The Countess's face did not change. It was very controlled, a face that had been doing this for twenty years and had the specific smoothness of long practice.
Dorian looked at Veyra with those annoying warm, working gaze and something that moved briefly in the space between them.
"Of course," he said. Warm. Pleasant. "No one is suggesting otherwise."
Veyra looked at him.
Zolani watched this. As she tried to rationalize Veyra's action reducing the ache it left in it's wake. She momentarily succeeded.
Veyra's gaze on Dorian was sharp... too sharp— she had been drugged and restrained and managed for weeks and she was sitting at a dinner table tonight for reasons that had something to do with the Count's calculations and she now was currently looking at the person who had put poison in her daughter's water with the particular expression of someone who was not yet capable of acting on what they knew and was therefore simply — restrained.
That was Zolani's opinion on the exchange between them. It could be more. She was unsure.
Dorian held the look for approximately two seconds.
Then he smiled and looked away.
Zolani filed the smile and the tightened grip Veyra held the fork that stabbed the steak she was eating.
The third course came and Fen knocked his water glass.
Not dramatically — the glass tilted, was caught before it fell, the water going partially onto the tablecloth and partially onto Fen's own sleeve. He looked at the spreading water with the focused interest of a five-year-old examining a consequence.
"Oh," he muttered.
His mother had already produced a cloth from somewhere and was managing the situation with the smooth efficiency that characterized everything she did. The Count watched this from the head of the table. His expression had the specific quality of someone watching something they found privately comfortable without deciding to acknowledge that they found it comfortable. From her peripheral Zolani could see the Countess' gaze narrowing.
The twelve-year-old looked at Zolani to see how she was reacting too.
How... Odd.
Zolani was not reacting though.
The girl's expression shifted. The wariness recalibrating slightly.
"He does that at every formal dinner," she justified his actions. Quiet. The first words she had directed toward Zolani. Her voice was her mother's voice in miniature — balanced, nothing wasted.
"Does he?" Zolani remarked watching her expression.
"He knocked the gravy at the H-harvest dinner," the girl stumbled on her words. "And the wine cup at the Midsummer table." A pause. "He's never actually broken anything."
"He has good instincts," Zolani praised, slightly amused.
The girl considered this.
"My name is Adra," she said. The offering of it deliberate. The decision visible.
"Adra," she said. "I'm Zolani."
The girl's eyes did something quick. The same quick thing Pip's eyes had done at the Arvane party. The same thing Isadora's had done.
She still wondered what exactly was the intent behind it.
Either way she held her gaze steadily.
Adra looked back at her soup, a red tint forming on her chubby cheeks.
But the wariness had shifted. Not gone — changed. The wariness of someone who had received new information and was deciding how it affects her previous observations.
The Count made his speech at the end of the fourth course.
Cael had been right. This dinner was just a facade. The Count was just observing the power struggle and keeping some growing ambitions in check.
Dorian.
Maybe the Countess and me? She wasn't sure exactly on who was the primary focus.
But she figured she was part of it either way.
The Count proceeded to speak about the household, it's coming season. About the academy — his gaze stayed longer on Zolani, the way he mentioned the academy was with a specific neutrality of someone who had made a decision and was formally stating it rather than discussing it.
He made it clear from his gaze that he expected not a single action that would tarnish the name of Draveth, when he said the word academy — not warmly, not coldly. Assessing.
She hated the stare. Made her want to misbehave intentionally more than ever.
She looked back with the expression of a daughter grateful for the opportunity. Playing the role easier than the first time she met him.
He lingered more about the importance of the house's reputation. He used the word bridge once — this family has always served as a bridge between institutions and between people — and she noted it against the sigil on the carriage door, the sigil on the candlesticks, the sigil in the old architect's drawings in the library.
He spoke about the Fog, very briefly, in the specific way powerful men spoke about inconvenient things — acknowledging their existence, framing them as managed, moving on before the acknowledgment could develop into a conversation.
She also hated that too.
Because under his gaze, Liss squirmed and unconsciously made herself smaller while looking down on her food.
And for a spilt second that motion enraged her enough to imagine his blood pooling on the table as she stabbed with her fork. Instead she cut the steak with a table knife and stabbed the piece then tasted it.
The sweet flavors overflowed and settled. It was so good.
"The eastern boundary situation is under assessment," he droned. "The guild has been informed. The household will take appropriate precautions."
"What precautions?" Liss couldn't help herself.
"Appropriate ones," the Count stated.
Jerk.
Liss ate her dessert.
The speech ended and the family ate to their fill before quietly dispersing with the efficiency of people who had sat through this particular performance before and knew the moment it was over.
After the Count left with Cedric, Lady veyra was the first, then Dorian and the Countess, Sera, The third concubine and her children.
Liss, Cael and Zolani remained.
After exchange pleasantries they left too.
On her way back to her quarters, Zolani heard the maids in the corridor outside talking.
Not speaking loudly — the maid's version of a private conversation, which was a low murmur that was quieter than ordinary speech and somehow more audible through walls because of the specific quality of attention it required to produce. She had learned to hear it in seven days the way she'd learned to hear a lot of things in this house.
"—saw it herself, Marna did. Two nights running—"
"—Pol's cousin in the village says the Fog has been at the well by morning—"
"—the thing at the tree line, she said, just standing there. Not moving. Just—"
She opened the door.
The two maids — Deni and the one she had identified as part of the Count's rotation — stopped.
"My lady," Deni said. The specific guilty quality of someone caught doing something that wasn't forbidden but felt like it might be.
"What's at the tree line," Zolani questioned, she wasn't in the mood to beat about the bush.
Deni looked at the other maid. The other maid looked at Deni.
"It's just rumors, my lady," Deni uttered, looking like she rather be anywhere else. "The groundskeeper is — he's older. He sees things sometimes."
"What does he say he sees."
A pause.
"Something in the forest," Deni said. "Near the lake. He said it was — large. And it didn't move like animals move." She stopped her train of thought, realizing where and who she was with. "It's probably nothing. The Fog does things to the light. Makes shapes."
"Yes," Zolani hummed. "Probably."
She closed the door. Headed to her room.
Interesting. It looked like she would be checking it out. See what it really was firsthand.