AN: I've had the beginning of this little story in my writing file since the end of Queen's Waltz, and in the months/years since then it's really just sat there, gathering dust. But for whatever reason, I sat down today and the rest of it just sort of wrote itself.

This is a return to the world of Queen's Waltz, but one of an earlier age - a look into the mind and paternal side of a very unusual and complex man.

Dedicated to the wonderful readers and reviewers of my Queen's Waltz fic - it is because of YOU that he now has a voice.

Much love,

Voi

P.S. I own nothing relating to Fable and write for fun, not to make money.

He is not like most men; Reaver knows this if just because he has lived long enough to be any sort of man he's ever dreamed.

Not that he dreams per se… the thought makes him snort.

But he's never had the desire to be more than the irreverently rakish fop his mother had labeled him as a young man.

And that is not because he ever loved his mother, thank-you-very-much.

If anything, the role of amoral hedonist has always fit him and even now, several hundred years later, the description is an honest one. Maybe the only honest thing about him actually…though Sparrow would frown if she heard him say the words aloud.

Perhaps, Reaver muses as he swirls the wine in his glass, this persona suits him now even better than it did before. Like fine wine or an expensive pair of shoes, age lends itself to the perfecting of such a particular personality. Of course, this is broken up by moments of uncomfortable introspection which is broken further by even longer bouts of irresponsible pleasure.

Eyeing the woman in the kitchen for just a second Reaver decides to never mention the three years he spent in Samarkand. It would be a shame for her to attempt to kill him on the cusp of so important an occasion. Still…the story was such a good one…

Taking a long suffering sip from his glass, Reaver chokes on the taste and reacts almost immediately, throwing both glass and decanter out the window. He can't remember the last time he's actually had a nice glass of wine, and with Sparrow trying to curb spending it seems unlikely he'll get any chance in the near future.

After a year of living together, it had become increasingly clear that to remaining anonymous amongst the people of Brightwall one had to be as broke a church mouse; which of course meant that Sparrow was having a gay-old-time with their current status in financial destitution.

Or rather, their perceived financial destitution…Sparrow was the queen so there really was no getting around the fact that between her treasury and his modest wealth as a pirate they could have bought the silence of the entire town. But Sparrow wanted what she wanted, and so they had to scrape by on what was a pittance each month.

Well…mostly…

Reaver had refused to do without one particular creature comfort. And for this, for red wine, he had taken a stand, storing the precious and expensive spirits in the rather handy root cellar in the basement.

Never mind that he had waited for Sparrow to leave on a day-long trip to town before moving them from their *ahem* hiding spots in the forest.

Eyeing the sadly watered down swill he had flung out into the Reaver scowled before bending down to retrieve yet another bottle of wine and a glass, his third set in the past hour.

He always needed wine at hand whenever thinking about the woman who was both his lover and queen.

Women were full of trouble, his father had warned him, but here Reaver was, almost four lifetimes later, stuck with one. She wasn't even a woman he could readily up and leave either, oh no that would be easy; he had to go and choose a Hero the likes of which a crazy seer had prophesized.

At least she didn't hit him the way the other female hero had taken to habit while they were adventuring. Instead his hero, Sparrow, killed him slowly (the cruel woman) with her careful practicality, spiriting every spare coin away until Reaver's started calling her 'Magpie' for her new-found tendencies.

Turning to give her a more studied look, he watched the woman as she busied herself in their modest kitchen, humming as she went. Despite the earliness of the hour Reaver was pleased to see she seemed well rested despite her condition. The domesticity was a new, but Sparrow had proved to have skills enough for them both.

Taking an absentminded sip from his glass Reaver shuddered.

Oh but he was really starting to miss the wine, damn it, the good wine.

He missed his mansion too…though Bloodstone was too far out of the way to feasibly travel with Sparrow nearing the end of her pregnancy. But where he might have once frowned at the thought of being so far from the palatial comfort, from the well-stocked wine cellar, he finds himself very nearly content.

Well, more content than the last hundred years, give or take a decade…

And in any case, living here, around Sparrow had allowed him to pursue other things he might not otherwise have considered, like painting.

He'd tried it before of course, before the camera was invented and the only way to really capture beauty was to stare in a mirror and try to pain what you saw. But often the results were disappointing. The master painter he had learned from had seemed impressed, but really, there were only so many ways one could paint a beautiful face before one got bored.

So. Bored.

When said master painter had suggested he try a vanitas or landscape painting Reaver had shot the man. Who had time for landscapes anyway?

He supposed he had time now, but really who was going to quibble over the details?

Besides, this particular painting, the one he had started only a month ago on a whim, was proving to be a very different experience. Not enlightening exactly, painting was still the same process it had been before, but the experience left him feeling thoughtful.

Proper thoughtful, not 'I wonder what's for dinner' thoughtful.

And it's very nearly done too, the painting. An image somewhere between bordello sexy and portrait formal, it's one of Sparrow.

Free flowing hair, eyes bright against the morning sky, the piece is almost absurdly romantic but Reaver cannot quite get himself to stop nor even consider destroying it. Even his attempts at making the painting more interesting end up swinging back towards modesty in some way, shape or form. Though he does have a particular fondness for Sparrow's breasts so maybe he'll try making her shirt just a little more open at the collar?

The thought has him so intrigued that it's only when his very pregnant lady arrives in the living room that he looks up in surprise.

Voice tight with pain she gives him a small smile as she braces her rounded body against the door jamb.

"I need you to get the doctor."

She clings to him when he unfolds himself from the chair and gathers her against him. Small though she it, there is a very real strength in her body that keeps her upright despite the pain, a steadiness that compliments his own usual flighty nature.

Leading her down towards the threadbare couch there is a moment, a split-second, when Reaver feels so light headed he wonders if he might faint.

Which would be embarrassing…truly.

He has to take several deep breaths before the room stops spinning.

"It's time?"

His hand gently squeezes her own as he asks.

"Yes," her smile is tight but brilliant, "It's time."

It takes nearly three hours of labor for the baby to be born. Three hours of listening to his sweet-tempered lover curse him to all the places hot and toasty, of delighting in the fact that she actually knows more swear words than he does (and in different languages too).

Weaker men might have found themselves forever scarred by the miracle of birth, but for Reaver the intensity of that moment has shown him yet another facet of a deliciously complex woman, a woman who has somehow captured his interest even more now than she did before.

And when at last he is presented with their daughter Sparrow askswhat they should name the little squalling bundle that has all of her mother's beauty but all of his loudness, his temperament.

His response is not one his lover had expected, but the look on her face is one all he needs to know that he's made the right decision.

He is not a good man, not a particular moral man or even upstanding citizen.

If anything, Reaver prides himself on his vanity, his outstanding fashion sense and the very deliberate way he masks his danger with a pretty face. He is a man of thorns, of verbal barbs and abilities that are even more deadly.

He is a man who is not nearly as complex as others seem to think, and yet, perhaps not as intensely shallow as he would like to believe.

It only makes sense that he names her after the one flower that possesses all these same qualities…never mind that Sparrow claims her sister had the name first.

That is pure coincidence, or a rather lack of originality of her part, really.

And so they call her Rose.