She didn't want to think it was true, and surely there had to be something else that kept she and Ari together after what they had endured—but she couldn't think of anything. Total blank. She stayed with Ari because of her own reputation but more importantly the good of her son, and Ari - well, he was with her because she give him a way to hide who he really was, but if not for Elliott would she have accepted that and stayed? She wasn't so sure anymore. She loved Ari, just liked she loved Zelda, but if given a chance to pursue happiness without it affecting her son she couldn't be so sure that she would pass on it.

And the fact that she was even second-guessing herself was not helping her try to tone down the intensity of this entire conversation. She will riddled with guilt and now she couldn't hide it on her face; her attempt to keep her lips in a straight line only resulted in a strained, unattractive frown.

"We have similar interests and we get along, but that's not holding our marriage together," she admitted, a little miserably. If only Ari was able to love her—or even be attracted to her, if he couldn't love her—there might be hope for them later on even without Elliott gluing them together, but knowing how he was Dionisia felt - trapped. There was a limit to their relationship, no room for growth, a finality they'd already reached. As seriously as she'd thought truth it and as much as she knew her thought process to be real and sound, she felt no less silly admitting it to another person. "We just live with each other. There's no - no anything."

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Zelda was ready to protest some more, to say that Dio was wrong, that Ari wasn't like that and neither was she, but what Dionisia said next cut off her argument right at the knees.

"You mean you don't —?" Zelda said. She couldn't bring herself to say it out loud, but was sure that Dio would know what she was thinking of. Dio was a mediwitch, and she had a child; she knew about intimacy and had evidently had it. But why wasn't she having it with Ari, when they were married and it was safe and encouraged, even? What was the point of being married — sure, love, whatever — if there wasn't intimacy involved?

There were a lot of reasons Zelda wanted to marry Alfred, but certainly one of them was that they would get to do all of that without having to worry about getting caught — and Ari and Dionisia were married and not touching each other, at all? She was utterly baffled, and it wasn't even the important part of what Dio said.

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   Dionisia Fisk

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That was... not what she expected Zelda to focus on, admittedly, because it was not what she'd intended with her previous remarks. But now that's all she could focus on, and - God it was embarrassing, because she still couldn't forget that one time she thought Ari was trying to sleep with her when he wasn't, and how she'd been disappointed and cried—

She pushed the thoughts out of her head, the heat rising on her cheeks. "No. We don't." It was quick but firm and final; she could not explain any further without the risk of hinting Zelda into things she'd promised Ari she would never speak of.

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"I —" Zelda started, and trailed off. She was trying to get better at saying what she meant to say, instead of just the first thing to pop into her head, but had evidently been failing so far. She took a deep breath in and sighed. Focus. "Even so," she said, "If you're going to talk to Mr. Crouch, you should probably tell him." Before he stumbled upon all the letters as Zelda had.

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She ought to tell Ari, definitely, because it was the good and honest thing to do, but she'd tried before and - failed. She hadn't even mentioned to Zelda how she'd fooled Ari into thinking she wanted another child, which was probably worse than withholding information about her correspondence and visits with Ben, because that was toying with his emotions in a way she definitely ought not to have.

Dionisia shifted uncomfortably in her chair. Of course, Ari could very well tell her he wanted a divorce and that Elliott was his and anything along those lines, but she knew it would be out-of-character based on the sides of him he'd shown her. Somehow the thought that popped into her mind next was somehow worse than any of those options. "But what if he tells me to... stop?" There was something more unsettling about the idea of Ari exerting authority over her than the idea of Ari leaving her. Their marriage wasn't perfect, but one of its saving graces was the independence she was allowed; she did not typically have to ask Ari's permission to do anything unless it involved spending unusual amounts of money, and he never told her to not do anything. If he suddenly did—what then would be left of her marital comforts?

That was one of the main reasons she'd never wanted to marry before Elliott: she did not like being told what she could or could not do.

"What would I even say to that?" she asked, hoping for a more practical answer than emotional support.

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"I mean," Zelda said, "That would be unlike him." Ari had not even explicitly told her to stop seeing Alfred when she told him about the sex, although Zelda knew he had probably been implying it. But it wasn't like Dio was doing that with Mr. Crouch. She was just writing. Telling him about Elliott, Zelda's perfect nephew (or — not-nephew) who giggled when she said Quidditch words at him, and who really deserved a less complicated life.

"Ari's a good man," Zelda said. Ari was a good man and he was also her brother, so she was biased, and there was no way she could tell Dio it was alright not to tell him. Because it wasn't — even if their marriage was unconsumnated, even if the situation was evidently weird, it wasn't okay not to tell Ari. "He deserves the truth."

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"Yes, but..." But it was out of character for her to be lying to Ari, and yet she'd found something worth doing so, so would it have been so surprising if this was the topic that made him lose his even temper? She guessed it boiled down to how Ari thought of Elliott—whether he was a blessing, a byproduct of the arrangement that had been beneficial to them both, or the son that was wholly his now whether or not they shared blood. It may have been the former at the start of their marriage, in the first few months after Elliott had been born now, but their son was nearly two.

She was inclined the latter was more of the case nowadays. Elliott was Elliott Fisk. He had some of Ari's mannerisms despite their lack of blood relation. There were some days Elliott would follow him around the house, mimicking everything he did in the way an almost-two-year-old could. He wanted his hair to be like Ari's, even though there wasn't terribly much of it yet, and he mirrored the silly faces that Ari made at him sometimes with an eerie accuracy for someone who shared none of the same genetics. Maybe Ari would not be angry because she was lying, but it would be perfectly in-character for him to be defensive and—perhaps—even a bit possessive where Elliott was concerned.

"If he... if he is angry...." Then, what? Accept whatever fate befell of her and hope that Ari was merciful in words and action? It was at times like these that Dionisia remembered the power Ari wielded if he wished—he could ruin her, however unlikely an outcome.

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"It'll be so much worse if you don't tell him, Dio," Zelda said, frowning; this wasn't information that could be skipped, if only because it was quite evidently eating Dionisia alive. But beyond that — if she told him now, Zelda did not think that Ari would feel that betrayed by the revelation. (Especially if he and Dionisia were not actually intimate with one another!)

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It would be so much worse. She knew it, she told herself it, and she believed it to be true—and yet, as she sat there, trying to envision all the ways that conversation might go, she found herself internally shaking her head at the idea of herself trying to bring it up in conversation. She couldn't.

"And if I don't..." she said in a low voice, lowering her gaze from Zelda's eyes to her chin.

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"Well, I'm not going to tell him," Zelda said; this time, the promise was less out of respect for Dionisia and more because she did not think she had enough information to even begin the conversation. "But it's not going to matter because you will, right?" Dionisia was better than this; better than keeping secrets from her husband when she knew they could hurt him if he found it.

"Just don't do it before dinner with Roslyn tomorrow," Zelda added as a quick afterthought. Ari deserved the truth, but another twenty-four hours wouldn't hurt him.

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   Dionisia Fisk, J. Alfred Darrow

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Dionisia stayed quiet for a good, long moment, and then, with pained reluctance visible on her face, nodded.

"I will," she said, but the word eventually remained unspoken. She would keep the secret as long as she realistically could; she did not think Zelda could not outright tell Ari and betray her trust, but there was only a matter of time before it was hinted to in conversation, either by a slip of the tongue or because Zelda assumed she'd already talked to him about it. She needed to be careful—and, maybe if given the time, she could ease him into it.

"And—speaking of dinner," she said, feeling that this was a good time to end that, "what is it that I should look out for exactly?" She knew Roslyn was not particularly fond of Alfred, but she did not know the purpose of the dinner. There was always a purpose of dinners with the Fisks.

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   Zelda Darrow

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"Just help me keep Roslyn from getting that sharklike little look on her face," Zelda said, wrinkling her nose at the thought of it. "I'm not really sure what her game is, tomorrow — so. We just need to get Alfred through it." Ros could be terrifying when she wanted to be, and Zelda had no doubt that a game was afoot, even though of course she would not know what it possibly was until tomorrow.

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