[Wild Roses] Queen
Title: silver linings
'Verse/characters: Wild Roses; Brighid, Jared
Prompt: 14B "despair"
Word Count: 534
Notes: Prompted by a verbal request.
She thought that she was the first of the family to find out about it, aside from the child's mother. As the mother came to her, as soon as she knew, and knew whose, and poured out her half-millenia heart to a woman not yet a century old.
She was, to her reasonably certain knowledge, older at eighty than this girl would ever be. If the boy was old enough to take to bed, he was also old enough to sire a child. Precautions should have been taken.
None of which she said to the girl; there was no need for cruelty.
Her grandchild would be provided for, no matter his parents' prospects. Advantages of bedding a prince.
Who was all of eighteen.
Who, a month later, shuffled his feet into her music room, sat down with her on the piano bench, and spoke of a pretty girl, and that he hadn't known she wasn't thinking about might-bes.
Him, she'd sighed at. Because he was the child of a mortal mother and had been taught to two cycles of time. He knew better.
But she'd said the same to him as she had to the child's mother--that his eldest would be provided for.
He hugged her, careful of his strength, and thanked her with an eloquence he hadn't got from his own father.
Who exploded, when he heard, and would have made rash vows if she hadn't shaken her head minutely at him, just enough for him to register.
Her elder son's explosion was quieter, but her younger sported a black eye for a week that he wouldn't explain.
The babe was a boy, born with a crop of blond hair and eyes blue as his father's. The blond fell out, grew back black as her own, and the blue faded with age to brown. He spent a lot of time with her, brought by one or the other of his parents, and he learned the progressions of musical notes that made music and the way letters shaped words sitting at her side, a hand tangled in her skirts.
He was the age his father had been, though he was far, far older already, when he thanked her, in words she couldn't shoo away as things that were right. Knelt at her feet, looking up at her the Queen, not his grandmother, and thanked her, for the life she'd given him.
She'd had to smile, as she leaned forward and kissed his forehead, gently urged him up with age-frail hands. He obeyed the way all the strong did when she laid hands on them, sat on the couch with her and held her hand carefully cradled between his.
"The old take care of the young, my dear, and you were the youngest."
He grinned at her, slowly, eyes saying volumes his mouth didn't need to, and she chuckled, a little sadly. "There are times, child, that I despair of your father ever really growing up. He will be young a very long time, I think."
Not the way of his son, who was growing up into a man even in the time she had remaining to her. It pleased her in an indescribable way, to see it.
'Verse/characters: Wild Roses; Brighid, Jared
Prompt: 14B "despair"
Word Count: 534
Notes: Prompted by a verbal request.
She thought that she was the first of the family to find out about it, aside from the child's mother. As the mother came to her, as soon as she knew, and knew whose, and poured out her half-millenia heart to a woman not yet a century old.
She was, to her reasonably certain knowledge, older at eighty than this girl would ever be. If the boy was old enough to take to bed, he was also old enough to sire a child. Precautions should have been taken.
None of which she said to the girl; there was no need for cruelty.
Her grandchild would be provided for, no matter his parents' prospects. Advantages of bedding a prince.
Who was all of eighteen.
Who, a month later, shuffled his feet into her music room, sat down with her on the piano bench, and spoke of a pretty girl, and that he hadn't known she wasn't thinking about might-bes.
Him, she'd sighed at. Because he was the child of a mortal mother and had been taught to two cycles of time. He knew better.
But she'd said the same to him as she had to the child's mother--that his eldest would be provided for.
He hugged her, careful of his strength, and thanked her with an eloquence he hadn't got from his own father.
Who exploded, when he heard, and would have made rash vows if she hadn't shaken her head minutely at him, just enough for him to register.
Her elder son's explosion was quieter, but her younger sported a black eye for a week that he wouldn't explain.
The babe was a boy, born with a crop of blond hair and eyes blue as his father's. The blond fell out, grew back black as her own, and the blue faded with age to brown. He spent a lot of time with her, brought by one or the other of his parents, and he learned the progressions of musical notes that made music and the way letters shaped words sitting at her side, a hand tangled in her skirts.
He was the age his father had been, though he was far, far older already, when he thanked her, in words she couldn't shoo away as things that were right. Knelt at her feet, looking up at her the Queen, not his grandmother, and thanked her, for the life she'd given him.
She'd had to smile, as she leaned forward and kissed his forehead, gently urged him up with age-frail hands. He obeyed the way all the strong did when she laid hands on them, sat on the couch with her and held her hand carefully cradled between his.
"The old take care of the young, my dear, and you were the youngest."
He grinned at her, slowly, eyes saying volumes his mouth didn't need to, and she chuckled, a little sadly. "There are times, child, that I despair of your father ever really growing up. He will be young a very long time, I think."
Not the way of his son, who was growing up into a man even in the time she had remaining to her. It pleased her in an indescribable way, to see it.