Chapter 11 - Entertainments! Of the 'magical', 'non magical' and 'family drama' kind
The next few days saw Elizabeth finding herself the object of Mr Collins increasing attentions, she even managed to find herself agreeing to the first two dances of the Netherfield ball with him, which vexed her greatly. She had almost thought to divert his attention to Lydia at one point. Her sister had very few compunctions about telling someone what they really thought. But it was not worth the inevitable argument that would follow.
There was so much rain over the next few days that she found little time to escape from his attentions and, although she rebuffed him as openly as her gentle breeding would allow, he seemed to be unable to take the hint. With very few avenues of escape she found herself confined to her room rather more often than she would like, if there were not a ball to look forward to she felt she would go mad.
Luckily there was such an event and, after as much squabbling as one would expect in a house of women, soon enough the day dawned and everyone retired early to ready themselves.
When they arrived Elizabeth thought she had never seen a house so lavishly decorated. Miss Bingley had outdone herself. The main ballroom was decorated to reflect the four elements. Each corner was festooned with ribbons matching their elemental colour and each had a spectacular piece situated in it.
The fire corner had two urns with an arching fire column between them. Occasionally a shower of colourful sparks, similar to fireworks, would burst from the flames. The water corner held a similar spectacle with water and bubbles.
The air held an upturned jar, almost the size of Elizabeth, with a swirling tornado contained within. A man, who was controlling the tornado, was also juggling feathers without touch, floating them up in twisting patterns to catch them as they spiralled down. Elizabeth stood mesmerised by the twirling patterns thinking air had never looked so interesting.
The earth had two large paintings of rocky scenes, majestic and beautiful. There were games dotted about where people had to use earth magic to roll the balls up a slope and gain points by dropping them through holes.
The whole effect was one of a town 'spectacular' rather than a simple country dance, but Elizabeth was so impressed that she even complimented her hostess.
"Miss Bingley, the decorations and entertainments are devine. I have never seen such displays before"
She regretted her outburst almost immediately
"Yes," was the sneering response " well I would not expect a place such as this to have seen such things but I assure you these sorts of entertainments are all the rage in the ton."
Elizabeth sighed inwardly and nodded before moving on. She looked around in earnest for Mr Wickham but caught no sight of him. She was excessively disappointed and found herself becoming cross with Mr Darcy for chasing away such an amiable man.
She sought solace in her good friend Miss Lucas but even then they were interrupted by Mr Collins claiming her first dance. She took to the floor with resignation and did her best with the oaf she was presented with. She deftly avoided him standing on her toes but more than once he bumped her or another dancer by turning the wrong way. She noted Mr Darcy watching her with an amused smile on his face, she glared at him before turning away. With relief they parted after the first dances and she was claimed by an officer who was far more agreeable.
When she returned to Miss Lucas she had just finished telling the story of Mr Wickham's misfortunes at the hands of Mr Darcy when the man himself was bowing before her and asking for her hand in the next dance. She was so surprised that she could do nothing but accept him.
She was so cross with herself but faced no choice but to take to the floor. She had thought to dance in silence but decided that Mr Darcy would prefer that, and she was not above being contrary.
"Miss Bingley has outdone herself, the hall is stunning"
"Indeed"
She sighed "it is your turn to say something Mr Darcy, you could comment on the ability of the magic on show, or the pleasantness of the dance steps"
"If you desire me to say something you need only tell me what it is and I shall oblige"
She had to suppress a smile, he was nothing if not clever. "Very well Mr Darcy, that response will do for now. By and by I may comment that I appreciate the elements on display today. We now may be silent"
"Do you talk by rule when dancing?"
She chuckled as she answered "sometimes it is best, then we may enjoy the advantage of saying as little as possible" she fell silent and let her face fall in to a mask of indifference.
Mr Darcy took a breath "do you often walk to Meryton?"
She raised her eyes to his, unsure why he was bothering given his obvious disdain. Again she could not resist the temptation to goad him "Quite often, it is beneficial exercise and will furnish the dinner conversation somewhat. When we saw you the other day we had just been forming a new acquaintance"
She noticed the planes of Mr Darcy's face harden and suppressed the smirk of satisfaction. She snuck a look at his aura, wondering if it would show any blackness in it. She frowned, it remained perfectly clear.
"Mr Wickham has the happy manners of one who makes friends easily. He is often unable to keep them however"
She raised one eyebrow "he has been most unfortunate to lose your friendship and still appears to be suffering for that"
Mr Darcy looked as if he would answer but they were just then interrupted by sir William who stopped to speak to them as he stepped through the dance. Mr Darcy was suitably distracted by a comment he made about Jane and Mr Bingley that he did not remember he had not answered.
"Forgive me I was distracted, of what were we speaking?"
"Nothing at all sir, I scarce believe you will find two people with less to say for themselves. Clearly we are such unsocial taciturn individuals, unwilling to speak unless we are to say something that will amaze the entire room"
"That's no great resemblance of of your own character I am sure. How near it may be to mine I could not say."
Elizabeth determined that she would say nothing and was surprised by his attempting to address her again.
"What do you think of the popular books on magical history?"
Elizabeth drew in a breath, she was beginning to regret her initial impulse to break the silence "I cannot say I am afraid Mr Darcy, I could not possibly speak of such subjects in a ballroom"
"Too distracted?" He asked rather doubtfully, she merely nodded.
"You once said you hardly ever forgave, you are careful are you not, when creating such resentment?"
"I am"
"You never allow yourself to be blinded by prejudice?"
The reply was haughty and immediate "I would think not. May I ask what these questions pertain to?"
"The illustration of your character."
"I would ask that you not sketch my character at the present time, I fear the result would do neither of us any credit"
She was about to retort when the dance ended, he bowed over her hand and she felt his palm warm up as it held her hand, she couldn't help the little gasp of surprise but his face betrayed no emotion and then he was gone. She had to believe she imagined it.
Mr Darcy walked away from the woman who vexed and intrigued him by turns. He had long thought she was very handsome and he knew that she had more magic than she seemed. He had not figured out why she hid it but he had seen her use fire magic and she had professed to being a water magic user. His touch would have burned if she had not had some fire in her and he had not missed her gasp but it had sounded like one of surprise or pleasure rather than pain.
He speculated that she could be duel talented, it was rare but possible. Her aura was not of the strength one would expect of a duel user, but it was possible she had one full talent and a partially developed second one. He was duel talented but his fire did not reach the peaks of the more talented fire magicians.
She was a mystery and his mind was keen to spend too much time thinking about her. He knew he had to stop before he became too enthralled and as he walked away he was counselling himself to forget her and began making plans to separate himself from the county that he was finding intolerable. He spared not a thought for her protective words about Wickham, nor did he recall that he did not precisely warn her off him.
.
The rest of the ball was mortifying for Elizabeth. Her mother drank too much and talked too loudly about the match between Jane and Bingley during dinner. She focussed heavily on the great advantage to her other daughters as if she expected Mr Bingley to fund their time in town.
Mr Collins rarely left her side and she found she could not dance again for fear of receiving further entreaties from the one man she wished to avoid. She could not bring herself to divert his attention to anyone. The only person close was her friend Charlotte and she assumed that she would not wish for attention from such a man.
Mary sang very ill and only an ill timed speech from their father stopped her performance.
Kitty and Lydia flirted outrageously and Lydia almost set the place on fire by interfering with the fire display. Some of the officers had been goading each other about their ability, or lack thereof, to manipulate fire. Lydia had taken it as a challenge and threw some sparks at the urn, knocking the whole thing over and on to a curtain.
Luckily the wizard from the water display saw the whole thing and came to help and the errant fire did little more than singe the curtain. Lizzie noticed and was on her way over when her mother stepped in. She momentarily was pleased her mother was finally taking notice of her daughter's poor behaviour, then she listened to the words which were shrilly ringing out over the ballroom.
"Oh Lydia, your fire magic is so accomplished" she simpered and turned to the militia men, who thought the whole scene rather amusing "she would make an excellent officer's wife you know. Fire is important to militia men is it not?"
Elizabeth felt a little sick
"Mama, you look like you need some refreshment, allow me to find you a seat and fetch you some"
"Oh Lizzie dear, did you not see how Lydia threw that fire? You are always saying she should practice more. How good she is! Yes a glass of wine would be just the thing"
Elizabeth threw her father a look and settled her mother and fetched her a fruit punch, making sure there was no alcohol in it. She was further mortified by her fathers words, who had not come to her rescue at all.
"Lydia dear, you know you have not the talent to be showing off your magic in a place such as this. Why don't you go and be silly somewhere you cannot do any damage"
Lydia pouted and flounced off to find an officer for the dancing was about to begin again. Elizabeth left the ballroom in to the dark of an adjoining room. She leaned back against the wall and let her head lean back almost stamping her foot in anger whilst also fighting back the tears of anger at her family for behaving so.
If it had not been for Jane and Bingley, Elizabeth would have counted this as one of the worst nights of her life.
A/N - I hope the two longer chapters make up for my silence yesterday! Poor Lizzie. I love the Netherfield ball in canon. Spent a lot of time thinking about this one. Why do you think she hasn't noticed any evil in Wickhams aura then? maybe he is trying to redeem himself? ;)