January 30th, 1891 - Hogsmeade Memorial Ballroom

Her conversation with Antigone last month had solidified it: Camilla desperately needed to get married. And she did not want to be desperate about it, did not want to be one of those debutantes who fretted endlessly about Men and What They Thought and their Mothers - but she was twenty-five. She was twenty-five and if she had not solidified a man

So tonight at the Exhibition of Art she had a bit of a scheme to get more men on her dance card. With a flick of her wrist, she set her dance card fluttering through the air - and then followed after it as it fluttered and eventually landed between a man and one of the paintings.

She should have planned the scheme better, though - Mr. Selwyn was not necessarily a bachelor she would have tried to target. He was older, and his family was a bit interesting in a way that Camilla did not appreciate.

But he was sort of handsome, and he was single.

And she needed her dance card back besides. Maybe this had not been one of her better-thought-out schemes.

"Do you mind, Mr. Selwyn?" Camilla said, striding up to him. "My dance card has made a bit of an escape." She pointed - the piece of paper rested on the floor between his shoes and the painting.

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Emrys rather resented that he was here at all, when he'd already made a separate trip to take in the art itself and he could have been enjoying much more intimate company at home. He did not make a habit of filling out his social calendar with pointless parties, especially not in January. After Mrs. Lestrange's insinuation of rumors, however, it had seemed irresponsible to miss a chance to be seen taking an interest in things (things being young women).

Of course, that meant that he ought to make an effort to at least appear interested in things, which was not his forte. Subtlety was his forte. Secret liaisons were his forte. When he'd first considered this invitation, before the insinuation of rumors, he'd briefly considered trying to find one of his former affair partners and talking them into a private trip into the Welsh Green — but that sort of thing required discretion, and disappearing for twenty minutes with persons unknown was exactly the opposite of what he was trying to be seen doing. So he'd danced and smiled and exchanged pleasantries with a handful of girls whose names he had already forgotten, playing the role but not enjoying himself in the slightest.

It was exhausting. He'd gone off this way to stare at paintings he'd already seen as a reprieve, but it was apparently destined to be a short-lived one. Miss Zabini, whom he recognized only because she managed to throw parties which were not utterly boring, seemed to have dropped her dance card. He could have simply stepped back and let her fetch it herself, but — he was trying to play nice.

"Of course, Miss," he said, bending to retrieve it and closing the distance between them so that he could hand it back to her. A thought crossed his mind and he wondered briefly how she would respond if he took her wrist in his hand and reaffixed it himself, but of course he didn't. With someone he knew so little, such a gesture could only be seen as intentionally proactive. He was going stir-crazy at this party, he supposed, but he still needed to play nice.

"I'm surprised you still have space available," he said, though he wasn't. "Your suitors must be remiss indeed to let such a lovely lady sit out a dance."

  

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Lou made this! <3

Camilla took her dance card from Mr. Selwyn and kept it between her pointer and index fingers. Mr. Selwyn might have been - maybe-old, but at least he wasn't the one with acknowledged bastards - but he was also complimenting her, and that was better than a net-zero male attention situation.

Her mouth quirked up into a smile. "Oh, thank you," she said, "I suppose that the art may be a distraction." It was - well, not all of the paintings were compelling, but they were something. Camilla somewhat envied the organizers of the event for finding a way to get everyone out here in the middle of winter.

Her eyes flickered towards the painting he had been looking at. "Do you have any favorites?" she asked, waving her free hand towards the wall of paintings. This was the sort of thing smart and interesting girls were supposed to say at art parties; and Camilla was smart and interesting, she was sure of it, but her own impending doom of spinsterhood had her feeling like she was putting on an act.

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Emrys turned his eyes back to the paintings with a slight frown. Should he just choose one at random so that they'd have something to talk about? To be honest, he hadn't found anything in this gallery particularly interesting except the Green, and he had a collector's eye for art. He'd stocked his house with enough expensive pieces that he could have hosted this same event at his house in Bristol — provided that he was interested in having this many people at his house, which of course he wasn't in the slightest.

"I would hesitate to declare a favorite," he answered honestly, because pretending to be enamored with one of these mediocre paintings sounded even more exhausting than pretending to be interested in continuing this conversation. "I consider myself a patron of fine art, but my tastes are... somewhat bolder than what's represented here."

It was a sincere statement — hopefully she did not read into it any ulterior meanings about pornography, or anything. He had realized only after saying it that those were almost precisely the words he would have chosen if he was trying to discreetly shop for pornography, but perhaps Miss Zabini was too naive to know about such things. "How are you finding the exhibition?" he asked, so that she didn't have too much time to ponder his phrasing.

  

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Lou made this! <3

Right, if she was asking him about the art then she was going to have to come up with opinions about the art, and Camilla was not sure what the most fashionable art opinion to have was. What had Witch Weekly suggested the other week? "Some of them seem to be more symbolic than others," she said, because symbolism was good, as was not liking things, and using large words. "But I admit that many of the paintings pale in comparison to the Welsh Green."

There; at least she would not sound stupid, and she had not said something bland, like that she liked the pieces.

She was curious, about the bolder art; Camilla had not realized that art could be bold.

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Emrys shot a sideways glance at her. Symbolic; what did she mean by that? He was no stranger to art with layers of meaning, but had yet to find any of it here. Certainly not in any of the lackluster pieces on the wall before them. Maybe she had more of an interest in this type of art than he did. Maybe she wasn't talking about the art at all, and this was a coded way of saying something that polite young women didn't say in ballrooms. He turned his attention to the art again with renewed interest.

A line of three portraits was before them: a young woman in yellow clutching a rose to her chest; another woman who was looking at the artist with a piercing gaze but whose features looked young, possibly childish; a discombobulated fellow holding a quill pen but no paper. Above were three scenes: a suitor holding a young woman's hand while she lounged in a garden hammock; a mother braiding flowers into a young girl's hair, also in a garden; one woman reading from a parchment while another woman lay dramatically on a bench behind her, as though she'd just been struck. So... what symbolism? Presumably she hadn't been talking about the skied works. The portraits could not be much more than what they appeared. So that left him with the suitors, the mother and daughter, or the melodramatic pair of friends. Something about gossip, perhaps, or did he only jump to the conclusion because that was weighing so heavily on his mind recently? Rumors about sweethearts, maybe, if he combined a few paintings — but what was he meant to make of the mother and child braiding hair in the center?

"Mm, yes, the Green," he agreed, glancing back at it. "Quite impressive. Have you had the opportunity to see the inside yet, Miss Zabini?"

  

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Lou made this! <3

There - she had not made enough of a mistake in talking about the art to have Mr. Selwyn look like he thought she was stupid or boring, and he was the sort of person who knew what 'bold' art was like. This was excellent news for Camilla, and she felt her confidence bolster with it - if she could talk passably about art, then she was certainly ahead of many other debutantes, who had not even thought about how to talk about art or who perhaps did not read Witch Weekly.

"I haven't gotten the chance yet," Camilla admitted, with a rueful smile. "Have you, Mr. Selwyn?"

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"I haven't been up, no," he answered. "Plenty of chances. I've lacked the right company."

It was an honest answer, and one he'd given without really thinking. He had just been internally lamenting a moment ago that he really couldn't sneak off into the Green with any of his usual quarry (men; married socialites; recent widows; in short, people who were unlikely to presume they had any claim to his feelings afterwards). Things like that required discretion, and his purpose here was exactly the opposite of being discreet — he needed to be seen and, if possible, believed to be actively interested in someday acquiring a wife. It occurred to him as he said it, however, that it was exactly the same thing he might have said if he were trying to get her into the Green with him. If his tone had been just a touch more suggestive, she might have thought he was propositioning her.

That was not exactly the kind of publicity he was looking for. He coughed and looked back at the wall of paintings. "What did you mean, symbolic? Which painting caught your eye to bring that word to mind?" He had been trying to avoid asking her about it in case she was trying to make some coy statement about rumors, but he'd rather drag that out in the open than run the risk of her having to respond to his unfortunate remark about the Welsh Green.

  

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Lou made this! <3

Camilla couldn't tell whether or not she was supposed to comment on that; could not tell, in short, whether or not she was being flirted with. Bold art, right company - it was all right in that weird middle area, and she could not figure it out. And before she could really think about it, Mr. Selwyn asked about the art.

Witch Weekly had not prepared Camilla to actually speak about art when her original statement was questioned. Damn the tabloid. She spent a scrambling few seconds thinking about what she knew about the word symbolism - she had taken art through her NEWTs at Hogwarts, come on Camilla - and, knowing the portraits that were around them, also realized that there was nothing especially symbolic about the paintings immediately surrounding them.

This wasn't her first bullshit rodeo, though, so -"Well," Camilla said, "The best example I've seen is in another row - the painting of the woman being consumed by the rosebush. Perhaps a little in-your-face, but one cannot complain too much, right?"

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(yes, I'm stealing the painting from this kayte post)

  

Emrys wrinkled his nose. A woman being consumed by a rose bush. He thought he'd seen it, but it hadn't particularly ensnared his interest; a little too obvious, in his opinion. Apparently Miss Zabini agreed.

"I suppose one oughtn't to complain too much, in case the artist happens to be nearby," Emrys allowed with a diffident shrug. "But you're right, it's very on the nose. Relatable, I suppose, but not especially profound. Sometimes I feel as though I'm being eaten by rosebushes," he admitted, turning around to take another look at the Welsh Green.

  

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Lou made this! <3

Camilla was relieved that she'd hung in there; seven years of Hogwarts art could come surprisingly in handy. She did not, however, understand, what he said when he said he was being eaten by rosebushes - maybe there was something with him and the Pendergast Roses that Camilla had missed?

"Still," she said, deciding to let that one go. It was better not to call people on the weird things they said, unless she already didn't like them. "I do wish that more events here were like this, with art instead of just -" she waved a hand in a 'eh' sort of gesture "- the same string quartet."

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Yes, that was a sentiment that he could agree with wholeheartedly. Typically he didn't have the patience to attend events that were boring, but he understood debutantes didn't have the same luxury. This season, regrettably, he might not, either. Already the prospect of half a dozen boring balls was making his skin itch.

She threw better parties, though, from what he recalled. Emrys, as it turned out, also threw parties that were anything but boring, though most people didn't have first hand experience to say so.

"Well, the hosts and hostesses of the world ought to do their best to save us from such things," he said with a shrug. "Have you ever been to one of my parties?" he asked, though he would be surprised indeed if the answer was yes. He'd certainly never invited her, though sometimes people did slip in on the arms of other guests.

  

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Lou made this! <3

Camilla couldn't help but smirk at his comment; she was confident in her skills as a host, for all that her father complained of her spending too much money in these endeavors, clearly it was worth it.

She had heard that Mr. Selwyn threw interesting parties with exclusive guest lists, but had never actually been to one. And of course Camilla was curious about them, but it wouldn't do to appear too interested - being too interested could scare people off, and at her age she could not be considered to be desperate in any capacity.

So she tilted her head and smiled. "I haven't had the pleasure," Camilla said, "Although I am glad to hear that you wouldn't dabble in the boring, Mr. Selwyn."

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"Well, I'll see that you're invited to the next one," Emrys said with a dark smile. "Assuming you've any choice of chaperone who might be similarly suited to more interesting affairs than this."

He was, unexpectedly, sort of enjoying this conversation — she was being vague and obscure enough to keep him on his toes, anyway, which was either interesting or the next best thing to it. He wasn't so taken by her vaguely-interesting commentary that he was willing to invite just anyone for the sake of securing her company. He had no notion of what the larger Zabini family was like, but the whole scandal surrounding his father and his divorce implied they were at least a little stuffy, and Emrys didn't throw the type of parties stuffy people would enjoy.

  

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Lou made this! <3

More interesting affairs; Camilla kept her head tilted, with the same curious smile on her face. "I'm certain I can conjure an appropriate option for that," she said, although of course it would depend on the circumstances of the actual party, her relatives could be difficult. (Lavinia, maybe, if she asked nicely.)

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