Lucky Rabbit

The words were barely out of Lady Frances’s mouth before Arabelle was struggling to rise from her seat. It was obviously difficult for her since there were no arms to push against, and for a moment, Pandy was afraid the woman would simply sprawl across the still-dusty floor. Pandy and Frances both hastened to Arabelle’s side, but Frances was trying to get her to sit back down, while Pandy was trying to help her get up.

Yanking her arm from Frances’s grasp, Arabelle continued levering herself to her feet by using Pandy’s arm, but her leg gave way beneath her, dropping her back into the seat. Frances grasped her wife’s hand and all but glared at Pandy.

“It’s been getting worse as she ages,” Frances said. “Soon she’ll be confined to our home or a wheeled chair. She takes more potions every day, and pretends like it’s fine, but it isn’t.” Turning the glare on Arabelle, she said, “It isn’t.”

Pandy stepped back, finally seeing not a bossy and overwhelming spouse but a desperate one, and sighed. “Light magic doesn’t work on Dark mages,” she said simply, even as she sent a single Minor Heal toward Arabelle. Augustus had all but told her to avoid this exact situation, because actually being able to help could give away that she wasn’t the Light mage she would almost have to pretend to be.

Minor Heal successful.

Healed Lady Arabelle Durchville for 20 HP.

Ouch. The full twenty? Honestly, Pandy had almost been hoping her spell would only heal a few points, which would allow her to say no without feeling too guilty about it. So far, it seemed like Minor Heal only repaired temporary or recent injuries, not anything long-term, including chronic disease or illness. No curing cancer for her.

Arabelle had been trying to stand again, and suddenly found that her leg would hold her, so she stumbled up and forward, almost running into her wife. Turning wide eyes on Pandy, she started to say something, then closed her mouth again and shook her head very slightly.

“You told me we were here to get to know Augustus’s paramour and see the house before renovations got underway,” Arabelle told her wife firmly. Ignoring Pandy’s total system shutdown at the word ‘paramour’, she gripped Frances’s arm, leaning on the taller woman a bit more heavily than she probably needed to at the moment. Looking back at Pandy, she added, “I’m sorry we disturbed you. I’m certain you have better things to do, and we’ll see you at Falconet tomorrow.”

Pandy’s mouth finally decided to get on with things, even though her brain had checked out, and she said, “Would you like to see the house?” Since it seemed Arabelle wasn’t going to throw Pandy under the steamroller, she also sent another tentative Minor Heal toward Augustus’s aunt-in-law. This time it only recovered twelve points of health, but a little more color returned to Arabelle’s face.

“No, I-” Frances said, obviously determined to continue the conversation even after being so rudely interrupted, and Arabelle stomped on her wife’s foot. It was a small stomp, as stomps went, but Frances stopped, blinking, then said, “Yes?”

Arabelle smiled broadly. “I wish I’d brought my cane now. I didn’t think I’d be up to much walking, so I left it in the carriage. Just sitting down for a minute has made all the difference, though.”

Frances was finally beginning to look a bit suspicious at her wife’s sudden improvement, but just then Nox strode in, feet actually on the ground, and all of his face-parts in approximately the right locations. In his hands he carried a black cane with a silver head. It took Pandy a moment to figure out that the elaborate carving looked disturbingly like the curled form of an Apparition.

“This belonged to General Avington,” he said, offering it to Arabelle with a bow that showed far more respect than he usually offered Pandy. “I hope it will help, my lady.”

“Oh,” Lady Arabelle said, her hand gently stroking the stretched curves of what could have been a screaming human face. “How lovely. Thank you, ah…”

“Nox, my lady,” Nox said, and Arabelle repeated the name before the butler backed out of the room.

And that was that. Pandy briefly showed the ladies the sewing room, though the trees blocking the window and the dark stain on the floor still gave it a distinctly horrifying air. The game room was a bit better, and she was glad to see that all of the billiard balls were made of not-people-parts.

Pandy had avoided this room and the library during her foraging expedition, since she remembered it being mostly intact, though filthy, and indeed Lady Arabelle was very impressed by the genuine ‘Foundation-era’ antiques, though she was equally disappointed that none of them were undamaged. That was probably why they were still there, however, since Piers and his predecessors had obviously sold anything of real value.

They only peered into the library because the shelves were so close together, and there was so much debris on the floor that it wasn’t safe for Arabelle. Besides, Lady Frances began sneezing almost as soon as the door was opened. “Allergic to mold,” she explained thickly once the room was shut up again, and Pandy made a mental note not to show them any of the bathrooms.

The door to the servant’s quarters just got a wave, and neither woman was terribly interested in the kitchen or the pantry. “You’ll need to replace that stove, my dear,” Frances said disapprovingly when she saw the soot-covered pile of metal, which still seemed to be smoking, even though that was surely impossible. “They have ones that can precisely control the temperature and run on magic now, or so I’m told.”

On the other hand, both women were very impressed by the dining room, which Arabelle called a Ballroom, with a capital B. She scuffed her slipper against the floor, revealing polished marble that was probably going to cost a lot to fix, and pointed out the beautiful crown moulding all around the top of the room, where the walls met the ceiling.

“That’ll all be hand-carved, and it was probably originally white, though it looks like someone tried to paint it gold.” She grimaced in distaste, and Pandy had to agree. The brash paint was curling in strips away from the wood beneath, and in some places had been applied so thickly that all detail had been lost.

At the stairs, however, they had to stop, because the winding steps were too much for Arabelle. Pandy sent her a third heal, and found that the other woman was already down five health points, just from the small amount of walking around they’d done.

“I don’t want to invade your personal space anyway, Eurydice,” the lady said, leaning on the black and silver cane. “Though I did wonder…” She looked back down the hall, gesturing to the right side. “Is that all for the servants? I assume the door near the entry is the cloak room, and you said the one in the middle is a bathroom, but what of the rest?”

Pandy winced. She should have known someone as observant as Lady Arabelle would catch that. In between the cloak room and the servants’ quarters was a space only accessible from the office above. It – and its potential contents – weren’t something Pandy really wanted to talk about.

To her surprise, it was Lady Frances who shut down this line of inquiry. “You just said yourself that we don’t want to invade her personal space, Belle. If she didn’t tell you, she doesn’t want you to know. It’s not like we don’t have our own secrets.” Those piercing brown eyes stabbed into Pandy, then swept down her wife’s body, lingering on the leg Arabelle was barely limping on.

Arabelle paused, then let out a puff of laughter. “Right you are, Frannie.” Reaching up, she patted Lady Frances on the cheek. “Well then, we’ve taken enough of Eurydice’s time. Though I would like to meet her brother at some point. It seems possible we’ll all be family someday, after all.”

Pandy’s cheeks flamed, and she would swear she heard giggles coming from the servants’ quarters. Lady Arabelle just smiled the sweetest smile Pandy had ever seen anyone but Thaniel produce, and laid her hand on Frances’s arm, using both her wife and the cane to support her as they made their way back to the front door. There, they found Nox waiting, holding two cloaks Pandy hadn’t even realized he’d taken.

Lady Arabelle got one more heal for the road as they said goodbye, with both ladies pressing kisses to Pandy’s cheeks, a gesture she returned with as much awkwardness as possible. “We shall send round an invitation for you, your brother, and Augustus to join us for dinner,” Lady Frances said as Nox settled her cloak on her shoulders.

Dinner? With Augustus and Isidor? That would be… awkward. But nice. At least, it would be nice as long as no one said a single word, and they all just sat there and ate food together. But what about Thaniel? Thaniel liked dinner, too!

“What about Augus- Mr. Blackwood- What about the chancellor’s wards?” Pandy blurted out. “Could they come?”

Arabelle’s eyes positively lit up. “Wards? Augustus? Yes, that would be delightful.” And with that, she and her wife made their cautious way down the steps and through the overgrown vegetation to the gate, which groaned as it opened, and clanked as it shut. A minute later, wheels crunched on gravel as their carriage rolled away.

Oops. That was bad, wasn’t it? If Augustus hadn’t told them about Thaniel and Lian, there was a reason. Probably a good reason. At least a reason-reason that wasn’t just Pandy spewing out information no one had asked for because she didn’t want Thaniel to be sad because he missed a nice dinner. Would he even be sad, though? He could have a comfortable meal at Falconet with his friends, or an awkward one with a couple of old ladies, teenage Isidor, the chancellor, and a woman who might turn into a rabbit at any moment. And Lian.

A throat being cleared behind her brought her back to herself, and Pandy turned to see the current occupants of her house, all crowded together in the entry-way. Nox, the throat-clearer, had a single brow raised as he watched her, while Isidor stood next to him, arms crossed over his chest so Tempest was pushed up, halfway out of her pocket, watching Pandy with a judgemental eye that she was so used to by now that she was only relieved that at least a turtle didn’t think any less of her after her slip.

Eleanor and Lord Winston were practically bouncing, barely containing an amount of enthusiasm Pandy wouldn’t have believed they had between them. Whether it was the new haircut or the change in clothes, the princess really was like an entirely different person, which could only be good when it came to her hiding in somewhat plain sight. Behind her, Empress Glory somehow occupied far more space than her physical body could have managed alone – hands on hips, having entirely abandoned her own image of prim and proper tutor.

Nyssa stood next to them, holding a tarnished silver tray absolutely piled with what looked like lumps of charcoal. As Pandy watched, one of them crumbled, causing a small puff of ash to drift into the air. A look of disappointment filled the elemental’s face, and she lifted the tray as she said, “They’ve gone already? We just finished the cookies.” Behind her, a small Dragon wearing a frilly apron squawked her displeasure.

Pandy stared at them all, somehow feeling both overwhelmed and incredibly fortunate. Offering Dragon and Apparition a vaguely apologetic shrug, Pandy smiled at Eleanor as she closed the door behind her. “Come on,” she told the cosplaying princess, “I got you some more pants, and I want to hear what’s been happening since I left!”