Thessine looked at her.
"You're right." she said. "I came because I needed to take responsibility for the person I was. Not just here. Everywhere."
"And the person you were." Duchess Celeste tilted her head. "What happened to her?"
"She realized she had spent years chasing something that was never going to happen." Thessine said carefully. "And in doing so she burned down everything around her. Her reputation. Her relationships. Her family name." She paused. "At some point you either keep running in the same direction or you stop and ask yourself why you started running in the first place."
Duchess Celeste studied her for a long moment.
"So you gave up." she said. Not unkindly. More like she was testing the weight of the words.
"I let go." Thessine said. "There's a difference."
Something shifted in the Duchess's expression. Subtle but unmistakable.
"There is indeed." she said quietly.
A small silence settled between them.
"And what comes next." Duchess Celeste asked. "Now that you have let go."
Thessine looked at her steadily.
"I fix what I broke." she said. "My reputation. My family name. Everything the Beaumont name used to stand for before I dragged it through every social disaster this city has seen in the past three years." She paused. "It won't be quick. It won't be easy. But I intend to do it properly."
Duchess Celeste looked at her for a long moment.
Then she smiled. Not the polite social smile she had been wearing since Thessine walked in. Something more genuine than that.
"I like that answer." she said.
"Hmph." said Duke Edmond.
Both women looked at him.
He picked up his cup and looked away with great dignity.
Duchess Celeste turned back to Thessine with dancing eyes and the expression of a woman very accustomed to winning.
"You must come for dinner sometime." she said. "Properly this time. As a guest."
Thessine blinked.
Of all the outcomes she had mapped out for this visit that had not been one of them.
"I would be honored." she said carefully. "Thank you, Your Grace."
"Wonderful." Duchess Celeste picked up her teacup looking thoroughly pleased with herself. "I do enjoy interesting company."
Across from them Duke Edmond sighed the sigh of a man who had learned a long time ago that some battles were simply not worth fighting.
He reached forward and took a biscuit.
Thessine decided to count that as acceptance.
The tea had gone slightly cool by the time Duchess Celeste set her cup down and looked at Thessine with the expression of someone who had made a decision.
"May I give you some advice." she said.
It was phrased as a question but it wasn't really one.
"Please." Thessine said.
Duchess Celeste folded her hands in her lap and was quiet for a moment. Like she was organizing her thoughts carefully before releasing them.
"The court has a very specific memory." she began. "It forgets nothing and forgives slowly. You cannot walk back into those circles and simply announce that you have changed. They will not believe you. And the more desperately you try to convince them, the less they will trust it."
Thessine listened.
"The only currency that means anything in this world is consistency." the Duchess continued. "Not grand gestures. Not one impressive moment that people talk about for a week and then forget. Consistency. Showing up the same way every single time until people stop waiting for you to revert and start accepting that this is simply who you are now."
She paused.
"It will take longer than you want it to. People will test you. They will say things designed to provoke the old version of you back to the surface. They will create situations specifically to see if you break." Her eyes were steady and calm. "You must not break."
"I understand." Thessine said.
"Do you?" It wasn't a challenge. More like a genuine question. "Because understanding it in a sitting room over tea is very different from living it at a dinner table surrounded by people who have already decided who you are."
Thessine held her gaze, then lowered it to look at the teacup.
"I know." she said quietly. "But I don't have the option of giving up. I have too much to rebuild."
Duchess Celeste studied her for a moment longer.
Then something in her expression softened.
"The practical advice is this." she said.
"Start small. Don't try to reclaim everything at once. Choose one or two families whose respect means something in this circle and focus there. A quiet dinner. A well placed letter. A favor offered without expectation of return."
She tilted her head slightly. "Today was a good start."
Duke Edmond made a sound that was almost agreement.
Almost.
"Align yourself with causes that are visible but not controversial." the Duchess continued. "Charitable work. Cultural events. Things that put you in rooms with the right people without putting you in the center of attention before you've earned the right to be there again."
Thessine was committing every word to memory.
"And." Duchess Celeste added, almost as an afterthought. "Find something that is yours. Not borrowed from someone else's story. Not built around another person's opinion of you. Something that belongs entirely to you." Her voice was quiet but certain. "A woman with her own purpose is very difficult to dismiss."
The room was quiet for a moment.
Outside a bird was singing somewhere in the Hartwell gardens. Duke Edmond had stopped pretending to be uninvested and was listening with focused attention.
Thessine looked at the Duchess.
"Can I ask you something?" she said.
"Of course."
"How do you know all of this?"
Duchess Celeste smiled. Small and private and carrying the weight of something she didn't fully explain.
"Because I was not always the Duchess of Hartwell." she said simply. "And this city did not always look at me the way it does now."
She picked up her teacup.
"It took time." she said. "And consistency. And refusing to let other people's memory of who I was become more powerful than who I was becoming."
She took a sip.
"You have a sharper mind than you have ever been given credit for Thessine Margot Beaumont." she said calmly. "Use it. Quietly. Deliberately. And don't let anyone see you working."
Thessine sat with that for a moment.
Then she dipped her head slightly.
"Thank you, Your Grace." she said.
"Genuinely."
Duchess Celeste smiled.
"Come to dinner next week." she said."Thursday evening. Nothing large. Just a small gathering of people worth knowing."