Author's note: First draft, unedited. I got this prompt after I had just started watching Hakushaku to Yousei and I was retardedly delighted when Edgar trumps all of Lydia's efforts to keep distance between them (it happens fairly often and he is always retardedly delighted as well XD)
Cutting the Deck
A Word of the Day Ficlet
By Kysra
There are times she feels more his captive than his employee, with the way she is confined to his property, to the degree he controls her schedule and monopolizes her meals and evenings. Even now, as she sits across the small table, peeking at him from behind the cards . . .
"You're staring again, Lydia."
"You have quite the variety of tells, my lord."
She grins a little at the barely perceptible darkening of his ash mauve eyes. He probably thinks she is flirting even though he knows better.
"I am an open book, my dear. My heart and affection is stitched upon my sleeve for your perusal and - hopefully - reciprocation."
Blanching at the way his look suggests he is starving and she, a perfectly succulent roast duck, she turns her attention back to the cards, reprimanding herself. The man is insufferable with his charming words and believable sweetness. She has no doubt he merely wishes to rattle her.
He calmly discards one card and draws another. It's what he does, drawing women to him with ease then discarding them with a similar level of difficulty, a greater degree of grace.
Even she - normally wary and discriminating in the company she keeps - trusted and followed him within the first seconds of their acquaintance with barely a backward thought. She sighs and lays her four deuces face up upon the table then draws a card from the stack perched in the center of the table, vexed by her own musings as easily as she is by his ever-widening smirk and the way he plays at cards - building his hand and leaving her ignorant of either his strategy or progress.
Very much like their relationship.
"I tire of this game of yours, Edgar."
He blinks, adorably feigning confusion. "You hold some sort of prejudice against conquian, my lady?"
When he calls her "my lady" like that, it sends shivers up her spine and reminds her of that brief moment when he spoke of her fear as if he could smell it and she felt as he must feel when he says her eyes see through him. That voice and title spell unintentional intimidation for it is not just empty words when he speaks them to her but a declaration of intent.
"I value honesty, sir. Your affections smack of an elaborate jest."
He smiles, sinking back more deeply into his chair, still playing his cards close to the vest. "I never jest with you . . . my lady."
Her eyes widen as he lays down all of his cards, four sets of three of a kind and two suits. He has won with seemingly little effort and as she looks down on his plays upon the table then to her own mish-mash of useless cards and closes her eyes.
Word: Conquian