I'm so proud of myself! It didn't take me forever to get this chapter done.
SPECIAL THANKS TO:
RHatch89: Thank you so much, you're review meant the world to me.
heytay1: Thank you.
steelegirl19: Thank you, love.
fairydaisy777: Thank you for reviewing! And, no baby Boleyn-Brandon will not be born at court.
Applejax XD: Thank you.
Silently Tearful: Awe, thank you!
Naruhina1519: I love writing the scenes between Katherine and Charles and the baby is coming soon!
HermioneandMarcus: Thank you.
HPuni101: Thank you so much! And like I said before, I have way too many scenarios about Katherine during the Boleyn downfall. They are all written down, but all of them sound amazing and I have a plot behind each as well. Sadly, I have to choose one though because we're approaching the downfall quickly.
ImmemorialMemory: Lol, I secretly want Henry and Katherine together too, although my love for Charles is vast! And tank you so much for you're review, it's hard to write an original character that will stand out to your readers.
ILoveThee: The baby is coming soon! Keep and eye out because I'm too pumped for that chapter!
Michaela Adams (anonymous): Thank you!
~I own nothing and no one except for Katherine and the bun in her oven that's read to come out soon.
~Enjoy!
Chapter 25: 25th December, 1533
Charles Brandon groaned as he heard knocking on his private chamber doors. He buried his face into his wife's dirty blonde locks of hair, and drew her body closer to his. He prayed that if he ignored whoever it was at the door then they would go away.
"Uncle Charles?" He heard two voices call for him from behind the doors.
He closed his eyes tighter and tried to go back to sleep.
"Father?" Three voices called for him this time.
Rolling over, he saw Katherine yawning with an adorable scowl on her face. "Hmm, Charles, what time is it?"
Charles looked out the window and saw that the sun was barely even rising. He knew that the cocks around England hadn't even crowed yet.
"It's time to face the little terrors."
"No," Katherine moaned. She waved her husband away. "Tell them to go back to sleep."
There was another knock and whispers followed along with giggles.
Charles rolled his sleepy eyes. "I don't think they're going to sleep anytime soon."
"Aunt Katherine? Uncle Charles? We know you're in there! Open up!" The voice belonged to none other than Catherine Carey. The nine-year old was very upbeat and sassy; something Charles always joked about and said it came from her Boleyn blood.
Katherine rolled over on her back and groaned, "Go answer the door."
Charles was already getting up to do so, but he stopped and looked back at his wife. "Why do I have to answer it?"
"Because you're a gentleman, and I'm pregnant."
Charles rolled his eyes and chuckled lightly. That was Katherine's favorite excuse to make him do something. Although Charles would do anything for Katherine, she didn't even need to ask.
Katherine was still trying to fit sleep by the time Charles had opened the door. As her heavy eyes begun to flutter again, she heard the voices of her niece and nephew, as well as her step children.
Cathy smiled brightly when the chamber doors opened. "Uncle Charles," she exclaimed, jumping for joy. "Finally, you're awake. Do you know what time it is?"
Charles could never be angry with his niece. Her blonde hair was always down in a braid, and the red highlights resembled a halo. Her blue eyes sparkled with pure child innocence, and she was even more adorable with her missing front tooth.
"It isn't even five o'clock, Cathy."
"See, I told you!" Charles young son, Henry, said.
Cathy shook her head. "No, you didn't!"
"Yes, I did!"
"No, you did not!"
Frances and Eleanor, two of Charles's daughters, pulled the two children apart. The young cousins were only a year apart, Henry being ten, and were exactly alike. Both children were pigheaded and ambitious with positive personalities, but whenever the two were around each other they were bound to argue. They were far too much alike to hold a civil conversation, but at the end of the day they were the best of friends.
"These two haven't slept all night I believe," Frances said, smiling at the children. It pained Charles to look at Frances at times, for she looked so much like her mother Mary. The similarities between the two were strikingly bold; as of now, the two women could have passed as twins. Like Mary before she became ill, Frances was tall and slender with grey eyes, and possessed extreme beauty. Because she had yet to be married, Frances wore her silky red-gold hair loose, flowing down her waist.
Cathy gasped at her cousin's words, as if Frances had just blasphemed. "How could anyone sleep?! If you sleep, you'll miss the whole celebration. Right, Henry?"
Charles didn't even see his nephew, Henry Carey. The seven year old looked to be dead on his feet. He yawned and wiped the sleep out of his eyes. "It is a bit earlier, Cathy. John isn't even awake yet."
Just in the past week, Mary and William Stafford had a baby, a son they named John. The newborn was a loud child and needy (per say). Charles and Katherine had never seen such a greedy baby. From the moment he woke to times in the middle of night when he would wake everyone else up too, John cried for his mother's love and affection, and also for her milk. The boy appeared to always be hungry; he was always attached to Mary's nipple, suckling all that he could. Cathy and Henry were slowly adjusting to having a newborn in the house. Although the two were excited to have a baby in the house, they weren't excited about all the noises and lack of attention on their part the baby brought.
Cathy looked at her family with wide eyes, like they were crazy. "What is wrong with you people? It's the most amazing time of the year!"
Henry rolled his eyes at his big sister and quietly slipped pass his uncle to climb into bed with his aunt. Ever since he was a baby, Henry had a close relationship with his aunt Katherine. He could never think about replacing his mother, but Henry always felt safer and more connected with his aunt than his own parents.
Katherine felt someone get into bed with her, but she knew it wasn't Charles, for the body was too small. She turned over and smiled when she saw her nephew. He looked like an angel as he lay besides her trying to fall back to sleep. The chubbiness in his cheeks was slowly fading as he matured into himself. Much like his sister, Henry had blond hair as well, and it quiet long too. He was always pushing it out of his face, which made him even more adorable. The red in his hair also resembled a halo.
Katherine didn't even know that she was stroking her nephew's hair until his sleepy blue eyes opened. He smiled softly, enjoying the sensation of having his head rubbed.
"And why are you up so early?" Katherine smiled as well, knowing as to why he was up.
Henry rolled his eyes and yawned again. "Cathy hasn't slept at all, and she's kept me up all night as well."
Katherine laughed and pulled her nephew closer. "You know today is her favorite day besides her birthday."
Henry nodded his head, snuggling into his aunt. "I just don't understand why."
"BECAUSE IT'S CHRISTMAS!"
Katherine and Henry jumped when Charles stumbled backwards into the room with a wide awake Cathy in his arms. Charles's eyes were wide with shock and amusement as he placed his footing. He certainly didn't expect his niece to launch herself at him.
"Cathy," Katherine laughed as she saw look on her husband's face. "Be careful with Charles, he's old now."
Charles playfully glared at his wife. Ever since had turned forty-nine, Katherine and his children constantly picked with him. He knew they meant nothing by it, and found himself laughing along with them.
Ignoring her aunt's playful, but serious warning, Cathy jumped out of Charles's arms and scrambled on to the bed. "Aunt Katherine, you're awake!"
Cathy forced herself between her aunt and her brother so that she could hug Katherine. Cathy pulled away and put her hands on Katherine's stomach, marveling at how hard her stomach felt as it grew, but also how the skin could feel so soft.
Nuzzling her face into her aunt's stomach, Cathy placed a small kiss on it. "Merry Christmas, my favorite cousin!"
None of the adults corrected Cathy and Henry when they said that Katherine's unborn child was their favorite cousin. The two children never saw their other cousin Elizabeth. A couple months after Anne's coronation, Mary, once again, shocked her family with scandal by secretly marrying William Stafford, a commoner (except for Elizabeth's baptism). Mary's family disowned her for this and Anne refused to allow her sister to return to court. The only one who didn't disown Mary in any type of way was Katherine. The youngest Boleyn was use to Mary's sporadic ways and scandals, so she simply accepted Mary for who she was, and her ways as well.
The two sisters also shared something in common when it came to their husbands: they loved them. Unlike Katherine's marriage, which the family greatly accepted (even though her father and uncle disliked Charles), Mary had had to appeal to Master Secretary Thomas Cromwell for help. Mary admitted that she might have chosen 'a greater man of birth and a higher', but never one that should have loved her so well, nor a more honest man. And she went on to write in a letter to Master Cromwell, 'I had rather beg my bread with him than to be the greatest queen in Christendom. And I believe verily ... he would not forsake me to be a king.' She begged Cromwell to try to convince her father and mother, her uncle Norfolk and her brother to see that she was happy and in love. 'I dare not write to them, they are so cruel against us.' But the Staffords were not forgiven, and remained outcasts living in rustic retirement at Rochford in Essex.
But the Staffords found theirselves at the Duke of Suffolk's manner more often than their house in Rochford. The disownment was not so bad, for it gave Mary and Katherine time to reconnect, and it also gave the children time to get to know each other and befriend one another. It was a beautiful sight to watch their family grow, and Mary and Katherine wouldn't throw that away for anything.
Cathy kissed her aunt on the cheek as well. "Merry Christmas, Aunt Katherine!"
Katherine kissed both her niece's cheek and said, "Merry Christmas to you too, Cathy. Now, why are you up so early?"
"Because it's Christmas," Cathy said as if though she were talking to someone who was mentally challenged.
Frances, Eleanor and Henry entered the room as well and greeted their stepmother with a smile and a kiss on the cheek. Charles's children easily adapted to having Katherine as their mother, for Katherine made it clear to them all that she was not there to replace their mother, but to help their father raise them and love them, and give them new siblings. Anne and Mary – Charles two eldest children and daughters from his first marriage with Anne Browne – quickly befriended Katherine, for the women were very close in age. Mary and Katherine were actually both twenty-three years old, and Anne was only three years older. Charles's eldest daughters saw Katherine more as a friend then a mother, for they were both pass the ages of being an adolescent.
"Well then," Katherine sighed as she struggled slightly to sit up. "Let's go awake the others, shall we?"
Cathy's eyes widened, everyone was afraid her eyes were going to pop out. She smiled brightly too and jumped off the bed. She began screaming as she ran down the halls.
"Mama, papa, wake up, it's Christmas! Anne, Mary, wake up! Catherine, you wake up as well! Humphrey, Jane, and George, you all wake up! John, you wake up too!"
Everyone in the master chambers laughed at the young girl.
"Well," Eleanor said. "We don't have to wake anyone up." She took Henry (Carey) into her arms as she and her siblings left their parents alone.
Charles came over to Katherine's side of the bed and helped her stand up. Now, at six months, Katherine's stomach was as big as it was going to get the physician had told her. She couldn't see her feet, and all the weight that she was carrying was hurting her back and her feet. She was also hungry all the time now. Pregnancy was such an amazing and challenging experience for Katherine. She had never felt this big or full before, but felt empty at the same time.
"Good morning, love." Charles kissed Katherine softly, and placed his hands on her stomach.
Katherine kissed him back. "Good morning, my…"
"EVERYONE, WAKE UP!"
-Page Break-
John looked like little jouster after a match. His body was still slightly red as beets, and he still had some bruises from being squished and squashed down the birth canal. He was lanky and had small hands and feet. His face would make all these kinds of weird, but adorable expressions, and his reflexes rivaled that of a lion. He felt like a little sack of flour, so light and precious. The smell of fresh air, poppy, and lavender surrounded the baby. He would sound like a mewing cat, sometimes one that was in labor. He skin was so smooth and soft. There truly wasn't anything like a new baby.
Katherine was sitting down with Mary in the pallor, holding her new born nephew. As of now, all John did was sleep, cry, dispose waste, and eat. It was an endless cycle of cuteness, and Katherine was looking forward to doing the same for her own child. Mary allowed Katherine to help out with John a lot so she could practice and prepare for when her own baby came, but Mary warned her sister that the moments would feel so surreal when it was your child you were caring for.
"I'm honestly surprised he didn't wake up with all ruckuses Cathy was causing," Mary said. She shook her head. "That girl is going to put me in an early grave."
Katherine laughed quietly. "Oh, she's a young girl, Mary. What is she supposed to do?"
"Act like a lady."
Katherine snorted (something that was unladylike) and gave Mary a pointed look. "Do you not remember how we would act in front of our aunts and uncles when mother and father weren't around?"
As young children, the Boleyn siblings were absolute terrors. Everything and anything was a game to them, for they never liked to be bored. It was when they were bored that their mischief sides would come out to play. Once they had broken their aunt's and uncle's dinner table, the cows were once let loose, and on a couple occasions their cousins' (usually one of the Howards) would end up hurt.
"Alright," Mary said. "She does act better than us when we were her age, but that's still no excuse. She knows better than to wake everyone up so early."
"Let her be a child, Mary," Katherine said softly. "In three or four years she'll be considered a woman."
The house was relatively quiet except for Cathy's footsteps and the echo of her voice. The other women were in the kitchen with the servants, helping prepare the meal. Usually none of the family went into the kitchen area, but on special holidays, when there was lot to make, the women helped the servants. Katherine would be in there too, but Charles didn't want her straining herself. The men were out in the fields, showing Henry and Henry how to use the archery.
It was Christmas, and that meant that there would be a grand feast. There would be venison and peacock (which was skinned and roasted then put back inside the cured skin with the feathers on as a table decoration). Charles's favorite meal was souse, which were pickled pig's feet and ears. Everyone's favorite was the pie; it was made of a pigeon, inside a partridge, inside a chicken, inside a goose, inside a turkey, which was then put in a pastry case called a coffin and served surrounded by hare and other game birds. A couple days ago Katherine had made her mince pie. It contained fruit (raisins, currants, prunes) and spices (cloves, mace, and black pepper, saffron) and also mutton to represent the shepherds. The thirteen ingredients represented Jesus and the apostles, the fashion was to make it shaped like a crib, which the children enjoyed doing, but that had been banned by Cromwell.
Mary and Katherine could hear one of the servants scolding Cathy for dipping her finger into the pudding, and for trying to steal a piece of the 12th Night fruitcake.
"A mother's work is never done," Mary sighed as she went to get Cathy. She took John as well; she was going to put him down for his nap.
Katherine sat alone in the pallor, running her hands over her stomach. She was already six months pregnant, and now, everyone who didn't know she was pregnant surely knew now. It felt like Katherine was carrying a ton of bricks since the baby had doubled in its weight. Her libido was completely off because she was always tired and achy (not to mention balancing a growing belly and fluctuating hormones), and she wasn't getting enough "attention" from Charles. But Katherine suppressed her sexual urges, at least for the nine months she was pregnant she would. Charles and Katherine both noticed that the child was responding to their voices and noises, but they had yet to feel their kick; as of now they could only feel the baby move. Katherine was also having trouble sleeping, the constant movement of the child was pressing down on her bladder, making her use the bathroom all throughout the night.
In just three months, the baby would be here. Katherine couldn't believe it. When she had first found out she was pregnant she was so sure that it would take forever to get to the point of her water breaking, but now, she was wondering where those months had went. She missed a lot of things actually; like the weekly check-ups, the odd and spontaneous cravings of food, watching her stomach grow day by day, but she certainly didn't miss the morning sickness.
Suddenly, Katherine felt her stomach twitch, like an uncontrollable nerve. It happened again and again, and for a second she feared something was wrong with the baby until she felt a tickle sensation; like someone had gingerly ran their fingers along her stomach, but from the inside.
Katherine remembered Mary always describing her children's first kicks as a tickling sensation.
Katherine's eyes had widened.
Her child had just kicked.
The baby kicked!
"Charles!" Katherine screamed, amazed at the sensation she was feeling. "Charles!"
Catherine, Charles illegitimate sister, came running into the pallor room, looking to see if anything was wrong with her sister-in-law. "Katherine, what is wrong?"
Eyes shining with tears, Katherine simply shook her head. "I need Charles. Please, go get him. Tell him it's the baby."
The other women and a few of the servants had gathered in the door way, they too were wondering what was wrong the Duchess. Eleanor ran out the door to go fetch her father, screaming his ran as she went.
Mary kneeled down by her sister's side, placing a hand on her knee. "What is the matter? Is the baby alright?"
"The baby is fine, Mary," Katherine said smiling.
"Then what is it?"
"Katherine?!" Everyone moved to the side to let Charles pass. His face was covered with a light sheen of sweat, and he looked pale in the face.
He quickly knelt down on the other side of Katherine and placed his hands on top of hers. "What is wrong with the child?"
Katherine laughed, realizing that she had scared everyone half to death. "The baby is fine, darling. I was just taken by surprised."
"By what?" Charles was going to go mad. If his wife did not tell him what she was calling him for soon he would explode.
Katherine replaced her hands that were resting on her stomach with Charles's and said, "Say something – anything."
Charles raised an eyebrow, but did as his wife said. "I would like it very much if you told me what the matter is."
And a couple seconds later, just like that, Charles felt something press against his palm. He moved his hand suddenly, surprised by the feeling. He looked up at Katherine with wide, happy eyes.
"What was that?"
Katherine laughed at the hope and uncertainty in her husband's voice. "The baby. It was the baby, Charles. It kicked!"
Charles, in amazement, pressed his hand back down on Katherine's stomach. In a matter of seconds the baby responded again. It was amazing. It was as if the child knew that it's parents were happy and proud about being able to feel he or she kick.
"Our baby," Charles whispered. His eyes were glued to Katherine's stomach before he looked up at her with glossy eyes. "Our baby."
Katherine couldn't stop the (happy) tears from falling. Never in the past months had Charles ever looked so happy and thrilled about their unborn child. He looked as if though God had given all the knowledge and wealth in the world. He had a look and aura to him now that Katherine had never seen before, and it was all because of the tiny human she carried inside of her; the tiny human that they had created out of love.
The room was silent as everyone watched the couple with smiles and tearful eyes.
Cathy, who was standing next to her cousin Henry whispered, "This is the best Christmas present ever."
Everyone laughed, agreeing with the young girl.
It certainly was the best gift God could ever bestow upon them.
Everyone in this story is just growing up too fast :'( I remember the days when I first began writing this and all of them were like babies to me. Now they're having their own babies.
I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter, and please tell me what you think.
Also keep an eye out for any other Tudor based stories, or any other stories I upload. Spring break was spent thinking and plotting over many many stoires.
See ya'll soon!
PS: Did I mention that the baby is going to be here soon? I did? Oh, well, THE BABY WILL BE HERE SOON! (So excited).