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Jessie watched her rambling in amusement, noting the defensive veneer. He thought about gently pressing her further - if she trusted him enough, she might eventually come out with an open, honest reply. But there were a couple of problems, none the least being that as she spoke, he felt the car turn off the long, straight road into town. They would be there very soon. The second problem was that it was the start of a very fine evening, and the last thing he wanted to do was linger on unhappy talk.

When she trailed off at last, the silence, which might have been awkward in another's hands due to the awkwardness (sorry, Evelyn) with which it was executed, was quite comfortable. He regarded her thoughtfully, as if he were taking in and mulling over her words - enjoying them, and in no hurry to reply or meaninglessly fill the silence. It conveyed many things - but definitely not boredom!

"I bet you were such a cute little girl. Utterly adorable. A beautiful little blonde creature in fancy silk frocks. Or were you more of a tomboy? Jeans and a cap?" he grinned, "I imagine it would've been hard to play all those sports in a dress. But how important would looking the part of the young lady have been to you? To your parents?"

He thought for a few more congenial moments, and then gave a little toss of his head, as if it were a little, self-deprecating tsk. He really did look striking, and not all that womanly, even though as he sat in the open with no tables or desks in the way, the way he sat could be observed - he folded his long, athletic legs one over the other demurely, or otherwise kept them tightly together like a woman. It suited him, actually. There was no reason in the world why Jessie would splay his legs wide open unattractively like a common, boorish or arrogant man. "Listen to me! I can hardly remember what it was like to be a child myself. Or maybe 'blocked it out' is a better way of saying it, hahaha. So I'm hardly qualified to speculate about your childhood." He turned back towards her. "You know... you're wonderful, and fascinating, and I can't imagine what good fortune must have been in my stars when you decided to grace a man like me with your company and your loveliness, but I feel very lucky for it."

The car had smoothly come to a halt like silk gliding against silk. The door behind Jessie opened, and he gave his beautiful date a kiss on the hand before he got out, thanking the chauffeur, and crossed to her side to open her door in turn. It was time to enter the opera house - a huge theater, flashy and strobe-lit on the outside if only by virtue of having to compete with all of the other flashy, grand hotels and storefronts on the Gambino Town promenade. None of them skimped on glitz. It, like the practise halls, had been recently refurbished on the inside. The interiors were classy and new, with the slight smell of paint lingering still even amongst the vast array of perfumes worn by the women who passed through.

The theatre's modern provenance came through in its architecture and layout - it was arranged specifically to be versatile. The stage could provide the productions with proscenium, thrust and round staging, individually or all at once, and the seating was architecturally semi-circular, for the acoustic benefits. The orchestra could be shuffled forward or back or hidden off to the side entirely depending on the requirements of the play. And like other theatres, the different stages of audience seating had their own informal, backstage nicknames: the elevated layer of seating suspended around the walls was "Heaven," whilst the people down below were in "Hell!" Jessie and Evelyn were sitting in neither of these. Jessie had procured them a seat among "The Gods" - the boxes. In fact, they had a box entirely to themselves. Yes, she really was spending more time alone with him than she ever had before.

The boxes were certainly a good choice for privacy. The hum of the crowd was dulled, rather than amplified, but when the performers took to the stage, every word and note would ring clear as a bell, so the advantages swung both ways. Actually, the last time he'd been to an opera with Cressa, she'd snubbed her seat and availed herself of his lap instead for most of the performance! In Heaven or Hell, that just wouldn't have been acceptable, unless they could somehow have passed her off as a toddler with an unfortunately serious case of gigantism. Of course, Evelyn would be much better behaved than Cressa. Going out with her was often like stepping out of the house with a Bengal tiger and no leash. With Evelyn, the privacy was not a... safety precaution - it was just nice to have.

After they had closed the door behind them and taken their seats, there was still some time before the curtain. Jessie turned to her again and continued to genially converse. He rather wanted to make up for evading her question earlier, and the time it took for them to get their tickets seen and walk to their seats had given him opportunity to think. "When I was a little boy, I had this Master, my personal tutor. You know, over the years I really warmed to him and his methods, but talking to you just now has made me think, and I remember now that in the start, when I was very small, I thought he was the most miserable, mean old goat in the world. He was always making me do the most imponderable exercises. I just didn't understand, when I was small, what the point was. I didn't realise he was preparing me for acrobatics, gymnastics, strength, and the sword. Gosh, I forgot how much I really hated him, when I was tiny. He made me practise the same steps over and over and over and over for hours, like a soldier, of course I didn't know what being a soldier was really like back then. But what I hated the most was single-armed handstands. Oh, I was a scrawny little thing. Really scrawny and skinny. Those handstands made my arms feel like they were close to breaking. And if I fell over or had to switch hands or sometimes if I just wavered, I had to start all over again. It was miserable. Utterly miserable!" he laughed.

His dark skin flushed darker with pleasure at the unexpected compliment. Jessie ducked his head away bashfully for a moment, face full with a smile, but turned back to her as she shrank away. He didn't mind a bit if she noticed that he was blushing. Taking her hand away from her face, he gently clasped it on the arm of the seat.

"There's no need to apologise," he said, continuing with a big, flirtatious smile: "Nothing you say or do could offend me. Please be as forward as you like with me!"

He wished that she would take that cue to kiss him again, but even as he desired it, his lips pressed against hers. Hm! What strange magnetism! Had he fallen towards her, or had she fallen towards him? He couldn't quite tell. They might have met somewhere in the middle, for all he knew. God, but her kisses were intoxicating. Every touch sent a heady cloud of vapour misting around his mind; fogging up the workings, rusting the cogs. It was so hard to think...

When he finally sadly parted from her, the lights in the theater had dimmed and the orchestra were all assembled. Oh, but those evidently long minutes had seemed like maddeningly short seconds. His breathing a little ragged, he cupped her face and stroked the smooth apple of her cheek, resting his own hot forehead against hers. "...Do you... find me too forward...?"

Evelyn bit her lip for a moment before letting out a barely audible “No.”

Evelyn was entranced by the performance—she had been unable to make time to see an opera, musical, or ballet since coming to the temple. The feeling was irreplaceable. Her heart soared with every note, and she could feel the plight of the poor girl.

When Jessie spoke, her attention turned to him. She tried to pick her words carefully. “You really have to look at things from his point of view, though,” she said, her hands resting in her lap, sitting with a straight back. “The girl he just fell in love with, who appeared to love him back, just ran off. She offered no explanation. His heart must have broken right there. But, of course, you can’t blame her much either. She spent her entire life serving her step mother and step sisters. She could scarcely believe that what was happening was actually happening. It all is too perfect.”

Well then, it would appear that adventuring companions don't simply walk through the Main Hall when they are needed. Everything from the so-called 'video games' was a lie, and Xei resolved to pay them no heed at all, ever. After a glance at the clock to see an hour wasted, he dispelled his blueprint and hefted the pack.

"But of course, I'd need to run around to gather companions. What was I thinking? Off to the library!" Xeiashi said to nobody in particular, though slightly louder than he had originally planned. No matter. The library was close enough at hand, and he entered promptly. There was no time to waste, adventure was at hand, and shouting wasn't allowed in the library. So he did the next best thing, and found the aura of his friend about 3 books away in a chair (so-called as he normally moves around the chairs as he reads. This distance wasn't anything more than 15 feet, but book-moving is slow work). He pulled up another chair, removed the bulky back, ignored his friend's surprise, and spoke thusly:

"Alexi, I'm going on an adventure to find an island that nobody knows about. Would rather not run off alone. You and Total are coming along unless you have a good excuse. So, what is your decision? ADVENTURE, (This he said as loudly and dramatically as librarily possible) or study books that you have probably read before?"



(Note: 'librarily', form of library. In this case, indicates the maximum volume and emphasis allowable in a library without earning a stern talking-to by the librarian.)

"Amazing, beautiful, kind, sweet, funny... enchanting," he said playfully, smiling at her, "Yes, all of those things and more, you're quite correct."

The final two acts soared past in a blaze of misery, reunion and triumph. Instead of leaving the way they'd come, though, Jessie took Evelyn through an unobtrusive-looking door in a corridor just off the stairs. He remained mysteriously silent about where he was taking her. Doors branched off in places, but he carried them knowledgeably on their route. At one point, they passed a great window with a magnificent view over the spectacularly-lit town, and stopped to admire it. Finally, they rounded a corner and found themselves confronted by a black-clothed bouncer, guarding the only door in that passage. Jessie approached him without faltering, and the man nodded to him. "Alright, Jessie?"

"Good evening," he politely replied, with a charming smile for good measure. The bouncer opened the door - it swung inwards - and stepped back with it, allowing them to pass through. Suddenly, they were in a different world. The smell of powder and makeup hung in the air. Lighting equipment was being ferried back and forth. Le prince charmant happened to saunter by with his wedding coat in his arms, and he - she - was suddenly much shorter than a man, without her heeled boots. Shorter than Jessie - just barely as tall as Evelyn.

It still wasn't clear why Jessie had brought Evelyn here or how he'd been permitted entry, though if he intended it as a gift, a massive gift it was. Who didn't want to go backstage and meet the cast after a performance like that? Of course, while they were there Evelyn could run around and meet anyone she wanted, if she wanted. Jessie had something specific in mind, though.

"What I don't understand is why nothing has been done about this bodice!" came a voice from one of the dressing rooms, "How many times do I have to tell you people - I can't breathe! How am I suppose to sing if I can't breathe?! The goddamn thing chafes my armpits! I can't dance, I can't breathe!"

"Alright, alright, settle down, let's see if we can't let the stitches out a little bit more," replied her long-suffering attendant, a flamboyant-looking elder man with smartly coiffed white hair and spectacles. Jessie had stopped to hover by this doorway, and as he stepped out into the flurry of the hallway, he touched him on the arm.

"Excuse me, does Almandine have any flowers she can spare?" The man turned tired eyes on him and gave a little sigh.

"Oh, I'm certain her Royal Highness has something she won't miss," he replied, obligingly slipping back in through the door, examining the mountains of bouquets lined up on one of the dressers and choosing one with an expert eye. Beyond him, the princess Lucette sat with her head in one of her hands, about to pop a tablet for a headache. Her assistant handed his selection of bouquet to Jessie. "Here you go."

"Thank you!" Jessie beamed, cradling the flowers in one arm, Evelyn on his other side. As they continued off on their journey, he turned to her, almost apologetically, in case this experience was shattering her illusions. "Unfortunately, some princesses are sweeter-tempered than others. You should play her role! A voice like an angel could use a personality to match, don't you think?"

He gave her another big smile, and then knocked on the door they'd come to. With only a little delay, Miriam opened the door to the ballet dancers' dressing hall. She looked surprised to see him - but pleasantly so. "Jessie! What are you doing here?!"

"We came to see the show, Mademoiselle!" he laughed, pushing the flowers into her arms. "Flowers for the master choreographer!"

"Oh pshhh, oh my, you really didn't have to-! Was it good?" she asked eagerly, giving him a hug and a kiss on the cheek.

"You know it was better than good. It was mesmerisingly good. Are my students in a fit state for me to see them?"

She gave a little, airy wave. "Oh, probably not, but who cares? Come on in!"

Smiling at Evelyn and eyeing her beautiful dress, she and her flowers squeezed back through the door and admitted the couple inside. The conversation between the girls in the gym-changing-room-like hall erupted into puckish shrieking and twittering - some of the girls, half-clothed, made coquettish shows of mock-mortification as Jessie entered, undercut by the fact that they completely neglected Aurelien to the point that he might as well have been another girl. A handful of them, however - about five or six - immediately rushed to greet their visitors, taking the exciting opportunity to give their teacher (or teachers, as Miriam also became lodged in the crush) a big group hug.

"Calm down, girls, calm down!" Miriam cried over the noisy, energetic babble, "We have some exciting news for Jessie, don't we?"

"Do you?"

"Aurelie got the part!" one of the girls squealed, prompting a great cheer from the rest of the room.

"Really?!"

"Yesterday!"

"You missed it!"

"He was nearly sick!"

"He didn't wanna go!"

"Oh, that's wonderful! I knew he could do it! Where's he hiding?"

"I'm here," the man of the hour replied blushingly, ducking out from behind some of the girls at the back. Jessie waded his way out through the crowd of women and shook his hand, before giving him a hug. "We just heard... a few hours ago. I nearly was sick, you know. I couldn't sleep - and they still gave it to me..."

"I told you you could do it. Don't worry. I'm gonna be here with you every step of the way, okay?" Jessie said, serious and reassuring. Aurelien beamed with pride. "We're going to make this perfect together."

"I know. The director has some guidelines we should follow..."

"Do you have them with you?" he asked. The boy nodded, jittery with nervous excitement. "You're not still worried, are you? If this is just going to damage your health, we might have been better off not doing it..."

"I-I'm fine! I'm just... I guess I'm still in shock, that's all. This has all happened so fast."

"You know where I am if you ever need me. In fact, you know... I should get a phone. Then you could call me any time."

With her date distracted, Evelyn had been momentarily abandoned to the mercy of the other girls. "I love your dress! Where did you get it from?"

"No way - is your hair magicked? That's SO COOL! I wish I could do that! Enchantments are so expensive these days."

"Are you from the Order?"

"Are you on a daaaate?"

"Cordelle!"

Miriam made a move to wedge herself in front of Evelyn and drive them off. "Girls! Show some manners to our guest!"

"Sorry, Miriam..."

"I really do like your dress," beamed the first girl.

"I do too!"

The questions resumed. "Is it nice there?"

"Do you see lots of mermaids?"

"What's Jessie like at fighting?!"

"Does he have a big sword?"

"Cordeeeeeell!"

"Oh, don't pretend you all don't wanna know!"

"Ahem," said Jessie himself, wading back through towards the door and taking Evelyn by the hand. "Girls, I know you're excited, but please."

"Sorryyy!"

"Sorry..."

"Evie, my secret's out anyway - I've been leading a double life," he explained playfully, "Combat instructor by day, ballet instructor by night. Well, by weekend."

"BA-na-na-na-na-na-na-na-BALLET INSTRUCTOORR!"

(Several other giggling voices echoed this.)

"These are my students, and this is my superior, Miriam."

"Oh, well - not so superior. It's a pleasure to meet you. Did you enjoy the show?"

[Not sure which timeline this is following, but this is early afternoon, like 12-1 pm-ish. Also apologies for the double-post; I felt bad that I haven't posted in a while so I thought I'd add some more action.]


Glee and Laramie were walking along the outside of the Temple enjoying the day. They had been sitting on a small terrace they had found, but after a while they got bored and decided to go for a stroll.

"Oh Laramie, isn't this romantic?" Glee said dreamily as she held onto her boyfriend's arm. "Such a nice day and we're walking together..."

"I suppose," Laramie replied distantly. He felt bad, but he couldn't focus on her. His mind was elsewhere. He was worried about how he would fit in with the other people at the Temple. The only ones he really knew were his girlfriend and...her...and he hadn't really interacted with anyone else besides those two. Not to mention his growing interest in the other girl...he could never remember her name, just that she could play the organ.

As the two of them walked and Glee continued to ramble to an only-half-listening Laramie, a quiet but foreign sound could be heard from far away. Laramie stopped when he noticed it.

"Laramie?" Glee asked when she noticed her boyfriend had stopped walking with her. "Is something wrong?"

The boy turned back toward his girlfriend.

"What? Oh...no, nothing. Nothing's wrong," he said. "It's just...I thought I heard music just now."

"Music? From where?" Glee asked.

"Where else?" Laramie responded. "Inside the Temple."

~~~

Inside the Music Room, Forte as usual was sitting at the piano and playing random notes. She was practicing for something she had going on that night. For once, she was actually going out to play at a restaurant in town. The girl had never really done anything like that before; in fact, the only reason she was doing it was because she wanted a change of pace.

The musician began to play a simple song she'd written back in high school. It was a song she'd penned when she was in a particularly foul mood; if memory served it was because a group of girls had thrown food at her in the cafeteria as she ate her lunch. It was loud and angry, perfectly reflecting her emotions at the time. Sometimes it was so loud that people far away could hear the song.

The powerful notes flowed from the piano and Forte let herself relax. Her eyes closed and she felt herself sway back and forth with the music.

But her state of peace was interrupted when the door flew open behind her.