kept putting off, that of typing a business report for her dad, and boss, who asked her for weekly updates on the dealings and projects of Buzz Inc, a PR firm and subsidiary of Lann Ltd. It was his way of holding control over her, knowing that she had to validate his time and investment in her. She wrote up the wrapping up of the Beesbury project, the handling of a PR fiasco by young Waymar Royce, shoots for publicity of the Crane women and provided the numbers, hours worked and dragons earned. Finishing with that took her past 6pm when she stepped out of her office done for the day.
Joceyln stood as Cersei passed. “Good bye Ms. Lannister”
She only nodded in response, and walked straight on ahead to her employee’s cubicle but Lyanna was not there. To look for the talented and willful art director she decided to ask her junior assistants but all of them were missing and the office was mostly deserted. A loud cheer went up from the common room though, and she followed it to investigate.
Lyanna, her employee and Jaime, her twin were involved in a battle of darts using a pin up board hanging on the wall. A cheer went up every time someone hit close to a 10. On company dime! Unforgivable!
Cersei waited for a moment but the competition seemed to intensify and she called out in her high and clear voice, “Jaime!”
The whole block turned to stone en masse and people looked panicky at the boss having caught them in a moment of frivolity.
“Sweet sister, come and see how I’ve been kicking Lyanna’s ass at darts.” Jaime sing songed and walked behind her cradling her with both arms.
Cersei smiled a slow smile which told Jaime that this was not going to fly and his smile curdled. She slowly walked up, unpinned the dart board and threw it to the ground. She turned to Lyanna, “Wrap the Silver Stag promos and we’ll have a chat.”
She walked out as serenely as she had entered and Jaime followed behind her. It was moments like these when she relished the power that came on being at the top of something. It was a heady feeling.