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“‘Acts of pleasure are the passion to which all others are subordinate’— I’m quoting my father. And I possess no passions that deserve priority over admiring a beautiful flower that blooms before me.”
Jeanne’s breath catches somewhere high in her throat— perhaps her heart magicked into a bloom of butterflies, fluttering wings ticklish against her insides as they travel up her neck and nervously wait behind her mouth. She stares up at Lady Dominique, who is smiling fearlessly, as though she hasn’t said a line of embarrassing flattery which would send a lesser person cowering at their own brazenness. No, instead she waltzes backward and pulls away to hold Jeanne’s hand above her head, leading her through one spin, then two, then a third that leaves her dizzied and flustered and falling against the Lady’s chest to regain her footing.
“Y-you’re too kind…” Jeanne finally manages to say, far too late. Her face feels unbearably hot, and oh, first Vanitas and now Dominique, what has her life come to? How so many people can, in one day, endeavor their best to send her into cardiac arrest?
“Nonsense,” Lady Dominique says. Her smile is dazzling. Golden. “You are the loveliest rose at the ball.”
High praise, given the bouquets of fresh, blood-red blooms decorating the hall.
Dominique gently takes her shoulders and helps her into position once more, setting a hand on Jeanne’s waist to begin dancing again. As they pass a windowsill, the Lady reaches out to pluck a rose from it by its ribbon-threaded stem. Jeanne takes it with a certain degree of hesitance; it is easy to believe a scoundrel like Vanitas likes her well enough on the basis of their… physical chemistry alone (oh, how she detests his phrasing) but it is an entirely other matter to have a noblewoman flirt with her, considering her status.
She runs her thumb over the stem as they slowly step about. A spine pricks her skin, a red dollop of blood running to her palm.
A lace handkerchief enters her vision.
Lady Dominique has stopped leading them through dance, though a hand is still at Jeanne’s waist. Her honeyed eyes follow the path of the blood, from thumb to palm to wrist. Jeanne flushes again and takes the offered handkerchief.
“Being a bourreau has nothing to do with it,” Lady Dominique says, watching as red marks white lace. “You are lovely, thorns and all. I know we haven’t known each other for long, but shall we be friends, Jeanne?”
The butterflies flutter to life again, barely letting words pass through onto her tongue.
“I have never had a good record with friends, my Lady,” Jeanne admits. Her fingers tighten on the handkerchief, as she tries not to further sully the moment with melancholy and memories.
“Perfect. I never have either, though I suppose it would be more accurate to say I’ve never had many friends at all—” Jeanne looks up in surprise “—So, shall we mend that together, Jeanne?”
“...If you would like, then I would be honored.”
Lady Dominique smiles.
The butterflies’ wing beats are hurricanes.
Jeanne has never been so taken with someone.