November 3rd, 1892 — Sina's Bedroom

His voice when he demanded his wife roll over was gruff, and the hand he placed on his shoulder to turn her away from him no less abrupt, but the kiss he placed against the nape of her neck when she obliged was gentle. He had come to her room some time earlier and they had already finished with sex and the subsequent cleanup. Now he slid in behind her under the sheets, curving his body to conform to hers while he held her. He wouldn't stay all night, but he wasn't in a hurry to leave. He would hold her until one or both of them drifted off to sleep, then make his way back down the hall to his bedroom in the middle of the night when he was groggy and unlikely to be observed by anyone, except perhaps the earliest risers of the servants who would be awake to prepare the fireplaces for the morning.

It had been several days since his conversation with Christabel, but the topic of discussion kept coming back to his thoughts. It nagged at him any time Daphnel appeared or was mentioned, which was frequently given the impending nuptials, and now as he lay holding Sina's warm body against his and breathing in the scent of her hair and her not- quite- extinguished perfume it occurred to him again.

"I'm afraid we may have been a terrible influence on my siblings," he muttered into her shoulder.

---

Thomasina Dempsey Cassius Lestrange

The following 1 user Likes Ozymandias Dempsey's post:1 user Likes Ozymandias Dempsey's post
   Madeleine Backus

---

MJ is the light of my life <3

She would never admit it out loud, but Sina was immensely fond of this — post-coital, Oz framing her like a parenthesis against a letter, as she tumbled back into sleep.

She arched her back against him as he spoke in silent acknowledgment that, yes, she was still awake. "I'm not surprised," she whispered back to him, "Which one?"

---

  

Oz mumbled something inarticulate but disapproving into her shoulder. He'd been hoping she would already know what he was referring to, but apparently not. Or maybe she just wanted to force him to say it explicitly. That was possible, because he wasn't sure exactly what to say, and he had the sense that sometimes she liked to see him fumble with words.

"Chris has decided she can be happy and successful while married to a man who doesn't care for her," he explained. "She respects you more than I've credited, it seems."

---

  

---

MJ is the light of my life <3

Sina hummed. "But you obviously have some emotion for me," she contended, "And I cannot say the same for Daphnel." Christabel would be neglected in marriage, perhaps — worse than that, she would be bored. Even if she actually did hate Oz, at least Thomasina would have never been bored by him.

---

  

Oz was surprised by her response, until he realized that she hadn't specified which emotion. He supposed it ought to have been obvious to anyone that there was something between the two of them, but presumably the same could be said for Daphnel and Christabel. She had mentioned that she found him funny and sweet, hadn't she? So he must have displayed some feeling towards her at some point, even if it was nothing stronger than mild interest or affection. Who could contend that mutual admiration, if that was what they claimed to share, was a shakier basis for a marriage than the mutual disdain Ozymandias and Thomasina evidently had? That was the difficulty in persuading her to give it up; from her perspective, knowing what she did about her brother's marriage, Oz understood her point of view perfectly.

"She doesn't understand that. People don't understand us," he said with a sigh, as though this was not a problem entirely of his own making; as though this had not been the design all along. "And she thinks she's in love with him."

---

  

---

MJ is the light of my life <3

Sometimes Sina thought that someone ought to have figured them out by now; she and Oz were both smart people, after all. If they had nothing to feel for each other except hatred, surely they would have stopped talking by now — and yet they kept at it, and they had never been called out for it, besides. The average member of wizarding society was, Sina had to conclude, significantly dumber than Sina and her husband.

She sighed back at him, which also had the effect of further settling her back against his chest. "On what basis does she presume herself in love?" Sina asked, sounding like a skeptical scientist.

---

  

Oz huffed in irritation that was clearly not directed at his wife. "I haven't the faintest. I'm not sure she does, either. One of the many problems of being raised by poets. Everyone in my family has spent too much time talking about love to know what the word means anymore." Himself being the obvious exception (Oz considered himself an exception to all judgements he passed on his family), they were all quite hopeless. Endymion was incurably romantic, Porphyria was militantly Romantic, and Lycoris was infatuated with Dash, of all people. Christabel was actually doing better than most of them, most likely, but that didn't mean she wasn't making a mistake.

---

  

---

MJ is the light of my life <3

Sina sighed. This was another problem with the Dempseys; they spent too much time in their own heads. "He's not even that interesting," she said. "But perhaps she'd rather marry someone who does not love her than be alone."

---

  

"Yes," Oz agreed, frowning into her hair. He didn't bother to specify which part he was agreeing to; Thomasina had the right of it on both counts. Maybe it was some mercy that Daphnel's only objectionable quality seemed to be that he was boring and not in love with Christabel. He was not, at least as far as Oz could determine, cruel or stupid. Ozymandias would have said there was no danger of Christa being so undiscerning as to allow herself to be courted and become engaged to someone cruel or stupid, but he would have thought her better than boring, too, so here they were.

"But that's asinine," he said, with a rush of frustration. Although it wasn't directed at Sina she would have felt the effects of it: his grip on her tightened slightly, his voice was a little louder and more impassioned despite still talking essentially in her ear. "She must recognize that she'll be miserable. Not immediately, perhaps, but eventually." Of course, the whole reason they were having this conversation in the first place was that Chris didn't recognize that. Bad role models — why would she think a loveless marriage would decay rapidly when it was allegedly what Oz and Thomasina had, and neither of them were particularly miserable five years down the line?

"She's probably going to end up with children a year from now," he said with disdain. It was a forgone conclusion, probably. If Christabel was willing to subject herself to a loveless marriage for the sake of... whatever her rationale had been when deciding to press on with this, she wouldn't do it by halves. Even if she'd wanted to delay procreating, Ozy doubted his little sister would know how; it wasn't the sort of thing to come up in a steamy romance novel. It was unlikely to come up during the traditional mother-daughter day before the wedding description of sex. And Oz certainly wasn't going to tell her.

---

WC: 325

  

---

MJ is the light of my life <3

"Other people are worse at being alone than we are," Thomasina pointed out, and never mind that she hadn't been alone in five years. She had been well on her way to spinsterhood before Oz proposed, and had been perfectly content that way, as long as she had her work and some of society. (And — had her husband ever truly been alone? Sina didn't know, but that didn't matter. Men were different.)

The question of children was a difficult one. Sina wrinkled her nose. She didn't want them — and neither did Oz. It was just another way they were privately well-matched. "I could talk to her," Sina offered, "About children."

---

  

Thomasina's offer surprised him; it wasn't an option that he had considered himself. Oz took a moment to turn it over in his mind. In many ways it was a perfectly elegant solution. Women were allowed to talk to each other about these sorts of things, Ozymandias presumed, without anyone thinking it scandalous — had he been the one to broach the subject there was a good chance Christabel wouldn't listen, even if she could get through the embarrassment inherent in discussing anything related to sex with one's sibling. And Thomasina was far enough removed from the matter that she didn't have to sugar-coat anything while pretending to be blithely, unconditionally supportive, like their mother would have had to do.

On the other hand, it would by necessity give Christa far more insight into their marriage than Oz would have preferred. Even if Sina didn't tell her anything that was about them specifically, it was not a large leap in logic and Christabel wasn't unintelligent. Obviously everyone knew that they didn't have children, but most people assumed it was because they couldn't stand each other long enough to complete the deed to conceive them (or that there was something wrong with Thomasina — of course some contingent would always think of that possibility whenever a married women didn't have children). So Christabel would know, coming out of that conversation, that their choice not to have children was just that — an incredibly deliberate choice that they made constantly. What would she do with that information?

The worst case scenario, Oz decided, was that she might try to confront him and question him about it someday — but he could dodge those questions when and if she chose to pose them. She would probably be easy to avoid, at least comparatively; she wasn't going to be living here any more, so she couldn't stake out the study all weekend, or something of that nature. And maybe she would be too busy with married life to bother trying to figure him out.

"That would be... good, I think," he said eventually. He ran one hand appreciatively down her arm and kissed her shoulder once again. "Thank you."

---

  

---

MJ is the light of my life <3

Sina sighed; unlike their daytime interactions, her tone was relieved rather than exasperated. "I'll see what I can do," she said. She closed her eyes. "I can't make her take my advice, but I can tell her about it."

At the very least, she could give a more medically sound description of intercourse than Lowri. Sina expected her version would be helpful.

---

  

"No, of course," he agreed, as he stifled a yawn. "You can't protect anyone from their own stupidity." Having children wasn't inherently stupid; it just wasn't for them. Having children with someone who you weren't sure loved you or not was certainly stupid, on the other hand — but so was marrying someone who didn't love you, and Christabel had apparently resigned herself to that.

---

  

---

MJ is the light of my life <3

Sina sighed. She'd be much more comfortable in the world if she could control other people's stupid choices, but all she could do was advise them, and there were so few people who listened to her. "At least Daphnel has money," Sina offered.

---

  

---

set by MJ

Well, it wasn't as though anyone would have let Christabel go through with this if he didn't. Throwing oneself into poverty for the sake of love was one thing, and while he personally couldn't have stomached it he was sure she would have found some support in the Hopeless Romantics of the family. Marrying not for love but for stability was less palatable, but common enough that Chris could announce to everyone what she had said to Oz and probably still have come away with their blessing, for the most part. No one would have let her marry if she wasn't likely to have stability or love.

"Money does cover a wide range of sins," he noted, this time failing to stifle the yawn. "I'm getting you rubies for Christmas."

---

  

---

MJ is the light of my life <3

Sina's eyes were still closed, and she shifted until she was fully settled in the bed. They would drift off soon, and Oz would be gone before the morning started — leaving her to sprawl out and happily take up her whole bed until she had to rise. "And what sins are you covering?" she asked, tone mild.

---

  

---

set by MJ