For a lonely soul, you're having such a nice time ~ [Ira]

The building was decadent. Expensive and elaborate architectural finishes adorned every room. The entrance hall was decked out with intricate tapestries and more than one crystal chandelier. The amount of people there who were serving – maids, butlers, waiters and the like – almost equalled the number of guests. Zephir thought that anyone who called this a house lived somewhere severely distant from the real world. It was a mansion, at least. A manor. A place perfect for hosting tonight’s affair. It was a charity ball. An event hosted by one of Britain’s wealthiest families annually, so that the rich and famous could come out and present themselves to the world as altruistic as well as beautiful and filthy rich. It was all horribly lush, and there was no reason for Zephir king to be there. He didn’t belong. He wasn’t pureblooded, and while there were a few half-blooded heiresses prancing around in ball gowns getting dirty looks from some of the older purists – he wasn’t rich, either.

Zephir was only here tonight because McTyrne was. The older healer was here with his wife and son, and had insisted that Zephir come. He was told that he’d need to become accustomed to these kinds of situations and events if he planned to follow his ambitions forward. And his mentor was correct, of course. Zephir had spent the night so far talking to various members of various families. He was already sure that he’d made good impressions on a number of people. None of them would know how much research he’d done into their families and businesses… Zephir was incredible when it came to working under pressure, but he didn’t like being surprised. When he’d first met Farren Abercrombie the previous year, he’d narrowly avoided insulting her composing work. He was lucky that he could think on his feet and was both calculating and articulate enough to navigate his way through conversation.

Like he’d thought during that very first meeting, the first taste he’d had of rubbing shoulders with the truly wealthy, the peculiarities of upper class society were not something that he could be learned from any book. Zephir could only study so much before he couldn’t learn any more from those sources of information. He was ambitious to a fault, and any kind of failure was simply not possible. Now that he had a way in, there was no way he was going to lose it. A waiter walked past him slowly, pausing to offer a drink. Zephir took a champagne – he was almost positive that the bottle it was poured from was worth more than anything he’d ever owned – and had a long sip. He’d just been with McTyrne and his family at their table. The charity auction had finished almost half an hour ago, and now there was a swing band playing in the dance hall and waiters circulating with platters of food and drinks.

The man moved through an elaborately decorated, empty room and down a hall, passing a couple of people that he’d met previously with a polite nod. A flash went off to his right; he supposed the daily prophet were interviewing a couple of the people who’d organised this event. He found himself on a large, marble balcony. It was summer, so the night air wasn’t too crisp. The music was a little more faint here, but there were a few small groups of people chattering and waiters with trays of cigars and drinks. Charity ball. Ha. He almost shook his head at the irony of it all. The young man might have been looking for another face he’d been acquainted with (it was entirely plausible that Farren could be here tonight), but someone else familiar caught his eye out here instead. Was she out here by herself? Why? He paused for a moment and then decided to go over to her. “Ira,” he greeted with a nod, “What did you think of the auction?” he asked politely, coming to stand beside her against the balcony rail. He'd spent some time discussing economic trade with this girl last time they'd met... She was intelligent and he picked her as someone with whom it would be potentially beneficial to be on good terms with.

The annual charity ball was something that Iraida Lvovna had come too look forward to every summer since she had been old enough to attend it.  She didn’t often enjoy travelling to England, but the event was so prestigious that anybody who was anybody was there.  And she was definitely somebody.  She had to make sure nobody forgot that.  But this year was different, for it was the first that she was attending without her parents – Dariya had fallen ill, and without his wife forcing him to go, Lev had no interest in the ball whatsoever.  She had been elated that they would still allow her to go, although she would have never been permitted to go by herself, of course.  Igor was chaperoning her, but fortunately he had gone off and found someone beside his own sister to make conversation with.  Or it had seemed fortunate in the beginning.  Ira had quickly realized that being alone made her feel …insecure.  She was used to having someone to be standing by at all times, whether that person was a date or simply her own family. 

At first, she hadn’t thought it would be a problem.  She was sure that she would have plenty of friends there to keep her company, but it turned out that they were all occupied with their own dates.  It was certainly different, seeing a party from the perspective of an individual.  It made her feel excluded, and Ira had no capacity for knowing how to handle that feeling.

So here she was.  Out on the balcony, alone, sipping champagne by herself like some kind of outcast.  How dare her mother fall ill at the last minute, much too short of notice for her to find a proper date!

Ira gave a start as someone spoke her name.  She was mortified at having been spotted out here all by herself.  Turning, she recognized the man walking toward her.  “Oh, Mr. King.  Good evening,” she said in English.  She thought the words sounded ugly coming out of her mouth.  She much preferred her native tongue, or even the complicated delicacy that was French.  “It was rather entertaining, wasn’t it?  I think Ambassador Moon was beside himself at having won that silly goblet, though I doubt Monsieur Dubled will ever forgive him,” she said with a faint smile, glancing over at him.  She didn’t know Zephir very well, having been introduced to him for the first time only recently, although she had gotten to know him a little bit as they’d conversed.  She found him to be charming, albeit somewhat intense – though not necessarily in a bad way.  He was the first male who had neither treated her like a simple-minded porcelain doll, nor as some kind of sexual object.  It was oddly refreshing.

Why hadn’t he called her Miss Ilyina? Idiot. The healer couldn’t afford these kind of small mistakes. Something like this was nothing, but a constant stream of nothings would make it obvious that he did not belong here. He was better than he had been, but there was still so much to learn. He shook his head. “Please, call me Zephir,” he told her softly, not really wanting to draw attention to his slip. They’d been on a first name basis by the end of their last conversation, but apparently that kind of familiarity had to be earned every time. Zephir’s expression was smooth, amenable, but inside his cogs were ticking and whirring.

Ira was both beautiful and clever, which made her very attractive to the healer. He was excellent when it came to compartmentalising though. Her influential family and wealthy lifestyle just added to her allure, but Zephir was well acquainted with boundaries and obviously would not misstep. Her next words made sense and Zephir found himself faced with two options; agree with her and smile, or voice his opinion. The man’s decision was made without missing a beat and tried to calculate outcomes in his head quickly. “You know, I half suspect that Monsieur Dubled was only betting so high to push Ambasador Moon further.”

The man cast a sideways glance at his acquaintance to see what she thought of that. Zephir suspected that the rotund man had been betting higher than he should have because he’d been working with the organisers of the event. It wouldn’t be horribly shocking. Perhaps Zephir was just too paranoid generally, but he didn’t think so. His paranoia was a gift sometimes – it kept him alert and on his toes. It was hard to slip up when you could see every possible negative outcome. Zephir reached up to run his fingers through his hair lightly before letting his arm drop back to his side.

He watched her silently for a moment, his body language polite and casual as he leant against the balcony rail. “So why are you out here instead of in there?” he asked, indicating inside with a slight nod of his head. The young man raised a curious eyebrow, but he wasn’t challenging her. His intonation made it clear what he was asking. Why was she out here, alone instead of in there, surrounded by other little socialite butterflies? Some friends, some false friends but all playing their perfect parts.

“Zephir,” Ira echoed, obliging his request with a rueful smile.  It was not commonplace for her to be on a first-name basis with any of her formal, high-society acquaintances, but he was insistent.  She felt that said something about him.  And not the ‘something’ she would have typically associated with such behavior; not a tasteless lack of manners, the likes of which she would need to find offensive, for he didn’t fling her first name around casually as if it didn’t mean anything.  Rather, it was almost as if there was a certain level of trust between them.  He was one of the few acquaintances she had made neither through her parents nor as a result of school.  The idea that they might share some kind of understanding was exciting to her.

Tilting her chin up at him, Ira listened with polite interest as he offered his views on the auction.  “That’s an interesting theory,” she said thoughtfully, looking out across the green.  She hadn’t thought of it that way.  While she was considering this, she caught the movement of Zephir running a hand through his hair in her peripheral vision and fleetingly found this curious – he didn’t seem the type to fidget.  Was he uncomfortable in her presence?  After a very brief moment of deliberation, she turned her eyes back toward him, giving an amused laugh and said, “You know, I do believe you may be right.  I don’t think it would be beneath Dubled to try and goad him simply for the fun of it.  They have a bitter rivalry that’s carried on for as long as anyone can remember – which I’m sure you’ve heard all about, for who could escape it, even if they wished to?” she joked.  “Though… it’s a shame to think the most exciting moment of the evening was all a hoax.”  There was a layer of sarcasm to the polite conversational tone of this final statement, suggesting that she thought the whole thing was slightly ridiculous.  Two old men bickering like children over a battered, second-hand goblet was not her idea of entertainment.

Then, Zephir asked the question that she knew would be coming eventually – for anybody with manners and even the basest skills of observation would have wondered why she was standing out on the balcony alone.  What could she possibly say in response to such a question?  She had no excuse – at least, not one that she considered viable.  It made absolutely no sense for someone like her to be out here by themselves.  Imagine the lecture she would have received for behaving so antisocially in public – she could just hear her mother now.  Arguably, everybody else was so busy being sociable that none of them would have noticed her out here.  Except, of course, Zephir.

She gave a soft sigh.  “I suppose I just needed a bit of fresh air,” she decided.  That, by itself, wouldn’t do at all.  Ira considered telling him that the room had been uncomfortably warm, or that the champagne had made her woozy, but neither of these excuses would have been any more satisfactory than the truth, for they both referred to physical conditions, and were therefore repulsive to her.  She opted instead for a display of compassion that she didn’t feel remotely.  “My mother isn’t well tonight,” she continued with half-hearted sincerity, glancing down at the champagne glass she dangled between her fingers.  “It’s not like her to miss something like this.”

Zephir was very aware of her expressions and movements. The man observed her closely, with a well-rehearsed front of being only politely interested. He was reluctant to give any information about himself away that wasn’t necessary, though was obviously avoiding this fact. He’d only really interacted with the Russian heiress once before now, and she barely knew more about him than his name and his interest in politics and the economy. The healer thought that she seemed like the kind of witch who would want to know about the details, but somehow he’d avoided having to explain that he worked on a hospital. The young man glanced over at a group of men enjoying cigars, like he was distracted by their sudden outburst of drunken laughter. In reality, Ira had his attention.

He knew all about her and her family. The healer had always taken an interest in wealthy, pureblooded families, though admittedly he hadn’t spent much time learning about those in eastern europe until recently. Even before he’d had papers forged to say that he, too was a pureblood, he had spent time researching those of influence. The Slytherin alumni might have been from a horribly poor family, but he was masquerading as a pureblood, and after all, knowledge was power. The young man imagined that he could see the cogs tick in Ira’s head as she processed what he’d just said. He was glad that she’d understood what he was alluding to so quickly, but supposed that speaking with a lot of subtext was something that came naturally in upper class society. No one really said what they meant. He nodded once when she agreed with him. “I didn’t see you-“ or her table “-bid on anything. Nothing caught your eye?”

The man asked this question politely, though inwardly he… hated it. The man had never had enough money to match even the lowest of bids for any of the items they’d sold here. He hated this event and ones like it. Not that he’d ever let it show. Zephir had spent a lot of time working towards his goals throughout the duration of his Hogwarts years. Achieving perfect grade had been of the utmost importance to the dark-haired man, but there had been a lot of other things that had mattered too. He’d done his best to make friends with similarly ambitious people and had invested a lot of himself into making himself look the part. There was no use in being clever and achieving highly if he wasn’t charismatic or charming. Hard academic work alone was hardly enough to get him anywhere. Now that he was a qualified healer, the next step was clear; make connections. Network. The fact that McTyrne had chosen him over other interns in his year indicated to Zephir that he was working hard enough to be noticed. But it wasn’t really enough. He could always be better.

The ambitious man knew that falsifying his heritage while appealing to one of the most powerful families in Britain as dangerous, but he’d long since done away with any naivety in that area. He’d do whatever it took. These kinds of events were absolutely necessary for whatever image he was trying to build here, as much as a part of him despised the whole idea of them. It was all about appearances and saying the right thing and absolutely not making a misstep. It was walking on air. Zephir might not have much currently, but he had a possible future to lose. It was a lot. A slight, agreeing smile tugged at his lips as he noted the sarcasm in her tone. He was, however, suddenly very curious as to why it was there. Wasn’t pretending that all of this ridiculousness was entertaining and normal part of the game? He wondered about how comfortable she felt with him. Zephir nodded again when she said that she needed fresh air, but he watched her with unguarded curiosity as he waited to see if she’d elaborate on the fact. He liked that she hadn’t ask him the same question in return.

He raised his eyebrows slightly at her answer. For a moment, he was unsure how he should respond. Such a display on sincerity seemed out of place here, and he wondered if it was real. It might explain why Ira was being unsociable tonight, though he didn't really know her well enough to know if she was usually much more sociable. He could only assume. Zephir took a light sip of his drink and swallowed before answering. "I hope it's nothing serious," he offered politely. "You seem... troubled."

If there was any hint of an accusation in his tone when Zephir mentioned not seeing Ira bid on anything during the auction, it was lost on her.  “I have enough stuff,” she explained.  It was true.  It was also true that she had little to no interest in the kinds of artifacts and trinkets being auctioned off tonight.  “And nothing really caught my eye,” she added with an almost mischievous smirk, tilting her head at him.  Of course, at a charity such as this, the expectation was for those in attendance to bid on items for the sake of generosity – it wasn’t about personal gain or possessions.  The Ilyins were always active participants in such pastimes, and tonight had been no exception.  But Ira herself had chosen not to bother with the frivolities of it all.  For her, the charity ball was much less about charity than it was about being seen.  As one of the most prestigious events of the year, it was something she always looked forward to.

And though the night had been more or less ruined by her circumstantial exclusion from things, it seemed at last to be turning around.  Conversing with Zephir was the most engaged and involved she had felt thus far, even though it was just the two of them.  But then, he was a very engaging sort of person.  She had learned as much from their first conversation.

She waved a hand dismissively at his display of concern.  For the moment, she could care less about her mother’s well-being.  She would never say so, of course, for she didn’t want him to think she was heartless.  And there was a certain appeal in gaining his sympathy.  “I thank you, but I’m sure it’s nothing serious,” she said heavily, and perhaps a bit more dramatically than was necessary.  Ira couldn’t claim to be especially close with her mother – despite the fact that the woman was very much involved in everything she did.  They had no real understanding between them, outside of their mutual sense of duty to their family and their image.  Ira had never felt any kind of extraordinary affection from her mother.  Agata Olegovna had always been far more nurturing than either of her parents.  And it was not a sore subject for her – it was simply the way things were.  But it did lend to her current feelings of apathy toward her mother.  At present, she was more annoyed at the woman than anything else she ought to have been feeling.

The conversation was brought to an abrupt, premature close when a familiar voice called her name.  Ira turned to find a friend approaching, asking her what she was doing out here and explaining that they’d been looking for her everywhere.  She apologized quietly and explained that she’d just wanted some fresh air.  Ira turned back toward Zephir with an apologetic smile.  “Please, excuse me.”  She hesitated for a moment, and then added, “It was good to see you again, Zephir.”  Her eyes lingered on his for a moment before she turned to go.