Night Falls

With a bow of her aged head, the Nanny stepped out leaving the two men alone. With the closing of the door, the hall lights lost, the room was dimmed to the flickering light of the fire.

In the heavy shadows, the young Lord turned to look up, the presence at his shoulder felt leaning closer. The voice so close to his ear soft with a hushed awe that runs counterpoint to the aggressive growl natural to his voice. "She is a beautiful creature indeed, brother. My congratulations on your little Ailynn."

It was with these words that the man, so shaken by recent years and his marriage, looked down at the tiny angel in his arms. Such soft skin, dark hair already in tiny curls against her fair face and then her eyes staring up at him with unusual curiosity for one so young. As he looked down into those eyes, his heart was lost, his breathe stolen and a love he hadn't felt since his son was born swelled within him. They were like sapphire velvet fired from within with a starburst of icy pale blue and shards of liquid silver, eyes that even now warmed, the pale blue and silver receding as she regarded the men before her. A small hand lifted, tiny fingers curling against the blankets around her as if trying to reach out and touch the two men staring down at her with such admiration.

As the two stared on, a soft tentative knock came to the door. The two men, as if broken from their trance, jerked their heads up to look at it before an invitation to enter would be given. A shaken young maid, looking as if harried and attacked, entered to drop an awkward curtsy and speak to the two men in a shaken voice. "M'Lord, your Lady wishes your presence and the return of her child. She demands it most forcibly."

The woman's tantrums and habits of throwing things at the staff was near legend by then and young Esiah sighed with a tiredness from years of dealing with such irritations. He started to stand, placing on lean hand on the smooth brown leather arm of the chair to push himself upright before a larger stronger hand came down on his shoulder with gentle insistence.

Looking back to his brother, he watched as the man's formerly tender expression hardened with purpose. The feral expression suppressed but still powerful on the man's face, eyes hardened with anger boiling just under the surface. "I will speak with the Lady and let it be known that you wish some time alone with your daughter."

Waving the distraught maid from the room, he watched as she scampered away like a beaten animal and sighed. "She cannot keep to this behavior. She will not act against me, she knows too well what will happen if she does. I will speak to her to calm her fits and keep her away from you until she can calm after her experience. You need time to bond with your child, and she must respect that."

Leaning over the arm of the chair, he pressed a gentle kiss to the baby's forehead and offered a soft smile to his brother before he turned and moved with determination to the door to slip out, closing the door firmly after him. Soft words were heard afterwards, directions to the staff outside that by penalty of their livelihood would anyone pass the doorway to disturb the Lord and his new young Lady.

Esiah listened to the door, the gentle murmurings easing the tension in his shoulders. His body fell back to settle against the back of the chair, eyes closed as he tried to flush the poison of his wife's anger from his body, calming his limbs to relax before he could speak to this new angel in his life without effect of it. The soft stirrings of the baby, mewings like a kitten, these brought his eyes open to look down at those beautiful blue eyes.

A smile, gentle and warm touched his soft full lips as he looked down at her. "Alright my little one, my attentions you shall have. It cannot be that a beautiful being such as yourself would go without admirers."

The child lay her head to one side against his arm, seeming to settle contented as she finds herself the object of his gaze. "A name for you perhaps. We cannot call you little one forever. It will put you to quite a state when you are grown."

His words seem to call forth answer in form of Walton, the elderly butler, who enters after knocking tentatively. The man clears his throat pointedly and makes his apologies for intrusion before going on to his task. "The Lady addresses me to give you notice that the child is to be called Victoria. 'Before you get any other dunced idea in your head' as she said it. I beg forgiveness for the rudeness of the statement but I was told to speak her words quite accurately."

Esiah, far from wincing at the cutting tone of her words, nods tiredly as he was quite used to it by now. Dismissing the butler, he turned his eyes back to his daughter and straightened his expression as not to upset her. "It seems my dear one that your dear Mother has decided to flaunt in the face of the throne and name you with Princess bearing. Give the Lady her pleasure. It does little good to war against her when she has such definite decisions. Let her have Victoria, but we must give you a name to ground you. You shall carry my mother's name as well. Victoria Anne Draken as you shall be. My little Anne, and your uncle Gareth's Ailynn. You shall have a few names to choose from."

He smiled at this, well aware that no one but his wife would be calling this little angel by that stuffy name. His long tanned fingers reached down to smooth gently over the baby's sleeping face, watching her perfect tiny features moving in her dreams in reaction to his touch. She had seemed to have settled into a comfort between his strong stomach and his arm, and was radiating a lot of heat for one so small. Laying his head back against the chair, his eyes close as well, the full night of his wife's screams to bring this blessing forth into his life having kept him awake.

He had reached the point of exhaustion and with his child's sleeping so trusting in her loving father's arms, he could himself give himself over to his weariness and rest.