He enters the room and gestures for Mary to exit, seeing the look on his face she is quick to do so despite her loyalties to her mistress. He locks eyes with his wife, those eyes that had enchanted him from the second he made her acquaintance. Her defiance is obvious, any other man might take this as disrespectful, but he had not married Elizabeth thinking or hoping that she was a submissive woman. He can see the pain in her gaze and his heart stutters knowing he had been so remiss as to be ignorant to it for these past months.
"Elizabeth, this is not the time for solitude. You have had months for solitude, months that I would take back had I known of the situation. You do not get to continue to suffer alone, we will work through this together. We promised one another that we would never live apart in body or in soul. We must be together in all matters."
Darcy expects her to protest again, but he is shocked and disturbed instead by the tears which silently stream down her face. Elizabeth had never been prone to crying. He has never seen a situation in which she has not taken charge and dealt through force of will. His heart breaks at the secrets which she had held so closely.
"You are right I should not have kept this from you. It was so simple to pretend as though it had never happened, I have no idea where to even begin in explaining and apologizing."
Darcy opens his mouth then shuts it, knowing that his attitude will determine the situation. "Wherever you feel right, I would like to hear it all if you are willing."
There is a long pause filled with only the sound of her ragged breathing. Darcy kneels next to her bed, disregarding his comfort to be close enough to console her for a story he wishes he never had to hear. Finally, Elizabeth closes her eyes and breathes in deeply "In the spring, you left me at Netherfield as you journeyed ahead to town for business. I was staying with Jane when I was overcome with the painful and most sudden abdominal cramps. I thought it was an especially bad bout of-" she cuts off and takes another breath to steady herself, "of monthlies. When the pain did not cease, Jane called a doctor and he told me-" She chokes on the next words and struggles to force them out. Darcy moves his hand to her back and rubs circles, feeling her breath coming out in short gasps.
"You need not tell me if you cannot, I believe I understand the situation."
"No, you are right, I owe you this. There was a babe, no more than two months along. I spent two days in pain before it ended, not much worse than a painful monthly though much worse in the magnitude of knowing."
Darcy lets out a sigh at the words. He had anticipated it after the content of the letter, but the reality of it caused a twist deep in his stomach. "Elizabeth, I had absolutely no idea. Why would you not tell me? The pain that you must have experienced, all on your own, how could you think I would not want to support you through such an event?'
"I had Jane; I was not alone. I did intend to tell you but I was so upset, like I had failed you and failed our child. Then my mother discovered I was residing at Netherfield and decided to make a visit by force."
Darcy feels something snap within him, the idea of his vulnerable wife all alone and without his protection being preyed upon by one who should have supported her. "What did she do?"
"She explained that it was a curse that had made itself known in many women of our family, she had grouped the burden of five daughters on a similar level of failure as what I had experienced. She told me other things, things that I will retain as sharing would violate her privacy though she had no consideration for my own. I would have disregarded her statements and threats as typical of her particular way of speaking were we not to have journeyed to Rosings for Easter soon after."
Darcy groaned and placed his head into his hands. As the story continued, he could not imagine it becoming worse, every new addition added to his guilt. "Aunt Catherine?"
"She was speaking to another relation, though I could not identify the woman, and I had the misfortune of overhearing. She reaffirmed my mother's words, referring to me as a failed broodmare. They both agreed that there was absolutely no benefit in marrying a woman such as myself if I could not even provide the fecundity typical of my class. They were… discussing the possibility of annulment or divorce on the basis of a lack of heirs."
Darcy stands up quickly, ready to journey directly to Rosings or to Longbourne, whichever he could get to first. He had no fear of shunning his relations, he would do so for less than the slight that had been so ruthlessly administered to his fragile and innocent wife.
"Fitzwilliam, please sit down. I know I should have told you. I know that you have every right to disappointment, I have tried these past months to correct my error, but I do not know. I have consulted midwifes who have provided me the same answer. Please, I do not think I could bear you turning your back upon me."
Her words are coming out in sobs and Darcy has never seen her with so little composure. He did not think it was possible for his heart to shatter so many times in such a short period, but his own emotions continue to astound him.
"Elizabeth, darling, how could I ever be angry with you? How could I ever turn my back upon you? I stood only to begin the process of preventing either of those women from ever breathing the same air as you."
"How could you not be angry? I withheld the truth from you, but more importantly, I have failed the most simple and direct duty of a wife. Lydia and Jane have had no issue, I do not know what prevents me aside from my own ineptitudes."
"I will not allow you to disparage yourself so. I admit that I wish you would have come to me immediately after your suffering, but for no sake other than your own. I understand the life that you lived prior to becoming Mrs. Darcy was very different," he waves his hand at her protest, "not in wealth or status but with the shadow of entail. Pemberley is under no such entail, if God does not grant us children then Pemberley will fall to Georgiana and her children."
"But we have spoken about children, I have seen you with our niece and I know that is not something I could deny you."
"You misunderstand the elements of such a production; how can you say whether the fault is yours or mine? Your mother granted your father five children, my mother only managed two despite her fervent desires. Though society would force you to suffer the burden, a child could not exist without us both."
Elizabeth sits silently, looking at him cautiously as though expecting him to contradict the statements. "And Elizabeth, do not mistake my intent in marrying you. Ultimately, the only life I was seeking to create was one for us to share."
Her breath rushes out in a quick sob and she throws her arms around him, nearly falling off the bed in the process. She buries her face in the crook of his neck and he feels the warmth of her tears soaking through his shirt. But he does not move, he allows her what she should have had months ago. He even feels his own tears making slow paths down his face, mourning the loss of someone who had never had the chance to exist.
Once her sobbing subsides, she turns to him again. "Fitzwilliam I feel the need to apologize again. While I was in the height of my illness I allowed my thoughts to get the best of me. The nature of your familial status has not daunted me before but I never imagined I would find myself so lacking in good health. First, the situation of this past spring. Then this bout of illness so soon. How can the tenants bare to have ten children and make it through illness so quickly and with so little side effects? I cannot help but agree with my mother in thinking that I have allowed my position in life to overcome my own strengths.
Darcy blinks down at her, attempting to understand her statement. She regrets her marriage to him? She wishes she had allowed herself to be the wife of a man like Collins who would have forced her into a life of constant suppression to prevent catastrophic social errors and who would never have been able to appreciate her? Before he can voice the questions rushing through his mind, her own thoughts continue in barely a whisper. "I had wished I would- that it would all go away. That I could allow you to find the wife that your family desired. One not so weighed down by the straddling of social spheres, one who could bring prestige and children and health and all that which I cannot."
Never in his life had a sentence stolen his breath away like that of Elizabeth's confession. Despite how horrid her experience was this spring, he had obviously underestimated its effect on her. She tries to hide her face in his coat but he tugs her gently until she is facing him again.
"Elizabeth Darcy, I need you to know completely and entirely that there is nothing that anyone could ever offer me that would ever make me regret my decision in marrying you. You are aware of my life before you, you know how my countenance has changed. What you suffer is not for me to bear as anything but pain in knowing that you are in pain. You are no burden to me, if anything I would consider myself a burden to you. My aunt is a simple outlier the rest of my family adores you. You and I have never experienced such a loss but I feel as though this sadness can only be natural. This is a loss which we should survive and bear together. Please, I beg you, do not allow yourself to ever feel as though anything that relates to you in any way could be above my notice, or if you do please tell me immediately. I will stand by you through anything but I cannot stand the thought of you suffering in silence."
She looks at him with such adoration that his chest contracts. His wife is one of the strongest people he has ever met and he has allowed it to blind him to her vulnerabilities. "How did I ever get so lucky?"
"I will always be there for you Elizabeth but you are not lucky for having me, this is the minimum of what you deserve in life."
She smiles softly, "I'm sorry Fitzwilliam, I don't know what came over me. You know I am not prone to theatrics."
"No Elizabeth, we have both been under such impossible stress. After you recover fully we must take some time for ourselves. Perhaps it is time for us to return to one of our holdings abroad."
Her eyes sparkle with mirth, "Mr. Darcy, are you suggesting we abandon our duties for a holiday? How irresponsible."
"I would abandon everything for you. I would live in squalor if it meant I would live with you."
"Now you are getting overly sentimental sir, what would society say?"
"Well, I am simply too wealthy to care."
"No no, you just sacrificed your wealth you are a pauper now."
"All the better, then maybe society will forget about us entirely."
She snorts and pushes her face deeper into his jacket. He pulls away slightly only to climb into bed next to her and re-arrange their positions so that she can recline more comfortably. He feels himself being pulled into unconsciousness, the weight of the revelations and many sleepless nights finally catching up to him. This is not a catastrophe that was on his list of possibilities this morning nor will it be something with a direct or easy solution. How can he ever hope to fix something that has wounded her so deeply, that has no solution? How can words or even actions ever begin to reassure her of all the things that burn in his chest? It will be no easy task, nor would it be achieved with any speed. The struggles pound through his head, him imagining a million situations that Elizabeth had so eloquently put forward tonight. It would be years, if ever, that he forgets the pain in her eyes or the dropping in his stomach as she referred to her death so simply. He has no idea how he can ever begin to heal the hurts of her heart but falling asleep with Elizabeth makes him feel safer than he has in days.
AN: Thought about splitting this up into two chapters but also thought that would be really mean. I think this is going to be the end of this story, thank you so much for reading along up to this point! I would love to hear your thoughts, I've really appreciated reading them until this point. If you hated it completely though uh maybe just keep it to yourself. Let me know if you have questions on anything too and I'll try to answer them!