Shopping came first, of course, though she's not as dedicated to the art as many idle rich women are; for one thing, she knows full well about the internet, and the joys of online shopping, and for another, when one buys true quality, one has one's clothes made for one; one doesn't buy off the rack. Fiona has spent a certain number of hours in pursuit of objects of varying interest - some clothing, but not much, picked a few items up from storage, bought some music, some books; almost all of it she has sent to Wales, carrying with her only those items she anticipates she'll want or need within the next day or so.
     Still - that adds up a bit. A designer bag from a prominent perfumier, another from a chocolatier of excellent reputation, and even a hatbox on a string are among her parcels as she makes her way from the taxi to the curb. And there's more in the boot; several bottles of wine, some sort of cosmetics and cleansers and what could best be termed 'girly stuff', and a few bags which suggest that Drancy's had a turn at it as well. She consolidates the parcels unhurriedly, ignoring the hovering of the driver. He'll have his tip.
     The final touch, perhaps, is the bouquet of freesias which is added on top of the rest of her pile; a handful of folded notes are passed to the driver, who beams despite himself and ducking his head, goes and holds open the door of the pub for her ladyship. If there was a puddle, he might consider putting down his coat. Amazing, how nice money can make people treat you...
     She's changed. Well, that and she's wearing different clothing, something picked up along the way - not that it's not attractive, but it's a compromise between her parts. Black jeans, black turtleneck, a long purple coat with gold embroidery around the edges and black tassels and cuffs, her long hair is worn down with the crystals and bells and beads and a black headband keeping her high forehead clear of stray or broken strands. Gold hoop earrings are paired with a black choker with golden fleur de lis on the front, and only a few discreet traces of shadow and gloss are on eyes and lips.
     Fiona walks in not as if she expects a cheer, but as if she expects to be at least modestly welcomed (parcels and all), lips quirking into a small, inquisitive smile. So. Let's see who's here. She steps towards the bar, parcels consolidated into two large bags that threaten to overflow. "Been a while," she comments aloud, to herself as much as to anyone else. She glances down at the Rock. "Things change..."

     Look, fellas, it's Louis the XIV! Wait, no, that's definitely a bird. Royally laden with gifts, at that...
     On a weeknight, which this most assuredly is, it's die-hards at Davy's tonight, recognizable faces, footballers at a table watching their own match (cretins), a few empty tables, no one on stage (that's for weekends only), a few old men, and a smaller cadre of lovely ladies dispensing God's own balm... beer. So, your attire and your, how shall we say, style of entry is getting a few turned heads, all male.
     One of the waitresses, Heather, recognizes you and gives you the once over. Very Davy outfit, that. Has a bit of a gypsy-pirate-queen thing going for it. "What'll you do for?" she says lightly, smiling. "A handtruck or a beer?" She's being perfectly pleasant, even though you might correctly surmise she knows a thing or two (or three) about your boyfriend.
     The man usually behind the bar isn't immediately seen, at least not behind the bar. The barreling large form of The Other Welshman comes into view soon enough, eyebrows cocking up and smile going immediately wide. "Hey hey, Fiona," Kelly croons out, looking at you first and then your bags. "Living large, I see. Heather... table six is running low on the liquids, darlin'..." Darlin. He says that just like You Know Who.
     Only, he's far more pleasant...
     As Heather leaves off with a saunter and a smile, Kelly goes behind the taps for you himself. "How about a cider. It's new, I'd like your opinion. I got it out of Anglesey... how have you been? It's been a while indeed..."
     If Kelly's seen the ring, he's not commenting on it...

     "The handtruck has its points," Fiona answers Heather with a grin, "but if I could just stow this wherever you've got room towards the back?" She's aware of the attention she's getting, and accepts it as her due. She is a lady and a punk and a queen, but moreover, she is a woman - and she will accept tribute to that womanhood, goddess in training that she is.
     (Does that make Davydd one of her training wheels?)
     There's no concern for where Davydd's been and with whom - her jealousy is aimed at the future and present leading to the future, such as it is. Heather's reply from her is perfectly natural and easy; to worry over every woman Davydd's been with would leave her with little enough time to enjoy life, after all. With a smile, she moves towards the bar, turning her grin and her personality onto Kelly.
     "Someone else offered to pay," the lady explains, hefting her bags towards the long stretch of wood. "With such generosity being turned in my direction, I could hardly refuse, could I? Besides, I earned it." Under him, over him, beside him, with him... and now... apart from him...
     "Actually," Fiona admits, "I'd planned on getting a cider. Perfect. You're a mindreader, Kelly. I've been pretty well - eating well, getting in various pastimes I haven't had time for before," getting shagged rotten by your father, "and so on. What about you?" One lightly coloured eyebrow lifts, the grey eye beneath it turning candidly onto you, barrel and all. "Life treating you alright, I hope?"

     "Yeah," he rumbles long and low, eyes lifting to you as he opens a bottle and pours it into a frosted lily-shaped glass. "Business has been good. I'm glad for a slower night actually," he admits it sort of quiet like with a look to you of 'Don't tell anyone'. "Oh, let me get that stuff upstairs. If I put it behind the bar, I'll trip and break my neck... bring the glass with..." he says of the lily full of cider.
     You're family now and apparently getting the family treatment...
     Kelly's tossing the towel in over the sink, doing a quick count of waitresses and nodding one over. "Your turn at the tap. Don't let the boys over there," a nod to the footballers, "...they have an open tab to settle." Oi oi! they shout out, laughing protest, Kelly you wanker and all that. "Yeah yeah yeah, fool me twice, laddies... there are men who haven't lived to tell the tale..."
     "So," Kelly beams at you as he gathers all of your packages in mighty arms and hands, "...in London to visit the family? Your mum and dad give you a blank visa to charge up?" It can't have been Davydd's generosity. When it comes to spending money, he has none. "Come on, it's back here, up the stairs..." A nod to the back of the pub. The office is back there, but so's the stairs to the private apartments above the pub.

     "Sounds good to me," Fiona answers promptly. Davydd said to spend time with Kelly; he didn't say it had to be downstairs, after all. She regains her grip on her packages, moving to pass them over to you, then taking hold of her glass. "Pretty glass," she admires, "I wouldn't mind getting something like it. Though I haven't quite gotten myself up to the task of redecorating the estate - I might someday, but..."
     A shrug. She isn't so insecure that she's got to - but by now she's no longer so insecure that she expects Davydd to throw her out for suggesting it. Things change.
     With a grin and a glance over her shoulder, she saunters towards the back of the pub, aware that she's likely being scrutinized but not really giving a damn. There's the soft chiming of bells in her wake, and the scent of freesias and cinnamon...
     "In London to avoid the family, more like," Fiona answers as she follows towards the stairs, boots clicking quietly beneath the call of the telly. "And no, this spree's courtesy of my fiance, much to my own surprise. Who am I to turn him down, though?" It'd be the first time in a long time that she's turned him down for anything, that's for damn sure. "He suggested since I'm here I pop in and keep you company, hold your hand if you've had any failed love affairs," she adds with a straight face. "So if you haven't, you might want to run out and have one really quickly, so you don't disappoint me."

     The look starts out as being nonplussed until the mention of fiancee treating to shopping sprees and hand-holding. "Davydd Llywelyn's a first-rate shite," Kelly rumbles out good-naturedly. "But let's have a visit on our terms, ducky, and not his." The grin loves the thought of it and the green eyes give a mischievous wink. "It'll serve him right for being extravagant. So, this is all on him then? What did he do? Overtip a waitress?"
     The established thought that Davydd couldn't possibly treat to lavishness or buy presents for his woman without being obligated to out of either a foreboding sense of guilt (not yet caught) or actual guilt (completely busted) must be rooted in some truth since everyone seems to share the same opinion.
     Past the back room with its lockers and small lunch table for staff and office there's a stairway. Up that stairway there's another hallway and at the end of that is a red door. Home sweet home. Kelly pauses at the door, looks at you, then the bags, then smiles and sets a few down to unlock. "I wasn't expecting company, so don't look too hard...and it's good to see you, no matter the cause, even if it is Llywelyn hi'self. I'm glad to have the company..."
     He opens the door to a nice foyer hallway, and as he takes the bags and himself in to allow you full entry, he swings the door wide. "Make yourself at home, give yourself the tour, I'll put these away..."
     It's a nice three-bedroom apartment, very roomy, very modern, and inescapably clean. Apart from last night's dishes still in the sink. There's no obvious "woman's touch" here, though he might have a maid. The furnishings are very sleek, London modern. The kitchen is open with an island and bar, a dining nook separated from the living area by a wood-screen wall. There are windows that give a view of a busy London, but those are all shuttered and draped off just now, the windows wider, fuller than what was originally here no doubt. The three bedrooms are off the hall in the other direction. A master bedroom, with a large bed (impeccably made) has its own bathroom. The bedroom's very male, with a platform bed, leather padded headboard (in red) and stainless steel fixtures. It's all ...red and silver. While tidy, it definitely has a lived-in feel.
     The first guest room is in woods and leathers, very earthy, obviously not used frequently. The third bedroom is on the other side of the bath that it shares with the other guest room. It doubles as an office, so the bed is slightly smaller.
     Kelly's in the kitchen, your bags and what-nots placed on the dining room table. "Oh, and I can tell you were to get a set of the glasses. I liked them when I saw them. I can have some sent up to Powis if you want. And... I wouldn't worry about redecorating. Davy's never really concerned himself with all that. What you see in Powis is really Gwendolyn's work..."

     "I've no idea," Fiona answers with perfect truth and a hint of resignation. "If he's done anything - he says he's having some sort of trouble right now, so I think it's got something to do with that." She prefers to think so to that he may have been laying down some other woman than herself, or one of her selves. "But he suggested it - maybe he wanted to keep me out of trouble. If so, I think it's a forlorn hope."
     Trouble follows her, rolling around in her footsteps, attracting faerie men and demons and angels and other creatures too strange to mention... and Love...
     She looks around as she moves, glad to have surrendered the packages - individually they're light, but they add up quickly! "I'm glad you're not minding the company," she murmurs. "Powis is a bit cut off; I don't mind it, in fact, most of the time I don't even notice it. But when I'm away from Powis, I like my change of scenery to be complete. Even though I'm looking forward to getting back - I've become accustomed to the timelessness of the place, or something."
     The 'or something' echos in her eyes as she wanders, looking at the kitchen, looking at the walls, moving to lean against the opening into the kitchen with a sway of hips and long, long hair. "I'd like that, thanks. Let me know what I owe you - you keep giving me free gifts, down there and now up here, and I end up feeling guilty." Her smile is real, the sentiment genuine, the artifice of the public stripped away again. She doesn't wear many masks at the best of times, and there's evidently no belief in needing one here.
     "I'm not in a hurry to change things. Things keep changing on their own, in my life - it's nice to have someplace to go back to," Fiona adds, dismissing the notion for now. "When I get tired of being lazy I'll probably start changing things, but I seem to be in a slow period right now. But I'm not here just to run on at the mouth as if you were being paid to listen." She folds her arms in under her breasts. "What about you, Kelly? And is it Kelly you like to be called? I've never even asked, is it your first name or your last..."

     "Actually, it's neither," Kelly grins at that. "How's that? But Kelly's a good name, and it'll do." He is in the kitchen past you with that same smile, and heading to the steel fridge. Out comes a bottle of beer, neither Irish nor English. It's a Welsh brew, from the dragon emblazoned on bottle and label. He's spry for a man his size, ending up on the kitchen counter with a single, graceful motion. He chuckles after he has a swig of the stuff. "There's no sense rushing through life. You'll put your own stamp on things eventually, I'm sure...you seem to have that way. Well, with what little I've seen..."
     Kelly looks from you to the bottle and then back to you. "It's Rhodri," he says quietly. That's his name. He takes a drink, seems amused at himself for the revelation, then shrugs. You've a way of making a man want to give up his power.
     "Bah," he starts to dismiss, "...the glasses, a trifle. But if you want to pay for them yourself, then there's a little glass shop in Wales, in Cardiff, called Ynis Witrin, the Glass Isle. They're custom pieces. They can make them for you or...whatever you want. If you want dragons, they can make you dragons. That sort of art would be lost on some of the lot downstairs," Kelly smirks, "...but I try to inject a little culture now and again..."
     Conversation about Davydd is always so much more serious, even when quipping in good-natured ribbing, like before. "He's been pretty quiet. I haven't heard ..." he points to his head, "...much over the past few weeks. But that's not necessarily a bad thing. I've seen him in more scrapes than I can count, and the one thing you can't do is discount him. He's a master of getting himself out of binds, as much as he is a master of getting himself tangled in them. I'm sure he'll be alright. And I'm just as sure," Kelly smiles, "...that he knows keeping you out of trouble is a bit of a pipe dream. Hell, it's the trouble you bring that makes you interesting."
     A bit too revealing maybe. He takes a drink and hops off the counter to head to the living room. "You know...well, I know you know this, or you probably know this," he says, pausing to stand in front of you. "But you're welcome to see safe harbor here, if you need. Or even if you just want to stay with... " Kelly blinks a little, then twists a Llywelyn smile. "Family..."

     "Rhodri," Fiona repeats with a small grin, unfolding her arms and bringing the lily to her lips. It makes her quirk an eyebrow in sudden thought for a moment, though the thought's put on hold. "Good thing I learned Welsh, or I'd be tripping over my tongue and teeth and lips getting in the way of saying it right. I'm Fiona these days... the name I was born with. It took me a while..."
     She had to grow into it... grow out of the old shape of it, the old nicknames, the old hurts. But while there's still a little of Drancy in her, it's not much - right now, Fiona and Drancy and Isabel seem as close to integrated as they've ever been.
     "I don't like being in debt." She quirks a grin and a shrug at the same time, taking a swallow of her cider, rolling it around on her tongue meditatively. "Mmnh... not bad, by the way. Not that I'm a connoisseur; I just like the stuff. And I have a penchant for apples." But you knew that already, didn't you? There's a hint of mischief in her eyes as she says it, past the embarrassment of that occasion, and maybe just a tiny temptation to pull the apples of Avalon out and see how you react...
     Would you run away...
     Would you take a bite...
     And if you did - what would you do next...
     But she doesn't voice it. It shows for that moment, in the lilt to her voice, the warm amusement in her eyes, golden apples reflecting as silver in the grey of her irises and then gone again. "Dragons are nice, though if I'm getting them, I'm getting them for me, not just because of the bloody git," such respect! Davydd gets none, no matter how affectionately she says it, "and I don't know what would really 'fit' me. I'm not sure there's any beast which would. I'll keep it in mind though. And the lot downstairs aren't bad, but you know that - I don't know, how do you feel about the finer things in life?" One eyebrow quirks, quizzically; and then she turn back to the topic of 'the bloody git'.
     "I worry about him a bit. He's ... stretched thinner than I've seen him before," Fiona admits, looking down into the cider for a moment. "But I got him to agree to call on me if he needs my help. I don't imagine he will, but it makes me feel better to know that he does take me that seriously, at least." She glances back up again, smile a bit wry. "I know I'm hard to take seriously. And I don't suppose that the trouble that follows in my wake makes it easier - easier to take the consequences seriously than the cause! But that just means I'm not a cancer, right?" She blinks as you step forward, and the corners of her mouth turn upwards.
     "Thank you," Fiona answers the offer, glass held between linked hands now, down between her thighs as she leans back, tipping her head back to look up. "I don't think I'm in any danger. But he did send me here because he figured I'd be safe, while he takes care of his business. So maybe he's right and I'm wrong. I'd like it if you didn't have to throw yourself in front of any bullets for me, though, Rhodri."
     Perverse woman, using the secrets she's given...

     "I have a damsel-in-distress complex," he answers easily, he even smiles a touch at it and shrugs. "He always had a damsel-in-undress complex. We're very different. And he is a git," he grins. "I feel I've the right to say it as much as anyone," and he dares you, with a look, to say anything different. "Oh good, not bad then. I'll continue to stock it, since you speak well of it. I've a preference for apples to pears. I don't care much for pear cider, it's a bit too tart for my tastes."
     There it is, a touch of color in the cheeks and he steps away and into the living room. Very modern, plush furniture. He takes a seat on a sofa and stretches out. "The finer things in life?" he wonders. "Such as? Well, I like nice things," a nod to his surroundings. "I don't like to be posh or pretentious about it, but I have money and I like to enjoy it. However much I may seem like the Everyman when I'm tending bar. I'm a successful businessman," he grins, "...every pirate is at his heart, right? So... I like to live well, just honestly, you know? The lot downstairs are mostly an honest lot. I could do without the footy players most nights, but they're not bad lads as long as they're not completely toasted." He takes another swallow of beer. "I had to play bouncer the other night. I thought I was going to get a call from Arsenal myself to join the team after sacking their lot." Emerald green eyes sparkle in a wink. "Is that what you mean about the finer things, or are you trying to get after some gossip? There is none," he insists. "I last dated ...hmm...it's probably been a few years now. And I don't poach from the help." Another shade of pink Rhodri goes as he might have offered info you weren't seeking. Oh well, he shrugs and takes another drink.
     There is a wash of concern on his face for Davydd. It's brief but it's there. He deals in worlds that Kelly... Rhodri...doesn't deal in, he walks in dark alleys of a dark city. His friends are good men, but honest killers. He knows them. And while they'd walk a mile in Davydd's shoes, while they'd kill to protect him, at the end of the day they're still ...participants in realms he ...simply chooses not to walk among. They get all the free drinks they can handle, of course.
     "Well, as I said, danger or no danger, and I suspect things are or will be okay, you are welcome... in fact, I'm going to insist, that you stay here. Besides, you know...it's nice to have someone who's not looking for free drinks to talk to." Someone who knows me. Someone I like.
     I like a little too much, but I like...
     "He's always been a bit of a loner. That he actually admitted he'd call you if he needed you says a bit about you, doesn't it. I think he takes you seriously. I do. I suppose you can see that..." He chuckles and rolls his eyes. "Anyway," Kelly exhales, "... I wouldn't worry until there's something to worry about. Life is long. No need to make it stressful and worrisome. So...what did you buy? Anything you can show off?"

     "I don't know," Fiona muses, moving with you towards the living room, "maybe he borrowed your complex where I was concerned. He didn't undress me until after he said he loved me." Which may be more information than you wanted to know, of course; she's unworried about the possibility.
     She doesn't respond to the dare; how could she, after she herself's called him not only a git but a bloody git? She finishes off the glass with a grin, holding onto the fine petals with one hand, rubbing her thumb absently along the grooves. "I've always preferred apple cider, though I used to be more pear-like, myself." Tart, even if not a tart. She settles onto one of the other sofas, occupying one end of it by herself and leaning slightly against the arm of it. "Well, nice things, mostly," Fiona responds slowly. "Ballet and opera are nice, in theory, but - well, I don't really do them myself. I know how to. But I ... just don't. I don't do much at all right now... I'm in a period of rest, as I said. But yes, money's no good if you never spend it. You just have to take it easy." She isn't interested, after all, in buying million-dollar cars when a 50,000 dollar one will be enough and maybe more than enough...
     There's another quirk of a grin, and she looks down quickly, a hint of colour entering her own cheeks, now. "I'd have liked to see that. If you played for Arsenal, I'd have to turn out for matches," Fiona declares, unconsciously rearranging her shoulders in a faux-aggressive stance. "As for poaching from the help, would it really be my business if you did? But no, I didn't really think so. None of the girls ... well, maybe some of them'd like to, but none of them look at you like they've really had that with you." She glances up, elaborating, perhaps unnecessarily. "They don't look as if they're measuring what they've had. And yes - I know there've been a number that've been more than motherly towards Davydd. I think they're all watching to see how long it lasts, and if I'll be jealous because they walked over his skin before I had. I can see why you don't poach, though - entirely aside from anything else, it'd make business more complicated for you, wouldn't it? Too much in your own backyard."
     Leaning over, she sets the glass aside and then sits up to shrug out of her coat, draping it over the arm of the chair so she can lean back freely. As before, there's the quiet chiming of bells to accompany her as she closes her eyes. Whether or not it's in her thoughts, you can look at her now, as she leans back, as she stretches her arms over her head. She is blind to your look, eyelashes down to her cheeks...
     Isn't it a shame...
     "I spend a lot of time inside myself," Fiona admits a moment later, unhurriedly as she lowers her hands to her lap. "So I don't always see as much as maybe I should. I recognize impossible things, Rhodri, but not necessarily what's right in front of me - depends on what it is. But life is long, yes, and I'm glad - glad of that." She opens her eyes, and the smile moves from her mouth into them as she looks at you. "Brave man. You actually want me to show off everything I've bought?"

     "I learned a valuable lesson from my time in the Renaissance: never shit where you eat." Kelly (Rhodri) grins at that and takes another drink. "It's served me well."
     There's nothing remarked upon about distressing or dis-dressing as the case may be, nor of Davydd in that regard, nor does he shudder at it. It seems natural enough between them, something known, seen, if not shared. "Well, I'm not much for the ballet, but I do like theater. I've always been a fan of Shakespeare and Marlowe, Ben Johnson, Milton. I like tragedies more than comedies, as a rule. I do prowl the West End for a good show. The Beau Monde Revue, it's a European styled cabaret. It's actually better than it sounds. I've seen a few of their shows, a bit heavy on the burlesque..." He grins. "Well, you get the idea. I don't sit around watching that much telly, not when there's so much else to do. I am just thankful I am here to see it, actually. A far cry from when I was a young man..."
     A very far cry...
     He has grown progressively more comfortable with you. You can see it in the way he sits forward and back, when he is passionate about something, like drama, when he's meditative. Like his father, his emotions are relatively on the surface, but unlike with Davydd they don't all come rushing out at once. He is comfortable, however. It's easy, this.
     Kelly blinks as you look back at him, and he promptly looks at the beer, tips the bottle, sees how much is left then takes the last swallow. "I've not gotten this far in life by being a coward," he cracks out with a warm expression. "Trot it out. What's the use of having spoils of war unshared? You forget, I was a famed highwayman. I like treasure... unpack it...let's see what you've got..."
      Red rushes up his face and Kelly clears his throat, standing. "Want another drink? Wine?"

     "What I figured," and Fiona nods once, companionably. "Stands to reason, really. If one of your girls gets possessive or clingy or expects preferential treatment, you're screwed - figuratively far more than literally." She can appreciate sound logic when she sees it. Sometimes. She curls up for a moment on the couch, as cozily comfortable as a cat, making herself at home.
     "I'm not sure how I feel about tragedies, largely because I tend to feel them too much, and I hate to cry. It's one of the downsides, I sometimes think, of my sex." She makes the comment without ego; it's a thought that occurs to her, and so she shares it. "It's 'okay' to be weak, but I hate it. I hate weakness in myself - it's fine for other women, but it's not fine for me, and so I feel I should be above it, and then when someone's words written down and enacted bring out the visible evidence of it... So while I like them, I hate them, and I end up more likely to watch a comedy, because what's the point of going to see a tragedy if it leaves you unmoved?"
     She grins as well, shaking her head. "I'm not much into television myself. It's fine - if you can't make the time to be there for real." A nice metaphor for life...
     She rises to her feet, holding a laugh in the back of her throat. "Land pirate," she teases. "Sure, I'll share my booty with you. Wine'd be nice, thanks." She moves from the sofa, to the dining table, easy in her movements but with an undercurrent of awareness of herself, of - something. Fiona tugs open one of the bags, beginning to disburse its contents. "Are you hoping for a fashion show, though? Because I'm not going to climb in and out of every item of clothing in here..."

     "If word gets out that there was a fashion display in here, any changing or unchanging of clothing, it's going to be me that needs to seek refuge not you," Kelly notes with a chuckle. He has an entire cabinet under his kitchen counter dedicated to wine. One bottle of perhaps fifty at hand is removed, the label noted and he sets the bottle on the table. "Besides, I shouldn't ask you to change into outfits for me while you're wearing my father's ring. It's a bit Oedipal." Emerald eyes widen at that, and he uncorks the bottle with a pop.
     Not that he's not thinking about it...
     "Vulnerability isn't weakness," he notes as he reaches for two glasses in another cabinet nearby. "What tragedy tries to effect is catharsis, application of that to one's one life. If you're constantly guarded against pathos and ethos, against vulnerability and self-examination, then you'll never change, and in never changing, never grow. And a plant that does not grow withers on the stalk. I would never equate weakness with crying. With showing emotion or... admitting one's vulnerability," he turns to you and offers you a glass of red wine by setting it on the island the separates the dining area from the kitchen. "I would only think you stronger, Fiona..."

     "He's only been jealous or possessive of me where William's concerned, which seems remarkably like missing the point. If you're going to be jealous of an artist for seeing the model nude, it should at least be an artist who's attracted to women," Fiona comments, amused. Ah, what she doesn't know...
     She takes up a bag, holding it up so that you can see the label on it. "Don't worry, I'll just hold them up to me and you can tell me what you think he'll think. Or, if you like, we'll pass entirely on the clothing - I'm not interested in encouraging a falling-out between you, and if you think he'd come after you with blood in his eye, well, then." She doesn't seem to think it's an issue. But then, she's not seen the full strength of Davydd's possessiveness...
     And maybe she hasn't read your own thoughts...
     Or maybe she wants to see what will happen...
     Troublesome wench that she is. Whether or not she intends to be is irrelevant. "I know that with my head," Fiona explains, indicating the five-pound box of truffles she's procured. They'll last a while, in theory; for now, she lifts open the lid and leaves them there, for you to sample if you like. Why not? You should get to sample some of the sweets. "But knowing it with the rest of me is more difficult. I'm better about it than I used to be, but I'm not yet at the point where I can just curl up and 'have a good cry'; every time I cry, I fight with myself until I give in. In order to cry, I have to lose first."
     Now she lifts out a handful of CDs - Sweet Honey In The Rock, Chopin, Blondie, Dead Kennedys - each is held up and then put down in a neat stack. "I know, deep down, that I'm vulnerable, but it takes something outside of myself to draw it out to where I can admit it. I'm ... not all that." Fiona's grin is lopsided as she reaches into the bag, rustling about as she pulls out the wine, a box of scented candles, an arrangement of bath salts and accouterments, and then pulls out a bag marked with the name of a lingerie shop. "So maybe I'm not all that strong, either."
     "How about you?" She unfolds the top of the bag, glancing up with a hint of challenge. "What's your vulnerability, then? After all, I've told you one of mine. Not my only one, to be sure..."

     "I'm not worried about him," Rhodri-Kelly notes simply. "Now, William's one to stay away from, but I'm sure you've already been lectured, so I'll spare you that. I've seen that man go through more women than a sultan through a harem..." He stops himself there. What you don't know about William may be a very good thing indeed. And Edward's another one. Gotta love the French.
     "Deal," he says on the display of booty. With his own wineglass, Rhodri-Kelly heads to the living room again and waits for the show, catching sight of the music on his way. Nope, never heard of them. Well, apart from Chopin.
     "My vulnerability?" he says suddenly, "Hmmm... my achilles heel is not my heel but my heart," he admits. "When I care for someone, or come to care for them, there's nothing that really stands in my way. It leads to trouble. I'm heartstrong, where others are headstrong." He sips at his wine and tips his head to the side, as if to read what's on the bag. It is as much a look to you: what are you waiting for, permission? And Rhodri smiles. It is a smile that deepens as he looks into his glass. "I care for you," he notes, lifting his head, looking at you directly -- as he typically does not do. It lasts for a few moments, before emerald skirts away again. Rhodri takes a drink. "That's why you're here. You've become a part of my life." He smiles. "Even if it's not the way I imagined it when you started coming to the pub, and when I heard you sing. Pure magic that was."
     The wine is tasted again and he rises, setting it aside. "So, I guess... in a manner of speaking, Fiona, I could say that you are my vulnerability." Rhodri chuckles a little, "I guess that's more of a revelation than an answer, but... there you have it. But... feeling for you as I do... I would never hurt you, and certainly never stand in the way of your happiness. Even if that happiness is in the figure of my father."
     "You don't have to possess, to love," Rhodri adds on.

     To Fiona, William is a charming - though admittedly powerful - figure whose sexuality is wrapped up in a mysterious wedding ring that the other invisible half of goes to another man. How could he have an interest in women? How, even so, could he have an interest in the odd and multitoned (and sometimes multihued) woman that Fiona is? It is incomprehensible; it is absurd. All warnings just bring about a roll of the eyes that she can't quite suppress. And Edward? Edward is nothing more than a name...
     With lingerie-bag and a bag from a tailor's, she heads back to the living room, listening quizzically as she sets them down, as she lifts out the first item, absently smoothing it against her chest. And it is - of course - lingerie. Why would things be easy when they could be awkward?
     It's a confection, pure and simple, as edible as Davydd appears to find her lately; the pale silk is smooth, sugared mint where blue and green mix that would - when worn - cup and lift her breasts to just halfway over her nipples, held up not by straps but by boning, sliding down snugly to just over the tops of her hips, laced up the front and back. Two ways to open it. It's trimmed as all good confections are, by lace that's been spun and knitted out of freshly whipped cream, a delicate layer along the top and bottom. There's knickers to go with it, of course, tied at either side with another whimsical scrap of lace. It's made in a way that it can be worn under something...
     But it's made to be seen...
     And ultimately - discarded...
     She listens as she holds it up, but her attention drifts from her teasing to look at you, to meet your gaze; and she's surprised. You can see it; taste it in the air as it shivers, feel it in the warmth that comes off her suddenly too-bright cheeks and eyes. "I ... no, I didn't know." Fiona blinks, looking down and hurriedly pushing the lingerie back into its bag; what was teasing has become thoughtlessness, playfulness become cruelty.
     "Maybe I'm blinder than I thought," she says quietly, tone subdued; her enjoyment of the show has fled. "I really didn't know, you know. You never said anything. And ... god, I'm stupid." She expels a breath in unhappy laugh. "So that's why you didn't make a play for Lily, huh? I'm sorry. I didn't mean to be..."
     But she is...

     "Now, who said anything about stuffing away the lingerie," Rhodri rolls out with a self-effacing smile. "I said I cared for you, I didn't say I was repressed. There is nothing more beautiful for a woman in that moment she is making herself beautiful for you. Women ... are like confectioner's sugar. Sweet, but best when spinning into some...artiface that will melt upon the tongue and transform art to pleasure." Well, we now know who has the silver tongue in this family.
     "It's okay," he waves off your ...well, you needn't feel badly about it. "I never said anything. By the time, I realized it really, it was already too late. I did my best to warn you," Rhodri smiles, reddening a little in the guilt of it. "Out of selfishness, but hey... I knew there was a chance you wouldn't listen. Don't feel badly, there's nothing to feel badly about. Like I said, I got what I wanted, just.... not the way I first thought of it. And... yeah...well, Lily's not really my type. She seems like a nice girl, but she's... just not the kind of woman I'm looking for. I love fearless women," he notes quietly. "One's not afraid to jump off a bridge if that's what they need to do. A woman who will be lovely for me, but mount up at midnight and run over the plain if that's what we decide to do. A woman to be Black Jack's Lady. I think Lily needs some looking after, and ...that's not what I'm looking for..."
     There's more than one Black Jack Davy, but there's only one woman between them...
     "I just thought you should know. And ... it looks like it was a successful raid on London's most fashionable." Rhodri grins suddenly. "They always did deserve to be robbed clean out of their underwear..."
     Amazingly enough, if anything the awkwardness he felt around you previously has all but disappeared. There is only the slight lingering, where he wonders if he has made you feel too uncomfortable around him now. But it isn't lasting.

     She looks down, the colour still high in her face. This isn't what she expected. This isn't what she envisioned at all...
     And, in the back of her mind, the nagging doubt occurs : does Davydd know that this is how you feel? Is this a test, of sorts - of her, of you, of himself...
     Is he not coming back after all...
     "Lily needs looking after," Fiona agrees. She can talk about Lily safely - it isn't her, after all. "I've looked after her a time or two myself. She spends a lot of time wandering, but she's ... well, she wants a father figure, or a big brother. Someone who'll be awfully sweet to her but firm at the same time, who she can listen to and nod and go out under the fence on by sneaking off to the occasional nightclub. She's my friend, and she's a good friend, but ... she's a bit flat. And helpless."
     Lily wouldn't thank her for saying so, but that doesn't make her feel guilty; the guilt she feels is for other reasons entirely, as she slowly smoothes and straightens the bustier and its knickers. "I can't help feeling badly," Fiona says finally. "I don't pretend to be the best - well, at anything, but at recognizing other people's wants and needs. It's taken me all this time to finally be honest with myself at all about my own, and I'm still working on it. But ... I do question whether you've really got a realistic view of me. I mean, I'm not fearless. My fears might not be conventional ones, or maybe it's more that I refuse to give in to them, but I've felt fear. Hell, I'm scared right now, if you want to know the truth..."
     She glances up, a hint of sorrow and humour mixed together in her gaze as she looks to you, corners of her mouth turning upwards tremulously. "And I hate to think I've hurt you, you know. Even if just by being as clueless as usual."

     "I probably don't have a realistic view of you. I don't really know you that well. And ... fearlessness isn't being without fear. It is being afraid ... then doing it anyway. And... that you are, and that you do. You don't let your fear cripple you. That's fearlessness." Rhodri rises from his seat and moves to you. He lowers himself onto his knees to better face you when you're sitting -- he's taller by an inch than his already large father.
     "You haven't hurt me, Fiona," Rhodri murmurs. "Far from it. There's ... no need to worry about that. You can't... or shouldn't...blame yourself for cluelessness when I, whose burden it was, didn't give you clues apart from really vague ones." He chuckles at that and shrugs a little. "I'm allowed to love you. I don't have to take it back, and I'm not going to. As I said, I'm heartstrong. And there's nothing that's going to stand in my way once I care for someone. Now, that doesn't mean I'm going to challenge Davydd to a duel or insist you run away with me. Nothing that pedantic. It just means that... I'm not going to be someone you can shake out of your life. You have me. What you do with me...well... that's up to you really. Friend, I'm that. And if that's all there is, then so be it. But whatever happens, I will be here, and this door will always be open to you."
     He takes your hand and he gives it a squeeze and he kisses it. There he is, Black Jack Davy, spitting image of his own father, your lover, professing his love and his fidelity. He is, in every way, the opposite of Davydd. Where Davydd gets on his knees to profess his inevitable infidelity and plead for patience, Rhodri is there pleading love and fidelity regardless of whether it may ever be replied to in kind. Together, they make one hell of a man.
     "I want you to remember that," he says, standing. "No matter what happens, this man is here for you. No reason to be afraid on my account..." Unless you're afraid that you feel something for him, too...

     This would be so much easier if only she were, at heart, at the heart of her, one woman. But no matter how her parts are united, there they are - and it is difficult for her; it shows in her eyes, and so she lowers them, knowing how they betray her. She's chosen to trust Davydd, and hope that her words, her warning will be enough - but she knows that there is the risk that it will not. That sooner or later, even while she wears his ring, it will be some other woman calling his name while writhing under him. And that hurts her.
     Oh, it hurts her...
     She doesn't turn away from the truth of the possibility, doesn't lie to herself by confidently asserting 'this shall not come to pass!' Instead, she has given him the truth - but maybe not enough of the truth...
     The pain of that possibility is a torment which she knows, though hidden largely from him. It is a torture that she writhes upon, conscious of it but keeping it forced into the background. And, after all...
     Would it really be Fiona if she didn't have pain?
     For all that she's exchanged one pain for another, it's there, and for that moment before she looks down, looks away, it's visible. For all that she fell into the river (did she fall or was she pushed), for all that she's chosen to confront the risk and the possibility, it's there...
     "I'm glad that you're not going to put us all to the test of heroics," Fiona says lightly as you kneel in front of her, looking down at her hand in yours. "I do care about you, Rhodri. You're a dear man, and you have honour and spirit - more than someone like me deserves." The lightness strips away quickly, and she ducks her head down a little further, assailed by a cacophony of crystal as she does so - crystal echoed in the glint in her eyes and on her eyelashes as she moves to hide her vision. "Davydd gave up some parts of himself when you were born, though your mother deserves credit as well."
     Droplets fall from her face to her lap. Never mind that, it's just an unusually low cloud formation...

     "She would appreciate the recognition, I'm sure," he chuckles softly. His hand rests upon your head a moment, a gentle almost-benediction-like motion. "But don't sell yourself short. You deserve a man to love you, to protect you. Why wouldn't you? And you have that. Davydd's a good man. He's a hard man, but he's a good man, Fiona. His world is just complex. It makes for complex answers. Me... my world is much more simple. I'm ...just a bartender, former land-pirate," Rhodri smiles and his hand falls away. "Single, no children still alive. No one to provide for but myself, really. He has three families, three realities, friends and enemies. Recent heartache and newer love, one upon the heels of the other. Much more drama than mine, and me... a lover of drama..."
     He returns to the kitchen. "How about dinner? Are you hungry? I am feeling a bit peckish for Pashmina's. You can't get that sort of thing in Wales unless you're in Cardiff? Care for some curry?"

     I'm afraid of making mistakes...
     I'm afraid of being hurt...
     Even if it's not the same hurt as before, oh, I am afraid of what will happen to my heart...
     "I don't know what I deserve," Fiona says aloud, voice quiet, but devoid of any further evidence of tears. "He has three of everything, I suppose, and there's three of me, but I only live in one place. And right now, that place is Nowhere at all."
     She glances up, almost all of the liquid crystal blinked away from her eyes by now. "I create drama by existing, I think," Fiona admits, "but I don't usually go out of my way to create it. It's happenstance. You're much better off out of it, you know. But," and as you rise, she straightens up, "dinner sounds good."
     And, she adds, stretching in her seat, surreptitiously swiping at her eyes as she restores her face and her voice to normal, "curry sounds even better. I used to live right over Pashmina's, you know. I still miss it from time to time."
     She isn't going to open the compartments of her heart - even if she'd planned on it (and she hadn't), now that she knows the contents of yours, that's not a burden she'll place on you. She never was into pulling wings off of flies, and while you're no fly (no flies on you bar one, perhaps), to put you to the test of her emotions, her desires, her fears, her doubts, her experiences, her words would seem too much like torture...
     "I'll pay," Fiona declares, tone returning to lightness. "You pay for enough around here." And she rises to her feet, with Truth locked beneath her tongue; her smile is genuine enough, though tinged with all that she will not reveal. How did her skin go to being so heavy?
     Davydd... I worry for you...
     Please, don't destroy yourself the way you usually do - if I'm not enough, or not good enough, tell me... don't show me...
     It's a silent prayer, one Fiona wouldn't admit to if asked about, likely, but a prayer nonetheless. Silently, she rubs the ring, as if to summon the future rather than living through it one knifelike step at a time. But aloud, all she says is, "Shall we get some naan?"

Posted by rowan at October 12, 2004 12:22 AM