The Past
In his almost five years, Killian had never thought of his mother as fragile. However, in the weeks following her encounter with the strange man at the docks, she seemed jumpier and sadder than he'd ever seen her.
About a month after that incident, yet another stranger appeared.
Christine was outside, hanging laundry on their small clothesline, and Killian was struggling through a book nearby (being fairly new to this reading thing) to make sure that the wind didn't blow her away. He had his wooden toy sword nearby in case the dog-man showed up as well.
His mother seemed more nervous than ever today. She was almost at Aunt Sari levels of nervous, and she worried more than anyone Killian knew.
She was hanging up the last piece of laundry when a man suddenly appeared in their yard. He had blonde hair, a scruffy beard, and sunken blue eyes. He was not a hugely tall man and was lithely built, but he was still bigger than Christine. That meant that he was a threat, although Killian would bet that his mother could beat him any day.
"Mama," Killian called urgently.
Christine turned around in a blur of dark curls.
"Connor!" She cried in delight, throwing her arms around the man.
He stood quite stiffly as his sister hugged him, but he didn't pull away. Eventually, he even brought up a hand to pat her gingerly on the back. She pulled back with a smile and examined his face.
"My goodness, I can barely see you under all of that hair," she teased.
Although he wasn't totally sure, Killian thought that Connor may have tried to smile. The result was more of a grimace, though, and was frankly terrifying.
"What's he doing here?" Killian asked suspiciously. Liam had told him all about their Uncle Connor, and Killian was certain that he didn't want him around.
"I invited him, darling," Christine explained. "Connor, this is Killian, my youngest son."
Connor eyed him up and down with little interest. "He looks much more like you than the other one."
"Come in! I'll make us some tea," his sister said, taking him by the arm.
Killian trailed behind with a suspicious frown. He certainly didn't trust the man with his mother after what Liam had said.
"So, any news?" Christine asked as she busied herself in the kitchen.
Connor threw himself down without ceremony into one of their chairs.
"Well, I've a new job. I'm now managing a theatre," he told her without enthusiasm.
"That's wonderful!" Christine gushed.
"You should perform in it. You'd make all of the other singers look like squawking chickens, of course, but one good singer is better than none."
"Of course," his sister promised, shoving a warm mug into his hand and pulling up a chair beside him. "We must see each other more often, Connor. I've missed you."
"I've missed you too. You're still the only person who has ever treated me kindly," he replied, and Killian sensed the first flicker of sincerity from his uncle's mouth. "I do have a question for you, though. You're always happy to visit me regularly, but I confess that I was quite surprised to receive an invitation over here. Have you finally decided to stop begrudging me that ridiculous incident?" Sarcasm bled into the latter end of his sentence.
Christine hesitated. "I suppose that I just realized that life is so short, and I would hate for something to happen to one of us without being fully reconciled. We see each other, yes, but I miss how close we used to be. I was hoping... maybe we could try again?"
Rubbing his eyes tiredly, Connor shook his head. "I don't think it's possible to go back to how we were. However, in saying that, you're still the person I trust most and the person I'm closest to, even after all this time. Pathetic, isn't it? And here, you're the one that made me this way."
His sister winced. "Yes, I know, and I shall never forgive myself for being unable to save you sooner."
"I know," Connor muttered moodily into his tea. "Doesn't change the fact that it happened."
Killian resisted the urge to mimic his uncle from where he was pretending to read behind him. Christine shot him a warning look.
"What else is new?" She asked, voice strained. Killian didn't blame her; his uncle seemed like a right git.
"I'm thinking of getting married," Killian's uncle sighed, leaning back further in his chair.
Christine's eyebrows shot up. She looked so shocked that Killian wouldn't have been surprised if he'd misheard everything and Connor had said that he had a pet dragon.
"To whom?"
"A woman," Connor smirked.
Rolling her eyes, she nudged him playfully with her foot. "I assumed as much. Who?"
"No one you would know. She's a pretty fifteen-year-old who sings in my theatre sometimes. Bloody awful compared to you, but she's pretty and she's an orphan."
Christine's lips twitched. "Clearly the selling point there."
"Clearly," Connor groaned. "I'd hate to have an in-law like Lord Stick-Up-His-Arse."
"Sh!" Christine shushed him, glancing at Killian, who quickly turned back to his book in the picture of innocence.
"What's her name?" She questioned, almost bouncing in her chair now.
"Helena," he said almost reverently.
"That's a lovely name. Connor and Helena Crewe," Christine mused, looking into the distance dreamily.
"She hasn't said yes yet. But she will. She's barely got a penny to her name." Connor was so matter-of-fact about it that Killian felt his dislike for the man grow even further.
Connor did marry Helena the following winter. It was a small ceremony with mostly just colleagues and family, and Aunt Sari cried of happiness. Christine didn't cry, but she did beam with pride.
"That's because it's her brother getting married. It reflects well on her, you see," Liam explained in his usual know-it-all tone.
Killian had seen Connor only a handful of times-
The Present
Emma groaned.
"Seriously? More hand jokes?"
The Past
-but the wedding was the first time he'd seen Helena.
She looked old to Killian, but a year is an eternity when you're five. She was barely sixteen when she married, and Killian couldn't help but notice that she didn't look too happy, even when she smiled. She was a short woman with white blonde hair, hazel eyes, and pouty lips that naturally fell into a frowning position. Where his mother was very thin, Helena was stocky with large breasts and hips.
Killian trailed behind his mother sulkily when she went to congratulate her new sister-in-law. As was typical of Christine, she enveloped a very surprised Helena into a warm hug. She looked frankly relieved when Christine released her.
"Welcome to the family," she told her cheerfully.
Helena grimaced. "Thank you, I suppose."
Christine continued to chat with her about what a beautiful bride she'd been, how lovely the ceremony was, and how excited she was to get to know her better. Helena nodded in feigned politeness throughout. However, as his mother turned around, Killian noticed Helena's face shift instantly into an expression of intense dislike.
"Come along, love," Christine told her still staring son.
That night, Sari, Gavin, and Ciarra came over for dinner. It was a celebration of Martha, who had recently passed away, in addition to a celebration for Connor. Still, despite the occasion, Christine refused to allow Gavin to bring any rats into her household.
"It was a miracle that she lived so long, really," Gavin sniffed, looking remarkably heartbroken.
"It's alright, Papa," Ciarra told him, climbing into his lap and wrapping her arms around him.
"It was because she was so loved. No rat could have asked for more," Edward told him solemnly.
"A toast!" Christine interjected, raising her glass of white wine; she'd recently decided that she couldn't stand red.
"To Martha!" Sari began, who was doing only a half-decent job at hiding her pleasure at having one less rat in the house. "And particularly to her inability to reproduce ever again."
"To family," added Edward with one of his rare smiles.
"To children," Gavin sobbed. Killian suspected that perhaps he'd had too much wine.
"And to peace and happiness for us all," Christine finished, downing half of her glass in a single gulp.
Looking back at that night years later, Killian would remember it with a sense of melancholy. It had been a wonderful evening, full of laughter and tears and happy banter. It had also been the last truly happy night for his family. Within the next two years, three out of four of the adults in that room would be dead.
The guards first came in April of 1806. Christine would comment in her journal that she was surprised it hadn't happened in March. It was a shame, in fact. If it had, she might have expected it.
Gavin came running into their house one evening with Sari and Ciarra in tow.
"Edward! I heard tell that the king somehow got news that you and your family were still in the city. He's sending guards to houses all through the city to arrest anyone who looks remotely like you and Christine. It might be time to use that hiding spot," he reported worriedly.
Killian's parents exchanged the look before leaping into action; Edward packed up food, Christine grabbed her journal and anything else that might reveal the identity of the occupants of the house, and Killian and Liam were instructed to grab books (in case they were down there for a while).
The cellar was dark and could be bolted shut from the inside. The carpet was nailed down over it so that the entrance was hidden from sight, unless someone attempted to move the rug. Edward had even glued a side table beside one of the armchairs onto the rug, so that there would be less reason to assume the rug was there simply to hide something.
The area was small, but Killian didn't mind being in close contact with his family; otherwise he'd feel absolutely alone in the dark. Christine lit one candle so that everyone could see each other at least faintly, but it was still very dim and gloomy. Christine had stored some food, candles, blankets, and pillows down there in preparation, which at least made things more comfortable.
It was lucky that they were so prepared, because it took eight days for the guards to reach their house. The eight days were agony. They had to stay fairly quiet, which was boring at first, but then Christine thought up a game. She passed around some paper and everyone had to add one word to make a story. That was fun for a while. She also hummed songs and got people to guess the title and what it was about. It was a fairly quiet game, although there were many suppressed giggles.
Killian wrote music and studied music theory with his mother's watchful eye over his shoulder. He read about ships with Liam and asked his father about any questions he had. He and Ciarra invented their own sign language, which the rest of the family enthusiastically tried to learn. Everyone got quite tired of eating canned and pickled things, but things could have been worse.
At nighttime, or what the inhabitants of the cellar guessed was nighttime, Killian slept nestled between his two parents with Liam. Christine sometimes voiced her worries about Connor when she thought her sons were asleep, but Edward soon managed to push away her fears.
"They weren't looking for him, Christine. Besides, they'll know that he had half lost his mind by the time he was rescued. I don't think he'll be considered a threat," Edward murmured.
Christine nodded tightly as Sari breathed a sigh of relief. Sari had never been as close to Connor, but she still considered him her brother.
On the eighth day, footsteps pounded over their heads. Christine put a finger to her lips and blew out the candle. Killian gripped his mother's hand and leaned into his father as loud voices echoed through the house and they heard the noise of furniture and belongings being thrown around.
When the noises faded without anyone finding them, everyone breathed a sigh of relief.
"Can we go up now?" Liam demanded, already standing.
Edward grabbed his hand and pulled him back down gently. "We don't know if they will return or if they've even left. We should wait at least a few more days."
Liam groaned quietly, but sat back down without another word.
They came back, as Edward predicted, two days later. Once again, everything was thrown around. It sounded to Killian like the stampedes on the Southern Isles that Christine had told him about.
"Now do we have to wait some more?" Ciarra complained irritably.
Killian didn't blame her. The small area was becoming increasingly claustrophobic and was starting to smell of unwashed humans and accumulated waste in buckets stuck in a corner. He also decided that he never wanted to eat anything pickled or canned again.
"A little longer," agreed Gavin.
Finally, a day or so later, the seven of them emerged back into the living room.
"Oh, sun, how I've missed you," Sari moaned.
"Our house," Christine said sadly, glancing around at the damage.
"We'll get it back in order in no time," Edward promised, planting a kiss on his wife.
Ciarra made the 'gagging' sign in their new sign language. Killian nodded in agreement.
The guards didn't come back for several months. The next time they came, they had less than a minute to disappear beneath the trapdoor; Edward had spotted them moving towards their street on the way home from work and sprinted down an alleyway to get there first and warn his family. Anything that needed to be hidden was already down there, and fortunately they only had to hide for a week this time.
"Sooner or later they're going to notice a pattern," Christine murmured worriedly. "Perhaps they're only checking the uninhabited houses from last time to see if people were simply away from home when they came. If we're the only house that's ever habitually empty, they're going to see a pattern. Who knows what they'll do then? Perhaps we ought to look into moving."
Edward did so the second they dared venture out from their hiding spot again. However, he returned each night with the same news.
"No one is willing to sell anything right now if it means that they may be housing fleeing criminals. I think they've backed us into a corner, Chris," he told her grimly.
Christine grimaced. "We'll just have to hope for the best then."
Guards began to appear more and more frequently, and finally, in July 1807, the first crisis occurred.
"Over here. I've found something!" A gruff voice called from overhead.
Christine breathed in sharply, and Killian felt her rise to a crouch.
"I love you," she whispered quietly to her family. "Killian, Liam, Ciarra, and Sari, stay hidden."
"Why me?" Sari hissed.
"You don't know how to use a knife or a sword. There's no point in you going out there and getting yourself impaled," Christine snapped. Killian had never heard his mother speak so sharply to her sister before.
The door opened and painfully bright light filtered down on the seven people below ground. Killian shrunk against Liam as Christine climbed out first, slashing at the man who had opened the trapdoor. Edward and Gavin quickly followed.
Sari reached for the remaining knife in their hiding place and stood with her grumpiest scowl in front of the children. Killian knew that if he saw that face on his aunt, he would want to run, but he wasn't so sure about the bad guys.
The children listened in tense horror to quiet screams and grunts and other even more unpleasant sounds of battle. Finally, Christine reappeared at the door.
"It's alright now. You can come up," she announced.
The four remaining people climbed carefully into what used to be their living room but was now a graveyard for five soldiers.
Gavin was cursing quietly, his face in his hands. Beyond that, there was a tense silence. Killian ran to his mother first, then his father, wrapping his trembling arms around them tightly.
"Oh God," Sari muttered, looking at the mess.
"I second that," Christine stated, sounding remarkably calm under the circumstances.
"We'd better move quickly to get rid of the bodies," Edward muttered, rubbing his eyes tiredly.
"And where exactly do you propose we put them?" Gavin groaned. "Regardless, they're going to know some soldiers disappeared around this area, and they'll come back with a vengeance."
"Gavin, stop scaring the children," Christine ordered brusquely. "Hopefully the next soldiers won't look as well as these ones."
"The more they bring, the more likely it is that at least one of them will have a brain," Gavin pointed out pessimistically.
"Gavin!" Squeaked Sari, smacking her husband on the arm. "This is not helping."
"Let's just focus on one problem at a time," Christine added.
"Perhaps we should burn them," suggested Edward, prodding one of the bodies distastefully with his foot.
"The smell would attract every guard within several blocks," Christine pointed out. "No, we need to either bury them or throw them in the ocean. Since the latter would be infinitely more difficult, we need to find a place to bury them."
"Our house," Sari suggested suddenly. "We could build a cellar like our hiding place here, but only fill it up again. They can be buried in our main room. It's disgusting, but-"
"But practical," Christine agreed, kissing her sister gently on the cheek. "Brilliant plan."
"Thank you. But if we're haunted by any specters, I'm moving in."
"You practically live here anyway," Edward pointed out with a faint grin.
Gavin groaned. "Bloody- God- fu-"
"Language!" Sari barked.
"Yes, you're right," he finished weakly.
"Liam, can I put you on clean-up duty?" Ordered Christine.
He nodded, looking proud.
"Children? Cleaning up... this?" Sari balked.
"Christine is right. Haste is important here," Edward confirmed. "We need everyone to dig who possibly can."
Liam, Killian, and Ciarra were soon scrubbing away at the floor with matching disgust, while their parents dug and transported bodies in potato sacks-
The Present
"That's a lot of potatoes," Emma commented, sounding skeptical.
"I didn't say that they were whole," Killian pointed out.
The words caused Emma to blanch.
The Past
That night, the entire family sat around the Jones table for dinner. For the first ten minutes, everyone was in a miserable mood. Then, almost everyone dissolved into hysterical laughter led by Gavin.
"It's really... not... funny... Gavin-" Sari tittered, leaning against him for support.
"It's not. It's stress," agreed Christine, who was the only adult who hadn't succumbed to the laughter.
Killian stared at the adults, dumbfounded. He had barely touched his dinner because he was feeling ill from the cleaning, and he'd been trying to sneak it into Ciarra's waiting hands to give to the rats. It was much easier now that the adults were distracted, but he was too shocked by this turn of events to take advantage of it.
"Killian, sweetheart, could you play for us? Perhaps some music would calm everyone down," Christine suggested, staring pointedly at his half-full plate. He could never fool her.
He eagerly slipped off of his chair and grabbed his violin from the hiding spot (he hadn't wanted to leave it where someone could steal it). He began to play but paused several minutes in when he realized that Sari was laughing so hard she was crying.
"What?" He asked, slightly offended.
"It's just, that song is so creepy... it makes me think of the evil ghosts inevitably haunting my kitchen," she gasped.
"Good, that was the inspiration," he replied proudly.
The entire table burst into laughter at that.
"Oh, God. How has this become normal?" Edward asked nobody in particular, eyes heavenward.
Christine gripped his hand at that. It was only then that Killian realized that she was crying.
"Mama?"
Everyone turned and Christine buried her face in her hands.
"God... I am so sorry..." she sobbed.
"For what, love? There's nothing to apologize for," Edward told her, pulling her head gently to his shoulder.
"It was just... too close... Edward. Gavin is... right. From this point on..."
The unfinished sentence hung in the air, but even Killian and Ciarra could fill in the ending. From this point on, it was just a matter of time before they were hunted down.
"We'll figure something out," Edward promised.
"Like what?" Christine demanded. "There's nothing left to do. We can't even leave... there are guards everywhere. The second we step foot on the docks or on a road out of the city..."
Again, she didn't finish. Killian wondered if it was some strange attempt at protecting them, as if saying the words would somehow make them true. They'd be arrested and murdered. He was almost seven by now; he could certainly fill in the blanks.
"You three should just move and pretend that you never knew us," Christine added to her sister, tears falling freely onto her bloodstained, formerly pale green dress.
"We could never do that," Sari promised quietly, and Gavin nodded solemnly in agreement.
"Then I'll have your blood on my hands as well," Christine wailed. "You could take Killian and Liam," she added, turning to them desperately with the sudden idea.
"And leave you two like rats in a trap?" Gavin countered. "Absolutely not. We're family."
"We're not even related," Christine tried desperately, her blue eyes wild. "Not by blood."
Sari's eyes narrowed dangerously and leaned across the table to grab her sister's hand. "Like hell, we're not. You're my sister in every other possible way."
Then, Edward interrupted with the idea that would determine the fate of every person in that room.
"Perhaps we're just not thinking about this in the right terms," Edward said quietly. "They're expecting to see a woman who looks like you and a man who looks like me traveling together. Perhaps the solution is simply to travel alone."
Silence fell over the room as his words fell.
"We could alter our appearances to a degree. I'm sure our appearances have changed somewhat, and we just need to take advantage of that. I could go first... I'll stowaway or bribe my way onto the next ship to the Southern Isles. I'll prepare a safe way for all of you and send someone to come get you, perhaps a native from the island. Then, you could cut your hair, Chris, perhaps even dress as a man. Two men and two boys traveling together surely wouldn't be suspicious. And no one will be looking for anyone who looks like you three," he added with a nod to Gavin and his family.
Christine was crying harder than ever now.
"What do you think?" Edward asked gently.
She looked up at him helplessly. "I don't want to be apart from you again. You know what happened last time!"
"Christine-"
"But I can recognize that it's our best chance," she added miserably. "So I know we have to try."
Killian looked frantically to Liam, hoping that he would intervene on their behalf. It was really their decision as well, wasn't it? But Liam's expression was grim, and he was giving Killian his bossy-big-brother-look that said to not interfere. Considering that it was their 'best chance', he couldn't really understand why everyone looked so miserable.
Edward left two days later.
"We'll see each other again soon," Edward promised as he tucked them in the night before he left. "You two be good for your mother."
"Papa? Will there be a naval school on the Southern Isles?" Inquired Liam, who knew his father had started studying at fourteen. In December, Liam would be fourteen, and had every hope of following in his father's (brief) naval footsteps.
Edward chuckled. "I imagine so, Liam."
He hugged a teary Killian last. With some final "I love you"s, he was gone.
Neither Christine nor Edward slept that night. In the end, Christine was still awake when he got up to leave in the early hours of the morning.
"Be safe," Christine begged, leaning her forehead against his and drinking in his familiar face for what would be the last time. Then, the couple shared a long, lingering kiss.
Edward pulled away first. "I have to leave now or I'll never make it," he murmured.
"Are you sure that we're doing the right thing?"
Christine eyes searched her husband's desperately, wishing that she had an excuse to force him to stay.
"Yes," Edward promised, giving her a last kiss. "I love you."
"I love you too," Christine said.
She watched from the doorway until he turned the corner. He waved at the end of the street, and then he was gone.
Sari came over that day to keep Christine company in her grief, but she had put her brave face back on. Killian knew that she missed his father, and he often saw it in lines of worry on her face when she thought no one could see her. She threw herself into caring for her children and writing in her journal fervently, as though sensing that the time she had left to leave her words behind was limited.
If Killian had to pinpoint a day that his life began its downward slope of fortune, January 9, 1808 was the clear choice.
Liam saw the soldiers coming at the end of the street, and he had only enough time to tell Christine and Killian to hide. Sari, Gavin, and Ciarra were down the street, but Christine comforted her boys by reminding them that the soldiers weren't there for them; really, their hiding was just a precaution.
There were more feet crashing above them than ever before. Killian leant into his mother and felt her reassuring heartbeat as she sang softly to comfort her children:
"I love the rose both red and white
To hear of them is my delight
Joyed may we be a prince to see
And Roses Three."*
When they heard the soldiers attempting to move the table over the trapdoor, Christine sighed as if she'd been expecting it.
"Stay hidden regardless of what you hear, and, Liam, take care of your brother," she told her sons urgently.
Christine crawled out as before, already wielding her knife expertly. There were cries and rough voices, but then one cry stood out among the others; a cry of pain from a woman. Then, Killian heard something that he'd never wanted to hear; he heard his mother begging.
"Please, not in front of my children. Do what you like to me, but, please, not here-"
Liam's eyes widened and he grabbed another knife. "Stay here, Killian."
Killian was too stunned to respond as Liam climbed out with an angry yell. "Leave her alone!"
There was a thump, and then a scream from Killian's mother.
Heart pounding, Killian silently crawled into the living room. Liam was lying unconscious near the kitchen table with a trickle of blood flowing from his head. From his position, Killian could see Liam's chest gently rising and falling. Not dead, then, just knocked out.
The other thing he saw was a soldier standing over his mother with a sword in her abdomen. Killian felt his blood chill in his veins, and, before he could think about it, he'd picked up his brother's forgotten knife and had run it into his mother's attacker's back. The only problem was that he hadn't anticipated how difficult it was to stab someone, and he was very little, which meant that the knife did not go in far enough to kill. It only went in far enough to cause him to scream and turn around angrily.
He disarmed Killian with a simple flick of his sword, his face furious. Killian backed against the wall away from the sword as the man advanced. It was touching his chest when another soldier pushed it away.
"Our orders were to kill the woman and her husband, not children," he said sternly.
"The bastard stabbed me," argued the angry man.
"You heard me," the other said coolly, with a look of something almost like pity towards Killian.
"Well, I can at least teach him a lesson," the angry man snapped coldly. The other man shrugged and nodded towards the remaining living guards, gesturing for them to leave.
The angry man moved his sword back towards Killian and very deliberately pushed it into his cheek. Killian tried to be as brave as his mother and not cry out, but a whimper emerged in spite of his efforts.
"You are nothing," the angry man told him. "Understand? Nothing."
Then, he wiped his sword on Killian's shirt and left.
For a minute, all Killian could focus on was his rapidly beating heart, the sting in his cheek, and the hot blood dripping down his chin onto his shirt. Then, he remembered.
"Mama!"
He stumbled over to Christine, who was half-sitting against the wall. Her face looked far too pale against her dark curls, and he'd never seen so much blood in his life. What colour had her dress been before? He was certain that it had been white, but now it was blossoming into a terrifying dark red.
Her eyes fluttered open briefly with a groan, focusing on her younger son.
"Liam?" She whispered.
"He's alive," Killian confirmed shakily, wrapping his arms around his mother's neck and looking nervously into her dazed eyes. "What shall I do now? Should I get Aunt Sari?"
"Mmm," Christine agreed. "Find Sari. You all... need to... leave now...hide somewhere. I imagine... Lord Alasdair and King... will want you dead... eventually. They're nothing... if not thorough. Wait for Edward... send my love..."
"You can't die," Killian told her, leaning his face against his mother's and smelling the familiar scent of cinnamon on her.
Christine chuckled weakly. "My darling, I would... never leave you... if I had the choice."
"Then you have to stay," he told her stubbornly, wiping away tears and blood from his face. "We need you."
"Oh, my love," Christine sighed, pulling him gently against her and beginning to hum the lullaby from before.
"Stop it. I should be comforting you," Killian cried into her shoulder. "Please don't leave."
"Killian-" She began, tears welling up in her own eyes.
"Please," he begged.
"I love you... so much, Killian. Tell Liam... how much I loved him... too. I'm not so certain... that death is the end. I'll watch you whenever... I can... maybe I can send you a sign... I'll get a little bird... to sing to you... and I'll be so proud of you," she promised softly, cradling her son's uninjured cheek. "I already am."
Christine's eyes started to drift shift.
"Wait!" Killian sobbed desperately. "Don't close your eyes, please!"
To be fair to her, she listened to her son's request. Christine smiled lovingly at him and forced her eyes open.
They stayed that way.
It all looked so wrong. His mother's face was stuck and her smile was hers but her eyes weren't. She would never look at him so blankly.
That was when it hit him. There would be no more singing in the mornings, no cinnamon-scented hugs, no games, no stories, no playing violin for her and seeing the glimmer of pride in her eyes. There would be no more confidential smiles that made him feel like a conspirator in a great plot, no more licking the spoon when she made pie, no more being praised for cleverness, no more jokes with his father, no more musical laughter, no more soft cotton dresses to dry his tears. She'd never do her brilliant character voices as she read to him again. She'd never gently chide him for being so precocious. She'd never listen to him so attentively again, or see right through his latest schemes.
She was gone.
*From anon. Tudor poem. This particular extract of text is from Libby Larsen's "Jane Seymour" from "Try Me, Good King".