She woke up with a nagging feeling that something was going to happen today.
Which was fine with her, let something happen! It would be at least some diversion amid this boring English life!
Her female intuition had never failed her before, and so she stretched out in her bed, smiling at the ceiling.
Oh, how she was sick of the plafonds, picturing the heroes of Antiquity, all over this house! One could go mad, waking up every morning, staring at the half-naked bodies of goddesses. She would admit even to herself that she had already memorized the names and family relations of each one…
She reached out, to poke her sleeping husband. Well, right. This miracle clearly was not to be: like it had become the custom lately, he was long gone. Or was it that he wasn't back yet?
One of these days, she might blow up the Ministry of Magic, and without a magic wand – her glower would be sufficient. Along with this house, that she had inherited from her parents.
How long had her parents actually resided at this place? A week? A month? As far as she could remember them – they died when she was not quite six years old – her mother was not terribly fond of the English weather, which was why they spent most of the time on the Continent.
And why does he have to like this house so much?
The girl smirked, remembering the rapture in her husband's eyes upon their first arrival here… Thank you, Uncle dearest. It wasn't enough that I had had to spend all my childhood, both in an out of school, with your slightly mental son; now that I am all grown up and married to boot, when I finally ought to be free of you, you managed to get me stuck on this island, in this boring and maddeningly quiet house…
But finally, today something is about to happen… Hopefully, it will be something more significant than the arrival of a new house elf. After all, this already happened yesterday; and there is nothing more boring than a repeat.
She stretched again and glanced at the clock: the sun had been up for more than an hour. Where had her husband gone again? Or did the Ministry introduce a mandatory morning roll call, to which the higher ups were to show up at dawn? No, she didn't like England. Not two years ago; not now.
"Good morning, Madame Helene," the female house elf entered the room and curtsied. The girl couldn't help but smile: here was the one joy in this household. She looked the elf over: she was wearing a summer dress and apron that she, Helene had designed and the house elves sewed. This was fun…
"You put your uniform inside out again," the girl pointed out, jumping off the bed and heading for the servant. The other flashed her huge eyes at her mistress in embarrassment, and set down the breakfast tray on the little table.
Oh, how difficult had it been for Helene to convince the elves that these were not clothes; that she had no intention of letting them go, but was only giving them an alternative to kitchen towels, a uniform. Her husband was no better: he almost fainted at the sight of dressed-up house elves. Her uncle was in his element, however: he stated that they should either have a child, or buy her some dolls – and leave the house elves alone.
"Where is the master?" Helene asked, helping Elle, her maid, to put her uniform on the right way – this was their morning ritual.
"He left an hour and a half ago, and told us not to wake you up, and that he would try to be back by the time you awoke," Elle dashed toward the bed and started making it.
"Oh, leave it," Helene told her, returning to bed. "I shall wait for him, since he had promised… Serve me the breakfast, and then you may go."
Helene chuckled as she watched the stuffy-looking house elf leave, and leaned back on the pillows, supporting the breakfast tray. She probably would not be going to her classes today – she wasn't feeling like it. Besides, it was a daft idea in the first place – to study design at the English Institute of Magic Fashion. If one really wanted to learn that, a French school would have been more suitable. What fashion was there to speak of here? Laughable… She had only seen a few people in this country who were dressed acceptably.
Speaking of such people… She still couldn't dismiss the confusing emotions that came over her at the sight of that aristocrat at the café… That the young man was indeed an aristocrat would have been clear even to Elle, with her tiny house-elf brain. Too well-mannered, too well-dressed, too much refinement in his features…
Who is he? And why did she feel this strange longing when their eyes met? Could she have met him before? No, she would have remembered… That silver was unforgettable.
Helene kept twisting a lock of her hair around her finger, looking absently out the window. Fog again… This place was beginning to seriously grate on her nerves.
"Here I am," the one she'd been waiting for entered the room. Her husband was smiling and, which was even more welcome, he was completely himself now, with any added ash-blonde. It was him – the boy she first met at the Masque Ball, the year he turned seventeen. "Did you sleep well?"
"Where on Earth have you been?" she received his kiss, noticing the shadows under his eyes, despite it being not even seven o'clock in the morning. "Has the Ministry instituted a mandatory dawn exercise program, to keep their employees healthy, with the Minister leading the class? Has the Atrium been turned into the gymnasium for the duration? And where are your gym shorts?"
"I gave them to my secretary, as a keepsake," he snorted, and Helene laughed.
"All right, now we have discovered where you'd been. A secretary, then… Is she pretty?"
"Oh, Helene, enough," he picked up the toast from her tray and began to eat it. "You know perfectly well that we are in the middle of a new start-up."
"Oh, stop! I don't wish to hear anything about your newly invented Floo powder first thing in the morning," Helene vehemently shook her head. "I am so sick and tired of it…"
"But, darling, it will be a leap forward in the development of magical transportation," his eyes flashed with excitement, and the girl decided to let him get it out, as always. It didn't matter that she had heard it a hundred time before. "We shall stop using the obsolete Floo powder – and our travel will become faster and more comfortable. Imagine, there will be no more soot on our clothes, and a single fireplace can accommodate up to three people simultaneously!"
"And what have you decided to do with the old mines?"
Her husband smiled, and Helene did not like the look of that smile.
"So, what have my dear uncle come up with now? To build a fancy hotel there? A bank? An amusement park? A jail for stubborn young ladies of marriageable age?"
"We are selling them," he narrowed one eye, as though speaking of something very pleasant to him.
"And who needs a business that is about to go bust, because it will have become hopelessly obsolete?" Helene peered carefully into her husband's face. Yes, Uncle, you have managed to make my calm and kind husband into a copy of your Marcus, albeit not a perfect one.
"But no one knows about it yet," her husband got to his feet and headed for his dressing room. "I have to change; I am having a private meeting with the Minister of Magic on this subject."
"Which subject? The new sort of Floo powder or your swindle with the almost-worthless mines?" she smirked at her husband when she turned around to glare at her. "What?"
"What are you doing today?" he had walked into the dressing room and therefore, was forced to speak much louder, making Helene frown: she hated yelling.
"As usual: classes, the library, lunch with Uncle and his friends; afterwards, I'll probably take a walk."
"The weather is beastly in London today, so don't wander around there; come right back after school, will you?" he looked out into the bedroom, busily knotting his neck-tie.
"I'll think about it," the girl said dismissively, setting aside her tray and watching her husband put on his Ministry robes. "Going already?"
"Yes, I have to hurry… In the evening, we can go to the theatre, if you wish."
"Fine," Helene received another kiss. "Good day to you, the youngest Chief Advisor to the British Minister of Magic in the last three hundred years," she watched him exit the room, and only then added quietly to his title, as she always did: "bought by the seventeenth Earl of Devereaux who holds monopoly on manufacturing and distribution of Floo powder…"
She never said it out loud in front of her husband, because she loved him. Why remind him that ever since he had agreed to become Marcus Devereaux, he became a near pawn of her uncle? After all, he, her beloved and devoted husband did it for them, for the sake of their being together. Not too high a price for happiness…
Her girlfriends, back when she still had some – never ceased to marvel at her for choosing him. He was too quiet, even inert, somewhat repressed, even cowardly at times, not a chatter-box. But he was also devoted, loyal, and steadfast. Always near, ready to help, ready to do even the impossible. When he spoke – and he spoke freely when it was just the two of them – it was interesting, and she realized that he was far from a dunce. Everything else she could tolerate, for her spunk was enough for both of them.
And now… Now he had changed. In some ways, for the better; in some – for the worse. Yet, what remained constant was his love for her, his caring, his eyes that looked on her with adoration and humility.
Her girlfriends used to call him insipid. But they had never been alone with him, chatting, laughing by the fireplace, with a glass of wine. And they had never been in his arms…
And no one, ever had become a metamorphmagus – just for them.
Helene smiled and walked to the window – again, like yesterday. And once again, she got a feeling that something was missing from her life, something she used to have, something important and intimate. Why?
It was the same feeling she had when she saw him at the café, that aristocrat. Maybe, to figure it out, she simply needed to see him again. Maybe then this strange longing she'd never felt before would go away…
But how would she find him? Maybe by returning to that café… That young man appeared to be a regular there; at least, the proprietor greeted him and his friend with a friendly gesture, as a good acquaintance would.
It is decided then – she'd go to that café. If she does not see the young man, she could always send in a house elf, to wait for him and follow him, should he show up.
Helene nodded at her decision, and immediately felt the gloomy mood lift, and the smile return to her face. That's better…
She turned at the sound of the opening door: for some reason, Elle preferred walking in instead of Apparating – and was about to speak to the house elf, when she realized that it was not her.
"Children is just what this house needed…" she smirked, looking into the green eyes of the boy with touseled black hair. He casually adjusted the half-moon glasses, sitting askew on his nose, and swept leaves from his wrinkled shirt. Then he smiled and spoke:
"I apologize for not coming last night. It was all because of my house elf. Did you happen to see my wand around here? And… do you have any candy?"