PATERNITY
A little time has passed and Kayla has delivered her fourth child, a girl they named Dalla Quay, D.Q. for short. She's perfectly healthy, though along with the news of her birth the rumors are quick to spread about the parents who were so foolish as to have another child after their third was stricken with such a terrible disease. All of them must be carriers.
"Let them think it," says Dalla Bonteri as she cuddles her new baby goddaughter and namesake. "It'll be safer for she and Suza in the long run."
Of course Dalla and Lux haven't forgotten about their first goddaughters, the one who ran away and died in the service of the Partisans and the one who was left behind…
…
Okay so maybe he didn't look all that much like Saw Gerrera but his dark skin and light eyes had been enough of a resemblance to her sister's abductor. It was the anniversary of Maia's death and Fiona Harkon had already had more than a few drinks when the stranger walked in to the pub.
She didn't remember much other than throwing her arms around him. "You gonna carry me away like you did her?"
"Babe, I would carry you anywhere." His voice wasn't like Saw Gerrera's either but kissing shut him up. That and more drinks.
And then she had woken up in a bed beside him. She was in no doubt as to what they had done even if she couldn't remember it. She didn't want to go home to Harkon Hall but where else was there. Her own room, the room she had once shared with her twin sister, would be cold and empty, so she wandered down the guest wing.
"Fifi?" The voice startled her.
She looked back at the young man standing in the doorway. She had forgotten that her father's apprentice shipbuilder was back after the maiden voyage of one of the ships he had designed. "Cornel."
"Are you alright?" He asked, concerned.
She ran to him and hugged him. It took him a moment to recover from the shock of the sudden physical contact but then he wrapped his arms around her too.
"I miss Maia," she cried into his shoulder.
"I know," he whispered back. Cornel Blackwell was a man of few words but he was a good listener. She could pour her heart out to him and he'd never question or complain or they could, like now, just stand together in the comfortable silence of their embrace.
…
Fiona had spent the last several mornings puking her guts out and now at the family dinner table three weeks after the incident, the food didn't look quite appetizing. She pushed her plate away.
Everyone knew what it meant even if they hadn't seen the results of any kind of test.
Her father broke the uncomfortable silence. "You should be glad your grandmother didn't live to see this."
Fiona squeaked in protest and her brother gave a nervous laugh.
"Truman!" Talia admonished and got a whispered, "sorry," before she also addressed her daughter, "do you even know who the father is?"
Fiona blurted out sarcastically, "Cornel is the father."
"You didn't just…"
"That is a new low even for you…"
"To blame a guest in our house…"
They were on the point of making her apologize to him when the man himself stood and took her hand in his and said, "I am the father."
They were all too shocked to say anything for a moment, wondering if he really knew what that meant.
Fiona stood also, still holding his hand. "Cornel, I didn't…" but when she looked into his eyes… That in itself was something he was not generally comfortable with, but he was making eye contact with her all the same. She found that she wished that he was the father.
She dragged him out of the room with her. When they were alone she confessed. "Cornel you're not. You and I never…"
"Arkon is the captain of Storm Rider," He stated.
She stared at him confused.
"He didn't make it, but it's his. He is the captain."
Fiona thought she was beginning to understand.
Cornel hesitantly lifted his hand and brushed her cheek with a feather light touch. "I didn't make the baby but it needs a father. I will… I am the father." His gaze dropped away self-consciously. "You said I was. If that's what you want…"
She took his hand that was still hovering near her face and pressed it to her cheek. "Aye. Aye, that's what I want."
He smiled. He had his mother's warm, honest smile not Jamos's cheeky grin. "I want to be a good father and… husband?"
"Cornel are you… are you asking me to marry you?"
"Aye," he said. "If you don't think I'm too old for you."
It was true. There was quite an age difference. He was twenty-four. She was sixteen. That was part of the reason that she had never even considered the idea of their being together. That and his father was friends with her grandfather. She was a child when he arrived at Harkon Hall to be her father's apprentice shipwright.
And then she looked up at him and realized he was smiling. He was teasing her. She laughed and swatted his arm playfully. "My old man."
"My Fiona," he whispered as he bent toward her ever so slowly. It was as if he was giving her every chance to push him away until their lips met.
She had never expected to enjoy his kiss quite as much as she did, or the way he said her name and called her his own. He left her breathless. "You should ask my father," she blurted.
"Now." Cornel nodded. "I'll ask him now." He took her hand and led her back into the dining room. They were met with silence so he didn't hesitate. "Lord Harkon, I want you to let me marry Fiona." He wasn't looking exactly at her father, rather somewhere on the table in front of where the man sat.
"Well, er, Cornel that's very…" Ephraim began.
His wife took up where he left off. "It's a very noble gesture but we know your not…" But Talia too, stopped mid sentence. Perhaps she noticed the way that her daughter and the young man were looking at each other.
"I am the father." Cornel repeated his earlier assertion. "I want to be responsible for Fiona and the baby."
Her parents were at a loss. It was Glover Harkon who finally spoke up with a bit of a smile. "Perhaps a comm to Blackhold is in order to see how his family feels about this?"
Cornel nodded. "Aye, we need a Blackwell representative for a wedding."
"Well, I think we'd need a few other things for a wedding." Talia had never thought she would need to plan a wedding quite so soon and she wasn't sure if she was feeling cordial enough toward her daughter at the moment to spend the time with her that it would take to do such a thing. She couldn't deny the way the two young people obviously felt about each other. Still she worried as any mother would… Shara. Aye. She needed to speak to Shara.
…
"So what's this all about?" The blue holographic image of Jamos Blackwell stood before them with his usual good humor and his wife slightly more wary at his side.
"Well," Ephraim looked to his own wife and then attempted to think where to start.
"You know we've had our hands full with Fiona the last couple years," Talia began. "and since we lost Maia…"
Ephraim squeezed her shoulder.
"You don't hold the monopoly on rebellious daughters," Jamos shook his head.
Shara swatted him and took control of the conversation. "Is Fiona okay? Do you need us to do anything?"
The Harkon's shared another look before Talia announced, "She's pregnant."
Jamos, as they all expected, even though it was neither the time nor place, answered with humor. "So you want your Papa and I to help you hunt down the low-life and make him take responsibility for…"
Ephraim stopped him before make a complete fool of himself. "She says Cornel is the father."
"Excuse me?"
"Cornel? My son? Cornel Blackwell?"
"We don't believe she was telling the truth," Talia hurried to explain. "Until tonight they had never seemed to be more friends or brother and sister."
"But tonight at dinner he stood up with her, took responsibility for the child and asked to marry our daughter." Ephraim nodded at Jamos's expression of incredulity. "Doesn't seem like it's been that long ago that you and my father were joking about joining our families with one of your boys marrying one of my sisters." His voice broke as it did everytime he mentioned Elinor or Miranda. He cleared his throat before he went on. "Never imagined I'd be approaching you about one of your boys marrying my baby girl."
"She's so young." Shara looked as if she might need to sit down. "And Cornel is…" She had tried her best with her son but it was just a fact that his emotional and cognitive development had been more delayed than the others. She'd had reservations about sending him off for his apprenticeship when he turned 16 knowing that his social skills weren't always what they should be. She knew he'd spent a good deal of his growing up away from her at Harkon Hall.
Ephraim looked at her sincerely through the holo connection. "Cornel is a talented, caring, responsible, young man. It has been a privilege having him as my apprentice these past eight years. I quite honestly believe that he would be an excellent husband and father."
Shara's hand went to her lips to cover a happy sob at hearing the praise of her son.
Jamos put an arm around her shoulder. "You still have your reservations, though?"
Talia sighed. "Fiona is a nexu. She says this is what she wants now but what if she changes her mind in a month or a year. I hate to say it about my own daughter but I also don't want to see Cornel hurt."
Shara was thoughtful for a moment and then asked, "Do you believe that they love each other?"
Talia and Ephraim shared another look and she shrugged resignedly.
"I never would have even considered it a possibility before today." Ephraim said honestly. "But seeing the two of them together when he came to ask for her hand, it seemed so obvious."
Talia nodded. "It was like they were always meant for each other and we're all just now seeing it." She huffed. "Still I wish we would have known sooner and could have steered them together before she went off and…"
"Could be that if parents tried to interfere it would have driven them further apart." Shara observed.
"How about this," Jamos spoke up. "We'll ask Cornel to come home. We'll say it's for the wedding preparations. Maybe a month or two apart will make them see things differently."
"Or absence could make the heart grow fonder." Shara smiled at her husband thinking of the time they had been kept apart when they were young and her divorce had not yet been finalized.
"Aye." He grinned back at her.
"Doesn't sound like a half bad idea." Ephraim agreed. "Tal?"
"Aye. Put it off for a bit and see what happens." Talia smiled. "I'm relieved to hear you say it, actually. It all just seemed so sudden."
Her husband gave her a squeeze and then asked the other parents. "They're out in the hall waiting. Would you like me to bring them in?"
When her son entered the holo field with his arm around the girl, Shara thought for a moment she was having a flashback. Fiona had that same Bralykburn determination in her eyes that her aunt Kayla had possessed all those years ago when Emoth had brought her home, sixteen and pregnant. Her aunt, Shara tried to reason it out, who would now be her sister-in-law.
"We're getting married, Momma!" Cornel exclaimed happily.
"The Harkons told us, Love. We're very happy for you." Shara couldn't help but smile. She could see it too, the way that the couple looked at each other.
"Dad, we're gonna have a baby!"
"I heard that, Son." Jamos smiled but it wasn't quite his signature grin. He was worried they were rushing into things as much as the rest of the parents. "Hey, what do you think about coming back to the Hold and we'll get a couple of rooms all set up for you and your wife and the baby?"
Cornel's face brightened at the idea until he glanced sideways at the girl who was standing next to him and saw her disappointment.
"You'll take me with you, won't you?" she asked with a pout.
He looked back and forth between his parents and his girl.
"Fiona," her mother spoke up softly from behind her. "I was hoping that maybe you and I could have some time together to plan your wedding. I know I haven't always been there for you the way you need me to be. I hoped that…"
"You just want to tear us apart!" The girl complained vehemently.
Then she relaxed visibly at the soft words of her husband-to-be. "Won't be for long and I'll get the rooms all ready for you and make a new cradle for the baby."
"She'll need a new one, won't she." Fiona beamed at him.
"Dalla Quay is still using the old one."
"But even if Emoth and Kayla's youngest wasn't using some old relic our baby still should have one of her own."
Shara jumped on the topic. "I'm sure Kayla and Kora would be happy to pass down any of the baby things they've used for their little ones whether the new baby turns out to be a boy or a girl." She smiled knowingly. "They grow so fast some of the things were hardly used at all."
Fiona scowled at the idea of hand-me-downs.
"And think of all the playmates the baby will have growing up at the Hold." Jamos added.
"Almost like Maia and me," Fiona allowed grudgingly with a blame laden side eye at her parents.
Cornel didn't notice the insinuation. He gave his bride-to-be a one armed hug and said softly to her, "we could name her Maia, if it's a girl."
She grinned up at him. "Aye."
…
Cornel lay in his bed awake the night before he would return home to Blackhold. He hadn't really thought of that place as home for the past eight years he had been serving his apprenticeship at Harkon Hall but now he would be preparing a place for he and his wife and their child to share.
His mind was so full of the planning and designs of the furniture he would build and the colors he would paint and all the things he would do to make the space comfortable and new and beautiful for his Fifi that he almost didn't hear the latch of his door as it clicked open or the shuffle of bare feet as his betrothed entered and then shut the door quietly behind her.
"Cornel, are you awake?" She said softly.
"Aye," he whispered into the darkness.
He could see her form silhouetted in the moonlight from his window. She looked small and thin in her nightgown, with nothing to indicate her pregnancy at this early stage. They had gone to the midwife however and verified the fact. She was carrying inside her own tiny body the child who would be Cornel's daughter or son.
"I couldn't sleep." She took a step closer to his bed.
"Neither could I," he admitted.
She took a deep shaky breath and then another step forward. "And I didn't want you to leave before…"
Fiona drew the nightgown off over her head and then without another hesitation climbed into the bed beside him under the covers. "I didn't want you to go away and forget all about me."
His own breathing became faster and more ragged as she slipped a hand under his sleep tunic and ran it over his chest. He nearly lost the ability to form words. "Fiona... we're not supposed to… before the wedding."
"Pish," She hissed close to his ear as she continued to undress him. She sounded much more confident than she had a moment before. "They only say that so a baby won't be made but since we already have one, it doesn't matter. And then it'll be like it's really ours, together."
He couldn't refute her logic and he didn't want to.
