January 6th, 1889 — Oakshire Hall, Kent

In her panic to write to Tiberius before she suffered the consequences of a strangely reticent Unbreakable Vow, she had missed all signs that she was actually in London the whole time. It hadn't helped that she was completely unfamiliar with the area she'd found herself in, she'd never been to America before so for all she knew it looked like a London dockyard. Hadn't the British colonized it, after all?

However, she started to pick up on little hints after the letter had gone. The abundance of accents she recognized as some variety of British, the occasionally familiar street sign, it wasn't until she found herself staring at the sign for the Leaky Cauldron that she realized she'd well and truly made a big mistake. No wonder she was still alive. Rather than relief, however, she only felt humiliation. What a fool she'd look if anyone found out, if Tiberius found out. Her regard for him might have diminished considerably when she found out about his failure but that was old news, how could she disdain him after this? She also couldn't easily forget that it was only a matter of hours ago she had been yearning for him with a violence that now seemed distasteful and embarrassing.

All she could think of doing was hiding out for a few more days so that it seemed as though she really had been abroad. She wiled away January 5th meandering around the countryside as a lynx once again, until finally an owl found her. Initially she had tried to attack it but then she spotted the letter in its talons and desisted. The letter from Tiberius changed everything. Tig crushed the letter in her hand and, outraged, apparated home.

Tig stormed through the house until she came to his study door. With the fist that still clutched his letter tightly, she pounded heavily upon the door, forcing herself to remain silent while she waited for him to investigate. She was somewhat unkempt with her hair half down and dirt on the hem of her dress, her wand was firmly enclosed in the hand that wasn't assaulting the door and the whole look was completed by the thunderous expression on her face.
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Tiberius had been more or less living in his study since his failure to perform the Animagus transformation several months prior. He believed he had finished the necessary preparations — he would be truly ready this time, and he would complete it or he would die in the attempt. He'd missed two lightning storms while waiting out the full moons required to rebrew the potion, and had been chanting his incantation ever since, but the winter sky had remained stubbornly clear. He grew more frustrated every passing day, and what he had once seen as a convenience (the daily absence of his wife) he had become irritated by. She was out there, prowling their property as a cat out of spite. She was lurking in the woods, laughing at his failure.

So, he'd told a friend of his (friend was perhaps a strong word for someone he knew only through their connection to the black market) that there were predators on his land he wouldn't mind being rid of. Something killing the owls. She wasn't, actually, but it had seemed a reasonable excuse, and it was all the other man — who had experience as a poacher — needed to act. Tiberius wasn't sure he'd actually intended for her to get caught or only inconvenienced by the presence of a hunter on the property, but he supposed he hadn't been surprised when she'd been trapped. Maybe a few days in a cage would teach her some humility, the saucy bitch.

He had been surprised to hear she was in America. It had seemed unlikely she would be able to effect a return on her own, with no money or even, to the best of his knowledge, her wand. He'd been pondering how best to stage her death without a body, which was terribly inconvenient, but decidedly less inconvenient than actually trying to track her down on another continent.

And then she was outside his study door. He knew it was her immediately, though he told himself he could have been mistaken. None of the servants would have knocked in that manner, though, nor would a visiting family member, if they had somehow arrived without alerting anyone who would have announced them. Only Antigone would feel she had some sort of right to his time, particularly in this room. It turned out his initial feeling was correct. He raised an eyebrow at his dissheleved wife, but did not move to open the door any wider than the ten inches or so necessary for him to gaze out.

"You found your way home," he said impassively. "Impressive."

  

"No thanks to you," she spat angrily. It pissed her off that he was barring her entrance and it pissed her off that he had been so blasé about her predicament, as if her life hadn't hung in the balance. Of course she knew now that her life had never been at risk and that for her to even be angry about his reaction suggested some level of care which she couldn't possibly admit to. "Not that I ever needed your help, and I certainly didn't need to be rescued. Not by you." Her rage had simmered down far too quickly and her underlying embarrassment was starting to creep back. What in the hell had she thought she was doing by going to him? What had she expected to say?

With a single letter and a rash arrival at his door she'd managed to - in her eyes - tip the scales of power back in his favor. What had she done? She gave an insisted shove at the door but hoped he didn't admit her, what she really wanted to do was somehow retreat without actually seeming to be in retreat from him.

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He wondered vaguely how she had gotten back. The timeline was rather tight, since he'd only received her letter to days ago. He wouldn't ask her, though, lest she have a truly impressive answer. This whole ordeal was supposed to make her less insufferably superior, not give her something else to be smug about.

However she'd gotten home, though, she had left in a cage. That much he knew, and that was enough to hurt her pride considerably, he imagined. Maybe if she got too self-satisfied in the future, he could buy a magical trap of his own and lock her in a menagerie. She'd make an exotic addition to the veranda. He could put her next to the fountain, then invite Valeria and her family over for tea. Maybe that brat of his cousin's — the one who wasn't his — would stick a finger inside and Antigone would claw it off. Win-win.

For now, though, he just needed her to back off. "I trust you had a comfortable journey, then?" he said snidely. Although he didn't come right out and say it, his tone certainly implied that he was aware of her method of transportation.

  

She furrowed her brow. His words, while infuriating, struck her as odd. Why would he say that and why like that? Did he know she'd only ever gotten as far as London? "What does it matter to you?" What do you know about it? "You don't even seem surprised to see me." Was it a testament to his faith in her abilities or did he know more than he was letting on? She edged towards him, even though the very action filled her with revulsion. This wasn't likely going to end with her regaining the upper hand and yet she couldn't help herself.

Tig pushed against the door more subtly this time and leered at him. "Were you even surprised that I was gone?" His letter certainly hadn't suggested it which was partly why it had enraged her so. Were the tables turned she would likely have been surprised, although she probably wouldn't have lifted a finger to help either, not that she thought he'd be likely to send her a letter about it. Hell the only reason she'd even written was because she'd thought her life hung in the balance.

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Surprised that she was gone? Hardly. "Why would I be?" he answered with a dark look. "You haven't been here more than a week altogether out of the past nine months." This may have been an exaggeration, but if so, it wasn't a large one. Of course, Tiberius himself had fled the country for several of those months, in order to focus on his Animagus studies privately (and a lot of good that had done), but he'd enlisted the help of his sister to come and check on Antigone periodically to ensure she was behaving herself. Tatianna had always reported that Antigone had been out when she'd stopped by — and that the servants knew neither where she was or when she was coming back. That uncertainty may have been one of the factors that had brought him home when he did, instead of waiting out a lightning storm abroad. He could have been abroad still if his wife hadn't taken to the wilderness.

He still wasn't sure if this was what Antigone wanted, or if she was just spending most of her days running around as an overgrown cat to spite him. Had she imagined this when she was studying to perform the transformation? Had this been what had driven her to succeed, the idea of becoming a feral, independent thing that disappeared for days on end?

Tiberius didn't regret letting the poacher on the property. The mental image of her in a cage pleased him. He only regretted that he hadn't been able to see it himself.

  

She had to reluctantly concede that he made a good point, she had barely been at the house since her successful transformation, her involuntary absence That he was aware of the extent of her absence, however, surprised her. Even if he had only had the staff keeping tabs on her comings and goings that level of interest was more than she'd expected of him.

"I had no idea you were paying so much attention. I hope you weren't pining after me, I'm not sure my respect for you could survive that." Tig entertained a smirk and leaned her full weight against the door. What he'd said about enjoying her journey still seemed odd to her but the odds of him expanding on it seemed smaller than the odds of winding him up to a point of blind fury at the moment. "Even Moselle doesn't pine for me, but then that's the way of cats." In an off-hand sort of way, she added pointedly, "Dogs pine." Hadn't he once told her that his patronus was a wolf? Not that she'd spent any length of time reflecting on that conversation.

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Tiberius wasn't sure what was more frustrating: her choice of vocabulary (pining!), her tone as she said it, or the way she leaned against the door. She was physically intruding into his personal space now, even if she was only a few inches into the doorway, in addition to encroaching on his patience. If she had hit anywhere near truth with her jab, it might have provoked him to fury, but the notion that he could pine for anyone, least of all his useless saltpeter wife, was so ridiculous he couldn't possibly be truly angry about the remark.

That didn't mean he was going to waste time entertaining it, though. Without comment, Tiberius gave the door a hefty shove, intending to shut it in her face — even if that meant sending her sprawling across the hallway as a result.

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   Antigone Lestrange

Feeling the door moving against her she reflexively pushed against it. Not that it did her much good. "Did I touch a nerve?" Tig hissed against the closed door she now found herself pressed up against. She chuckled despite not really being amused. On the contrary, she could feel her temper quickly rising back to the surface at having been so abruptly cut off from the object of her interest.

"Coward!" She moved to thump the door with her fist but at the last minute feared it might be too revealing a gesture and instead hit the door with her flat of her hand, digging her nails in to the wood to satisfy her frustration. "You couldn't become an animagus and now you can't even face your own wife!" Her eyes shone vindictively as she anticipated the effect of her next words. "You're a pathetic excuse for a man." She felt a rush of adrenaline run through her as she anticipated him flinging the door open in a seething rage.

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As the door shut Tiberius turned to lean against it, lest Antigone throw herself at it in an attempt to force it open. Given her history of acting with grace and poise, it didn't seem at all unlikely. He didn't reach to lock the door, however, because he knew she would be able to hear the audible click from the hallway, and he didn't want it to seem as though he was worried she would try to come in. He wasn't running away. He just wasn't wasting his time with her any longer.

The silencing spells on the walls were designed to keep noise from his activities from reaching the outside world, but they also served to prevent incoming sounds — or would have, if Antigone hadn't been mere inches away from him and obviously upset.  She intended her words to be heard, he knew, and specifically intended to engage him, and if he hadn't had this thought in the forefront of his mind when she started speaking, she may have succeeded.

What to do with Antigone? He could poison her. He owned numerous books on the subject and would be spoiled for choice if he went that route. He could kill her so seamlessly a healer would be baffled, or leech away her strength until she was left bedridden and helpless for weeks. He closed his eyes briefly and remembered the way her face had looked when she'd nearly died two years ago. Ashen and sweaty, with an expression of need she'd been too weak to try and articulate.

He couldn't poison her if she wasn't at home, though, unless he let loose a small army of magically altered mice in the woods for her to subsist on. That was too much work, and too unpredictable. He wouldn't be able to monitor the effects until she was incapacitated or dead.

Lashing out wouldn't fix her. If it would have, she'd have learned her lesson long ago. He'd threatened her, struck her, burned insults into her skin, and still she came at him like this. She'd been locked in a cage and hadn't emerged from the experience even slightly humbled. What, then, to do with his wild and willful bride?

He took a deep breath and looked around the study, as though the books and artifacts collected there could answer the question for him. He remained where he was against the door, his entire body tight like a compressed spring ready to snap.

  

For a few seconds she remained pressed against the door, listening intently but the only sound she could make out was that of her own pulse. He wasn't biting. This was unprecedented, this wasn't how things were supposed to go. How dare he, how dare he keep his temper! If she didn't even have power to provoke him, then what did she have? He may have slipped in her esteem since his failure at animagus transformation but she had never for a second thought his opinion of her could suffer. Was that it? Honestly, she had never known what he felt for her but there had been times when she felt fairly confidant that she had somehow earned some extent of appreciation from him.

It had never before concerned her what he might think of her but suddenly it did now. Clearly her concern came from the very real possibility that he might kill her one day if he no longer valued her in any way, or at least that was what she latched on to as an explanation. What could she do? If she just walked away the problem remained and she'd likely fixate on it until she got to the bottom of it, but if she persisted she might not get anywhere anyway and look foolish in the process.

Unless there was another way to get his attention? What did he care about that wasn't in his study? Was there anything? Short of committing a grisly murder in the foyer, she could think of nothing that might draw him out. "Tiberius!" she snarled, frustration getting the better of her again. She slammed her fist hard against the door a couple times despite knowing it to be a futile gesture. Next she tried leaning against the door but it was either locked or he was leaning against it, either way she wasn't physically strong enough to overpower it. Tig rested her forehead against door, jaw and fists clenched as she tried to compose herself enough that she wouldn't do something humiliating she'd later regret. If only she'd managed to get a better grasp of legilimency, perhaps she'd have been able to use it through the door but she hadn't really tried it since the incident with the dead maid. Despite her certainty it wouldn't work, her hand was already removing her wand from the pocket of her dress. She couldn't make eye contact, she couldn't possibly pull it off, but as long as he was unable to witness her inevitable failure what did it matter? Tig pictured him in her mind and the consequent surge of anger gave her the conviction to mutter the incantation beneath her breath.

It wasn't going to work, there was no way in hell it would and yet as she strained to form some sort of connection, she realized her own desperation and suddenly feared what she might reveal to him should she succeed. At that moment, as if to spite her, she thought she might have actually done it. Shit. Tig wrenched her mind away from whatever she had sensed - real or imagined - and violently recoiled from the door. "I wish I'd stayed in that cage!" she shrieked, rounding on the door and giving it a good thump with her fist before storming off as quickly as her skirts would allow. Had she actually done it or had she just imagined it? She didn't want to think about the possibility that she'd actually made contact, what might he have glimpsed?

Tig headed upstairs and as she neared his bedroom door, her temper got the better of her. She let out a loud screech and flung his bedroom door open so aggressively that the handle hit the wall. She responded by flinging it back the other way, but instead of slamming shut it bounced back from the door frame. What now? She could ransack his room and it would probably make her feel a bit better but now that she was there she didn't really feel like doing anything but leaving.

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Tiberius was still leaning against the door and listening to her repeated attempts to open it thudding dully behind him when he felt it. A powerful, but clumsy burst of mental energy. Was she trying to use legilimency on him? Cute. He had once used the metaphor, when teaching her this very skill, of sneaking into and exploring a house. Her brief attempt was akin to using a batting ram against the front door. Even Cassius, damaged and oblivious as he was, would have recognized it. Her anger and frustration practically radiated through the door.

Why was she so keen to anger him? She was willing to attempt legilimency, knowing the risks and the improbability of success, to find a way to do so. What was her goal? Why stoke his ire?

He heard her storm away and moved to follow her without really knowing why. Up the stairs, down the hall, into ... the wrong bedroom. There was confusion on his face as he slipped inside the door, but when he saw her there — alone in the middle of the room, doing nothing, going nowhere — something clicked. A light shone in his dark eyes as he closed the door behind him.

"Was this what you wanted?" he said with a sneer, though his pulse had quickened at the thought of what was to come. From where she was standing it took only one strong shove to send her sprawling onto the bed. "Filthy whore," he muttered, reaching for his belt.

  

Perhaps if she hadn't been making so much noise she might have heard him following her. The surprise was clear as day on her face when she turned towards the sound of his voice. Mere minutes ago she would have been pleased by this turn of events but now all she felt was an almost nauseating level of embarrassment. He'd seen! He'd seen too much and now she couldn't wish herself out of existence any more ardently.

She was more or less frozen with horror at the thought of what he might have gleaned from her - seemingly successful - attempt at legilimency, he could have pushed her with considerably less force and achieved the same result. It wasn't until she realized he was starting to remove his belt that she remembered herself. Tig scrambled backwards into a more defensive position. "What did you see?" Whatever had drawn him out of his study seemed to have had the effect of shifting the balance of power more in his favor and she was convinced it came at the cost of her pride. She felt as though the ground had been knocked out from underneath her and the worst part was that it was entirely her own doing.

Before he could make a move to stop her, she slid off the opposite side of the bed from where he was and stood facing him. "I have to know." As assertive as she was trying to come across, she was painfully aware of the wavering in her voice. As long as she wasn't red in the face too...

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Her clumsy attempt at legilimency hadn't really given him much of an opportunity to actually peer around in her thoughts, probably most likely because he hadn't really been trying to retaliate. He was still holding to the promise he'd made himself when they wed about not using legilimency on her, though he'd questioned the wisdom of such a policy on many occasions. It hadn't been a matter of seeing so much as feeling, a moment ago — it was impossible not to get a sense of the emotion behind the attempt, which was particularly vivid for him, since he tended not to experience such intense feelings except in exceptional circumstances. He didn't know how to communicate that, though — and wasn't sure that he would even want to — so he ignored her question and continued his own train of thought instead.

"So desperate to get in, weren't you?" he said with a sneer as he pulled his belt loose and dropped it to the floor. "Who was really pining, Antigone?" he taunted as he crossed towards her.

  

Her cheeks burned intolerably as he spoke. Maybe, maybe on some level she could admit that she wanted him but that didn't mean she cared about him. It was enough to snap her back to her usual aggressive self. "Oh shut up will you!" She marched around the bed to stand in front of him, jaw squared and face still red with what she was telling herself was anger. "You could be found dead in a ditch tomorrow and I wouldn't give a damn." She thought she might give a damn if his will didn't treat her favorably, however.

"Not that you can talk, I've never seen someone so eager to undress in the midst of winter." Her eyes flicked down to where his belt lay discarded and back up to his face, resenting the involuntary rush it gave her.

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"Shut up," he grumbled, not in anger but in impatience. She was using an absurd amount of words for a situation that required none. He'd already decided how this encounter was going to end, and nothing she said was going to affect that. She'd closed the distance between them and now he reached out for her, seizing her hips with both hands and pulling her to him. He then slid one arm around her waist to keep her from pulling away. His right hand went to the closure of her dress, though he didn't have time for buttons or laces. She'd probably already ruined the dress anyway with her trek through the wilderness. He tugged it sharply, hoping the fabric would give way.