Ford watched as she began to climb the chair, eager at first to see whether this really worked. He was not used to knowing a spell in a pinch — not that he often found himself needing to; he tried to avoid disasters whenever possible, unless they were directly related to his job. Still, he'd never been the best under pressure back at Hogwarts, so he'd been a little hesitant to be too hopeful about the charm holding on the chair. When it became clear that it was working just fine — or, rather, once Miss Farley had climbed up high enough that continuing to watch her would put him in danger of accidentally peering up her skirt, or being accused of it — he diverted his gaze, cheeks flushing.

Perhaps she sensed that something had shifted, because she stopped and called a question back at him. Ford blinked up at her. "Well, I'm not staying down here," he answered. It was true, but all the same — she could have gotten up to the next room first and then asked him, couldn't she have, instead of beckoning him to follow while she was right above him? If she hadn't noticed the position she had put him in, though, Ford wasn't going to call attention to it. He moved to the base of the chair and focused his gaze very specifically on the area right around his hands as he followed her up.

Fortunately for both of them, the room they arrived in seemed intact — except for the hole in the floor from where the chair had burst through. After picking his way through the splintered wood to get clear of the gap, Ford took a second to get his bearings. "The staircase to the ballroom should be that way, right?"

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Set by Lady!

It must be getting hotter by the second below her, for she could see his reddened face from halfway up the chair-ladder; it didn’t occur to Jemima that he might be able to look up her skirts. (Frankly, if they got out of this alive she didn’t care who saw up her skirts.)

Still, satisfied he wasn’t going to practise self-immolation in the powder room, Jemima hauled herself – not particularly elegantly – onto the floor of the room above, breathing heavily from all the stress and exertion. She was not used to doing more than dancing these days; this had been rather a lot to contend with all at once.

Of course, it was not over yet... but it felt far easier to breathe when there was not only a door between them and the flames. Jemima nodded, scanning their surroundings as swiftly as she could, eager to be back in the ballroom and find her sister and – his family, she supposed. She wasn’t sure if he had mentioned who he was with. “I think so,” she said breathlessly, giving him a small smile in gratitude and sympathy and brimming trepidation at what they might possibly find in the ballroom when they got there. “Let’s go.”

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