do you miss the world?

For some the brazen confident that lead to Dottie walking up to the vaguely familiar stranger—subdued and flirtatious rather than the beaming grin that’s her norm—to the fairywine drank they not. Not for her. Any in the Summer Court could attest to her tendency towards gregariousness, towards unashamed and confident flirtations. Those held closest to the crown new the truth beyond the perception of the Summer Children as carefree, as reckless. They knew the measured thoughts behind her smiles, knew the information that could be gained from a well-timed smile.

“Lovely stranger! I don’t think we’ve met yet.” A giggle punctuated her sentence. “And if we have you must forgive me. My memory has failed me.” The words all rang true, all had to given her fae nature, but still they were selected carefully, selected to paint an imagine of the type of fae she was. 

“My friend!” Dottie’s tone was a warm thing, syrupy sweet and cloying and influenced heavily by the amounts of fairywine she had drank leading up to that moment. She walked up to Castalia, a beaming grin on her face. Two glasses of fairywine rested in her hands, one in each hand. She held out the untouched glass. “Would you like some, my dear?”  

 Warmth built within her with every sip of her own fairywine, enough to pull her attention away, even briefly, from the ever building tension at the high court. She knew the dangers that surrounded her. She knew the heavy scent of blood in the air. She knew the ways violent revolution spread. It was a thing the born-fae would likely frown upon, the ways her mortal life—the ever shrinking percentage of her time lived overall—and yet the memories stuck still. 

They echoed loudly, a cacophony of screams and cries and whispers and shouts and gasps and metal slicing through the air and worse. They followed her in her dreams, nightmares of red and silver and a language rarely heard now and her mothers worry and the shaking of hands and the speeches of men who thought themselves the best leader. They followed her in waking life, in the ways she learned not to trust not because of the cruelty of the fae but the cruelty of humans, in the ways she waited for chaos, for strife, for blood.

Dottie wore very little, her dress a sheer thing that covered just enough for the outfit to not technically be obscene. It was the type of outfit expected in the Summer Court. After everything her nerves had not yet settled, not entirely, and she watched the other fae, those she knew came out from the Summer Court, carefully, waiting for things to crumble once again. Still she portrayed the carefree joy required of her role, ample amounts of fairywine only aiding in that cause.

Dottie could smell already the stench of blood. Two centuries later it still hung heavy in her memory, always there at the back of her mind, always brought to the forefront at the slightest sign of dissent in the court. A sense of unease, thick and noxious, settled over her. Her past echoed in her mind, a flaw she thought far too mortal for what she had become. After the coronation she wanted in equal parts to lock herself in her room, to lay in her bed and hide from the turmoil that would soon unfold, and the need to distract herself with the warmth of the summer court, with lips and hands and bodies pressed against her’s.

cordelia startled at the touch of someone arm her arm, but as she fell into step with dottie, she relaxed. “ ce sera magnifique sûrement, ” she agreed. speaking in french with the other woman always felt like coming home, but a part of it was bittersweet. it was not with a friend, not quite, nor a mortal, but instead a fae who had left home eons ago, becoming something else entirely. though they came from the same place, time had shaped their lives into different shapes.

the corners of her lips turned upwards at the remark. “ hm, i’m sure the queen is rolling in her grave at the idea of missing such a fête. and to think, of all the cake that will be here. ” it was a slight joke, but she couldn’t help but laugh. it was silly and airy, and with dottie beside her, the waves of tension locked in her chest slowly began to dissipate. “ are you eager for the festivities to start ? ”

Dottie’s time in France was two centuries behind. She grew up in a place far different from the France of the current age. In the times she had visited since she became fae, she watched the way time changed the human world, the fae it changed the France she held so dear. She loved it still, would love it always, but would rather hear it from the lips of Cordelia, hear her fondness for the place rather than ever see it for herself again. Best to leave her memories as they were.

“Oh yes certainly.” Her smile grew and the warmth of the room grew just a hint. “I have high hopes for what fun the High Court has to offer. They have so much decadence at their disposal.” She shook her head wistfully. “Not that I think anything here could ever rival the revels hosted by our lovely Aurelia and Isaliendrin. No one can plan a revel quite as beautiful and cruel as their’s.”

Dottie once saw a beheading, saw too many for her own comfort. Back during the days her heart thundered and her blood coursed with mortality, she saw the head of a dissenter roll during a rare trip to Paris, an inevitable thing if her family wanted to have food to put on the table that week. She’d frozen at the sight of the crowd, of the man they all focused on. The metallic scent of blood stayed with her during the walk back to the carriage, during the following months, during the following centuries.

And now she added another to that horrible tally. She knew how the fae saw weakness, knew how her reaction, a thing of emotion inappropriate for the occasion, might be twisted, knew all the ways this all could go wrong. She had already lived it. Still she stood there frozen, her face contorted in horror, even as the crowd around her pulsed. Moments passed, the crowd jostling her, while she stared at the head left on the ground. In an instant for jolted forward. She stumbled in the direction of where she’d seen Matty in the crowd. 

“I believe Lucius is the obvious choice for fuck. We already have quite a lot of fun together. And I would marry my darling Deneva, one of the brightest stars in my sky, in a heartbeat. I could certainly never kill her. That leaves Cordelia as an unfortunate casualty but her mortality makes her death a cruel inevitability.” 

After the bustle of arriving, of exploring the high court and meeting whoever she could, Dottie’s day had settled into a slow evening, a contrast to the evenings and night spent often in the warmth of the summer court, stinking of flowers and fairywine. She stood now outside Deneva’s room, hand raised to knock. Her heart already ached to see her fellow summer children, a day without them nearly. A decision made in a split second before she tossed away her intention to knock and opened the door, sauntering into the room free of care.

There had always been a caution Dottie felt when around the winter fae. Even as a human, when under the protection of Matty, she had never feared the summer fae. Yet the winter fae, even as she stood with immortality and magic pulsing through her veins, a caution overtook her. Perhaps it was a thing of instinct, a hold over from knowing the chilling bite of the cold as a human woman or a more fae thing, a pitting of summer vs winter on the basis on magic. Perhaps it was a thing of experience, her only real experience with the winter fae that of Safie, a woman of mortal flesh turned ice, whispering in her ear and sowing the seeds of doubt

date: april 29th location: dottie’s room in the high court closed to: @flirtationisms​

Loss is a phantom that visits boldly following the sun’s descent: the shadows tug his thoughts to the times when another’s laughter was pressed to the corner of his mouth, when he felt loved. He swallows thickly, attempting to stir thoughts of another: a girl with flaxen tresses and moss-hued irises, a laughter that could surely coax flowers into bloom. Dottie. Perhaps if he squints she could have their eyes, if he strains their mouth. She was intended to water down a hurt which throbs, and it’s a cruel part for her to play, surely– to kiss a man who must still taste of another, to kiss a man with a heart still in his pocket. And each morning Lucius pities her, the girl that simply isn’t.

But at night he needs her, the desire to forget the ache thus coaxing his silhouette to trail gilded halls, stalling at a door leading to the girl of gold’s room. Knuckles curve to a fist, digits meeting the surface with an audible knock. “I am itching to hear of your day, Dottie dearest,” his mouth twists to a grin as the door swings open, “you must indulge me, what do you think of the high court’s newest guests?” He finds mirth in her musings, a light to counter the shadows that loomed. She’s a distraction, yes– but their moments feel genuine all the same.

Dottie knew the loss of love. She had felt the ache of the end even. No matter that she chose the ending the acute ache wrapped its self around her heart, longing for the return burrowing beneath layers of gauzy fabric and embroidered factors. She turned to the warmth of others, the sparkling eyes of another fae, laughter near as joyous as she craved, imagined a life where she was free of cowardice or free of loyalty. It was enough for her, she had made it enough for herself.

Yet her pain was not one of uncertainty. It was the pain of yearning, the pain of watching life march on with your dreams just beyond your reach. It was a thing far different from the pain of grieving, of a love lost to the icy depths of an unknown fate. 

Without a thought she opened the door, already dressed for bed in a sheer nightgown and her smile, beaming and bright, already in place. Her smile only grew at the sight of Lu. “Hello, my sweet Lucius. I’ll admit I wasn’t all too sure when I would see you next. So much seems to be happening now.” Perhaps a bit of an understatement. “I’m afraid nothing too interesting has happened yet.” A shrug of her shoulders accompanied her words. As she spoke she made her was through her room, settling down in an armchair. 

“I did run into the Winter Child today. Certainly not the most pleasant encounter.” Not that she expected anything else from Safie, from the woman she knew only as an extension of her own doubts, a reminder that she had not been enough. “I don’t know what it is about the winter fae but I would not mind if I saw them scarcely until the coronation.”

At the sight of her fellow Summer Child, Dottie’s nearly ever present grin grew, burned bright enough to match the sun. “Julius, my dear star, it’s been too long since I saw you last.” She said, a falsehood she believed utterly given the two had last seen each other that day. Her voice was loud, boisterous, certainly a bit too loud for the distance between them. She glided towards them, footsteps She held her hand out, an expectation for them to take it.

replies owed:

safie 

matty 

cordelia

lu (queued)

starters to do:

castalia  (drafted)

deneva (drafted)

the summer children’s garden. 

Her knock on the door on the door before she pushed it open was quick, a few consecutive taps before she entered Matty’s room, a habit that perhaps should’ve been broken when she turned down the staff all those centuries ago. By now she’d gotten used to it, used to seeing him in whatever state, her respect and loyalty never wavering no matter what. 

A large smile was plastered across her face, genuine and bursting with joy. “Mattaeus, darling, I have a question to ask of you. it’s nothing too serious, I promise.” In her arms she held a gown, a thing of sheer fabric and embroidered flowers. It was a dress similar to the fashion she’d worn since she first became fae, light and flowery and just revealing enough. She held the gown up. “What do you think? I was hoping to get your opinion before we left but it slipped mind in all the hurry.” 

There was a giddiness that built within Dottie at even the thoughts of events as grand as the coronation, a hold over from barely a moment in her long life spent as a mortal. She remembered when news of the revolution’s end, it’s true end, finally reached her family, remembered the ways she imagined glamorous balls where she might catch the eye of the rich once the fear and blood settled, remembered the purely human joy that followed those lofty dreams. 

She moved quickly, her actions close to a blur as she explored the high court, waiting gleefully for the moment the space would transform into a thing of splendor and excellence and revelry greater than it was even now. At the sight of Cordelia she slowed, linking her arm with the human woman. The switch to French took barely a thought.