Post by opalgirl on Feb 17, 2011 14:15:53 GMT 10
Title: Things to Love
Rating: G
Word Count: 698
Summary: Coram remembers all the things he loves about Rispah, as years go by.
Notes: This just kind of forced itself out; it's three loosely-related snippets.
The first years they’re married, they live at Trebond, looking after the castle and land on behalf of the Crown. To most of the tenant farmers and villagers, he’s familiar; he’d been born and bred on Trebond land and hadn’t been anywhere else until he’d gone soldiering.
Rispah’s a sensible enough woman to fit in with the people, and she gives life to two beautiful babes, those first few years.
They’re at home—home being the steward’s old stone house atop a hill—during high summer when the word comes. Riders from Corus coming along the road, in royal colours.
Rispah greets the King’s couriers with a toddling babe propped on each hip, wearing a plain cotton dress and no shoes, but she might well be the loveliest thing he’s ever seen.
Very little changes, when they leave the steward’s house for the castle. Rispah cheerfully gives up cooking—“I was never any good at it, laddie-me-love; don’t know how it was you ate what I put in front of you,” she says—and they take ownership of a long-empty townhouse in Corus that belongs to the estate, but they still live simply.
He may have come into a title, by some nonsense idea of the King’s—Coram knows full well whose idea this was, and he’ll have words with her when he next sees her—but it doesn’t stop him from doing work.
Rispah still has people she knows in the cities, mostly among the flower-sellers and dancers. That won’t change, and he doesn’t expect her to abandon them. Once in a while, one of the girls will write to her. She’s expecting their fourth child when one such letter arrives, from a woman in a bad way, with nowhere safe to go.
When Rispah takes to seeing the lass looked after, having her fed and clothed and cared for, even once considering bringing her to Trebond, Coram remembers the heart he fell in love with. She’ll abandon no one, his Rispah, and he’s met very few like her.
“Even if they never leave Trebond, if they wed and stay here, those girls ought to know how to defend themselves,” Rispah says, her fists propped squarely on her hips. “Had to break me a nose every once in a while t’ get my point across, an’ it’s not just in the Lower City.”
Coram refuses to think about the rough lifestyle she once led, and what she’s saying-but-not-saying. “Never said it was a bad idea, love,” he replies. “I taught both lad an’ lass to fight.”
“Aye. Y’know, some of the old folk still ask after th’ ‘poor motherless things’. Took me ages to figure out just what in the Mother’s name they were on about.”
“It’s not a bad idea, Rispah,” he says, setting aside the report about this year’s grain harvest, “an’ we could use a few more for patrol an’ the like an’ if they’re lasses or lads, doesn’t matter. Not to me. Just some of the folk—the parents—mightn’t like it, you teaching their girls to brawl.”
Rispah just looks at him. “Don’t imagine some folk much liked you for helpin’ to hide a girl amongst lads, either. They’ll live. Wouldn’t be teachin’ the lasses to brawl, just enough to get ‘em home safe.”
He remembers that he loves her stubbornness and her common-sense, and the way she looks at problems. “What’s the headman’s wife say?” The woman with the most power among the villagers has her wits about her, and he trusts her opinion.
Rispah grins. “She says she’ll learn with ‘em. Helps them defend themselves from bandits if it were to ever happen.”
“I’m sendin’ their Mas and Das to you, if they come complainin’,” Coram warns.
Rispah bends and kisses his cheek. “Aye, you do that, then. How many lasses did we send off to the Riders last spring?”
“Too many. Includin’ our own.”
“Just what I was gettin’ at, laddie-me-love.”
He rolls his eyes, annoyed at her ability to manipulate him and his wife just laughs at him, sweeping out of the study. She can always make him see sense—another thing to love, he supposes.
Rating: G
Word Count: 698
Summary: Coram remembers all the things he loves about Rispah, as years go by.
Notes: This just kind of forced itself out; it's three loosely-related snippets.
***
The first years they’re married, they live at Trebond, looking after the castle and land on behalf of the Crown. To most of the tenant farmers and villagers, he’s familiar; he’d been born and bred on Trebond land and hadn’t been anywhere else until he’d gone soldiering.
Rispah’s a sensible enough woman to fit in with the people, and she gives life to two beautiful babes, those first few years.
They’re at home—home being the steward’s old stone house atop a hill—during high summer when the word comes. Riders from Corus coming along the road, in royal colours.
Rispah greets the King’s couriers with a toddling babe propped on each hip, wearing a plain cotton dress and no shoes, but she might well be the loveliest thing he’s ever seen.
***
Very little changes, when they leave the steward’s house for the castle. Rispah cheerfully gives up cooking—“I was never any good at it, laddie-me-love; don’t know how it was you ate what I put in front of you,” she says—and they take ownership of a long-empty townhouse in Corus that belongs to the estate, but they still live simply.
He may have come into a title, by some nonsense idea of the King’s—Coram knows full well whose idea this was, and he’ll have words with her when he next sees her—but it doesn’t stop him from doing work.
Rispah still has people she knows in the cities, mostly among the flower-sellers and dancers. That won’t change, and he doesn’t expect her to abandon them. Once in a while, one of the girls will write to her. She’s expecting their fourth child when one such letter arrives, from a woman in a bad way, with nowhere safe to go.
When Rispah takes to seeing the lass looked after, having her fed and clothed and cared for, even once considering bringing her to Trebond, Coram remembers the heart he fell in love with. She’ll abandon no one, his Rispah, and he’s met very few like her.
***
“Even if they never leave Trebond, if they wed and stay here, those girls ought to know how to defend themselves,” Rispah says, her fists propped squarely on her hips. “Had to break me a nose every once in a while t’ get my point across, an’ it’s not just in the Lower City.”
Coram refuses to think about the rough lifestyle she once led, and what she’s saying-but-not-saying. “Never said it was a bad idea, love,” he replies. “I taught both lad an’ lass to fight.”
“Aye. Y’know, some of the old folk still ask after th’ ‘poor motherless things’. Took me ages to figure out just what in the Mother’s name they were on about.”
“It’s not a bad idea, Rispah,” he says, setting aside the report about this year’s grain harvest, “an’ we could use a few more for patrol an’ the like an’ if they’re lasses or lads, doesn’t matter. Not to me. Just some of the folk—the parents—mightn’t like it, you teaching their girls to brawl.”
Rispah just looks at him. “Don’t imagine some folk much liked you for helpin’ to hide a girl amongst lads, either. They’ll live. Wouldn’t be teachin’ the lasses to brawl, just enough to get ‘em home safe.”
He remembers that he loves her stubbornness and her common-sense, and the way she looks at problems. “What’s the headman’s wife say?” The woman with the most power among the villagers has her wits about her, and he trusts her opinion.
Rispah grins. “She says she’ll learn with ‘em. Helps them defend themselves from bandits if it were to ever happen.”
“I’m sendin’ their Mas and Das to you, if they come complainin’,” Coram warns.
Rispah bends and kisses his cheek. “Aye, you do that, then. How many lasses did we send off to the Riders last spring?”
“Too many. Includin’ our own.”
“Just what I was gettin’ at, laddie-me-love.”
He rolls his eyes, annoyed at her ability to manipulate him and his wife just laughs at him, sweeping out of the study. She can always make him see sense—another thing to love, he supposes.