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Happy St Patrick's Day. Enjoy the one day of the year when the whole world is Irish.

Maidens of Mayhem Chapter 12

Started by Evie, July 10, 2010, 01:57:59 AM

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Evie

Chapter Twelve


   Twelfth Night.  It was the final night of the Christmas season, the grand finale of the holiday season of courts and feasts and merrymaking.  The girls had awakened eagerly that morning, despite having been up quite late the evening before, dashing off to early Mass without so much as a quiet grumble from Ailidh, for they were all looking forward to delivering their gifts immediately afterwards.

   As they flew down the staircase, they encountered Sean Earl Derry.  "Are you coming to Mass?" Celsie asked breathlessly.

   He smiled, "Oh, I'll probably catch a later one."

   "What, too many sins to confess all at once for you to make ready for the first one?" Ailidh jibed, a knowing glint in her eye, for she'd begun to suspect where the Contessa's nocturnal wanderings through the secret passages were taking her.  She hoped she was wrong, for Celsie's sake, but she'd begun to sense a closeness between their patroness and the Earl that seemed to go beyond mere casual acquaintance.  

   He laughed.  "Maybe I'm storing up for Easter," he joked.

   Celsie's eyes widened. "Oh, you mustn't, Lord Derry!"

   He grinned down at the earnest young maiden.  "Don't worry, sweeting.  With all those prayers you've sent up for me already, I'll probably find a host of angels waiting to offer me safe conduct through the Pearly Gates the moment I pass on, just based on your good behavior."  He winked.  

   She sighed.  "Well, that reminds me anyway, I've a Twelfth Night gift for you!"

   Derry smiled.  "Another handkerchief?" he asked hopefully.

   "Oh, I can't tell you," she said archly.  "You'll see it soon enough."

#

   Celsie was disappointed to find that Lord Derry had not returned to his quarters yet by the time she and her companions made their way to his door, but she had realized that possibility beforehand, so she simply pushed the thin wrapped present through the small gap under his door.  He would realize who it was from, she knew.  Even if he didn't notice her name on the wrapping, he could hardly fail to recognize the needlework.  She smiled happily, her eyes lighting up with anticipation as she imagined him opening the tiny parcel up and tucking the new handkerchief into his doublet, next to his heart.

   They moved on, Sophie wanting to head downstairs to the Royal Library next, for she had a couple of framed sketches she wished to give to Father Nivard and Bishop Duncan.

#

   Their deliveries took up most of the hours that were not already reserved for Court, though they made certain to be present for that, eager to see who would be knighted and whose betrothals would be announced.  Maybe Sir Seisyll will have a special announcement to make next year, Celsie teased Sophie, who just rolled her eyes and blushed.

   He is not courting me! she insisted.  We're just friends.

   Oh?  Is that why he turns up at our apartment almost daily, and why he danced with you three times last night?

   He's just being polite.


   Umhmm.  I wish Lord Derry were that 'polite' to me!  Celsie stifled a giggle.

#

   The Twelfth Night Feast surpassed even the fine dining they'd enjoyed over the previous eleven days, gaining even Alienora's grudging approval and making her almost pleasant company in the few hours she ventured out of the de Varnay apartments before heading back upstairs right after Feast to take her rest.   At last, once the food had a chance to settle and the evening's performances had come to an end, the Great Hall was cleared for one more Christmas Season revel for the visiting populace to enjoy before the majority of them would start heading back to their own lands over the following days.

   The musicians struck up the opening strains of the first dance.  The young ladies soon found themselves besieged by dance requests, Sophie soon whirling away on the arm of Sir Seisyll yet again (much to Celsie's amusement), and Ailidh dragged off, only half protesting, by Sir Jass.  Celsie smiled as Sir Stefan de Varnay approached, accepting his offer to lead her through the next dance.

   Before they'd gotten more than a few steps into it, however, Stefan found another man's hand tapping his shoulder.  He turned to see Earl Derry.  "Pardon me, Sir Stefan, but I'm stealing your partner."

   Celsie found herself being whisked away, suddenly several feet away from her friend's startled brother.  She gaped up at Derry.  "My Lord?" she said, giggling.  

   "Have I ever mentioned you look like an angel?"  Derry said.  "Like one of those golden-haired angels on the frescoed ceilings of a cathedral."

   She laughed.  "I hope not!  They're all male; at least the ones I've seen in cathedrals are."

   He grinned.  "Well, aside from that."  His arm tightened around her, and she blushed, wondering what had gotten into the Earl.  As much as this evening was shaping up to be like something out of her fondest dreams, Derry's behavior seemed a trifle...unusual.

   "Your form, thank God, is not at all angelic.  Definitely not male.  Such sweet, lovely curves!  Let's get married, Celsie," he murmured in her ear.   Heedless of the large number of people who surrounded them, he pulled her even closer, beginning to nuzzle at her neck.  She pulled back, startled, and glanced up towards the roof beams half-instinctively.  No, there was no mistletoe directly overhead.

   "Um...Lord Derry?"

   "I love you, Celsie."  The blue eyes gleamed almost feverishly.  A sudden thought occurred to the demoiselle.
 
   "Oh dear God...!"

   Derry deftly maneuvered Celsie into a dark alcove, directly underneath one of the ribbon-bound clumps of mistletoe Duchess Meraude's ladies had fashioned from the basketloads Ailidh had donated.  

   "My Lord, what are you doi--?"

   The question was abruptly cut off by a kiss, tender at first, but swiftly growing more demanding as his body pressed her into the deeper shadows of the niche.  Celsie's head reeled.  She tried to push him away, alarmed.  "Sean, please, you can't--"

   "What in the hell are you doing, Sean!" the Contessa hissed, suddenly appearing behind Derry, grabbing him by the shoulder and shoving him away from the trembling maiden.  "Are you in your cups, or have you just taken total leave of your senses?!"

   Sean Derry shook his head as if attempting to clear it.  "I'm sorry, Stanzi.   So sorry, sweeting.  I'm awfully fond of you—you know that—but our dalliance has got to end.  It's been delightful, but I'm in love with Lady Celsie."  He nodded, his eyes slightly glazed.  "We're getting married."

   "Your...your dalliance?"  Celsie's blue eyes fastened on Constanza, reflecting her dazed confusion.  Tears began to well up.

   Constanza stared at Derry in shock, then whirled on Celsie.  "Oh, sweet Jesú!   Celsie, what did you give him for Twelfth Night?"

   Celsie, completely drained of color, clamped her fingertips to her mouth.

   "Answer me, child!"

   "It's—It's in his doublet, I think," Celsie finally managed to whisper.

   Constanza spared a brief glance over her shoulder to see if anyone on the dance floor had just witnessed the compromising scene—fortunately most seemed intent on their dancing or caught up in conversations to take any notice of what was happening in the shadowed alcove, partially hidden behind an arras, although one or two people had started to look in their direction curiously—then she turned back towards Derry, plunging her fingers into the opening of his doublet and his shirt front, snagging the edge of a handkerchief with her fingertips and extricating it deftly.  "Hey!" Derry protested, but she silenced him with a swift touch and a mental command.

   You will remember nothing of this!  she instructed him, altering his memories of the evening slightly to include an ill-advised dare involving some visiting Bordermen and copious quantities of Ballymar whiskey.

   "You're drunk, Sean.  Let's head upstairs."  The Contessa speared Celsie with a look.  And you, too, will go upstairs, young lady!  But not just yet.  Let's not set every tongue in Rhemuth to wagging!  She glanced around the Great Hall, her gaze eventually falling on Alaric Morgan and Richenda.  I need you! she mind-spoke to her startled cousin, briefly sending impressions and images to her of what had just happened, albeit slightly edited to leave out certain quite personal details.  And I might require your lord's assistance in getting Derry back to his quarters.

#

   With Morgan's assistance, Derry was soon helped back upstairs, reeling quite convincingly with supposed inebriation and poured deftly onto his bed.  Alaric, after hearing Constanza's account of what had happened, grudgingly agreed it was probably for the best that Derry not remember the details of how he'd accosted Alaric's young ward, especially given that the whole situation wasn't at all his fault, though he insisted on being present when Celsie was questioned.  The demoiselle, now escorted upstairs by Duchess Richenda, looked quite distraught when she entered her apartment.

   "I never meant for that to happen!  I don't know what went wrong," she told them, weeping.

   Duchess Richenda took Celsie's hands in her own.  "We know you didn't," she said gently.  "But we need to know, what exactly did you pray into those stitches?"

   The demoiselle's lips trembled.  She glanced uncertainly at Constanza, then back down at her shaking hands, her face turning crimson.  "I just...."  She turned miserable eyes back up at Richenda.  "All I did was pray that he'd fall in love with me and...and that he'd be a true and honest husband to me!"

   Alaric Morgan, leaning against the wall, winced.

   "Oh, dear."  Richenda squeezed Celsie's hands.  "The handkerchief will need to be destroyed, then.  I'm certain you can understand why, now that you've seen its effects."

   Celsie nodded.  "I never dreamed it would do that to him!  I wouldn't have...it's not right....He's going to hate me now!" she wailed.

   "It's definitely not right, Celsie.  I know you never meant to harm Derry, but a love spell of that sort takes away the recipient's free will.  He was under a compulsion, and I'm quite sure you never meant for that to happen."

   The girl shook her head vehemently.  "No!"  She swallowed.  "It wasn't real.  He said he loved me, but it was never real."  The blue eyes turned up to meet Richenda's looked haunted.

   Richenda gathered Celsie in her arms as the girl shook with sobs, looking more like a young child now rather than a woman of seventeen years.  "Shh.  Hush now, sweeting.  Look at me."

   At last, Celsie regained enough composure to draw back.  "Yes, Your Grace?  Am I—Are you sending me back to Chervignon?"

   Richenda looked startled.  She smoothed the damp golden hair back from the girl's tear-stained cheeks.  "Goodness, no!  If anything, tonight's mistake shows you definitely need more supervised training, and we can hardly offer you that if we send you packing!  No, dear.  We can undo the spell; it will be easy enough to unwork.  And Derry need never know what happened tonight.  But you must promise you will never work another spell of that sort unless your work is properly supervised, and that you'll not attempt to work one on your own again until you've been fully trained.  Only once one of us has told you that you're ready," she added swiftly, remember the brash overconfidence of youth.  "And by 'that sort,' I mean any spell that has the potential to influence another person's behavior or well-being.  Not simply love spells; I think now you understand why you're not to attempt those at all!"

   Celsie nodded, looking quite subdued.  "I'm just as bad as Master Rannigan," she whispered.

   "Oh, child, never that!  Your steward knew full well what he was doing when he sought to take advantage of you.  Your actions were an accident.  Unfortunate, but not malicious."

   Ailidh and Sophie burst into the apartment, laughing.  "You'll never believe who actually danced with Sophie!" Ailidh announced, though the sight of Celsie's devastated expression and the somber expressions of the others in the room stopped both girls in their tracks once they noticed.  "What's wrong?"

   I'll explain later, the Contessa mindspoke to them,  For now, though, let's just get Celsie off to bed. She glanced at Alaric and Richenda, sending them similar thoughts.  Ailidh and Sophie nodded in agreement, reining in their curiosity for the moment as they attempted to comfort Celsie,  escorting her out of the room into their adjoining bedchamber.

   "We'll check back with you in the morning," the Duke quietly assured Constanza.  "And I think I'll stop by Derry's quarters again just to make sure there aren't any lingering effects.  You kept that handkerchief?"

   Constanza produced the item, carefully not handling the embroidered corner.  "Did you wish to hold it for safekeeping?"

   Alaric chuckled grimly.  "God, no!  Not unless she prayed Derry's name into it specifically." He gave his wife a wry smile.  "The last thing I want is to start throwing myself at my ward!"

   The Duke and Duchess of Corwyn took their leave.  Exhausted, Constanza fell into a chair, staying up just long enough to share what had happened with Sophie and Ailidh, warning them to keep a close eye on Celsie until she'd fallen fast asleep, for she was concerned for Celsie's fragile emotional state, and then, realizing that hers was probably the last face Celsie wanted to see just then, she went to bed, any hopes of celebrating the end of the holiday season in her lover's arms quite forgotten.


Chapter 13:  http://www.rhemuthcastle.com/index.php?topic=557.0
"In necessariis unitas, in non-necessariis libertas, in utrisque caritas."

--WARNING!!!--
I have a vocabulary in excess of 75,000 words, and I'm not afraid to use it!

Alkari

Suitably angsty.  :(    Poor Derry - if he remembers anything about this incident at all, he's going to be quite suspicious of anything remotely resembling a handkerchief from now on.  And poor Celsie, who doesn't understand her powers yet.

AnnieUK

I'm feeling sorry for Alaric (no surprises there then!).  All that must have brought Bronwyn's death flooding back to him. 

Alkari

Oh yes - of course that would remind him of Bronwyn, AnnieUK.  He'd have all sorts of terrible memories about love charms, wouldn't he.

Evie

#4
Yes, that's why Richenda ended up having to do the questioning.  Alaric, despite wanting to be fair, might have had trouble being fully objective due to the incident bringing up painful memories of Bronwyn, and Constanza's just as much in love with Derry as Celsie is, despite being realistic enough to know she won't be with him for the long-term, so she'd be torn between some degree of sympathy and yet wanting to shake the girl until her teeth rattle.  Only Richenda is removed enough from the situation to be able to be most fully objective at that moment.

What Derry's going to remember is never, EVER to get into a drinking contest with Border men again if it involves Ballymar whiskey.   ;)

Celsie, otoh, might require a lot of coaxing before she summons up the nerve to use anything but the most basic of her powers again.

Oh, and "angsty" has just begun.  By the end of the holiday season, I think the girls will have next year's holiday calendar pre-marked with "OMG, Twelfth Night's Back...RUN!!!"    :D

By the way, this wasn't how I'd originally planned for Celsie to find out about Derry and Constanza--in fact, this scene wasn't originally supposed to happen at all--but when I was trying to decide what the girls might be making as Twelfth Night gifts, the idea just suddenly sprang up full-blown in my mind like Athena emerging from the head of Zeus.  Again, I blame Elkhound and that story idea wish list.  So, what's it like to be my Muse, Elkhound?  Does the job come with a uniform?  Do muses have wings?   ;)
"In necessariis unitas, in non-necessariis libertas, in utrisque caritas."

--WARNING!!!--
I have a vocabulary in excess of 75,000 words, and I'm not afraid to use it!

AnnieUK

LOL an old friend of mine (female, and old enough to know better) once discovered never to get into tequila drinking contests with Greek marines!  And she hadn't had her memories altered - they were all hers!

Elkhound

Quote from: Evie on July 10, 2010, 11:54:34 AMBy the way, this wasn't how I'd originally planned for Celsie to find out about Derry and Constanza--in fact, this scene wasn't originally supposed to happen at all--but when I was trying to decide what the girls might be making as Twelfth Night gifts, the idea just suddenly sprang up full-blown in my mind like Athena emerging from the head of Zeus.  Again, I blame Elkhound and that story idea wish list.  So, what's it like to be my Muse, Elkhound?  Does the job come with a uniform?  Do muses have wings?   ;)

If I do say so myself, I'm good at coming up with plot gambits; I'm afraid I'm not good at working out the details.  I've only written in two fandoms, both TV shows: The Sentinel and Firefly.

I'm glad you took up my idea; Celsie was playing with fire, and I'm glad that she was no worse than singed.   And Richenda was the right person to deliver the rebuke; Alaric would have given her a blistering dressing-down of the sort he'd give a junior officer who had made a major military blunder, and that would have been much worse. 

Evie

I think you're right, and I'd not have been able to get into the right mindset to write Alaric well, which was another reason I went with Richenda.

You wrote Firefly fanfic?  *big puppy-dog begging eyes*
"In necessariis unitas, in non-necessariis libertas, in utrisque caritas."

--WARNING!!!--
I have a vocabulary in excess of 75,000 words, and I'm not afraid to use it!