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@violenceinherent

An evening party in the Estate District, held mid-season, in summer.

Light sparkled through the chandelier, turning the crystal-cluster into a constellation against the dark drapery that covered the ceiling. A slow wheel of people revolved through six grandly decorated drawing-rooms, each one decorated in a different color scheme. The bright colors and expensive fabrics of their clothes sparkled and flashed just as brightly as the chandelier. Silken jackets, velvet trousers, high heels studded with diamonds, and prized necklaces of pearls wound around pale necks, and the men regal in sober colors of fabrics just as rich, though none of them, Lea privately thought, were half so beautiful as the women in the room.

Perched on a green velvet couch in a room with green, leaf-patterned walls and bookshelves and trimmings of rich, dark brown wood, Lea sipped from a glass of fruit punch (barely touched it, truly; it was too sweet for her) and exchanged light conversation with those of her mother’s acquaintances who came to speak with her.

When no one came to speak to her, her gaze roamed. Oh, she tried to examine the men, their clothes, their looks, the way they spoke to others, the way others spoke to them, to assess who might be worthy of her acquaintance, but her gaze, one way or another, returned to admiring the beautiful clothes of the young women, the way a strand of pearls peeped beneath lace that clung to slender neck, the way one laughed, floating as she walked on shimmering heels to meet an acquaintance. Gentle, sighing envy brushed her heart. Perhaps it was the way they walked that drew men to them. It drew her.

She rose, intending to find her sister and retire with her to a garden or somewhere more out-of-the-way where they could confer. Her own heels, rather low compared to some she regarded with slight envy, were muffled into low, nearly inaudible clunks by the carpet. Hold your head up, steady your chin, but not so high your nose is pointed anywhere but ahead. Loose shoulders, smile, smile, smile.

She paused in the foremost drawing room, inspecting the crowd for her sister’s outfit, a pale blue confection that might be considered demure compared to the flashy sets filling the room. She found no sign of her, and lingered a moment, looking over the people in the room.

#violenceinherent #violenceinherent1 #correspondence;#( oops. i wrote far more than i intended to. )#( just setting the stage here now. )

@paternall

Months, this had gone on, months!! Over a year of agonized hiding away, of staying indoors on the finest day for fear that someone might have the plague, over a year of cutting people off the moment a whisper reached them (old friends, they didn’t matter when lives were at stake), over a year of watching the city crumble, and it still dragged on. Would it indeed go on forever?

Lea could wait no longer. Her father feared what her Uncle Eustace might do, were he to get wind that his son was no longer under the watchful eye of Arius and Irene, and instead under the decidedly less watchful eye of Elenore. (He did not count for Maximilian or Lea, of course he did not, he did not know them.) But Lea feared for her cousin, who she loved truly despite the quarrel between his father and hers, and so, after much persuasion, Arius had, at last, agreed: Lucky must leave the city.

Thus fell the problem of finding a way out of the city for him. Stride was missing, Dundermore had refused (she suspected his inability fueled his goading method), and her own family’s agents were just as trapped in the city as she was. She had tried every route she could think of, and nothing, nothing!!!, had worked

And the plague was still getting worse.

A rumor had passed her ears (none escaped her, or so she thought) that Miss Wiltern’s old protector still haunted the city, watching over her and her sister despite being driven from her side (the circumstances surrounding that were murky to her, a rarity in this city). He, so the rumors went, was one of them who moved in shadow, and could leave the city at will on errands for his wards.

The railcar hissed to a halt, sparks flying from its wheels, and Lea peered out the window of the car. Clarke craned his neck to see past her. “That is the house?” Lea asked, speaking to the driver of the railcar.

He told her the address, confirming that it did indeed belong to Miss Rebecca Wiltern, his voice gruff and quiet. Lea nodded, and Clarke hopped out of the car, to circle around and open the door for her.

A white, heeled boot struck the ground, and Lea graciously accepted Clarke’s offered hand to rise. He retired back into the car to wait, and she made her way, alone, up the path and the steps to the house.

A maid met her at the door, and Lea drew one of her personal calling cards from the purse dangling from her wrist and offered it out. “Good day. I am here to speak with Mister Antonio, please, on matters of business.” Her voice stayed soft, and she hoped this Antonio was smart enough to employ a doormaid who did not chatter.

The maid bowed and withdrew, allowing Lea to step into the foyer and out of the mild chill of Dunwall’s winter, and there to wait, white-gloved hands clasped, to be called or met by whoever would see her.

#paternall #paternall1 #correspondence;

“I do not like this new Serkonan style of dining.” She turns her head, lips pursing slightly as her gaze sweeps across the scene and returns. “It seems to me very stiff and formal, and not at all conductive to the ease and comfort which a good dinner with friends ought to have.”

#( open. )#( prompts. )#correspondence;#( i tried making fancy icons for this and failed so y'all just get the text version. )#( she's talking about a la russe vs a la francais. )

@wcrfareoverseer (x)

“i think you are mistaken, m’lady. i – i don’t know what sorrows you speak of and i’ve little to say.” fragments of truth weaved together to form something of a response, something of a lie. restrict the lying tongue. there is always sorrow. in dunwall, there is always sorrow and thomas is not exempt.

She considers him, this Overseer, with a tilt to her head, the feathers that adorn her hat rustling slightly with the movement. Her eyes skim his uniform, checking for insignia, signs of rank.

“Perhaps I am, I do hope I am,” she returns her answer in a low murmur. “One never knows for certain.”

She weighs briefly the pros and cons of interrogating him further. She chooses not to—it is said, and there is no real reason to press the issue. Still, it is difficult to resist adding, “Though I doubt very much you have nothing to say.”

#wcfareoverseer #wcfareoverseer1 #correspondence;#( this is probably dh1 era. maybe at a party? maybe at a sermon? )#( do rich people in dunwall regularly attend services? i think they do. maybe. i hope there's more than one chapel in dunwall. )#( the entire city's population ain't gonna fit in that measly little box. )

@katell-clayton said:

"Clement... Your mother is going to kill me."

“I heard.”

Assistant Lord Treasurer Clement Montgomery glanced back towards the grand staircase of Lord Treasurer Daniel Clayton’s home, and hurriedly motioned for Zosime to follow him.

Clement pushed open the door to the drawing room, and hurriedly dismissed the maid in the process of finishing up the dusting, explaining softly, “I’m terribly sorry, you can finish when Miss Melo leaves, but I must speak to her in private. No one is to enter this room. Do not tell Lord Clayton that Miss Melo is here.”

The maid protested, and Clement interrupted her, insisting, “You may go.” She curtseyed, and fled.

Clement settled onto a chair in the drawing room, flicking back the tails of the hastily-thrown on morning jacket. So hastily thrown on that his cravat was messy and jumbled, limp on his chest. “Lord Clayton read about it, just this past hour.”

Lord Melo has written to the papers, stating that Miss Zosime Melo was the daughter of a whaler, not his own daughter, and that Lady Melo had not been in Serkonos during the Fugue Feast she was said to have been conceived on.

He motioned for her to take a seat. “I’ve not received word from my lady mother yet. I have received word from Lord Clayton. Much of it does not bear repeating before a lady, as indelicate as her habits might be.” He smiled, trying to soften his words with a look of a laugh. He sobered again, and leaned forward. “What can we do? We must act, Miss Melo, and quickly.”

#c. her firstborn son #katell clayton #katellclayton4 #v; children grown #correspondence;

@daggersandbonecharms said:

Willie of the Winsbury

Cigarette smoke hung heavy in the air. The stench of whiskey hung heavier. Secretly, Lea was glad for the coarse cloth that covered her head and hair, protecting it from ash and dust and really, smell.

Packs of young nobles, deciding they wanted to venture into the slums for adventure. It amused her, even as she joined them. Personally, she would rather stay in the gilded landscape of riches and beauty, but, humoring her “friends” wasn’t too great a strain on her.

And running into acquaintances, that amused her too.

“Be careful of the girls who are too soft to be here,” she murmured to the familiar, scarred-face man, as she slipped through the crowd in the wharfside drinking establishment. “Flirt a little too hard with one of them and her father might just decide that under your scars you’re handsome enough to marry her.”

#daggersandbonecharms #daggersandbonecharms1 #correspondence;

@religiousshitbaby said:

I Will Never Marry

The waves of the ocean tossed and broiled, roaring against the rocks. The sea-wind caught at the feathers and plumes adorning her hat, tugging at them, and were it not for the ribbon holding it to her head it would have flown into the sea like the bird it was made from long ago.

Lea rested a gloved hand on the cold metal of the railing between the walk and the dancing waves, tracing where the paint was beginning to flake off. A ring sparkled on her finger, diamond set in silver and surrounded by tiny, bead-like pearls.

“I am engaged.” How odd that word felt on her tongue, especially saying it to one of those few who knew the reality of her tastes. “So much for memories.” Her mouth tugged as she stared at the ring. At last, she pressed her lips together, and slipped the ring off her finger, tucking it into her pocket. “How lovely it would be, to live single all my days.” She paused, then laughed, light as the jingling of small bells. “Ah, I am sorry for speaking to you of needless woes and pasts that should be, well, past.”

#religiousshitbaby #religiousshitbaby1 #correspondence;