open | well i've lost it all

[coquettish_trees]

WHO: Lexie and the brave people who feel like maybe getting things thrown at them/being yelled at/cried on/some other flavor of ridiculousness.
WHAT: Breakup Drama ♫
WHEN: nowish (end of Haring)
WHERE: De La Fontaine apartments in Hightown
NOTES: if you're a melodramatic noblewoman with a sudden case of regency constitution clap your hands
[ if you want a certain flavor of ridiculousness, put it in your title or hmu on plurk (@shaestorms) or discord (shae#7274) ♥ ]



It has been three days since she returned to the apartments the Comte keeps for her and her sister in the middle of the night, and Alexandrie de la Fontaine has not emerged from her room. In fact, Alexandrie de la Fontaine has not emerged from her bed. The only mark of her continued residence is the persistent heartbroken sobbing from behind the door. It is largely quiet, muffled, a background sound to be filtered out like the ocean waves. It does on occasion become more energetic as some thought—new or revisited for the hundredth time—sets her off, or disappear entirely when the expenditure of it all sends her to sleep.

Meal after meal is brought, left, and found again untouched; the tea over-steeped, the coffee stale, and both quickly rendered cold, for she will not stand for a fire being lit in the hearth. (The first maid to find it silly and begin to kindle one in any case for her lady's own good received a thin bruise the shape of the side of an expertly aimed hairbrush and a tongue-lashing for her trouble. There have since been no other attempts.) Instead, she has wrapped herself in the covers of her bed, her attire unchanged since her return save to become rumpled, her hair slowly coming free over time as the pins vex her and are yanked out and thrown to disappear in the rug.

She is missing entirely. Silent on the network when she would usually be flip, absent from both duties and regularly kept company. Crystal messages go unanswered, and callers are turned away with the vague explanation that Lady Alexandrie has taken ill and is not receiving visitors; that they may leave a card, or a message, and she shall respond once recovered.

Some callers are, of course, slightly more insistent.

[ Here you still are! If you're not Evie and you're coming in the normal person way, Marceau is chasing after you right now in that sort of eminently austere way fourth generation lifelong butlers have. If you're a scalawag or something, she has a window. There's probably a trellis. We'll figure something out. Prose or brackets are fine! ]

Comments

[rowancrowned]

Lady Alexandrie is Gwenaelle’s friend, and not Thranduil’s, but given that they are soon to be one flesh under Chantry blessing, he is compelled to look in on her while in Hightown to visit Romain for what but wedding plans, if for nothing more than to see if Gwenaelle ought to come.

In his favor is his experience dealing with Orlesian ladies, and, more importantly, Orlesian serving staff. Between that and his position in the Inquisition, he makes it past the staff and to her room. He is not so crude as to barge in, instead knocking with a light rap of his knuckles.

“It is the Provost,” he calls. “May I come in?”

He is not Gwenalle, but they are cut enough from the same sort of cloth that he might be able to offer comfort.

[coquettish_trees]

Here, finally, a brief twinge of genuine guilt. Less so than if it had been a visit from Ambassador Amsel, but nevertheless she has been indulging herself in her sorrow, and Gwenaëlle's husband (and soon-to-be husband) is, as he had introduced himself, the Provost of the Inquisition.

For this occasion, she will manage to struggle herself to reach out and fumble herself an actual handkerchief. It makes her cheeks slightly less damp, her affirmative response less nasal and stuffed, but on the whole does little to fix her appearance.

Should this be an official visit at all, well... she does look ill.

[rowancrowned]

He enters, and closes the door quietly after him.

"Mademoiselle," he says, and continues in Orlesian, faintly tinged with a Halamshiral accent, "I apologize for calling on you, but Gwenaëlle suggested you might enjoy company."

Nevermind that he's her friend's husband, calling on her alone- the elveness unmans him as well as the rifterness does, and he finds himself one of the lovely little chairs that find their homes in the estates of fine ladies, and brings it to the bed, and sits.

"That is for Gwenaëlle," he says. "As provost, I am here more to- make enquiries about conduct."

Gwenaëlle had been vague with the details, but at the end of the day, her beau was first, Tevene, second, a mage, and third, Thranduil's problem.

[coquettish_trees]

A small brief smile at his use of her mother-tongue, the diplomacy inherent in it. Alexandrie would happily allow herself to relax and be made comfortable by it, were she inclined to spill her woes.

Which she would be, were they only hers. It is strange to be so hurt, to have recourse for vengeance, and to not wish to employ it in the slightest. Soft. Unforgivably. That hurts again, and she rather daintily employs her handkerchief to dab at the evidence—an immense contrast to the forcefully unrestrained sobbing of earlier in the morning—before replying in the same.

"Your pardon, Lord Provost, but I believe your wife to rather have decided I ought to have company." The meddling bitch. (Affectionately thought, of course). "I shall not turn you away, however, provided you continue to be kind about the poor showing I make of myself."

[rowancrowned]

He’s picked up a great number of Orlesian effects from Gwenaëlle—his favorite foods, the cut and color of his clothes, turns of phrase, all the detritus of a foreigner picking up on the culture sheltering them.

“Not at all,” he corrects lightly, and pats his own jacket to find his own handkerchief, embroidered by Gwenaëlle in charming, faux-Dalish leaves and vines. “I think she might object. You ought to award the credit to me, and not her.”

He leans forward to offer the linen square to her. “I have seen worse.” Lightly. Implied either Ghislain or Gwenaëlle herself. All Orlesian ladies must take a class in it, for their similarities in acting out emotions too large to trap behind ribs. “Can you forgive the impropriety of my barging in?”

[coquettish_trees]

The shield of proper behavior is a comfortable one. For the space of Thranduil's visit, she might well pretend to simply be ill, and he might well pretend to believe her. If they both pretend skillfully enough, she may even fool herself for a time. Despite her own handkerchief being perfectly serviceable, Alexandrie secrets it beside her so that she might take the offered one with an appropriately grateful look and repeat her earlier dabbing--at the outer corner of her eyes, this time.

"Gwenaelle's work, yes?" she inquires, examining the embroidery briefly before folding it neatly, "She has always had a fine hand." She offers the folded cloth back in return, and affects a small wan smile; the very picture of ladylike fortitude. "And you are of course entirely forgiven. It was kind of you to look in on me. I am quite sure I shall be soon recovered, aided in no small part by such visits."

He can tell Gwen she was well enough to dissemble.