Henrietta stared. His hair was matted against his forehead and there was a drop of water clinging to his cheek almost like a tear. Why would he have said that? It could not possibly be true. It was not that Henrietta could not imagine the world without her mother in it, because she had imagined it plenty of times; after Hector and her father she was no stranger to unexpected loss, so of course the notion had occurred to her. It was that the world with her mother in it and the world without were so vastly different that Henrietta was convinced she would have known when one transitioned to the other. Everything would have changed. She would have felt it somewhere deep in her body.

"No, she's not," Henrietta said dumbly. She didn't think he would lie to her, after having been so kind to her on previous occasions and having tried to protect her a moment ago, but he must have been mistaken. There was no possibility that her mother had died.

Although that did leave the unanswered question of where she was. She should have been clambering back to the boardwalk by now, or at least yelling shrilly from the water. Instead, the only sounds were the gentle lapping of the water and the distant music from the ballroom.

She still didn't believe her mother was dead, but something was wrong. Henrietta put one hand to her mouth and fretfully bit her nail. She leaned forward slightly and a breeze she hadn't noticed before tussled her hair, which made it difficult to see — but there was something he was holding onto in the water, something big and awkward and — dead weight. That was the phrase for the way the thing he was holding looked: it was dead weight.

Henrietta's fingernail broke beneath her teeth.

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   Noble Greengrass

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Rune made this! <3

He hadn't handled this very well. How had he been told when his father died? He didn't entirely remember — just that it was like his heart dropped out of his chest, and then the blur of going home, and the funeral in painstaking detail. (And then — what came after.) Maybe it would be okay if he didn't handle this perfectly, because maybe she wouldn't remember exactly.

(This ignored the problems that they faced that Noble hadn't had with his father's death, and Noble had the clarity of mind to suspect this wouldn't be the most difficult part of the rest of the night. Because they had to cover it up. Didn't they?)

"I have her here," Noble said. He stifled an instinct to gesture with his hand that had dragged along Mrs. Cartwright the corpse, because that seemed too much like behavior in a play. "She — it looks like she hit her head."

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set by Bee

He had her there. The thing he was holding — the dead weight — was her mother.

"Oh," Henrietta said from behind her hand. She was cold, and she couldn't tell if it was from the wind blowing on her or something else, something inside. Hit her head. Mama would have preferred a different way to die, probably, if she'd been able to choose. She probably would have preferred a longer life, too, if she'd had her druthers. Her life had been abbreviated by the fall. Mama had once told Henrietta that it was common to rush through anything; a lady should always take her time to do things to perfection. Would she resent having a sudden death?

Not as though her opinion on it mattered now. Henrietta realized that with a start: her mother's opinion on anything didn't matter now.

She shuffled her feet and hugged her arms around her chest, trying to keep the warmth of her body in and shield herself from the wind as much as possible. "You should let go," she said quietly. "If you stay in the water you might catch a cold."

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Rune made this! <3

The wind had picked up. The Sanditon had always seemed to Noble to be like a ship in a bottle, where nothing could happen to disrupt it — but maybe even the carefully-curated environment had storms sometimes. He was, he knew, fixating on random details to ignore dealing with what had happened — that he was holding onto the arm of a dead woman, and that he was going to have to get himself and Miss Cartwright through the rest of the night somehow.

"Alright," Noble said. He let go of Miss Cartwright's wrist. Without any grace, he used both hands on the side of the boardwalk to haul himself back up. He was dripping, sopping wet, and he shivered in the wind — he ought to put his coat back on, Noble thought, but that would just get it wet too. He ought to dry himself out. It wasn't urgent.

Maybe the ocean would bring Mrs. Cartwright back out to sea, and no one would know, and they could say she'd gone missing. (Holden and Miss Cartwright already had a missing relative. It seemed cruel to subject them to another, but Noble couldn't think of another way.) But when he was back on his feet and looked back over, she had already bobbed back up to the surface. Maybe that was because of the weather charms, too.

"We should talk," Noble said, tone gentle, "About what we do next."

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set by Bee

Henrietta's eyes stayed on the shape in the water when he let go and climbed up. It bobbed in the waves and knocked up against the pillar of the boardwalk with a noise that was something like a low-pitched squish. It wasn't the sort of sound a human body was supposed to make. It sounded lifeless. The thing in the water may as well have been a sack of garbage.

The man was saying something, and she refocused her attention on him with a start. What they did next? What did he mean? If this was about Mama catching them alone together and making assumptions — or about what other people might assume — that was unlikely to be much of a problem for them given recent events.

Goodness gracious, Mama was dead.

Henri moved her hand to try and push her hair back into place, but the wind made it impossible. Her eyes slid back to where the shadow in the water was. That was what he must have meant by what happened next, she realized. They would have to do something about Mama's body.

Henrietta ran a finger along the edge of the nail she'd just broken. What if they didn't? What if they just went back to the ballroom and pretended they'd never been out on the boardwalk at all? Of course that wouldn't really work; her hair was a mess and he was sopping wet. They'd have to explain that, and it was inexplicable. Henri shivered. "Should we tell someone?"

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Rune made this! <3

Merlin, Noble wished that he didn't have to talk her through this. Maybe there was another way, but he was cold and wet and he couldn't figure it out, and Miss Cartwright had always struck him as a little bit helpless. So — he was going to have to navigate this, the body, with her. Especially because the death of Mrs. Cartwright was at least partially his fault. The time to leave Cartwright family matters to the Cartwrights had passed several minutes ago.

"If we tell someone," Noble said, still gentle, "They're going to ask how this happened. And — I don't think that would be good, for either of us." He glanced down at the water again. Why wouldn't the ocean just take her? If it hadn't been for the weather charm on the Sanditon, he was sure that she would have gone out to sea by now. But instead the body was there, just floating vaguely around the pillars of the boardwalk.

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set by Bee

It was easier to focus on what he was saying when she was looking at his face, and this time the implications of his words reached her without delay. If someone asked how it had happened they would either have to tell the truth or lie l, and neither would look good. The truth was that her mother had caught the two of them alone, he'd drawn his wand on her, and then Henrietta had knocked her over the edge of the boardwalk — or at least, those were the facts as they would be perceived by others. A lie would be safer, but there was no ready lie that occurred to her that wouldn't also lead to troublesome questions.

A few minutes ago Henrietta had been afraid her mother would have her committed, and she realized that was still very much on the table. Even though she was dead, Mrs. Cartwright still had the power to dictate Henrietta's future.

She pursed her lips. "We'll get rid of her," she said in a wavering tone. "Her body, I mean. And then no one will know we had anything to do with it."

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The following 1 user Likes Henrietta Cartwright's post:1 user Likes Henrietta Cartwright's post
   Noble Greengrass

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Rune made this! <3

Miss Cartwright was taking this a lot better than Noble had expected — namely, that she was suggesting exactly what he'd wanted to do. He nodded once. "The easiest way to do it would be for the sea to drag her out," he said, and his voice sounded more clinical than he'd expected. The water was their only option, really — they couldn't very well carry a corpse around the Sanditon, they were bound to get caught.

He was thinking very quickly now — less of the body as something he was responsible for causing, and more of the body as a logic puzzle they could solve together. They were going to make it through this. Noble was going to make sure of it.

"Which — the weather charm," Noble said; the way Mrs. Cartwright kept bobbing towards the surface, kept near the shore, had to be caused by the weather charm. "I can — try to play around with it." He had a NEWT in Charms, so — it couldn't be impossible.

And with the wind whipping around like this, something had to be up with the weather charm already. Probably no one would even notice.

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set by Bee

Henrietta didn't love the idea of meddling with charms, but she didn't have any better ideas. Magic in her world was something unstable and dangerous enough on its own without being tampered with, but if he thought he could manage it she wasn't about to argue. Certainly not while they had no other options readily apparent.

"Alright, then," she agreed, but she edged in closer to him as though she expected something to go wrong which would force her to take cover on his shoulder.

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Rune made this! <3

Noble nodded once, and drew his wand. He aimed it at the water. He just wanted to cast something to suck the current back out to the sea, taking the corpse with it instead of leaving the water placid and close to shore. He considered for a beat, then muttered a spell and aimed at the water.

Almost immediately, things went wrong. The wind kicked up more than it already had. Waves thrashed against the pillars of the boardwalk, violently — Noble lost sight of the body, but was the furthest thing from relieved. Oh, he thought. There had already been something wrong with the weather charms — the uptick in the wind, stupid, he should have known it already — and Noble had just made them wronger.

He looked up at the sky and saw clouds gathering with speed that ought not be possible. "We need to get back inside," Noble said, reaching for his coat, "Now." Never mind that he was sopping wet and her hair was a mess — anyone else who had come outside and into this sudden burst of wind would be just as chaotic-looking as they were.

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set by Bee

Henrietta could tell at once that this wasn't what he'd intended, not from what was happening around them but from the changes in his body language. She stiffened, bracing for danger, and the wind whipped around them furiously.

"Y-you can't," she protested as he grabbed his coat back. "Looking like that. You're all —"

What she was about to say became irrelevant as the sky opened up above them into a sudden, freezing rain.

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The following 1 user Likes Henrietta Cartwright's post:1 user Likes Henrietta Cartwright's post
   Noble Greengrass

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Rune made this! <3

He was sopping wet, he should have toed out of his shoes before he jumped in the water because they were soaked-through in a way that was starting to be uncomfortable, and it would be noticed. But with the clouds gathering above them so quickly, and in a pattern Noble didn't entirely recognize — as if they were forming a series of large rings — he didn't trust the outdoors.

The choice was taken away from them by the rain; Noble tugged on his coat not because he thought it would offer him any protection, but because otherwise he was afraid the wind would carry it away. A crash of waves beneath them sent sea-spray blowing into Noble's back. He reached for Miss Cartwright's wrist — they were well-past propriety now.

"We have to go," he said again, with more urgency. He tried and failed to blink the rain again; it was falling so hard Noble couldn't see more than a few feet away from them. He couldn't leave her here.

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set by Bee

Henri had never seen a rainstorm start so suddenly, and she was left gasping in surprise as the rain pounded down on top of her. She nodded at his words, though she wasn't sure if it made any difference; with the wind and the rain like this he might not even see her nod from where he was standing. Her heart was racing, possibly because of the danger they were clearly in but also possibly because he was holding on very firmly to her wrist, which had never happened to her before.

Henrietta followed close behind him as he led them back towards the ballroom. They had only gone a few steps when the wind blew something onto the boardwalk right in front of them. It had come from the docks, it seemed, and it probably was not substantial enough to actually block their path, but it startled her and she reflexively moved closer to him, shielding herself from the worst of the wind with his body. She remained as close as practical the rest of the way back to the resort, until by the time they reached the door she was clinging to his arm. Even so, the force of the wind had left her shaky on her feet.

It was not quiet inside — they could still hear the impact of the wind and rain all around them — but it was so much calmer than it had been a moment ago that Henri was left shell-shocked again. She took a breath, tried to think of something to say, and ultimately made a noise that was something like a sob.

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Rune made this! <3

They were lucky to make it. For half of the walk back, Noble wished that his coat was bigger, so that he could tuck them both under it like an umbrella — for the other half, all he could think was please let us make it back inside, on repeat, a prayer to some higher power he had never believed in.

But they made it. Noble tugged the door to the Sanditon ballroom hallway shut behind them as the wind tried to force it back open. He could still hear the storm raging, winds and the rain that was buffeting the building — but they'd made it. The worst, Noble thought, was over. Puddles were forming beneath them on the hallway floor as the rain dripped down, but surely the worst was over.

He turned from the door to Miss Cartwright at the sound she'd made. Noble frowned. He wasn't sure if he should touch her again — it wasn't at all polite, but maybe they were still past any politeness inside, some pact they'd made when her mother hit her head on the boardwalk's pillars — but he couldn't just leave her there making sobbing-ish noises.

He especially couldn't leave her there because they needed to talk about what just happened, what they had done and what they did now, at least a little bit. (The pact didn't exist yet — they needed to form one.)

"Miss Cartwright," Noble said. And then, because they'd committed crimes together, "Henrietta."

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set by Bee

The noise she'd made first was a strangled sound, not-quite crying but certainly not anything that would have come from a composed young lady. Composure was exactly the word for what she was lacking right now, and only part of it was everything that had happened with Mama. Part of it was being very wet, with her hair a tangled mess from the wind, and her legs still shaky from the force they'd had to push against to carry her here; no one could have felt composed, in such a situation, whether their mother was newly dead or not. It was hardly her fault she'd made a very unladylike noise, but now she needed to take some deep breathes, smooth out her skirts, push her hair back off her face, and regain her composure.

Which she might have done, if he'd stopped at Miss Cartwright and not called her Henrietta. Hearing her name on his lips, and spoken with some urgency, startled her. She fixed him with wide eyes. Her lower lip trembled.

"I don't know your name," she admitted mournfully. Tears were gathering in her eyes and she hastily rubbed her eyes with the heels of her hands to prevent them (though it ought to have been the least of her worries; after being out in that storm no one would have noticed extra water on her cheeks). "I know we were introduced at my debut but I met so many people and I couldn't remember them all and you always knew who I was so I couldn't find an opportunity to ask. I know you're one of Holden's friends and you've been so— s-so kind to me," she continued with a sniffle. "But I don't know your name. I'm sorry."

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The following 1 user Likes Henrietta Cartwright's post:1 user Likes Henrietta Cartwright's post
   Noble Greengrass

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Rune made this! <3

Noble usually strived to keep emotions other than general good nature off of his face, and maintain a mask of neutrality otherwise; there was usually a great deal going on underneath, but he tried to keep it from showing. (Unbeknownst to Noble, this mask of neutrality usually presented itself as a vague worry.) Miss Cartwright startled him enough that it showed: his mouth opened in a little 'o' before he could regather himself.

Noble supposed he shouldn't be surprised: he wasn't exactly important, other than being Holden's friend, so it made sense that Miss Cartwright wouldn't know his name. Why should she? Besides that, she seemed so desperately apologetic about it that it was hard for Noble to find a way to be angry about it, especially after the emotional drain of the rest of their evening.

"Noble Greengrass," he said, after a beat. He just wanted her to stop crying, but he still didn't know her well enough to wrap an arm around her shoulders or embrace her, as he would his sisters. (Obviously he didn't know her well enough — she didn't know his name.) "That's my name. It's — it's all right that you didn't know it."

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set by Bee