GENOA

Lord Arvis yanked on the ankle of his pants. "They do not fit." Azel attempted to inch his way across the ground, freed, unbothered by his brother's complaints or their lady losing her lunch. Mostly his foot tapped behind him, head bopping.

"They do fit. They will fit you today, tomorrow, and several months from now, milord."

"It is barely on my waist."

"Your mother will tighten them." He warily eyed her. Loose clothing was not new to her. She stopped growing young, eternally on her tiptoes for it, but handed-down dresses from her cousins rarely fit. His were new, of course, but intentionally left with growing room; for a boy who spent seven years as a duke's son, it must have been odd. She grabbed the waist of his pants, pulling the extra fabric taut against him. "See? And then you grow—"

"I know how hemming works." A bright boy, after all. She unwound her fingers from his pants. Her record of stitching was nearly as bad as the rest of her life, so she would not take anything remotely sharp near him. "We will be back in Velthomer in several months, and these pants will be useless."

Velthomer, Velthomer, Velthomer. "Well, we can keep them for when Azel's big." Hard to imagine, really, her itty bitty son in pants, let alone being seven , especially with his frustrated little whine . "You…" if she told the lord, would he keep it from his mother? "…will be fine. Your mother will get you fit and you won't even notice."

"I will know." She shushed him, nudging him back to sit. Azel came back to her arms, sniffling. Lord Arvis looked at him now, always preferable. "May I hold him?" She nodded — the lord was a trustworthy boy. He settled against the couch, and she laid Azel down beside him; without being told, the lord laid his arm down to barrier him. Azel blabbered sweetly.

"Try not to fight," she said. Freed of children for a minimum of four minutes, she pushed herself off the floor; her knee popped. It was a bit late to be throwing up, wasn't it? Sunilda stopped early — thank the gods, the boy was small enough — but every woman was different (allegedly; her scope was not wide). It was not daylight yet there were things to be done. They needed to be on the move, by her lady's claims, but the lord would not budge on his pants, Cigyun needed rest she would not take, and the sweet air of Verdane grew heavier each day.

She took the woman a drink. Their lodgings were meager but not poor, an 'inn' off the side of the village gathering hall. From a childhood of sleeping on the floor, she wouldn't begrudge a crowded bed. Almost, she missed her pallet in her lady's quarters if only to escape the lord's elbow. Cigyun presently lost it all in a small adjacent room complete with a bucket, tub, and pot.

"It must have been the squash," Cigyun muttered, hand on her stomach. "Neither of you have liked it. Do you need something, Sunny?"

Sunny, again. "Just to check on you, milady." She stepped around and over her legs. Lady Cigyun had color in her cheeks, at least, barely looking like she was with a child. She wouldn't believe her if not for the kick her hand got on occasion. "I know it is early to throw the day away, but —"

"We will be leaving for Genoa the moment my stomach settles. Is everything packed?"

"Yes, milady. One of the village kids handled it," with coin, always. "The lord needs his pants hemmed," she mentioned.

Peacefully enough, she smiled. "He will live. He has others. Is the little sir fed?" Sunilda nodded. She pulled one of the lord's handkerchiefs out of her dress pocket, finally scented, offering it to Lady Cigyun. "Good, good. I need you and Arvis to bother the market for peppermint, and if you like Azel can stay. Get the poor boy knocked out before we go."

Go. Another day with a prickly child kept in the dark. "I can manage a market by myself, milady. The lord can stay here and you -"

"By yourself? In a new country? No, no." Sunilda gathered the obscenity of her hair in her hands, pulling it back from her face. "Arvis will know when I am ready to tell him, and not a moment before."

"And when is that moment?"

"...I am not certain."

Fantastic. Her lord was possessed by a crabapple rotten by rain. Sunilda shifted on her knees, sliding behind her. "You know I can't tell him no. You said I don't have to tell him no. All he does is ask and ask and ask about-" Cigyun was impossible to speak to like this, but they'd been here before. Those months only she knew of her own pregnancy, who cared for her? Sunilda went running the moment she gathered up the courage. "And you claim my baby was rude."

"My lot in life is to give this world stubborn children." Head crammed in a bucket, cheek smeared with sick (quickly dabbed with the handkerchief), Lady Cigyun managed to remain unfairly attractive. Men fell for her at the drop of a foot. ( Men ? It was two — a duke and a prince, both with stubborn babies they did not care - too far? Princes were kind, dreamy, never stupid enough to sleep with married women. Given a chance, Prince Kurth - what did it matter? It did matter; if her boy's father had a smudge of the prince - what was this?)

"They get it from you."

Cigyun chuckled. "It is a gift to be stubborn."

*...*

Stubborn, and the lord liked to peacock. As all things went, he refused to go with her, until she reminded him of her dullness and just how bright he was. She didn't know what peppermint looked like (she did), and needed her lord, head crammed in a book, to help. And, despite her early vanity, this was a strange new country, so she kept her hand on the lord's shoulder and refused to let him stray further than that.

The early sun meant little; the children she paid to do mild lifting hopefully scrambled back to their mothers skirts. The village was not small, nor was it big, but there were enough awake to make the streets narrow. Unlike Lady Cigyun, the average Verdanite stood a head taller than her, save for the children.

Sunilda saw the peppermint, but before she asked the lord for confirmation , she stopped. Azel was fed. Taking her time gave her lady a moment to rest. "This way, milord," she said.

"I want to go back to Mother. How can she hem my pants if I am not there?"

"She's talented. Come on. Azel needs socks."

"He has socks in Velthomer." He did not leave her touch, turning around under it. Unbelievably, his eyes were warm. "We could turn around now , Svan, and be in," voice quiet, " Grannvale by the end of the week. Reunite with our guard, press forward and maybe beyond to Dozel-" and back to Velthomer! Why return to Velthomer when his mother was here? The lord never made a move to leave Velthomer, but she thought it would come as he grew.

She pulled them slightly off to the side. Why carry on into Verdane? He knew nothing, oddly enough. "Did you forget something in Velthomer, milord?" she offered. Packed were his blanket and cloak, uncertain what else a boy like him needed. He slept with no stuffed toy, his favorite book weighed down the chest (it was not about knights, it was about knight formations), and his mother held his hand over carriage reins. Why fuss?

Lord Arvis — a duke's only true son, red as the god Herself, perhaps even marked, here in the green land of Verdane freckled with trees, his mother's land, so close to it — blinked much like the Verdanite child she flagged for help that morning. "Forgotten something? No. Have you?" Her one other dress, yes. Her secret.

"Then why go back, milord?" Recalling his knowledge of this trip, "So soon?" Peppermint, socks, some kind of candy. Now that Azel called her arms home instead of her belly, her knees cooperated all the time, bending them to find the lord's eyes. "I've enjoyed our travels. I know the day we return to Velthomer we can no longer be this kind."

"Why does that matter? We should not be in Verdane. There isn't a thing in this country we cannot find in some backwater Grannvalean village."

"Who said we are finding anything?"

"I haven't done arithmetics in months now," he blabbered, as if she managed his education. As she gave his shoulder a squeeze, his brow creased, continuing. "I will be cordial when we go back." If cordial meant frigid, sure. Sunilda was a lady's maid first, good for errands, laundry, and beating the dust out of a carpet (was her company notable?). Lord Arvis did not pay her any attention in the duchy — she was with Cigyun in the morning, and by evening the lord returned to her. "I cannot do a thing out here."

Do a thing. Do what? "What can you do in Velthomer? You are the duke's son, not the duke." Curiously enough, his eyes dropped. She caught his chin before it dipped. Men did not live forever, she reminded herself. Boys knew this. Boys got inheritances, the inheritances of their wives; some of them got duchies and everything in them. "Yip your orders when we get to Velthomer. For now, Arvis," he did not correct her, "we are in Verdane, and your brother," the only? or one of two? "needs socks. Okay?"

"...and the peppermint. I've never known Mother to be sick." Either of them.

"Neither have I."

*...*

Sunilda took Azel back from Cigyun's arms; he'd nibbled on her dandy dress, leaving a patch of spit behind. "Is that your dress to ruin?" she asked; his hand clung to her. "You can eat, but you have to get in your basket when you're done."

Not a thought in his head. "Go inside, get him fat-eyed," Lady Cigyun offered. "He'll sleep the stretch to Genoa, touch wood. He was very busy while you were gone, trying to roll from belly to back!"

As with most things, Lady Cigyun was right. Azel even let himself be tucked in, feet and all; he jammed his fist in his mouth, tranquilly gnawing on his knuckle. "Good baby," she said. No response, not that she would be ready for one, kissing that precious spot between his eyes, sliding him through the door of the carriage. The lord sat up front, and her delicate lady helped her up.

"I apologize again, Sunny, for how often I cram you in tight spaces! After Genoa we have one more hurdle to clear, then it will be a time of great rest."

Taller, now, by the boost of the carriage. Her fickle, beating heart said to act on her feeble want. She stumbled! That was all. "And, again, Lady Cigyun, I follow because I want to."

"That you do."

*...*

After a long morning of doing nothing, Azel's serene face lulled her to sleep. What else was there to do in the carriage? His other hand looked ripe for holding, pressing her finger into the rumpled palm. When she woke, the carriage stopped, and Azel wiggled one foot to freedom. She shushed him with a finger on his nose, promising to be right back. She offered him a wooden ring to hold, which he took.

Opening the door, she bonked the lord in the head with it. He scowled, moving to give her space to step out. "Arvis won't sit on the ground with his mummy," Cigyun sighed. On her knees, sat back on her calves, she almost looked with child, stomach ever so slightly out from her body. "I hope we didn't wake you."

"No, no, it's alright…" the map was spread out on her thighs. "Is it?"

"Just past these trees is Genoa. We've made remarkable time." Sunilda took her word on it, choosing instead to look at her slim finger pressed on a dot on the map. "We are good with supplies. We are good on time. It will shave off a day, maybe two." She knew little about map reading; taking a step off the carriage, she went to her knees. The next dot was...far. "We were never able to reach that village in a single day. Hug the road, sleep on the edge of the forest-"

"Outside," Lord Arvis said. "Mother wants us to sleep outside ."

"We were always going-"

"No. Not in Grannvale."

Stuck as ever on this, was he? She had her own complaints. Sure, she didn't know much about Verdane (she was getting used to the air), but it's reputation was not stellar. "There are bandits-"

"Barbarians," Lord Arvis chimed.

Hand on him, "-and any other variety of," large, "men with sharp things and bad minds."

Lady Cigyun rolled her map back up. "One day or another, dears, we'll have to sleep outside. The other option would be to ride night and day and surely irritate the poor horses. Sunny cannot drive, and you are too young to drive alone."

Sleeping outside was not the worst thing she'd done, but it was always controlled. The lord, doing his best to be firm, "We have seen enough of this country. Let's go back somewhere more civilized."

"We are going on, Arvis." Sunilda took the map when offered, setting it up on the bench-seat. Little Azel cooed inside. She stepped around the lord to get into the carriage. A bit of sunshine while they were stopped before the long trip. "Would you like to know something?" Cigyun asked him. She held her breath. Now? Yes, there was a reason to push on, and the lord needed to know.

Immediately, "Always."

Lady Cigyun offered her hand. The lord took it. "Do you think I am uncivilized?"

"No, Mother." Azel came easily, slid across the floor and then freed from his confines. Did he know why they were here? Another baby to keep him company! The great gossip they could engage in...no, no, no. Cigyun's babe was a prince or princess, even more than the lord, and her boy was —

"Then you will be just fine in this land." Lord Arvis was nobility by his father; the new babe was royalty by their father. Outside of her duchy, the Duchess Cigyun, her peerless grace, was as plainly born as her; men fell for her, and did not fall for Sunilda. Good. what would she do with a man's attention? "Trust Mummy for a few weeks. Then everything will make sense. I promise."