Having a Ball
Summary: Pure fluff-and-nonsense. Polly and Mal contrive go to a party in the Abominable City; there are red dresses and blue meringues; a few friends from the Watch make cameo appearances; I play with tenses to dubious effect. Polly/Mal.
Note: This involves women kissing – shock-horror – women. Don't like, don't read; whatevs.
Disclaimer: Characters are not mine; no profit will be generated. Etc.
Having a Ball
The ball-gown was a vision in crushed velvet, silk-satin, and taffeta. It was crimson. It was narrow-waisted. It was backless. Sergeant Polly Perks thought it'd probably look terrible no matter who wore it, but on her own sadly bustless frame the effect was particularly distressing.
Polly looked at herself in the gilt-rimmed mirror, and sighed. A deep-cleaved and heaving bolster-bosom should have filled the red ruffled front of the dress; smooth shoulders and a creamy back should have filled the deeply plunging back. Diamonds should have been shining in fat glossy ringlets; pearls should have glowed at earlobes and wrists; elegant kitten-heels on slim ankles should have peeped from beneath the rustling hem. Polly sighed again. Chest blessed with only the subtlest of curves, back and shoulders bony, hair short and only vaguely blonde, feet clumsily shod in a pair of worn black court shoes, and not a diamond nor pearl in sight…
I look ridiculous. This whole thing is bloody ridiculous.
Still, the invitation had been clear:
Their Graces Sir Samuel and Sybil Vimes requeft the pleafure of the company of
SERGEANT MISS POLLY PERKS
At a Grand Reception
To be held in the
Great Hall of the Unfeen University
In honour of Brave Borogravia's Valiant Victory against the Vanquifhed Foe!
At Seven of the clock, Sharp, on the Twenty-Third of Spune, this being the Most Illuftrious Year of the Fruit-Bat.
Formal attire is requested and required
Polly couldn't imagine that Butcher Vimes himself had written it,[1] but that didn't mean that the bloody invitation had been any less disheartening. Bet that bloody clerk gave himself a sodding hard-on with all that alliteration, she'd thought, with a sourness that'd surprised her.
"Do I have to go?" Polly had asked Major Clogston, as they sat in the Kneck Keep on the day it arrived.
"Yep," Clogston had said. "Orders. General Froc says it's our diplomatic duty. It's to show willing between the nations."
Polly didn't think much of diplomatic duty, and certainly wasn't willing to show it. She was a soldier first, a barmaid second, and a diplomat not at all. "Our diplomatic duty?" she had asked, peevishly polishing a boot. "You don't have to go. Why me?"
Clogston had shrugged. "You're the symbol, aren't you," she'd said. "White flag from the Keep, Woman in Uniform, parade to the palace, the whole Prince Heinrich-boot-groin-conjunction thing, all that jazz…"
"Wazzer, sorry, Alice, was the damned symbol – she sat up there on that bloody great horse, didn't she?"
"Yeah, but Wazzer's a bit weird," Clogston had pointed out reasonably.
So that had been that. She was going. It meant a thoroughly tiresome trip to Abominable Ankh-Morpork, a city that Polly had never visited and never wished to visit; it meant leaving the squad in the middle of a burgeoning war; and, terribly, it meant finding something 'formal' to wear. Polly, when she had first read the invitation, had assumed that 'formal' meant her new full-dress uniform: white breeches, boots, scarlet jacket and shako.
Ha.
"Dress, Polly, it means you have to wear a dress," Clogston had said patiently.
"Why?"
"Just because. I'll find you something."
Polly had found that a far from satisfying explanation, but, true to her word, Major Clogston had unearthed the crimson crushed velvet number from an obscure forgotten basement somewhere in the Keep and had presented it to Polly, who'd shrunk away from it as if it were poisoned.
"Ooh, a party," Maladicta had said later. She'd come in with sardonic eyebrow raised right on cue as Polly had been trying the dress on and cursing its makers, her maker, and all the gods in Dunmanifestin. "Is that what you're wearing, Polly?"
"That's Sergeant Perks to you," Polly had growled as she put her foot through a silk petticoat, "And, yes, this is what I'm wearing. What's it to you?"
"I'm sure you'll look delightful, Sergeant. I look forward to seeing you in it on the night."
"You're coming too," Polly had stated, unnecessarily, as the vampire had produced a slip of embossed white cardboard from her jacket, and grinned at her with full-teeth-effect.
"Of course," Mal had said. "I'm rather looking forward to it. I like a party."
"You would," Polly had said sourly, still struggling with the dress. "You're a vampire. You're elegant. I, by unhappy contrast," she'd said, shoving an arm viciously under a shoulder strap and hearing with some satisfaction the sound of a splitting seam, "am a bloody mess. And I don't like parties."
The vampire had merely grinned again as Clogston had hastened forward, needle and thread at the ready…
And now here she was, Sergeant Polly Perks, stuck in a student's bedroom at the Ankh-Morpork Unseen University, wearing the bloody dress, and sighing at herself in the mirror.
She was about to go to a ball.
Stupid, stupid, stupid, she thought crossly, as she attacked her blonde curls violently with a hair-brush. She looked at herself in the mirror one more time, thought It will have to do, and burst out into the corridor in a flurry of silk and taffeta.
Several stumbles and a heel through silk later, Polly lent against the corridor wall, and thought sod it. Where the hell is Maladicta anyway? She was meant to be in this mess with me. She wanted to come! Nuggan above, what a bloody nightmare…
Now what? A footman was tripping towards her on well-turned ankles.
"Miss Perks?" he asked.
Polly eyed him. "Sergeant Perks, yes," she amended.
"I've been instructed to take you to the Grand Hall. The Reception has begun. If you'll follow me, madam…"
"You call me sarge," began Polly automatically, but then stopped. Listening to the sounds coming from the Hall ahead, it seemed unlikely that being a military sergeant with all the trimmings would count for very much. Small talk, Polly reminded herself. Smile and nod.
"Have you seen my…friend?" she asked as she trotted along next to the footman. "Vampire, in uniform? Can't miss… him?"
"Mister von… Maladict… has already dressed and joined the Reception, madam," replied the footman, giving up on Mal's many honorifics and ur-names but continuing on, unperturbed and unflustered, as the best footmen should.
So now it was Mister, again, thought Polly. Do I care? Does it make a difference? Besides, what could it possibly make a difference to? It's not as if you enjoyed a sodding great romance together, is it? He… she… just looked at you, in that way, that very specific way, didn't she? And she smiled at you, in that knowing way. And she winked at you, and looked elegant and generally, well, you know… didn't she?
Oh, shut up, Polly told her brain. A few winks do not a romance make. And Mal's an infuriating, superior, pain-in-the-arse, gods-damned vampire. Get a grip, girl.
Still, her brain persisted; you liked her as a man, didn't you? And now you know you still like her as a… female…
Oh, bloody hell, thought Polly. A cross-dressing vampire really shouldn't have such an effect on me. It's not that exciting.
It bloody is though, isn't it?
Really, shut up now, Polly said inwardly. You're going to a ball. Concentrate. Mingle. Make connections. Do your diplomatic duty. Show willing.
The footman was holding the great doors open for her now, and announcing her in trumpeting tones as "Sergeant Miss Polly Perks, of the Borogravian army!" and she was thrust into the Great Hall. Somebody gave her a flute filled with champagne. The crowd closed around her. Ladies voices tinkled and chirped and slurred and drawled, and occasionally hooted. Men's voices brayed and droned and guffawed and shouted boisterously. Champagne glasses clinked. A string quartet was lost in the background din. Someone was singing, badly. Everyone was wearing gold, or silver, or crimson, or bright green, or sapphire, or every-coloured uniforms with enthusiastic frogging. Dancers swirled across the room; ladies and gentlemen stood in clusters and shouted drunkenly at each other. She saw no-one she knew.
So these are parties.
Polly shrank back towards a wall. She looked thoughtfully at her full glass of champagne, and then deliberately downed its contents.
This was an error.
Still burping a little as she went, and wiping the bubbles from her nose, Polly made her way further into the hall.
"I seah," brayed a voice as a hand caught her arm, "You're thayt splendid young thing who kicked the jolly old prince in the old you-know-what's, ha-ha, aren't you?"
Polly turned to see a couple of middle-aged men in tailcoats and stiff white waistcoats smiling at her from behind their glasses of champagne.
"I suppose I am," she said, eying them cautiously.
"Well, jolly good show, ay should seah. You look terribly well in thayt dress, by the way. Better than jolly old trousers, what!"
"Oh, ay'm not sure, Rupert," said his companion, looking down the front of Polly's dress quite unabashedly, "Nothing like a bit of skirt in a bit of uniform, eh!"
"Ho ho ho!" said Rupert. "No, indeed! And one would certainly knair who wore the trousers, wouldn't one!"
"Ho ho ho!" said the other.
Good grief, thought Polly.
"Have some more champagne," said Rupert, handing her a glass, "And come and meet some people."
'Some people' apparently meant some younger men in tailcoats and two women not much older than Polly who smiled at her with all the warmth of a pair of crocodiles.
"I love your dress," said Crocodile No.1, who'd evidently decided that a royal blue meringue with a gold-stringed bodice was a viable sartorial statement. "You must let me knair who it's by." If the upper classes ever deigned to snigger, her companion – Crocodile No.2 – would have done so. She certainly snorted as she smiled.
"Air, ay'm not sure they have tailors in Borogravia, Josie. Ay'm not sure it's by anybody."
Josie tinkled a laugh. "Gosh, sorry!" she said, sounding not at all sorry. "One does forget, doesn't one?"
"Don't listen to hair," one of the tailcoats said to Polly. "We all think you've done jolly well, considering, you knair…"
"Apparently her father is an innkeeper," Josie stage-whispered to her companion, who lent over to murmur in Polly's ear: "Bit of advice – hairdressers are alive and well, you knair."
Polly considered clawing Josie's eyes out there and then, but settled for spilling her champagne down the salmon-pink silk-satin of Crocodile No.2's dress.
"Oops," she said.
The Crocodiles shrieked in unison.
"Excuse me," said Polly, politely, and escaped into the throng.
She headed for a table in the corner to find some replacement champagne. Sipping at a refreshed glass, and taking refuge in a giant bow window with billowing curtains, she looked balefully around the room. No-one paid any more attention to her, which was one thing to be thankful for. The glass was soon empty. She picked up another, and drank that too. Where was Vimes? She knew him, at least. Or that blonde sergeant from the Watch? Where was she? She'd at least met her.
And where in the bloodiest of hells was Mal?
Sod this for a game of soldiers. Polly set down her glass, and set off, with a somewhat unexpected unsteadiness, for the door. A thought struck her, and she returned for a full bottle of champagne. Off she went again. Diplomatic duty, my arse.
She weaved and stumbled, but she'd almost reached the door when a dancer crashed into her.
"Sorry sweet-heart," he slurred as he lurched backwards.
Polly picked herself up. He was wearing a cavalry jacket unattractively patterned in green and yellow, and he'd spilt mayonnaise down the front. His face was red and his breath meaty.
"Alright there?" he asked, focussing on her figure, such as it was. "I've got a new Quirmian racing chariot, y'know… really well sprung, fast as you like… big seats… fancy a spin, hur hur?"
"No," said Polly. The champagne was making it hard to focus, but at least he was drunker than she was.
"Oho," bellowed Mr Mayonnaise, grabbing her around the waist. "So you fancy a shag right here do you? Saucy thing… gimme a minute and I'll find…"
Unk.
A kitten-heel could be useful, Polly discovered, as she walked briskly away from a white-faced Mr Mayonnaise, who was now bent double and holding his foot.
She was still carrying that champagne bottle. Polly tipped her head back and took a good slug of the stuff. That was better. Now… get out of here, find your room, drink the rest of that champagne, and go to sleep…
Polly crossly pushed open the big doors of the great hall, and walked straight into a vampire.
"Mal! Where the hell have you been? Horrible party… this is your fault. And how in the bloody buggering hell, when I'm stuck in this bloody dress, did you get to wear gods-damned trousers?"
"And good evening to you too, Polly."
The vampire grinned, took a shiny black cigarette case from an inner pocket, shook out two cigarettes, lit them, handed one to Polly, and took an elegant drag on her own before continuing.
"Is that a bottle of champagne you're holding, Sergeant Perks?"
Polly took the cigarette and glared at her, but she suspected that the alcohol had lent the glare a fuzzy edge, and that it wasn't quite up to sergeant standards.
"Yes, yes it is champagne," she said. "So what? And why are you wearing a suit? I thought it was all long hair and lace corsetry these days, Corporal Maladicta."
Mal shrugged. "I like to cut a dash," she said. "One can't be dapper in a dress."
Polly dizzily looked her up and down. 'Dapper' wasn't really the word. She wasn't really sure what the word was at all. Polished black shoes under black trousers; white waistcoat; white shirt; white cravat wrapped around the high pointed collar; black tailcoat, beautifully fitted. Black hair cut short and slicked back. Cheekbones. Pointed smile. Lips. Legs. Cigarette holder (honestly!) loosely held between two long fingers. The slight curve of a breast beneath the stuff of the shirt…
Stop. Just… stop. Stop it now. What the hell's wrong with you, girl?
Polly took another angry slug of champagne, and handed the bottle to Maladicta.
"Well you can stay and cut a dash here all you want," she told the vampire. "I'm off."
"Off?" asked Mal, sipping the champagne and licking her lips. "Off where? Nice champagne they've got here, by the way."
"Off to somewhere quiet where I can drink the rest of this bottle alone and in peace, without having to worry about falling over my own gods-damned shoes, or being attacked by maniacs wearing meringues, or dealing with a bloody vampire!"
Polly realised she was shouting.
Mal looked hurt.
"Not one drop, Polly," she said reproachfully. "That's what this little ribbon means. I am distinctly unbloody."
"Oh, put a lid on it, Mal," Polly said, suddenly very tired and inexplicably close to tears.
Why can't I deal with one little party? What's wrong with me? What happened to 'You call me sarge?' I should be able to cope with a dress and a couple of objectionable poshos!
"Yes, sir," said Mal, flipping a loose salute and taking another sip. "Lid going on." She smiled. "Now then," she said, "soon, Polly, you can be off, and alone if you want to, but first," she said, taking Polly's arm and steering her back into the Great Hall, "we're going to get ourselves a little more of this champagne."
"Alright," said Polly, wearily. "Then I'm leaving. Why'd you want to come to this thing, anyway, Mal? 'S bloody terrible."
"True," said Mal, making a beeline for the cocktail table. "But, for one thing, I thought we deserved a break."
"Fair enough," mumbled Polly, as Mal put a full glass in her hand. "But why here?"
"Come on, Polly," said Mal, drinking from her own glass, "this is Ankh-Morpork, after all, city of a thousand delights. Anything could happen. And," she added, as the band finished its chamber music and started up a vigorous, brass-driven quickstep, "I rather wanted to show you a good time."
She gave Polly a dazzling smile. "Do you mind?"
And Polly, heart beating rather fast as she looked at Mal, nonchalantly smiling with hand outstretched in this dreadful party full of dreadful people, found that… no, she didn't mind at all.
Later happened.
The throng has subsided considerably, but the champagne is still flowing, and the band is still playing.
Mal is dancing in her shirtsleeves with her shadow.
Polly is sitting, far happier than she feels she has any right to be, to one side, with a cigarette in one hand, and a glass of champagne held at a rather dizzy angle in the other. She's drunk, she knows, but so is Mal, so it doesn't matter. The Crocodile Sisters sit on the other side of the Great Hall, staring balefully at her and the dancers. Polly gives them a grin and a wave, but she doesn't really care about them anymore.
She's watching Mal.
Mal has abandoned her jacket and her waistcoat, and she's dancing in her shirt and braces, with a glass in her hand.
Polly thinks, now – and she fully admits that this is very probably the champagne clouding her judgment so ridiculously, but she thinks it anyway – she thinks, now, that she's never seen anything so glorious as Mal, dancing with a glass of champagne at the slow and dizzy tail-end of a party.
She wonders if she should tell her that. She wonders whether Mal would care. She wonders, again, why she cares.
She closes her eyes. The room spins. Her heart is racing, and she's not sure why, but she can't stop it. She thinks, through the haze, that it might be something to do with the way she and Mal had danced earlier, and the way Mal had smiled at her, and the way Mal's hand had lingered in the small of her back as she'd left the dancing and sat down, but she can't be sure. She can't be sure about anything, now. Maladict is Maladicta. He's a she. Does it matter? She doesn't know.
Mal does. Polly has a feeling that Mal, even when drunk, knows exactly what she's doing.
What is she doing?
Polly gives up.
Time passes.
The footmen are starting to clear the tables when the music finally stops and the last dancers dip and sway towards the edges of the room and the double doors out. Mal comes to a halt in front of Polly. She grins, in the way only a vampire can.
"You really are very beautiful, you know," Mal says.
Polly blushes furiously, and then – and she's not sure what on earth possesses her to do so – she tells Mal: "You're glorious."
"Thank you, Sergeant," says Mal, grinning again and sitting down next to Polly. The vampire snakes an arm around Polly's shoulders. Polly can feel the stiff cotton of Mal's shirt against her bare shoulders, and can feel the presence of Mal's white hand dangling a mere hair's breadth from her right breast. Polly's heart is racing, and she feels rather curiously as is if her legs have floated away. She opens her mouth to try to speak, but nothing comes out. Why is her heart thudding so? She takes a sip of champagne and tries again to ask the question that has been bothering her all evening.
"Are you flirting with me, Mal?" she manages.
"Yep," says Maladicta, unabashed.
"Oh," says Polly, blushing again. She takes a deep breath, and, without knowing entirely why, puts her hand on Mal's thigh. She turns to look at the vampire.
"But," she says, "You're a…female."
"Well done, Sergeant," Mal says, looking entirely unconcerned, but letting her hand drift a little further down Polly's side, so her fingertips are now brushing the thinnest of silks that is covering Polly's breast.
Polly feels the touch, and her breath catches in her throat. She doesn't think her heart can beat any faster. She swallows.
"But I'm a gir…"
"Oh, for gods' sake," Mal says, before she can finish, and then – and Polly will remember this moment for as long as she lives – she leans and kisses Polly, very gently, on the lips.
Mal draws away. Polly's mind is blown, like an egg.
"That," she says, with uncharacteristic clarity, "was an Abomination under Nuggan."
Maladicta sounds decidedly unapologetic as she has a sip of champagne and says "Yes, I know. Sorry."
Polly's dizziness and fuzziness has cleared. Her whole body thrills. She suddenly knows exactly what she's doing.
"That wasn't an objection, Corporal," she says to Mal, "Merely an observation."
And then she leans close and kisses Maladicta again. She can taste the champagne, and feel the stickiness of her lipstick.[2] She can feel Mal responding, can feel her tongue, very soft, on the slick inside of her lip. Polly's arm comes up from Mal's thigh to her body. She can feel the hardness of Mal's ribs and the warmth of her skin through the white shirt. Mal tightens her grip around Polly's shoulders. Their tongues touch, briefly, and Polly thinks she might faint. They part, eventually, and Polly's eyes are held by Mal's. Then Polly giggles. Mal raises her eyebrows, but smiles too.
"Every day, something new, eh, Sergeant," she says, not looking away.
"The world is certainly unfolding itself for me, Corporal," replies Polly, in somewhat shaky tones. She giggles again. Her heart is simply surging.
"Home, James?" suggests Mal, tracing patterns on Polly's bare shoulder with light fingertips.
"Who's James?" asks Polly, standing up and swaying. "And where's home?"
"Who cares?" shrugs Mal, taking Polly's hand and smiling at her again.
Polly smiles back.
They leave, hand-in-hand. They are watched balefully by the Crocodile Sisters, but, right now, they don't give a monkey's figgin who sees them.
Polly woke next morning with the headache to end all headaches.
Mal was still in her shirt and trousers, and still asleep next to her in the single bed. She looked very peaceful.
Even though she was alone, Polly blushed. She felt suddenly shy, and very naked. She'd slept that night in Mal's arms. She'd been so drunk, she remembered, that she'd shrugged the awful dress off, and got into bed naked without even thinking about it. Mal had taken off her braces and boots, and got in next to her, as if it was the most natural thing in the world. She remembered Mal kissing her neck and shoulders, and Mal's cool arms snaking around her. She remembered, blushing harder, how she'd sighed and moved against Mal, as the vampire's hands had stroked her stomach and found her breasts. She remembered twisting her head round and kissing Mal on the lips once again, and she remembered Mal's hand leaving her breast and finding Polly's own trembling hand; Mal stroking her palm, and her hand eventually closing round Polly's own fingers. She must have slept, then.
Slept; or passed out.
Polly looked at Mal for a long time, and then quietly got up, and began putting on her uniform. Forget last night. Back to Sergeant Perks. White breeches, black boots, white cotton shirt, white neckerchief, black stock, scarlet jacket, and sword belt. Polly finished buttoning her jacket across, and turned back to the bed.
Mal was watching her.
Polly blushed. Again.
"You do know I'm going to take all that off you again?" said Mal, yawning.
"Really?" said Polly, for want of something better to say.
"Yes."
"Oh." And then, because that seemed a little rude: "Ok."
Polly attempted a smile. Her heart was thudding violently again. She felt as nervous as hell. Mal was still watching her, and grinning. The vampire's shirt was open at the collar, and for at least three buttons down. Polly looked away hurriedly. She wished Mal didn't look so knowing, so in control, so calm. She wished that she didn't look so…attractive. Damn.
"Uh… so what happened last night, then?" she asked, because she thought that the right thing to ask. Sort of cool. She remembered exactly what had happened, though. She hoped she sounded nonchalant enough.
Mal saw through her in an instant, of course.
"You're blushing, Sergeant Perks," she said.
"Yes, thank you, Corporal Maladicta," said Polly, "that was an observation that was helpful in the extreme."
"True, though." Mal continued to smile.
"Gods damn it, Mal!"
Mal stretched and yawned again. Hands behind her head, she said, "What happened last night, Sergeant? Well. We drank far too much champagne. We danced far too close together. We kissed."
Polly was silent, blushing.
"You may remember," added Mal. She looked at Polly, pointedly raising an eyebrow. When Polly still said nothing, she continued. "Would you like to do it again at some point?"
Polly cleared her throat, and attempted to take a deep breath.
"What?" she asked, "drink champagne and kiss you again?"
"Don't forget the dancing," said Mal, "but yes. Drink champagne with me again. Dance with me again. Kiss me again. How about it?"
Polly felt, strangely, both utterly lost – the conversation beyond anything she could have imagined saying to anyone, ever – and, at the same time, beautifully in control, of herself, of her conversation, of what Mal wanted, and of what she wanted.
Polly looked Mal in the eye. "Sounds good," she said.
Mal held her gaze. "Excellent," she said. "How about tonight?"
"Tonight's good."
"Splendid."
Mal smiled and looked at Polly with startlingly green eyes. She looks, thought Polly, as if she's imagining me naked, as if she's thinking about touching me, as if she's… Polly blushed, for the fifth time that morning, not just because she was imagining what Mal might be imagining, but because she was imagining it for herself…
They continued to look into one another's eyes. Polly felt her knees tremble. She shifted, and felt the slick wetness between her thighs, and the pulsing of her blood in her breasts, her chest, her… private parts.[3] She cleared her throat. Mal continued to smile, showing the tips of her canines. Mal, decided Polly, simply smouldered with sex…
Good grief, thought Polly. Get a grip. Smouldered? Who are you, Jilly Cooper?[4]
"Right," she said. "So I'll see you tonight, then?"
"We've established that, Polly," said the vampire.
"Right…yes…OK. Good."
"I'll see you at seven, by the main entrance to the University."
"Is this date, Mal?"
"A date? Do I look like the sort of vampire who goes on dates? No, Sergeant. This is a…dalliance."
Mal grinned again.
"Right. Good," said Polly, attempting to maintain control. "Well, I've got my diplomatic duty to attend to now, Corporal Maladicta. I'll see you at seven. I'm meant to be meeting some people from the Press at twelve, and Commander Vimes is introducing me to the Patrician of this gods-damned awful city…"
"City of a thousand delights," corrected Mal. "See you at seven. Don't be late. And don't change, please. Keep your uniform on."
"I thought you wanted me to take it off, earlier," said Polly.
"No, I wanted to take it off you. And don't worry, I still will."
"I'm not worried, Mal."
"Good."
"Good. Well then. I'll see you later." Polly, feeling yet another blush burn across her face, hoisted up her sword belt, and left Maladicta to her own abominable devices.
Seven o'clock, and Polly was waiting under the colonnaded portico entrance to the Unseen University. Against her better judgment, she'd obeyed Mal, and kept her uniform on. She tugged nervously at her high collar and stock. She was sure she'd tied it too tight…
Mal was coming up the street.
Polly swallowed, and smoothed her hair back. She could see that Mal was in black again.
"Good evening, Sergeant Perks," said Mal, coming to stop in front of her.
"Evening, Mal," said Polly, looking the vampire up and down. High black boots, this time, worn with black trousers, a loose white shirt, and a short black jacket.
"Do vampires ever wear anything other than black?" she asked. Witty opening, Perks, she thought sardonically.
"My shirt's white," pointed out Maladicta, "and you should see my underwear."
"Should I?"
"Oh yes."
I'm actually flirting, thought Polly. Flirting with a vampire… flirting with a junior officer… flirting with a female… This is wrong on so many levels…
Mal offered her arm. "Shall we?" she said.
"Where are we going?" Polly asked, taking the proffered arm.
"A little bar I know."
"How do you know anything about Ankh-Morpork? You've only been here two days!"
Mal just smiled.
They walked in silence for a while. Polly's heart was pounding again. What was she doing? Going on a date… sorry, beginning a dalliance… with a sexually-suspect and morally-ambiguous vampire with a coffee addiction and an unhealthy obsession with elegance and cutting a dash… I must be mad, thought Polly. She did like Mal, though, an awful lot; more than she'd care to admit. She was witty. She could hold her own. She was competent, cool, collected. She was probably horribly intelligent. Polly had such fun talking to her. Mal made things hum. And, yes, she did rather cut a dash…
Put it another way, Perks. Go on.
And Polly was forced to admit to herself that Mal was, undeniably, the most brilliantly attractive… person… Polly had ever set eyes on. Which, admittedly, was not the greatest of compliments if you'd worked in a bar in a small town for eighteen years and been in a rag-bag army squad for another two, and hadn't seen many people full stop, let alone attractive ones, but there you were.
Polly had a feeling that, given free rein a room full of the hunkiest guardsmen[5] and the Missyest of Miss Ankh-Morporks, she'd probably still plump for Corporal Maladicta every time. It was just a feeling.
And now here was the bar.
It was Ladies Night, apparently.
The bar itself was bright, the bottles of various types of alcohols lit up behind glass panels, but the room was dim, and lit only with these new-fangled luminescent imps, strung out in glass jars on a wire. Polly saw hints of figures and shadows and shapes in the gloom. She was conscious of the bright scarlet of her uniform jacket.
"Wotcha, Mal," said a figure weaving up to them. Polly blinked, and saw a replica of Maladicta herself standing there and grinning toothily at them. Black hair cut short (do they ever wear it long? thought Polly peevishly), but battered armour and chain-mail in place of Mal's customary Borogravian uniform.
"Alright, Sal," said Mal, smiling. "Long time no see. How's your dad?"
"Old bugger's pegged it, thank gods," said 'Sal.' "Who's this then?"
"I suppose I'd better be 'Pol,'" said Polly, rudely, before Mal could answer, and before she could stop herself.
'Sal' giggled. "I like her," she said to Mal.
"Polly, my dear," said Mal, "allow me to introduce me to an old sister-in-arms of mine, Salacia von Humpeding, formerly of Humpeding Castle, Uberwald, and now of the Ankh-Morpork City Watch and special envoy from the Low King. She's a Lance-Corporal and a Lady, but you can call her Sally. Sally, this is Sergeant Polly Perks, of the Borogravian Army."
"Nice to meet you, Pol," said Sally, sticking out a hand and grinning again.
"That's Sergeant Perks to you, Lance-Corporal von Humpeding," said Polly, shaking the vampire's hand rather too firmly. Polly didn't really know why she was being so spiky. Oh yes, you do, said an annoying voice in her head. You're jealous, aren't you? You're jealous of this vampire who seems to know Mal as well as you do…
Shut up.
Sally seemed oblivious to Polly's vice-like handshake. "Come over here," she said. "It's Girls' Night Out."
Polly found herself, a few minutes later, sat at a table in an alcove, a glass of… something… in her hand, being introduced to a dwarf in lipstick ("Call me Cheri…"), a young woman with blow-up beach-balls for breasts ("Hi! I'm Tawneee!"), and that blonde sergeant she'd met that day she took the white flag to Butcher Vimes ("Angua. Nice to smell you again.").
Polly took a tentative sip of her drink. It fizzed as it touched her lips, and tasted of…alcohol. "What's this?" she asked.
"That," said Mal, "is a Long Hard Screw Against The Wall. You can have a Screaming Orgasm next, if you want. They go together pretty well, I find."
"Oh," said Polly. There didn't seem to be much else to say.
Time passed. Polly had had both the Long Hard Screw and the Screaming Orgasm, and was feeling a lot happier. Her mind was a little… fuzzy… as a result of the alcohol, but she wasn't drunk enough not to be able to logically run through the causes of this new happiness. One, she thought, I've drunk a lot of multi-coloured alcohol. That's always going to help. Two, 'Sal' is clearly more interested in that Watch Sergeant than Mal. And three… Polly grinned as she thought about point number three… Three, Corporal Maladicta's cool, competent white hand has been stroking my thigh for the past fifteen minutes. And, oh boy, does it feel good!
"Still want that champagne, Sergeant Perks?" Maladicta murmured in her ear, the feel of Mal's breath on her neck sending shivers all through her body.
"You offering?" Polly answered back, out of the side of her mouth, as she continued to listen to and laugh at a story of Angua's.
"Of course," said Mal. She got up, and cleared her throat. "Ladies," she said, "it's been a pleasure, but Sergeant Perks and I have things to do…" There was a chorus of goodbyes. Polly got rather unsteadily to her feet, and gave the gathering a wave.
"Lovely to meet you all," she said, "Angua… Cheri… Tawneee… Sal… See you soon."
She felt Mal's hand in the small of her back. "Up," murmured Mal, giving her a little push towards a dark staircase in the corner of the bar.
Polly found herself, a few minutes later, in a rooftop garden. The view would have been spectacular, had this not been Ankh-Morpork. As it was, Polly could see the tower of the Unseen University away to her right, and that was it. Yellowish fog obscured all else. Below, on the street, Polly could hear the sounds of someone vomiting. Still, for what it was worth, the night was warm…
"Romantic," she said dryly to Maladicta, who'd come up behind her, and was rummaging behind a fern that had seen better days.
"Indeed," said Mal, grunting in triumph and hauling out an ice-bucket complete with champagne bottle, and a couple of glasses. "I knew Sal would do it alright."
Polly raised an eyebrow.
There was a pop… and a hissing rush as Mal opened the champagne and poured it with some aplomb into the flutes. She handed one to Polly.
"Cheers," she said, gesturing with her glass in Polly's vague direction, and taking a sip.
"Cheers," said Polly, drinking from her own glass, and wondering vaguely what she was talking about. Her heart was pounding again.
To distract herself from the there-ness of Mal, she wandered over to the parapet and looked out over the fog. She could feel rather than hear Maladicta coming up behind her. She drank hurriedly. Her heart was fluttering madly.
"You know, properly, there ought to be a dome of stars above us, and a full moon," said Polly, hoping Mal wouldn't notice the breathy catch in her voice.
"I know," said the vampire, putting a nonchalant arm around Polly's waist, "but even I can't arrange that. Sorry." Polly shivered at the touch, though not with cold, nor fear. She gulped another tot of champagne. She could smell Mal, smell her clothes, her hair, a faint scent. I can't bear this, she thought, the tension… the uncertainty… oh, the certainty… Polly felt dizzy as she cleared her throat, stared straight ahead over the fog, and asked Mal, so close beside her, "Well, we've had the champagne. Are you going to kiss me, or not?"
She could feel Mal grin, although she did not look round.
"That depends," said Mal, slowly moving her cool hand up over Polly's uniform jacket, over her ribs.
Feeling like an actor in a spectacularly under-rehearsed play, Polly took a deep breath, and managed to force out, "Depends on what?"
"On whether you want me to or not." Mal's hand was stroking her side now, slinking its way up under the thick scarlet stuff of her jacket, and onto the thinner cotton of her shirt.
Polly was finding it hard to breathe. Her…private parts…were slick with the…what? Anticipation? Excitement? Pleasure? This was wrong. Mal was a…female. So was she. Mal was a vampire. She was not. Mal knew what she was doing. She did not. Two women…? Could it…? Despite the… events… of the previous twenty-four hours, Polly still wasn't sure.
"Well…?" Mal was waiting for an answer, sipping her champagne, and grinning still. "Do you want me to kiss you?"
"You make things very difficult sometimes, you know, Mal," said Polly, swallowing. She could feel Maladicta's hand on her bare skin now. ThudThudThudThud went her heart. Adrenaline was surging.
"Do I?"
"Yes."
"Sorry," said Mal, not sounding apologetic in the slightest. Her hand had moved up Polly's back, beneath the shirt. "You still haven't answered me, you know."
Polly's voice was a thick croak. One word was all she could manage.
"Yes."
"Yes?"
"Yes." A word rather gasped than croaked this time.
"Good."
Polly could feel Mal shifting even closer. She felt Mal's lips on her neck, kissing her gently. This is madness, she thought. A vampire's got her mouth on my neck, and I don't care…Polly could hear Mal's breathing now, rather faster and shallower than it normally was. Her lips kissed their way up to Polly's jaw-line. I'm going to die, thought Polly. I'm going to die with the tension and excitement of it all. My heart's going to give out on me right now, here, on this roof terrace… And then she turned.
Maladicta's lips met hers instantly, in a rush of warm breath and softness.
The kiss was gentle, almost tentative, to begin with. Mal's other hand had come up to touch Polly's jaw, and Polly put her arms round Mal's shoulders, marvelling, in some part of her brain, at her slimness, and the firm muscles of her back.
This isn't wrong, thought Polly, tasting the champagne on Maladicta's lips for the second time in twenty-four hours… This is bloody right…
She leaned into Mal, pressing the length of her body, her stomach, against her, and kissed her harder. Here was Mal's tongue, soft against her own… here was the wetness of the inside of her lips… here were Mal's hands, running up and down her ribs and across her stomach…This is right… oh, this is right…
Above, through the fog, stars traversed and twinkled, and Great A'Tuin, the Cosmic Turtle, slowly, slowly, flapped crater-pocked flippers the size of continents and swam on through the gulf of space, while the great Disc slowly turned on above Him.
Back in her room at the UU, Polly is leaning against the door, heart thudding. She can't remember much of the journey back. She doesn't really care at the moment.
A vampire is kissing her neck.
Maladicta has brought the champagne back with them, and, after taking a sip, is leaning into Polly, leaning against the door, and tracing the line of her jaw with kisses that Polly finds so unexpectedly tender and gentle that she fears she might cry.
"Uniform suits you," says Maladicta, drawing back momentarily and grinning.
Polly giggles. She takes a sip of her own champagne to try and steady her stupid fluttering heart.
"However, says Mal, bringing her hands up from Polly's waist and expertly loosening her stock and neckerchief, "you may look better without it."
Polly can't help it. It may be the champagne, or the strangeness of it all, or the simple fact that she's in a room with a female vampire who's been kissing her as if her (non)life depended on it, but she lets loose a terrible snort of laughter.
Maladicta looks rather put out.
"Something I said, Sergeant?"
"Well, yes, actually…"
"Care to enlighten me?"
Polly tries to stop laughing quite so hysterically. She tries a gulp of champagne, but things rather bubble up again, so she laughs even more.
"Sorry," she says, wiping her nose on Mal's offered handkerchief, "but it's such a complete seduction, Mal. The champagne, the rooftop, the kiss, the uniform thing… I'm just not the kind of girl who gets seduced."
"No?" Mal sounds entirely unconcerned. "You seem to be doing a pretty good imitation of it."
Polly takes a deep, juddering breath. Mal is looking steadily at her, with those clear green eyes. Polly stares back, with round, rather worried, blue ones. Mal smiles suddenly.
"Look, Polly," she says, taking her hand, "I rather want to seduce you…." Mal pauses for a long second. For once, the vampire seems rather at a loss for words. She continues, "See, I like you, Polly… a lot. So… the seduction thing… would you mind?"
Polly's heart is still beating like a mad bird in her ribcage, but she's calmer now. She grins at Mal. "Not a very vampire thing to say, is it? Whoever heard of a vampire asking to seduce someone?"
Mal is grinning now, too. "I'm not meant to be very vampire, as you well know, Polly."
Polly giggles. "True. Still, you've already kissed me… twice… you've given me champagne… twice… you've flirted madly with me… I think you've gone beyond asking…"
"Polly?" says Mal, sipping her champagne, unruffled.
"Yes?"
"Shut up."
And, as Mal is kissing her again, Polly does.
Much later, Polly remembered something. She joggled the cool white hand that dangled above her shoulder.
"Hey," she said.
"Mm?"
"Dancing."
Mal turned her head on the pillow, and shifted the arm around Polly's shoulders. "Eh?" she said. "What about dancing?"
"You promised dancing."
"Did I? You really do have the most exquisite breasts, you know."
Polly grinned as she twisted away. "Drinking champagne. Dancing. Kissing. How about it, you said."
"Oh, yes." Mal seemed to consider this for a while, during which Polly took each one of the vampire's dangling fingertips into her mouth and kissed them. "Archaic," Mal said eventually.
Polly looked at her, eyebrow raised.
"Dance," Mal said. "Noun. Secondary meaning (a). To move up and down, with continuously recurring movement, from excitement or strong emotion." She grinned at Polly. "That do?"
Polly let her teeth close on a finger, just a bit. "No," she said. "Sort of works, but gives entirely the wrong impression. Excitement, strong emotion – yes. A continuously recurring movement – well, yes, on a small scale, I suppose. Moving up and down – yes, in parts, but the whole is more. Try again."
Mal grinned again, wider. "Alright," she said. "I'll take you dancing tomorrow. Better?"
"And the other things?"
"Champagne and kissing? I should think so."
"And what we were just doing?"
"Fuc…?" Polly is quick to stop the question with a kiss.
"Yes," she said, after she'd finished. "That."
Mal smiled. "Oh, yes. Certainly," she said.
Polly smiled back. "Good."
And the new day was a great big fish.[6]
[1.] In fact, Vimes had shouted loudly and enjoyably at the unfortunate secretary who had penned it. "Dress uniform!" he had expostulated to his wife, who had unwisely come downstairs to see what the fuss was about. "That's what formal attire means! And valiant bloody victory? It was luck! And a Grand Reception! Who's bloody stupid idea was this, anyway? And…" Sybil had merely gathered up the invitation proofs to dispatch to the printers, and told him mildly that it would do him good, and could he please stop shouting or he'd wake Young Sam? So Vimes had stopped. "Well, anyway, I'm not going," he'd said, sulkily, after she'd left the room, but Sybil had called back from the hallway that he wasn't to even think about trying to get out of it, because his name was on the invitation. So that had been that.
[2.] Oh, what – you think those blood-red lips come naturally?
[3.] Nugganatic Borogravia was, of course, a modest country, with a modest language to match. Polly's native tongue had no knowledge of any of the more…esoteric… words for…those parts. In fact, Polly's tongue had no knowledge of …those parts at all, but, as Mal will discover later on, Polly's tongue is a quick learner… Ahem.
[4.] Every universe has one. Fact.
[5.] If Polly had been in Ankh-Morpork for longer than two days she'd have known that was an oxymoron if ever there was one.
[6.] Sorry. Had to be done.