It was hard for Alice not to feel melancholy the next week as she went back to classes. She had barely remembered to find Adelaide, and tell her why she had not been in the library that Saturday morning. Adelaide had been relieved that Nancy had not been physically hurt, and then had asked if she needed help moving her things to whatever off-campus dwelling she would be moving to with her husband and sister.
"Just with that amount of information, you know that I'm moving off campus?" Alice asked, surprised.
Adelaide nodded. "Your grandfather will want to lessen your sister's emotional upheaval if he can, as that could affect her powers, so he will want her with you because she is more familiar with you than with him. You can't adopt her, because I doubt Lord Grabiner would allow it. The headmistress can't allow young children not belonging to staff to live on campus without setting precedence. Your only other choice is to foster her off campus. And I know you would do whatever you had to for your family. You married Grabiner after all, and that was probably more your grandfather's idea than yours."
Adelaide had obviously done some research into both her and her husband's families to know all of that, or someone had done it for her. Considering the 'defense tactics' she was using against her mother, it only made sense to find out as much as she could about the families she hoped to meet. But….
But the more time Alice spent with her, the more Adelaide was becoming a friend rather than a charity project. There were some things a friend could know about her, but a project could not.
Alice looked around, making sure there were no eavesdroppers. "I know that it's not the story that's being put about, but originally I only married him to save my life and his magic. I didn't even know that I had a magical grandfather at the time. I'll tell you the story someday, when we have more time. We decided to stay married ourselves, when we fell in love."
Adelaide stared at her. "So it wasn't a political arrangement? You wandered into some spell, he made a promise, and you both were lucky enough that you came to love each other?"
"You're very close to what actually happened," Alice admitted. "It was probably more work than luck on our parts, though. I basically had to prove that I was even more stubborn than he was. It surprised us both that we were as well suited to each other as we are."
"I could see that," Adelaide said dryly, then shook her head. "'Well, if it could happen to you, maybe it isn't too much to hope for myself."
Sometimes, her heart really went out to the younger girl.
Alice had to grin at what Hieronymous had told her about the 'special' detention that had taken place on Sunday. Apparently, some of the students in detention had been willing to take on the dragon but had been let down by their less courageous partners. These were the students who went straight for the dragon's sticky teeth or claws and managed to finish their detention in less than twenty minutes, and had earned the merits they had lost on the test back as a result. The rest had to stay until the dragon was spotless and not sticky in the least. Apparently, Hieronymous had allowed the dragon to wake enough to start to stir in order to urge the rest of the students to work faster.
Alice assumed that the entire sophomore class would work extra hard to avoid any more detentions with her husband in the future.
There was also processing the events of Saturday, and it was not that easy for either of them. Hieronymous had found himself relieved of a burden he had been carrying for more than a decade—if he was willing to put it down—as well as the impromptu father of a young girl as soon as he returned from his own honeymoon. Alice found her family officially separated into two households, knowing that she would never live with her parents again. Visits to their house might be common, while she remained at school, but after graduation she would be moving to England. And then there was Nancy. Alice hoped that she had what it took to raise her sister into a good, well-balanced young woman. There was also the subject of the boy-child Violet's spirit had told them of. Where would one even start with such a child?
"Take it one challenge at a time," Hieronymous suggested when he was discussing these things with her, up in his room after supper. "Start with minding your studies, and looking for a house. Your steward has contacted a local relator, and they are going over what our options would be."
"Good," Alice sighed. "I don't have to worry about it till later then. I'll have to spring this 'Honors Program' that I'll need to attend during the summer on Mom and Dad when I get home for Spring Break."
Hieronymous nodded. "And you are mourning your old life, and concerned if you will match the responsibilities thrust upon you in the new. It is natural, I suppose, but I have never seen you fail either others or yourself yet. I consider it quite unlikely that you would begin to do so now."
She smiled at him. "You have a lot of confidence in me."
"Only as much as you did in me," he replied. "You must have had some assurance in order to put as much effort into me as you did."
Alice thought back. "I had hope, which isn't quite the same thing as assurance. I believe that everything happens for a reason. I was not sure what that reason could possibly be initially after our marriage, but after you were able to admit that you liked me I began to consider that we were meant to be together."
Hieronymous considered that. "And were your subsequent actions merely in surrender to fate?"
"Fate, or even someone else's actions, can't make you love someone," she replied. "You still have choices within the framework. Violet and Hafiz were able to make us get married, but we were the ones that decided we liked it. I wonder what made her pick me."
Hieronymous cleared his throat. "She may have noticed how much I was attempting to push you out of my thoughts. Under the circumstances, I thought an entanglement would be improper, but still you insisted on intruding."
Alice frowned, thinking back. "Like during the spell Potsdam cast during the goodbye before Christmas? When did you start to notice me?"
Hieronymous grinned sheepishly. "I thought you pretty when you ran into me on the first day. As I have seen too many pretty faces that lacked sense, I gave you demerits hoping the shock would make you think. That you stood up for yourself in front of literally half of the school told me that you had courage, not to mention a certain dignity in how you allowed others to treat you. Your success in your first test—without neglecting your other studies—set you apart as intelligent and clever. That you refused Mr. Danson's aid in exchange for mine showed an independent streak—though your choice of name for the election was a bit odd."
"I am a bit odd," Alice replied with a smile. She had not realized that he had been thinking about her that early.
"I will not dispute that," her husband said.
"So your behavior during the candle sale…?"
Hieronymous sighed. "I had begun wishing that you were older, so an entanglement would not be improper, or against your best interests. I was deliberately ignoring you so hard that I did not check the time. When you nearly collapsed, I was angry at myself for allowing it to happen. I took you to the Glen as a restorative, telling myself that I owed it to anyone in that condition. For your own benefit, I curtailed your effort at conversation believing that it would be best to nip any potential relationship in the bud. I was afraid that if we came to be on friendly terms, it would only be harder for me to keep myself away from you. In some ways, you terrified me because I knew I wanted you but could not have you."
Alice sighed. "At the time, it may have been the best thing. Then, I would not have considered being more than your friend, and I would have been scared off by any offer to take it further. However, you could have developed a friendly relationship with me and then asked me out my senior year or something."
"I doubted a treasure such as yourself would have remained unclaimed," he replied. "There was also the matter that you might be happier with a soul more undamaged than my own. I would still label my feelings more as attraction to you than actual love at this point. I did realize, though, that if I really did care for you…I had to allow you the opportunity to find someone more worthy of you than I."
"You tried that," Alice told him, smiling. "I came right back to you anyway."
"For which I am profoundly grateful," he answered.
They sat in silence for a few moments, unsure of where to go from there.
"We've been through a lot already, haven't we?" Alice mused.
"More than many couples during their first year together," Hieronymous acknowledged.
"And it makes me feel better, knowing that you'll be there muddling through life with me," Alice decided.
Nancy called over the hand mirror several times. She was having fun with Grandfather, she had seen Cinderella, and she appeared to like her new nanny. She backed away from the mirror to show her the princess dress that Grandfather had gotten her. Alice guessed that her sister was as well as could be expected. The third night in, though, Potsdam had roused her from her bed and she had gone to find her sister crying for their mother in one of the guest bedrooms. The nanny, upon Alice's arrival, handed Nancy over to her and left to sleep in the next bedroom over.
It took a little time to console her sister, but when she finally calmed down and they both crawled into the large bed to sleep, Nancy asked her why her nanny hadn't let her go into her and Uncle Hieron's room to find her.
"He has to teach class early in the morning, and I wouldn't want to wake him up," she had answered, hoping that she didn't sound strangled. Of course her sister thought that they shared a bedroom. Why wouldn't they, when every other married couple she had ever met did?
At any rate, she had no intention of correcting Nancy's supposition and elaborating about that area of her relationship with her husband. It was then that Alice realized that she was probably the one that would have to have the 'birds and the bees' discussion with Nancy eventually. Hopefully, that was years down the road, and Alice was not looking forward to it.
Fortunately, Nancy had accepted her explanation and dropped off to sleep to be taken back to their grandfather in the morning.
The rest of the week was fairly uneventful, culminating in the play on Friday night. This year, it was Arsenic and Old Lace and Clark played Jonathan Brewster the villain. Her brother even used a glamor to make himself look like Boris Karloff. It provided some laughs that she had needed desperately. Clark seemed to enjoy himself too, even if this villain did not indulge in maniacal laughter.
The next day, she kissed her husband goodbye before returning to her room to pack for spring break. Hieronymous would be going over some of the properties with her steward to see if he had found anything suitable yet. She had her own tasks to attend to, while she was away.