Re: Ball: Clementine, Irene & Declan
They were not kin, she and Galatea. They did not breathe the same air, their hearts did not palpitate the same blood but Irene knew in that barest breath of seconds that Galatea shrugged as if the moments in a closed, stifled room that smelled of expense and carelessness, that something was array. They were too alike one another not to notice the slipping of the mask. The actor's pause for breath before stepping into the light, the applause. The blink. Irene remembered blinking.
Kin wasn't anything at all, merely an anchor and Irene had cut her chains long before she had become Irene Adler, if they had been there at all. The amused look she gave Clementine enjoyed the performance for what it was, very polished, and as Clementine slid from the room like butter sliding from a warm knife - haste, rather than ease, Irene judged - she paused only to slide the last pin into the mass of hair piled on her head.
And then? Then she followed.
Down the stairs, polished balustrade and massed flowers and ivy wreathing them. It was ghastly, it was practically bridal and the man whose purse had funded it had absolutely nothing gallant about him. All the flowers, the champagne flutes, the strains of delicious orchestral music were weighted up against the merits of her own performance. But she could think about that later.
She swiped a glass of champagne from the platter of a passing footman, the stem swung between two fingers, and watched Clementine's progress through the room, idly assessing for her tall, handsome brother. The brother who had caused all the bother. That was interesting.
"Darling, if you wish to fling yourself headlong into someone's path," she remarked, in the vicinity of Clementine's shoulder, "We can pick you someone far more interesting." A sharp flash of smile to the gentleman concerned. "I'm sure you're charming. To someone empty-headed."