[fill] these ties, how fast they break (3a/?)
anonymous
January 19 2013, 07:44:19 UTC
That afternoon, he sat alone in his study and considered the facts. The most marriageable member of their family was gone. She had taken the horse with her, which made traveling an inconvenience at best, an impossibility at worst. She had even taken some of their savings, which they’d kept collectively in the moneybox in the upstairs study that used to be Brian Xavier’s. They still had enough income to live passably for at least a year, but Charles knew that they couldn’t afford to think in such short terms. Within twelve months, Charles’s paltry inheritance would be close to exhausted. Even if they let go of most of the servants, there would be no guarantee that the money would last, and besides, his mother would throw a fit if he tried to discharge the staff. Sharon Xavier had been born into money, had lived in money all her life, and would not accept anything less even under these circumstances. She was as stubborn now as she had been when they had been rich, their futures secured by Brian Xavier’s power. Her obstinacy would undoubtedly undermine Charles’s attempts to stretch their resources, but he would surmount that obstacle when it came up.
For now, the most important question was this: what could any of them do to ensure a stable future, and how? Their options, from what Charles could see, were severely limited. His mother was too old and too proud to work; she hadn’t toiled a day in her life, and she wasn’t going to start now. Raven was only sixteen, and after their father had died, her schooling had fallen off as their income had dwindled. She’d had a governess, but she had been a troublesome student, more inclined to run wild outdoors than sit in the library to study properly. He knew she could play the piano and sing tolerably, she could read and write, and she knew her manners. Her academic education had been nowhere near as extensive as Charles’s, her motivation even less so, but she was a gentlewoman, reared under Sharon Xavier’s elegant tutelage. If nothing else, their mother had taught Raven how to be a desirable young woman, and she was getting to the age where men were beginning to notice. When Emma had first been introduced to society, boys all over town had been lusting after her, smitten by her aloof demeanor and frosty sophistication. Barely any attention had been paid to her siblings, who were at the time too young to be pursued and not nearly as interesting.
But now Emma had removed herself from the equation entirely, which meant that Charles and Raven could finally be viable targets of courtship. Or they might have been, if only their reputation were still intact, if only Emma’s actions would not end up reflecting negatively upon the entire family.
Charles clenched his fist on his knee in frustration, wondering if Emma had realized just how much trouble she was causing them, wondering if she cared at all. Charles was a young, intelligent, well-bred omega. Raven was beautiful, clever, and fiery in a way many alphas would find charming. Both of them came weighted with an old-money name of great repute, and their social status was nothing to be scoffed at. And yet, the town’s available alphas would scoff, because Emma had gone and eloped with the stable hand, dragging the Xavier name through the mud as she did, and it would be social suicide to associate with such…ill-mannered people.
He let out a trembling breath. Was that what they were now? The ill-mannered family of the town, shunned and disgraced? If there were no marriage prospects out there for either himself or for Raven, what were they to do? Work? Did Raven have marketable skills? Did he?
[fill] these ties, how fast they break (3b/?)
anonymous
January 19 2013, 07:46:20 UTC
He was desperate enough to consider this seriously. Raven could possibly serve as a governess. She certainly had a basic-level education for it, and she had been close with her own governess; surely she would have picked up some cues or helpful habits. Charles, for his part, could qualify as a private tutor. He had gone to university at Oxford and had earned several distinctions there in the sciences, as well as in philosophy and literature. He also had a near-perfect memory that absorbed information as fast as he could read it, and he could grasp new concepts more quickly than most other students. If required, he could learn more subjects, if that would make an employer take greater notice.
God, was he truly contemplating this? All his life, he had been taught the role of the upper-class, perfectly-composed omega. He was to acquire proper skills in his early years to make himself desirable to future alpha suitors. He was to attend town parties and dance, as politely and primly as his dance tutors had taught him. He was to remain coolly detached from the lower rungs of society, to keep his nose free of the activities relegated only to the ‘lower class,’ according to his mother. She would be horrified if she knew he was thinking of - God forbid - working to earn an income. He knew she would rather he sit idly by in the drawing room, pretending that nothing was the matter, because if there was one thing his mother and all the upper-class families Charles had ever known did well, it was maintaining a perfect façade.
Well. A perfect façade would hardly save their home. He needed to act, and if his mother disapproved, there was nothing to be done about it.
He got up from the desk chair and crossed over to his bookshelf. Running his fingers over the dozens of volumes stacked there - accumulated from his years at Oxford - he glanced over the subjects. Mathematics - basic arithmetic, algebra, calculus. History - Early English, Eastern European, Modern. Literature - Byron, Shakespeare, a recently-published volume of a selection from an American poet named Walt Whitman. Then Charles’s passion - biology, chemistry, Darwin’s revolutionary theory, Mendel’s corresponding publications. He knew quite a lot, and it would not be a chore to pass on his knowledge; he loved learning in any form, and if he could impart even half his enthusiasm to a student, he would be well-satisfied.
Would he be accepted anywhere? Would an omega from a discredited family be accepted as a proper tutor for young, impressionable children? Was there any other choice?
He sighed and returned to his desk. After a moment, he pulled out a sheet of paper, dipped his pen in ink, and began to write.
[fill] these ties, how fast they break (3c/?)
anonymous
January 19 2013, 08:54:07 UTC
*****
His mother was, predictably, furious.
“Charles Xavier,” she said, her entire figure trembling with suppressed rage, “you had better be jesting.”
“I’m not,” he told her solemnly. Though his mother was seated on the couch and he was standing by its arm, he could feel her looking down on him. Once, the strength of her disapproval alone would have made his knees weak. But he had grown up, and the time when he would have cowered under her glare had long since passed. She might have been a natural omega, but he was not. He was his own man, and cowering was something he had taught himself not to do since he was twelve years old.
He was not alone in his deviance. Raven, too, was scarcely the model of the perfect omega; she was slightly too wild, slightly too independent for her own good. Growing up, Charles’s insistence on defying proper social decorum and Raven’s propensity for following where he led had driven their mother mad. There was a reason Emma had always been her favorite. Oh, how she had cooed over Emma, her eldest, brightest, most beautiful child who had learned at age four how to perform a faultless curtsy, who had charmed boys almost since before she knew what marriage was. Emma had played the part of the smiling, stylish debutante while Raven had played with mud and sticks on dirty lake shores, goaded on by a gleeful Charles. It was no wonder why Sharon Xavier, the epitome of the proper omega, had loved Emma best.
How ironic then, Charles thought, that Emma should be the one to ruin them. How perfect she had been, and how rebellious she seemed now. Charles was still not certain if his mother had wept out over their family’s new circumstances or over her groomed successor who had betrayed her in the worst way.
In any case, his mother was not weeping now. She was sitting rigidly in the armchair that Erik Lehnsherr had occupied not even a week earlier. Her thin fingers were gripped tightly together, her knuckles colored white with pressure, her lips pinching in anger.
“You can’t do this,” she said. “I will not allow you.”
Charles met her gaze evenly. “It is not a question of your permission, Mother. I am merely informing you of our options, and of the course of action I have decided to take.”
“You can’t do this,” she insisted, her eyes wide in disbelief. “You are - you are my son, and an Xavier heir - an omega - you aren’t meant to go to foreign homes and - and teach - ”
She spat the word as if it were the equivalent of him going out and shoveling manure. Charles forced himself to remain calm as he answered, “I can, and I will, Mother, unless you can think of a better alternative.”
“We are upper-class,” she hissed, her face twisting in disdain. “We do not lower ourselves to the levels of - of tutors and manual laborers - ”
“Forgive me,” Charles interrupted, “but I would hardly consider becoming a tutor debasing myself, or my status. Do you even think we have a choice, Mother? You know that without Emma’s marriage, we have as good as lost the house to Mr. Marko. When he comes to collect is his business, but I do not plan to sit around and depend on his good grace to keep us alive.”
“You’re being melodramatic - ”
“Am I? You know as well as I that if Kurt Marko decides to turn us out, there is nothing we can do to stop him. Where will we be then? I’m doing this for you and for Raven. If you can’t agree with that…well. It won’t stop me.”
He held his mother’s gaze resolutely, matching her glare for glare. Sharon Xavier may have taught him etiquette, but his time at Oxford had taught him backbone. He used it now, knowing his mother would capitulate eventually because she had never been particularly adept at argumentation. A good omega was agreeable and acquiescent after all.
Finally, she glanced away, her mouth drawn in an unhappy line. “An omega like you isn’t meant to be working like this. You won’t get hired anyway. With our…” She struggled visibly for a moment. “…With our reputation, what sort of offers do you hope to receive? No one will even want an Xavier as a spouse ever again, let alone as a tutor to children.”
[fill] these ties, how fast they break (3d/?)
anonymous
January 19 2013, 08:55:40 UTC
Charles sighed. “I know as much, Mother. I’m not a fool. But I have to try. Do you understand?”
“No, I don’t.” She stood and crossed over to him, her expression weary. “But you were always different. Do as you like.”
Then she disappeared from the room, leaving him alone once more.
*****
One week passed, then another. Charles had walked out to town several times, asking after open posts at various households. He had been turned away each time with thinly-veiled contempt or simply with disinterest. Apparently, all of York had now heard of Emma’s indiscretions, and the town was determined to shun them as thoroughly as possible. Charles had never felt as humiliated in his life as he had when he had walked down the street by the farmer’s market and a group of men a few years older than him had shouted obscenities at his back, asking if he were available, too, asking if he would elope with any of them, with such a lewd emphasis on elope that he had shuddered and hurried on.
He was beginning to despair. It had been over two weeks since he had begun to advertise his availability as a tutor, and he had not even gotten so much as a glance of interest. Raven had put out tentative inquiries after a governess position and had found nothing. They were without inheritance, without prospect of marriage, without even the possibility of employment. Charles was checking the books every night, scribbling calculations in the margins, cutting back on purchases. Still, he could tell they would not last longer than a year, and the threat of Kurt Marko’s arrival loomed large with every passing day. He could not, for the life of him, imagine what they would do if Marko came collecting now, when they were dangerously close to coming apart at the seams.
One evening, close to a month after Emma had gone, he was sitting in his study staring blankly at a book in his lap when Raven burst into the room, panting and fairly brimming with breathless apprehension. “There’s a rider downstairs,” she said, her eyes wide. “He’s from Thornfield. He says he has a message for you.”
Charles stared at her for a moment before dropping his book and rushing out. He leaped down the stairs and stopped just at the top of the second floor, pausing to straighten his waistcoat and slow his breathing. Then he descended to the foyer as calmly as he could manage and found the messenger waiting patiently in the sitting room.
“Mr. Xavier,” the man said, bowing. “I am Mr. Lehnsherr’s servant, Janos. I have been instructed to deliver a letter to you.”
He held out a thin envelope, and Charles took it, confused. At Janos’s expectant look, he slid his finger under the flap and broke the seal. The letter inside was written on creamy, thick paper, and the script was neat and elegant. Charles read it once, then again. Then he raised his eyes incredulously to Janos, who was watching him equably.
“Is this a joke?” Charles managed.
Janos’s eyebrows lifted. “Mr. Lehnsherr does not joke. He says that if you are amenable to the offer, he will send a horse for you tomorrow morning to discuss the terms. He would like an answer as soon as it is convenient.”
Charles gaped at him for a long moment. His eyes flicked unbidden back to the letter in his hands - back to the job offer. Was this reality? Erik Lehnsherr, Emma’s spurned fiancé, extending a hand to him when the rest of society had not? What were the odds? What were the chances this was a cruel trick, an act of vengeance for the social embarrassment Emma’s elopement had likely caused Lehnsherr?
And yet, how could Charles say no? If this were nothing more than Lehnsherr’s revenge, then Charles would endure it. And if this were something real, then he would be forever grateful for the opportunity. There was no other answer.
“Yes,” he said. “I’ll be ready tomorrow morning at nine.”
Re: [fill] these ties, how fast they break (3d/?)
anonymous
January 19 2013, 18:42:00 UTC
OP has so much admiration for Charles right now. So strong in the face of adversity, and so practical and common sensical. Loved how you added in that detail of Charles' harassment--a good way of showing what he's got to contend with as an omega, and he just seems stronger for it.
Question for author--is going to Oxford unusual for an omega in this 'verse? I was getting the sense that Charles' interests in science and academics was something of an irregularity.
For now, the most important question was this: what could any of them do to ensure a stable future, and how? Their options, from what Charles could see, were severely limited. His mother was too old and too proud to work; she hadn’t toiled a day in her life, and she wasn’t going to start now. Raven was only sixteen, and after their father had died, her schooling had fallen off as their income had dwindled. She’d had a governess, but she had been a troublesome student, more inclined to run wild outdoors than sit in the library to study properly. He knew she could play the piano and sing tolerably, she could read and write, and she knew her manners. Her academic education had been nowhere near as extensive as Charles’s, her motivation even less so, but she was a gentlewoman, reared under Sharon Xavier’s elegant tutelage. If nothing else, their mother had taught Raven how to be a desirable young woman, and she was getting to the age where men were beginning to notice. When Emma had first been introduced to society, boys all over town had been lusting after her, smitten by her aloof demeanor and frosty sophistication. Barely any attention had been paid to her siblings, who were at the time too young to be pursued and not nearly as interesting.
But now Emma had removed herself from the equation entirely, which meant that Charles and Raven could finally be viable targets of courtship. Or they might have been, if only their reputation were still intact, if only Emma’s actions would not end up reflecting negatively upon the entire family.
Charles clenched his fist on his knee in frustration, wondering if Emma had realized just how much trouble she was causing them, wondering if she cared at all. Charles was a young, intelligent, well-bred omega. Raven was beautiful, clever, and fiery in a way many alphas would find charming. Both of them came weighted with an old-money name of great repute, and their social status was nothing to be scoffed at. And yet, the town’s available alphas would scoff, because Emma had gone and eloped with the stable hand, dragging the Xavier name through the mud as she did, and it would be social suicide to associate with such…ill-mannered people.
He let out a trembling breath. Was that what they were now? The ill-mannered family of the town, shunned and disgraced? If there were no marriage prospects out there for either himself or for Raven, what were they to do? Work? Did Raven have marketable skills? Did he?
Reply
God, was he truly contemplating this? All his life, he had been taught the role of the upper-class, perfectly-composed omega. He was to acquire proper skills in his early years to make himself desirable to future alpha suitors. He was to attend town parties and dance, as politely and primly as his dance tutors had taught him. He was to remain coolly detached from the lower rungs of society, to keep his nose free of the activities relegated only to the ‘lower class,’ according to his mother. She would be horrified if she knew he was thinking of - God forbid - working to earn an income. He knew she would rather he sit idly by in the drawing room, pretending that nothing was the matter, because if there was one thing his mother and all the upper-class families Charles had ever known did well, it was maintaining a perfect façade.
Well. A perfect façade would hardly save their home. He needed to act, and if his mother disapproved, there was nothing to be done about it.
He got up from the desk chair and crossed over to his bookshelf. Running his fingers over the dozens of volumes stacked there - accumulated from his years at Oxford - he glanced over the subjects. Mathematics - basic arithmetic, algebra, calculus. History - Early English, Eastern European, Modern. Literature - Byron, Shakespeare, a recently-published volume of a selection from an American poet named Walt Whitman. Then Charles’s passion - biology, chemistry, Darwin’s revolutionary theory, Mendel’s corresponding publications. He knew quite a lot, and it would not be a chore to pass on his knowledge; he loved learning in any form, and if he could impart even half his enthusiasm to a student, he would be well-satisfied.
Would he be accepted anywhere? Would an omega from a discredited family be accepted as a proper tutor for young, impressionable children? Was there any other choice?
He sighed and returned to his desk. After a moment, he pulled out a sheet of paper, dipped his pen in ink, and began to write.
Reply
His mother was, predictably, furious.
“Charles Xavier,” she said, her entire figure trembling with suppressed rage, “you had better be jesting.”
“I’m not,” he told her solemnly. Though his mother was seated on the couch and he was standing by its arm, he could feel her looking down on him. Once, the strength of her disapproval alone would have made his knees weak. But he had grown up, and the time when he would have cowered under her glare had long since passed. She might have been a natural omega, but he was not. He was his own man, and cowering was something he had taught himself not to do since he was twelve years old.
He was not alone in his deviance. Raven, too, was scarcely the model of the perfect omega; she was slightly too wild, slightly too independent for her own good. Growing up, Charles’s insistence on defying proper social decorum and Raven’s propensity for following where he led had driven their mother mad. There was a reason Emma had always been her favorite. Oh, how she had cooed over Emma, her eldest, brightest, most beautiful child who had learned at age four how to perform a faultless curtsy, who had charmed boys almost since before she knew what marriage was. Emma had played the part of the smiling, stylish debutante while Raven had played with mud and sticks on dirty lake shores, goaded on by a gleeful Charles. It was no wonder why Sharon Xavier, the epitome of the proper omega, had loved Emma best.
How ironic then, Charles thought, that Emma should be the one to ruin them. How perfect she had been, and how rebellious she seemed now. Charles was still not certain if his mother had wept out over their family’s new circumstances or over her groomed successor who had betrayed her in the worst way.
In any case, his mother was not weeping now. She was sitting rigidly in the armchair that Erik Lehnsherr had occupied not even a week earlier. Her thin fingers were gripped tightly together, her knuckles colored white with pressure, her lips pinching in anger.
“You can’t do this,” she said. “I will not allow you.”
Charles met her gaze evenly. “It is not a question of your permission, Mother. I am merely informing you of our options, and of the course of action I have decided to take.”
“You can’t do this,” she insisted, her eyes wide in disbelief. “You are - you are my son, and an Xavier heir - an omega - you aren’t meant to go to foreign homes and - and teach - ”
She spat the word as if it were the equivalent of him going out and shoveling manure. Charles forced himself to remain calm as he answered, “I can, and I will, Mother, unless you can think of a better alternative.”
“We are upper-class,” she hissed, her face twisting in disdain. “We do not lower ourselves to the levels of - of tutors and manual laborers - ”
“Forgive me,” Charles interrupted, “but I would hardly consider becoming a tutor debasing myself, or my status. Do you even think we have a choice, Mother? You know that without Emma’s marriage, we have as good as lost the house to Mr. Marko. When he comes to collect is his business, but I do not plan to sit around and depend on his good grace to keep us alive.”
“You’re being melodramatic - ”
“Am I? You know as well as I that if Kurt Marko decides to turn us out, there is nothing we can do to stop him. Where will we be then? I’m doing this for you and for Raven. If you can’t agree with that…well. It won’t stop me.”
He held his mother’s gaze resolutely, matching her glare for glare. Sharon Xavier may have taught him etiquette, but his time at Oxford had taught him backbone. He used it now, knowing his mother would capitulate eventually because she had never been particularly adept at argumentation. A good omega was agreeable and acquiescent after all.
Finally, she glanced away, her mouth drawn in an unhappy line. “An omega like you isn’t meant to be working like this. You won’t get hired anyway. With our…” She struggled visibly for a moment. “…With our reputation, what sort of offers do you hope to receive? No one will even want an Xavier as a spouse ever again, let alone as a tutor to children.”
Reply
“No, I don’t.” She stood and crossed over to him, her expression weary. “But you were always different. Do as you like.”
Then she disappeared from the room, leaving him alone once more.
*****
One week passed, then another. Charles had walked out to town several times, asking after open posts at various households. He had been turned away each time with thinly-veiled contempt or simply with disinterest. Apparently, all of York had now heard of Emma’s indiscretions, and the town was determined to shun them as thoroughly as possible. Charles had never felt as humiliated in his life as he had when he had walked down the street by the farmer’s market and a group of men a few years older than him had shouted obscenities at his back, asking if he were available, too, asking if he would elope with any of them, with such a lewd emphasis on elope that he had shuddered and hurried on.
He was beginning to despair. It had been over two weeks since he had begun to advertise his availability as a tutor, and he had not even gotten so much as a glance of interest. Raven had put out tentative inquiries after a governess position and had found nothing. They were without inheritance, without prospect of marriage, without even the possibility of employment. Charles was checking the books every night, scribbling calculations in the margins, cutting back on purchases. Still, he could tell they would not last longer than a year, and the threat of Kurt Marko’s arrival loomed large with every passing day. He could not, for the life of him, imagine what they would do if Marko came collecting now, when they were dangerously close to coming apart at the seams.
One evening, close to a month after Emma had gone, he was sitting in his study staring blankly at a book in his lap when Raven burst into the room, panting and fairly brimming with breathless apprehension. “There’s a rider downstairs,” she said, her eyes wide. “He’s from Thornfield. He says he has a message for you.”
Charles stared at her for a moment before dropping his book and rushing out. He leaped down the stairs and stopped just at the top of the second floor, pausing to straighten his waistcoat and slow his breathing. Then he descended to the foyer as calmly as he could manage and found the messenger waiting patiently in the sitting room.
“Mr. Xavier,” the man said, bowing. “I am Mr. Lehnsherr’s servant, Janos. I have been instructed to deliver a letter to you.”
He held out a thin envelope, and Charles took it, confused. At Janos’s expectant look, he slid his finger under the flap and broke the seal. The letter inside was written on creamy, thick paper, and the script was neat and elegant. Charles read it once, then again. Then he raised his eyes incredulously to Janos, who was watching him equably.
“Is this a joke?” Charles managed.
Janos’s eyebrows lifted. “Mr. Lehnsherr does not joke. He says that if you are amenable to the offer, he will send a horse for you tomorrow morning to discuss the terms. He would like an answer as soon as it is convenient.”
Charles gaped at him for a long moment. His eyes flicked unbidden back to the letter in his hands - back to the job offer. Was this reality? Erik Lehnsherr, Emma’s spurned fiancé, extending a hand to him when the rest of society had not? What were the odds? What were the chances this was a cruel trick, an act of vengeance for the social embarrassment Emma’s elopement had likely caused Lehnsherr?
And yet, how could Charles say no? If this were nothing more than Lehnsherr’s revenge, then Charles would endure it. And if this were something real, then he would be forever grateful for the opportunity. There was no other answer.
“Yes,” he said. “I’ll be ready tomorrow morning at nine.”
Reply
can't wait to see how Charles/Erik relationship will develop!
Reply
Question for author--is going to Oxford unusual for an omega in this 'verse? I was getting the sense that Charles' interests in science and academics was something of an irregularity.
Reply
Reply
Leave a comment