Time Passes

The months that had gone by soon turned to years in the Dandridge house. Kyrie and Isaac now frequently left their rooms to join up in that same guest room, Renard and Vivian continued to spend their evenings together, and Dessi often stayed in the slave's bedroom to be available to answer Mae in case she ever called in the middle of the night. Sometimes she made one of the other girls stay in the slave bedroom so that she could go out and visit the off-duty guards, but that didn't happen as often.

As happy as Kyrie's life was lately, the nobles in their house were having a rougher time of it. Kyrie sat in the nursery with Raine in her lap, gently rubbing her back while the little girl stared forlornly at her toys and her guest. She wasn't actively crying at the moment but the expression on her face trembled with unshed tears.

"I... I want to play."

At this comment, Kyrie looked over towards the other child in the room, Markus, who had been curiously watching everything with Raine despite Vivian's efforts to try and distract him. Markus was Jiera Deveris's child, and even though nothing more had happened to endanger the life of Mae or her daughter, none of the slaves had forgotten that poison had come from her household. As a result, when it had been announced to them that Jiera and her son would be visiting for a few days they had all tensed up. Kyrie was trying her best not to take it out on Markus, but she had to admit that a part of her hoped Raine would continue to feel bad so that she would stay away from Markus.

As soon as that thought entered her mind though, Kyrie immediately felt bad for it. Markus was just a 2 year old boy... No matter what his mother may have done, he could hardly share the blame. Plus, it was awful of her to wish for Raine to continue feeling terrible; it was a shame, really, Raine was just prone to mysterious sicknesses. Ever since she was about 9 months old she would wake up with a slew of horrible symptoms: stomach pain, vomiting, fever, bowel problems, and then sometimes nothing appeared to be wrong with her aside from just immense pain. Both Vivian and Kyrie had been terrified when it first happened, wondering if Raine would even survive her ailments, but the lady had been at her daughter's side the whole time. Every time Raine had one of these bad bouts Mae would be there, holding her hand and soothing her. This had kept up from when it started to just last night, when little 3 year old Raine had some serious stomach cramps.

The only good thing about all of this was that Raine's ills seemed to be getting less severe as she got older, and Kyrie hoped for both Raine and Mae's sake that that was true.

Raine had just had a bit of a relapse of pain when she'd been playing with Markus earlier, and Kyrie was a little slow to respond now that Raine had let her desire to play with Markus be known once more.

"... You can play, but I have some things I want you to do. First, I want you to finish the tea that I brought up for you, and second, I want you to promise me that you will play very calmly so as to not upset your stomach. Can you do that?"

The little girl slowly nodded, and Kyrie reached down to help put the tea back in her hands. Aiding Raine so that she didn't spill, soon the cup was empty and Kyrie was picking Raine up and gently putting her down across from Markus.

"Gentle, Raine. Slow movements."

As Raine was set down, she tentatively followed Kyrie's instructions, and both Kyrie and Vivian watched as she got more comfortable as time went on. The pain seemed to have subsided, likely in no small part due to the tea, but whatever the true reason was, it was a huge relief to the two slaves.

Vivian moved away from the children now that they weren't paying any attention to her, and she sat down next to Kyrie a little ways away. She was... A bit more subdued than usual. Generally when Vivian found herself with free time while Kyrie was present she would immediately jump into a topic but today she was silent as she watched the two children across the room.

Trying to think up a topic of conversation to compensate for Vivian's reticence, Kyrie gently picked at her skirt a little before murmuring the first thing that came to mind.

"I can't believe that Lady Deveris's child is here in our nursery."

"Yeah... I keep thinking that I should keep a closer eye on him, like maybe his mother has already poisoned his mind or something, but when I look at him I just don't see anything more than a toddler."

As if the highlight that, the little boy across the room was cooed happily as he worked on a puzzle with Raine. Raine could talk fairly steadily at this point, so she was chattering away, and while Markus did know some words he just couldn't keep up with Raine. They looked for all the world like they were truly enjoying each other's company, and Kyrie only wished that the children of the Terra Kingdom could see Raine like this. Raine's existence had become public knowledge when she turned one, but the backlash that they had all expected had been swift and severe. Mae's social status plummeted even if her power did not sink in the least: she was still the owner of the Terra Kingdom's most profitable mining chain, and no amount of status drops could really change that. Still, ever the prudent woman, Mae had upped the amount of guards posted in and around the house. While nothing had actually happened yet, the fact that there were all of these silent heavily armed people about definitely took its toll on the mind.

What they hadn't expected was the vehemence from regular people.

When Dessi and Isaac went to the market they brought back stories of how poorly the people looked upon Mae for having a child out of wedlock. Why though? What did it matter to them who a noble had a child with? This slander paved the way for other negative things to be said about Lady Dandridge, things that weren't even true! They talked about how unhappy the people living on her land were or how she was secretly colluding with the Dominion for profit or even just that she was an absolute terror to the people working in her household. How could they have such a wrong view of Mae?! Anyone who actually interacted with Mae or lived on her land knew just how untrue all these rumors were. For the Terra Kingdom she was bounds better than every other noble, and even when comparing to their neighboring countries she was one of the best! Was someone purposely trying to slander her for some reason? Was it the same person who tried to kill her?

Kyrie's mind could easily go in circles just stewing on it, and she'd drawn pictures to put some of the things in her imagination down onto a page, but other than that there just wasn't a lot to do. It was a bit sad that all they could really do was grit their teeth and move on.

Some of them were doing that a bit better than others, and while Vivian was one of the ones doing poorly in the house, Kyrie didn't actually think it had anything to do with the master's well being. Leaning close to her friend, Kyrie placed a gentle hand on Vivian's shoulder.

"What about you, hanging in there?"

"Barely."

Vivian let out a soft laugh at that and leaned her head back against the wall they were sitting next to before closing her eyes. Kyrie just sat close to her friend, knowing how much taking care of Raine taxed Vivian. Vivian had never said it in so many words, but Kyrie had observed Vivian in many aspects of her life and she was pretty sure that Raine was one of the factors. It wasn't that her treatment of Raine was any less; she seemed to still be perfectly happy and full of energy when she was actively interacting with the child. Yet there was a strange but ever growing unhappiness to Vivian ever since Raine had been born. It wasn't hugely obviously, it was more just a weird sense of despondency that Kyrie felt emanating off Vivian in rare moments of inactivity.

A part of Kyrie wanted to approach the feeling head on, but at the same time, she felt like if she did that then Vivian would retreat even further into herself. So instead she felt it safer to just idly chat. Gesturing towards the children now, Kyrie spoke up.

"I feel like their dynamic is very similar to ours. Listen to Raine just talking a mile a minute while Markus struggles to absorb all the things she's saying."

Kyrie giggled softly at this, and Vivian opened her eyes to look at the two of them. A smile ghosted her features then.

"I can see it."

It was a lackluster response and Vivian knew it was because she winced a little and let out a sigh as one of her hands combed through her hair.

"I'm sorry, Kyrie. I know I'm terrible company at the moment I just... I don't know. I'm a little worn out."

Kyrie's expression softened with sympathy and she entwined her arm with Vivian's as a show of comfort and support.

"Is there anything I can do to help?"

Vivian gave her an almost pained smile.

"If you have a magic recipe to cure exhaustion then I'd love to have it."

Ah... She was clamming up again... Kyrie wasn't aggressive enough to want to keep pushing when it was clear that someone was trying to avoid a topic. Instead, she just gave Vivian's arm a little squeeze and the two women leaned against each other as they watched the kids.

In truth, Vivian felt like everything she might've ever wanted was just out of her reach. After almost 3 years of taking care of Raine, Vivian still couldn't bring herself to want a child of her own. Renard often spoke fondly of the little girl of the house, and Vivian was painfully aware of the fact that he would love to have children of his own someday, but she just didn't think she had it in her. If she could just be the one to provide that for him though, then perhaps he would finally favor her, finally choose only her. The rising choking feeling in her throat as she tried to entertain the idea told her that even if she did get pregnant with his child, he wouldn't choose only her.

It didn't help that it hurt to see Kyrie so happy with Isaac as well. The things that Vivian did with Renard just felt so much more real when they happened between Kyrie and Isaac; kisses when they crossed paths in the hallways, hugs when greeting each other for the first time, teasing touches to let the other know of their presence, and the glances. Oh the glances... Vivian was so pleased that none of these things were directed towards Renard from Kyrie, but at the same time, it pained her to see a relationship so real and true next to her own.

She hated herself for being jealous and harboring bitterness towards Kyrie though; the girl had been nothing but a friend to her for the entirety of her time in the house. Even though Vivian had started her relationship with Kyrie thinking that it was just something that would be beneficial to her, she had to admit that over the years she'd really come to like Kyrie. Maybe it was just that she spent enough time with the other woman that they naturally became friends, but Kyrie was sweet, helpful and generally in a good mood. It was hard not to like someone like that. Yet Vivian couldn't help resenting her for having such a happy romance. Renard still felt so far away from her, and Kyrie and Isaac were a constant reminder of what Vivian longed to have for herself. Since Kyrie was a source of her unhappiness, she just couldn't confide in her about it. Vivian recognized that she would just be making a problem between them when there really didn't need to be.

So in the end she just reached over to return the hold that Kyrie had on her arm, giving Kyrie a gentle squeeze before clenching her eyes shut. Everything was just so unfair, but in a way that left Vivian helpless to really do anything about it. She loved Renard, but she also loved Kyrie, and it was wrong of her to take out her frustrations on her best friend in this house. So she just took the comfort that Kyrie offered without giving Kyrie any kind of reward for her efforts to coax information out of her.

Vivian couldn't help wondering if she just wasn't destined for true happiness. If that was the case, then she wished she could hurry up and get used to settling; it was too painful to hope for something that would never be there.

Perhaps the only people in the house that had absolutely no real worry or stress at all were the two children in the nursery; they played their games completely oblivious to the tension that the other members felt, and whatever pain occurred was easily forgotten as evidenced by the smile on Raine's face now.

... If only she could bounce back as quickly as a child could.