[ Unaware of his worrying - she lifts the tea to her lips, sipping it slowly. Taking her time to sort how to answer him, trying to form the words.
Because the answer to that couldn't be more complicated. Couldn't be more simple, in its own way. It feels like a knife edge. Standing on the tip of it, how quickly it could fall. It was easier when she first met Jacob. She didn't care about living. Didn't care for anything anymore. She had only one path in front of her. There was nothing else to lose any more because she knew what she was doing, wasn't living. So what if it all went down in flames?
But now... ? ]
Yes. No. It's a warning. To you. That he can extend his reach further than you can move. [ Her words aren't soft worry. No, it's the tone she only ever extends with him. That firm direction where she lets every other pretence drop, extends that harsh line in her body up and out of her mouth. ] And it's a warning, that unless I come crawling back with something good and make all this worth his while, he will find me, and I will go straight back into the asylums, and this time, he has enough excuses for hysteria to let the templars doctors do whatever they want with my body.
[ It's seldom she speaks of it. Not even to Jacob. He holds her, more often is worth mentioning, when the fear gets her, late at night, when she's shaking, terrified of it. The cold metal in small, linoleum-lined floors. But right now - there isn't tears with it, as he settles in beside her. That subtle shift closer, that isn't reaching for him, but it's the reassurance of his presence when she lets the outside of her leg brush against his. ]
I just want this over with. I'll need to be away, for a while. The less he can pin your or I's location... without me, he is running half blind, and he knows it.
[ Jacob listens, taking a swallow from his own cup, letting her tell him. She's the expert on Jack, after all, but he doesn't forget that it's her own fear of the man that colours her commentary. That she has suffered, and suffered so greatly at his hands that he no longer deserves to be considered her father.
Jacob's seen the marks. He's seen scars as well as tattoos, he's seen strange indentations in her flesh from needles and from restrains left on so long that the flesh never sprang back to its natural form. He's always tried to distract her from those marks when they're together, kissing them as ardently as he kisses every other patch of skin, never letting her see how angry each mark makes him. Never letting her know that in the blackest part of his heart, he wants to take his knife and cut corresponding marks into Jack, so deep that each little mark leaves an impression on his bones.
He pushes those dark thoughts away and keeps the light smile on his features as she finishes, and then shakes his head. ]
He's fear mongering. If he could get you back, he would be. This is to scare you into crawling back to him. It's aimed at you, not me. I don't give a toss what he prints.
[He knows she's moved closer, he felt it, and now he just gently wraps an arm around her, pulling her a little closer still, so he can kiss her, against her temple, her cheek. He knows she's scared. Jack's a bloody monster, he told her he loved her while he used her like a tool. And he's doing it again now.]
I'm not going to let him hurt you. I'm not going to let him get his hands on you. Alright? But I'm not frightened of him.
[ Her eyes close, as he kisses her. It's more reassuring than that part of her that is all the cynicism that Jack raised her too, should let it be. No one is here for you but me, got it Angel? No one.
Her pulse flutters in her throat, holding the tea in the trap of her fingers, light, and dizzy and some of it has nothing to do with her condition or the fear of Jack, that is just how he makes her feel. Light, full of light, not just in that literal sense that when he's got her just the right way, all her markings glow under his touch - but like a feather all drifting on the wind, she is light and Jack is wrong, and she is not alone. He's so easy with it, his goodness, his assurance, the protection he gives and she'd do so much worse for him if he'd ask for it, but he - he never, ever did.
She thought it once, and Jacob would give her such a look for it, but it didn't change that it was true to her. Gallant. He always was. ]
Are you ever frightened, Jacob? Sometimes I think I need to be, for you. [ Her head turns, brushing the tip of her nose against his cheek. Sighing in no small measure of comfort against him. There, just there, like there wasn't the rest of the world to bare down outside of the carriage on them. ]
But I meant it. I need to go away for awhile or I am going to be a liability to you. An obvious one.
[ There's something in her breathing that becomes more measured. Calmer, deeper in and put than it had when his lips first brushed her skin. He's glad of that, glad that she has managed to find her footing and the panic and fear she was working towards has fallen away. There's no need for fear. It's a tool used to divide and hurt people and Jack installed too much of it in her.
She's probably right that he isn't afraid of enough. At least not outwardly. She shows him her fear and he keeps his locked away. It balances then, somehow. There is no need for her to take on his.]
Only when you're at the reigns of a carriage.
Don't be ridiculous. I'm not letting you out of my sight. That's what he's trying to do Angel. If he can get you away then he thinks he has some chance of getting you back. We stick together. That'd the idea: Rooks are in it together. Till the end. You're a Rook now. If you're worried about being recognised then... I don't know. We'll get you a wig. Some new clothes.
[ If she needed too, she knew, shove her hair up, put on the uniform. She wouldn't look much different to a runner for the Rooks, just one more boy slipping watches out of the pockets of the stupid and rich.
Or, that would be a decent plan. Except for one little fact. She takes a deep breath. Now or never, Angel. Now or never. She presses her lips together, not even sure she can speak to say it, it still feels... so, what, she didn't know? Unbelievable, damning, confused.
But luckily, it wasn't the sort of thing she had to say necessarily. Wordlessly, she reaches for his other hand, gently taking his drink out of it. Setting it aside next to her tea before turning back to him. Watching him, nervously, then watching his hand because that's much easier than worrying about how he will react when he realises. Gently directing that hand to settle onto her stomach.
No, not her stomach. The bump that steadily had grown and neither of them had noticed. Different to how she's all soft curves and little dips that he usually enjoyed so much, and different to a trained body, after all, she wasn't the hardened fighter he, or most of the women in the Rooks, were. But this is different there is no mistaking the shape of how she traces his hand over her belly. Four months was enough of time, apparently, that it was becoming distinct.
She waits until she hears some reaction to make sure he understood and finally looks up at him. Nervously swallowing, it's not about what might happen to her or... this. She trusted Jacob, completely and wholly, looking up at his face. Trusted he would not snap like the worst stories she'd heard, of loving men one second, furious the next over the prospect of this ruining him.
Because she couldn't pretend it wouldn't, Jacob was a man who valued his freedom more than anything. This could never allow him that. But nor would Angel trap him with her state. Just because she'd been a fool who had been enjoying herself too much to remember the consequences of laying on her back and opening her legs, that wasn't his fault. ]
No, Jacob. This isn't something we can hide and hope it goes away. [ And to that... ] I need to borrow some money. If you can spare it with all the extra men. [ She'd noticed the extra guns. Jacob might pretend he wasn't worried, but she knew that wasn't completely true. ] There is a doctor. Down in Bath. For the right amount of coin he... makes it go away and is discreet. [ A little higher class, than what a lot of women at this end of the town had to do, something she'd heard women gossip about in drawing rooms away from men's ears.
But all the coin in the world didn't change the risk, that she knew. ] It isn't perfect, I know, but... he has a good success rate. Most of the women live.
[ If she says it cheerfully, they can pretend this isn't... dreadful, right? Perhaps there is a grain of truth to it, she is all worry for him, for the Rooks, but for herself? That she tosses away easily. ]
[ Jacob begins, but he doesn't resist the way she manoeuvres him, steers his hand. He's not sure where it's going, as normally when she does that sort of thing it's to guide his hands to parts of her unclothed form.
His frown causes creases between his eyes. He'd like to think he knows her body, the shape of her, even if over the last couple of weeks- longer, perhaps- she's been too ill to want his company for anything more than brief cuddles. But the strange distended swell of her worries him, seems horribly unfamiliar. His mother died giving birth to him. Evie hates everything considered a woman's duty, and the working girls he knows make every effort not to fall pregnant. So it takes a moment, several seconds, for him to work out what she is stilling him, without telling him. ]
You're pregnant?
[ He has to ask. He has to have the clarification, but she doesn't actually need to say it. It's clear in her face, in the way she looks at him. His.
He's not sure if he's ever got a girl pregnant before. He hopes not. No one has ever told him he has.
It's a little dumbfounding.
It's very dumbfounding. It takes all the words out of his head, and that might be why she ploughs on. Angel does this, he knows. She thinks of everything she wants to put forward before she starts, thinks about phrases that will work, because she can't get out of her head the fact she's trying to persuade Jack on something. She can't seem to escape him, even when she's far, far away. He's always there, in her mind. ]
What are you talking about? Most?
[ His hand hasn't moved, gently resting on the swell of her belly, protectively spread over the curve. There's a swirling mass of feelings in him, disbelief and joy churning together with this sudden fear, a real fear, that she might die. A wonderful world where she's safe and with him, a little chubby pink baby on her hip whisked out away from under his feet.
Yes - [ Why is it so hard to say it allowed? Talking is what she does, what she's always done. Angel could talk herself out of a cardboard box. Maybe that's what makes this is much harder to deal with. She can't talk herself out of this. She could say whatever she wanted and it does change the fact that there is a tiny being growing inside of her belly. That over weeks and weeks, whether she liked it or not.
That it's his. Maybe if it had just been one of her ex-husbands, or targets, or anything else, it might have been easier to just slip away and do this. But the numbers just hadn't worked out that way. Made her have to tell him, let him know.
And that was far, far more terrifying than Jack or Templars, by itself. But that it comes with the truth - he's right. They're always there, in her mind. Breathing down her neck. Waiting for her to slip, and - isn't that the fear? This is one hell of a slip. Everything she can do to defend herself would go out the window the longer this went on.
This. This. His hand still on her belly, and she takes a shallow breath. Looking down at that and then up at him. Trying to work out what - so instinctively, what he wanted, how to cater to it. ]
You know what I mean. [ Her hands curl over his where it's still placed, fingers laying wide. ] I know it's a risk. [ But what does she do but calculate risk? Runs numbers on every situation, working it in her mind over and over and over.
And comes to the resolution that has gnawed at her since the moment she was told: ] Jacob, I don't know what else to do. [ It makes her voice crack because she always knows what to do. No matter how bad it got, she could form a plan, she could push forward with an idea. ] I don't know anything about having a - a baby. But if it keeps up any longer, I'm barely going to be able to walk let alone -
[ Fight, move, run, stand by his side as he said. Part of his team. Have his back. She's going to be as mobile as a beached whale, and twice as useless. ]
[ The look he gives her is confused, concerned, flickering from their hands together back to her face.
Numbers. Risk. Chances. That's what she does. She's like a machine, a thinking engine just coming up with sums and outcomes. Sure, that's useful, it's good to have those skills. Jacob can look at a drop of fifty feet or more and calculate the best and safest way down, or how he needs to make the jump if it comes to it. But that's different. This is different. She's not a machine. She's a woman. A human being with dreams and hopes and feelings.
The idea of losing her is horrible. More than he can stand. But this isn't his decision.
He swallows, a little thickly, and tries to find the right words.]
You didn't know about coming to live with a group of thugs on a train either, but you took to it like a natural.
I... This isn't my choice, Angel. I'll support whatever you want to do. I don't want you to feel like you've got to do anything. We could look after a baby. People do it all the time. You're the smartest woman I know, we could... we'd manage. I promise you, you'd be safe. Safe and cared for, both you and the baby. This is your home now, with me, with the Rooks.
I know it's dangerous but - [ It bubbles up the days and days of imagining, constantly, what will happen if she keeps it. So fixed on it. Only half hearing him to start with. A bad habit when she's got herself this far into this state. Churning and churning and churning. Talking a mile and minute with barely a stop for breath in between sentences. How often it took a miracle to shut her up when she got like this. But then, Jacob wasn't inclined to yell at her for talking too much. He let her say what she was thinking, even if right now, she really did need to stop. ]
We aren't married, and if - if this keeps going, when Jack finds out. It'll be worse. He'll call me a whore, the things I've done he'll bring it all up to punish you for - and, all my husbands - You couldn't be seen in the street with me. The baby. I'd be a weight around your neck, I've no dowry for you, no inheritance or pension, I don't want to do that to you - then the baby would be a bastard. A bastard from a stupid lovelorn girl who has nothing but dead husbands and a -
[she takes a deep breath before she goes on. Stops. Mouth open. Wait, wait, what did he say? ]
... Did you say... We? We could look after the... [ She turns back to him, so very confused, that pinch in between her brows that said he'd thrown her for an absolute loop, a spanner jammed all the way into her calculations. He did that, so often, she should expect it, but some how, he always managed to surprise her, everything she thought, did. ]
... You want the baby... [ he wanted to keep it? With her? Her and the baby and him? Together. Them. Them and a baby. A baby and them. ] ... With me?
[ Can she see that none of these arguments are likely to work on Jacob? He doesn't live amongst her lardy-dar wealthy peers, he's not a member of the landed gentry, he's not anything. He's just Jacob Frye. The world she's from is completely alien to ninety percent of the population of London, probably even more. Marriage is for the wealthy and the pious. Most people get together, have a child, and by common law that's it, they're married.
Jacob doesn't expect that for himself that's true. But he's never much had any dreams of any sort of future. He'd lived for the hear and the now, the pleasure and the pain of that moment and any plans he does make are simple ones, for a few days in advance, to make a kill, to get the intel he needs.
This is happening because he lived for the moment. But he doesn't think that's a bad thing. He doesn't think this is a problem. How many of his Rooks were born on the wrong side of the sheets? Most of them, probably. Does it matter? Not one bit. ]
It looks like we've got one, doesn't it? I will, if that's what you want. If that isn't what you want then... I support you in that too. But no one here, no one who cares about you, they won't care. They won't think you're a whore. They won't think any less of you.
[ There was a lot of things Jacob didn't care about, and most of the time, it was a relief. Things that mattered to a lot of others almost never did him. Like her being Catholic in an otherwise protestant country. That she firmly was of those classes he more than once openly detested the existence of, but he'd never dulled in his affection for her.
Angel presses her lips together, teeth gnawing on the inside of her lip as she watches him. Thinks about what Jacob does care about. Because she can't be sure until he's sure. Not just of the idea of it. But every gritty little bit of everything he enjoyed was held up to the sharp brunt not of just ideas, but reality. ]
What if the men laugh behind your back that you're the fool for believing me when I say it's yours when they say I've cuckolded you? Day after day after day and you'd know it too.
[ Because that she knew, they would. The one difference between them, he believed so much, so often, to the better, that people were as earnest as they seemed. It was why she cared for him, so much, because it was easy to believe that too when she was with him.
But it didn't change what she also knew. Men talked like women talked, even if they would never admit it. How else would she be so good at getting information with preening words and soft touches, if they weren't inclined to it, to begin with?
Then there was. ]
And what about when I'm fat as an old nag, and just as foul-tempered - [ the worst act of her foul moods, rare as they ever were: haughty silence, for days, until she had whoever it was grovelling. ] - or the baby won't stop crying and it's the middle of the night and you just want to sleep but I can't make it quiet. Will you want me and a baby then?
[ It's not angry, but Jacob can feel anger beginning, the seeds of it in his gut. He knows that anger isn't good, but it builds in him less these days than it used to. Still, he has to take a breath, and look at her again. He hates when people attack his friends like that, with words. He deals better with fists. ]
No one is going to say anything like that. Not anyone that matters. The Rooks wouldn't, and I expect your father to try his very best to hurt us both.
[ He moves his hand, gently, from her belly, to take the hand that's rested on his and knot their fingers together. ]
I don't think having a baby is a walk in Hyde Park, Angel. But I don't think... I don't think that a baby will make me care about you less. I don't think anything will make me care about you less than I do. I mean... [ That probably wasn't phrased well. ] I'd like us to have this baby. If that's what you want to do.
[ Angel falls silent, at least. Watching his face, letting him move her hands without comment and resistance. It's only when she's secure there, in his hold, does she register it so much.
She lifts their joined fingers, bringing them up as she bowed her head over them. Pressing a soft kiss, warm against his knuckles. Her lips always, always so soft. Taking the time hidden with her hair falling in front of her face to think. Falling silent for moments, just like that, taking slow sure breath against his skin, her nose pressing there.
Then at long last, she speaks. ] I don't know what I want. [ That was the truth of it so often. Why, in the weeks once she was sure, really sure, nothing would happen to her and he and his rooks really would protect her, she had run absolutely wild. Tried every single thing she could get her hands on. Fired every gun, threw as many knives, drove carriages and did it too fast, sung songs at the top of her lungs until she drank herself under the table. Went to every show that she wasn't supposed to. Built him horrific things, that could kill men in ways that shouldn't be possible, as long with dolls that would sing ditties and mechanical flowers that would dance and left them with him with the same emphasis, already moving on to the next idea as frantically as she did the last.
He was not the source of some creation myth that allowed it, he never told her what she and could not do and that was - simply, the most profound thing anyone had ever done for her. ] ... When the Count... He wanted me to have children, his heirs. Jack wanted it too so I could keep the lands. I spent every day terrified that it would happen. I couldn't protect anyone, not even myself, how was I going to protect my own baby? From the Count or from Jack. But it didn't happen and then he was dead anyway. [ The words are said against his hands, curling around it - more teasing out the thoughts than so much telling him the story, what she thinks, really thinks. That muddled way every choice is half soaked in the blood of the awful ones before it. Picking herself apart in the definitions not so much of what she wanted, but what she didn't. Always at odds, sometimes she was just any young woman. Worried about what ribbons looked good on her, and getting to Mass on time, and whether the rain was going to ruin her going outside to paint.
But sometimes she was sleeping with a man, carrying his child, and only really began to realise he was more than any of that. He was her friend. ] But when Ruthie told me. I didn't feel that. At all. It's... everything else that makes me worried. But not... you, This. I only thought about telling you, but I was scared you wouldn't be happy. [ Because that mattered, so oddly, and so sharply different to men with lineage building built of their wives. A frown, again - and that was - ]
[ It didn't feel like last time. It didn't feel like that mindless dread of wondering if she threw herself down the stairs, she could make sure nothing happened. Which perhaps to most people, didn't mean much of anything. So she wasn't afraid of him? She'd been sleeping with him, very happily for months now, that tended to be part of the deal.
But for her? ] I think, I think that means I do. With you. Only with you.
[ As he listens to her, it dawns on Jacob that for all the many thing he complains about, for all the things he has he has to suffer through, his father never tried to force him or Evie to marry anyone. There was no discussion of heirs and doing their duty to anything but the Creed.
He's never had to worry about any of this. Neither has Evie, he supposes. They've never had to worry that any marriage they have wouldn't be a love match and they'd have to have children with someone they couldn't stand.
He squeezes gently at her fingers, not to interupt the flow of her feelings but to ry and relay through such a small gesture that he's sorry. For all of it. For what her husbands had forced on her and what she'd had to endure. It's not right, any of it. But she's free now. ]
I think I'm happy. A little surprised but... happy. As long as you're safe and happy, that's what I want.
[ This isn't what he assumed they'd be discussing tonight after all. The paper lays open in front of them, almost forgotten after all of this. ]
You know... we should announce it. In the paper. Like Jack did, and maybe he'll choke on his tea. Sir Jacob Frye of Crawley and his young wife wish to announce that their first born is due... er.
[ He looks a little sheepish then, the grin a little apologetic.] Something like that. We'll play it his way.
[ She thinks Jacob might like the marriage market and despise it all at the same time. All those pretty boys and girls, lined up, trying to catch the eye of someone just like him. A young Sir, in the Queen's favour, handsome and strong. They'd fawn at his feet, just to talk to him. See if he'd steal a kiss so they could whisper to their friends about the Handsome and Daring Jacob Frye.
But if they tried to have him for more than a night, she'd have them by their throat for trying to keep him. Which was - a strange feeling. She'd never felt that sort of possessiveness. She'd work out what to do with it - later. For right now, it's so much easier to smile at him. His excited declaration. ]
He'll kill someone. [ Which is a joke, and isn't. But she's finally smiling, laughing at him. ] Five more months. By the way. You got me with child - four months ago.
[ And sometimes, despite what she is and how blunt she could be, she is still Lady Angel Darling, the daughter of a wealthy financier and Lord, who had tutors and dancing lessons and could sing at a pianoforte moderately well for polite company, who would never speak to a man directly in a ballroom without company and could turn her fan to signal everything she needed without ever lifting her eyes. That goes pink as rose bush tries to tell him, the more practical details. ] Do you remember that night? Mister Green... sent us that herb? The one for your poison darts?
[ Which wasn't how they'd used it. He said it produced a pleasurable tingly sensation and increased impulsivity, and if she was going to mix it for Jacob and the Rooks to use, she had to know the side effects. So she'd mixed it into a drink for her and Jacob - intent on observing their reactions.
Observe she had. A lot. Pleasurable sensation and increased impulsivity was an understatement. ] And you were - quite. Thorough. [ That was her mistake, Jacob didn't need help being impulsive and having no restraint. Especially not when all he wants was soft and giggling in front of him. Giggling so much she couldn't do sensible things like remind about certain things he should and should not do. ] Very Thorough. Several times. [ If she kept saying anything else she'd go so red she might faint so she clears her throat. ]
[ Thankfully for all concerned, Jacob had never been involved with any of that, and would never be. The Frye's had never been wealthy enough, or notable enough, to ever have been considered for such an event- Ethan was, after all, nothing more than a schoolmaster. Assassins tend to marry other assassins, to try to restrict the heartbreak, maybe, when a husband or a mother or a child is killed.
But he pushes thought thoughts away. This is different, none of this is the case, and nothing is going to keep him from being happy about the news. He still isn't sure he believes it, but perhaps it takes a while to sink in. He assumes she's known longer than he has.]
Four months?
[ Even before she speaks he's trying to work that back. God knows he's not great at dates and remembering when specific things happened but then she's there, reminding him. Oh yes, Henry's herbs. He can't help but grin, leaning back into the cushions on the bed and yes, he does look a little smug. But how can he fail to be smug, when she turns that beautiful shade of pink along her cheeks and describes it so very carefully, as if she's telling a maiden aunt. ]
You were as randy as a cat in heat, as I recall. There was one point I tried to stop and you pinned me to the bed for another twenty minutes.
[He's not going to take all the blame, after all, not when it takes two to waltz. And at this point he'll say anything to encourage a blush to glow a little brighter.]
Jacob. [ She hisses it almost petulantly, mortified, and as he leans back, she pushes at his shoulder as he sinks away. Not hard enough, if ever, to do him any damage, but certainly enough to send him towards the piles of pillows she insisted upon that he was already heading towards. ] It was not -
[ She is smiling, even if she's still steadily going pink, working it's way up to her ears. Oh, yes, she remembered it very well. She could barely deny it. Had crawled all over him and he'd had to do nothing much than touch her to send her shuddering against him. Giggling in fitful little bursts.
Giggles she's trying to keep out now. ]
- You just - looked - very handsome.
[ It's blurted out very quickly, and wasn't that always the problem? At odds with herself. She could whisper him all sorts of things, at the moment, terrible and warm into his ear. Of one simple truth, she looked at him and could barely help herself. Not when she thinks of the clever things he could do with his mouth and fingers, how good he looked doing it. But God forbid anyone to bring it up before or after the fact, the sort of things she'd say to him, and just him alone. Just like he looked now, and absently, one hand lifts, brushing against the bump on her stomach. Smoothing over it, now that his hand was gone, and the warmth left with it. Mapping out the shape as she had done every day since she'd been told. ] You always look so terribly handsome.
[ It's admitted, still pink, but she looks over him, and something in it, all the anxiety, the worry, and the far too visceral fear, goes. Just watching him, smiling to herself. A sensation that is so utterly profound for all that it is - stillness. Quiet. Listening to the train rock as it goes along, and the sound of his voice. ]
[ His reply is more to do with the gentle shove than it is about anything else, and he laughs as he sinks down into the cushions, reaching out to stroke gently up and down her back. In the light from the carriage lamps, and what little light comes in from the bright moon outside, she looks utterly wonderful. The flush in her cheeks, the brightness in her eyes, her lips pulled into that beautiful curve. She looks healthy, despite the fact these last few weeks she's been so tired, so sick.
But the acknowledgement of why seems to have had almost a miraculous effect. She looks so much different to the woman in white in met in that grey garden, which seems like a lifetime ago. ]
You were drugged. That explains the hallucinations.
[ He is teasing, he knows very well he's not the worst looking man in the world. But he also very much enjoys being told so, and the best way to be told so is normally to deny it.
Not that he cares too much if she says it again or not, gently moving his hand to her hip and shifting his own form, tucking himself against the vibrating wall of the carriage and trying to wordlessly invite her down with him. ]
[ She pushes up the bed a little, adjusting her skirts and petticoats before she followed him down. They were starting to get tight. Had to set them that little bit higher as to not dig in or get in her way now, as she worked. That, and the damn things just didn't stop riding up whenever she moved about.
But once it's sorted, she lays down next to him. Curling her leg through his, pressing against his side, propping her head up on her hand, so she could look down at him. Lifting her hand to tug on that wayward curl of hair that always seemed to escape when he pushed it back. Sliding it through her fingers. ]
The only thing I was hallucinating was thinking that if I spent that long in bed with you, admiring you so intimately, this somehow wouldn't happen. [ She shakes her head, all the same. ] But never about you. [ Well - ] That, and when you sprouted wings for a moment. That was... definitely different.
[ She trails her fingers against his cheek. Following the little scar in his brow. Following with her eyes, around his face, his cheeks, his nose, that little bump where his nose had broken at some distant point, the little dimple on his cheek. As much about appreciation as affirmation. He's here, he's real, and he is hers. ] I think it's going to take some time. To think about having... a baby. [ That was the truth of it, plainly and without much grief either way. ]
... But... [ She stops her sketching of his features, settling her hand flat against the curve of his cheek. ] ... I don't think I'd rather work this out, with anyone else. [ There's one thing, at least, that was a relief. ] And I am glad I don't have to pretend, to you or anyone else. Even if the whole train knows, and worked it out before either of us did.
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Because the answer to that couldn't be more complicated. Couldn't be more simple, in its own way. It feels like a knife edge. Standing on the tip of it, how quickly it could fall. It was easier when she first met Jacob. She didn't care about living. Didn't care for anything anymore. She had only one path in front of her. There was nothing else to lose any more because she knew what she was doing, wasn't living. So what if it all went down in flames?
But now... ? ]
Yes. No. It's a warning. To you. That he can extend his reach further than you can move. [ Her words aren't soft worry. No, it's the tone she only ever extends with him. That firm direction where she lets every other pretence drop, extends that harsh line in her body up and out of her mouth. ] And it's a warning, that unless I come crawling back with something good and make all this worth his while, he will find me, and I will go straight back into the asylums, and this time, he has enough excuses for hysteria to let the templars doctors do whatever they want with my body.
[ It's seldom she speaks of it. Not even to Jacob. He holds her, more often is worth mentioning, when the fear gets her, late at night, when she's shaking, terrified of it. The cold metal in small, linoleum-lined floors. But right now - there isn't tears with it, as he settles in beside her. That subtle shift closer, that isn't reaching for him, but it's the reassurance of his presence when she lets the outside of her leg brush against his. ]
I just want this over with. I'll need to be away, for a while. The less he can pin your or I's location... without me, he is running half blind, and he knows it.
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Jacob's seen the marks. He's seen scars as well as tattoos, he's seen strange indentations in her flesh from needles and from restrains left on so long that the flesh never sprang back to its natural form. He's always tried to distract her from those marks when they're together, kissing them as ardently as he kisses every other patch of skin, never letting her see how angry each mark makes him. Never letting her know that in the blackest part of his heart, he wants to take his knife and cut corresponding marks into Jack, so deep that each little mark leaves an impression on his bones.
He pushes those dark thoughts away and keeps the light smile on his features as she finishes, and then shakes his head. ]
He's fear mongering. If he could get you back, he would be. This is to scare you into crawling back to him. It's aimed at you, not me. I don't give a toss what he prints.
[He knows she's moved closer, he felt it, and now he just gently wraps an arm around her, pulling her a little closer still, so he can kiss her, against her temple, her cheek. He knows she's scared. Jack's a bloody monster, he told her he loved her while he used her like a tool. And he's doing it again now.]
I'm not going to let him hurt you. I'm not going to let him get his hands on you. Alright? But I'm not frightened of him.
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Her pulse flutters in her throat, holding the tea in the trap of her fingers, light, and dizzy and some of it has nothing to do with her condition or the fear of Jack, that is just how he makes her feel. Light, full of light, not just in that literal sense that when he's got her just the right way, all her markings glow under his touch - but like a feather all drifting on the wind, she is light and Jack is wrong, and she is not alone. He's so easy with it, his goodness, his assurance, the protection he gives and she'd do so much worse for him if he'd ask for it, but he - he never, ever did.
She thought it once, and Jacob would give her such a look for it, but it didn't change that it was true to her. Gallant. He always was. ]
Are you ever frightened, Jacob? Sometimes I think I need to be, for you. [ Her head turns, brushing the tip of her nose against his cheek. Sighing in no small measure of comfort against him. There, just there, like there wasn't the rest of the world to bare down outside of the carriage on them. ]
But I meant it. I need to go away for awhile or I am going to be a liability to you. An obvious one.
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She's probably right that he isn't afraid of enough. At least not outwardly. She shows him her fear and he keeps his locked away. It balances then, somehow. There is no need for her to take on his.]
Only when you're at the reigns of a carriage.
Don't be ridiculous. I'm not letting you out of my sight. That's what he's trying to do Angel. If he can get you away then he thinks he has some chance of getting you back. We stick together. That'd the idea: Rooks are in it together. Till the end. You're a Rook now. If you're worried about being recognised then... I don't know. We'll get you a wig. Some new clothes.
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Or, that would be a decent plan. Except for one little fact. She takes a deep breath. Now or never, Angel. Now or never. She presses her lips together, not even sure she can speak to say it, it still feels... so, what, she didn't know? Unbelievable, damning, confused.
But luckily, it wasn't the sort of thing she had to say necessarily. Wordlessly, she reaches for his other hand, gently taking his drink out of it. Setting it aside next to her tea before turning back to him. Watching him, nervously, then watching his hand because that's much easier than worrying about how he will react when he realises. Gently directing that hand to settle onto her stomach.
No, not her stomach. The bump that steadily had grown and neither of them had noticed. Different to how she's all soft curves and little dips that he usually enjoyed so much, and different to a trained body, after all, she wasn't the hardened fighter he, or most of the women in the Rooks, were. But this is different there is no mistaking the shape of how she traces his hand over her belly. Four months was enough of time, apparently, that it was becoming distinct.
She waits until she hears some reaction to make sure he understood and finally looks up at him. Nervously swallowing, it's not about what might happen to her or... this. She trusted Jacob, completely and wholly, looking up at his face. Trusted he would not snap like the worst stories she'd heard, of loving men one second, furious the next over the prospect of this ruining him.
Because she couldn't pretend it wouldn't, Jacob was a man who valued his freedom more than anything. This could never allow him that. But nor would Angel trap him with her state. Just because she'd been a fool who had been enjoying herself too much to remember the consequences of laying on her back and opening her legs, that wasn't his fault. ]
No, Jacob. This isn't something we can hide and hope it goes away. [ And to that... ] I need to borrow some money. If you can spare it with all the extra men. [ She'd noticed the extra guns. Jacob might pretend he wasn't worried, but she knew that wasn't completely true. ] There is a doctor. Down in Bath. For the right amount of coin he... makes it go away and is discreet. [ A little higher class, than what a lot of women at this end of the town had to do, something she'd heard women gossip about in drawing rooms away from men's ears.
But all the coin in the world didn't change the risk, that she knew. ] It isn't perfect, I know, but... he has a good success rate. Most of the women live.
[ If she says it cheerfully, they can pretend this isn't... dreadful, right? Perhaps there is a grain of truth to it, she is all worry for him, for the Rooks, but for herself? That she tosses away easily. ]
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[ Jacob begins, but he doesn't resist the way she manoeuvres him, steers his hand. He's not sure where it's going, as normally when she does that sort of thing it's to guide his hands to parts of her unclothed form.
His frown causes creases between his eyes. He'd like to think he knows her body, the shape of her, even if over the last couple of weeks- longer, perhaps- she's been too ill to want his company for anything more than brief cuddles. But the strange distended swell of her worries him, seems horribly unfamiliar. His mother died giving birth to him. Evie hates everything considered a woman's duty, and the working girls he knows make every effort not to fall pregnant. So it takes a moment, several seconds, for him to work out what she is stilling him, without telling him. ]
You're pregnant?
[ He has to ask. He has to have the clarification, but she doesn't actually need to say it. It's clear in her face, in the way she looks at him. His.
He's not sure if he's ever got a girl pregnant before. He hopes not. No one has ever told him he has.
It's a little dumbfounding.
It's very dumbfounding. It takes all the words out of his head, and that might be why she ploughs on. Angel does this, he knows. She thinks of everything she wants to put forward before she starts, thinks about phrases that will work, because she can't get out of her head the fact she's trying to persuade Jack on something. She can't seem to escape him, even when she's far, far away. He's always there, in her mind. ]
What are you talking about? Most?
[ His hand hasn't moved, gently resting on the swell of her belly, protectively spread over the curve. There's a swirling mass of feelings in him, disbelief and joy churning together with this sudden fear, a real fear, that she might die. A wonderful world where she's safe and with him, a little chubby pink baby on her hip whisked out away from under his feet.
And he'd be alone again.]
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That it's his. Maybe if it had just been one of her ex-husbands, or targets, or anything else, it might have been easier to just slip away and do this. But the numbers just hadn't worked out that way. Made her have to tell him, let him know.
And that was far, far more terrifying than Jack or Templars, by itself. But that it comes with the truth - he's right. They're always there, in her mind. Breathing down her neck. Waiting for her to slip, and - isn't that the fear? This is one hell of a slip. Everything she can do to defend herself would go out the window the longer this went on.
This. This. His hand still on her belly, and she takes a shallow breath. Looking down at that and then up at him. Trying to work out what - so instinctively, what he wanted, how to cater to it. ]
You know what I mean. [ Her hands curl over his where it's still placed, fingers laying wide. ] I know it's a risk. [ But what does she do but calculate risk? Runs numbers on every situation, working it in her mind over and over and over.
And comes to the resolution that has gnawed at her since the moment she was told: ] Jacob, I don't know what else to do. [ It makes her voice crack because she always knows what to do. No matter how bad it got, she could form a plan, she could push forward with an idea. ] I don't know anything about having a - a baby. But if it keeps up any longer, I'm barely going to be able to walk let alone -
[ Fight, move, run, stand by his side as he said. Part of his team. Have his back. She's going to be as mobile as a beached whale, and twice as useless. ]
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Numbers. Risk. Chances. That's what she does. She's like a machine, a thinking engine just coming up with sums and outcomes. Sure, that's useful, it's good to have those skills. Jacob can look at a drop of fifty feet or more and calculate the best and safest way down, or how he needs to make the jump if it comes to it. But that's different. This is different. She's not a machine. She's a woman. A human being with dreams and hopes and feelings.
The idea of losing her is horrible. More than he can stand. But this isn't his decision.
He swallows, a little thickly, and tries to find the right words.]
You didn't know about coming to live with a group of thugs on a train either, but you took to it like a natural.
I... This isn't my choice, Angel. I'll support whatever you want to do. I don't want you to feel like you've got to do anything. We could look after a baby. People do it all the time. You're the smartest woman I know, we could... we'd manage. I promise you, you'd be safe. Safe and cared for, both you and the baby. This is your home now, with me, with the Rooks.
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We aren't married, and if - if this keeps going, when Jack finds out. It'll be worse. He'll call me a whore, the things I've done he'll bring it all up to punish you for - and, all my husbands - You couldn't be seen in the street with me. The baby. I'd be a weight around your neck, I've no dowry for you, no inheritance or pension, I don't want to do that to you - then the baby would be a bastard. A bastard from a stupid lovelorn girl who has nothing but dead husbands and a -
[she takes a deep breath before she goes on. Stops. Mouth open. Wait, wait, what did he say? ]
... Did you say... We? We could look after the... [ She turns back to him, so very confused, that pinch in between her brows that said he'd thrown her for an absolute loop, a spanner jammed all the way into her calculations. He did that, so often, she should expect it, but some how, he always managed to surprise her, everything she thought, did. ]
... You want the baby... [ he wanted to keep it? With her? Her and the baby and him? Together. Them. Them and a baby. A baby and them. ] ... With me?
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Jacob doesn't expect that for himself that's true. But he's never much had any dreams of any sort of future. He'd lived for the hear and the now, the pleasure and the pain of that moment and any plans he does make are simple ones, for a few days in advance, to make a kill, to get the intel he needs.
This is happening because he lived for the moment. But he doesn't think that's a bad thing. He doesn't think this is a problem. How many of his Rooks were born on the wrong side of the sheets? Most of them, probably. Does it matter? Not one bit. ]
It looks like we've got one, doesn't it? I will, if that's what you want. If that isn't what you want then... I support you in that too. But no one here, no one who cares about you, they won't care. They won't think you're a whore. They won't think any less of you.
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Angel presses her lips together, teeth gnawing on the inside of her lip as she watches him. Thinks about what Jacob does care about. Because she can't be sure until he's sure. Not just of the idea of it. But every gritty little bit of everything he enjoyed was held up to the sharp brunt not of just ideas, but reality. ]
What if the men laugh behind your back that you're the fool for believing me when I say it's yours when they say I've cuckolded you? Day after day after day and you'd know it too.
[ Because that she knew, they would. The one difference between them, he believed so much, so often, to the better, that people were as earnest as they seemed. It was why she cared for him, so much, because it was easy to believe that too when she was with him.
But it didn't change what she also knew. Men talked like women talked, even if they would never admit it. How else would she be so good at getting information with preening words and soft touches, if they weren't inclined to it, to begin with?
Then there was. ]
And what about when I'm fat as an old nag, and just as foul-tempered - [ the worst act of her foul moods, rare as they ever were: haughty silence, for days, until she had whoever it was grovelling. ] - or the baby won't stop crying and it's the middle of the night and you just want to sleep but I can't make it quiet. Will you want me and a baby then?
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[ It's not angry, but Jacob can feel anger beginning, the seeds of it in his gut. He knows that anger isn't good, but it builds in him less these days than it used to. Still, he has to take a breath, and look at her again. He hates when people attack his friends like that, with words. He deals better with fists. ]
No one is going to say anything like that. Not anyone that matters. The Rooks wouldn't, and I expect your father to try his very best to hurt us both.
[ He moves his hand, gently, from her belly, to take the hand that's rested on his and knot their fingers together. ]
I don't think having a baby is a walk in Hyde Park, Angel. But I don't think... I don't think that a baby will make me care about you less. I don't think anything will make me care about you less than I do. I mean... [ That probably wasn't phrased well. ] I'd like us to have this baby. If that's what you want to do.
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She lifts their joined fingers, bringing them up as she bowed her head over them. Pressing a soft kiss, warm against his knuckles. Her lips always, always so soft. Taking the time hidden with her hair falling in front of her face to think. Falling silent for moments, just like that, taking slow sure breath against his skin, her nose pressing there.
Then at long last, she speaks. ] I don't know what I want. [ That was the truth of it so often. Why, in the weeks once she was sure, really sure, nothing would happen to her and he and his rooks really would protect her, she had run absolutely wild. Tried every single thing she could get her hands on. Fired every gun, threw as many knives, drove carriages and did it too fast, sung songs at the top of her lungs until she drank herself under the table. Went to every show that she wasn't supposed to. Built him horrific things, that could kill men in ways that shouldn't be possible, as long with dolls that would sing ditties and mechanical flowers that would dance and left them with him with the same emphasis, already moving on to the next idea as frantically as she did the last.
He was not the source of some creation myth that allowed it, he never told her what she and could not do and that was - simply, the most profound thing anyone had ever done for her. ] ... When the Count... He wanted me to have children, his heirs. Jack wanted it too so I could keep the lands. I spent every day terrified that it would happen. I couldn't protect anyone, not even myself, how was I going to protect my own baby? From the Count or from Jack. But it didn't happen and then he was dead anyway. [ The words are said against his hands, curling around it - more teasing out the thoughts than so much telling him the story, what she thinks, really thinks. That muddled way every choice is half soaked in the blood of the awful ones before it. Picking herself apart in the definitions not so much of what she wanted, but what she didn't. Always at odds, sometimes she was just any young woman. Worried about what ribbons looked good on her, and getting to Mass on time, and whether the rain was going to ruin her going outside to paint.
But sometimes she was sleeping with a man, carrying his child, and only really began to realise he was more than any of that. He was her friend. ] But when Ruthie told me. I didn't feel that. At all. It's... everything else that makes me worried. But not... you, This. I only thought about telling you, but I was scared you wouldn't be happy. [ Because that mattered, so oddly, and so sharply different to men with lineage building built of their wives. A frown, again - and that was - ]
[ It didn't feel like last time. It didn't feel like that mindless dread of wondering if she threw herself down the stairs, she could make sure nothing happened. Which perhaps to most people, didn't mean much of anything. So she wasn't afraid of him? She'd been sleeping with him, very happily for months now, that tended to be part of the deal.
But for her? ] I think, I think that means I do. With you. Only with you.
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He's never had to worry about any of this. Neither has Evie, he supposes. They've never had to worry that any marriage they have wouldn't be a love match and they'd have to have children with someone they couldn't stand.
He squeezes gently at her fingers, not to interupt the flow of her feelings but to ry and relay through such a small gesture that he's sorry. For all of it. For what her husbands had forced on her and what she'd had to endure. It's not right, any of it. But she's free now. ]
I think I'm happy. A little surprised but... happy. As long as you're safe and happy, that's what I want.
[ This isn't what he assumed they'd be discussing tonight after all. The paper lays open in front of them, almost forgotten after all of this. ]
You know... we should announce it. In the paper. Like Jack did, and maybe he'll choke on his tea. Sir Jacob Frye of Crawley and his young wife wish to announce that their first born is due... er.
[ He looks a little sheepish then, the grin a little apologetic.] Something like that. We'll play it his way.
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But if they tried to have him for more than a night, she'd have them by their throat for trying to keep him. Which was - a strange feeling. She'd never felt that sort of possessiveness. She'd work out what to do with it - later. For right now, it's so much easier to smile at him. His excited declaration. ]
He'll kill someone. [ Which is a joke, and isn't. But she's finally smiling, laughing at him. ] Five more months. By the way. You got me with child - four months ago.
[ And sometimes, despite what she is and how blunt she could be, she is still Lady Angel Darling, the daughter of a wealthy financier and Lord, who had tutors and dancing lessons and could sing at a pianoforte moderately well for polite company, who would never speak to a man directly in a ballroom without company and could turn her fan to signal everything she needed without ever lifting her eyes. That goes pink as rose bush tries to tell him, the more practical details. ] Do you remember that night? Mister Green... sent us that herb? The one for your poison darts?
[ Which wasn't how they'd used it. He said it produced a pleasurable tingly sensation and increased impulsivity, and if she was going to mix it for Jacob and the Rooks to use, she had to know the side effects. So she'd mixed it into a drink for her and Jacob - intent on observing their reactions.
Observe she had. A lot. Pleasurable sensation and increased impulsivity was an understatement. ] And you were - quite. Thorough. [ That was her mistake, Jacob didn't need help being impulsive and having no restraint. Especially not when all he wants was soft and giggling in front of him. Giggling so much she couldn't do sensible things like remind about certain things he should and should not do. ] Very Thorough. Several times. [ If she kept saying anything else she'd go so red she might faint so she clears her throat. ]
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But he pushes thought thoughts away. This is different, none of this is the case, and nothing is going to keep him from being happy about the news. He still isn't sure he believes it, but perhaps it takes a while to sink in. He assumes she's known longer than he has.]
Four months?
[ Even before she speaks he's trying to work that back. God knows he's not great at dates and remembering when specific things happened but then she's there, reminding him. Oh yes, Henry's herbs. He can't help but grin, leaning back into the cushions on the bed and yes, he does look a little smug. But how can he fail to be smug, when she turns that beautiful shade of pink along her cheeks and describes it so very carefully, as if she's telling a maiden aunt. ]
You were as randy as a cat in heat, as I recall. There was one point I tried to stop and you pinned me to the bed for another twenty minutes.
[He's not going to take all the blame, after all, not when it takes two to waltz. And at this point he'll say anything to encourage a blush to glow a little brighter.]
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[ She is smiling, even if she's still steadily going pink, working it's way up to her ears. Oh, yes, she remembered it very well. She could barely deny it. Had crawled all over him and he'd had to do nothing much than touch her to send her shuddering against him. Giggling in fitful little bursts.
Giggles she's trying to keep out now. ]
- You just - looked - very handsome.
[ It's blurted out very quickly, and wasn't that always the problem? At odds with herself. She could whisper him all sorts of things, at the moment, terrible and warm into his ear. Of one simple truth, she looked at him and could barely help herself. Not when she thinks of the clever things he could do with his mouth and fingers, how good he looked doing it. But God forbid anyone to bring it up before or after the fact, the sort of things she'd say to him, and just him alone. Just like he looked now, and absently, one hand lifts, brushing against the bump on her stomach. Smoothing over it, now that his hand was gone, and the warmth left with it. Mapping out the shape as she had done every day since she'd been told. ] You always look so terribly handsome.
[ It's admitted, still pink, but she looks over him, and something in it, all the anxiety, the worry, and the far too visceral fear, goes. Just watching him, smiling to herself. A sensation that is so utterly profound for all that it is - stillness. Quiet. Listening to the train rock as it goes along, and the sound of his voice. ]
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[ His reply is more to do with the gentle shove than it is about anything else, and he laughs as he sinks down into the cushions, reaching out to stroke gently up and down her back. In the light from the carriage lamps, and what little light comes in from the bright moon outside, she looks utterly wonderful. The flush in her cheeks, the brightness in her eyes, her lips pulled into that beautiful curve. She looks healthy, despite the fact these last few weeks she's been so tired, so sick.
But the acknowledgement of why seems to have had almost a miraculous effect. She looks so much different to the woman in white in met in that grey garden, which seems like a lifetime ago. ]
You were drugged. That explains the hallucinations.
[ He is teasing, he knows very well he's not the worst looking man in the world. But he also very much enjoys being told so, and the best way to be told so is normally to deny it.
Not that he cares too much if she says it again or not, gently moving his hand to her hip and shifting his own form, tucking himself against the vibrating wall of the carriage and trying to wordlessly invite her down with him. ]
Do you feel better? About... all of it? The baby?
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But once it's sorted, she lays down next to him. Curling her leg through his, pressing against his side, propping her head up on her hand, so she could look down at him. Lifting her hand to tug on that wayward curl of hair that always seemed to escape when he pushed it back. Sliding it through her fingers. ]
The only thing I was hallucinating was thinking that if I spent that long in bed with you, admiring you so intimately, this somehow wouldn't happen. [ She shakes her head, all the same. ] But never about you. [ Well - ] That, and when you sprouted wings for a moment. That was... definitely different.
[ She trails her fingers against his cheek. Following the little scar in his brow. Following with her eyes, around his face, his cheeks, his nose, that little bump where his nose had broken at some distant point, the little dimple on his cheek. As much about appreciation as affirmation. He's here, he's real, and he is hers. ] I think it's going to take some time. To think about having... a baby. [ That was the truth of it, plainly and without much grief either way. ]
... But... [ She stops her sketching of his features, settling her hand flat against the curve of his cheek. ] ... I don't think I'd rather work this out, with anyone else. [ There's one thing, at least, that was a relief. ] And I am glad I don't have to pretend, to you or anyone else. Even if the whole train knows, and worked it out before either of us did.
[ Kill her, honestly. ]