"Victoria?"
"Mmm… morning," she whispered, rolling towards him. "Lord M. William."
She blinked her eyes open and saw her husband, who smiled warmly at her and whispered,
"Let's go see him before breakfast."
Victoria slowly sat up and stretched, clenching her fists above her head and arching her back a little. Melbourne grunted a little from beside her, and he informed her,
"You're more beautiful than ever."
"Hush. I'm fat." Victoria scoffed a little, but Melbourne shook his head and sighed. He petted Victoria's ribcage and murmured,
"You're softer. I quite like it."
"And you're kind," Victoria told him, "but I promise to be slim again soon."
"Victoria, you bore our child only six weeks ago," Melbourne reminded her. "There is precisely nothing saying you must be back to your original form already. Goodness… give yourself grace, Victoria."
Her eyes burned then, for she remembered the way she and Albert had fought about her becoming plump from overeating. What would Albert have thought about Victoria's body after giving birth? Did it matter now? Now, it didn't, she thought. Albert was gone, and Lord M was here.
In the six weeks since she'd birthed Henry Alexander, Victoria and her husband had grown closer than ever. Victoria had expressed that she didn't want to nurse the baby, but she'd feared Melbourne insisting upon it. Instead, he'd told her that her body was her own, and that if she wished for a wet nurse, that was what they would have. Henry Alexander would love her just the same, Melbourne had insisted. After all, Augustus had been fiercely bonded to his father, who had scarcely nursed him.
And so they had taken on a nursemaid to care for Henry during the times when Victoria and Melbourne needed privacy. Victoria was still, after all, a duchess if not the Queen. It would have been ludicrous not to have staff to care for the child. But she and Melbourne spent most of their time with Henry in their arms. Victoria would play the piano and Melbourne would sit and watch with Henry in a bassinet beside him. Just this last week, they'd gone for a brisk walk outside on an unseasonably warm day, and Victoria had carried their little baby all wrapped up in warm blankets.
Now she pulled herself out of bed and yawned, wrapping a silk dressing gown around herself and buttoning it up her front. Melbourne ensconced himself in a velvet robe and slid on his plush slippers. Then the two of them grasped hands, and she followed him out of their bedroom.
She couldn't be happier, she thought. A year earlier, she would never have fathomed living as a duchess at Brocket Hall with her beloved Lord M as her husband and the father of her child. It would have been an absurd dream. She'd known, even on the day she came here to Brocket Hall to declare her love for Lord Melbourne, that it was a distant fantasy to imagine the two of them here, together, happy. But here they were - together and happy, with their child to love.
They went down the corridor to the nursery that had been set up for Henry Alexander. His nursemaid slept in there with him; she was a girl of good breeding who had come from London on the recommendation of Harriet Sutherland.
"Good morning, Elizabeth," said Melbourne as they walked into the nursery. Elizabeth, the nursemaid, looked up and smiled from where she was tending to Henry at the dressing table.
"Morning, Your Royal Highness. My Lord."
The baby was wrapped in a blanket, and his little suit of clothes was laid out beside him. Melbourne huffed a breath from beside Victoria and asked Elizabeth.
"May I dress him?"
"Of course, My Lord," confirmed Elizabeth. Victoria watched as Melbourne strode into the room and up to the changing table. Elizabeth stepped back and bowed her head, and Melbourne gently began to unwrap the blanket from Henry. He lifted the baby up and whispered, just loudly enough for Victoria to hear,
"Sweet boy. We heard you crying for milk in the night."
"He sleeps well for a child of his age," Elizabeth insisted. "Good long stretches of sleep. He sleeps soundly, too."
Victoria gulped. She nodded as she watched Melbourne pull on the somewhat frilly ensemble over Henry's head and rotated the baby, buttoning up the back of the long gown. He picked Henry up and cradled him in his arms, staring down at him with unmistakable adoration in his pale green eyes. He asked Elizabeth,
"He's eaten, has he?"
"Yes, My Lord. Shall I take him whilst you go to breakfast?"
"I'd like to keep him," Melbourne said. "I can eat one-handed."
Victoria grinned broadly at that. Melbourne was so very attached to Henry. She felt love for her child, to be certain, but Melbourne was absolutely smitten. Victoria felt a slight distance from the baby; she couldn't help herself. There was just a little detachment between herself and Henry. Victoria didn't know why. She wouldn't have been able to explain it. But it was obvious that Melbourne was head over heels in love with his son.
The two of them walked downstairs, and Henry cooed beautifully in Melbourne's arms. Victoria reached over to pet the baby's cheek with her knuckles, and Melbourne murmured,
"Your mother and father love you dearly, Henry. Hm. Indeed we do."
"You are such a good father, William," Victoria hummed as they walked through the foyer and off to the side, through a parlour. "I feel I am a terrible mother. He feels just a little awkward in my arms."
"On the contrary, Victoria, I find you are an attentive and adoring mother to our little boy," Melbourne insisted primly. He tightened his grip a little on Henry, and as they walked into the dining room, Victoria noted,
"He looks so like you now. In his first days, he looked a little like a toad, but now he looks like you."
Melbourne laughed at that. "A toad, Ma'am?"
"Well. Newborn babies are not so very attractive, are they?" she demanded. She raised her eyes to Melbourne, who stared ahead and sighed as he said,
"He was beautiful to me the very first instant I saw him."
Victoria licked her lips and felt incompetant again. She let the servant pull out her chair at the dining room table and then watched as William's chair was pulled out for him. Melbourne sat with Henry in his arms, and the servant asked,
"Shall I send for the nursemaid, My Lord?"
"No; I mean to hold him whilst I eat. Thank you." Melbourne smirked up at the servant, who bowed and turned away.
Another servant came in with a tray of two plates of food, placing one before Victoria and the other before Melbourne. Glasses of juice and milk were poured, and Victoria examined the food before her. Egg fritters, sausages, bread sticks with cinnamon butter, and sharp cheese. Victoria blinked a few times and wondered if she should temper herself from eating to try and get her old body back. But she remembered what Melbourne had told her. She was just a bit softer now, and he didn't mind.
As the servants retreated to the periphery of the room, Victoria raised her eyes to Melbourne and said quietly,
"It's been six weeks."
"So it has." Melbourne stared down at Henry and touched at the tip of his nose before he said, "Six wondrous weeks."
"My doctor told me to wait six weeks, for the health of my body. But I feel I am quite recovered at this point," Victoria said tightly. Melbourne seemed to realise what she meant then, and he smirked a little as he flicked his jade green eyes up to her.
"Tonight," he whispered, and Victoria shivered. They had been intimate in caressing one another, and she'd brought him pleasure with her hand a few times since Henry's birth, but they hadn't had a true marital encounter in almost two months now. Victoria felt like she was dying for want of him. Melbourne seemed to read the craving on her face, and he nodded and said again, "Tonight, Victoria."
"Thank you," she mumbled. She tucked into her food, cutting a sausage and taking a bite. She watched Melbourne adjust Henry in his arms and use his right hand to inelegantly stab at an egg fritter. He leaned over and brought the bite to his mouth, and Victoria giggled.
"It would be so much easier for you to eat if Elizabeth took care of Henry," she protested, but Melbourne shook his head and picked up a glass.
"I never, ever want to put him down. Here is something to know about children, Victoria, and I learnt it through painful experience. One day, you will pick them up, and put them down, and never pick them up again. They grow. And so, whilst Henry is very little, I shall hold him and hold him. Because one day I shall put him down and never pick him up again."
Victoria's eyes boiled with tears at that. She swallowed hard and asked, "Could I hold him for just a moment, William?"
He gave her a knowing look and nodded. He pushed back his chair and rose, and he walked over to Victoria. She took the squirming little infant from Melbourne and wrapped him up in her arms, and she stared down into his face.
"Henry," she whispered, stroking at his forehead with the knuckle of her forefinger. "How you look just like your dear Papa. Will you grow to be anything like him?"
Melbourne bent down and kissed Victoria's cheek. He murmured to her,
"See? A fine mother."
Victoria curled Henry more tightly against her body and used her right hand to pick up a buttered breadstick. She leaned over the table and took a bite, laughing a bit at her own inelegance. Melbourne went and sat back down, quickly eating his own food before taking Henry from Victoria so she could eat properly. When the two of them had finished, Melbourne suggested,
"We've another hour before Henry will need to eat again. Shall we go to the greenhouse?"
"A fine idea," Victoria agreed. She bundled herself up in a thick cloak with leather gloves, and Melbourne put on a warm coat. They swaddled Henry in a thick Scottish blanket and then headed out of Brocket Hall, walking as quickly as they could across the lawn toward the greenhouse. When they got inside, it was considerably warmer, and Victoria handed Henry to Melbourne and stripped off her cloak and bonnet, hanging them by the door. Melbourne kept his coat on and cradled Henry in his arms, walking over to his hibiscus plants. He turned Henry until he faced the plant, and he said softly,
"These are hibiscus flowers, Henry. Your Papa grows these quite carefully. And these, these are plumeria. They're difficult to keep alive in the winter, but your Papa works diligently to protect them. Just as your Papa shall protect you, my dear boy. Hmm."
Victoria felt tears bubble over her eyes and stream down her cheeks as she watched her husband with their son. She whispered to herself,
"Oh, William."
"Let's go see the roses your Mama carried on her wedding day to me," Melbourne said stoutly, and he carried Henry through the greenhouse. Victoria silently followed, her skirts dragging on the cobblestones. Melbourne paused before his pink roses, and he reached with his left hand to dust his fingertips over their petals.
"Roses," he murmured to Henry, "have thorns. One thing you will learn, Henry, is that even the most beautiful things in the world have flaws. The exception to this rule, of course, is your mother. She is beautiful and has no flaws at all. Your Mama, Henry, is a rose without thorns."
"William," Victoria whispered again. "Lord M."
He turned over his shoulder and flashed her a little smile, staring right at her as he said,
"Your Mama, Henry, is a dream made manifest."
Victoria strode up to her beloved Lord M and wrapped one arm around his shoulder. She touched at Henry's cheek, at the tiny face that so resembled his father's, and she said softly,
"You two are everything to me."
"Victoria," Melbourne said in his gentlest tone, "Are you happy?"
She met his pale green eyes and nodded vigorously. She cupped Henry's face in her palm and squeezed at Melbourne's shoulder. She thought of the wall at Dover House. She thought of marrying him, of abdicating the throne, of moving here to Brocket House. She thought of his flowers, of pearls. She thought of Melbourne's sobs in the instant Henry had been born. Her eyes seared like fire, and she cried harder than ever as she nodded again and insisted,
"I am most happy, William. I am most happy."
"As am I," he said, bending to kiss Henry's forehead. He leaned down then and planted a kiss upon Victoria's lips and purred, "So very happy."
~ THE END ~
Author's Note: It's always difficult to know where to end a story, but this one feels like it's reached its natural conclusion. I look forward to writing more Vicbourne, and I'm so exceedingly grateful for the readership and feedback I've received for this story. Long live Vicbourne! Stay safe and healthy. Love to all.