Just as swift as he came with a stride, Sirius was gone with another. There was distance again, between them, though nothing like the prior awkward one; this was a charged tension birthed on expectations.
It is basic human nature to attach expectations even with a mere acquaintance. One classifies them in their own standards and expects them to act accordingly, without even knowing that they are creating biases in their heads.
All biases hurt, the good ones as well as the bad ones.
If one was to meet a raggedy old man on the road, one would expect him to beg for money or goods. If one would meet a foul mouthed folk, one would expect them to be agressive and uneducated.
Though Ori belonged to both of the two aforementioned categories, she had not a clue what the Duke expected of her! For one wouldn't buy elite titles or create false backgrounds for Raggedy Street Beggars or Foul Mouthed Folks. Right?
Or maybe that was all in Ori's biased head and the Duke was a good person. Just, a very hard to read and attach expectations sort of a person.
"Bring Lady Gregory the medicine and we shall provide her with privacy to get dressed," Sirius declared, clapping his hands to get the maids to work.
A chorus of, "Yes, Your Grace," erupted amongst them as most of the maids fluttered away to complete the assigned chore whilst four of them stayed behind an agitated looking Albert.
"We shall be leaving her here, Your Grace?" Albert questioned in the most polite tone he could muster. To add additional curtsy, he kept his head bowed with one hand over his heart and the other behind his back.
"Yes Jenkins, we shall," Sirius stated, walking across the room to fetch a leather covered diary from the mantelpiece. It was a dull brown in color and its cover was handcarved with intricacies.
"But— Your Grace! It is your room! We cannot—" Albert added so much pressure on the word that Sirius had to audibly sigh in his face to make him stop.
"Let us go, Jenkins, lest you bust a blood vessel or two," the Duke gestured the maids to drag the whining butler out of his sight. "My Lady," Sirius curtsied to Ori and strode out of the room. The brunette waved both of her hands to his departing back.
"He has long legs," Ori let out a low whistle in observation, for Sirius only took three strides to reach the door on the opposite end of the mantlepiece.
The remaining two maids closed the doors behind the Duke and greeted Ori with curtsy. It made her feel all awkward and undeserving of such treatment. The brunette shuffled around in the bed, evading eye contact with a flurry of, "Oh you don't need to be so formal with me," and "No, No, it's okay."
Ori was ready to bury her head in a pillow and give up the pretence, when her gaze landed on a familiar yellowing piece of parchment. Ori fished it out from between the pillows and realised it to be her father's letter. The one she had given to the Duke during their last meeting.
Ori unfolded the paper and skimmed her eyes over words she couldn't read or spell. Though, from overhearing her parents speak on multiple occasions, she did know that it was a letter issued by Nobelai's Holy Empress to her father, one of the Holy Knights, after he had defeated a dragon of some sort.
"I wonder if the Duke read it," Ori mumbled under her breath. 'Is this the reason why he agreed to make me a Knight?' Ori wondered as she folded the piece of paper again and restored it to its hiding place.
There was a knock on the door as a maid called out, "Medicine for the Lady!" Ori looked around with her mouth pursed close and both the maids inside the room stared through her soul.
With wide eyes brimming with expectations.
It creeped her out of her wits.
Ori shifted closer to the bedpost farthest from the door and clutched the blankets to her chest for the room was too cold with one of the windows opened.
"Should I let her in?" One of the maids finally voiced out, much to Ori's genuine surprise. Her jaw hung low.
She was being asked for consent — to open a door and let someone in? Her- Ori, of all people?!
Don't people just barge in and do what they are supposed to do? And return with the door left open behind them?
Considering the topic of doors was too foreign for Ori and all her experiences were stories of rants and annoyances berated by Arcelia. The dwarf was forever annoyed with her husband who never remembered to close the doors behind him.
Ori was almost going to say, 'Are you asking me?' but then she was reminded of Sirius' little curtsy before he left. A Duke bowing before a peasant girl like her— she must keep his respect!!
A shudder ran through her soul as Ori cleared her throat and nodded, "Yes please, come in," she uttered as modestly as she could. Strange were the days she was living in. Strange were the times she was teleported into. How fast does the night changes? She had only been out for two days.
The door was pulled opened by the maids and in walked another with a tray in hand, adorned with the most beautiful piece of pottery Ori had ever seen. Behind her was a train of maids, sashaying inside with clothes, hairbrushes and suspicious looking wooden boxes.
"Your medicine, my Lady," the maid offered the little navy jar, patterened with embossing moon and stars, to Ori. "You must drink all of it in one go," she urged as Ori picked up the little jar from the tray.
"Thank you, ha-he," Ori managed awkwardly, hands sweating upon touching something so beautiful. Ori's heart thundered in its cage, birthing a series of what-ifs in her head.
What if she chokes on the medicine?
What if she accidentally knocks the jar to the floor?
What if she drops its contents on the bed?
Suddenly, Albert's accusatory words rang in her head, "A peasant has soiled your sheets, my sire!"
Ori sucked in a breath and hastily put the jar back on the tray, grinning sheepishly whilst looking the confused maid in the eye.
"Would you mind helping me to the floor?" Ori asked, holding out a hand for help. She couldn't risk breaking something so beautiful or making Albert feel right.
"It would be my absolute pleasure," one of the maids walked up to the bed and took Ori's hand. The brunette fired a flurry of, "Thank you so much!" and "You're the kindest!" as the maid helped her shift across the bed and land on the floor without hurting her knees.
Ori pulled the blanket down, along with her, and the maid helped Ori to wrap it around her arms and keep herself warm and covered.
Both the maid and Ori were red in their faces, out of embarrassment, dealing with unexpected gentleness on both sides of the spectrum. Ori had never thought that anyone other than Arcelia was genuinely kind and the maid was not used to grateful masters.
"May I ask, Lady Gregory, with all due respect, why would you like to be served on the floor?" The maid holding her medicine questioned.
Ori pressed her teeth together, suppressing the urge to say, 'I have lived my whole life like this. It is comfortable.' They would surely consider her weird and figure out the whole scam.
So, looking up from the ground, at the genuinely curious and flabbergasted faces of the maids, Ori replied, "Oh, you see, our Gregory family has this tradition that we must always be down to Earth. It sustains our life as mightly as our Empress does, am I correct?"
Whispers erupted within the silent room.
"And if you eat or drink medicine whilst on the ground," Ori remembered her father's words, "then there is a healthy energy flow between you and the magic core inside the Earth. You get healthier sooner and," she placed a hand beside her mouth and whispered almost in conspiracy, "you stay younger."
Instantly, all the maids dropped to their knees with loud clinks and clanks.
"Lady Gregory, you are the wisest woman I have met!" The maid with the medicine exclaimed, to the agreement of all others.
Ori worked hard to supress a snort, lest the illusion of her greatness would shatter. "Then, I don't think you've met many women," Ori retorted cheekily, picking up the jar with much more comfort now.
"She's so humble."
"She's so kind."
"She's so gentle."
"She's so beautiful."
"No wonder the Duke let her stay in his room."
The maids whispered amongst themselves out of Ori's earshot. The brunette opened the lid of the jar and grimaced at the sight of a bubbling dark green liquid within.
"Beautiful from the outside cannot be trusted," Ori mumbled under her breath, scrunching her nose as she brought the liquid close to her lips and gulped it down in a go.
"She is so wise!"
"She must be an Argenti Philosopher!"
"We must write down her words!"
The maids saw Ori's disgust with rose tinted glasses. The brunette had no idea of her uneducated arse being compared to that of philosophers as she chugged the liquid and gently rested the jar (she was terrified of it collapsing in her hands) back on the tray again.
"Thank you so much for the medicine," Ori groaned bitterly, remembering her mother's words to always thank anyone who provides them a meal. "How fast will it work?" She questioned the maid kneeling in front of her.
"I'd give it two hours, Lady Gregory," she replied as she got up and curtsied.
"Then— how am I supposed to go down?" Ori frowned, craning her neck to look up at her.
"Why, the Duke shall assist you with that, my Lady," the maid passed a small wink to Ori and walked away with a smooth, "I shall get going now."
Ori had not fully understood the true essence of the words until she was coddled into a navy dress way out of league, doused in a bucket of lace and pearls and was butchered by pins and hot curls— all in the name of a mere breakfast with the Duke.
And Ori had not fully understood the true essence of those actions until she was sat in front of the Duke, staring at her with wide eyes and, holding his arm out for her to take.