In Which Holladrin Approves Any Addition

July 4, 1202

"There! Is that better, you fussy little boy?" Holladrin watched her son's face ease with relief as she tested his blankets with a pinch of her fingers. Her mother-in-law, the kingdom's premier midwife since its founding days, new better than anyone how to swaddle an infant, but Tarien always seemed to want more wiggle room than the typical baby of his size. Odd, seeing as he never wiggled much once he had that room, preferring only to writhe about in shameless annoyance when he didn't.

How would the poor tailors manage, once he was of an age to do the same with his clothing? "You should take advantage of your swaddling days, you know. Once you're free to move about, it's only a matter of time before you'll be expected to do things, and life won't be just naps and cuddles and... excrement."

"Well, there will always be excrement," came Searle's voice from the doorway, more sigh than statement.

Holladrin frowned. If he'd chosen to flip her words into a commentary on life rather than tease her about how she was talking to a baby about bodily functions, then there must have been some of that so-called excrement with which to deal. "What's wrong?"

Her husband folded his hands in front of him and cracked his knuckles--a standard for him, if he would have preferred to use those knuckles to knock someone's teeth out but was too polite to do so. "Your father is here."

Of course. The teeth that every man who cared about her wanted to knock out the most. "That's strange."

"My father said the same--only, peppered with a few words I don't know if this little boy needs to hear yet. But my father must not be as terrifying as your grandfather, because he's still here."

"So he'll show up unexpected on a random day for no reason, but our wedding was out of the question." Of course, her twelve-year-old self would have been ecstatic had he shown up for any reason at all. If only she could reach back in time and slap some sense into that stupid girl. "Tell him I've gone out."

Searle cringed. "Actually, all he said when I was in earshot was that he wanted to meet his grandson."

That ought to have surprised her more than it did. "So he'll acknowledge that he has a grandson. Then again, he did acknowledge that he had a daughter and seemed to consider that in itself decent parenting. If he goes through the trouble of looking at Tarien once, then he can call himself grandfather of the year."

Of course, Tarien had a grandfather--Searle's father--who could have been in the running for that title in earnest. And he also had a great-grandfather, her grandfather, who had won it twenty-two years straight. "I'm not subjecting our son--or any other children we might have--to any of that."

"So... I'll tell him to take a long walk off a short pier? Or some more biting version of that I can say when there's no baby in the room?"

"First off, tell him that he can't be a grandfather if he hasn't been a father first." In her arms, little Tarien blew a few saliva bubbles and let their remnants drip down his mouth. Searle reached over and wiped the drool away with his sleeve. How comforting it was, knowing that if she dropped dead tomorrow, her son would have a father who'd never dream of abandoning him. "And then you can add whatever you like."

NEXT CHAPTER:

In Which Searle Resents the Twisted Luck

August 19, 1200

"My father's not coming to our wedding."

Holladrin's words were laced with neither anger nor sorrow, but an ill mixture of resentment and exasperation and defeat. Searle would have almost preferred to find her throwing furniture in a rage or sobbing on the rug. Neither would have been a happy sight, and both would have been the frustrated aftermath of dashed hopes, but at least there would have been hope there to begin with.

Holladrin's father had been letting her down for so long she no longer entertained the thought that he wouldn't.

"Oh." If there was something he could say to make it better, it was beyond Searle's imagining. His own father had never let him down. "Well... maybe that's for the best. You don't need him."

"You're right." But she picked at the nail of her thumb with her index finger--her never-fail tell of uncertainty. "He'd probably just sulk around the whole time anyway."

"Hmm." It may have been harsh to so readily agree to criticism of a man he'd never met, but Holladrin's father had proven to Searle time and time again just how possible it was to hate a complete stranger. If they ever did meet, he doubted his own capacity to offer a handshake instead of a slug across the jaw. For Holladrin's sake...

...well, she needed some form of closure, maybe. Some final note. But other than that, there couldn't have been any upside to her father's showing up any time soon.

For her sake--no matter what happened--he would never be that kind of father to any children they had.

"You're so lucky. Your father is always so... present. Your mother too. And, obviously, your mother is alive."

"I am lucky." Almost twisted, really. In many ways, who one's parents were could make or a break a person--and who one's parents were was always, invariably, a matter of pure random luck. "And you deserve to have been so much luckier."

Holladrin sniffed, picking at her nails again. Taking compliments couldn't have been easy for someone whose only parent had spent their entire life neglecting them; it would be some years yet, he'd come to terms with the fact, before she'd truly believe him when he spoke the truth about her. For now, he'd take a small smile when she was done, and her leaning on his shoulder with a sharp breath, hair liquid gold against his fingers.

"At least I'm lucky to have you."

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