Today I Met

“One, two, three, four, five.” As this was the seventh time in two pages Dolph had uttered this particular set of numbers, Camden looked up from his page. “What are you doing?”

“Pacing.” Camden’s eyebrow arched upward. “I’m waiting for Lady Peyton.” Camden could have understood (sort of) if Dolph were pacing while waiting for Lady Heidi, but as far as Camden knew, Lady Peyton was involved with the blacksmith and quite happy to be and Dolph was still head over heels for Lady Heidi. That meant unless things had drastically changed, the only reasons that Dolph would be meeting with Lady Peyton were completely mundane things, like new cups. And who would pace over a new tea pot.

Dolph stopped pacing and flung himself down on the settee. “Don’t look at me like that. It’s–complicated.” Camden looked at his friend.

“I want to–ask Heidi to marry me.” Dolph admitted, his cheeks taking on a flush of pink.

“What does that have to do with Lady Peyton?” Camden asked, stretching out his long legs.

“The only proposals I’ve had any experience with were a father sitting down with another father and hammering over betrothal agreements. Or a lass saying that she didn’t mind marrying the lad her father had picked for her. I’m fairly certain my previous experiences will not help me out here…” He ran a fingernail over a bit of candle wax that had fallen onto the table next to the settee. “I want to do this right, the way that Heidi would have been asked at her old home.” Dolph paused before adding “Only better.”

“So, may I ask why you’re asking Lady Peyton?” Camden asked, uncertain why of all of the women who were in Shadowcrest anyone would ask Lady Peyton for advice on proposals. Lady Peyton was a lot of things, a romantic was not one so far as Camden had ever noticed. Lady Jolene, he could see. Even Lady Tiffany, but Lady Peyton? She still wore trews!

As if he had read the thoughts that Camden had not voiced. Dolph slumped back against the cushions. “I don’t want anyone to know I’m asking. A secret is a secret between two, between three it’s in doubt. If I asked Lady Jolene to come here, even with you as chaperone, I’d fear Sawyer’s response. I don’t want to get into a fight with him. Lady Peyton, however, I could be asking her about any number of things.”

“And Master Ren will not get angry?”

“I don’t believe he would.” Dolph said. “There are too many logical explanations for why I might invite Lady Peyton.”

“Rap, rap, rap.” Lady Peyton called from the front door.

“Please, come in, my lady.” Dolph called back.

“I hope you don’t mind, I brought company.” Dolph and Camden exchanged a glance, he could see Dolph practically calculating what they needed more of to give this a legitimate feel.

But while the woman who followed Peyton was redheaded, it certainly was not Lady Heidi. Camden couldn’t help but stare for a moment. A bright fall of copper hair tumbled down over her shoulder in loose curls, brilliant green eyes sparkling even in the dim light inside of the house.

“G’afternoon, my lords.” Lady Peyton said. “This is Victoria. It was either bring her with me or leave her to listen to Tiffany’s plans for updating the walkway at the castle. Which she’ll hear about at dinner anyway.” Lady Peyton shrugged and absently swatted at her platinum hair.

“Oh, no, that’s fine.” Dolph said. “Greetings, Lady Victoria. When did you arrive in Shadowcrest?”

“Yesterday.” Lady Victoria said with a soft smile.

“Vikki, this is Lord Dolph and that’s Lord Camden.” She gestured over her shoulder.

“Greetings, Lady Victoria.” Camden added belatedly, closing his book.

“Pleased to make your acquaintance, Lord Dolph, Lord Camden.” Lady Victoria said, her voice a softer drawl more like Lady Nessa’s than Lady Peyton’s sharp angular sounding voice.

“So, what’s the damage?” Lady Peyton asked as Camden put his book back on the shelf. It would probably be very rude of him to spend the afternoon nose shut into a book.

“I beg your pardon, my lady?”

“Well, given the sick look on your face before you saw Vikki, I imagine you didn’t call me here to talk about plates, so why did you ask me to come by. And it better not be anything untoward or I’ll kick your ass further than Kennedy’s gonna kick Blake’s if he doesn’t either shut up and let Kennedy do her job or produce an MD.”

“Oh–of course. No, uh, I wish to propose to Lady Heidi. And I was–hoping that you might, perhaps, have some ideas.” Lady Peyton looked around the room.”What, may I ask, are you looking for, my lady?”

“The cosmic bunnyhole I’ve fallen down… again.” Lady Peyton said, Lady Victoria pressed her hand against her mouth and giggled. “Who in the name of Peter Pan’s floating panties would ask me for proposal advice?”

Dolph looked at Camden and mouthed “Peter Pan’s floating panties?” Camden could only shrug. He had no idea what she meant by that.

“Well, you at least know what Heidi would be familiar with, or perhaps, what she might wish for in a proposal?” Dolph said, sounding small and yet hopeful.

“Well, I guess I could run through some old rom-coms and see what I can pull out of my butt.” Peyton said. “Although personally, I was more a fan of shit blowing up.”

“But you can quote Casablanca perfectly, Pey.” Lady Victoria interjected with a laugh.

“Hush. We don’t mention that.” Lady Peyton pointed at the redhead. Lady Victoria smirked which just caused Lady Peyton to haughtily raise her chin.

“Well if we’re gonna think about something as dreadful as romantic proposals, perhaps we should sit down. Might as well not end the day with my feet hurting as not as much as my head.”

“Certainly.” Dolph said gesturing at the kitchen table.

“So, Lady Victoria,” Camden said. “How are you liking Shadowcrest so far?”

“Well, it certainly is different and when I saw the bathroom I almost cried, but I imagine that I’ll get used to it.” Lady Victoria said. Why was it that the bathing room was always one of the first things that the ladies commented on. A bathhouse was a bathhouse, wasn’t it?

“Is there anything romantic around here?” Lady Peyton asked.

“Has Master Ren not taken you to romantic places?” Dolph asked.

“Um, I don’t know that what I would think of as romantic is quite what Heidi thinks of as romantic. I mean we sometimes go down to the lake and skip rocks and fish. But I somehow don’t see Heidi find that romantic. Venice or the Eiffel Tower  it’s not.” Lady Peyton said.

“Well, what about a meadow?” Lady Victoria offered. Lady Peyton turned and looked over her shoulder. “You know something with trees and flowers and butterflies. Most women find that romantic.” She pulled out the chair across from Lady Peyton and sat down. Camden sat back down on the settee and picked up his book, though it was hard to concentrate on the words on the page.

What’s gotten into me, you’d think I was Sawyer. He thought, as he watched Lady Victoria talk, the animated way her hands moved and her eyes sparkled.

Still as he settled in that evening, after Dolph had made his plans and Lady Peyton and Lady Victoria had left for the evening, though he heard the conversation, and ostensibly had read twenty pages in his book, he couldn’t remember a word of what Dolph had said, nor a letter in those twenty pages.

He could, however, remember exactly the way the candlelight flickered off Lady Victoria’s hair, the way she flicked an errant strand back from her face. He tapped a quill on the treatise that King Lachlan had asked him to scan over, but his mind wasn’t on that either.

Instead he raised his eyes to the candles on the desk, the slow, almost lazy, way the wax slid down the side and thought of green eyes and a slow, steady hum, like that electricity that Lady Peyton sometimes talked about that seemed coursing through him.

This entry was posted in Camden, Dolph, Peyton, Victoria and tagged , , , , , , . Bookmark the permalink.

6 Responses to Today I Met

  1. Morgaine2005 says:

    Aww. Somebody’s got a crush. But don’t worry, Camden, you’re not quite at Sawyer’s level … er, yet.

    Dolph was really cute, though! It’s adorable that he wants to propose to Heidi in the most romantic way possible. And it’s equally adorable that he has no clue how to go about it and is forced to ask Peyton, of all people, for help. … He might have been better off asking Sawyer, Sawyer’s got a lot of romantic ideas. Except I’m not sure Dolph can play an instrument, so that would probably eliminate 75% of them. The other 25% I have a feeling would be impracticable. “I get it, Sawyer, that saving her from a dragon would be most romantic, like in the Ballad of Sir Slays-Dragons-A-Lot, but we don’t have dragons here.”

    Still, yay! Hopefully there will be another wedding in store soon! And then more BABIEZ!

    The reconstruction is well under way!

    • Andavri says:

      Yes, Sawyer would have tons of romantic ideas, but even more than the impracticality of it, Dolph’s thinking “I want it to be like back where Heidi came from.” He wants to try to live up to her expectations, do it like she’d have been proposed to if she’d never come to Shadowcrest. Sawyer can’t tell him that. Sawyer doesn’t know that.

      We shall see in the next post whether Dolph gets a yes.

      Poor Camden. That yet is awfully looming. ;-) Thanks, Morgaine.

  2. jm.chandler says:

    So much cuteness in one post. I love how Dolph is worrying himself sick (I hope not really sick) about how to propose to Heidi. Will we be seeing it on the next episode? :D And Camden… I feel like giving him a big squish. I love seeing him vulnerable like that since what we’ve seen of him, has been all so polished and courtly in manner. LOL! At Peyton and Peter Pan’s floating underpants. Priceless. I like Vikki, she seems very sweet and I’m anxious to see how her story unfolds and if Camden’s affection is returned… that is, if he gets the nerve to act on those bits of feeling that are working their way into his head and his heart, scrambling all semblance of sanity. ;) Love, what a kicker.

    • Andavri says:

      Yes, yes we will be seeing the proposal in the next episode.

      Camden has always been pretty remote and we’ve only seen him passingly in other posts, but he’s fairly hot-blooded underneath that exterior. :-)

      I’m glad you liked Peter Pan’s panties, I didn’t see Peyton swearing, I imagine, like with Lock and Wesley in the first post that hearing profanity out of a woman makes the Crestians uncomfortable, and as so much of how Peyton is already succeeds in doing that… Well…

      We’ll see more of Vikki and Camden this season, though. Thanks, Lili!

  3. Van says:

    Did Victoria know Peyton beforehand? Or was the comment about Casablanca just some sarcasm that flew waaaay over my studied-out head? :P

    Yaaaay for Dolph and Heidi! And I’m sure the proposal will be plenty romantic (although I’m kind of with Peyton on the whole romantic thing :P ).

    Nice to see that Camden’s made a friend ;)

    • Andavri says:

      No, no, the Casablanca thing. It’s more a reference to there is life outside of what you see in the posts. (I’m new to this whole online serial thing. I haven’t found a good balance.) The point of it was more Peyton protests to not have a single smidge of romantic in her, but in truth she is a sucker for old movies like Casablanca and that doesn’t fall into her projected persona.

      It was part of a conversation that they had had the night before where someone misquoted Casablanca and Peyton corrected it and even put it in context, thus giving herself away.

      None of the girls are going to have known each other before, but Vikki and Peyton are already sort of forming a friendship. Peyton’s been a little “odd man out” pretty much since she got there and so needed a friend and Vikki’s a bit bewildered yet.

      As I explained to Morgaine and a bit in the episode, Peyton was really the one that Dolph felt like he could ask, without arousing suspicion, and besides it made for some funny. And I like funny. (It rhymes with Hunny and Bunny and that just makes my whiskers tingle Pooh like.)

      Thanks, Van.

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