faderift | OPEN ↠ THE WINTER PALACE, PART I

OPEN ↠ THE WINTER PALACE, PART I

WHO: Open to all
WHAT: The War of the Lions comes to a head with tense peace negotiations scheduled for a grand Winter Palace ball
WHEN: This is forward dated to ~~Firstfall 30~~ Wintermarch 15. This post covers only the first few hours of the event, Part II will be posted in the coming days with the next stage.
WHERE: the Winter Palace, Halamshiral, Orlais
NOTES: Please make sure to read the OOC Post for more info!

The Inquisition's encampment at Halamshiral has grown to be a second home for some, having remained on the estate grounds outside the city for several months now. The field full of tents and campfires is quiet tonight, a large contingent having made their way to the famed Winter Palace to attend the evening's ball. It's not just a party, of course: it's also a venue for much-needed negotiations between Empress Celene and her challenger cousin, Grand Duke Gaspard. All of Orlais' highest and mightiest have gathered to see if tonight the War of the Lions will finally come to an end.

The Inquisition's role is not entirely clear. Some consider them mediators and peacekeepers, and it's true they've done their best thus far to safeguard the citizens of Orlais without overtly choosing a side in the conflict. But others see them as a foreign force marched into the heart of the nation en masse and fear some sort of coup may be in the offing. The Empress and the Grand Duke remain politely wary, but have agreed to allow Inquisition agents to assist with event security. Patrols rove the grounds (and, more discreetly, inside the palace), made up of small teams of Imperial guardsmen, chevaliers, and Inquisition members. It's a risky decision, pairing up people who have been on opposite sides of a war for the last year, with only the agents of a controversial religious(??) order as a buffer. The atmosphere is tense, everyone on edge waiting to see where the first blow will be struck--and by whom.

The Ballroom

The ballroom glitters, lit with hundreds of candles in sconces on the walls, bundled on stands, dangling from elaborate chandeliers. There are even servants assigned to circulate about the dancefloor carrying trees of slowly-dripping candles, the better to allow guests to appreciate their partners' finery or critique their neighbors' steps.

There's plenty of critiquing going around, whether from the couples daintily spinning and mincing about the sunken dance floor or the crowds milling about the mezzanine above them. Fashion and flirtation are the hot topics of the day, as ever, but there is an undercurrent of tension not usually present at such events. Many of the hushed conversations are about troop movements or Tevinter plots, destroyed lands and dead chevaliers. Nothing can quite make an Orlesian extravaganza somber, but no amount of wine and music can completely erase awareness of the war that has brought them here tonight, or the uncertainty about what will come of it. As a precaution the guards have confiscated all weapons at the door, but there is less rowdy behavior than one might expect, a combination of many young men having gone off to battle, and most of the people who remain preferring to remain on their best behavior in this trying time. Guests who do not do the same will be quickly and fiercely shunned.

But not all choose to spend their time worrying, and if it is not as carefree an affair as usual it is still most definitely a party atmosphere. Much of the laughter and chatter and fan-fluttering is as genuine as ever, flowery compliments and veiled insults abound, the food is plentiful and delicious, carried about in great piles by servants dressed entirely in gold. The wine is even better, flowing freely from the mouths of a multitude of sculpted lions (which grace the arms of both Celene and Gaspard). The music is brisk and upbeat, provided by a large contingent near the dance floor and several smaller clusters tucked about the venue.

The vestibule is quieter, aside from the constant cries of the heralds announcing each arrival. Conversation continues out here at a steady hum, but the music is more distant, the air less thick with perfume and intrigue. Beyond that are the Inner Gardens, where pairs and small parties circulate between elaborate hedges and topiaries on paths paved with delicate pieces of seashell that glow faintly in the moonlight. Many come and go as the night continues, taking the air as a respite from the crowd and candles inside or using that as an excuse to sneak off for torch-lit liaisons.

The Outer Gardens

The Outer Gardens are still ornamental but less intricately landscaped than the Inner: hedges are lower, topiary larger but less detailed. The torches are more numerous here, the better to highlight arrivals. Carriages of all sorts draw up one by one to the gilded iron gate, footmen in powdered wigs rolling out steps and assisting the passengers as they disembark. Other servants clad in simple lion masks scurry about, taking charge of coats and capes, delivering drinks for those who cannot wait even for the time it takes to walk inside, delivering news to the heralds and consoling those who arrive just behind a larger party and are forced to wait their turn in line to be announced.

The Imperial Guard are present inside, too, but subtly; here they are present in obvious numbers, breastplates shining, resplendent in purple and yellow surcoats, with matching plumes jutting from their helms. They watch each entering personage carefully, collecting weapons from all, no matter how exalted their position. Inquisition agents pass through the area as well, pairs accompanying guardsmen on their rounds through the gardens or up on the palace walls.

Some noble guests even linger here, the shy or the unpopular (or the too-popular), or those for whom even the Inner Garden has grown too crowded, spilling out to catch the cool evening breeze on a wine-flushed face or to continue a conversation too serious to have interrupted by tittering. It is still noble territory, that is clear, but it isn't entirely unusual to see a lady engage a guard in banter as he passes, or a lord stop a servant to inquire after inside information on her mistress.

The Servant's Quarters

Earlier the servants' quarters was a roil of activity, stoves loaded with pots boiling and pans sizzling, trays laden with food, casks rolled out full and back in empty with alarming frequency. But now the fountains are filled and the food all cooked and plated, delivered to tables and staging areas, leaving the vast majority of the staff at their leisure. And while the nobles are occupied across the gardens with their ball, that means it's time for a party here, too.

The rooms are packed, from kitchens and sculleries to dining halls and normal halls, store rooms, boot rooms, everywhere. The servants at Halamshiral have nearly all gathered except for the unfortunate number tasked with serving at the ball itself, and their numbers are nearly doubled by the presence of numerous Inquisition agents and outside retainers whose noble bosses are busy spending their visit dancing and gossiping. That's most of what's happening here, too, with a band playing loud and fast in the servants' hall, tables and chairs pushed back against the walls and piled up to make room for a dance floor. In other rooms, wine flows and food is piled high, leftovers from the ball and anything not quite perfect enough to serve to the upper crust.

The place is full to bursting, hot and noisy and raucous, the floors sticky with spilled ale. A dice game spills out from the cheese room, couples neck and giggle among the tall shelves of bottles in the wine cellar, a group of laughing young men dart among the crowd stealing masks off faces and replacing them with different ones, a cluster steps out in the courtyard to share a pipe beside ladies maids having a whispered argument about whose employer wore it better.

Please note: This post covers only the first few hours of the party, not the entire night. There will be a second post going up in the next week that will cover the conclusion of the event, so please make sure not to assume too far into the future in your threads here. Please make sure to also read the OOC Post for more info on who can attend which party and how we're using comment counts here to determine the outcome of the civil war.

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It takes perhaps an hour after the first dance for Thranduil to approach, all silver and white and confidence. She had not returned his gift, and that is a very bare something. The absence of her company is something he notices enough to miss it. It is something he cares about enough to try and mend.

Gwenaëlle's life will be snuffed out like the candles on her dress, in what will be no more than a blink of the eye to him. It would be a terrible shame not to enjoy her company for as much of it as he might have.

He smiles at her father, first, gives that polite little nod that means acknowledging an equal, and once that's done, to Gwenaëlle:

"Might I steal you away for a dance, my lady?"

Finding herself between the proverbial rock (Thranduil, smiling) and hard place (her father; returning the smile gracious but not the nod, neatly reframing it his due deference rather than validating Thranduil's assertion of equality) -

Gwenaëlle says, "Fine," with brisk unenthusiasm, before Emeric can make some sort of clever remark on the subject of how many people have ever asked her to dance vs how many she's ever accepted. She shakes him off her elbow and allows herself to be led forward, only:

She drops Thranduil's hand, too, before they ever reach the ballroom.

"I don't dance."

But she did want to get away from her father, so, job done.

He expects his hand to be dropped, but still misses the warmth of her hand, slowing his walk so they might walk side-by-side, and do so at a meandering pace in the general direction of an elven servant with bitesized foods. "You would deprive me of the joy of navigating around your grand statement?"

He's fairly sure it's not real fire- Gwenaëlle being bright enough not to possibly condemn herself to burning to death at this fete due to a stumble- but he minds it anyway, allowing her enough space but still close enough to be with her.

"I assure you I will not step on your feet."

"It'll be remarkably easy to avoid while not dancing." If she were in a better mood - with the situation or with him - then she would perhaps be a bit lighter in her refusal, but Thranduil will at least be able to console himself with not having to observe her say yes to anyone else. He is not singular, either, in her willingness to decline sharply; Gwenaëlle is not known at court for being sweet-tempered.

Being here does not put her in a sweet temper. The sooner this is all over and done with, and preferably topped off with Celene's death - the better for meaning she can leave again. Thus far, the only part of the entire farce she's enjoying is her dress, a novelty she rarely has occasion for and which is doing its job in asserting her personal bubble magnificently.

"I haven't any interest in your joy or lack thereof."

He tilts his head to look at her, curious. "And would you offer assurances that I won't be set ablaze from simply standing near you?" That would be a very clever, if violent, way to throw off displeasing suitors. He's fairly sure that most of the hairdos are partially horsehair and the palace isn't entirely marble-- perhaps she'll burn all the Winter Palace down in search of something that'll quell the pain she seems to be feeling.

Thranduil would tell her it won't work, but they're in public.

"What is keeping you from lighting it all on fire tonight, my lady? The watchful eye of your lord father?"

"The fact that I'm not fucking stupid," she says, the tone of voice so perfectly, correctly polite as to almost disguise the actual words that come out of her cupid's bow mouth, beneath a half-mask that gleams onyx and moonstone and does substantially less to disguise the stormy nature of her expression. (It isn't an accident that she fails to give him any such reassurance.)

Gwenaëlle's life is not her own to squander, and she's always known it. She isn't going to knowingly jeopardize her position now for the same reason she doesn't any other day; the only person that kind of foolishness will hurt is her. It would be an insult to those whose good opinion meant the most to her -

That they are gone, now, makes maintaining it no less important.

Still; a timely interruption temporarily cuts off this line of inquiry, as a young man - of an age with Gwenaëlle and strikingly similar in looks, high cheekbones and dark eyes, resplendent in red - places himself in their path and takes in Thranduil, holding his drink nearer him in mock-scandal. "Bold choice of accessory, Gigi. Decided to compete with me, after all?"

Her tone does not change: "Die in a well, Marcellin."

"At least dance with me first?"

"A deep well, very dark, where no one will hear you screaming--" but she allows him to lean past the outer skirt of her gown and press a laughing kiss to her cheek.

Edited 2016-11-18 05:31 (UTC)

Thranduil waits, as is appropriate, watches as Gwenaëlle shifts to allow this man the room needed to kiss her cheek (notes the arrangement so that he might come into her space the same way a little later on without impaling herself) and greet her with affection. Curious.

It is to Gwenaëlle that he addresses his question, brows raised, turning neatly to face her. "'Gigi'?" It's certainly cute, toothless, and shows a little hint of the other other side that Gwenaëlle certain has buried down somewhere. He likes it. Marcellin has given him a lovely gift, despite his rudeness.

It's a question and she could answer it; what she does instead is correct him, "Lady Gwenaëlle."

It's difficult to navigate an interaction where she can't declare we aren't friends, now in front of the assembled Imperial court, as good as an admission that they ever had been, and thoroughly inappropriate. Not being terribly good at maintaining her position correctly is not the same as being unaware of what that's supposed to look like, and - certainly, it is not this.

Her hands clasp at her waist, fingers clenching as if she would like very much to be holding more securely. Her elbows, probably, wrapping her bare arms about herself; she does not. She scarcely needs to make herself look vulnerable after going to all this trouble not to.

Her dress is not a threat. It is a small, stupid defiance: look at her, it says, unafraid to be looked at.

(It isn't true, but she wishes it were.)

How small their dramas are, and how quickly they will be over in his perspective. That makes him callous, more often than he ought to be, unfeeling when he cannot find the reason to care, solid in how he thinks it matters not-- for so-and-so will be gone in a breath and what does it matter that he was rude for one Orlesian girl, made her life difficult when it was just as easy to be kind?

This court could tear her apart as easy as it does anything else. He need not add himself to the list of thing that is out to get her.

Thranduil takes one last long look over Marcellin and his gaze lingers for a moment even as he begins to speak to Gwenaëlle, facing her by the end.

"Lady Gwenaëlle," look, he can learn. "I assume you would prefer to be left with this Man?"

He can return to looking over the dancefloor. It was quite a nice view.

Grand. She can only imagine what she's going to hear from her idiot brother about this later -

"Keep walking, Marcellin," without pausing. The proposal to leave her with someone (with Marcellin, ugh, she's never going to hear the end of this) like she's a child or a dog that can't be unattended, she does not dignify with a response; walks away from both of them without a backwards glance.

"Chin up, old son," Marcellin suggests, cheerfully, as he leaves: "She's like that with everyone."

He closes his eyes, exhales, pleads with Iluvatar for patience beyond the measure normally allotted to him, and turns to follow Gwenaëlle after allowing her enough of a head start. Thranduil comes from behind, steps to her right, following along sedately, hands folded behind his back.

"Am I truly so offensive, my lady? What about me is so repugnant?" Thranduil's voice is soft, genuine. He can guess a few of them, but she won't give voice to them, he thinks.

There is something she has to like about him. Occasionally, he sees it. She hasn't wholly avoided him; at times she's seemed to like him, and it's that which he pursues.

"We've simply run out of things to discuss," she says, her own hands clasped in front of her, walking through the gardens as if she hopes to discover where she's going when she gets there. "I haven't got anything left to say to you."

It isn't a lie, is the problem.

The things she can't say hang ugly and uncomfortable in the silences between them, and Gwenaëlle doesn't have it in her to pretend that they don't, that she can just ignore them and smile when he speaks to her of other things. It will always be there, a shadow underneath everything else, and she can't do it. Speaking with him in the manor after Guenievre had shown her that; being expected to pretend all was well and speak of inconsequential things had only made her feel sick and lonely.

She has been angry with him, that's true, but also true is that a part of her is angry with him for things that are no fault of his own - she had taken comfort in his company, once, and now she can't, now the ways he tries to offer can only hurt her. The unfairness of it lodges too deeply to make him anything but a sharp reminder that she's always going to have failed someone.

"No," he murmurs, agreeing. "Not here. But when we return to Skyhold I would-- speak with you. Somewhere private, where we might be ... open."

Speak properly, speak honestly.

He follows sedately behind her, his hands behind where hers are before her. He enjoys her company. He would have liked to dance with her on this night, would have liked to offer her better comforts when her maidservant had died-- been told why it was the death of Guinevere hurt so much-- and know more about her smith.

It is not often that he finds himself caring about a mortal (and for ease's sake, he places the elves of Thedas in the not-mortal category) but he can admit when he has a vested interest in a person, in their well being. He has so very few pleasures left to him; if this is one, he is not at fault for trying to keep hold of it.

"I find myself longing for your company, my lady. I would make amends."

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OPEN ↠ THE WINTER PALACE, PART I

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