we all keep our sadness cupped safe in our hands ( semi - open )

[elegiaque]

WHO: Gwenaëlle Vauquelin + YOU?
WHAT: Settling into Hightown.
WHEN: Current.
WHERE: The new Vauquelin residence, Hightown.
NOTES: Open to anyone who'd have a reason to visit her at her home. Deliveries, pick ups, important conversations as need having.

Actually moving into her new townhouse is not as involved a process as it might be; Gwenaëlle's brought her bedroom with her, not the entirety of the Vauquelin household, so most of the interiors are what had belonged to the current owner the property is now being rented from, purchased on her behalf by the Duke before he left so that she can do as she pleases with them, replace or keep the pieces she likes at her leisure. She'd not been expecting it to be her own home in quite so literal a way, and in overseeing the airing out of the place and some rearrangements made, she finds she's not entirely -

She didn't want to rely on her grandfather, but she misses him. Maybe living together here would have been pleasant.

No sense in dwelling on it, though, when there's still a hundred things to be done - messages sent to her friends and acquaintances by runner to inform them of her new abode and ensure everyone who ought to have her address has it and will have no trouble locating her now that she's (finally) out of the Gallows. She leaves Yva to unpack her belongings, pens a request for Alistair to come at his convenience because she requires his assistance, spends a solid several hours sorting through her new library inventory to see if any of it is useful or if it's all just What This Merchant Thought Would Look Impressive On His Shelves - a selection of tomes are set aside to be donated to the Inquisition, she supposes someone from the research division might come and collect them or she'll have to have someone take them down. Her own books go up, and she has the remainder of what she certainly isn't keeping out boxed up to be delivered to her landlord's current address.

It is a very nice house, and she's more pleased with it than she isn't. Visitors will be shown to the walled courtyard, where she's spread a blanket on the grass and is settled there with her writing, reading glasses balanced on her nose, hair swept back in curls.

Comments

[elegiaque]

"No," Gwenaëlle says, feigning thoughtfulness, her amusement real if from a great distance, "I daresay they won't."

The list of dance partners she was prepared to be scolded for snubbing at balls is long, after all, and here is one new law in her little kingdom: there will be none of that. None of the tiresome and tiring parties that she doesn't care for, no endlessly pretending to find each other interesting in salons, no being obligated to agonise over seating arrangements and who to invite to what. There's not going to be any fucking thing to invite anyone to, problem solved.

(She likes to dance - but that isn't what it is, in a ballroom. It's only the same maneuvering, in a different gown, with different shoes.)

"And no; I believe she has something particular in mind for herself that wouldn't suit him well at all, so he will stay here. Of course she's always welcome," the little, subtle ways that she always warms up when she speaks of Morrigan, a more uncomplicated adoration than the strange thing between herself and Thranduil.

uses the wrong account for my freakin gagtags

[limier]

"Of course. The residence seems suitably detached from the neighbours, you may all have some privacy."

And what the neighbours will make of the nature of that — as they certainly will — well, an Orlesian lady attached to the Inquisition was always going to attract a certain amount of attention. If the discretion of the arrangement draws further interest, the practicalities of it at least discourage active snooping.

She’d like to nose around the point of Morrigan, nearly as concerning a woman as it is possible to be (while remaining a surprising conversationalist), but she’s little forgotten the affection with which Gwen’s spoken of her: Here and now, there and later. When the purpose of this particular visit is judgment, better not to associate that with — with whatever Morrigan is to her. Enough will have been rightfully assumed.

"Have you spoken with them, or have your staff?"

Those neighbours. Have they been vetted? Or, far more likely: Reassured that the Inquisition isn't about to open a rift in their backyard?