On one hand, Lorenz wasn't angry in the slightest about what had happened during the phone call, even though he acknowledged that it only was able to happen because he'd been forced to stay at that hotel. On the other hand, by the time Claude had heard that and knew that he wasn't going to be needing to play hardball with one of his own men, he'd already been through the wringer and it wasn't even time for breakfast. It had all started the moment he'd opened his door that morning and heard the unmistakable sound of people arguing, and rather than playing it smart and staying out of things, he decided to be a bit nosy and see what was going on down the hall.
Figuring that it was most likely Sylvain and Felix going back and forth—they seemed like good enough friends, but there was just enough gunpowder between them that when a spark hit, it'd erupt into flame—he went down toward their rooms, but saw that the door across the hall was open and the yelling was coming from inside of it. Now he knew that it was much more than a spat between friends, and he really should stay out of it, but Claude's feet carried him right to that doorway to see what the fuss was about; never did he expect that it was the king himself yelling at one of his guards about something, and that said guard was standing there taking it without so much as flinching. His whole body panged in sympathy for the verbal attack he saw Ingrid going through, her unable to move from the spot she was frozen in while Dimitri yelled at her about something that probably wasn't her fault.
Until he actually heard what was being yelled, anyway. "You can't keep trying to disobey the orders I gave, do you understand me?" he bellowed, to which Ingrid seemed to have no reaction at all. "Say yes or no, or else I'm putting you on the first flight right back to Fhirdiad and you can explain to your parents why you're no longer a member of the royal guard!"
"I didn't try disobeying anything," she finally replied, unaware that there was any sort of audience at all. "Whoever told you that must be trying to stir up drama, because I'm over it. You told me what I'm not doing and so I'm not doing it."
"Why in the goddess' name would he try causing drama?" Dimitri asked, flinging a hand toward the open doorway that almost felt pointed at Claude, despite him having had nothing to do with what was going on. Well, nothing that he personally tried to do, but he had a feeling that his disagreement with Felix might have led to this in some way. "That's not something one of my men would do, and you know it."
"No, I know that someone overprotective of me would try to get you to think that I'm a liability here in some way so that they don't have to worry about me as much as they worry about you." If there was more to what Ingrid was saying, Claude wasn't there to hear it, as he could hear the sound of a nearby door opening and he did not want to face consequences for listening in on the king reprimanding one of his guards. Unfortunately for him, he wasn't able to get back to his own room quite fast enough to not be caught, but it was Lysithea coming out of a room (that…wasn't her own, he noted) that had spotted him spying.
She dashed down the hall, long white hair flowing behind her, until she was caught up with her leader and gave him a hard pat on the back. "Say, Claude, what's got you up this early?" she asked, sounding rather energetic for someone who usually was a late-to-bed, late-to-rise kind of person. "Was it the yelling match we all got to hear?"
"Nope, it was my alarm. I'm not being paid to sleep in here." He considered going into his room and locking Lysithea out to end the conversation before it went anywhere, but he strolled right past the door and decided that going down to the lobby would be his course of action instead. "What about you, why are you awake before mid-morning? You decide that being a functional member of society is best for you?"
Lysithea huffed, rolling her eyes at the comment. "I'll have you know that I don't need to be functional as a member of society yet, I've still got plenty of time to learn the ropes of being an adult. Right now I'm just focusing on getting better at my job, which means getting up at the time other people would and…socializing." She gave an audible shudder at that, which struck Claude as odd because she was the one that had mentioned it in the first place. "So I might've accosted one of the guys from Faerghus and found out what he doesn't like."
"Which guy?" Claude asked, apprehensive in his questioning and dreading hearing the answer, which was only made worse by the fact that it wasn't Lysithea that answered the question after all.
"Excuse me, are you going to come back here and clean your damn mess up or are you leaving it to me?" Felix yelled from his doorway, which by that point meant he was yelling over the residual sound of the fighting still going on in the royal suite. Claude looked at Lysithea and the almost amused smirk she wore, and thought to stop her so that she could go back and set things straight, but the idea of letting Felix suffer just a bit because of her was too good to pass up.
Their escape would have worked better had they not needed to wait for the elevator to reach their floor, because by the time the doors opened for them, Felix had decided he was going to chase them down himself, and that led to there being a long stare down between the two parties as Felix blocked the door from being able to be closed so he could continue to tell Lysithea she needed to go back and clean things up. Eventually Claude, wanting to get the yelling over and done with, pushed her out of the elevator into him and slammed the "close door" button, which thankfully worked in his favor. Sure, he'd just sold out one of his own people to someone he couldn't stand, but he'd escaped the yelling, only for his ears to start ringing by the time he got to the second floor with the board room that was still set up as their meeting place for both teams.
It was when he got inside that he found Lorenz, Raphael, and Ignatz, and the whole ordeal from the previous night was smoothed out and explained in its entirety. "So, mind explaining where the female half of our operation is?" Lorenz managed to ask after he'd finished saying that he wasn't mad at any of them and that the dip in the pool had ended up being more refreshing than expected. "I would assume you have no idea about Hilda and Marianne, but the other two, perhaps?"
Grimacing as he thought about what he'd literally just done to Lysithea before coming downstairs, Claude considered lying but he knew that if things went as bad as they seemed they were going to, he would be ratted out rather quickly. "I don't have any idea about where Leonie is or what she's up to, but Lysithea's causing chaos with the prick from Faerghus and I applaud her for it."
"Because what we need is more chaos around here," Lorenz sighed, resting his head in one hand and shaking it softly. "Admittedly, I found myself looking forward to this trip but now that we've gotten here and settled in, I cannot help but think that it's poorly planned and being horribly mismanaged."
"Something's not right about all of it, that's for sure." It was a thought that Claude had been playing with since the previous night, but now that someone else had voiced it first he felt fine with talking about it as well. "I don't think it's anything to do with the king or queen themselves, but at the same time I don't think they're exactly the most in control of things right now."
Lorenz, only hearing the part where Claude agreed with him and not the part where he voiced concerns of his own, continued on down the path he wanted the conversation taking. "You would think, for being such a high-profile event, things would be better organized and not so clearly put to the side. I mean, the hotel change day of arrival? That would not happen if there was someone actively putting thought into how this all should go."
"I don't think that was really their fault, though. Something tells me that the people here in Enbarr had a lot to do with that, but I can't quite figure out why that'd be." He looked around their meeting room, sparsely populated but intentionally isolated from the public elsewhere in the hotel. While Claude wasn't the most up-to-date on the relations between the different parts of Fódlan, he and everyone else knew very well that there was nothing but bad blood between Adrestia and Faerghus, and it wouldn't make any sense if the different delegations weren't trying to sabotage each other.
But pointing that out to Lorenz when all he wanted to do was get to talk down about the people who were footing their bill would only cause friction that was completely unnecessary, so he let his friend continue on badmouthing the people who'd brought them there in the first place. "You know, it'd be funny if someone walked in while he was going on about all that," Raphael said, idly listening from a nearby seat at the table. "See what their reactions are to how he's taking everything. I think it'd be a fun time seeing him get all blush-y and apologize-y about what he's saying."
"I, the esteemed Lorenz Hellman Gloucester, do not get 'blush-y' about anything except a woman's presence, and even that is never guaranteed," Lorenz replied, snappish as he gave Raphael a disgusted glance. "I could handle owning up to my own words if someone called me out on them."
"I think all the times you haven't owned up to what you've said would say otherwise, but who am I to judge?" Whenever there was an opportunity to jab some fun at Lorenz, Claude would gladly take it, and this was no exception. Nodding a silent thanks toward Raphael for opening up the conversation in that direction, he continued with, "Besides, we all know that you get more than a bit of a blush when you see a woman, or get called out for being wrong. You get twitchy, too, and it's fun to watch it happen in real time."
"Silence! I do not do any such thing!"
Ever the innocent third party in these sorts of discussions, Ignatz cleared his throat and piped up with, "From what I've seen happen from time to time, you definitely do. N-not saying it happens every single time, but it happens enough, you know?"
The groan that Lorenz gave came on like a roar and lasted long enough that the next person to enter the room was still able to hear it as it was ending. "Did something happen that we should be aware of?" Mercedes kindly asked, her and Annette entering together with no sign of their royal charge following behind. When all the guys told her that there was nothing at all, she looked stern but didn't press the issue. "Okay, but if something does happen, please make sure that we're all kept in the loop on it. Don't want our machine falling apart because of a single loose bolt."
"What machine, exactly?" Claude remarked under his breath, trying not to look at the ladies and give off the impression that he was being accusatory at either of them. "Far as I can tell, there's really the 'you' part with the 'us' as the afterthought, doesn't work too much like a machine from my perspective."
Annette was the one to clarify, sounding incredibly chipper as she spoke. "That'd be because we haven't actually had to do any work yet! This is always how it looks to start, but once guarding has to happen, things totally mesh together so, so much more. Just have some patience and you'll see it for yourself!"
Claude could have made some comment about how it should have already been meshing together, but he just looked at Annette and Mercedes both and forced a smile, trying not to cause a problem where one wasn't needed. "I'll keep that in mind going forward. For now, though, any idea of when things will be happening?"
"Probably not for a while, when we checked in just a moment ago they seemed like they weren't intending on going anywhere but their room for at least a few hours." Shrugging her shoulders very slightly, Mercedes seemed like she was sliding right into a leadership role with the group, even if she didn't have a whole lot of information to share. "But according to the schedule, there's nothing going on meeting-wise today, so perhaps a day for sightseeing and relaxing here in Enbarr might be in the cards."
As much as he wanted to point out that he wasn't there to have a relaxation day, even if he was being paid to do absolutely nothing, Claude decided it wasn't worth the stress to try and point out that tiny little detail. He glanced at Lorenz, who didn't seem bothered even slightly with the idea of getting extra downtime, then to Raphael and Ignatz both, neither of whom looked to be paying attention to what had been said. "Then I guess I'll have to look into what there is to do around here. Never intended on getting to spend time seeing what this place has to offer, after all."
Maybe "intended" wasn't the word he wanted to use in that situation, but what was said couldn't be taken back. Even though he wanted to make it clear that he never anticipated the downtime, he never considered it a possibility when he'd heard the limited details about the job, he had to swallow down all of those clarifications and just accept that he made it seem like he had zero interest in what Enbarr was like. Although, if he was being honest, that was closer to the truth than anything. "I was looking up some different fancy restaurants around here, y'know, just because it's always nice to eat out and live the good life every once in a while," Raphael mentioned after a quiet moment, showing that he had been paying attention to some things. "Me and Ignatz were thinking about hitting one of them up if we got the chance, and if we're not gonna be working the whole time, we might just have to do that."
"We could join you, maybe?" Annette suggested, regardless of if she was meant to be replying to that or not. "It's always fun to get to know the people we're working with, and that'd make for a great opportunity! I'm sure the others could do a great job of guarding the royals for one night while we do that, or…" She trailed off as she looked at Mercedes, who seemed to be going stone-faced at the idea. "Wait, what's the matter with all that, Mercie? There's so many of us that they could definitely do the job in our place."
"You aren't wrong, but maybe we should keep from making these sorts of plans until we know for sure what the overall plan is for today. I only suggested sightseeing as a possibility, I didn't mean for it to become the plan without any discussion with the people writing our checks." With her face slowly turning back to the cheerful and thoughtful expression she'd been wearing previously, Mercedes went on to explain her thinking on the matter. "It's just nice to have a backup plan in case the original plan falls to pieces, which I'd hope doesn't happen now, but who knows what's actually going to happen anymore."
"That's a sentiment I find myself wholeheartedly agreeing with," Lorenz said with a nod, but his agreement wasn't exactly something Mercedes had been looking for so she paid it no mind at all. "I feel like going through this week expecting to listen to secondary plans might just be the best course of action. There is no order, no organization, no—"
He was stopped by the sound of the door flying opening and slamming into the wall behind it, Ingrid running in with stomping feet that would have had to have been heard in the lobby beneath them. "I swear, next chance I get, I'm going to make them pay," she seethed, her angered steps not calming down until she was no longer walking around, having taken a seat at the table to bury her face in her arms. "This is all stupid! I never should've let them change the plan without telling me first!"
A silence fell over everyone else who was gathered, no one wanting to be the next one to speak after that particular outburst. Mercedes ended up taking it upon herself to try comforting Ingrid in a quiet manner, to try allowing everyone else to get back to their normal conversations, but the damage had already been done. There was nothing anyone could say that would feel fitting after hearing someone threaten to make the king of a country pay in such a heated manner. Even when others finally made their way into the room, the awkwardness was obvious to them all and small talk was left at a bare minimum even after everyone was gathered.
There were limited directions given for what everyone was meant to do that day, the overall consensus being that they should probably stay close to the hotels for safety but that there wasn't anything particularly diplomatic in nature happening that day. "We are going to attempt to have a meeting tomorrow with the emperor," Dimitri said, no sign of the angered voice he'd been using at Ingrid before in how he spoke to everyone. "There is zero guarantee she will show up, since it's before our already-arranged meeting and she may be saving all of her kindness for what has been made public, but we are still going to try."
"That means everyone's more or less free to do as they wish today," Byleth added, sounding completely mentally detached from what she was saying. "Personally, I think I'll be staying up in our room, but that's not what everyone else has to do."
"Can you believe this?" Hilda whispered to Claude, leaning over to get right next to his ear as he was not paying attention to what the king or queen had been saying, his gaze continuously flickering toward Ingrid and how she was still stewing in her strong feelings. "I knew agreeing to come do this was going to be a perfect idea, look at all this free time we're getting paid to make the most of. Perfect for a lazy lady like myself, I think."
Under his breath, just barely loud enough for her to hear and to react to, he replied, "Implying that you weren't going to be lazy this whole trip anyway, even without this." That was how Hilda (and Marianne) being along for these work-related trips worked, they were always just there to supervise and keep everyone in check, not so much to do any actual work of their own. Still, even knowing that very well, Hilda reacted to being called out in such a way by smacking Claude's shoulder and telling him that she would never do such a thing in that situation, but he knew it to be more of an attempt to save face than anything.
"You think there's going to be anything fun the others decide they're going to want to do?" Ignatz asked, a nervous tone to his voice. "Or…do you think it's going to be us doing one thing and them doing another? I'd love to get to build some sort of relationship between our two sides but…" As he trailed off, the meeting seemed to be adjourned so that people could go their separate ways, and no sooner had the king and queen left did three of their personal guards go with; Mercedes, Annette, and Felix wasted no time on getting out of the room, the first two in more of a panicked hurry than the third, as he was being as grumpy as always. Sylvain wasn't too far behind, but he at least made eyes at Leonie before leaving, and she, in a flustered state, excused herself to follow him.
"Somebody should go fish her out of that mess before she gets too entangled," Lysithea muttered, shaking her head as the door closed after Leonie stumbling out, her trying to catch up to Sylvain before he got too far. "Who's calling dibs on that one?"
When nobody responded, Marianne stood up from her chair and sighed quietly. "I'll do it, I don't see there being too much of a reason for me to stick around right now. Hilda, we'll have to meet up again later to figure out our plans." She left quickly, and when the door closed behind her the rest of them in the room were left looking at each other, unsure of what to do now.
"I-I heard someone mention wanting to build a relationship between our two sides?" Ashe said, just as timid as Ignatz had been when he'd asked about that in the first place. "Personally I think that sounds like a fantastic idea, and even if everyone else chooses to sit out I would…I will…I could be a part of it, if you wouldn't mind?"
Raphael, looking between his friend and the gray-haired one he didn't know beyond his name, gave a firm laugh as he wrapped an arm around Ignatz's shoulders. "You hear that? Someone's taking you up on your suggestion! If nothing else, the three of us can go out and have the time of our lives at dinner, how about that?"
"Four of us," Lorenz corrected, inserting himself into the plans, "if the idea is to go out for a fancy meal like you had previously been talking about. Sending unfamiliar and uncultured individuals into a situation like that…it's a breeding ground for multiple social faux pas that we could do without as a group."
Ashe came to join with them, and their little group began discussing plans for what dinner was going to look like, which left Claude once again staring over at Ingrid and how she still looked like she was crying while slumped over the table. "You know, a picture'll last longer," Lysithea told him, while Hilda finally realized what was going on and gave Claude a disgusted look. "A picture, or actually going over to talk to her."
"Nah, I think she needs to be left alone, especially by him," Hilda immediately said to follow up, sounding perfectly like a jealous ex-girlfriend who didn't want what she'd given away finding his happiness elsewhere. "Like, think about it, what if her friends come back and decide to rip him a new one? You guys can't do your job without Claude, that's for sure."
"I don't think you'll need to worry too much about that happening." It was cryptic and unexplained, and Lysithea made no effort to clear up the meaning of what she said, but she was soon gone as well. Now, without her in the room the numbers were starting to dwindle to the point that Claude would have considered trying to talk to Ingrid, but Hilda still being right by his side was putting a stop to that.
So, to keep the peace and to stop anything nasty from going down, he stood up and headed out of the room, unsure of where he was going to go but knowing that he was better off being anywhere but in there with who was left. When he got to the elevator he hesitated on which button to push, but after checking to make sure he had his wallet and his room key he hit to go down to the lobby rather than back up to his own room, and so Claude's Enbarr adventure was poised to begin.
Or so he thought, but when he got down to the lobby and found that a couple of the people who'd previously left the meeting room were down there waiting to return to upper floors, he froze while still inside the elevator. "Hit the wrong button there, did you?" Sylvain asked him, stepping inside to join him while everyone else stayed behind, and without thinking Claude mashed the button for their floor instead. As the doors closed he lifted his arms and tucked them behind his head, leaning against the wall. "I'm going to guess you didn't actually hit the wrong one, you clearly intended on going downstairs for some reason. What, you watch what was going down from the windows or something?"
"I didn't think anyone would be down there that I'd already know," Claude answered, looking at Sylvain exclusively through side-eye glances. "I was intending on heading out to do some exploring of my own, but then you were there and I…decided against it."
"That makes perfect sense. In fact, it makes so much sense that I can't believe you just told me that and expect me to believe it." Chuckling, Sylvain lifted up off the wall before turning to face Claude head-on. "Look, was it someone I was with? I've done nothing to do, me being there wouldn't change anything."
There was no easy way for Claude to come out and admit that he'd merely frozen at the sight of Sylvain, Marianne, Leonie, and Felix all there, in the middle of some sort of conversation, so he took the easy out that was given to him. "It was one of them, yeah. Just didn't want to have to deal with it, so I hung back and now we're here. Here's hoping they'll be gone when I go back down."
"Probably, I know Felix was planning on scouting the perimeter of the place to see if it'd be safe for Dimitri to come down for a while, and that Leonie of yours…oof. What a feisty and strong woman you've got there, wish I could know her better." Dropping his arms, Sylvain rolled his neck until it gave a pop. "She's fawning over me, but I've got no reason to be doing the same with her right now, she's not giving me anything to work with. That Marianne, though, she's shown that she's quiet and reserved and I kinda like that in a woman, if we're being honest. You see any problems with her?"
"I'm not going to advocate for you to be hitting on any of my team members, no matter what kind of women you think they are." If Claude was feeling up to it, he would have shot back with a bit of a trade—he would give information about his friends and coworkers if Sylvain returned the favor about one of his own—but something told him that doing that would cause nothing but problems for them both. "To get to know them, you've got to do the talking and learning yourself, sorry."
Blinking a couple of times in surprise at the response he was given, Sylvain ended up chuckling again, shaking his head as he did. "Usually when I make comments like those, the answer I get it 'stay away from my friends, you creep', so even giving me that hope that I could get to know them…well, it's warming my heart. Thanks, dude, I hope I'm able to get to learn about them myself sometime. Them, or your pink-haired dream girl you've been keeping from me, getting to know her would do things to me, y'know?"
"It'd keep her from trying to chew my ass out every time I so much as look at a woman, so honestly? Go for Hilda. I support it." Claude didn't actually want Sylvain anywhere near Hilda, given how he'd just talked about his reputation with others regarding women, but he wasn't actually sure how tongue-in-cheek that comment had been so he felt at least a little at ease about what he was saying. "You going after her means I'll have the time to—"
"Go after Ingrid."
"—I mean, is that an option?"
There was a silence that only ended when they arrived at their floor and the door opened, Sylvain stepping out and giving Claude a bit of a shrug. "I can't tell you what is or isn't an option for her specifically, but do know that what you do with her has consequences with others that you might wanna be careful with. But, end of the day, it's all up to you. Hope you have a great ride back down!"
And so the doors closed on Claude still in the elevator, beginning to slink back into the corner as he realized what he'd just gotten himself into. Now Sylvain knew his intentions, which meant that it was only a matter of time before Felix knew his intentions, and if their prior scuffle was any indication, it was going to be a horrible time if that happened. Taking a deep breath, Claude closed his eyes and counted backward from ten, reopening his eyes to look around the empty elevator when he'd calmed himself down a bit. He wasn't interested in Ingrid beyond a professional lens. He just wanted to get to know her, to know why she was such a strong-willed security guard in a world where the men seemed to want to dominate her. He wanted to tell her that he enjoyed her confidence and her power and wished that she'd gotten to live in the role she'd been expecting for the job.
But something was going to stop him from getting to do that, and there were many possibilities of what that something could be. It might have been Felix, asserting his dominance over someone that was encroaching on a person he seemed protective of. It might have been Hilda, not wanting to let Claude go even after their romantic relationship had been severed into a strictly work-related one. It might have even been Ingrid herself, not wanting to talk to someone who wasn't going to have any say in what she did or how she could improve her standing among her peers. Or, what Claude dreaded, it could have been himself, not wanting to overstep lines that were so firmly drawn in the sand that he was standing in, not wanting to cause more problems than he already had.
The group he'd evaded was no longer in the lobby when he got down there, but there was Annette, standing by the other elevator looking longingly up at the one-way windows that shielded the second floor from other people's eyes. "I ran into a stranger up on our floor, they were telling me they saw hands on the mirrors in the sky and thought the hotel might be haunted, so I came down to look for myself," she said when she noticed Claude approaching her, his eyes tracking where she was looking at. "I think it's got a simple explanation, but Mercie said I'm not supposed to mention the truth about that floor to anyone so I just said I'd come look at it. Do you think anyone's still in that room?"
If she was asking that question, the answer had to be yes unless they'd all left right after him and missed her by moments on the elevator. "Yeah, there was a group of them in there making plans when I left. Plus Hilda, doing her own thing, and…" He didn't want to say Ingrid's name and call attention to her moment of weakness, but something told him that if anyone was going to be sympathetic to her plight, it was going to be Annette. "Ingrid's still in there too, she's taking what happened this morning rough."
"She should have known better than to get on his bad side, he's got a bit of a heated temper that he can't control sometimes." Annette was talking about Dimitri, stealthily leaving out his name in case they were being listened to. "I don't know what happened, in specifics, but it's probably the same thing that happens over and over again with different people in his guard group. They overstep their boundaries, they get chewed out, rinse and repeat. It's been better since his wife stopped having to be gone all the time, but it's not been a perfect fix by any means. He just really, and I mean really, needs some good therapy to get him out of this angered state he gets in."
"That's not something you should be saying about someone like him, is it?" Joking with how he asked it, Claude knew there was no way of getting the point across that he was presenting a serious question. For being someone who worked for the king (or, specifically, the queen), it was rather strange how open to badmouthing him Annette was. "Sure, guy seems like he's a little unhinged just based on my small interactions with him, but I wouldn't say that means he needs therapy. Just a nap, probably."
"Oh, trust me, he needs that too, but…" Annette's voice trailed off as she turned from looking up at those mirrored windows to her feet, which she kicked out of the bottom of her long skirt a couple of times. "I don't know why I'm telling you any of this. Maybe it's because you seem trustworthy, maybe it's because you're in charge of a really cool group of people, or maybe it's just because I'm gullible, but when I say he needs help, I mean it. It's not something any of the rest of us can help him with, either, and because of who he is he doesn't want to find help outside of us."
Claude nodded, assuming that it would be fairly difficult to get an unbiased therapist when you were the king of an entire country. He could have made some sort of remark about how there was an easy solution to that problem, but doing so would open himself up to questions about what that solution might be and he wasn't about to discuss that again. "Then I don't really know what to tell you, besides good job trusting me with these sorts of things. My lips are sealed on this just like everything else I know."
Annette mumbled something quietly, kicking her foot into the ground one more time before walking away, and as Claude watched her go he saw her stumble and nearly trip on her way to the elevator—not because of her skirt or how she was walking, but because she was still looking down and didn't see someone coming at her from across the way until it was almost too late to do anything. He gave a soft chuckle after seeing her save the situation, heading off to the front doors of the hotel to properly start his journey out into the unknown there in Enbarr, a city he'd never thought he'd have a reason to enter.
Being out on the street felt a lot like being out around town back home, minus the weather that felt unseasonably warm to him. By the time he'd made it one block, he was carrying his light jacket under one arm, so that he didn't end up drenched with sweat before arriving anywhere. There were plenty of shops and restaurants with their doors wide open for customers, and while Claude didn't walk into any of them, he was taking mental notes about what was located where just in case he was asked to go out again with someone else. "One of these places has to be that restaurant the guys want to check out," he said to himself, wondering if they were still having that conversation or if the topic had finally been exhausted and they'd moved on. "All of this looks fancy enough that I'd feel underdressed walking inside."
It made sense, though, that they'd put the king and his entire group of guards in the ritzier part of the city, even if most of them weren't the right kind of clientele for the stores located around there. While Lorenz, Hilda, or even Claude himself if he was prepared would fit right in with the folks going inside of these places, people like Raphael and Ignatz weren't going to be as lucky, and if his assumption was correct and one of the restaurants there was the one they were intending on dining at, he'd have to warn them to clean up nicely before their meal. After walking a few blocks he found places more familiar to his eyes, stores and names that they had back home in Derdriu as well.
Those were the kinds of places Claude also avoided, because he knew what their goods were like and he wasn't a fan of them to begin with. He only entered stores that were unfamiliar in name but didn't look like they cost an arm and a leg to buy anything at, and while he didn't end up purchasing anything the entire time he was out on the town, he did find quite a few places that he knew others would get a kick out of, including a giant candy store that he made the biggest mental note to tell Lysithea all about when he saw her next. There was something novel about being out in an unfamiliar city by himself, but by the time he'd finally turned back to return to the hotel, he found himself wishing he'd made the trip with at least one other person.
"At least no one here recognizes me, like they do when I'm out around town," he conceded, one of the reasons why going alone worked out like it did. "Never quite get used to being stopped on the street by people who know me from the news or from TV shows I've been on." Saying that garnered some interest from passersby, but nobody decided to test his reaction by stopping him right there to ask who he was, a fact he was thankful for.
For whatever reason, the walk back to the hotel took longer than getting down through the shops, and so he ended up stopping at a food stall peddling "authentic Adrestian cuisine", just to get a taste of what the locals ate. None of it seemed too different from what he could pick up at the food trucks at the park in Derdriu, but he still went through buying a dish and eating it, finding it bland in flavor but very filling with every bite. The owner of the stall had seen Claude's ID card in his wallet when he'd pulled it out to pay, and had offered to add spices to the dish for the foreigner, but he'd turned down the offer to try it as authentic as possible, but he regret that conscious choice after that first bite of relatively flavorless meat and vegetables.
After swallowing down as much of it as he could stomach, Claude found himself with the energy to get back to the hotel with ease, but getting back was an entirely different story. The street he was walking down should have been the same one he'd come in on, but none of the places looked right, and it took until he was closer to the hotel to see it high above the buildings for him to realize that in the middle of everything, he'd gotten several blocks over from where he'd started. Noting that as something else he needed to keep in mind for if there was a next time he went out for a walk, Claude made his way back to the correct street and found himself immersed in those sights he'd already seen once, leading his way back to the front doors of the hotel.
A security guard, someone not of the group from Faerghus or his own, stood at the door, holding a gun firmly across his chest. "Reason for entry?" he barked, startling Claude as he hadn't seen this guy when he'd left. "I'm not just letting any random shmoes into this hotel, after all."
"Uh, yeah, I'm part of the group guarding the k-i-n-g, you might wanna just let me in so I can get back to work." Claude flashed a dazzling, charming smile at the guard, who grunted and grabbed his gun a bit tighter, not moving out of the way. "What, don't believe me? How many people in Enbarr know the guy's here?"
"I believe you, I'm just not letting you in." The guard gave Claude a murderous glare, one that sent actual shivers down his spine even in the heat. "Give it ten minutes, then you can enter. Boss' orders, unfortunately."
Knowing very well that orders like that did happen from time to time, but that this guy's way of delivering that news was all wrong, Claude took a step back and turned to look down the other way he hadn't gone exploring. "What a city you've got here, I'm pretty impressed by what I've seen so far. You do a lot of work like this all over?"
"I'm not making small talk with you."
"Should've figured, you struck me as one of those 'married to the rules' kinds of guards, the kind of people I've never been able to keep employed under me. Since I, you know, am the head of the Leicester Alliance Security Company and all." Just trying to flex his position as he waited, Claude was not expecting to hear the sound of the gun being cocked, and he warily looked over at the guard, who seemed to be playing ignorant to the scare tactic he'd just used on someone trying to make friendly conversation with him. "Y-yeah, man, I'll just keep quiet until you let me in, that sounds great."
"Claude? What are you doing standing around out here?" Leonie asked, as she and Marianne came up on him and the other guard outside the hotel. "It's really warm out right now, I'm surprised you haven't ducked inside to cool off or something."
He motioned toward the armed guard with his eyes, Marianne gasping and covering her mouth when she saw him but Leonie brushing it off like it was nothing to be surprised by. "That'd be why, actually, can't exactly get inside when there's a guy doing his job keeping us out right now."
"Why is he keeping us out? We're the guards for the ki—" Leonie's words were cut off by the gun cocking again, which let Claude know it probably was less of a real gun and more of a prop to scare people with, but she hadn't been around for the first time and she swallowed everything else she'd wanted to say down, letting it linger in her throat instead of the inevitable bullet she thought she'd be hit with.
"Did he say how long we'd be stuck out here for?" Marianne seemed like she was suffering in the heat, and given that she was wearing a dress that had actual long sleeves, it would have been best for her to get inside anywhere. Thankfully, at the sound of her voice and how drained it was, the guard heaved a sigh and stepped aside so that the trio could enter the hotel, locking eyes with Claude and giving him that glare one more time as he went in.
Once the doors closed and they were in the now-empty lobby with only employees around, Claude explained that he'd been told ten minutes before they could go inside, before thanking Marianne for showing up when she did to help speed that up. "Excuse me, I helped too, didn't I?" Based on how she was laughing when she asked, Leonie didn't think she'd been helpful at all, but she still presented the question for consideration.
"You helped almost get us all killed by a cap gun, that's for sure," Claude said after some consideration for what the best course of action on revealing his suspicions would be. "I don't think a real gun could make that same reload sound without being discharged, but I'm no gun expert so maybe I'm wrong."
"Wouldn't that be a story, getting shot while not even doing our job," she replied, shaking her head before finally noticing that the lobby had completely cleared out compared to earlier in the day. "Anyway, I think they're thinking something's going to be happening, if they've sent everyone out of here. What do you think it's going to be, because I'm looking forward to some excitement that isn't the threat of death."
Marianne, also looking around, couldn't come up with a solid answer based on their limited given evidence, so she suggested going back up to the rooms and seeing if anything was happening up there. Since she was so levelheaded and had just saved them from the heat and the gun-happy guard, neither Claude nor Leonie saw any reason to argue against the plan so they headed toward the elevators to ride up to the floor with two of their rooms together. Neither elevator was on the bottom floor when they got there, so they were left waiting for one to come down to pick them up, and while they waited they chatted about the weather and how different from home it felt outside.
It was a good thing that going back up to their rooms wasn't a dire need, because when the elevator got down to the lobby its doors opened and Dimitri, Byleth, and Mercedes all came out, the king and queen dressed down to look less regal and their attendant looking less like she worked for them and more like she was just a friend. "You guys planning on going somewhere?" Claude asked, voicing the same thought that Leonie clearly had, while Marianne snuck to the elevator and went up to her floor anyway, not wanting to deal with the social interaction. "Let me tell you, the guy out front's prepared for it."
"The guy out front?" Mercedes repeated, to which Claude nodded. "That's strange, minus you three we'd accounted for everyone before coming downstairs. You mean the emperor has sent guards of her own to keep an eye on us?"
"Not surprising in the slightest, she always wants to make sure that she has the upper hand in life," Dimitri remarked, while Byleth stood motionless, just taking in the discussion around her instead of participating in it. "However, we're not going outside of the building, there's a shopping district inside that we wanted to check out. Think of this place as a resort, and we're going to take advantage of that."
Knowing that he had a specific job to stick to, but also knowing that one guard who was more of an assistant than anything else, Claude decided that he was going to overstep his boundaries just a hair. "I'll come with you, then. Just in case things get a bit crazy. Would've figured one of your men would be here to do that, but since they're not, I can jump right in and do it instead."
"I'll help too, if that's okay," Leonie said, following right in her leader's footsteps of filling in a perceived gap. "I could use a bit of actual work right now, anyway. My mind's not meant for all of this downtime."
While he didn't verbally accept their offer, Dimitri certainly didn't seem too bothered by them coming along with him and his wife as they headed toward the shopping area the hotel had to offer. He pulled down a hat over his face, shielding his scarred eye from being visible to anyone around him, and motioned for Mercedes to keep her distance so that it wasn't blatantly obvious that she was there to guard, and when Claude saw that happen he had Leonie hang back with him, so that they were trailing the king and queen but not to the point that they were immediately called out for being with them. The shopping area was cleared out as well for the most part, and while there were still other people beyond employees that they could see, there were guards keeping those members of the public from heading toward the hotel lobby. "I wonder if there's any stores here we have at home," Mercedes mused, speaking loudly enough from her position at the front of the group that everyone else could hear her. "I've always been curious about what other cities have to offer that's the same as at home."
"That's what I was out doing earlier, getting a good feel for what's the same here and what's different," Claude replied, trying not to sound too suspicious as a tourist but knowing that what they were doing was not going to be making anyone fit right in. "In fact, that's what I think I'm going to do right now, if you'll excuse me." He grabbed Leonie's arm and began pulling her in the direction of some shops across the way, while Mercedes came to a stop in front of a completely different store and allowed for the royals to pass her by. In a forced whisper, he told Leonie, "I'm going to play up looking at things, you keep an eye on the couple and be ready to jump into action whenever."
"Got it," she replied with a small nod, and so every few seconds she was glancing over her shoulder and down the corridor, to where the royal couple had stopped in front of a store of their own choosing. Since Claude still had a hand on her arm, she wasn't able to slip away unnoticed, but she was able to jerk her arm to get his attention at one point, alerting him to look in their direction as well. "Shall we follow?" she asked, showing Claude that the people they were there to watch were entering a store. "Or do we keep watch from here?"
He looked across to see Mercedes also keeping an eye on the situation, but something felt wrong if all three of them were not close enough to do anything if there was anything that happened. "Head in after them, just in case," he decided, letting go of Leonie's arm so that she could jog across the mall to enter the store they all had their eyes on. She didn't immediately come back out, and when someone did exit the store it was Byleth, looking around confused before motioning for Mercedes to join her.
That felt like Claude's cue to get closer as well, just to have a grasp of what was happening where he couldn't see it. "Whoever told that guard to come inside, it was a good idea," Byleth was saying, Mercedes nodding as she heard it and Claude feeling slight validation in his choice to let Leonie go. "The employees inside were not prepared to see customers and were ready to make things become physical, so her entering was well-timed and well-received. Dimitri's still doing some shopping despite it all, but I…"
"Couldn't bear to be in there any longer?" Mercedes finished, to which her queen said was correct. "I understand completely, that would be quite a stressful situation to be stuck in, and at a time where we're trying to limit your stresses to the minimum necessary it would be foolish to stick around."
"Yes, well, that would be why I removed myself from the store." Byleth happened to notice that Claude was just close enough to be able to hear what had been said, and she stared blankly in his direction for a moment. "You may have heard that, but I'll have you know that I'm not weak, ill, or in any sort of need."
As much as Claude wanted to assure her that he didn't think any of that, and that he was already aware of what was being referred to, he remembered Annette's panic in her voice when she'd thought that he was going to spill all of the secrets she'd given him, and he decided that he had to just play dumb. "I wouldn't have thought that a queen could be any of those things, it sounded to me like you were making a mental health choice."
"You must have been raised to be a smooth talker, trying to flatter me like that," Byleth decided upon hearing Claude's response, having no clue that he was masking the truth with his words. "But I must inform you, or perhaps remind you, that I am married and won't be taking your advances so kindly once Dimitri is back."
"That wasn't—I didn't—trust me, if I was trying to flirt with you, it would've been beyond obvious." Hearing the soft laugh that Byleth gave at his flustered response, Claude was able to deduce that she wasn't being serious with her threat, but it was still not something he particularly wanted to explore further. "Ahem, anyway, glad to know you had it in you to step out of a bad situation, but Leonie's a good one to have on your side when things start getting a little weird. She doesn't take sh—"
"What he means to say is that she's quite adept at handling sticky situations," Mercedes interrupted, her cheerful voice a bit forceful as if trying to remind Claude that dropping curses in front of royalty was a bad idea. He rolled his eyes slightly, thinking about his previous experiences with royals who were much more open to the idea of cursing, but didn't dare try and argue for why he felt it was appropriate. "Let's just hope that they're out soon, I can't imagine the businesses in here want to keep everything so locked down all day just for us."
"While we wait, care to join me with some window shopping? I can't imagine Dimitri will take too much longer but who knows, really." Without waiting for an answer, Byleth started on toward another store, and after giving Claude a stern, motherly glare Mercedes was right behind her. Claude, realizing that he was making all sorts of wrong impressions every time he opened his mouth around these people, was quick to follow as well, and while the ladies looked at the different stores it was up to him to keep checking to see if the others were on their way to join back with them. It was almost an hour before all five were back together, an exasperated hotel staff member having come twice to see if everything was okay and if they could reopen the lobby to the public, but when Dimitri came out of the store he and Leonie both were carrying their fair share of bags, the king explaining that they were all his purchases but most of them were for staff back home that couldn't make the trip.
Since two of their group of five were now laden with bags, continuing on into the mall didn't seem like it was in their best interest (even ignoring how they'd been more or less asked to get a move on), they headed back to the hotel lobby and got right into the elevators to go up to the main floor of rooms. Claude felt as if their choice to fit all five of them in the elevator at once was a bit poor, but it allowed for him to ask something that he hadn't felt he'd had the chance to ask yet: "So, you can totally choose not to answer this if you'd prefer, but what's with the room splitting that you guys have going on?"
"Safety reasons, remember?" Leonie replied, speaking over the bags she was holding in front of her face. "That's what we've all been told."
"I mean their room splitting, not just the rest of us." His adamance that there was something to be addressed was met with silence, no one wanting to be the one to answer him, which he'd more or less figured would be the situation. With all of the secrecy and privacy that they were being forced to endure, keeping something so important close to their chests only felt like it was fated.
That didn't mean that Claude didn't know where he'd be getting his answer from, and he knew exactly when he would get it. The time came that evening, after dinner and after the groups of guards staying at other properties were sent on their way. Most of the remaining group had gone back to their rooms for the night, although Hilda and Marianne had gone down to the shopping district for themselves and had invited Claude to go with them. He had turned them down, seeing the person he wanted to speak to heading for the elevator to go up to their room right at that moment, and he abruptly left his conversation with the ladies to go meet them before they disappeared.
"Oh, hello, Claude!" Annette chirped in greeting, surprised to see herself being joined by one of the guards she hadn't traveled there with. "Fancy seeing you here, almost like it's the only way we can get up to our rooms. You ready to sleep for the night or something?"
"Not quite, I was just hoping to get to talk to you about a question I thought of that no one else seems to want to answer." He smiled kindly at Annette and watched as she thought about how to proceed, her eyes tracking from side to side as she weighed her options. "If you don't want to answer me, it's really fine. I understand why."
"No, I do want to answer you if I can! I'm just not sure why you're asking me, when there are so many others who might know more than I do." She lowered her voice to add, "Unless it's because of everything else I've already told you, then it definitely makes sense why you'd be asking me, but I don't have a whole lot else that I could really share with you."
He was tempted to tell her that it was entirely because of her being so eager to share information with him previously, but that was something he was going to save for when he really needed to get a bribe out there. "I'm asking you because I trust you and your word, and you've already proven to me that you want what's best for me in all of this craziness." That was when the elevator door opened and they both stepped inside, him pressing the button for his floor and watching as Annette failed to do the same for her own; he'd convinced her to help him out, hook, line, and sinker.
When they got to the correct floor, he led her down to his room and they went inside together, not too worried about being caught in such a position given the later hour and the fact that the hallway seemed quiet when they were out in it. "What do you want to know from me?" she asked once the door was closed, a finger twirling part of her orange bangs that had gotten mussed compared to the rest of her hair. "Like I said, I don't really have a lot I can share with you, mostly because I've already shared all of it!"
"I was curious if you knew about the separate rooms for the king and queen," he came out and said, knowing that he could easily blow this chance if he didn't take it. Annette's face dropped when she heard about it, but soon she was looking at him with a sly smile. "I take it that you know a thing or two about it?"
Her smile only grew as she answered his inquiry. "I know where it is, and that it's meant for the queen if we feel she needs to be somewhere safer, but that's all I got for you there. Why, are you thinking about asking if you can use it for something?"
"What? I…don't know where that idea came from, I was just curious about why it exists in the first place." Not a lie at all, but based solely on how he'd spoken nervously in those first few words it wasn't entirely convincing on Claude's part.
Annette, in all of her kindness and respect, didn't badger him further about what she thought the room question was for, but repeated yet again that she didn't know too much because she'd already told him everything. "I'm going to go up to my own room and get ready for tomorrow," she said after they'd stared each other down for a moment or two, neither of them doing anything to get the other to move from their stance on the situation that had just been created. "You stay out of trouble, and don't try to go snooping for the queen's other room. It's not here, and you won't be able to get to it anyway because of the curfews in this city."
"There are curfews?"
"After a certain time, I don't even know when for sure, they don't let people in or out of buildings unless it's an emergency. Mercie was telling me about it this morning, they barely missed being locked out because of it last night over at their hotel." Annette walked to the door, Claude following her so that he could open it like the gentleman he was. "Thank you, and I hope I've given you at least something helpful to you! Have a good night, Claude!"
He mumbled his good night wish for her as she walked down to the elevators, him closing his room door and walking back to the bed in a bit of a daze. What in the world was Annette going on about, thinking he wanted to use the queen's safe room for something? She must have been imagining reasons for why he'd be curious about it, because he really only wanted to know why it existed in the first place. It wasn't until he was drifting off to sleep that night that her probable idea struck him, and he shot up to sitting in the bed, beginning to breathe heavily at the mere thought. There was no way that it was clear to everyone around him that he wanted to get to know a certain someone better, was there? It had to all just be coincidence that these conclusions would get jumped to around him when he was asking about things that had nothing to do with said person.
Figuring that it would be best to drop the topic entirely with anyone, Claude swore to himself right then and there that he wasn't going to spend even a moment's more of his time thinking about the strong-willed woman from Faerghus who he'd wanted to get to know better. She was going to be his downfall if he let her, and he wasn't going to let someone else existing cause him to screw up the highest-profile job he'd ever had in his life. If things went sour there in Enbarr, they certainly weren't going to be because he was interested in Ingrid, and that was just how it was going to be.
