Don't Tell Mama (The Summer Brood & Guests)

[Jenny]

Rolling her eyes, Jenny made a big show of putting her phone away with a huff, slipping down in her chair slightly and picking up a tea spoon from the table and spinning it in her hand. The talk of shopping had convinced her this might be worth it, but she so did not want to be here. She raised an eyebrow at Gaston's protest, looking at him incredulously.

"Popular? You? Yeah, right."

Wrinkling her nose at Jesse's next comment, Jenny wondered what cruel god had lumbered her with such weirdos for siblings. At least Tristian wasn't a complete psychopath. One out of five was something at least.

At her mother's next question, Jenny spoke up again. "I thought I saw her with a cast on her arm the other day." She said loudly, oblivious to the information the rest of her siblings were working to keep quiet. "And I heard this mental rumour the other day about her." She laughed as she remembered, looking straight at her mother. "Everyone is saying she got stabbed by a bat!" She laughed, looking around the table and expecting her siblings to join in her laughter. "Or, like, a boy who turned into a bat? Either way, it was hilarious.  You guys heard that rumour, right?"

As she looked around the table, Jenny noticed Genevieve glaring at her.  "What?"

[Meredith Emrys-Pendragon]

"Gaston is popular," Meredith shot back to Jenny "Loads of people like him, just because they're not the kind of people you like doesn't mean they don't count."

She winced as Jenny wittered on about Lorelei's arm in the cast, and shot Gwen a panicked look out the corner of her eye, wondering how she was taking the news - and then she suddenly remembered.
Gwen knew about the duel. She was toying with them, Lorelei had said in her message that she'd sent her mother a letter because she'd been worried the duel would go, well, as badly as it nearly did. Which meant Gwen was just waiting to see which one of them would admit that the duel had happened.
Sneaky. It was moments like this that Meredith really admired Gwen, she only wished she had even half of her ability for subterfuge, but unfortunately she took after her father quite a bit.

What Gwen didn't necessarily know, however, was how badly that duel had gone, and if Meredith could save her friend from a lecture - especially one she'd already had from half her siblings - she would do what she could.

"What a stupid rumour, where do these things even come from?" she asked loudly, raising an eyebrow. She was actually a little intrigued, a bat was pretty strange after all, where had that come from? "You probably saw the cast because Lorelei hurt her wrist, she was in a duel. She told you about the challenge, didn't she?" she asked, turning her attention to Gwen, hoping she sounded more casual than she felt. The wrist she couldn't hide, it was still in plaster after all, but the other injuries she could maybe avoid just for the moment at least.

[Genevieve]

Genevieve’s smile grew as Jesse told her about the statue he’d made of their dad. “Oh Jesse, he will love that!” She reached over and squeezed his hand. “Will you make me something?”

And then Jenny was speaking again, and Genevieve looked at her sharply, glaring at her hoping desperately she would see, she would understand and for once in her life she would shut up. Genevieve hadn’t been at the duel but she had heard all about it, and it sounded awful - but the last thing any of them wanted was for their mother to find out just how bad. She didn’t know what Gwen would do, but she didn’t think it would end well for any of them - especially Mordred. And while none of them were fans of his right now, she didn’t wish her mother’s anger on him.

She gave a tiny shake of her head when Jenny finally noticed her, praying her mother wouldn’t see. She hated this, she hated hiding things from her mother but she knew that this time it was necessary.

She breathed slightly easier when Meredith jumped in. She glanced at her mother, hoping she would accept Meredith’s explanation. If Gwen knew Mordred had nearly killed Lorelei... Genevieve couldn’t bear to think about it.

[Lorelei Summer-Lac]

Oh how Lorelei wished she'd been present for most of this actual conversation. She could tell from Meredith's and Tristian's texts that things were going down, that she definitely had to be there (despite her strong desire otherwise), and that her mother had reserved a Seat of Shame for her. Hopefully she could just play this off as getting lost (believable? Did any of her family remember that she'd completely memorized maps of Trenale and had her own versions cobbled from various notes that may or may not have included secret passages?). Or maybe she could state the very real thing of dressing taking far, far long than it should have, given the circumstances.

But at last, after a delay that had to have felt like a week to the people inside, Lorelei arrived. Now, normally, Lorelei looked like a closet had ambushed her in an alley and left her the worse for it. This time, however, it looked like Lorelei had put up a fight and actually won. The light blue dress definitely qualified as "summer," which would likely have made her shiver under most circumstances. A pair of white tights helped fight that, as did the silver and white wrapping/fingerless glove she wore on her right hand. Her left arm just bore the splint for now. The hair had been twisted up into a loose bun, just a few tendrils falling out into Lorelei's eyes. and her shoes were actually a pair of light blue sneakers that her mother had given her in preparation for walking around Trenale.

"So sorry I'm late, Mo--moth---your highness," offered Lorelei, bobbing awkwardly to her mother. She looked around, seeing that she'd literally walked into some conversation. Hey, there were seats off beside Meredith. Maybe Lorelei would end up there instead of in the seat of shame. "I'll just seat myself, no need to get up or anything," she said, trying to shuffle over toward Meredith. If Lorelei had her way, she'd be literally hiding behind her friend for most of this dinner.

[Gaston Jr]

He couldn’t help but beam at Meredith as she stood up for him. Looking over at Jenny he said, “I will have you know that I am King of the nerds, I am as a god amongst my people.”

It was sort of true, out of all the nerds that he knew he certainly seemed to gather a lot of people around him, and people did tend to value his opinion on the latest things to do with geekdom. Todd was the only true threat to his crown, but Todd would never stab him in the back like that…Gaston jr was going to keep a closer eye on Todd…

He was losing himself in his own thoughts about Todd potentially being a Judas that he had missed Jenny’s comment about Lorelei until Meredith piped up with her own version. Of course everyone had heard the rumours, he hadn’t gotten a chance to go see Lorelei yet but he had heard she had been in hospital. Of course when she came in and he saw the cast, he looked at her in shock and without thinking blurted, “Rory! What happened to your arm?! If you say you didn’t hurt it in a lightsabre duel I’m going to be very disappointed. That is the only acceptable way to hurt ones arm.”

[Jesse]

Jesse squeezed her hand back and smiled, “of course. I’m already working on something at the moment, a piece entitled Vincent the Great, it’s based off of one of Lorelei’s literary works. I’m hoping Meredith might have a spell to bring him to life, sort of like Pygmalion.”

Which was when he realised that the topic of conversation had turned to the writer in question. He smiled cheerily and said, “Oh yes, she was definitely in a duel, I was there, although rather disappointingly no she did not get stabbed by a bat or was turned into one, that would certainly have been a marvel of the animal kingdom. However she was stabbed by-”

The door open and Lorelei entered, he motioned to her and said, “Ah, here she is, she will be able to tell it better. Lorelei, I was just telling mother how you were not stabbed by bat or turned into one, and that you were in fact stabbed by-”

[Tristian]

“-more tea mother?,” said Tristian quickly, before Jesse could dig an even bigger hole for their sister.

He had tried to subtly signal to Jenny as she was speaking to stop however apparently the signals had been too subtle. He liked Jenny, she liked to shop and she always had the best gossip, he was one of the few siblings that he could spend time around without becoming frustrated with them; however she was really pushing the boundary on that as well. Meredith had already done a good cover in terms of the wrist.

He had been relieved when Lorelei had finally entered, even more relieved when he saw that she had dressed appropriately for the tea and nodded his subtle approval to her as entered…which was when Jesse and Gaston Jr really let the side down…

It felt wrong to lie to his mother, it wasn’t really a lie, more a diversion technique, but it just wasn’t right. Still, he wanted to buy Lorelei some time to think up a story (if she did not have one already, hopefully it would involve lots of high speed chases and better clothing) and of course…he wanted to protect Mordred…just a little longer. Because when mum found out about that...hopefully she wouldn’t.

[Guinevere]

Ah Jenny, of course, she could always rely on Jenny to bring her the best news, whether intentionally or not. She smiled a little as her daughter spoke, however her eyes travelled around the rest of the table to gage the reaction of the rest of them. Genevieve looked like she wanted jump across the table and stick a gag in her sisters mouth, Meredith was already trying to do damage control (which was impressive, she had clearly figured out a few key things, well she was Merlin’s daughter too, there had to be brains in there somewhere) and Tristian was on diversionary tactics.

Then of course Jesse, sweet strange little boy that he was, ruined all their good work. Which of course was the perfect time for the girl in question to step into the café.

She took note of the cast. Just as she was told. The other things would be harder to spot at this point. Her eyes roamed the rest of her, analysing every part, looking for any further sign of damage. She tried to keep her expression neutral but try as she might concern was etched all over it.

Her analysis complete she smiled at her daughter and taking the teapot off of Tristian started to pour some tea into the cup at the setting beside her, “Lorelei, so glad you could finally join us, please, come sit by me.”

Placing the teapot back on the table she reached over and gently moved a strand of Lorelei’s hair out of her face, she glanced at the cast and said, “We are going shopping after tea darling, we’ll get you something nice for that…now…sweetling…” with her free hand she reached into her handbag and took out the letter that Lorelei had sent, and placed it in front of her, “and the rest of you…” her voice changed from soothing and caring to the Queenly tone she adopted usually when she was on throne, “tell me what happened. Tell me, the truth.”

[Mordred Le Fey]

Dearest Mordred,

I would be delighted if you would join me in Todd’s Tea Shop tomorrow at 2:15PM for some afternoon tea. I find myself in the neighbourhood and I am eager to catch up on all the goings on and could think of no one better for such information than yourself. Besides, I have someone else that will be attending who is really looking forward to seeing you again.

I look forward to seeing you there,
Guinevere

She knew.

Mordred had found the Summer messenger waiting outside his door when he returned from meeting his father. Snatching the note from him without a word, he’d gone into the house and slammed the door behind him, heading straight back to his bedroom and locking himself in before collapsing back on the bed, where he’d spent around 90% of his time since the duel.

It had taken him about 4 hours to gather the courage to actually open the note, and he immediately wished he hadn’t. He wished he’d never left the house, if he’d just done what he’d been doing for the last - he’d lost count of how many days - he’d never have seen the messenger and would never have got the note.

He wasn’t going to go. No way in hell was he putting himself in that position. Nope, he was going to stay right here, with his recently delivered booze for company. He was not leaving this room.

Shit. He had to go. She was the goddamn queen.

He didn’t sleep at all the night before, instead sat on his bed, working his way through various bottles of whatever was in his room, and chain smoking, his vape long forgotten. He had spent some time trying to work out what to tell her, how to get himself out of the whole situation, but the more he thought about that the more the appealing the bottle of pills hidden under his mattress looked. As dawn rolled around Mordred hadn’t moved, still drinking, still smoking, still yo-yoing between no way in hell am I going and shit, I have to go or she’ll come and find me.

He finally left the house at 2:25pm. He had attempted to make some kind of effort; he had put on a dark, grey suit but it hung loosely off him - apparently 4 or 5 days of a liquid diet resulted in pretty rapid weight loss. The gash on his cheek, Lorelei’s little gift from the duel, had become infected due to lack of care, and he’d stuck a dressing over it, knowing it looked pretty disgusting. He still had a bruise on his jawline from Tristian’s punch which was now sickly shades of yellow and green. His cheeks were drawn and he looked gaunt, his hair messy but far from his usual artful mess, and he had dark circles under his bloodshot eyes. Appearance and grooming hadn’t been high on his list of priorities since he decided life wasn’t worth living anymore. Despite a quick shower, he had a lingering smell of stale alcohol which no amount of cologne would cover, and his hands shook constantly.

He was a mess, and his only hope, as he looked in the mirror before leaving the house, was that his pathetic appearance might persuade the queen to take pity on him. As long as no one else saw him like this, he couldn’t summon the will to care.

The light outside was bright after the darkness of his room, and he wore dark sunglasses as he walked to the tea shop, his head down, smoking what he couldn’t help feeling was the condemned man’s last cigarette. As he reached the tea shop he looked up at the sign with a feeling of imminent dread, and after dropping his cigarette and crushing it under his shoe, he took a deep breath and entered the cafe, the tinkling bell making him cringe. He took his sunglasses off and looked around, freezing as the worst sight he could have imagined met his eyes.

The entire Summer clan. And Meredith. All of them - his worst fear realised right in front of him. He’d rather face a pack of wild dogs - it would have been quicker and cleaner.

“Oh, fuck.”

[Jenny]

"Whatever." Jenny shrugged off Meredith's indignant comment, and rolled her eyes again as Gaston spoke. "You are so lame. I can't believe we actually share DNA." She muttered, tapping the spoon again. This was so dull.

She looked around in mild confusion as everyone began denying her rumour. "Whatever, I'm only saying what I heard..." She muttered, as Jesse spoke. "Wait... she was stabbed? That is amazing, who did it?"

She looked up as Lorelei entered - things were starting to get interesting. For once in her life she decided to keep her mouth shut, and just watch what happened next, especially as their mum pulled out a letter and started asking questions. She had no idea what was going on, but she had a feeling there was a good show coming.

Especially when Mordred then appeared. Her mouth fell open slightly as she took his appearance in. "Gods, he looks rough." She muttered, shaking her head.

[Lorelei Summer-Lac]

So now Lorelei knew roughly like what her version of hell would look like. First, she'd be wounded and still recovering from pain in all her favorite spots. Then, her mother would descend to arrange a tea and purposefully put Lorelei in the Seat of Shame. Oh, and everyone would be staring at her, because she'd be late. And by everyone of course that meant everyone who mattered save for her dad (and thank God he wasn't here, or that Lorelei didn't have a crush on anyone; this was crushing enough, thanks). Then Mordred, the guy who slept with her best friend, had stabbed Lorelei a few times, had some sort of relationship with Tristian (what was going on there?), and could totally be redeemed if they tried, would show up. Of course to top all this off, Jenny had to be there making snide comments.

Also she'd been threatened with shopping. so there's that too.

So, yeah, Lorelei might have locked up in sheer panic, staring at a letter, at her siblings, at the guy who was all but standing next to her and his cheek really didn't look all that great.

"The truth," said Lorelei, speaking slower than normal. This was an illusion; this is Lorelei. "Well, it's actually rather simple. Mordred insulted Meredith's honor through actions. I found out about it because that's pretty much what I'm best at. I challenged Mordred to a duel to third blood out of honor. Tristian oversaw it because that's what he does. There were some blows exchanged, no big deal. Healing magics. Meredith showed up at the end. Oh, and Jesse was there. And the penguin mermaid princess. So there were lots of witnesses and stuff. Then you invited us all to tea and now we're here to enjoy tea and fill you in, your highness... majesty," God, Lorelei sucked at courtly manners. "i'm gonna go sit down over in my totally not embarrassing seat over there and--" Lorelei turned a little too quickly ,feeling a quick stab of pain which had her good arm flailing. Of course, the only thing nearby to grab happened to be Mordred.

Because, you know, this wasn't awkward enough already.

[Meredith Emrys-Pendragon]

Meredith was preparing to explain to Jesse why bringing things to life was probably a bad idea when Lorelei entered and... it all got very stressful very quickly.
Clearly they had been fooling noone, least of all Gwen, and apparently she'd already figured more than a few things out thanks to Lorelei's letter, which Meredith found hardly surprising, the queen was a very intelligent woman after all.

She gathered her thoughts, trying to find the best way to explain things that didn't get every single one of them in trouble, but then the door opened again and all thoughts fled her mind, she didn't even register Lorelei launching into her explanation.

Mordred looked awful.

His injuries looked even worse than when they were fresh, he clearly hadn't been taken any care of himself whatsoever, despite all his cruel words and dismissive behaviour, those little hints she had seen of something else, of something more, just as Tristian had said, they were coalesced into the absolute picture of despair before her. It was like he'd completely lost all will to do anything.

"Mordred..." she breathed, feeling tears welling at her eyes and desperately fighting them away. Even Lorelei's unfortunate tumble wasn't quite enough to break into her horrified stare.

[Genevieve]

Genevieve, like Meredith, was about to suggest to Jesse that using magic to bring things to life probably wasn't a hugely sensible plan, when everything just seemed to go mad around her.

First Jesse decided it would be a good idea to let the cat well and truly out of the bag, which Genevieve thought her siblings and Meredith could probably have handled, if Lorelei hadn't appeared at that exact moment. And then their mother produced a letter, and before any of them could answer, Mordred walked through the door. Genevieve sat speechless as she took in his appearance - she had certainly not expected him to look like that. After Lorelei had told her about the flowers, she thought that perhaps Mordred was taking this a little more seriously than other brawls he'd gotten into, but he looked like he had given up, and it was a shocking sight.

Genevieve simply sat, hands in her lap, mouth closed, as she waited to see what would happen next, hoping she might be able to help with something, at some point.

[Gaston Jr]

It was nice of Meredith to continue sticking up for him, he was really pleased about it, although that really pleased feeling seemed to be really quickly followed up by a horrible drop in his stomach when he remembered the text she had sent. Oh yeah. Mordred. Meredith was just being Meredith, doing the good and honourable thing, sticking up for the weaker opponent, in short, she was just being nice, it didn’t mean anything. However he tried not to let it show, he was starting to get fairly good that and besides there were other distractions now from the girl he had been in love with since he was old enough to know what love was.

The man himself had arrived. Mordred. He looked awful. He looked really awful. For a second, he was concerned…

Then Gaston Jr glared.

Of course he would look awful. Coming in looking all hurt and despondent, after everything he did to Meredith he was trying to win the sympathy vote. And given Meredith’s reaction…it was working. He bet it was all an act, some ruse that Mordred had devised in order to get through this tea. If mum had invited him, and surely she had invited him otherwise he wouldn’t have been here then he must have known he would be in trouble. This was his plan to get out of trouble. He would think that mum wouldn’t see through it and then she would be all sympathetic and nice, HA! How wrong he was about to be! Mum would definitely see through this charade of his, she would tear him a new one no matter what he looked like.

ESPECIALLY after what Lorelei just said. He got the impression she was playing it down, that what had happened had might have been more dramatic, but it did not matter, mum already knew, she must do, mum knew everything, when was everyone else going to realise this, and she must know that what Mordred was doing now was just a way to avoid her wrath…

…the glare faltered a bit…

Unless the guy was genuinely a mess in which case Gaston Jr, despite everything, did feel kind of bad for him and maybe he should probably get him some help…

He then just started to look confused.

It was so hard to tell with Mordred.

[Jesse]

When Lorelei finished her explanation which Jesse had spent most of his time nodding through he clapped.

“Yes, yes that was a fairly accurate account, however you missed out all the blood,” said Jesse to his sister, before turning to his mother to say, “there was quite a lot of blood, especially when Mordred stabbed her in the stomach. Did you know that stomach wounds are notoriously painful and if untreated result in a slow and painful death?”

He looked back at Lorelei and with a confused expression said, “I do not remember the penguin princess however. I do remember the pretty girl with the caffeinated beverages but I do not remember a mermaid. I feel I would have remembered someone with a fish tail. Which is just silly really when you think about it. Why do Mermaids not have fish heads? That is where the gills are and that is what helps them breathe underwater.”

Then Mordred came in and my, my did he look in a bad way. When Jenny said as much he nodded to his older sister and said, “indeed, given the stench I would say this is the product of much heavy drinking, by his deathly complexion I would add that he perhaps has not eaten much in the past few days, and I believe that cut on his cheek needs some seeing too…oh and that bruise looks like it’s from a punch, a well placed one at that.”