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[mahalakshmi]

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[mahalakshmi]

[ She hums in the thought, leaning forward in a stretch, sheer indulgence. How a proper mad Empress should be, to her mind. They sprawled so well in those paintings. ]

I would need to be a Vorrutyer first. So you can teach me such things. Instead of yelling at them about dirt.

[vorrutyer]

Ah, lessons in madness. A challenge. You need to have a natural facility for it, after all.

[ He leans back in his chair, eyebrow a little lifted. ]

First, you must start fussing far more about your appearance.

[mahalakshmi]

[ She thinks about it, then thinks about it again. Looking at him in a certain kind of scrutiny before she leans back again. Getting lessons in madness, then, is it? Well, she did tell him all her opinions on crops for all things.

Well, if there's any promise to alcohol, it is that she will not remember much of it. To her lessons then. ]

I suppose you are very beautiful. [ She does her best with it, tugging at her skirts to arrange it as best she can. ]

[vorrutyer]

You're quite right that I am.

[ He presses a hand to his heart. ]

And I have been waiting for an acknowledgment of the fact all this time. Good heavens, it's taken far too long. I was starting to get worried.

[mahalakshmi]

[ her hand cups over her mouth as she laughs again ]

Will I need to tell you every day?

[vorrutyer]

[ He smooths down his moustache. ]

It would certainly help my self-esteem if you did. I don't suppose you might write me poetry?

[mahalakshmi]

[ She bites her lips, thinking a minute - no, no she doesn't, not her own at least. But she takes her step forward, a hovering hesitation - he wanted poetry, well she could give him something half the same as she rocks the rest of the way, leaning her face closer to his, taking in that small soft breath that is - recklessness, as reckless as yelling at him in a garden. ]

'I swear, since seeing Your face, the whole world is fraud and fantasy. The garden is bewildered as to what is leaf or blossom. The distracted birds can't distinguish the birdseed from the snare.'

[ Sounds out each word carefully, sincerely, all of the meaning she needs. Not her own words, no, but she thinks, she thinks it will make do. ]

[vorrutyer]

[ A flicker of surprise in his eyes gives way to a smile of genuine, unfeigned pleasure as he listens. A small nod, a tilt of his head. ]

High praise. I aim to confuse and befuddle.

[ A moment, and then he leans in and murmurs back at her: ]

Des humains suffrages,
Des communs élans
Là tu te dégages
Et voles selon.
Puisque de vous seules,
Braises de satin,
Le Devoir s’exhale
Sans qu’on dise: enfin.
Là pas d’espérance,
Nul orietur.
Science avec patience,
Le supplice est sûr.
Elle est retrouvée.
Quoi?—L’Eternité.
C’est la mer allée
Avec le soleil.

[mahalakshmi]

[ His hair looks so soft, it is hardly fair. She wants so very much to brush against it. See if that is some kind of illusion that her drink fogged gaze has put together out of the moment and the warm words she feels said so close. As much as she hears them.

A temptation too easily given into, as she lifts her hand up, and brushes against it,
lightly with the curl of her knuckles to keep it as unpresuming as possible. ]

Do you see me as an eternity, then? [ Laughed, because she is full of it. ]

[vorrutyer]

[ Foolish, perhaps. This is his fiancée, not a potential conquest. But he reaches out in return, lifts his fingers to stroke hers, and replies in a warm murmur: ]

I am not usually a believer in eternity. But I must have faith, with you - because every moment away from you is an enernity of agony, and every moment with you makes me pray it will go on forever.

[mahalakshmi]

[ He's playing with her, he must surely be. It is not fair, that she must share him. He has made that much plain. He belongs to no one and nothing and - fine. Fine, she thinks she can manage this. She knows she will. It will not be so childish a dream as she might have otherwise imagined but - regardless of what he said, she would find her own ways to be happy.

And she thinks he would approve, even if he does not know, of the indulgence she has in looking at him and wanting otherwise. ]

To you, that must make me something worth loathing? [ He is such a good liar, and the drink, the drink is enough to make her want to believe it for at least a little while. ]

[vorrutyer]

Loathing...

[ His thumb skims against her knuckle, and then - with a strange sort of shyness, a nervous hesitancy - moves forward to touch her wrist. It's fine, he thinks to himself. She's drunk. He can play around like this without real consequences...Even though he knows that, in truth, that's not true; he has an eye that's trained well to recognize when someone is drunk enough to forget and when someone isn't, and she isn't. ]

Perhaps. Or perhaps it's adoration. I scarcely know how to tell the difference. The only thing I know I cannot feel is indifferent.

[mahalakshmi]

[ The veins run blue - there, run like river lines, up the soft corner of skin. She is still what she is, covered for the most part. Drinking in his company is one thing, to be shamefully indecent is another. But for it, that half inch of skin seems at once - her whole body, soft as lightning, loud as droplets.

Don't look at it, don't look at it, it will disappear. Opts to wets her lips, the sharp press of her teeth over it. Feeling that shaken warmth unfurled like a seed into each of her limbs. Taken up root. ]

Is that to be my wickedness? Making you feel indifferent?

[vorrutyer]

I should hope not.

[ He traces that vein, moving upriver like a merchant-barge, traveling to where the skin is covered by sleeve, pushing up against that border. ]

The one thing I never want to be is cold. Kill me with fire, lady, but never with chill.

[mahalakshmi]

You are safe with me, my lord, I do not think that's a crime I will ever be accused of.

[ It spreads, that heat from so little a source. It makes - no sense. None at all. No more than how drinking should make her warm either. Prickling as it goes, it is barely a touch barely thing at all when she had kissed him, sealing that they were both be part of this, both meet each other in this - different kind of business venture.

Less than that, nothing at all, not to be thought of even as she doesn't move an inch from it. He could be cutting her apart and she would not think to move away from him. ]

[vorrutyer]

I suppose not, no. Of the two of us, I am the cold one.

[ His other thumb comes up, joining the first in the stroking of her wrist. Tentative but sincere, his hands, even as his mouth speaks oblique half-truths. ]

But there is nothing for which you have no passion, is there?

[mahalakshmi]

[ It's such a trial, to keep each breath steady. Moving and out slowly from her. The effort in keeping herself from doing nothing, when she has to swallow down on something prickling in her own throat, in the corners of her elbows and knees, that tickle. Can't go back or forward either, even if she knew what she was to do.

He is only playing, she says again, he is Byerly Vorrutyer and he has kissed more men and women than she will ever know and done more so. She can be as firm in this as he can. ]

To a fault, I am told.

[vorrutyer]

Ah, to a fault.

[ He lifts her hand a bit, placing her fingertip against his lips. It's not quite a kiss, but when he speaks, his lips flutter against her sensitive skin. ]

Tell me about what drove someone to accuse you of such excess. Won't you?

[mahalakshmi]

[ Stop it, stop it, stop it. He doesn't care, he doesn't care, he doesn't care. Her free hand goes to her glass again - almost empty - was this not what they called courage? Never needed it before, but the further it suggests and the further she goes along with its suggestions, the more she needs it.

Wetting her lips against the sweet taste on the bottom of her lip, a quick swipe as she finds the word. That answer is easy - with her eyes are wide blown in alcohol and that trickle of heat that says his name alone down her spine. ]

I slapped you and kissed you.

[vorrutyer]

A most fond memory.

[ His eyes crinkle in amusement. ]

Did you get in trouble for that, dear lady?

[mahalakshmi]

[ She ducks her head, takes her breath, and she finally gets the courage to pull her hand back. Shoves it into her lap, like she could put the thought out of her way. her head tilting away, letting her hair do the work of covering her expression as she finishes off the rest of her drink in a gulp. There - still, keeping up with him. As she slides it empty back. ]

I received quite the lecture. I think the only thing worse I could have done than one, was the other. But I promised that you would not let me down, nor discard me.

[vorrutyer]

[ He laughs, taking up her glass and pressing it to his lips. An indirect kiss. ]

And what made you so sure I wouldn't?

[mahalakshmi]

[ He's a menace, dreadful, terrible menace, who has no mercy to her at all, as she watches that elegant curve to the glass of his mouth that is singularly distracting. ]

Because we promised to each other our agreement. And I think - and perhaps it is only presumption speaking - that you do not find me as awful as you thought you might.

[vorrutyer]

[ A slight lift of his eyebrow. ]

I never expected to find you awful.

[mahalakshmi]

[ Her eyebrows lift for that, surprised maybe. ]

What did you expect then?