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chryzure · 4 months

Text

wallflower in the wings

ALT TITLE: chrysiarchie first meeting fic yayyyyyyy

AUTHOR’S NOTE: kudos to chrysi for making extended eye contact with archie’s scary fucking blue eyes

—-—

Archibald noticed the woman in the shadows at every party for the past week. Never the same corner, or even remotely in the path of the party, but if he found his eyes wandering, he could always pinpoint where she’d be: wherever the least number of people congregated, tucked away with a book in hand and eyes dispassionately set upon the ballroom—sometimes even with a pen poised above the page.

It would bother him if he let himself think too hard about it. Not because she didn’t enjoy the celebrations of Clairdelune—many guests didn’t, he knew—but because she didn’t enjoy them whilst still perching herself at the outskirts. No matter how many times he went about the whirl, flirting and stealing married women away to his chambers, she was there. Sitting. Observing. Judging.

Except sometimes she’d not even be doing that. Right now, all she did was read.

Archibald could not understand the torment she had to be putting herself through. The woman was of great beauty. and it had not gone unnoticed. Even some of Archibald’s own cousins—and a non-zero number of uncles—had come up to her, inquiring after a more personal meeting. She’d replied to all them the same: a long stare, mouth inflexible, her gaze piercing and cold even through the buffer of the Web.

She was clearly from another Ark, though her coloring made it difficult for him to guess precisely where. Her hair was white enough to be from the Pole, but the freckles across her skin marked her more of Cylope. The shape of her eyes, however, were uncannily that of Vesperal, and the fall of her hair followed the customs of the Serenissima.

None of that mattered. Perhaps hers was a family of great prosperity, inter-married across all sorts of Arks after a generational series of holiday romances.

All that he cared about was that she intrigued him. He’d approached people for far less pressing matters, and with the way this party was going, he needed a new form of entertainment if he hoped to endure.

He only allowed himself one more sneaking glance to the white-haired woman in her reader’s corner before he resolved to approach her himself.

Touching the brim of his opera hat, he announced to the cohort of Mirages, “I fear I must take my leave of your company.”

One—an older woman, still lovely in her advanced age, with a storm-grey pouf of hair pulled back from a glamoured, suspiciously wrinkle-free forehead—turned to him with her steel brows furrowed in a pout. The dark of her tattooed eyelids made her gaze all the more sultry.

“Oh, but why?” she asked, voice studiously breathless. An invitation—one that Archibald accepted as many times as he turned it down.

He turned a beaming smile her way. “Because, dear Madam Vera, I am bored,” he answered truthfully.

All playful disappointment disappeared behind a placid surface. Twin spots of color rose high in her cheeks.

The man beside her guffawed loudly. His jeweled fingers tightened on the handle of his staff as he patted Vera on the shoulder. His balance swayed with his amusement. His amusement coupled with his brightly patterned clothes gave him the appearance of an aging peacock than was typical of him.

“Dear cousin,” laughed the man, “you know our ambassador. It seems he has found a new conquest.”

Archibald turned to him, brow raised. “Nothing quite so crass, Baron Melchior! I seduce, not force!”

The man waved a dismissive hand with a final chuckle. “So, have you?”

Archibald smiled inanely, though he felt it flatter than most. “And if I said I have not decided?”

“Perhaps I can help you!”

He did not think so.

Vera rolled her eyes to the false sky. “You two do not fear the offense you cause to the gentler sex.”

It was said lightly, but Archibald could see the clench of her jaw. More noticeably, he saw her illusion slip an inch—her skin sallowed in the overhead light, and more wrinkles showed at the corners of her eyes than just crow’s feet.

“You are anything but gentle, cousin,” Baron Melchior said. He shot Archibald a wink, to which Archibald felt no need to respond beyond a vapid smile.

The baron’s hand still pressed into Vera’s shoulder. In the aftermath of this declaration, she shrugged it off with a huff.

“Mr. Ambassador,” she said sourly, the barest bow of her head. Her fellow Mirage did not receive even that luxury, her farewell to him hardly more than a flick of her eyes and a tight line to her mouth. “Cousin Melchior.”

With that, she peeled away from the two of them, her gait steady and firm. Archibald watched her go wordlessly.

Out of all the women he found in his bed, he found Vera the most refreshing. Perhaps the next time, he’d be interested in her.

Though, he thought as he returned to his study of the woman in the corner, perhaps not. He did not visit the same woman twice with any notable frequency.

“Ah, cousin Vera. Such a proud figure, is she not?” Baron Melchior mused. When Archibald did not reply to him, he turned to him with an elegant, overexaggerated motion with his hand. “Now, sir—your new quarry?”

“I still haven’t decided if it is to be so,” Archibald said, though he gave himself no limit to come to a conclusion. Whether it be this night or in a month, he would not be lying when he said such a statement.

Baron Melchior’s brows rose. His tattooed eyelids swirled with the motion—a latent illusion, as extravagant as his enchanted clothing. “Such restraint from you!”

“Let us not pretend to understand all my inner workings.” He masked his irritation with another smile. “The young lady reading the ball away, in case you must know.”

“Oh, but of course.” The baron followed Archibald’s gaze. When his eyes stopped on the white-haired woman, he sucked in a sharp breath. “Now, Mr. Ambassador…”

“Cautionary tale, I’m sure?”

Baron Melchior anxiously touched the golden head of his staff. “Be careful removing the virtue of another Ark’s diplomat, I say, be careful.”

He tilted his head. “You know her?”

“I cannot say that I do.” The baron frowned at her, eyes narrowing.

Perhaps it looked bad that he didn’t know all his guests. Indeed, Archibald knew a great number of them from his familiarity with the Pole’s political landscape. As for other diplomats, holidayers from other Arks, and other such nobility, he greeted more than three-quarters of them personally to learn of their goals. That this woman snuck below his notice was alarming—but other members of the Web treated her with glib acquaintance, and so Archibald did not worry himself too greatly over it.

Either way, Archibald tipped his hat at the baron.

“It seems my duties put me in her path regardless of my decision. I take my leave, my dear friend.”

Patting him on the shoulder, Archibald extricated himself with airy ease. He twined around the dancers and partygoers, flashing a smile here and there when he heard greetings of “Mr. Ambassador!” or, more intimately, more warmly, “Archie!” But he did not allow himself to get sucked into any more conversations.

The woman didn’t look up as he came to a stop in front of her. In fact, she didn’t even seem aware a human body had entered into her realm of influence.

With a grand sweep of his hand, he removed his hat and pressed it to his chest in the semblance of a charming doff.

She made no move to suggest she’d noticed his gesture from her periphery.

Fascinating. And he meant it.

“What could possibly delegate a woman as lovely as you to the corner?” Archibald greeted with a smile.

The woman did not look up. Instead, she flipped the page of the book she was reading. Archibald glanced at the title, only to find it written in a foreign tangle of words. It looked like it predated modern phonetic conventions.

“Do you even know who I am?” she asked, disinterested.

His brows shot up. A diplomat with no manners! How endearing, on top of his initial fascination.

“I can’t say I know all my guests, my lady.” He punctuated this with the smallest bow, then took the opportunity to slide onto the edge of the seat she sat on.

Her eyes flicked to him for the briefest second. Her mouth didn’t flinch in any particular manner. She didn’t move from him.

He grinned. He’d take that as a sign of good fortune.

“But perhaps you might enlighten me,” he suggested coyly.

The woman’s hands stilled on the book. Her expression still did not crack, and not a syllable passed her tongue. Her eyes, finally, left the page wholly to study him.

A pleasant jolt went through him as she did. Details jumped out at him the way they couldn’t through his family’s eyes. Red, with pupils of gold. Midas’s Ark, Leadgold?

Archibald adored the question of this woman. A diplomat of no manners, reading a book written in an outdated language, approaching nobody, regardless of intentions, with no clues or hints to tell him as to why she’d decided to take a vacation on the Ark of the worst climate.

After her careful study of him, she arched her brow.

“Mr. Ambassador, I am not going to sleep with you,” the woman said, matter-of-fact.

His smile faltered, his eyes widening, face freezing in what was sure to be a half-grimace. Good heavens! Had he come across as such a womanizer?

“That’s not why I’m here.” The protest fell from his mouth like pebbles rolled out of a cupped hand. He couldn’t say how his frozen smile stretched around the words, only that he was grateful he didn’t feel heat at the back of his neck, nor in the crest of his ears.

“Is it not?” The woman marked her place in the book, shut it. She turned her shoulders to him now, twisted at the waist to face him in a sardonic respect. As she did, Archibald noticed a glitter across one collarbone—four fingerprints, etched into her skin with iridescent scarring. “Mr. Ambassador, I hardly think my assumption comes from nowhere. I’ve watched you take two, three women up each night, at different moments, or all at once. So tell me why my statement is so offensive to a man that very clearly thinks with his” —her eyes flickered up and down his body, but it didn’t feel as complimentary as most fluttered eyelashes— “needs.”

Honest, to boot. It was so refreshing that it almost outweighed his horrific humiliation.

Laughing, he exclaimed, “What a judgment!”

“A non-inaccurate one,” the woman observed coolly.

He inclined his head with a grin. “That is not why I approached you, however.”

“Oh, fucking saints.” She cast her eyes to the fake sky and dropped the book to the seat, defeated. Crossing one leg over the other, she folded her arms, and still did not look at him. “What is it you want?”

“It seems, my lady, that you are not enjoying a party that I have slaved over,” he said calmly.

“Hardly,” muttered the woman.

He disregarded her exasperation. “My reputation is on the line, not to mention the honor of the embassy! Surely there is something I can do to improve your enjoyment.”

She shot him a disgusted look.

“Rest assured, Mr. Ambassador, that there’s nothing to be done. There has not been a party, ball, or otherwise gathering yet invented that I would enjoy. So stop wasting your breath. Now, if you’ll excuse me.” She grabbed her book and stood, brushing off her skirts cursorily.

He watched her, partway wordless.

“You’re retiring for the evening?” he asked inanely.

The disgusted look pierced him through again, complete with a curl to her lips. “There is a more enjoyable way to pass the night than this.”

Tucking the book under her arm, the woman lowered herself into a derisive little curtsy. Then she straightened, shook out her hair, and, with a sniff, began to walk off.

He stared at the space she’d been standing in with no small captivation, mouth slightly parted.

How refreshing! He needed to know her better. A perfect parry to his oppressive boredom. And, to be truthful, not unlovely.

Before her footsteps could travel too far, Archibald lifted his chin and called, “If you dislike the parties so much, then why do you still come?”

He heard her heels stop their clacking. Her skirt whispered over the illusion of marble, before it, too, stilled.

Archibald didn’t turn to study her, though he wanted to. He knew that she kept her back likewise faced towards him.

Instead, he added, “Night after night. You seem so dreadfully sick of it, yet you don’t even try to find a more remote spot.”

The woman’s dress rustled. Her irritation prickled almost as a physical sensation, a tangible third body between them.

“I’m playing nice,” she replied after a beat, “so that I might quickly return home.”

The clacking resumed, and in its wake, Archibald found he could taste bitter emotion on his tongue.

He tilted his head.

Perhaps Al-Andaloose, he mused, though he still did not think that was quite right.

He’d have to ask after her.

#w.mine #memorie.txt #s.chrysiarchie #FIRST FIC POSTED ON NEW BLOG WHOOOOOOO. i need archie dead.

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