Note: I don't own the Gundam characters. Thanks to all who reviewed. This next chapter is especially for you.
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The Lighting Of The Fires (Chapter 06a)
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On their way to Lady Orville's dinner party, Quatre, sitting beside Relena in the post chaise, broke a rather protracted silence by saying, "I am pleased that we are going, my dear."
"Are you?" she asked rather shyly.
"Yes, it is time that you met some of our other neighbors. I expect they have not left cards because of Dorothy's reticence. I am sure they judge me a recluse."
His comment surprised her. In the half a month she had been at his home- or, rather, "their home," as she must call it and try to expunge the feeling that she was an unwanted guest come for an indefinite state- Quatre had made no reference to the lack of formal visits generally paid to a new arrival. Rather than giving him a direct answer, she contented herself with saying, "I expect they thought that since we were so recently wed…" She blushed, realizing that the observation she had been about to make, with its suggestion of a honeymoon, would be the last sort of a remark he would wish to hear.
"Yes, I can well imagine that they expected we would covet our privacy. Relena, my dear, you have been wonderfully forbearing. I…" He hesitated, for the carriage was slowing to a stop. "I forgot that the Orvilles live so near. I should not have forgotten. It will be good to see Duo again."
"I imagine he will be pleased to see you too," Relena said. Quatre was looking very handsome tonight. His evening clothes became him, and she found herself remembering the night they had met. He had looked similarly handsome. He had easily outshone all the gentlemen she had seen on that never-to-be-forgotten occasion, and again it seemed incredible that they should be married-especially after she had stepped on his toe.
He would suffer less were she to do it now, she thought with no little satisfaction. She had lost more weight, and this evening when she had come down to join him, he had commented on the change in her appearance. "You do look exceedingly lovely tonight, Relena, my dear," he had said on a note of surprise, and then he had fallen silent. She had wondered, and was still wondering, if he were comparing her to his lost love-but of course there could be no comparison.
More than ever she was convinced that he and his Dorothy had occupied an enchanted world of their own-one closed to all invasion, a Garden of Eden, or, better yet, a utopia. Then she remembered with a surge of excitement that Mr. Barton had discovered an early edition of a Sir Thomas More work-dated 1530! She remembered the librarian, his eyes alight with excitement, as he had carefully shown her the thin, leatherbound volume. He had said wonderingly, "Just think, it was printed before Shakespeare was born, and he might easily have drawn upon it for The Tempest." It was very pleasant to have Mr. Barton in the house. He had made other discoveries in the library, and he was always eager to share them with her.
"My dear, whither are you wandering?" Quatre said.
Relena looked up quickly and did not see him. "Where are…?" she began confusedly.
"I am here, my dear, waiting to hand you down."
She realized then that the coach door had been opened, and rather than sitting beside her, Quatre was standing by the steps waiting to hand her down. "Oh, dear, I was thinking," she told him.
"A most regrettable habit, and one that you must endeavor to conquer if you are to be like most females," he said lightly as he helped her out of the post chaise. "However, I might add that I, for one, find it singularly refreshing. In fact, your singularity in that regard was one of the reasons I married you. It is not every young woman who beguiles her time at Almack's with a book."
She looked up into his smiling face and felt a delicious warmth stealing over her. She had never seen so... dared she call his look ardent? She spoke over a pounding in her throat. "I have never tried to be like most females, Quatre."
"I know," he said softly, "and that is what I most appreciate about you. Indeed, it occurs to me that I have never appreciated you enough. I have to believe that Lady Orville has proved far more discerning than myself."
Before Relena could reply, several other ladies and gentlemen moving in the direction of the castle had caught sight of Quatre. There were delighted greetings and swift introductions, which Relena, meeting interested, curious, and pleased glances, feared she might not remember. Then they came into a large ball to be punctiliously announced by an elderly butler. Further introductions followed. Relena met a Lady Cavendish, a Lord Calvert, a Lieutenant Colonel Dashwood, Mr. and Mrs. James Lord, and Colonel Wiltshire with his lady, and hoped that she would have no difficulty in remembering them all.
Then suddenly Quatre was separated from her by a tall, bronzed gentleman with a soldierly bearing, who later proved to be her host, Lord Duo Orville. He told her that his lady was much taken with her but did not wait to hear her comment that she was fond of Lady Orville.
Indeed, there was a considerable amount of fractured conversation, of anecdotes told and interrupted by others who had been there at the time the said anecdote was in the process of unfolding. There was also a moment when her hostess determinedly dragged her into an alcove and said archly, "You are in such good looks tonight, my dear Relena. Am I to deduce… ?" She did not appear to be disappointed by Relena's embarrassed denials.
"The man is beginning to realize his errors, it is evident," she whispered. "And it is also time that Dorothy was drowned in a deep pool. She will be, after tonight. Duo will have something to say about you. I have demanded that, and now that he has seen you, he is really quite annoyed with Quatre-or I should be even more annoyed than he has been. I think he loathed Dorothy even more than myself. Husbands should be partial to their wives and allied against their enemies, my dear. Until the ghost is laid, Dorothy will be your enemy, but I feel that Quatre is finally seeing the error of his ways."
"He has seemed different tonight," Relena murmured.
"And high time! He often watches you, you know. In fact, he is beginning to behave as a newly married man ought." Lady Orville winked. "I will hope that this behavior will be followed by other manly manifestations."
Relena blushed. "Hilde!" she protested.
"I know I am being outrageous, but also he is outrageous, and not so harmlessly, either. Sixteen days- shocking, I call it!"
Relena stared at her in horror. "I… I never told you that…that…"
"My love, that is part of it. Your reticence does you great credit, but it is also revealing to me, I who count myself your best friend. The man is a fool! I only hope that he will not come to appreciate you too late."
"Too late?" Relena repeated, staring at Lady Orville incredulously.
"Oh, Relena, Relena, Relena, I could shake you," Lady Orville hissed. "At a word, you would lie down and let him walk on you, and it should be the other way around. There, I will say no more, because you will not understand and you will be unhappy, and I have invited you here so that our neighbors and friends can see what an excellent choice your husband has made. I also hope that Quatre, who has been looking your way while we have been conversing- or, rather, while I have been conversing- will see the error of his ways and cease these sins of omission."
Having had her say, Lady Orville left Relena's side, and her position was usurped by other ladies. Everyone appeared to like her, and as the evening ended, she felt happy and excited. Despite her lingering shyness, she had enjoyed herself, and Quatre appeared in high good humor as he handed her into the post chaise.
"My dear," he said, pulling her against him, "You have made an excellent impression."
"Did I?" Relena asked, thinking only of the warmth of his arm on her shoulders, and the warmth of his tone as well.
"You seem to have had no trouble conversing with anyone. Duo remarked on it. It was good seeing him again."
"I should imagine you would have, since your estates adjoin each other. I hope that you had a chance to speak with Lady Orville."
"I did, and I found her charming."
"Oh, I am pleased. You do like her, then?"
"I think I like her mainly because she seems to like you, and consequently shows excellent taste." Quatre bent to kiss her. The kiss might have begun by being casual, but it lasted a surprisingly long time. "Relena, my dearest Relena," he said finally, "what a damned fool I have been!''
"Oh, n-no-" she began.
"Oh, yes," he interrupted. "And I do hope that you will forgive…" He paused, for the post chaise had traversed the relatively short distance that lay between the two estates and was rolling into the stable yard. Though it was dark, there was a full moon that night, and standing in a bright pool of moonlight was a wraithlike figure clad in white and wringing its hands.
As Quatre, usurping the place of his footman, wonderingly helped Relena from the coach, the figure ran toward them, wailing, "Oh, where have you been? You must help me, Relena, I have left my husband and I…I do not know what to do." However, it was not to Relena that Sylvia turned. She flung herself into her brother-in-law's arms and sobbed against him as if her heart would break.
Quatre stared down at Sylvia incredulously. Even in her agony, her moon-illuminated features bore a startling resemblance to Dorothy. Automatically his arms tightened around her quivering body. He said gently, protectively, "My poor child, what is amiss?"
"I…I…" Sylvia looked up at him piteously, and then, upon receiving the support of his arms, her last bit of strength appeared to ebb and she swooned.
"I must get her inside," he said unnecessarily.
"Yes," Relena agreed faintly, thinking… but she did not know what to think, could not think at such a time. Sylvia must be brought into the house, and Quatre had easily lifted her and was carrying her inside. At this hour the servants had retired, save for her abigail, Quatre's valet, and the footman who had admitted them.
Fortunately Catherine could make the bed in one of the many spare rooms, but Quatre, still encumbered by his fair burden, directed that Sylvia be put in the chamber his sister had once occupied, it being more commodious and better furnished than the others. Furthermore, it was close to the suite that he and Relena occupied.
Relena, trailing behind him, watched as he brought Sylvia into the chamber, his voice edgy as he directed Catherine to hurry. Then he carefully put Sylvia on the chaise lounge and in the glow of a hastily lighted candelabra he scanned her unconscious face.
"She is so very pale," he said anxiously.
Sylvia was always pale. She had very little color in her cheeks. Relena longed to provide that information but could not. Shock and fear had put a bridle on her tongue, and there was agony as well. In a moment that seemingly had held great promise, when her husband had seemed more interested, more caring-if not actually loving- her sister Sylvia, like a bird of ill omen, had come to dispel her happiness again-and now what would happen?
Conjecture was beyond her. She could not consider the ramifications attendant upon Sylvia's arrival. She must minister to her stricken sister, or else be thought uncaring and even inhuman. She came to stand near Quatre at the chaise lounge.
"Should we not apply burned feathers?" she suggested. "Beggin' your pardon, milady," Catherine said crisply as she slid pillows into their cases, "but my sister's much given to faintin' fits, and water splashed in 'er face brings 'er about quick as that."
"Water, then?" Relena suggested.
"Yes," Quatre agreed. "Catherine, will you fetch some... He paused as Sylvia stirred and moaned. "Never mind," he added quickly. "I believe she is . . . recovering."
Sylvia opened her eyes, and staring fearfully into Quatre's anxious face, she wailed, "Oh, p-please, he…he must not find me."
"My poor, poor child, what has happened?" he asked solicitously and tenderly and in a tone Relena had never heard from him before.
"Oh, Q-Quatre, it is you," Sylvia said wonderingly. "But-but how did I…I get here? I…I am so confused!
"I brought you, my dear. You are in my sister's chamber, and you are quite safe with us," Quatre assured her gently.
"Am I?" Sylvia shuddered. "Am I safe anywhere as long as he remains in the world? Oh, God, God, God, I have lived in such stultifying terror that I scarcely know the meaning of the word safe. Am…am I really safe? If he should come searching for me…" Sylvia shuddered again.
"If he should come here, my dear, he will have me to deal with," Quatre said soothingly. "I assure you, you will have nothing to fear from him in this house. You are with me."
Us. He should have said us, something in Relena's half-benumbed mind informed her, but he had not. She was seized by a most frightening sensation. She felt as if the room had suddenly narrowed to exclude her, leaving only the two of them, Quatre and Sylvia, staring into each other's eyes. Were she to leave, she was positive that Quatre would not even notice her departure, for it was not Sylvia's face that was looking back at him from the pillows- it was that of Dorothy, to whom she bore so fatal a resemblance. Acting on that same conviction, Relena moved out of the room and went down the hail to her own chamber. Out of habit she looked about for Catherine and belatedly remembered that the abigail was making Sylvia's bed. Usually she would have undressed, but this gown was complicated, and she must needs wait, as she had often waited in the days when she and Sylvia had shared an abigail.
Later, when a taciturn Catherine had helped her mistress undress, bade her good night, and gone up to her room on the third floor, Relena, lying in her wide bed, remembered Quatre's words and the warmth of his arms around her on the way home- as well as the promise she had believed they held. She wondered if after leaving Sylvia he might come to her chamber, if only to bid her good night, but she was almost positive that he would not.
By the time the clock struck one in the morning, Relena, being truly positive that Quatre would not come, ceased to contend against a determined Morpheus and fell asleep.
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End Notes: Terribly sorry it's so short but I promise the next one will be longer. Review please.