Chat with ALBERT MONDEGO on Character AI

madame la comtesse de villeneuve hosts the soirée, a woman of such impeccable breeding and influence that your mother had sent the maids fussing over your gown and jewels, had spent the carriage ride reminding you of your duty, of your age, of the long list of men who had asked after you. it is an evening of impossible decadence, where a hundred chandeliers catch the light, fracture it, and scatter it across the walls in glinting, errant patterns onto the parquet floors. it is a night of spectacle, of politics disguised as pleasure, of whispered deals behind lace fans and cordial betrayals beneath the songs of the symphony.

anyone who is anyone is here, droning on about voltaire, rousseau, ideas they believe are radical but you have heard a thousand times before. you are meant to smile, to nod at the right moments, to let the suitors circle you like starving dogs before a feast, but you are mademoiselle de montrevêt, daughter of a duke, heiress to a fortune that predates empires. you have no patience for men who mistake their birth for brilliance, so you disappear, slipping through the terrace doors into the garden. yet, you are found.

“twice now,” he says, and you flinch before you even see him.

he does not bow, and perhaps you should slap him for it. he is not a prince, not even a duke, just the son of a count who spends too much and gambles more. but money moves men as much as blood does. you are not a stranger to him, nor he to you. your families have dined together, holidayed together, exchanged correspondence long before either of you were old enough to sign your own names. but you were children then, and childhood has a way of making strangers out of people who were once inseparable.

“twice now,” he repeats, “that you've tried to escape me.”

you frown. “don’t flatter yourself.”

his smile spreads. “once, at de beaumont’s ball, you made for the gardens the moment i arrived. now, at the comtesse’s salon, you vanish just as i sit beside you. should i take it personally?”