Ada fundamentally understood what she was being told but simply couldn't understand how it could be. "N-No," she rebuked. "I won't accept that. You can trust me, Mr. Urquart, I would do anything for you, I am yours heart and soul! I won't leave you like I did before, never again, I'll never leave you." She was starting to turn an unhealthy pallor as though taking ill, the look of frantic desperation in her eyes didn't help either. "I understand why you wouldn't trust me, I'm sure I would feel much the same were I you, but I swear upon my honor..." In what was a very sudden and brazen move, especially for Ada, she seized his hand and placed it upon her chest, just above her heart. "Does it not beat true?" Whether her heart was 'true' or not wasn't so apparent as the alarming palpitations it was making.

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Hastily, he withdrew his hand. Nothing about the situation felt at all right and, for a moment, Balt wondered if it would not be best—for both parties—to simply abandon Miss Lovegood there. Not the gallant thing, to be sure, but with reason escaping her entirely, he wondered if he truly had any other option.

"No," he said frankly, even coolly. "Miss Lovegood, I think it best that you return home to your brother."

  

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Ada was by no means the sort of woman one might call haughty or proud, but even she would have been mortified by her actions were she in her right mind. "But I love you!" She suddenly sank to her knees in the middle of the street, a look of deep anguish on her face as she stared up at him. "I shall never love again, you are my only chance of happiness, can't you love me?" Tears started to well up in her eyes. "I'll do anything for you, anything at all! Please don't leave me, if you leave my life shan't be worth living a second longer. I can be mother to your children," by this point she was lightly sobbing, "I can take care of you if you'll only let me love you!"

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If the pair had not drawn attention before, they certainly were now.

Balthazar was torn. Before him was the woman who had left him at the alter, who had publicly humiliated him, who had insisted she did not love him. Not a man alive would suggest he owed Miss Lovegood anything—she had shigged him out of his dignity, his children out of a maternal figure (though to be fair, had saved herself from the Topaz situation).

But she was clearly upset, and for a time, he had borne her affection. His father had never been a particularly compassionate man, but Gaylord Urquart had at the least instilled in his son a basic degree of chivalry. A glowsy weight upon him—guilt? Sadness?—Balthazar reached into his jacket, producing a handkerchief for the young woman.

"There, there," he offered kindly, more gentleness to his tone now. In spite of what had happened, Balt knew she was not some fly-by-sky without a head on her shoulders. She deserved some measure of care.

  

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"Thank you." It was not because of the tears on her face that she accepted the handkerchief so readily. Ada held it just under her eyes so that it might catch her tears but also allow her to breathe in the scent of him through the fabric. She hoped he wouldn't ask for it back, she wanted to keep this handkerchief always, she would wear it close to her heart until the day he realized that he loved her back.

Through a pathetic little sniffle she asked, "Will you not give me a second chance?"

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A sad smile now. In the days, even weeks after she had jilted him? Of course he would have. He would not have felt right denying such a request, refusing to allow for the fact that people—men and women alike—did make mistakes, did change their minds. But today?

Even were she in her mind, too much had transpired for the Urquart family for Balt to allow Miss Lovegood to join their ranks. Topaz's condition...it was not a burden that he would place on Miss Lovegood's shoulders.

"No, Miss Lovegood," the wizard replied gently. "I do not think it would be in either of our interests to do so, not really—your brothers would most certainly agree, and I believe even you will, given some time to think on the matter."

Some time to recover from whatever this was.

  

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Ada hiccuped into the silence. He did not love her, could not love her, would not have her... What was she to do with all this love? This torturous, unwanted love he would not accept? How could she bear it? The answer came to her quite suddenly and a violent compulsion to obey it set in almost as quickly.

"Then there is nothing left for me but to end my life." It might have been funny had she not said it with such resolute conviction. The love potion was making it impossible for her to accept what she was hearing and her romantic tendencies were being blown wildly out of proportion. Perhaps a tiny part of her addled mind was also hoping the threat of her demise would bring out the romantic overtures she so craved from him.

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   Balthazar Urquart

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Balthazar gave a strained chuckle at her feeble joke, but the colour swiftly drained from his face as, looking at her, he realized that Miss Lovegood might actually be serious. What the hell had come over her so, to make her behave this irrationally?!

"Miss Lovegood, I do not believe it appropriate to joke about such things," came his careful reply.

  

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Some vague semblance of sense, a mere twinge of sanity, came back to her for a fleeting moment. Foolish. She was being foolish. She was embarrassing herself. She hadn't been joking, she knew this, but she also knew somehow that deep down she wouldn't, she couldn't. The pangs of mad love were trying to tell her otherwise but she couldn't quite grasp the sense of it.

It was, however, a passing moment of faint clarity. No, she wouldn't do it probably, but he didn't know that and what better way to make him expose his love for her than to let him think she was deadly serious? "I would never joke about my love!" She rose to her feet a little unsteadily. "Not to you." Now would be the hard part, she'd have to walk away from him willingly. "I shall go directly," Ada murmured, dabbing at her cheeks as she turned from him.

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He almost stopped her—with Miss Lovegood behaving so queerly, Balt was uncomfortable letting her set forth on her own, lest some sort of trouble befall her. He held himself back, though, his fingers half extended in a motion that never reached fruition.

Whatever had happened to Adelia Lovegood was not something he could fix, and he was loath to risk further confusing the matter. And so, the wizard merely watched instead as his former fiance disappeared once again into the crowd.

  

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— mj makes pretty things! —