She had to be joking.
But she wasn't smiling.
"Mrs Fowl?" the bodyguard repeated, careful not to show his uncertainty. His expression remained stoic, and his posture relaxed, though alert; he was new to this post, and therefore not intimately familiar with the Fowls and their strange fancies, but none of his research had given any indication they had such a cruel sense of humor.
And Mrs Fowl looked so gentle.
But the only other explanation, then, was that she was serious.
He wasn't sure which possibility he hoped was true.
"Butler, please," Mrs Fowl said again, and his suspicions were confirmed. It was still more of a request than a command, but not by much - and anyway, he wasn't sure he remembered how to say no just then.
He continued to hesitate, and the creature she held kept on staring. Its eyes made the hairs on the nape of his neck stand up and prickle. He was almost convinced it understood what was happening, as ridiculous as that may have been.
"Here." The woman made the decision for them both, stepping in close with a look that stated she believed she was in complete control of situation. He would have preferred time to prepare, to research, before he committed to this course of action - but it was too late now, as she held the creature in one hand and gently nudged his hands together. "It's not hard," she added, and smiled reassuringly - which did nothing to reassure him, because those were words only uttered by someone who had never made the mistake you were inevitably about to.
She was no longer asking for his cooperation.
Butler couldn't be sure if Mrs Fowl was amused or just poking fun; even when he relented and tried to play along, his movements were stiff, and she didn't say a word. His gaze flicked to the door just once, silently begging the gods to send an interruption before this played itself out to its obvious conclusion.
They remained alone, but this didn't come as much of a surprise - Butler had never much all that much faith in the belief gods paid attention to mere mortals.
And then - the creature was in his grasp, and Mrs Fowl was stepping away. He almost dropped it in surprise.
It was so light.
"Mrs Fowl-" Butler began to protest, but fell silent when she looked at him. Reassuring or stern or pleading, it didn't matter.
He couldn't deny her this.
"No," she responded cheerfully, rebuking whatever logical reasons he might have thought of as to why this wasn't appropriate. The creature stared up at him through all this, stealing his attention, anyway: it wasn't as if it was curious, it was just that he loomed above everything in the room, and it didn't have much choice in the matter.
This was A New Situation, Butler thought, and it wasn't a happy realization.
But evidently he was faking it well enough, because Mrs Fowl flashed him a grateful smile and bolted - genteelly, of course, but he was A Trained Professional and he could spot a dash for freedom when he saw it - towards the small door at the back of the bedroom. It made a dull thump! as it closed behind her, almost shearing the back of her foot off in her haste-
-and then the room was silent, and he was left alone with the thing in his arms.
Butler bit back a sigh and reluctantly gazed down. It was still looking in his general direction, and he had the uncomfortable suspicion that this was unnecessary; it could have been left in a - a swaddle or something, right?
It had been one thing to tend to Juliet in her infancy, of course - there had never been any doubt that she had Tough Genes, and could handle whatever life threw at her. If he'd dropped her, she would have just bounced back up and kicked him in the shins... but this? This was just a child, and it was fragile and tiny and if he took his eyes off it, he'd probably lose it.
Butler shook his head at himself, and glanced around the room just to prove how irrational this concern was. He could see seven ways to handle a sudden invasion through the window without letting his charge be destroyed (and without crushing it, or dropping it) and six of those would end in it being completely undamaged. Mrs Fowl returning would complicate things, and he adjusted his plans for her involvement-
-glancing towards the door she had disappeared through, which showed no signs of opening again.
Butler wasn't the type to sigh heavily and lament his lot in life, and so he didn't. He stood there, stiffly cradling the head, in case the creature decided to flop out of his grasp and roll away under the bed.
He looked down again.
"Do not expect this to become a habit, Master Fowl," he stated, deadly serious.
Too late he had the thought that his rumbling monotone had more chance of terrifying the creature than of reassuring it, but the shriek never came, even when he tensed. It just kept lying there, not even having the decency to drool.
He wasn't sure it was even blinking.
Maybe it was broken? It might actually be as fragile as it looked, and even though it was impossible to hold it any more gently than he was without letting it go entirely, Butler couldn't dismiss the possibility. He was very strong, after all.
Wisely, he decided not to voice this concern, well aware that it was baseless. He looked up again instead, picking a spot on the wall to focus on with exaggerated intensity; the wall wasn't intimidated, and Butler just felt ridiculous. He looked down again.
The infant looked back. No spit bubble popped between its lips, but it did blink.
Butler found the longer he stared, the harder it was to see an it and not a he. This knowledge did less to comfort the bodyguard than the sinking realization that Mrs Fowl was never returning, and he would be stuck here for eternity, cradling a baby.
It was dangerous to get attached, he believed - this was a job, first and foremost, and how could he be expected to protect his charge to the best of his abilities if emotions clouded his judgment? Perhaps in the future an amicable respect between peers might develop - far, far in the future, when Master Fowl was much older - but for now...
For now, his job was to protect - not to get attached.
Butler stared at Artemis, and Artemis stared back. He had very, very blue eyes; they were almost intelligent, and he-
Too late, the Eurasian caught his own thoughts, and cursed himself.
Damn.
Well - that didn't last as long as he would have hoped, did it.