Chapter Text
Dear Godd Millie,
I suppose I should say that I hope you're enjoying school, but I don't see why you had to go through all that bother – we were having a perfectly good time here, and you still got to have lessons, so I don't think it would really have mattered that much. Now that you've gone, Gabriel won't even let Jason take lessons with me half the time, and Flavian won't teach me anything interesting because he doesn't care about making things fun for me, only for you. After he found out I was lying about knowing witch sight and only worked it out after I talked to you about it, he keeps making me learn how to do it "properly" and do all sorts of experiments on why the normal way doesn't work. I know you keep saying you like him, but he's much nicer to you than he is to me, so I don't think you really understand how dreary he is.
I expect you'll get tired of school before long, so we can have more interesting lessons once you're back.
Yours,
Christopher
p.s. Proudfoot is following Miss Rosalie around again and trying to climb up her skirts – she keeps saying she's going to turn her into a hat if she shreds another hem, but only when Throgmorten isn't nearby.
Dear Go Millie,
Apparently I’ve done too well at convincing Flavian that I actually care about magical treaties within the related worlds, so I hope you’re having better luck with your Very Stupid expression at school than I am here. He said I get to skip lessons tomorrow, but I don't know why he thinks that going on a hike is a "nice day off" when the last time he took me on one he killed me. You would probably enjoy it, though. The woods here are completely different to anything you had at the Temple – isn't it boring, just switching one building for another building?
Not much has happened today, really, other than Gabriel talking about getting more students. You should come back to meet them, since apparently I'm going to be kept in lessons if they visit so I don't 'put them off', according to Tacroy.
Yours,
Christopher
p.s. Proudfoot is still following Miss Rosalie everywhere, and has snuck into the dining hall for the third night in a row despite all the doors being closed. Do Temple cats walk through walls? Throgmorten stayed in the basket I put him in when I brought him to Series Twelve.
Dear G Millie,
Flavian had me try weather magic yesterday after dinner and it said it was going to be thunderstorms, so I almost got out of the hike, but it was glorious sunshine and not a single cloud this morning so he made us leave right after breakfast. Jason said he's jealous, but of course he is, because he hates being inside quite as much I hate being made to be outside. I got sunburnt instead, and apparently learning how to fix that is tomorrow's lesson. At least Flavian's very apologetic and says it shouldn't happen like this in autumn – you should make sure you're here in spring and summer so he can take you on all the hikes that would burn me.
Have you heard anything from Series Ten recently? I know the diamonds were meant to be for your education, but won't they be more use if you get your education for free here and then spend them all on setting yourself up afterwards? I think it's worth considering, and I think you could make a very good argument for it for Gabriel.
Yours,
Christopher
p.s. Miss Rosalie says Proudfoot is only following her because she likes being in Tacroy's lap when he's spirit-travelling, but she had white fur on her shoulder so either Proudfoot is really good at climbing or she's carrying her around.
Dear Christopher,
I know you think you're being very clever, but you really must stop magicking me letters all week, else my Housemistress will keep taking them whenever she sees me reading them. I told you already that mail comes on Saturdays and goes again on Sundays, so I get one letter per week, and I don't actually need to hear about Flavian's latest hike on the exact same day it happens. (You're awfully unkind about him sometimes, Christopher, and I know that this is about him losing you the Castle cricket match last week, because you just sent me three letters in as many days that were nothing but complaining about Flavian, and I don't even know how there's that much to say about him!)
The rest of the girls are in evening chapel and I'm meant to be doing homework, so I suppose you get an extra letter this week just to tell you to stop it. You get a proper letter tomorrow.
Yours,
Millie
p.s. Throgmorten is always near Proudfoot, so Miss Rosalie definitely doesn't mean it or he'd know about it – Temple cats always know, and you only see them when they want you to.
p.p.s. They can't walk through walls, though, only through spell-walls, otherwise Throgmorten would be on your bed every day. Are you sure someone isn't sneaking her into the dining room?
Dear Christopher,
You know that sending me letters all week means that I don't get any actual letters to open when the mail comes, don't you? The other girls all get weekly post from their family, so I would quite like somethi do wonder what they think. At least Mordecai sends me post, so it's clear that someone hasn't forgotten me!
See, I have nothing to write to you now because we've been writing all week, so I'm just filling time until it's time to send the post, because I've already written my weekly update for Gabriel and replied to Mordecai. I know you think it's strange that we write, Christopher, when I suppose I know him less, but there's something about being in the wrong world that no-one else can ever understand, and he answers all the questions about my world that I never got to learn the answers to. And he gives me Proudfoot updates that are more than just telling me which Family member she's targeting this week!
I suppose I could write all the gossip about Eliza being caught cheating on her magic test, and how the girls on the next dorm down the corridor are planning a raid on the kitchens, and how Delia has promised to let us ride her new pony when he arrives next week, but you've already made it very clear that you don't care about that. Show me where I asked for fifteen updates on Flavian being annoying, Chr
Mordecai told me all sorts in this week's letter, after I told him that I thought you were bored after I left. That you loved school when you got to go, and you were absolutely furious with your father and Gabriel for making you leave and move to the Castle, and of course I knew that because we talked about it while I was still Asheth at the Temple – but in every letter you tell me how boring and awful school is and how I should come back to the Castle! And maybe I shall, but I haven't even had a term yet, and you got almost a whole year! And it shan't be so lonely at the Castle when the students that Gabriel wants arrive, and you'll probably find new people to boss around, and I'll still be back for every holiday, and of course I'll write.
Yours,
Millie
p.s. Mordecai said that every time Miss Rosalie sits at a desk, Proudfoot sits on her shoulders and curls around her neck, so I suppose that she's being a scarf and not a hat. He also said she's going to put his harpist out of a job if she keeps laying on his chest and purring – do you suppose anyone has studied Temple cats as an aid to spirit travel? I dare you to do experiments with Throgmorten.
Notes:
This fic was made using La_Temperanza's Letters, Flyers and Stationary workskin guide for the CSS and instructions
Chapter 2: 'I worry about you'
Notes:
Brief notes from my poorly-remembered GCSE French, which incidentally was not Swiss French:
Cher/Chère = 'dear' to address a letter; Mssr. = mister; Mme. = madame; Mlle. = mademoiselle (not just Millie misspelling her own name)
Chapter Text
Dear Chri Cher Mssr. Chant,
I hope you are doing well, and send my love to Jason and Henrietta and Bernard and Elizabeth as well. I hope you've been able to speak to Gabr Mssr. de Witt since I came back to school, and that you've been able to talk about some of the things we discussed over the break without too many issues.
School is awf horri continuing as expected, and there have not been many changes since I returned. There is a new elocution teacher, Mme. Favere, and she has been taking me for additional lessons after dinner, which everyone seems to agree are much needed. I am also receiving additional tuition in deportment in lieu of riding lessons and swimming, and in magic we have been learning small charms and glamors suitable for society. I hate it I hate it I
Please do write back when you have been able to speak to our guardian about the things we discussed.
Bien à vous,
Millie Mlle. de Witt
- Christopher
I haven't had a single letter for weeks and I know they're not getting through because of what you're saying in them, you've seen how I have to write when they read everything we send! I can't even send my love to my friends who are boys without them making me cross it out because it's not becoming of a young lady - oh, I do hope Jason and Bernard understand why I can only ever ask after Henrietta and Elizabeth, and I never told you how they stopped me from writing to Mordecai because they asked who he was and it's not becoming to send letters to the help either, just because he works for Gabriel! They only let me write to you because I explained that we share the same legal guardian, and then they asked if you're like my brother which is gross but I just kept saying that we've both lived full-time at the Castle under Gabriel's guardianship for years.
Please just write an acceptable letter to answer my questions in as subtle a way as you can, and then send me notes whenever you can get them past the wards – you did it well enough at my old schools, but I suppose they didn't care so much about preventing us from talking to anyone outside. I swear they would have kept me here over break if they could have got away with it. I can't even use letter paper because they're rationing it, so I suppose the back of my notebook will do until they see I've torn pages out.
- Millie
- Millie
I'm in Gabriel's bad books and doing all sorts of stupid extra lines and extra homework, just because I was telling him that he was being an idiot for not listening to you, so the fact that that's still going on probably tells you what I was writing in my letters. Which were never getting to you. And Gabriel knows and he still doesn't care and seems to think you can just sit out another term, and he's acting like I'm meant to be perfectly happy to sit here and let it happen to you.
What on earth are you getting elocution lessons for, anyway? Your accent is perfectly nice, and it's not like you're going to sound English when you're not English. And you're an enchantress, you're Ashe a very powerful one, why have they got you doing stupid glamours like a half-rate witch?
I don't see why you didn't tell me about this months ago when it all started, and why you just let me believe that you were writing your letters all formal and French because you wanted to, or just wanted to fit in and do it properly. You're not French either. Or Swiss. This would have been sorted out months ago if you'd just told me and let me argue with Gabriel about it, but now we'll be lucky if he forgives me by summer even if we don't do anything else.
I'll handle everything, no need to worry about it. I'll have a real plan by the time your real letter arrives.
- Christopher
Chère Mlle. de Witt,
It's lovely to hear from you, and I've passed on your love to the other students, who are all just as concerned pleased to receive your letter. I've also passed on your regards to Mssr. Roberts, of our shared acquaintance, and he inquires after your health and apologises for his absence during your break at home due to other obligations. He assures you that he will be here during your upcoming break, and was also part of a few conversations between myself and Mssr. de Witt.
The discussions I had regarding our conversations were certainly less than fruitful, and I don't think they'll be going anywhere soon, so perhaps it's time to give up on that. If Mssr. de Witt isn't writing to you directly about these things, I'm not sure how much I'll be able to do from here.
In my lessons recently we have been learning all about Series Five – we talked about this during your break, if you remember? We may be going on a field trip, since I can spirit-travel with access to additional lives, and it will be easy for enchanters to create a house and summon food and so on, and it will be a perfectly good trip. Some of the islands are incredibly small and remote, so it will be difficult to find one that's inhabited, or to find any specific island.
Have you been able to try any spirit travelling in your magic classes? Your particular circumstances should mean that you have the ability to move between worlds without needing the same sort of anchor as most people. It has very interesting potential that I'm excited to explore more in the near future.
We are due to have our next lessons and possibly our trip to Series Five in the evening of next Saturday, so I suppose you should be prepared to hear all about them – I'm sure you'll be able to find a quiet spot to go over everything when I send you the notes I made, if it all goes according to plan.
Cordialement à vous,
Mssr. Chant
- Christopher
For the last time, I am not running off to Series Five with you! That won't solve anything, and I'm sure we will both be entirely miserable when we're both stuck on an island with nothing else to do. I said already that I'm not sure it's a good idea, and you just won't listen – you never do!
Me telling you my problems is not me asking you to single-handedly fix them by ignoring every single thing I tell you – it was bad enough over break when I could actually tell you that, but now you're just planning things without me and expecting me to do what I'm told!
I get enough of that already from everyone else in my life, and I'm perfectly capable of solving my own problems, thank you.
- Millie
Chapter 3: 'I need you'
Chapter Text
- Millie,
I don't know why you didn't tell me that you were going on this job for Gabriel – I had to find out from Simonson talking about new work assignations over dinner! You finished school barely a month ago, why are you already doing all this work stuff? Gabriel has loads of enchanters, he doesn't need to send you specifically.
Let me know when you can wriggle out of it and come home.
- Christopher
Dear Christopher,
My work is going very well, thank you for asking, and this is exactly why I didn't tell you. You can even send me real letters on real stationary instead of scribbling annoyed notes on the back of Con's homework that you stole after dinner. It's in the envelope – give him it back.
You're aware that people get jobs after graduating school, aren't you? I know you haven't been to one for most of a decade and that you've known what your job will be that entire time, but the rest of us aren't quite so fortunate. Gabriel and I have been talking about me staying at the Castle and working for him for years now, and maybe it's not what I'll do forever, but it's doing perfectly fine for me right now.
I'm not going to wriggle out of it, I'm going to do my job – Gabriel isn't forcing me to do anything. I'm working for the office of Chrestomanci. The Castle is paying me a wage. I did tell you that I was doing all that paperwork to make sure that the government knew I was in the country properly. Because of adult things, like taxes, that I have to pay because I'm getting a wage. For my job. That I am doing. Have I made it clear enough yet?
Everything is going very smoothly and it should be all wrapped up in a week or so, and then I can come home and tell you all about it, but until then I'm afraid you'll have to gossip with the rest of the Family at dinner to figure out what I'm doing.
Yours,
Millie
Dear Millie,
Well done on your job, very exciting, but why are you bothering with it? We both know you can stay at the Castle without doing that. You're Gabriel's favourite, and of course you can stay here forever once I'm Chrestomanci. You don't need to work to prove that you deserve to stay.
I thought that now you'd finished school, you'd actually be around more and I can see you once you I'm finished with all the training and meetings and lessons that Gabriel makes me sit through (at least your schools actually had term times and a graduation date, and not just Gabriel telling you that education and self-improvement never stop, Christopher, if you are to be the next Chrestomanci.) I expected we could do things after I'm finished for the day, because Grant still has homework and none of the others will put up with me for anywhere near as long as you two – I didn't think you'd be wandering off to different worlds within weeks of being back.
And I didn't steal Grant's homework; he gave it to me so that he'd have an excuse for not turning it into Flavian tomorrow. So there.
Yours,
Christopher
Dear Christopher,
It's not about earning my keep at the Castle, I could do that with the Temple diamonds – it's about having something to do. I'm not just going to mope around the place, waiting for you to finish your meetings with Gabriel so that I can follow you around the Castle like Proudfoot's kittens. And do what, make vaguely impressed noises at all the big important things you've done today? And do what the rest of the time?
I did enough sitting around and being useless and ornamental when I was the Goddess, and you know that I hated it. Why do you think I'm going to do it all over again?
You never even asked what I was going to do after I finished school – you just presumed that I wouldn't be interested in doing anything! Well, I have a job now. I suppose that when you are the next Chrestomanci, I'll be working for you instead of Gabriel, and then maybe you can have me sitting three feet away from you at all times. But until then, I have work to do, and right now I have a meeting to go to.
Yours,
Millie
- Millie
What on earth did you say to Christopher? He's been moping all day, and he wasn't even a little bit smug at giving me my awful work back and telling me that I had to actually finish it now. Half the staff are tiptoeing around him, and half the others are rolling their eyes, and Gabriel is just pretending it isn't happening at all, like he does.
Has he written you back yet?
- Conrad
- Con
Exactly what I told you before I left – Gabriel asked if I wanted to work for him, and I said yes, and now Christopher is throwing a tantrum about it. Exactly like I said he would. Are we surprised? It won't last for too long, since it's me he's angry at and not Gabriel, and I'm not there right now to keep the fight going so it'll all be very half-hearted and boring for him. I'll pester you for updates if he doesn't write back, I suppose.
- Millie
- M
I didn't wan
It's not that I exp
You know I've never thought of you as useless or ornamental, don't you? You don't think that that's how I treat you?
- C
p.s. I didn't use Grant's homework this time. Happy?
- Christopher
No, you don't treat me like that. It was a low blow. But sometimes that's how it feels to be aimless and purposeless around y the Castle.
- Millie
p.s. Scribbling it too quickly to write names but enough time to be petty? You must be feeling better.
Dear Millie,
See, proper stationary. From the office of the Chrestomanci and everything. Official correspondence for official adults. I'll even seal it with the official seal if it'll make you happy.
I'll be very happy if you stay at the Castle once I'm Chrestomanci, and you know I've never thought that you're useless. You're the most useful person in the place, and you have been since the day you arrived from Series Ten and helped rescue us all. That's why everyone loves you. No wonder Gabriel wanted you to work for him.
I'd still rather you didn't spend all your time on work trips to other worlds, though. You've spent most of your time away as it is, with school – can't you do work that keeps you here? I'm beginning to think you're avoidi Do you not want to see m It'll be tiring you out, and I don't want you to get sick again like you did when we came back from Series Seven, even if it did mean you had to stay home for months. You don't have to stay three feet away. You can do as many as twelve. Maybe you can even be in a different room sometimes.
You do want to stay at the Castle, don't you? Not just because you can't think of anywhere else to go and can't go back to your own world? You don't have to, but I'd like you to. But I don't want you to be unhappy here.
Yours,
Christopher
Dear Christopher,
I don't have time to write a full letter, but yes, I want to stay at the Castle. Don't be silly. Even if the other students leave over the next few years – or maybe they'll be working for you too – I'm still going to want to stay.
I mean, you're right that I don't have anywhere else to go, but I don't think I want anywhere else to go. Maybe sometimes, for a few weeks every so often, because there are so many worlds to see – but that's not the same thing as moving away for good.
I promise I'll be home in a few days, and if Gabriel tries to send me on another trip right away, I'll turn it down.
Yours,
Millie
- Millie
I can't wait for you to be back. I need someone to tag-team me on Christopher tantrum management, because everyone kept asking me to fix it!
Still, whatever you told him, he must be feeling better. He even slid down the bannister in the entrance when he didn't think anyone was looking, and the last time he did that was the first day of cricket season.
- Conrad
Chapter 4: "I love you"
Chapter Text
My dear Millie,
Now I know why so few Chrestomancis ever marry – how am I ever meant to stand being away from you for more than a day? And once Gabriel actually retires I'll have to deal with being summoned away from you, as well, and is it too late to tell him that I don't want the job anymore? Have I spent the last decade doing too good a job at convincing him that I'd enjoy it?
There's a servant hovering outside my door right now, saying that I need to go and see the King, but I'm going to give this to them now to send because at this point, who knows when I'll have chance to actually sit down and write again? Maybe not for hours. Really, though, I've been here two days and all I'm doing is going around in circles in awful meetings and missing you and being unable to write. It should be a crime for a man to be sent to another world for an indeterminate length of time when he's barely been married a month. I may have to ostentatiously flash my ring at the King in this meeting until he apologises. Again.
Please continue to make Gabriel's life a misery for sending me as 'practice'.
Your husband,
Christopher
Dear Christopher,
I really don't mean to laugh, because I miss you dreadfully as well, but – if you somehow think that being married is what's making you unable to spend more than a few days away from me without being miserable, then I have some bad news about all those letters from the last decade or more that I have saved in my desk.
You do enjoy your job, and we both know it, and I certainly knew what I was getting into when I decided to marry you (even though we both knew for years that this would happen, really, didn't we?) I knew what it means to be the wife of the Chrestomanci, more than I think any woman in the Related Worlds. Lots of our friends are still here after the wedding and Elizabeth doesn't have to go back to Italy for her classes for another few weeks, so I have plenty of company, but it doesn't really make everything better, does it?
Especially when I'm feeling unwell recently – please don't worry or rush back, I'm only saying something because otherwise Con or one of the others will say something and then you'll panic, it really isn't that bad. It's just the stress from the wedding, and I'm sure the fact that your parents have only just left today didn't help. It's only that as much as I complain sometimes about how overbearing and fussy you can be, I do appreciate it. I could do with some overbearing fussiness when nothing is making my headache better except tea that's spiced like Series Ten, and no-one can make it perfectly unless I do it myself, and then I remember that you can make it for me. And you only learnt because I wanted it when I had the flu years ago, and it was your way of apologising for the way you'd treated the whole thing. You're not the only one who's rather grumpy about this whole thing, is what I'm trying to say! Don't worry, Gabriel is well aware.
You really don't have to find the time to write full letters – you know that we've spent years communicating best through little notes on scraps of paper, sent by summonings and conjurings instead of actual post. Just write whenever you can.
Yours, always,
Millie
My dear Millie,
If you were trying not to make me worry, you're doing very badly at it. I'm sure I can bully Grant into telling me if you're actually okay. I'm not sure how unwell you'd need to be for Gabriel to let me come home – can you cough on him a few times?
I still have no time and even less sleep, but the sooner I wear down everyone involved in negotiations here, the sooner I can be home. I somehow doubt that it's what Gabriel intended, but quite frankly I don't care.
Please don't remind me of the state of some of my old letters. I certainly wrote a lot of them, but did I ever write a single good one? We had a lot of practice over the years, but I don't think I ever really got better at it – you just got better at reading between the lines.
I do love you, Millie, even if I've mostly written it as insults and passive-aggression over the years, and I'm not quite sure how you put up with it. It feels strange to write. I suppose I never really felt like I had to say it, because we both knew what I meant. But it's quite stupid to dance around saying it now, isn't it, after we stood up in front of everyone?
I love you. I miss you desperately. I may throttle the King if he says but we must consider one more time instead of just agreeing to the terms I negotiated. There, isn't it easier if I just say things? At least to you – I don't think other people deserve it, really.
Please rest and take care of yourself and I will be asking Grant if you're being stupid about it. Is it safe for him to extend his stay, at least until I get back? I miss him, too. Don't tell him.
I love you, always,
Christopher