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the-dye-stained-socialite · 1 month ago

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@the-masterless-press hi EJ! i was your secret swap partner for the @fallenlondonficswap this year! I hope you enjoy the fic!!

Griz's Day Off Pairing: Virginia and The Efficient Commissioner (can be read as a ship, or just teasing)

Word Count: 1,903 Summary: Griz is invited out to one of Virginia's spas along the Railway, and has a nice day before winter sets in.

The train rattled along its journey, wreaking hell on the Effecient Commissioner’s already sore body. A particularly brutal shake caused her to wince. Honestly, how did this thing not derail between every station? Another jolt, and a shock of pain went right to her hip. The seats were in desperate need of improvement. Perhaps that would be something to bring up at the next meeting. Griselda rubbed at her freshly-pained joint through her woolen suit. Thank the False-Stars that the trip to Ealing was so short , she thought with a sigh. Else not, she might not have the leg strength to get back off the blasted train.

With Hallowmas done and past, the weather change was beginning to take its annual toll on her body. She felt its frosty grip more and more each year. Winter, even in the Neath, especially in the Neath, was cruel and unkind to her. Increasingly frequently she would wake up painfully aware of each of her joints and old injuries. Stiffness pierced her like a preserved bug, and held her unable to move how she pleased. Efficient as she was, even she could be slowed down by the cold and pain, and what a terrible time to be slowed down it was! Winter was always the busiest for her. Lacre, Tragedies, and contingencies consumed every waking thought that was not devoted to her pain. Another sigh escaped her. This was likely to be her last day off until the next Feast of the Exceptional Rose. She dreaded the mounds of paperwork she knew she would face in the coming season most of all. Yet she did it anyway, to keep London safe as well as she could.

The train rolled to its stop, and forced Griz from her thoughts. She grabbed her travel bag and headed out to the station, glad to be on steady ground. Her knees creaked in sympathy, and she was reminded of an abandoned house.

Among the station’s crowd, a Deviless in a red pillbox was waiting.

“Hello, Virginia,” Griz said.

“Hello, Griz,” the Deviless greeted. “It’s nice to see you accepted my offer.”

The Commissioner was always wary of Hell, for it and London had an uneasy shared history, and their legal system was near unnavigable for even her. Virginia herself was a unique matter. Deeply entrenched in the politics of both Hell and London, and a large and unignorable contributor to the Great Hellbound Railway. It couldn’t have existed without her, at least not in its present state. Griz attributed a fair few of her migraines over the years to this Deviless in particular. Yet here she was now, inviting Griz to the spa she ran here in Ealing for a relaxing day. Wary as she was, the idea was all too appealing for the Commissioner to turn down. The two walked side by side on their way to the bathhouse.

The spa was only a short distance, though the journey was stretched by Griz’s slower pace. Virginia said nothing however, and Griz found herself wondering how much the cold affected a Devil. Perhaps the slowness was for both of their benefit.

When they arrived, Griz was shown to a changing room, which mercifully had a chair. She was able to change into her bathing suit, and swapped her walking boots out for slippers. A working Devil came to take her bag and clothes soon, and she left the changing room. Virginia had also taken the time to get changed it seemed, for she had exchanged her formal attire for her own swimsuit. It was a thoroughly infernal cut, so tight that Griz was shocked Virginia could move without popping open a seam. The tailors they must have in Hell!

She approached Griz with a smile, and hooked a warm arm around one of Griz’s own. “Deviless I may be, running a spa such as mine is more useful for me than being treated in it.”

“But?”

“But,” she continued, leading Griz down a hall. “Even warm waters can be a boon, Deviless or no.”

Griz laughed, caught off-guard. Her laughter turned to more wincing when something in her ribcage shifted.

Virginia offered her a look of sympathy, or maybe pity. “Besides, I find little point in allowing aches to set in if I’m already paying the heating bills.”

“This conversation feels a little pointed,” Griz chided.

“Your joints had more to say than you did last meeting, Griselda . I caught the Minutes-Taker attempting to transcribe the argument between your spine and your knees.”

Griz flushed bright red. “He did not! I read those minutes thrice over, and there was scarce mention of my joints, thank you .”

She snickered. “He was doing a rather poor job of it.” She opened a door before Griz could get in another word. Faintly sulphuric steam billowed out. “And that right there is the other reason. You rarely take a break from your work, and even when you’re away from the Bazaar you don’t stop. Do you know the effect that has on one’s soul?”

“Seeing as I’m not a Devil, I don’t, actually. Would you care to enlighten me?”

“No.”

Griz groaned. Virginia smirked.

“Come this was, I assure you that we’ll get it fixed.”

Griz huffed, but followed her through the door anyways. “And how do I know that it needs to be ‘fixed’?”

“Seeing as you’re not a Devil, you’ll just have to take my word.”

“Ah, because that’s exactly what I want to do. You’re even worse outside of the boardroom, did you know?”

Virginia laughed again, and Griz found herself joining in. For as little as she’d ever care to admit it, this sort of petty banter was fun. So much of her work was serious arguments and work-arounds and loopholes, that being able to use those skills for joking jabs was an enjoyable turn of events.

“Ah, just one moment,” Virginia said, her laughter ending abruptly.

Griz watched as she untwined their arms, and walked over to another of her workers. She seemed to be giving the Devil instructions. Griz took the opportunity to look around the room.

It was a touch difficult to make things out given all the steam, and the low lighting of course, but it wasn’t foggy enough that she felt like she couldn’t navigate. The room seemed to be unoccupied save for her, Virginia, and a few workers. No one else was here for a treatment, then? Perhaps they were just in other rooms. The spa itself was a mostly circular pool, a few feet in diameter, with a set of stone steps leading down into it, and a wooden railing. The pool was deep enough to soak in, but neither deep or wide enough to make swimming a viable option. She guessed that it was likely a natural spring, which the bathouse had been built around, with a few modifications. Though Griz had only been standing for a few minutes, already the steam had begun to warm her body from the cold’s biting chill. Her knees had begun to complain again though.

Just as she had noticed this, Virginia had re-appeared at her side, and the worker she had been talking to was nowhere in sight.

“Are you going to stand there the whole time?” the Deviless teased.

“Well, I wasn’t certain if you needed to treat the water first, and I thought you had wanted me to stay here so-”

“So you need orders .”

The Commissioner's face flushed for an entirely different reason.

“Hah!” she laughed. “Well come on then, get in the water. That is where most of the benefits come from, you know.”

Griz huffed. “I do know.” Still, she padded over to the waters, careful to remove her slippers before stepping in.

The water was so warm it was nearly a shock. Oh , how good it felt though. Griz lowered herself in the water almost too quickly, eager for the relief. Virginia followed shortly behind her. She found somewhere comfortable in the pool and settled in, Virginia taking a seat nearby.

The relief on her smaller joints was near immediate. Those which chilled first, also thawed first. The water coaxed them back malleability again with its wet heat. Griz took the time to stretch and roll her wrists, to open and close her palms, enjoying how quickly her aches had dissolved. Her tendons too seemed looser and more relaxed. All of the writing her job demanded has taken quite the toll on her hands over the years, and though this did not undo it, for one blissful moment it seemed to have wiped away decades of use. She sighed with pleasure. Yes, her daytrip was worth it for her hands alone. Besides, her feet no longer hurt from the walking either.

Griz knew how much she was being pampered when the worker came back to present her and Virginia with large wine glasses. She accepted hers with pleasure, and took a tentative taste. She was surprised to find it tasting of genuine grapes. Griz would take care to enjoy this then.

“So,” the Deviless began. “Anything that you needed to get off of your chest?”

Griz snorted. “You’re well aware I can’t talk about the Bazaar to people like you.”

Virginia raised an eyebrow over her glass of sherry. “I never said anything about the Bazaar. You could talk about anything really.”

“Hm, yes I suppose that one’s on me isn’t it?” Griz paused to straighten her posture. She felt things shift pleasingly back to where they were meant to be. The water had taken on a softer quality now, which she had not noticed initially. The knots in her shoulders unspooled as she sat, thinking. The heat had started to permeate deeper now that she had been soaking in it. It sank down to her very core in the very best way. “Well, I suppose… There was quite an incident with paperwork over this summer.” Griz chose her complaint carefully. Something that had genuinely bothered her, yet nothing that would cause diplomatic complications if she said too many details.

“Oh, yes, paperwork incidents tend to be quite the worst of things, don’t they?”

Griz chuckled. “I can’t imagine what you have to deal with.”

“Oh, you’d never believe the stories I could tell!”

Thus, they had found their conversation. Mutual complaining about legal systems and incompetent interns. As Griz let out her mental frustrations, she felt her body relax too. Tension slowly melted away in the spa. Her hips, knees, spine, all of it ceased its complaining. She was content to savour the euphoric feeling. At one point, she became convinced that such looseness could only be rivaled by a puppet, cut from its strings. Groans and creaks became happy sighs and light laughter. Her body no longer seemed so heavy, physically and emotionally.

The water seemed to have an effect on Virginia as well, for at one point Griz became aware of a contented-sounding hum, coming, inexplicably, from her companion. It continued even while she talked.

Griz was very glad she had taken a day off. There was nothing better she could think of than to continue enjoying this moment of luxury. She even got to complain about her coworkers, and wasn’t that nice? Both winter's painful bite, and her Tragedy-based worries were kept at bay, and she could truly relax, at least for a little while.

#dye stained fics #fallen london #the efficient commissioner #virginia the deviless #fallen london fic swap #fallen london fics #the entire time i was thinking of the golden girls jfkdbkdbksbfdsjvds #look at me i have something presentable to maintag for once :O #tysfm to my dear friends who helped me with my writer's block <3

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