I had intended to write some kind of holiday status report (my baking adventures did not end with the last post), but I've been in the mood for Eroica fic, and since most of what I can find is of an unfortunately low quality (rec me something good that I haven't read and I'll do something nice for you someday!), I've been coming up with my own bunnies.
I always want to send Klaus and Dorian to parties together, so today I sent them off to an English country house weekend. Klaus and his father are there because his father has decided it's high time he got involved in marrying Klaus off. Unbeknownst to them, Dorian and his boyfriend Jamie (it's too similar to James, I know, but in my head, that's who he is) have also been invited to the house for the weekend. Their hostess is not stupid enough to think she's going to marry them off, but Dorian's always fun at a party, and it does help keep the weekend from being too unbalanced on the female side of the scale.
The presence of Klaus' father keeps him from behaving badly, and he and Dorian and Jamie find a kind of grim solidarity in being the only young(ish) men in a house full of single young women and varying groupings of parents.
They play cards one afternoon, as one does at such a country house, and that's when another family arrives. Parents, of course, and three women who were clearly related. One of them held a baby in her arms and was being escorted by a young man.
"I'm afraid you're no longer the prettiest girl at the party," Jamie murmured over his cards. He flicked his eyes at the newcomers, and Dorian and Klaus followed his gaze.
Klaus sized up the women with a professional eye. Pale, blue eyes, golden hair, the kind of faces and bodies any schoolgirl would dream to have. Even he could see they were beautiful, and the youngest the most beautiful of all.
He looked back to the table in time to see Lord Gloria make a forcible switch from absolute stillness to casual geniality.
"I suppose not, but what I may lack in beauty, I certainly make up for in," a flirtatious pause and a slow blink of his eyes that drew both Jamie and Klaus' full attention, "experience." He laid down his cards and stood to greet the women their host brought across the room to meet them. "Hello, Mother."
Klaus nearly dropped his own cards in shock.
"Hello, Dorian." Despite being a good deal shorter, she somehow managed to look down on him. She transferred her disapproval to Jamie, Klaus, and their cards. "Two of your conquests, I assume. You're just like your father."
"Madam," Klaus said as calmly as possible, wishing he dared yell at her, Lord Gloria, and his father, "I am no one's conquest, much less his."
"No," Lord Gloria all but purred, "he's no conquest, and he never will be." He managed to make dropping back into his chair look as elegant as if he'd learned the move in a dance class. "If you'd only say yes, Major, you'd be the last man I'd ever sleep with." He turned his smile up at his mother. "If he didn't shoot me, I'd stay with him until death do us part."
Conscious of his father's presence across the room, Klaus could only stare at Lord Gloria and wish himself somewhere else.
"Hmph! Perhaps you're not so like your father after all. He never would have made such a promise, much less meant it."
I always want to send Klaus and Dorian to parties together, so today I sent them off to an English country house weekend. Klaus and his father are there because his father has decided it's high time he got involved in marrying Klaus off. Unbeknownst to them, Dorian and his boyfriend Jamie (it's too similar to James, I know, but in my head, that's who he is) have also been invited to the house for the weekend. Their hostess is not stupid enough to think she's going to marry them off, but Dorian's always fun at a party, and it does help keep the weekend from being too unbalanced on the female side of the scale.
The presence of Klaus' father keeps him from behaving badly, and he and Dorian and Jamie find a kind of grim solidarity in being the only young(ish) men in a house full of single young women and varying groupings of parents.
They play cards one afternoon, as one does at such a country house, and that's when another family arrives. Parents, of course, and three women who were clearly related. One of them held a baby in her arms and was being escorted by a young man.
"I'm afraid you're no longer the prettiest girl at the party," Jamie murmured over his cards. He flicked his eyes at the newcomers, and Dorian and Klaus followed his gaze.
Klaus sized up the women with a professional eye. Pale, blue eyes, golden hair, the kind of faces and bodies any schoolgirl would dream to have. Even he could see they were beautiful, and the youngest the most beautiful of all.
He looked back to the table in time to see Lord Gloria make a forcible switch from absolute stillness to casual geniality.
"I suppose not, but what I may lack in beauty, I certainly make up for in," a flirtatious pause and a slow blink of his eyes that drew both Jamie and Klaus' full attention, "experience." He laid down his cards and stood to greet the women their host brought across the room to meet them. "Hello, Mother."
Klaus nearly dropped his own cards in shock.
"Hello, Dorian." Despite being a good deal shorter, she somehow managed to look down on him. She transferred her disapproval to Jamie, Klaus, and their cards. "Two of your conquests, I assume. You're just like your father."
"Madam," Klaus said as calmly as possible, wishing he dared yell at her, Lord Gloria, and his father, "I am no one's conquest, much less his."
"No," Lord Gloria all but purred, "he's no conquest, and he never will be." He managed to make dropping back into his chair look as elegant as if he'd learned the move in a dance class. "If you'd only say yes, Major, you'd be the last man I'd ever sleep with." He turned his smile up at his mother. "If he didn't shoot me, I'd stay with him until death do us part."
Conscious of his father's presence across the room, Klaus could only stare at Lord Gloria and wish himself somewhere else.
"Hmph! Perhaps you're not so like your father after all. He never would have made such a promise, much less meant it."
