August 1879 — A Country Party

That girl you danced with earlier seemed nice, his mother said as they waited for their coats to be returned in the front entry hall. Ned had danced with four girls throughout the course of the evening, but he knew immediately which one his mother meant. Nice had a very specific meaning, coming from her. The one with the auburn hair who had brought up George Eliot in the conversation after the dance. Being well-read was nice. Ned didn't necessarily disagree on that point — of course he wanted whoever he married to be intelligent, and interested in literature — but he didn't think it was the only requirement, either, and sometimes he thought his mother did. The girl who talked about George Eliot had stepped on his toes and mentioned how she didn't get along with half the women in her Hogwarts class because they were all snobby, which he didn't take as an auspicious sign of her being able to make many (or any) friends in society. But interacting with women at parties was as much about trying to find the right girl as it was about reassuring his mother that he was open to the idea of finding the right girl, so he didn't bring any of that up. He merely smiled and nodded and helped her put her coat back on.

We're going to the Ferrow's ball next week, aren't we? his mother was asking, but she already knew the answer. She accepted or rejected invitations for the both of them, and Ned had never protested at being dragged along wherever she wanted. I wonder how it will compare. Ned didn't; country parties were all comparable in his mind. They all ran together, and he hadn't even gone to that many, all things considered. He was only twenty-two, with probably another six decades at least of society events ahead of him. It was rather early to be disillusioned with them.

I'm sorry, sir, we can't seem to find a carriage by that description. This from a servant, and cut through the noise more than anything his mother had said in the last ten minutes.

"What do you mean? You lost it?" he demanded, aghast. They could get home without a carriage, of course — the floo was a good deal quicker and more comfortable than a carriage-ride back to London, anyway — but they were not so well-off that they could afford to simply misplace a carriage. How did one misplace a carriage in the first place? "You're going to find it, aren't you?"

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Marion Flourish

  

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Set by Lady ♡

Marion tried her hardest to put her best foot forward. So much so, in fact, that her feet were in terrible pain from the endless dances that evening – surely with at least half of the eligible men at the party, if she was successful A very accomplished evening, her old house matron congratulated her, holding Marion’s hand as she waved down the footman and provided the description of their carriage. The floo would surely be a more convenient way to return to home, but the old lady was distrusting of new inventions that could lead good ladies like them into the wrong sorts of fireplaces, and learning how to apparate was also out of the question. It wasn’t that she didn’t trust Marion, just that she was of the old way where ladies simply didn’t do such things.

Eager to take her shoes off, Marion wobbled into the carriage after helping the old witch up into it. She dropped onto the seat with a whoosh of relief and eagerly kicked off her heels. No longer fussed with how her hair needed to look she slouched back into the seat and– “Oh!”

The older lady was talking something or another about some Ferrow’s ball or a nice chap she’d seen Marion dancing with, and didn’t notice the young woman's perturbed squeak. Marion shifted around in her seat to find the pointy culprit– a book.

“Ms. Robinson, are you quite certain this is our carriage?” Marion interjected, glancing with a bit of alarm around herself. Hadn't the curtains had been red, not blue, on the way here? Oh, she was sure of it now. Not that the old woman opposite her wouldn't notice – she was half blind.

“Oh of course I am, dear. I special ordered these seats to have extra cushioning, I’d know them anywhere,” the woman waved her off, and carried on about going to the modiste for autumn dresses. Marion’s brows furrowed, but a dissent died halfway up her throat. After a full five minutes and no sense of where they were headed, Marion turned back to this mysterious book. The cover was ornate, pretty silver embossing on leather. Her fingertips ran over it before she opened up the first few pages– Le Morte d'Arthur.

Though the book itself was unfamiliar, the story was one she knew well, and it felt reassuring to settle back into it after so many years. She lost track of how long she’d been reading when Ms. Robinson squawked. “This is not the way home,” she startled, nose pressed to the glass.

“Mmhm, I don’t believe it is,” Marion murmured agreeably, flipping another page.

“Are you reading, Marion? Whilst we are being kidnapped?” The witch snapped the book shut with a sharp inhale through her nose. Serenity, she told herself. Then she used the book to wrap sharply on the carriage roof, a knock that bid the carriage to stop. “Excuse me, sir...!”

It took a full fifteen minutes before they were back at the party. Ms. Robinson stepped out of the carriage with surprising dexterity for a woman of her century age, and a foreboding huff suggested some sorry servant may have his earful in a few moments. Marion reluctantly followed, feet still aching far too much to think about putting back on her shoes, so she opted to wait right near the queue. Didn't notice that it was only one of her heels that she held in one hand, while she still held onto the book in her other. She yawned, it was getting quite late now. The back of her hand, still holding her shoe, covered her mouth politely. Then she heard the sound of a slight commotion to her side.

A man was describing a carriage. A woman loudly spelled out, “Flourish. For Merlin’s sake, F-L-O-U-R-I–” And blue curtains, he said.

“Oh!” Marion exclaimed for a second time. She turned towards them straight away, hastened closer before she could think better of it. “Are you in search of your carriage? It seems we were given the wrong one,” she started to explain apologetically to group.

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   Edward Flourish

Mama had not been amused by the mishap, and truth be told neither was Ned — at least not while the carriage remained missing in action. It was entirely inconceivable to him that anyone's house or grounds could be so expansive, even through the use of magical aid, that it was possible for a carriage, complete with horses, to just go missing. At least no one had yet accused either of them of being at fault for the mishap, though his mind was already scrambling to think how he could prove that they'd come in a carriage that night, if it came down to it. Had anyone he recognized been there when they'd arrived and could swear to their dismounting it? — would the receipt of the purchase of the carriage serve? — it was not a new carriage, but a family of bookshop owners did tend to keep meticulous records. They could probably scrounge up a receipt for any major purchase going back the past seventy years, if pressed to do so.

Then someone interjected and said they'd been given the wrong carriage, which was such a sensible explanation that Ned would have been irritated at himself for not having already thought of it if he weren't too busy being relieved by the prospect that this little interlude was at an end. He could do without describing the carriage's woodworking to any other footmen (an exercise in futility, and one probably meant mostly to keep him busy — none of this lot had anything to do with the carriages and the ones that did were already off searching). "Thank Merlin," he muttered, and moved towards her. "Can you show me —?"

He would have finished the question, except that he was immediately and wholly distracted when he noticed the shoe. It didn't register at first glance — his immediate reaction was that it looked like quite a dangerous corsage, solid and spiked as it was. Then he realized it wasn't a flower, but a shoe. Had this woman worn a shoe around her wrist all evening? Was that fashionable? Ned was sure he would have noticed if anyone else had done it. It took a full second for him to consider that it might be her shoe — as in, the one she had been wearing when she arrived — and that this necessarily meant she had either stolen someone else's shoe (unlikely — how would one manage it? — but perhaps if one was in the habit of sneaking away with entire carriages it wasn't so difficult) or else she was walking around in stocking feet. He had to forcefully resist the urge to look down and check.

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   Marion Flourish

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Set by Lady ♡

Marion’s smile turned bright, both at the situation and the fact that she’d been helpful. The young witch really had no plans for herself beyond getting married and what she might settle on with her future husband. But if she had had the choice, and all the money and spare time in the world, she would love to be a renowned healer, or perhaps a sage professor, or maybe a spirited cursebreaker, or something. But these were nonsense thoughts, of course.

The woman raised her eyebrows as the man’s train of thought ended mid-sentence. She could guess what he was asking, but it seemed something had distracted him. A curious gaze followed where his went, only then remembering that she had her heeled shoe tie around her wrist. Marion went a brilliant shade of red. Could feel it rush uncontrollably from each ear to across each cheek to the bridge of her nose. The woman pursed her lips and instantly swung both hands behind her back, as if this were all perfectly natural. Toes curled, too, so that she might not risk poking them out from under her skirts.

“Oh it’s, it’s over here,” she ground out in a voice that was a bit higher-pitched than she meant it to be. Her head tipped back to nod at the carriage they’d just stepped out of, footmen all gone as they were sorting out the business with the carriages. No doubt Ms. Robinson was insisting on testing the seats of each and every one of them, and that’s assuming someone hadn’t taken theirs already. “Very sorry…” she added worriedly, because that really now made it at least three things to be sorry for when she considered the things in her hands.

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The shoe disappeared and she blushed, which confirmed that Ned had caught her at something she shouldn't be doing. Probably he ought to have politely pretended not to notice. Sparing her feelings and not calling any attention to it seemed the most chivalrous thing to do. Instead, he found himself grinning at her with a spark of mischief in his eye. Aha! his look seemed to say — the same sort of look his father had used to give him and Nick when they were children and he saw them sneaking out the door of the shop to go adventuring in the alleyway. Maybe it was just that the evening was winding down and he'd run out of patience for polite and bland; maybe it was that she was obviously young and this seemed like such a charmingly harmless blunder for a girl in her first or second season.

"Just exercising the horses for us, hm?" he quipped, as he walked through to where she'd indicated and took a look. It was indeed their carriage, which resolved one mystery — the next one being where hers was.

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Set by Lady ♡

The man grinned at her. The reaction was so wildly unexpected that Marion felt her heart skip a beat, and finally she looked at him– really looked at him. First took notice of his expressive eyes, ones that told her he knew she was barefoot and he found it amusing. Hah, that makes one of them. Though it did help Marion feel marginally less mortified (only marginally), and she smiled faintly back. A brief glance over his shoulder confirmed that at least no one else seemed to have noticed.

He started to wander over towards the carriage. Self-conscious that he’d see what she had behind her back from a different angle, Marion followed along at a safe distance. Petulance, maybe, made her keep clutching that shoe and book into the bustle of her dress.

“Hah,” her laugh was small and breathless with surprise, and nerves too, seeing him peeking into his own carriage. Would he notice his book missing? It seemed a bit awkward now, didn’t it, to point out that she’d forgotten it was in her hand? But if she took it that would surely be stealing, wouldn’t it? Was it worse to be caught attempting to steal, even if she wasn’t, or actually stealing? “Well, this had not been my intention,” she offered hastily, stepping a bit closer to peek in herself. It was quite dark in there, thank goodness! (The witch still had not noticed, however, that she only had one half of her footwear in hand.)

Feeling infinitely relieved now that she had time to decide what to do, Marion turned back to the stranger. “Though you will be pleased to find them all warmed up for a pleasant, expeditious trot now?” A question because she supposed that an expeditious way home was what any of them wanted, at this hour of night.

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Ned was indeed pleased, but the anticipated speed of his horses on the route home had nothing to do with it. He didn't know why he was in such a good mood suddenly; the party had just been another party, and he hadn't been in such high spirits fifteen minutes ago. He could blame it on the return of his carriage, of course, but the truth was it probably had something more to do with the girl he'd caught in stocking feet. There was just something so earnest about it.

He'd ducked his head into the carriage just for good measure, although he was already sure it was his. He leaned out and waved towards his mother to get her attention, easily a head above everyone else with one foot still on the step of the carriage. "Mama, over here," he called. It was only at this point that he registered that there had been an unexpected flash of silver on the floor of the carriage, and he leaned back inside to look at it properly.

A shoe. Hers, obviously, but how on earth had she forgotten one shoe in a carriage? He owed Perrault and Ballet an apology, it seemed; when he'd read their version of Cinderella he'd always thought it a bit contrived that a woman leaving a ballroom, even in haste, could leave behind half her footwear.

Ned reached to pick it up and turned towards the young woman behind him. "La petite Pantoufle de Verre," he pronounced with another grin — the little glass slipper, which was the title of the story as he'd originally encountered it in the French. "Here, hide this before my mother comes over and makes any loud comments about how cold your feet must be."

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Set by Lady ♡

Oh no. He leaned back into his own carriage despite her (granted, feeble) attempt at charming wit, and now no doubt he noticed that his favorite and most prized book was now missing, soon he'll interrogate her, and she'll be called a thief, and ruin her hard-won reputation, oh, life was over before it even started--!

"Oh!" Marion wasn't always so squeaky. But she felt herself pressed from all sides with this situation, and utterly incapable of conjuring up a better response than to balk with wide eyes. For the man had turned back to her with less an expression of contempt, and more an expression of amusement as he held in his hand one silver heel. The little glass slipper. He was grinning again, and she had the odd impulse to smile back. In fact she may have, but it was completely by accident, and primarily because she enjoyed being considered a princess.

Of course, smiling at this moment was wildly inappropriate, so Marion pursed her lips to stop it at once.

"Sorry-- ah, thank you-- uhm, sorry," the words tumbled out like she'd entirely forgotten to speak English under his scrutiny, and she haplessly brought both of her hands out from behind her back. "I seemed to have mistook my shoe for your book," she offered, feeling her cheeks go pink again as she couldn't quite meet his discerning eye. The witch offered the book back to him, and hastily retrieved her shoe.

The telltale crunch of gravel announced the impending arrival of his mother, and so Marion skittishly dropped her shoes to the ground with a clatter. There were an odd number of things she supposed this woman would want her to explain, but salaciously bare feet would not be one of them! In haste she lifted her skirts so that she could sweep the shoes underneath her dress. Disguised the motion with a little curtsy and greeting as the lady approached them. Of course, now she was stuck here to the spot. Perhaps she could get away with an idle sway to cleverly maneuver back into the heels?

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She must have recognized the reference, because she smiled. When he had been a boy at Hogwarts, surrounded by other boys his age and yet simultaneously newly alone in the world, an older student had broken a crystal ball in the common room and he'd secreted away one smooth piece that caught his eye as it caught the firelight. He'd rested it in the windowsill of his tower bedroom, and sometimes in the morning — not every day, not always at the same time — the sunlight striking it would send golden lights dancing across the ceiling of the dorm room. Her smile was like that — as dazzling, as fleeting. She pursed her lips, and though he could see the traces of the expression around the edges of her face still she seemed determined not to let it out again. How much time had he spent after those brief flashes of light nudging the shard of crystal along the windowsill, trying to find just the right position or angle to make it happen again? You could just use a spell, one of his roommates had said, but Ned somehow knew instinctively that using magic to achieve the same result would have taken all of the magic out of it. It was beautiful because it was unexpected; because it was a thing that had to be coaxed into existence rather than commanded.

He was going to get her to smile at him again, he determined. Given that he'd already been in the process of leaving when they'd met, this might prove difficult. His mother was waving the servants away and turning in this direction already. He was momentarily taken aback when she presented him with the book, so lost his opportunity to remark on it before his mother joined them — and now it wouldn't do to make a joke about how good it was that the shoes were not actually made of glass, given how hastily she'd thrown them down to the ground.

"Perhaps next time we take the floo, Mama," he suggested to her, though he knew she would still insist on taking a carriage anywhere that was reasonably within a carriage-ride from London. What's the point of having a carriage at all if no one sees us using it? she had already told him once before. "It's far less likely that a servant might accidentally send any lost young women to our address. Though I suppose not impossible," he mused. "And more embarrassing for our poor heroine in that case, I suspect. No — perhaps we were right to take the carriage after all."

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Set by Lady ♡

Marion always supposed that she disliked being the center of attention. She was neither pretty nor wealthy enough to command a full dance card like the Pureblood girls, and it simply didn’t do to appear overly clever like the witty ones who had robust conversations standing along the walls. She was not courageous like a Gryffindor either, nor sweet like a Hufflepuff. Really, she was wholly and entirely unremarkable in all the ways that mattered. So it followed that she should earn no remarkable amount of attention.

Yet, here she now stood, feeling the center of attention. From someone quite handsome no less, and wealthy enough for his own carriage, and clever enough to remember books and French. Was he courageous like a knight? Perhaps sweet, like a taffy treat? Someone who perhaps was just being affable, when he called her a heroine. Though at that exact moment, when it seemed like this man was speaking with her rather than with his mother, Marion felt that she quite liked the idea of being the center of attention.

Her lips quirked to a smile. She didn’t notice that it happened, rather preoccupied with catching her train of runaway thought so that she would not simply blink in silence at this man like a bewildered bird.

“That would be infinitely more embarrassing, yes,” she quickly agreed, having never even considered this was a mistake that could be made. Of course it makes sense, all it would take is a poorly timed sneeze. Marion resolved in that instant she would never take the floo. “Although I am not lost,” she pointed out. “Given that I know quite well where I am. I was simply, ah, misdirected,” she offered. Which was precisely what she did as her hand waved vaguely while her toes sought out the sole of her shoe.

Nevertheless, the mother looked less than impressed. It was a familiar feeling, that of eyes roving over her figure from head to toe. Marion sucked in her belly. She inquired where Marion was off to— the witch squeaked out her matron’s neighborhood like a confession. Though she was not lost she was still quite wrong, it seemed, as this prompted a lecture from the woman about properly identifying one’s carriage — “And where is your chaperone? You know, girls could be murdered this way! Worse, kidnapped!”— and Marion bobbed her head along in agreement, bashfully taking her eyes down to her skirts. Occasionally she fluffed up a ruffle, feet still finding their way into her shoes.

Though she stole an occasional glance up at the gentleman as his mother’s diatribe went on. Pursed her lips so she wouldn’t be caught smiling like a fool, lest she prolong the verbal punishment for both of them. “You are quite right, madam. I’m so very sorry for the inconvenience and causing your worry…” she eventually offered. This seemed to appease the mum at least; the lines in the lady’s face softened, and for a split second the woman seemed incredibly familiar. As if this was someone she’s met in passing a few times before. Now how did she know her…?

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Mama was off, and Ned knew better than to try and interrupt her. She did mean well, for all that she could sometimes be a bit too boisterous in the way she presented herself. Instead he observed the young woman, with particular attention to the subtle dance she seemed to be executing under her skirt to get herself back into her shoes. He was amused but trying not to smile (lest his mother notice and ask what had been so funny) when the mention of kidnapping caught his ear. A fate worse than murder, apparently. At that he felt he was justified in a proper smile, because even Mama had to realize that she was being a touch ridiculous.

"Oh, we weren't much inconvenienced," he reassured her (despite his mother's demeanor very much implying the opposite). "But we are very relieved you weren't kidnapped. Imagine if you had gotten into the wrong carriage. You might have been halfway to Somerset by now."

His mother raised an eyebrow — Somerset was not the area she'd said she was going back to, nor was it particularly known for being the home of kidnappers who lurked in empty carriages, so she clearly thought she had missed some important context. For his part, Ned was watching the young woman and wondering if she would have caught it — Guinevere, when she had been waylaid in the woods, had been kidnapped by the evil king of the Summer Lands — generally understood to be modern-day Somerset. It was an obscure reference, though, and he wasn't sure if she'd even read the book that she'd handed back to him or whether she'd only glanced at it when she found it in the carriage.

"We should probably go, Mama," he pointed out, to forestall the question he could feel her about to ask.

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Set by Lady ♡

Marion was rather used to being talked at, so she didn’t terribly mind that the woman carried on and on. It wasn’t as though she needed to live with her; in moderate doses this was quite tolerable, much like how Marion felt about her matron. It was that thought that finally struck a chord of recognition— was this the wife of that book shop owner in London? Drat, the name failed to come to mind! She’d only gone to magical London once or twice in her summers before first and second year, and since then she’s spent all her time during breaks in Hogsmeade. But if her inkling was right, this woman helped her pick out her schoolbooks for her very first year. Goodness, perhaps it was for the better that this woman did not seem to recognize her — Marion was quite a foolish child, not knowing anything at all about the wizarding world. The woman had been very kind to her, which felt quite a bit like pity in hindsight.

The short walk through memory almost distracted Marion from the gentleman’s commentary— generous assurances that she didn’t inconvenience them which surely she did. Marion might’ve even insisted as much, if he didn’t say something rather funny about Somerset.

The witch caught onto it instantly, Guinevere’s rescues by the King and his men were always her favorite part of the stories. A small laugh escaped before Marion could think better of it, a lacey gloved hand quick to cover her mouth. So this gentleman was not only well-read, he was funny as well. Marion could feel her cheeks grow a bit pink, but at that exact moment she steeled her resolve. Her matron had talked to her before about such a thing as a window of opportunity. This oddly felt like one.

“Goodness,” she finally recovered with a small sigh, “That sounds like quite the adventure, though I insist that I am not one predisposed to kidnapping,” Unlike a certain Queen, who was always off being kidnapped. It was a careful hint, not wishing to make the mother’s eyebrows raise up any higher than they already were on her forehead.
Marion offered a small curtsy, satisfied with the state of her feet in her shoes. The straps were still undone, but she was sure she could wobble her way away as needed. “I shan’t keep you any longer, I’m sorry again for the trouble,” she offered humbly, with an expression that did not really look one bit sorry.

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Ned interpreted her laughter as a sign that she had caught his reference and grinned broadly in response. "Probably better that you aren't predisposed to kidnapping," he quipped. "Rescue does sound like such a bit of effort." Particularly for someone who didn't have a dozen acclaimed knights and an entire kingdom at their disposal to command to do all the hard work for them, which Ned didn't. (It did not occur to him until later that he had automatically cast himself in the role of her rescuer, in the event that she were kidnapped — and yet had still not managed to acquire her name).

"Until we meet again, then, Miss," he said with a smile. "In more favorable circumstances, perchance."

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Set by Lady ♡

It was the sort of moment where Marion desperately wished she was more clever, or more charming, or more becoming, or more wealthy. There was something she wished to latch on to, to prolong perhaps the best conversation that she had all evening! But there was, alas, nothing at all. The book was back in the man’s hands, her shoes were back on her feet, and there was no real reason for them to continue talking at all. From the corner of her eye in the distance, she also saw Ms. Robinson finally waved to her, their carriage coming up from its port around the corner.

Dark eyes moved quickly from her guardian to the mother and son before her, and Marion politely inclined her head. “Er, yes, until then, Mister, and ah, Missus…” The witch awkwardly stumbled, realizing that no introductions had really been made. With a discerning and rather cold look, the woman supplied, “Flourish. Good night, dear, please arrive home safely.” Marion flushed slightly at the curt bite in her tone, though of course she probably meant well…

Flourish. Flourish. She knew that name from somewhere. Marion cast a last flickering look of interest as she nodded, uttering a quiet goodnight before turning on her heel and walking to Ms. Robinson. If she turned slightly to glance nonchalantly over her shoulder while she went, wondering if she might catch a glimpse of the young man named Mister Flourish looking at her as she looked at him– well. That was nobody’s business but her own.

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   Edward Flourish