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August 15, 1202
"Cladelia! You're so gorgeous!" Alyss clasped her hands together with a squeal. She could always be counted on to pay a compliment, even when no such compliment was necessary. Today was one of those days, but now that Alyss was not only Cladelia's follower-turned-friend but her sister-in-law as well--for all the idea of anyone wanting to marry Koradril still boggled her mind--of course she'd be the first to fawn over her wedding gown.
Especially since who knew when Cladelia would next return to Naroni, what with marrying a Dovian and all.
A Dovian baron. The same Dovian baron she'd once drunkenly written to, pretending to be her brother, warning him that he might have impregnated some fictitious young woman. Life was strange.
"It doesn't matter what any of those people think." Her sister sniffed. Cladelia, though she usually won most over in the end, did suffer from that terrible need to be liked--but Riona seemed to have inherited their mother's utter indifference toward approval. "Apart from your own self, the only person whose opinion might matter here is Arkon's, and clearly he thinks you'd make a good enough baroness if he asked you to marry him."
"Who's to say he asked?" Cladelia joked, if only to mask her pangs of sisterly inferiority. "But I suppose you're right. He's had ample time to rid himself of me if he'd wished."
"Exactly. And if you're worried about anyone else, it's not as if you won't prove them wrong before long. You'll make an excellent baroness."
Huh. Unlike Alyss, Riona had never been one to toss around compliments lightly. Why should she have, when she herself had never had much need of them? "You really mean that?"
"I wouldn't bother saying it if I didn't." Riona took her by the arms and planted a quick kiss on her cheek. "You'll do just fine--and Arkon won't ever doubt that he made the right choice."
"Thank you, sister." Compliments might have meant more from those who thought they needed to be earned. "I'll try to borrow your confidence there."
NEXT CHAPTER:
January 1, 1198
Still struggled to stand upright following the ordeal of changing into her nightgown, Alyss giggled. "I can't believe we're drunk!"
"You moreso than me," Cladelia mock-scolded her friend--though she couldn't deny that her bedroom was much blurrier than usual. But, she was the youngest child of older parents who had lost most of their will to discipline before she'd been secured in her mother's womb. Alyss was the third child, whose parents had still been young and eager to do everything just right. She would have been less drunk than Alyss, but not for lack of drink--more for the fact that she'd had considerably more practice.
Not that practice helped some people. "But neither of us moreso than Koradril!"
Alyss blinked, a couple extra seconds required to match the face to the name. She got it in the end, though. "Oh! Your brother! He's very drunk. Cute--but drunk."
"And yet we're the ones who get sent to bed right after midnight!" Because her lenient parents just had to spend New Years' with Medur and Ellie. Because her perfect older sister and her killjoy husband just had to be here instead.
"Hmm..." Alyss reached for her chin, but missed. "He's older; he's allowed to be as drunk as he wants? And he's a man!"
"He's not that much older--and drunk men are rude and violent. Drunk women are just fun, like us."
Alyss squinted. "We are?"
"Obviously!" Not that they had much opportunity to get up to anything fun when they'd been unceremoniously banished to her bedroom! Meanwhile, Koradril was still in the hall, translating their grandfather's book of hymns into armpit farts. "It's not fair. We ought to punish Koradril."
"But Mernolt's the one who sent us to bed!"
"My mother will deal with him--but we need to show that drunk men can do stupid things to. We should frame him for something."
"Oooh! A frame-up!" Alyss clapped in giddy pleasure, but then dropped her hands with a frown. "Wait, what are we framing him for?"
"Something only someone drunk and stupid would do. But what can we do from in here...?" Cladelia scanned the room in search of anything potentially incriminating. The parchment and ink at her desk was the only thing that came to mind. But, what could the parchment implicate him for? Stupid Koradril. Stupid older brother, with his manliness and his drinking privileges and his college friends who were--
"I've got it!" Cladelia rushed--or tried to, what with her damn feet and the slanting floor getting in the way--to the desk and sat down, her stumbling friend close behind. A steady chair did little for the motion of the room, but at least she could focus on the blank sheet in front of her.
"We're going to prank the Baron of Rexus."
She pulled her quill out of the inkwell and marked the date at the top--even if she did have to cross out '1197' as an afterthought. "'My dear friend Arkon'... see, he and Koradril are friends, so Koradril calls him 'Arkon'."
"Oooh! You're so clever, Cladelia." Alyss giggled again. "Now, what's the letter going to be about?"
"Hmm." What did she know about the Baron of Rexus? Well, she knew his name was Arkon. And that he and Koradril sometimes went to brothels. And that everyone in Dovia thought he ought to find himself a wife. "...'It grieves me to inform you, my friend, that a certain female schoolmate of ours... who shall remain nameless'..." Cladelia couldn't quite recall any of Koradril's female schoolmates at the moment. "...'has confided in me that you have impregnated her.'"
Alyss gasped. "Oh, my!"
Whether that exclamation was of shock or amusement, Cladelia continued. "'I can't be sure of the story, as I know we men never speak truthfully of our sexual exploits, but she is very upset and expects that you will claim responsibility for the child. Therefore, if you wish to get to the bottom of the matter, I would advise that you cut your holidays short and return to Naroni at your earliest convenience. Signed, your friend, Koradril Sadiel'."
"Cutting a baron's holidays short! Koradril is in trouble!" Alyss rubbed her hands together in glee as Cladelia set down the quill. "But we're not going to send it, are we? I mean, the poor baron didn't do anything."
Cladelia sniffed. "Everyone's done something."
"But we don't even know the baron!"
"Then we'll get to meet him when he shows up to see his secret lover." Cladelia folded up the letter and stamped it shut with a wax seal--rather more heavy-handedly than she would have sober, but Koradril was pretty heavy-handed. "Anyway, care for some more wine? I have a few flasks stashed away in my dresser."
NEXT CHAPTER:
September 12, 1183
It was about damn time for some peace and quiet.
With Severin's sister-in-law about to give birth any day now, the household had been cast into a state of constant chaos that had nearly resulted in his seeking refuge at the home of a friend--or would have, if Severin had been the sort of person who bothered making friends. His mother waddled about with the start of her own baby (why so many bloody babies?) sticking out of her, only fretting over Esela's comfort until Hamrick or his father or usually Esela herself reminded her that she needed to rest too.
Add that to Falidor's frustration with his first taste of neglect, and Aldhein's resultant whining over why Falidor wouldn't leave him alone... Evera and Setran's frequent visits with their noisy brood... Alyssin and Aidric and their babies... Podrag and Ceira and their baby... Ellie and Medur (and thank God, no babies! ...yet)...
He supposed he loved his big, annoying family. Even the damn babies, maybe. But surely he could love them better from a distance? He had half a mind to see if he could start at the university a few years early. No sense delaying the whole grouchy bachelor hermit lifestyle that had been his future since they'd forced him to share a crib with his twin sister and he'd kept the whole house up with his audible displeasure.
But for now, finally, there was a quiet moment in which to practice that sacred art of solitude--whether the family had calmed down, or he'd simply learned to tune everything out. It helped that his father was still at work, and Hamrick was out in the fields. And there was a new doctor in the nearest village, so of course his mother had pestered Teodrin into going to see him about whatever-the-fuck-it-was-Teodrin-kept-going-to-doctors-for-even-though-obviously-none-were-helpful. Not that Teodrin tended to contribute much to the noise. Even when they were both in their shared bedroom, Severin barely noticed he was there.
His mother's knock, however, was not so prone to invisibility. "Severin? I'm sorry to disrupt your reading, but Esela's having the baby. I need you to watch your nieces until your father gets home."
And nor was her voice. God damn it. "Can't Alina do it?" Alina actually liked kids!
"I promised Alina that she could attend the birth; she and Evera are with Esela right now." Of course they were. "And before you ask, I sent Hamrick to get your father, and Setran to get Lady Arydath."
Of course she had. Sometimes, he suspected his mother deliberately left him as the only babysitter because she knew how much he hated it. "Isn't Thetis old enough to be in a room by herself for a while?"
"Yes, but she's not old enough to watch her little sisters." His mother sighed. "Seriously, you get your bum down there right now, or you'll be on diaper duty all week."
And she would make good on that threat; he'd already seen more of Falidor's bare shitty ass than any of his other siblings had been forced to endure. Severin groaned. "Fine."
"Good."
His mother's footsteps hurried back along the hall and down the stairs as Severin put away his book. God, he couldn't wait until school started in January and his family would be obliged to leave him alone while he studied! Maybe he's just live at the school. Or not, since he might get stuck in charge of any snot-nosed brats who got there early.
He shuffled out of his room with his eyes to his feet, only the scarring memories of his youngest brother's excrement pushing him forward. At least Thetis was past that phase, even if she was still too young to be interesting. Was Electra? Alyss, at least, probably wasn't. Damn, if she didn't keep it in until somebody else could deal with it...
"Uncle Severin!"
Thetis would meet him at the bottom of the stairs. "Uncle Severin, guess what? Guess what?"
His honest answer would have been 'I don't care'. He compromised with "What?"
"Papa paid my school fees today! That means I get to go to school with you!"
He wasn't sure why his nieces liked him so much. He never tried to be nice. "Well, not the same class..." Thank God.
"Still! I'll see you at breaks! And you can walk with me!" That last bit had probably been his mother's suggestion, as if it wasn't bad enough being stuck walking with Aldhein already.
"Uh-huh. Any idea when your father will be back?"
"I don't know." Was that a surprise? Thetis rocked back and forth on the balls of her feet, as she often did; behind her, her even more annoying little sisters munched on Falidor's dolls. At least Falidor himself was down for a nap. Knowing Severin's luck, though, he'd wake within the hour. "How far away is Lady Arydath?"
Severin sighed. "Too far."
His niece laughed. "You're funny, Uncle Severin."
"Not funny. Just pissed off."
"What's 'pissed' mean?"
...shit. "If anyone asks, it's a word Uncle Podrag taught you."
"All right. But what does it mean?"
"It means that I'm supposed to sit down here until your father and grandfather get back." Given the context, he supposed it was true enough. Severin didn't like to lie to his nieces. Kids might have been so much more tolerable if only adults didn't insist on lying to them all the time--not fully, but more. "So, what do you want to do?"
He regretted asking immediately. "I want to play lady's maid!"
And here he thought he got credit for bracing himself to play horsie. "Do you even know what a lady's maid does?"
"Uh-huh. They dress up their ladies and do their hair and stuff. Auntie Ellie told me." Then why couldn't her father have told her more about being a knight? Severin hated playing knights, but at least Aldhein had gotten him used to it. "So I'll be Auntie Ellie, and you can be Lady Rona!"
Years later, Severin would look back on this moment and consider it a marvel that he didn't teach Thetis yet another swearword--and not one so mild as 'pissed'. "Can't I be a guard or something?"
"No!" She grabbed him by the wrist and dragged him toward the couches. That did it. If he so much as saw another diaper before he headed off to university, then he was breaking the news to his mother that she wouldn't be getting any grandchildren out of him. "Now come along, milady! We need to get you all dolled up for the banquet!"
NEXT CHAPTER:
