Page 61 of The Forger and the Duke
My wife, Wenna. Thaker beamed, spelling her name. He introduced Amaranthe and Mal to Wenna, then indicated the children.The babe is Morvath, a bonny maid, and this,he lifted the crawling child,is Branok, my big strapping boy.
“Da!” The boy beamed at them, drooling around a tiny white tooth.
“They’re absolutely beautiful, Thaker,” Amaranthe answered, signing. “Congratulations to you both.”
“So this is his Miss Amaranthe!” Wenna said. “Come in, come in. I’ll fix you a tea dreckly when the cheel is fed. He goes on and on about you, miss. Says you’re top ’o the trees, you are.” She gave her husband a saucy grin, and he signed back.
Cheeky.
“Thaker was my one friend while I lived here.” Amaranthe took the seat Wenna indicated. “This is Mr. Malden Grey, who will be a barrister. Favella sent for me to be with her in childbed, but it appears—I was too late.”
Her throat closed unexpectedly. She and Favella had never been close, but her cousin’s wife, not much older than Amaranthe, had been her companion after her parents died and she was left alone. Though nervous and prone to bouts of the vapors, a fretsome woman who found the ill in everything, Favella had been better than nothing.
Wenna shook her head and captured the tiny fist waving from beneath the shawl. “She took to bed weeks ago when the doctor advised it.” With her free hand she signed for Thaker. “But the pains started a week ago, and she suffered for days. At the last, the baronet insisted the doctor cut her open, thinking to save the baban, but ’e’d the cord wrapped fast around the neck, poor mite.” She clasped her babe closer and her face was soft as she watched her older child attempt to climb his father’s leg.
“What a terrible end for her,” Amaranthe said. “Reuben must be devastated.”
“He’s howling mad, innit ’e,” Wenna confirmed. “Goes on and on about his heir. You’d think that’s all he cared about.”
It is all he cared about, Thaker said. He hoisted the boy in one arm and with his free hand set out the things for tea. Amaranthe smiled to see her friend so domesticated. At least things had gone well for Thaker since she left.
What about Eyde? Thaker asked. He outlined a pregnant belly in front of his waist.
“She’s with me,” Amaranthe signed back. “Married to a Welshman named Davey—no, you’d like him!” she insisted when Thaker shook his head and huffed. “And her child Derwa is nearly six. Healthy and bright as a button.”
“She’s the one I was brought on to replace, then,” Wenna said. “The baronet didn’t want to keep me when I took up with Thaker, but the lady couldn’t get any other help. Everyone here knew what himself had done to Eyde. I told him I had the pox when ee first come at me, and ee let me alone after that.”
Mal fell into a coughing fit and reached for a dish of tea too. Amaranthe grinned. “I wish I had thought to do that.”
Thaker put down the struggling boy to bring biscuits to the table. The child crawled to Mal, grunting, and pulled himself to a standing position using the cuff of Mal’s boot.
“Da,” he said seriously, regarding his guest.
“I should say so.” Mal nodded in agreement, blowing on his tea.
Amaranthe’s heart melted, watching Mal with the child. She liked the calm, direct manner he had with his siblings, but seeing him interact with the infant made her all soft and whimmy.
She’d never envisioned herself in a warm kitchen with babes crawling about her; her dreams involved vellum folios and inks. But a sudden, wild notion filled her. A vision of herself in her parlor, the light falling like gold leaf over her page. Her cleaning her knife and capping her ink as Mal entered with a babe cradled in his arms. Their babe, with his blue eyes and rakish smile and that fearless way he had of confronting the world.
Her vision swam, her ears ringing with a faint, high sound for a moment. She blinked to find Thaker standing before her. He pressed his hands together, then turned them open, watching her with a curious, expectant look.
“A prayer?” Amaranthe pointed to the sky. “Of thanks, that we are together again?” She had taught Thaker the simple prayers, rector’s daughter that she was.
He shook his head, giving his hoarse, high chuckle. He left the room, and Amaranthe turned to Wenna. “What do you think Reuben will do now?”
Wenna set the shawl aside and propped up the baby while she adjusted her bodice. Morvath belched, then looked about with a satisfied smile.
“Hold ’er?” Wenna rose from the chair and handed the infant to Amaranthe. “Me luv forgot the butter. I expect the baronet will marry afore his mourning is done, fixed on having an heir as ee is.”
“Who inherits if Reuben does not have a child?” Mal asked. He watched with interest as Amaranthe tried first one way, then another of holding the squirming infant. Finally, she and Morvath agreed that she would hold the babe upright so she could look about.
“Joseph,” Amaranthe answered. When she drew breath her head filled with the milky scent of child. A sensation she had never experienced, never thought to experience, twinged through her belly. The soft, warm weight on her lap felt lovely.
“Our father was the second son, and entail is on the heirs male,” Amaranthe explained. “So Joseph is the next baronet if Reuben does not sire a boy.”
Her attention fixed on Thaker as he entered the room carrying something wrapped in linen. Something the size of a book. Her breath stopped when he withdrew the covering and placed a leather-bound parcel on the table before her. She barely felt it when he lifted Morvath and cradled the baby while Wenna turned from the pantry to regard her curiously.
All Amaranthe heard was the blood in her ears. She recognized the dark leather. With trembling fingers she unwound the long straps and opened the cover.
