Rose Hill, 1779
A loud banging on the door made Quinn leap her way out of the bed. She had taken forever to fall asleep, looking out of the window restless in fear that her father wouldn't be able to stop the slaves' plans. He was only one, after all, against hundreds of slaves. Rachel had to pull Quinn by the hand and hug her tightly to keep her in bed. Eventually, she fell asleep to the sound of Rachel's heartbeat. But that farm had already a fair share of problems to deal with, and the last thing she needed was for someone to come inside her bedroom and find her sharing a bed with her slave.
"Rach," she whispered. Rachel fluttered her sleepy eyes open, and Quinn smiled. She never woke up before Rachel, and it was endearing to see her face all marked with wrinkles from the sheets. It still surprised her that the simple sight of Rachel could make her mind go blank. Rachel stood there staring at her confused for a good minute until someone knocked on the door again, reminding Quinn of why she had waken up Rachel. "Can you go to the dressing room? Someone is knocking on the door." In a second, Rachel was out of the bedroom and Quinn sighed before going to the door. "Who is it?" she asked in a murmur as fear made her knees buckle.
"It's your father, Quinn. You may open the door now," he said. Before he could step inside, Quinn wrapped her arms around his neck. The discussion they had the night before was long out of her mind, and it was relieving to have him alive and well in front of her after a night of so much worrying. She couldn't stop thinking of what it would feel like to have him die and know that their last memory together would have been a fight.
"Is everything alright?" she asked when she felt strong enough to let go of him and hear everything that could have happened while she was safe inside her bedroom. She hoped one day she would be brave enough to take his place and do the same.
"Yes, everything is alright now," he nodded with a smile. It was only then that Quinn noticed the paleness in his face and the tiredness in his eye. He needed a good sleep. "I have handled everything. You don't need to worry anymore, nothing will happen."
"Oh, that's marvelous!" she sighed, leaning across the door and relaxing the muscles on her shoulders. "What did you do? How did you stop them?"
"It doesn't matter now, what matters is that it's all handled," he shrugged and placed a hand gentle on her shoulder. She smiled. She trusted him enough to not ask any further questions. "But I need to know, Quinn, how did you find out about this? Not even Malcolm, who spends his whole day down the quarters was aware of what was happening."
"I," Quinn stuttered and felt her cheeks getting warmer. She wanted to tell him she had found out on her own. She wanted to make him proud of her. But she couldn't lie. She didn't have time to come up with any plausible story of how she would have found out. "Rachel warned me," she confessed in a murmur. Russell's eyebrow shot up in surprise.
"Well, it's great to see you are finally getting your hand on how to treat her. I knew you would manage, sooner or later. And it's a very good signal that she trusted you enough to tell you that. She might end up being a good addition to this farm and a good helper when you are running this," he smiled and caressed her shoulder. It surprised her, but not as much as she was surprised as he kept talking. "Now, about last night. I'm sorry I snapped at you, dear. I was merely upset about how your brother's dinner turned out. That was not how that dinner should have gone. That night is gonna be forever in your brother's memories and it should be a good one. You know you didn't behave well."
"I know," she rolled her eyes. It hadn't been her best moment, but still, she didn't regret it. She could have behaved differently, but it still wouldn't change how she felt about the whole thing. She was still upset he would be leaving her again. "I'm sorry," she said anyway, just to change the subject. She didn't want to think about it.
"You should apologize to him, not me," Russell said, and Quinn nodded, even though she wouldn't. He should be the one apologizing to her. He was the one leaving. "Anyway, I wanna thank you again. We would be in deep trouble today if it weren't for you. You saved this farm, and it only proves further how deserving you are of it. I'm proud of you, daughter."
Quinn beamed, although she disagreed. The heroine of the night and savior of the farm had been Rachel - but she could never refuse a compliment from her father. They were far too scarce for her to do so. So she nodded, and he walked away with a smile onto his bedroom.
Rachel walked into the kitchen house tying her hair up in a bun. Quinn had been restless all night and she had barely gotten any sleep, which made her lose track of time in the morning and sleep in for longer than she should have in a regular day. It was crazy to think that not very long ago she would have been punished for that, and in that morning she had been awoken with a kiss on her cheek instead. If it weren't for all the worrying in the pit of her stomach, she would think she had been dreaming.
On the other hand, it felt ruthless to be so happy, while she didn't know what could have happened to the slaves down in the quarters. She only knew a few of them, but it didn't matter. They were slaves just like her, although their treatment was completely different. She could only imagine what they would have to endure after their master found out they had planned an uprising. When she saw Lou Lee sobbing in a corner, with her arms wrapped around her own legs and Dorea caressing her hair, Rachel's heart sank.
"Oh, God, what happened?" she asked, rushing to Lou Lee's side and kneeling on the floor near her. Lou Lee didn't answer - her words weren't able to come out between the incessantly sobs and hiccups. Rachel grabbed her hand and dropped a kiss on it, but Lou Lee only cried harder. "Dorea, tell me what happened!" Rachel begged, looking up to Lou Lee's mother. The woman hesitated, and Rachel felt a tug in her stomach. "Please, tell me!"
"Master has sold Bernie," Dorea finally said.
"Fuck," Rachel whispered under her breath. It was her turn to be out of words.
"I don't know how, but master found out Bernie was one of the planners," Lou Lee wailed, shaking her head. "He was out of the farm before the sun rose. I didn't even had the chance to say goodbye, Rachel. My baby might never know his father, just like I never knew mine. This is not what I want for this baby. This is not what I want." She cried harder. Rachel scooted closer and wrapped her arms around Lou Lee.
"Don't cry, Lou," Rachel whispered, but in truth she had no idea of how to comfort her friend. She figured the slaves would be punished, but not sold. She shivered thinking how awful it would be to have the ones she loved sold away from her, and never knowing what would happen to them. "I will try to talk to Quinn and see if she can find out where he went to, okay?"
"No, no!" Lou Lee begged, shaking her head hard. "You have helped us a lot already preventing the fire, Rachel, but I don't think you should get involved in those matters anymore. I will see what I can do," she said with a nod, but then scoffed in a broken smile. "It might not even be his baby anyway," she said. Rachel's lip were closed tightly. It hurt her just to think about being in Lou Lee's situation. "God, I don't want this baby, mama!" She cried, hiding her face in her hands.
"Now, don't you say that, Lou!" Dorea said. Lou Lee swallowed a sob. "That baby hasn't come in a good time and I know it's scary to not even know what color it will be when it's born, but I promise you, you will love that baby with all you have the second it is born! It will help you forget what happened to Bernie and it will bring you a happiness you have never felt before," she said soothingly.
"And we will all help you!" Rachel exclaimed, placing one hand on Lou Lee's stomach. "We're gonna pour so much love in to that tiny baby that it won't even notice there isn't a father around," she said in her sweetest voice. Lou Lee sighed deeply and shut her eyes tightly to try to stop the tears. "It will be fine, Lou. We'll help you. We've got you."
"Yo, are you Rachel?" asked a black man Rachel didn't recall ever seeing, as he peeked his head into the kitchen house.
"Yes," Rachel answered with a confused frown.
"Someone's calling for you," he said, before disappearing. Rachel got up to leave, but Dorea grabbed her arm. Her eyes were bulged out with fear and Rachel assumed it was because she didn't know how to deal with Lou Lee's incessantly sobs.
"I gotta go, I think it might be Quinn. She must be done with her breakfast already," Rachel said, patting down her apron. She wished she could spend the whole day down in the kitchen house, but she couldn't abuse of Quinn's recent kindness. "I'll be back to check on you later, but please, don't worry so much, Lou. We'll all be fine!"
Quinn had already had lunch, and Rachel hadn't come back. Even George had asked of her, and if Quinn wasn't ignoring him she would have confessed she was starting to worry. Rachel had left in the morning to take Quinn's gowns to the laundry room, and hadn't come back ever since. Quinn knew that sometimes Rachel took longer than usual, remembering she had some forgotten chore to get done - but she never took so long. Quinn felt something warm in her chest when she realized the only thing in her mind was concern. She wasn't angry. She didn't feel the need to punish Rachel, the so strong need that never left her head before.
"Abigail?" Quinn asked, as Abbie took away the plates from their dining table. The slave turned herself towards Quinn and bowed her head, in a silent acknowledgment. "Have you seen Rachel?"
"How can you not know the whereabouts of your own slave?" Judy asked with a chuckle. Quinn ignored her mother and stared at Abbie until an answer came.
"Last time I saw her, she had been at the kitchen house, miss," said Abbie. "Would you like me to go fetch her?"
"That won't be necessary," Quinn answered. "I'll go there myself," she said. Judy gasped. Quinn hid a smile. Her mother would never set her foot in a slave's house, and hated when Quinn did so. It felt liberating to be able to go against her so firmly without the fear of being punished. Growing up had its perks.
"Excuse me," Quinn said as she walked in. Dorea and Lou Lee stood up at once, and Quinn couldn't help to notice how blotched the younger's slave face was. She almost asked what had happened, but remembered it wasn't her place to do so. She shouldn't pry on the slave's life. "Have any of you seen Rachel?"
"She left early this morning to go after you, Miss Quinn," said Dorea. Quinn frowned deeper and felt something twisting in her stomach.
She knew in her heart that something wasn't right.
And all her fears were confirmed the moment she gave up looking and went to her room, only to find Rachel sitting on her dressing room's floor with blood splattered all around her.
"Oh my God!" Quinn exclaimed, her hands flying to her mouth as the books she was carrying flung to the floor. "What happened to you?" Quinn asked in a murmur. Rachel had her eyes closed, and shook her head. Quinn could see the purplish bruises forming around each one of Rachel's eyes. A slit on her swollen lip, dripping blood. Her always so perfectly tight hair pulled in all directions. A rip on the sleeve of her gown that revealed a nasty cut. Quinn felt like throwing up. Her legs failed her, and she fell onto her knees by Rachel's side. "Tell me," she whispered.
"It's okay," Rachel murmured, trying to smile but closing her lips with an expression of pain that broke Quinn's heart. "I'll be fine."
"Rachel, you tell me what happened to you right now!" Quinn said, more forceful than she ever intended to. She didn't want to take advantage of her power to force Rachel to tell, but she had to know.
"A couple slaves found out that I was the one who told you about the uprising," she said under her breath. Quinn drew in a sharp breath and anger flooded her. "But it's fine, Quinn. Everyone is safe now, and I'll be better in just a couple days, I promise you. What matters is that the farm is safe!"
"What?" Quinn scoffed. "Rachel, nothing is fine! Look at you! Look at what they did to you!"
"They had their reasons, Quinn," Rachel said with a shrug and Quinn growled. She couldn't believe the same Rachel that used to be so defiant towards her could accept what happened to her so easily. It killed her inside to think Rachel had given up.
"There are no reasons, Rachel!" she exclaimed. She wanted to touch Rachel, shake her back to the senses. But she couldn't even come closer. She felt like mere proximity could hurt Rachel further. "I'm gonna kill them. Tell me who was it."
"Quinn, no!" Rachel shook her head, her eyes welling up. "Please, don't do anything! It will only make things worse!"
"Rachel, if you don't tell me I'm gonna find out on my own. I'm gonna kill them," she said, with a coldness in her voice that made herself shiver. Of course she wouldn't kill them with her bare hands. At that moment, she didn't even have the courage to walk down the quarters. If they had done all of that to Rachel, only God knew what they could do to her. But Malcolm had to obey her, too. She only needed to order him.
"Quinn, you don't have to do that," Rachel tried to argue, but Quinn wouldn't let her. Nothing change Quinn's mind once she had made a decision.
"Yes, I do!" she snapped, and Rachel flinched. She regretted instantly. She didn't want to scare Rachel, she only wanted to protect her. "They can't touch you, Rachel! They're slaves, and they can't lay a finger on you! I need to put them in their place!"
"I'm a slave too, Quinn," Rachel murmured with a sad smile.
"You know what I mean, Rachel," Quinn shook her head and lowered her voice. Rachel's statement hit her hard. It's not like she had forgotten it, but it always hurt to be reminded of their different conditions. "I love you, and I take what you say in consideration. I swear I do. I always did, even before I could acknowledge it. But this is different."
"Nothing is different," Rachel replied. "Just because I'm serving in the main house instead of working down there with them, it doesn't mean I'm better than them. I was letting myself go too far and I was forgetting who I really am. They put in my place."
"Your place is right here with me," Quinn replied, getting up and fixing her dress. "And their place is under this ground. Don't move, I'll be back to help you. But I'm gonna fix this first."
And she left, ignoring Rachel's plea behind the closed door.
"Quinn Fabray," her mother said with a smug smile, stopping by the front door just when Quinn walked back from the yard with a bucket of water. "I have no idea what you have done this time, but I have never seen your father angry like this. I guess he finally found out the kind of daughter he has. If I were you, I wouldn't keep him waiting."
Quinn dropped the bucket where she was - it wasn't a coincidence that so much water spilled on her mother's feet. Part of her wanted to believe that her mother was exaggerating, but the second she stepped inside the house she could hear her father yelling at Malcolm and knew he had heard of what she had done. Quinn knocked softly on the door, bracing herself before gathering the courage to come in.
"Oh well, look who's decided to join us!" Russell said with a mocking chuckle. His face burned bright red, and Quinn licked her lips without saying a word. On the chair in front of her father's table, sat Malcolm, shivering. "Will you please enlighten us on why you thought it was fitting to kill three of my slaves?"
"They beat up Rachel," she whispered, not brave enough to take the few steps that were required so that she could sit on the next vacant chair.
"And that's how we deal with infighting now? We just kill them?" Russell asked, again with that mean chuckle that made Quinn's spine freeze. "What am I supposed to do now, Quinn? We are already in one of our worst seasons ever, and now I don't have slaves enough to work on the plantation. Oh, and you want to know what else? We also don't have money to buy new ones, because there are sacks and sacks of spoiled sugar in the storage house that I can't sell!"
"Father," Quinn said with a deep breath. She rarely stood up for herself, but this felt different. She had to so. For Rachel. "Remember how you thanked me this morning for saving this farm when I told you about their plans? I wouldn't have been able to tell you anything if Rachel hadn't told me first. And they beat her for that! It isn't fair!"
"Quinn, I didn't ask you what happened! What is done, is done. I don't want reasons, I asked you how we're gonna fix the consequences that your unthought actions brought us!" His voice had never been that loud. His face had never been that red. He started coughing and Quinn wanted to come closer and see if he needed help - but was too afraid to move. He sat down, coughing and coughing until air came back to his lungs and he took a deep breath. "I know you haven't realized Quinn, because as always, you only care about your own problems. But I haven't been well for a while. I am ill, and this farm will go to ruins if the moment I'm away you take decisions like this one."
"Well, what do you have?" She asked, suddenly filled with concern. It didn't even bother her to be called selfish. She had been many times before. She was only worried, because to be honest, she had realized her father hadn't been at his best, but she didn't think it was anything serious. Her father groaned, as if she had asked the all too wrong question.
"No one knows yet, but that's not the matter right now. I have money to buy slaves to replace the ones I have sold, but I don't have money to replace the ones you so easily ordered killed. Three is a lot, Quinn. It's harvesting time. I didn't wanna do this, but I don't see any other options."
"What are you talking about?" She asked, finally sitting down, as if she knew she had to be seated to listen to what he was going to say next.
"I'm bringing Rachel to work down the quarters until harvesting is done," he said. Malcolm nodded, and Quinn knew they had already discussed the matter. She got lightheaded, and gripped tightly on the chair's arms.
"You can't do that," said Quinn, with a nervous giggle. "She's my slave!"
"Well, do you have a better plan?" He asked. "I'm all ears," he said. She damned herself for not being able to think fast enough and to come up with a better solution. She needed to think of something that would make him change his mind, instead of just making her look like a spoiled five years old child. "You have killed three of mine, I would say that's only fair I take one of yours. What would you say, Malcolm?" Russell asked.
"I- We really need the help down the quarters, Miss Quinn," he said nervously, fidgeting with his hands. It didn't match the personality of the man Quinn used to see working, and it impressed her that everyone could be so afraid of her father while still think so well of him.
"Father, please!" she said, getting up and walking towards him. Her only hope would be convincing him by making him pity her, but he stopped her before she could even start, raising his hand to forbid her from coming closer. She would never admit how much the gesture hurt her.
"It's already decided, Quinn. It's past the time you learn that all your actions have consequences and that you may not always like them, but they will still happen. Perhaps that will teach you how to think ahead before making decisions," he said, his voice much calmer. She didn't know what scared her further, having him calm like that or angry like before. "You may leave now," he said.
And she had no other choice but obeying.