Fall 1886 — A Country Party

This was a weekend in the country sort of party, which generally Oz enjoyed. Everyone knew what was expected at a party such as this, and for one weekend anyone who was staying the night would be forgiven to stooping to the level Oz and Dash occupied on the day-to-day. For at least one unlucky couple that would probably mean a hasty marriage sometime before the season formally closed, but Ozymandias had never found himself in that sort of trouble and never expected to. His parents weren't the types to force a marriage on him no matter what he got into, and he made sure to steer far clear of girls with those sorts of parents. Besides, he was careful not to get caught in a compromising position — no veela-in-the-hammock stories to be told about him. So for Oz, a weekend in the country represented an opportunity to get into a good deal of trouble that was otherwise difficult to arrange. It was Friday afternoon and they were kicking things off with a party, to which considerably more people had been invited than those who were expected to stay on for the following two days. He ought to have been flirting with women and trying to choose the right target for the weekend; that was basically the point of starting with a dance, though the host and hostess wouldn't have admitted to it. Instead, he kept looking over at Thomasina Pomfrey.

She was likely just here for the party. The hosts wouldn't have invited a working woman to stay the weekend. That meant that he shouldn't have wasted his time with her, even if she wasn't — well, her. He'd made that mistake as a younger man, spending the first day flirting with someone who left at sundown and then having to start from scratch when all the other likely lads were ahead of him. Talking to her would be a waste of his time, and actively detrimental to his goal of having fun this weekend, but he kept looking in her direction anyway. He was wondering how quickly he could get her cheeks to flush with anger, if he decided to talk to her. Four sentences, he decided. He could make her angry enough to ruin her complexion in four sentences.

A bold young blond approached him and tried to flirt. He bantered back with her, on autopilot. He'd done this often enough that he didn't need to think about what to say. He asked if she intended to stay the weekend and she affirmed that she did. She was angling for a dance, though of course she wouldn't be so bold as to actually ask for one. She was leaving that part to him.

"I think I'll get another drink," he said instead, which left her looking mildly annoyed. He moved towards the refreshment table, coming away with another drink and running right into Miss Pomfrey's circle of conversationalists, as though by accident. He greeted one or two of the others that he knew by name, saving her for last. "Miss Pomfrey." That wouldn't count against his allotment of four sentences, he decided. "What a surprise to see someone like you here."

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MJ is the light of my life <3

Thomasina was only attending the first evening of the party — she was a healer and didn't have the time to spend the whole weekend, and would not have been invited to, besides. But some of her friends were attending for the entire weekend, and so she had gone with them. She was actually having fun, mostly chatting with people who she hadn't seen since the close of the season.

Ozymandias Dempsey kept looking at her. Sina was aware of it, and of his location in the room, but was careful not to look at him and give him the satisfaction.

She should have known he'd come to her eventually.

"And yet no part of me is surprised to see you, Mr. Dempsey," Thomasina said, smiling crookedly and raising an eyebrow at him. (The implication she could not say without further provocation — that Mr. Dempsey was exactly the sort to get accidentally engaged on one of these weekends — was obviously at the front of her mind.)

One of her friends, generally knowing how these conversations with Mr. Dempsey went, touched a hand to Sina's elbow. She ignored her.

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Oh, good, she was ready for him. Oz arched an eyebrow at her in response to her statement, though he thought he knew exactly what she meant by it. The eyebrow was less a question, more a dare for her to actually say it. She wouldn't, of course; it wasn't polite to say such things so bluntly. Or maybe she would; she didn't have a habit of being polite, at least not where he was concerned.

He adjusted his mental calculus slightly. If she'd thought through this conversation already and had pithy responses ready to go, it might take as many as eight sentences to make her flush.

"Because of my well-known fondness for the countryside," he supplied tartly, hoping she would contradict him. "And generally sociable disposition. Although apparently the latter isn't a prerequisite for an invitation."

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MJ is the light of my life <3

Thomasina's mouth twisted wryly. "Oh, is sociable the word we're using for it now?" she said, her mouth opening in an affected 'o' of surprise. "I wasn't aware; thank you for informing me." If one was solely focusing on her tone, they might have thought she was being genuine — the mockery was in the exaggerated surprise on her face, and the words themselves.

She was sure that Mr. Dempsey would be able to tell. He usually could.

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Oz affected a slight frown. "I'm terribly sorry if I've put you in a difficult position, Miss Pomfrey," he said, twirling the glass in his hand by the stem. "Had I known you had such a limited vocabulary, I would have used smaller words."

He was up to five sentences, but he thought this one might do it. She was proud of her intellect, he'd gathered, so insulting it might genuinely annoy her. If it didn't, he had three sentences left of his self-imposed challenge. He could find a chink in her armor somewhere, no matter how ready she was to spar with him.

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MJ is the light of my life <3

Thomasina's eyebrows shot up; it was only her extensive practice at fighting with Mr. Dempsey that kept her from reacting too strongly. Her most prized quality was her intellect — Sina had always been smart, and was convinced that she would always be smart — but of course he knew that; it was not well-hidden, and Ozymandias Dempsey seemed to see her.

Her friend tapped her elbow again, knowing this would go poorly. Sina ignored her once again.

"I'm afraid you're thinking of another acquaintance, Mr. Dempsey," Sina said, tone as if she were actually sorry, "As I have an abundance of wit and judgement when compared to the women you choose to spend time with."

Calling him a whore was unoriginal, at best, and likely to scandalize others at least a little — but this would give her a second to regain her temper!

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   Ozymandias Dempsey

She was surprised. This delighted him, though it didn't show beyond a glint in his eye and very small momentary twitch at his lips. It wasn't color in her cheeks, but it was something to have made her eyebrows shoot up like that. He could tell by her response that he'd knocked her at least a little off-balance, too, because it was a rather feeble attempt at an insult. The rest of the people in this conversation (all now quiet) might be scandalized by a comment like that, but it wasn't as though Oz was in denial about his bachelor activities or the caliber of women he usually took to bed. If he'd had a high opinion of their wit and judgement, he might have been courting them instead of sleeping with them.

"I wasn't aware you were paying such keen attention to my social habits," he returned smoothly. "To have such a firm opinion of the women I spend my time with."

Six sentences in, and he thought he was coming out on top so far.

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MJ is the light of my life <3

She didn't like the way his mouth twitched. He was winning, and he knew it.

Luckily, she had ideas in regard to his next statement. "You overestimate how deeply one has to look," Sina said, with a smirk, "Given that you broadcast your exploits for all to hear, despite their lack of interest." Mr. Dempsey was a rake, and everyone knew it — and Sina could not even blame the women he took to bed, because he was, despite all of his other qualities, attractive. His best friend had a bastard; (although Sina did not want to bring it up, as she thought it suggested that she had looked into his activities.)

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She might have had a bit of a point there, he had to concede — about the peacocking tendencies, anyway, not the bit about despite their lack of interest. Ozy could stomach being called a rake or a degenerate, but he could not tolerate being called uninteresting.

"Someone's projecting," he remarked dryly. The look he gave her bordered on pitying. "You must know it isn't my fault no one has taken any particular interest in you." He wasn't sure whether this one would land hard or not. She wasn't the youngest of women on the social scene, so the lack of suitors could have been something she was sensitive about, but on the other hand she didn't strike him as the type. She worked, for one thing, which indicated she probably had as many dreams of grand romance as Porphyria did. Even if she wasn't actively looking to marry, though, it couldn't feel nice to be more or less called undesirable.

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MJ is the light of my life <3

And now he was saying she wasn't desirable? Thomasina felt a flash of anger; her eyes narrowed. But she knew she was beautiful; she had those lovely long legs and the hair people found interesting, and she was smart, and put-together. She was just more clever and so much more interesting than most of the men she knew. Obviously.

"Men always do have so many feelings about something they can look at and not touch," she said, with a note of irritation.

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He'd hit the mark, apparently, and Ozymandias felt a flash of triumph at the clear signs of anger in her eyes. Had that been eight sentences? He'd lost count at the end, but if he hadn't hit it he'd at least been fairly close. He could disengage now, but he could also stay and try to provoke her further, to see how far he could wind her up before one of her friends intervened. His eyes flickered briefly towards the other people nearby, the audience to the scene they were in the process of causing, and tried to gauge how likely it was that they'd come to her rescue in the next minute or so.

Her response brought him up short, though. It wasn't necessarily the words themselves, but something they provoked in him: he realized, all at once and for the first time, that he did want to touch her. He'd never admitted that she was attractive, even to himself. He'd once described her face as avian, and not in a complimentary way. Still: he wanted to touch her, and with this comment she might as well have come right out and rejected him before he'd even tried to ask.

"You may fancy you'd like to be safely locked away like a piece of art in a gallery," he said, with a hint of real malice that had been absent from the conversation so far. "But art without any aesthetic appeal has no value."

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   Thomasina Dempsey

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MJ is the light of my life <3

She felt her temper explode before she moved. Her face flushed. Later, Thomasina would not be sure if it was the words or the tone that set her off.

Regardless, she straightened her spine. She took a step forward, into Dempsey's personal space. She was distantly aware that someone would surely pull her back soon; whatever words they exchanged next, they were going to be ugly.

"You are the single most impossible, self-obsessed, onerous man I have ever met," Thomasina snapped, standing on her toes to increase her own height. How long had he been this tall? He must have been this tall the whole time, but Sina had never felt herself aware of it before this moment.

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   Ozymandias Dempsey

Ozymandias' heart beat a little faster when she rushed at him. For a split second he wondered if she was angry enough to hit him (wouldn't that be the talk of the party?) but she stopped short. She was meeting his eyes and standing on her toes, and there was a delicious intensity to this moment that he wouldn't have traded for anything (except maybe —). Miss Pomfrey may have unexpectedly wounded his pride a moment ago, but at least he'd been able to damage her right back. He took a perverse pleasure in this — he actually smirked, which was the first genuine emotion he'd displayed throughout this conversation.

"I'm flattered," he said, holding her gaze. "You don't even make my top ten." Nevermind that she'd just called him all sorts of nasty words: what she'd really just admitted to was that he was the single most in her eyes. He thought the most wounding response he could deliver would be that he hardly considered her at all — for all that it was untrue.

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MJ is the light of my life <3

This was not the first time they'd argued that Thomasina wished she could hide her feelings; hurt flickered across her face. She dropped down back to her usual height, but stayed far too close to him. "I don't believe you," Sina said after a beat, her eyes still on his — she wasn't as loud as she had been a moment before, but anyone looking at them would have been able to tell they were still fighting.

The most cutting thing she could think to say: "You're the one who was looking at me."

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   Ozymandias Dempsey

The expression on her face gave him pause. He'd meant to make her angry, and in order to do that he'd said hurtful things, but he wasn't sure that he'd ever intended to hurt her. He pushed his tongue to the back of his teeth, on the verge of saying something if only he could think of what to say. She found words first. He wished she hadn't.

Miss Pomfrey had seen him watching her, earlier in the party. He wanted her, and she knew it. Maybe she'd known it before he had. That could have been why she'd said that in the first place, because she was seeing him too clearly: men always do have so many feelings about something they can look at and not touch.

He wanted to leave. Better still: he wanted to go find that blond from earlier and flirt with her very loudly within earshot of Miss Pomfrey. He wanted her to know that even if he'd been looking it wasn't an indication that there was anything behind it. Nothing he couldn't put aside to pursue someone prettier and more genial. Of course, there was always the chance that Miss Pomfrey would see right through that, too.

Oz glowered. "Because you laugh too loudly," he lied. "It's grating."

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MJ is the light of my life <3

Did she laugh too loudly? Sina did not believe she did. Her laugh was delightful, she thought, because when she laughed it was because something was funny. So — he had been looking at her for some other reason. Or, even if it was her laughter, he was at the very least thinking of her.

She stood on her toes again. She was not entirely sure why; just that when she was that close to him and that physically involved in it, it was a rush, and she wanted the rush.

"I hope you have a good weekend," Sina said, voice thick with sarcasm, "With your blonde. Try not to think of me."

This required admitting that she had seen; Sina was okay with that, if it meant he was bothered by the thought of her all weekend.

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