#v:prestream

Dear Raoul, Vicomte de Chagny,

How lovely it was to receive your letter! I hadn’t realized how our correspondence had fizzled; don’t worry, though, my regard for you had not. I thought about you quite often. It was if we’d never left off writing at all.

However, now that we are writing again, I’m eager to ask all sorts of questions. Please forgive me if the volume is overwhelming! And do let me know if so, and I’ll do my best to pare them down in future letters. I’d hardly want answering them to become a burdensome thing. 

How are you? And how are Philippe, and Annette and Marie? Are you still sailing with the navy? How exciting that must be, travelling to all sorts of new places and seeing new people, and the sunset on the water must be the most beautiful thing. Here in Whitestone, the colors almost seem to reflect off the mountains, and it’s even more dazzling in the winter. You must visit sometime to see it! I’d so love for you and your family to visit Whitestone someday soon.

I’d like to go sailing myself, though I’m not sure I could handle it as a vocation like you do. I’d miss my garden too terribly after a while, and Whitestone and my siblings. I imagine it would be dreadfully difficult to grow any sorts of plants on a ship. All that salt air couldn’t be good for them.

In response to your questions, my siblings are well; much is the same. Here is the list of goings-on, as abridged as I can make it. Oliver has been sneaking out to the city nearly every night, which I suppose means the trellis I put underneath his window has been serving him well. (I do worry about the ivy though.) Julius and Vesper have been preparing all week with Father and Mother for the diplomatic delegation from Emon, which is quite far from Whitestone. (I know very little of the kingdoms of Europe, so I can’t expect you to know much about the ones of Tal’Dorei.) Percival set himself on fire the other day, but with all he does in that workshop of his, that’s not actually unusual. Cassandra was there to douse him with a bucket of water. I actually haven’t seen Ludwig much lately -- he’s around, but nothing noticeable seems to be going on on his end. Either that, or he is very good at keeping it to himself. Which is actually quite impressive when one has six siblings.

I don’t mean to keep you reading this letter for ages, so I’ll close now and hope you write soon! Enclosed is something to help lift the greenery-less life at sea -- I’ve clipped one of the roses from the castle garden and carefully dried it flat between two of the more dusty tomes in the library. I’m quite proud of them! They’ve bloomed so beautifully this year. Percival says a dried flower will likely get broken in transit. I hope he’s been proven wrong.

your friend,

Quirking an eyebrow, Belle grinned and chuckled to herself. “Well, monsieur, I’m not one to turn down a dance. But I must say, I doubt your wife would approve of your dancing with a pretty young girl. And my husband can get quite jealous at times.”

Glancing down at his wedding ring and holding her hand up to display her own, the princess laughed. “But we are at a ball, I suppose. What else is one to do but dance?”

At the Royal Ball | @truerlifebegin

Vesper was waiting on the steps of Whitestone Castle as the carriage rolled through the gates and into the courtyard; smiling a smile that was equal parts diplomatic and warm, she then waited as the Queen of Narnia exited her carriage to formally welcome the woman.

send a ‘🌸’ for my muse’s reaction to yours putting a flower in their hair. | @bookofvesper​

He’d paused in his violin practice to squint at the run of sixteenth notes, slowing them down to almost quarter notes, his bow sliding over the strings, repeating them faster and faster until his fingers tripped less over themselves. Pausing to grin in quiet triumph, Ludwig then felt the brush of fingers behind his ear, and flinching at the tickle, turned to see Vesper there. She must’ve slipped in the room while he’d been practicing.

Iseult nodded slightly, steeling herself to not seem too reserved, lest the lady think she was uninterested in her company. Her husband was moving among the crowd and therefore she knew she could not count on him to ease the situation for her in this moment. She would simply have to make do.

(Their fathers had engineered a wise match, she knew now. Julius took the strain of a never-ending parade of strangers -- from which, as eventual Lord and Lady of Whitestone, there would be no relief -- from her, and she lent him a steadiness he could lean on for when he overextended himself.)

At the Royal Ball | @truerlifebegin