In Which Severin's Standard Is Twice Raised

November 20, 1172

"Look, while I understand that you're at the age where the very rumor of--" Severin's tongue stalled on the words, still caught somewhere between annoyance at the accidental vandalism and utter disbelief that such a clever girl could be so gullible "--cow tipping might tempt you to try it, surely you must have figured that a girl your size couldn't possibly push over a cow on her own? Besides, cows don't even sleep standing, and they're more alert than they seem."

Riona folded her arms and sank further into the couch, a hint of a scowl on her face. She was only twelve and he could've sworn she'd already given him more gray hairs than her siblings combined. He could almost feel another one turning as she glowered. "Yes, I've figured that out."

"Granted, but it would have been nice if you'd done so before you startled all those animals and cost Ceidrid a perfectly good fence." What to do with this girl? This hadn't been the first time she'd pulled a stunt such as this, and he doubted it would be the last. All of his children were scamps, but somehow, that word just wasn't strong enough for his sixth-born. "I hope you know that the repairs will be coming out of your grandparents' Christmas money."

She inclined her head upward, her brow wavering in a pathetic arch. The look she wore was of one trying to tell herself she didn't believe what she was hearing. "You wouldn't."

"I'm afraid you've left me no choice. You haven't responded to any other punishment I can bear to give you."

Riona's jaw dropped, most likely to protest. She was never given the chance, however, as the door burst open with such a sudden force as to push the past few minutes from existence. Severin's mother had always said the world had begun with a bang.

"Where is he?"

Severin had to stare as Lorn stormed into the study with a heated anger most unlike his usual gentle self. So much for thinking that cow tipping would be the day's standard of the bizarre. "Err... to whom would you be referring?" As if that was the first question that came to mind.

"Jadin!" He spat the name forth as if choking up something most unpleasant. "Where the hell is that red-headed hedonist shit of a son of yours?"

Severin raised an eyebrow. Hadn't Lorn always liked Jadin? All the recent attempts to match his younger sister with the boy seemed to say so--why the spontaneous change of mind? "Around here somewhere, I would assume."

"Well, would you mind getting him in here?" Lorn's clenched fists were turning red; Severin doubted he'd so much as swatted a fly in his life, but that didn't seem to matter now. "Perhaps he'd like to explain to me how it is that my sister missed her monthly?"

...well, that explained it. "Riona, would you mind fetching your brother for me?"

She sprung to her feet with a salute, a devilish grin on her pretty freckled face; she'd always had a rather malicious sense of schadenfreude. "Permission to return and observe his humiliation, sir?"

Severin's eyes narrowed. "Denied."

Sulking, Riona hurried out of the room and pulled the door shut behind her with nearly the same strength Lorn had used to open it. Perhaps she could push over a cow after all if she was angry enough--not that there weren't more pressing matters at hand. "Lorn, you do realize that women aren't always regular?"

"Yes, but that doesn't explain why she's been ill these past couple of weeks--and here I was, thinking she just had a touch of stomach flu." He seemed almost as furious with himself as he was with Jadin. Severin could understand that, he supposed; he'd felt something similar with Raia. "Besides, Eilyssa told my mother that Xeta told her she'd slept with your son, and Xeta admitted it again when my mother confronted her!"

He took a breath, if only because he'd just remembered the need to do so. The wrath in his eyes lingered. "Look, I know you have a reservation about arranging matches behind your children's backs and I've been respectful of that up until now--and as much as I hate to pull rank on you, your son has left me no choice."

"I understand." Now that he thought about it--and though it pained him to admit it--this was probably for the best. He wouldn't have ever been able to push Jadin down the alter without the threat of an angry uncle- or grandfather-to-be anyway. "At least I can tell myself that she would have been his first choice anyway."

Lorn sniffed. "I hope for her sake that you're right about that. Still, I can't believe my own sister would lift her skirt for that little scoundrel! Christ, with all this talk about the chausser's wife, you'd think she would've realized she was bound to get knocked up--"

"Xeta's knocked up?"

It was Jadin, somehow fresh-faced and innocent as the day he'd crawled out of the womb. He couldn't have had a baby on the way. He was just a baby himself.

Severin sighed. "Well... possibly."

"Probably," Lorn corrected, his fiery eyes turning upon the boy. "What do you have to say for yourself, you conniving little bastard?"

Jadin said nothing. He only blinked. Again... again...

Then--against all odds--he smiled. "YES!"

Wha--? The monosyllabic thought didn't even have time to form before a laughing Jadin had made a mad dash from the room, the dance in his step more fitting of a man who had just been appointed King of the World. "Everybody! Everybody, guess what? MY COCK CAN MAKE PEOPLE!"

Whatever other noise lurked in the study followed him out. Severin only gaped in bewilderment; Lorn just looked plain confused.

But at last, after ample minutes of listening through the door to Jadin's continued praises of his own virility, he spoke. "What... the hell... was that?"

Severin shrugged; so much for thinking that Lorn's anger would be the day's standard of the bizarre. "I think my son just figured out where babies come from."

Lorn sniffed in reply. In his startlement, at least, he'd forgotten to be angry. "So--the wedding date. How does the fourteenth work for you? Can you make the necessary preparations by then?"

He gnawed at the lining of his cheek and sighed. He'd lived his fair share of strange days, but this one was really something else. "The fourteenth should be fine."

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