Using some (errr, a lot actually) of my own headcanon for Saturday's Times in this one.
[ Saturday ]
The baby makes a disconsolate noise, the fifth it has uttered in the past fifteen minutes. Saturday grits her teeth together and sets her pen down.
It is lying in its crib, which Dusk had acquired for her the last Earth Saturday. It's... staring at her through the slats of one railed side; seeing her attention, it whimpers again.
It should be glad that she has permitted it to stay in her office, the only fully enclosed area in the entire Upper House. Instead, it keeps making those aggravating noises and distracting her from her plans to expand the tower and exploit the Demesnes below her.
Saturday picks up her pen again, quickly writes out three brief missives, and sends them through the messenger tube sitting on her desk. Then she sits and waits, drumming her fingers against the surface of her desk. She resolutely ignores the baby's whimpers.
Dawn arrives first, followed shortly by Noon and then Dusk.
"Have you studied the materials Friday's Dawn provided?" Saturday demands without preamble when the three Times are before her.
"I have, mistress," Dusk agrees. Dawn sneers at the thought, and Noon shrugs.
"Very well. Dusk, you are charged with the maintenance of it when it is in the Upper House. I expect you two-" she looks significantly at Noon and Dawn, "-to read those books, in case you need to care for that thing in the future."
The three Denizens bow, then Dusk immediately makes for the baby. He picks it up carefully, and it presses close him.
"He is cold, mistress," Dusk says. "May I take him to my quarters-"
"Whatever you want," Saturday interrupts impatiently. "Within reason." She wants that noisy irritation gone. It had crossed her mind to accidentally lose it, but the retribution from the other Trustees would likely be too much trouble to deal with.
Dusk bows again, careful to keep the baby close, and takes his leave.
"Each of you will do a quarter of Dusk's tasks on Saturdays, to accommodate his new duty," she tells Dawn and Noon. The former smiles, while the latter looks disgruntled.
It is perhaps for the best that Dusk was the only one to learn how to care for the baby, Saturday reflects. While none of her Times are eminently suited to the task, Dawn and Noon are rather more ill-suited than Dusk in their own separate ways.
Her Dawn is rather new to his position, whereas Dusk and Noon have been her Times since her inception as the ruler of the Upper House. The Denizen formerly known as Pravuil was promoted because she approved of his cunning and ambition; but these are not traits she wants cultivated in the Trustees' pet Heir. Perhaps if she could mould the child herself, without the other Trustees' involvement but as it is... who knows what other nonsense the others would instill it with? No, better to hope that it will be raised naive and thus susceptible to manipulation.
Her Noon is also unsuited to the task. In truth, he ought to be her Dusk - as he was, before she switched them - and it shows. He is not as capable as the current Dusk, and struggles sometimes to complete the tasks she sets him to. Adding the job of caretaker would have been too much for him to handle on an ongoing basis.
Of course, she could have left Dusk as Noon and vice versa, but the current Dusk was too ambitious, too presumptuous. She needed to curb that ambition, bring him to heel. He was her servant, and ultimately disposable - he needed to know that as well.
Satisfied with the outcome, alone in her office but for the steady, unrelenting patter of the rain against the glass, Saturday picks up her pen and resumes her plotting.