asked by swensicle via tumblr
The only thing I'm going to say here is… have you seen penny dreadful? Xd
That and I'm sorry it took quite a few days but I love the era and I needed time to decide what kind of story to tell. It end up being something similar to a Penny Dreadful's scene because I'm still not over my crush with Eva Green. (Not the same though because I needed room to play with Emma and Regina) I've used a few inaccuracies like Emma's clothes but just because I couldn't help it, sorry ^^''
Are you afraid?
Regina Mills lifted the right side of her dress as she stepped out the carriage, her bright brown eyes eyeing the mansion in front of her as her companion took her now free hand and carried her to the main entrance. The old house had certainly seen better days and the chipped paint was a symbol of a decaying era that seemed to slowly become to an end. Or perhaps she was being just gloomy.
The two lackeys at both sides of the old embossed doors however, spoke of money and a slightly vulgar need to show to the guests the richness of the mansion's owner. Something that made Regina smirk slightly under her nose, the black lace-up jacket she was wearing shining slightly under the light of the oil-lamps that illuminated the hall that hide behind the doors, the sound of the pouring rain and steps on mudded roads disappearing once said doors were finally closed behind her and her companion.
Giving her coat to another lackey with reddish blonde hair and enjoying the confused look the man gave her when he realized that instead of wearing the proper gloves –either elbow length or a slightly shorter version- she was glove-less she nodded once to her companion and stepped aside, looking briefly at the too bright and big decoration of the place, the colors and overly-used chiffons making her teeth hurt.
"Quite an interesting place" She said in a cold even tone and Mr. Gold snickered at her side, his coat already being taken care of by another lackey, his intelligent eyes sparkling under the lights as he looked at the same details that seemed to clung to the eyes of whoever that tried to look at them more than one single second.
"Indeed dear"
Gold's voice was deep yet playful and Regina hide her annoyance looking at her feet, the purple dress she was wearing, topped with a vest that hugged to her waist like another corset, was also quite scandalous if one wanted to stick with an etiquette that the brunette found too boring for her liking.
"I still don't know why you want me here" She said, muttering under her breath as the man who had invited them both started to approach them, a fake smile on his thin lips and his hand already pointing at Gold.
"Because I need you" Gold replied swiftly before taking the host's hand and giving it a firm yet minute shake.
The host, an already balding man that didn't look quite the king of finances with a deep affection to antiques that everyone seemed to describe him whenever his name could be heard, took Regina's hand and kissed it once, the maybe too large beard of his tickling the woman's knuckles and making her wish for half a second to actually have picked up her gloves instead of having decided to play a little with the faux and overly constricting etiquette she was expecting to need to follow.
Either way it was already nothing else than wishful thinking and when Leopold White looked back at her still muttering pleasantries she nodded and replied back, her deep rich voice filling easily the place as their host carried both Gold and she to another room, slightly bigger, where the some of the other guests were already talking in groups no big than three.
The room was equally equipped with too many decoration and maybe too bright lights and candles that gave the place a slightly phantasmagoric aura. Not one that Regina let herself feel impressed by but one that certainly spoke of too much money spent in one single thing.
"You may excuse me" Leopold say, his words directed solely to Gold who gave a nod, his cane between his hands as Regina looked back at the two of them, the chocking she wore catching the light as she did so, its reflection being saw on the way Leopold blinked with excessive celerity as he already started to move. "I expect you two in a few minutes on the teal room though, Mr Gold told me that you both are quite interesting on the show I've brought tonight"
"Quite interested" Regina quipped looking at Gold who smirked once before returning to his false numb pretense of a smile.
Not even bothering to mingle between the other guests Regina eyed Gold with an incendiary gaze, her lips pursed into a tight line not bothering to even try to hide her confussion and slight annoyance at the man's still poorly hidden smirk.
"I still don't know why you want me here" She said and even to her own ears the words sounded fake.
"He wants to speak with the dead" Gold said as he looked at his cane, the handle protruding between his fingers. "And I want to see if he can"
"So you brought the medium just in case" Regina spat back and Gold smiled once again, his head tilting to one side, his voice low when she spoke again. "I think you and I both know that what he is about to show is nothing but a stupidity. Your work is to actually try to connect with them, you know how much we need to find the demon that…"
"Not interested in your pity games" Regina replied with the coldness of a queen, her mask falling back again upon her features, features that had been named beautiful by many men and women before but now looked sharp and deadly as she eyed the elderly man in front of her.
"But you still want to stay" Gold pointed out and Regina narrowed her eyes, turning and starting to walk between the guests, knowing that the way she had walked away from Gold had already raised a few brows here and there between the most older guests of the party. Manners always came first in a dinner like the one she was in, manners that she found too staganant and far too decadent.
The room and the guests, now that she could actually look at it freely while she feigned to be interested in something completely different than the place, had once been a large ball room that was now half its size thanks to a new wall that didn't quite seem to be properly built. The room she was in was red colored with lamps that only helped to the idea of long fiery fingers hovering between the happily talking guests; women impeccably dressed and men with long and strong faces that did nothing to hide lecherous eyes that looked at the much younger women that roamed the room from time to time. Leopold's idea probably. As far as Regina knew the man's wife was slightly more intelligent that the king of finances. That was at least what rumors said albeit she didn't exactly thought of rumors like a real and good source from stories.
Her smirk and skepticism of what she was seeing was cut short by a presence at her back, presence that seemed to bore two holes on her body as she turned slightly, the obsidian on her neck suddenly feeling even heavier than before.
Two fiery green eyes looked at her, a smirk equally skeptic as hers glinting under the lights as the stranger walked towards her, interest sparkling on those eyes as bouncy curls moved with every new step the person took a rather androgenic clothes covering a women's body that Regina's eyes roamed for a second without any traces of shame.
"Interesting" She thought, and indeed was; from the top of her unruly hair to the soles of her men's shoes the woman that was now looking at her from an indecency short distance was nothing but that; androgynous clothes weren't exactly permitted and if Regina herself was already pushing etiquette with her deep purple dress and gloveless hands the woman in front of her was nothing more but a signal of how things weren't supposed to be done.
The blonde's lips parted, smirk growing even more pronounced. "You have the most interesting eyes I've ever seen" She started, not bothering to even introduce herself "Curious, skeptic"
"You have seen skepticism on them?" Regina asked and her whole body thrummed as the stranger nodded, eyeing her with an unexpected shyness that suddendly bothered her.
"Indeed" The blonde's voice broke slightly at the end, smirk returning and shyness hiding behind deep emerald irises, eyes that made Regina narrow her own. "Skepticism of this room perhaps, of the people in it"
"How you pretend to know such many things about me with just one glance?" Regina said back, lips still opened in a cold smile, fiery brown eyes locking themselves with the ones of the stranger. "I don't even know your name"
"It's Emma" The blonde replied and the pink and suddenly moistened lips made Regina look back at them, rage over the insulting blonde woman disappearing from a second, banter already on play. "Emma Swan"
"Invited by Leopold I guess"
The words weren't meditated or carefully laid, not like many other words Regina was used to say to the men and women alike that thought too highly of themselves but it seemed to make the blonde scoff and smile in the same mysterious way than before.
"I was asked to be here for the first time, something that seems to be the same case as you"
"Perhaps" Regina answered, eyes narrowing, one step being taken towards the blonde as the rest of the party seemed to fade away. The other woman was slightly taller than her since her flat shoes made her equally tall to Regina who was being helped by her own laced and high-heeled ones –another slight breach on the etiquette if she was being honest but she really didn't want to think about it- "Are you invited like this often? In the spur of the moment?"
"Perhaps" Emma replied as she threw her head slightly back, her curls now cascading around her face, snark glowing on her eyes. "I tend to say yes whenever I'm invited to such parties"
"And if you say no?" The brunette replied quickly, too quickly perhaps but the presence of the blonde was making her chest feel heavy, as if something was calling her from the back of her head, an old call maybe, one as ancient as time and as she swallowed she saw the way the blonde's eyes followed her throat, the conversations around them feeling once again like nothing but muffled noises that didn't need to be heard.
"I never say no"
That was enough for Regina to swallow her anger and take a final step towards the blonde, her bodies too close, probably by this point dragging some attention, attention she definitely didn't want to even think about.
"You don't look skeptical anymore" Emma said and her smirk had returned, a long curl falling in front of her eyes as she did so. And whereas her look called nothing but of a lower status, the harlot attire and everything else for a second looked as regal and posed as Regina herself. "Intrigued perhaps"
"Try annoyed"
"So you know why we are here? You don't look like the rest of the women that have been invited. Not that a party of a Spiritism session is particularly ordinary but…"
"Neither do you"
Emma nodded slowly at that, one hand taking Regina's, at least approaching enough to create the image of touching, her body heat obvious on the tips of the brunette's fingers.
"I'm something else, although you fit even less than I"
And she was right, Regina thought, eyes up, a sneer on them.
"You look about to think if you have really think correctly on calling this party lethargic, you are now considering the idea that maybe you were wrong" Emma continued and her eyes seemed to have turned into embers as she talked.
"No" Regina replied, her own voice taking a timber that almost echoed around them. "I'm here because, as many humans I thrive on terror, on the unknown and the people around us think that they can play with it, twist it"
The last word felt strange in her mouth, the taste almost bitter. "I thrive on it because I know the power it brings within it, you are here out of curiosity, expecting a game, a play. I'm here because people need such kind of things"
Her blood was pumping too strongly through her heart, making her deaf to anything else but Emma's presence, the blonde's looking at her through half-lidded eyes, curiosity and interest mixing together, too close to burn.
"The question is why are you here, what's your real motive. Are you here because you want to be afraid?"
"And you? Are you afraid?" Emma asked back the same moment Leopold's voice called his guests to the other room, his eyes shining proudly as people looked at him, both women also turning their eyes to his figure, spell broken.
"Perhaps" Regina replied and the blonde smiled. The rage that has been bubbling inside of the brunette growing only larger but also the wanton need to make the blonde look at her an apologize far stronger than earlier, heat pooling on every part of her body as Emma winked at her.
A game, a play
"If you see any spirit" The blonde replied, a whisper between the already chatting guests around them, Leopold starting to explain on his thick and far too exaggerated accent of the other part of the seas what he planned to do. "Just tell me"
And Regina knew in that moment that Emma was telling the truth.
A/N Ok, context! In the original scene Regina's counterpart is going with Gold's to a party in where they intent to have information about quite an interesting set of pictures. The host holds a Spiritism session and Regina's counterpart… let's say that she is the real channel.
Emma's counterpart is a handsome man called Dorian Grey (yup, that one) and is basically breaking almost every rule of etiquette by the way he talks with Regina after only looking at her. Regina's character answers him in the same flirty tone and the conversation escalates in a few moments until host call all of his guests to the table in where the Spiritism session begins.
The conversation they both have between the moment they met is the one depicted above with a few changes here and there.
I know that I've not written Emma in her exactly first session behavior but characters decided for me what to do with themselves (I merely wrote what they wanted ^^'') so I hope to have been as close as the original prompt than I was able to. (Sorry, I already said in Tumblr that Victorian based prompts are my real guilty pleasure)