A Slow Paced Envy (9/15)
Monday, July 17th, 2023 19:18![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fumblingmusingsA study of a potential Female England characterisation. Snapshots through the years showing how and where her attempts at parenthood and romance run dissonant to the reality of being the motherland of the world's largest empire. There's a lot of people in her head who don't belong there, and it soon becomes everyone else's problem.
Also available on Ao3 or Tumblr.
Chapter Nine: 1867-1870, or Canadian Confederation and the Franco-Prussian War
Windsor, England
“I still believe Newfoundland will be yours. They will see it one day.”
“Ah,” Canada replied, resisting the urge to scuff his polished shoes. He had not been dressed in such fancy clothes for a long time. A black overcoat, embroidered with golden thread. Court dress, England had explained during the fittings. Another quiet gift made without much fanfare.
Maman was all dressed up too, in a way he rarely saw her. Pearls and diamonds on a tiara and necklace along with the set of opals that Jack had given her as a Christmas gift a few years ago that she’d had set into rings and bracelets and brooches. She sparkled in the brightly lit room, but her smile was tainted with melancholia.
Jack and Maia squeezed past, laughing and chasing each other. The two were well into adolescence now - Maia in particular had almost grown at the rate of a human.
“Mattie, Mattie,” Zee gasped as Jack got his hands around her, pinching her nose, she shook him off with an elbow to the gut. He wheezed, laughing all the same.
“Children, please try to calm down a little,” Evelyn chided weakly. It had been over half a century, Jack would calm down when he exhausted himself. That took some doing.
Maia put her hands against Matthew’s cheeks, squeezing so tightly his lips puckered.
“You are the most handsome man here tonight,” Zee declared in no uncertain terms.
Despite her grip, Matthew’s smile was visible. Matthew felt handsome. Evelyn’s expression melted, then as she caught Jack out in her side view, she sighed. He was pouting, being denied attention. Evelyn ran her fingers through his hair, but he twitched away.
“All of you do. Now you two will you please -”
Jack shoved Maia, ripping her away from Matthew. She stumbled over her skirt, which unlike her mother was still short enough for her ankles to be exposed. She zipped off again, neat and tidily running and skipping through the room, unnoticed and unremarkable.
There were several other adolescents and children, some visibly much younger than herself, and yet they all were placed in a corner, keeping quietly to themselves. Beatrice and Leopold, the youngest of the Queen’s children and yet seemingly at ages with Jack and Maia, watched the two siblings wrestle, ignorant and uncaring of decorum. The little ten year old princess, the shyest of the Queen’s children, clung to her fourteen year old brother, looking very much like she wished someone would play with her like that; Leopold himself was bookish and introverted, so very the opposite of England’s youngest two. Victoria was not present, doing as she had done since Albert had died and leaving all and every public appearance of the Crown to the Prince of Wales and his Danish wife.
At this gathering of MPs and Lords and Royals, most did not quite know who the two raucous children belonged to, Jack in particular received dirty looks every now and then, which only served to cause Evelyn to give even more poisonous glares of warning behind their backs.
Canada drew his mother’s attention back - to where it should have been, he bitterly mused - by returning to the original point of conversation.
“Yes. It’s odd to have parts of yourself floating unconnected,” Matthew said.
“You are connected through me,” England replied, eyes returning to Canada a moment after she spoke. “And I hope you remain so for some time.” She took his hands, squeezing tight. “My boy. My Dominion.”
Matthew smiled once more, bashful, and Evelyn returned it, though her eyebrows were drawn up into a frown. Her nose turned red.
“Nothing changes for you?” she asked.
He slowly shook his head. “Not for me.”
It was a change, but not as grand as what she had built it up to be. At least in his own mind. Each province had been responsible for years now, this was just a case of combining Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick into one central Parliament. And the new title. Dominion. There had been such debates over what title he was to claim - Kingdom (too equal with Britain and too likely to antagonise America) or Confederation (which was better than regular federation for reasons that curiously sounded like the influence of America and his messy system) but in the end Dominion had been chosen. A grand title that reminded Matthew of a fairy tale kingdom that never truly existed. One of Evelyn’s old bedtime stories.
“I want you home every winter for Christmas and the New Year,” she pushed. Her cheeks were becoming as red as her nose, muscles in her neck very tight.
“Promise.”
She smiled wider, but it fell almost instantaneously. “And you’ll write to me? About everything, not just politics.”
“Even what I had for breakfast.”
Evelyn nodded. “That is all I want.”
She kissed him softly and quickly, another blessing to his temple. “Oh darling. My wonderful, dutiful, kind gentle boy. Well done.”
It was not a clean cut. It was not an end. Hypothetically, she could still veto some laws; she could still muster him for war if needed; her Queen was still his Queen.
And yet.
“Are you… are you proud?” he asked, hating how weak he sounded.
His mother’s eyes widened, taken aback. “You need ask?”
It was Canada’s turn to tighten his hold on England’s fingers, looking at her with a desperate confusion and uncertainty. They stared at each other for a long while, Evelyn despairing that it needed to be spelled out to be understood.
“Of course I am. My pride and joy and my dearest heart. Hmm? Don’t forget that. Please.”
Matthew sighed. “Thank you.”
She kissed him again, the mood thoroughly ruined. How had her two eldest boys not understood how she felt about them? What was she doing wrong?
The answer came very slowly, an answer she had known for a very long time, and was awfully inconvenient to come to in the centre of a crowded room. She had never voiced it to Matthew, afraid of what he actually thought of her.
“This is… impossible. Isn’t it?” she asked. “The two will never fit.”
“T…Two?” he said, eyebrows drawn into a frown.
“Nevermind. Just get that bloody railway built, won’t you? All that fuss over a train track, my goodness.”
That was a rather glib way of looking at it, but yes, Matthew mused, a cross continental railway through the provinces (and who was to pay for it) had been a topic of much debate these past months.
Before he could reply, there was a crashing sound, someone knocking over a priceless ornament, or something similar. The two jerked around, England’s long skirt swinging, to see Jack frozen over a shattered golden vase. Maia, standing adjacent, was slack jawed. She caught her mother’s eye, then yelped across the crowded and fanciful hall.
“Ma, Jack’s made a mess!”
Evelyn gasped, pushing past many bearded and moustachioed minister, British and Canadian alike, leaving Matthew behind, blinking at how quickly her attention had been redirected.
Jack was taller than her now, as all her boys seemed to be, and like the other two was awkward and gangly, although his clumsiness was far more pronounced. He instantly began to collect the shards when England got close.
“I can pay,” he stammered. “I’m sorry. Sorry, it was an accident and - ow!”
He hissed, a short splatter of blood joining the shards. Jack dropped the pieces to the ground
“Don't be stupid. It's just a vase. Austrian. I think. Maia, go find someone to tidy up, and let me clean your hand sweetheart. You would be surprised where you can pick up an infection from.”
Shaking a little, shying away from the judgemental and tutting sight of the elderly men, Jack allowed Evelyn to remove him from the hall. Matthew remained, just a little awkward, until another one of the Princesses sought to rescue him. Louise, he recognised. Definitely the prettiest of the Queen's daughters.
Jack was quiet as they left, until he wasn't.
“How can you stand them?”
“Who?” Evelyn teased, turning the copper tap on in the kitchen. Clean water burst forth, and she pushed his hand underneath, letting the water run red. Her fingertips remained soiled, but almost absent-mindedly she wiped them on her red dress, as if she were wearing an apron and not a priceless ball-gown. Staff bustled around them, used to their mistress and her bustling children paying little mind to social norms.
Jack swallowed a sneer. “Those old…”
“Fat shits?”
A ghost of a smile went over his lips. “Your words”
“Oh, I know you. You would use something far cruder.”
Jack laughed, but it did not last long.
Her fingers ran through his dark hair, tufts of brunette which singled him out against his blond brother and mother. Not as dark as his sister, whose hair was the colour of corvid feathers, but a warm colour which matched his sun-kissed skin and freckles. Evelyn used to have freckles, but she had barely spent a day in the sun for years, and most had faded away. Kisses from fairies would give you them, supposedly.
It showed then, how long it had been since England had been kissed.
“Sweetheart, you are looking awfully morbid. It does not suit you.”
“The last convict ship leaves soon, right?”
“Right,” she confirmed, a single eyebrow raised in question. “It’s such a good thing, is it not? No more shame. Your people will matter just as much as Matthew’s.”
Not hers, Jack noted. Her people still mattered more. And his did not matter as much as Matthew's. It wasn’t just Britain’s convicts that were sent his way, Canadian ones were his too. Those rebellions from the 30s which were neatly tied up in a bow in a box buried in the back garden never to be discussed again.
“Do you know who’s on the Hougoumont? Like where they come from?”
Sometimes Evelyn’s face would do a funny thing. The colour, what little there was, would leach out, leaving behind a grey sort of sick pallor. The warm green eyes, that green and pleasant land, would freeze, reminding people more of dying fenlands than pastoral hills. She knew the angle Jack was getting at, and clammed up as a result.
“Mary,” England yelled over her shoulder. “Is there boiled water anywhere?”
An old woman pulled her head out of the oven from where she was inspecting some form of tart. “It will be cooling now, my lady, but there’s some water left in the kettle.”
“Perfect.” England turned away to rummage through the cupboard. Opening the lid of the copper kettle, Evelyn threw salt and another white powder inside, the sizzle making Jack warily watch his mother. Turning off the tap, she poured the mixture onto Jack’s cut. He hissed, swearing.
“Please watch your mouth.”
Jack ignored her. “It won’t get infected, so why”-
“Better safe than sorry,” England uttered, tossing the kettle uncaringly into the sink for someone else to clean. Taking a fresh rag, she dried his hands, then her own. Already the cut had stopped bleeding, needing no bandage. “Come on. Let’s go for a walk, get some fresh air.”
“Ma…”
She took his arm. “A turn about the garden. Please.”
Never could a dispute take place in public. Never could arguments be had, or emotions run high. It was very difficult for the representation of the Australian colonies, who only knew how to wear his heart on his sleeve. Sarcasm was about the worst lie he could put forth.
Do not let your feelings (very natural and usual ones), Ma had once said, sounding almost as if quoting someone, and not entirely sure she believed it herself, of momentary irritation and discomfort be seen by others. Don't, as you so often do, let every little feeling be read in your face and seen in your manner.
Jack had argued bottling things up did not seem very healthy. She saw emotions as something inherently private, something to be guarded and only shown for those who she trusted. Only family got to see her emotions at their most uncontrolled. Jack thought such a thing very sad.
“Why does it matter who’s on that ship?” she asked as they walked along. “They’re the last of them. What matters is you’re able to look forward now. Be a second chance for honest people like your brother and sister.”
“Are they Aunt Erin’s people?” he pushed, feeling an inevitable irritation at the dismissal of his people, honest or otherwise.
“Why does that matter?” She scoffed. “It’s the same group that terrorised your brother, yes. The same group who are constantly threatening Manchester and London and Liverpool; places my sister has her people call home and meld with mine. It’s all such a mess sweetheart. I know what is happening is not ideal but…”
Not ideal seemed an understatement.
“Alfred said that”-
“What did Alfred say?” Evelyn asked, abruptly regretting ever asking for correspondence between her eldest and youngest boys.
If it were Canada she had questioned, the shy boy would have trailed off, unwilling to upset his mother for the sake of making a point. Australia had no such compunction, so doggedly made his point.
“That it's important to have empathy for all involved.”
“Alfred said that did he? He does not practise what he preaches. I do not understand why you care about her people…”
She paused, stopping in the middle of the path.
“Jack,” she called, staring at the ground. “Jack, you do love me more than her, don’t you?”
In the dark, in the moonlight and glowing light coming from the manor, Jack distinctly paled.
“That - It - You cannot compare a love for a mother to an aunt!” he laughed, a decidedly fake sounding one.
Something in Evelyn's chest splintered. A familiar scenario, a familiar feeling. Desperation, that dreaded and madness inducing emotion, took hold.
“No, you cannot. Because her love for you does not compare to mine.”
England tugged at Australia's jacket collars, neatening out an issue which did not exist. She was frowning directly into his sternum, as if burning a hole right through his heart. “She tossed you away at the first opportunity. Said she refused to be anything to you. I was sick and grieving for a lost child and you gave me a reason to get out of bed and see the sun. I adore you, how can I not? Despite everything that those fucks in there claim is to your detriment, I care not one whit. Erin would… Erin will abandon you the moment you do not show her an appropriate amount of pity. Her love is conditional. Mine is not.”
“You don't mean that.”
Her grip became white knuckled, her words a deranged hiss, earnest and entreating and frightening as she argued, “She said, she literally said she did not want to be your mother, that she did not want you, that you were a replacement and somewhere to dump the undesirables! Called the fact that I loved Alfred and Matthew madness and yet gave you to me regardless! Do not feel sympathy for her Jack, she does not deserve it.”
“Why are you telling me this?” he asked, voice rough and sounding like he was very close to tears. “You’re being unfair.”
Horrified at his reaction, angry at her sister’s influence despite her lack of presence, England slowly loosened her hold on her youngest boy's coat. She was desperate for him to understand, realising her behaviour was off putting and yet unable to stop herself.
“Because I cannot bear the thought of you feeling torn in two when you need not be. You must understand. You're my beautiful sweetheart. Mine. And Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, all of it, is yours. Your people are ours. It is inevitable that these three facts pull in different directions sometimes. I… I want to believe it is manageable, however. That we can be happy. And you'll be given as grand a day as Matthew has had, to be the centre of attention and praised and adored. In time. He was patient, so must you be. I know it's slow, sweetheart. I know you're impatient and feel ready. But you know, to be a parent is to say and do things that a child might not understand, might resent, but I swear it is for the best. It may take a while for you to understand, but one day you will, and you will thank me for it.”
Jack was quiet, watching his mother’s outburst with furrowed brows.
“Do not look at me like that,” she said.
“...Like what?” he whispered.
“Like I am mad or -” Her hands dropped down, and she stepped back with a flinch, as if coming back to herself, only for a moment, then she appeared miserable again. “You can go back with the ship if you like. In November.”
Jack’s frown only deepened. “Ma, don’t be like this.”
“Like what? You are unhappy here, you always have been, every time you visit, you do not like it amongst the snobbery of my upper class, you feel picked on and excluded, you did not like school, which I have been very understanding about. So. What is to be done about it?”
“Do you want me to go?” he asked, eyes shining.
The muscles in Evelyn’s neck bulged as she swallowed. “I want you to be happy. With me.”
“I am. It’s just they”- he gestured back at the house, the people standing at the top of the stairs not so discreetly watching them - “don’t make it easy. And then you say things which are so… so awful, like you want people to be miserable.”
“I do not!” She held her hands to her throat, wrapping around the pearls and tightening them and tugging until they pressed into her neck, creating imprints and nearly obstructing her breathing. “I will take it back then, if it will make you stay and be happy. I cannot be sorry that the last group of convicts are Fenians, but I don’t know what would be preferable to you. The entire situation is shit, you know that. Just as I know you will make something good out of it all, regardless of the convicts and their crimes.” Reluctantly, with a tight voice, Evelyn added, “And your aunt does love you, she does. I love you more. I ask the same of you, that’s all.”
Jack said nothing, and Evelyn, for the first time that he could remember, lost her temper at him.
“Stop looking at me like that!” she shrieked. What little colour she had passed away, the red marks on her neck growing starker.
Jack flinched, and immediately her demeanour shifted, apologetic without once saying the words ‘I am sorry’.
“Wait, wait, oh sweetheart, come here. I'm alright, you just made me panic. If you want to stay then stay, and I will do what I can for you. Come here.”
Her arms wrapped around his shoulders, and slowly he hugged her back, completely caught off guard by her erratic and dreadful hypocritical behaviour. Matthew's big day was affecting her more than she maybe realised, but that wasn’t that only issue.
“I didn’t mean to upset you,” he half apologised. She accepted it with a coo, rubbing his back in an attempt to be reassuring.
“I get a bit high strung, that is all. I know you would never hurt me. Shall we go back?”
Nothing felt resolved, but Jack accepted that maybe tonight was not going to be the best timing for such heavy conversations. He couldn't ruin the evening for Matthew. He had smiled more brightly in one day than what had felt like months, years even.
A ghost of a smile appeared in England's lips as Australia guided her back to the stone buildings. All manner of outbursts seemed set aside for the moment.
“If I could have it my way, you know, we would all be human. I would be a widowed English country woman with my three boys and one girl and we would be safe and happy and left alone. One of you would inherit the estate, one of you would join the navy, and one of you would join the church or go to university and become a barrister.”
There was no need to explain which boy would have taken on what role. England actually giggled at the fantasy.
“I’d keep Maia with me for as long as I was able, until she likely eloped with some handsome army officer or similar, someone below her station. That would be the worst of our problems.”
“I’d drag her back,” Jack laughed at the thought of Maia running off with any man, let alone someone from the army. “No man would be good enough.”
“Ha! I’m sure.”
“What happened then? To our imaginary father?”
“Hmm,” she pondered the thought. “Funny. I can’t picture one.”
“We didn’t need one.”
They walked back up the steps and inside, Jack not so subtly passing his mother off to Maia, who smiled brightly, utterly ignorant if anything that had transpired. He walked over to Matthew, whose frown lines seemed to be growing permanently etched between his brows.
“She’s quite mad you know,” Jack muttered. Matthew, still slightly taller than his younger brother, did not look surprised, only saddened and unusually angry. Defensive.
“And?” he pushed.
“She tried to strangle herself,” Jack complained, and Matthew did note the marks on her neck from where she had pulled at her jewellery. “Then she talks about wanting to be human… I can't keep up with her. If she isn't stuck in bed relapsing she's all manic and excitable.”
“I swear to God if you try and call up any ‘doctor’ -”
“No!” Jack cried, offended that Matthew thought he would do such a thing. “Besides, they would never listen to me; I’m too young and foreign to them.”
Matthew only grew more consternated. “You want her to be locked away?
“No! For God… Come on Mattie. Look. She’s lonely, right? And bored. Anyone would go mad being watched the way she is. Even just now I could feel eyes on us when we walked around the garden. I hate it. I want our mother back, stable.”
“Well… suggestions are welcome.”
Jack looked down at the cut on his hand, cleaned and disinfected. “She knows a heck of a lot about sanitation and stuff like that, doesn’t she?”
“Well, she talks to the Nightingale lady a lot I think, and um… some sisters called Garrett. Doctors when they write back - Budd and Snow when he was still alive and… Oh. I get it.”
Jack smiled. “I bet she wants to do it - nursing - and she listens to your advice more than mine, Mister Dominion.”
Matthew looked over at Jack, not entirely convinced, then over to his mother, who was politely engaged in conversation with some elderly woman, holding her hand gently and bent over, remaining on the lady’s eye level. Charming, when she wanted to be.
“...I’ll try.”
*****
Sedan, France
“I have someone for you to meet, Ludwig.” Gilbert slapped a hand on Ludwig’s shoulder, dragging the man down a little. Both in uniform, they were walking along the road leading to one of the field hospitals. Neutral nations had sent over doctors and nurses of their own, helping the wounded and dying, French or German alike.
“Who?”
“Ah. Don’t get too excited. Or, maybe. Well. It’s not France. From what I hear he is in Paris. No, I am actually fulfilling a favour right now. England asked to be the first foreign nation to meet you, amongst other things. That hasn’t happened, obviously, thanks to Austria, but… well. Don’t tell her that.”
Ludwig stopped, boots quieting on the gravel path. Up ahead was a generally chaotic series of tents built up around two central stone buildings. Men, mostly, in white coats or white armbands marking them as medical personnel, seeing to soldiers in grey and blue. Women, their hair pinned up and back behind white veils, with dresses that exposed their lace up boots and white aprons, moved where required. A few, Ludwig noted, were stained red.
“England wanted to meet me first? She is here? Is this appropriate?”
Gilbert scoffed, waving on the new nation - fully an adult and yet so ignorant of how much of the way their lives worked. The two walked over
“Don’t worry yourself. England has seen much worse than a tired soldier. I tell you, you should have seen her when she was allowed to fight. Scrappy. Now… I don’t know what you’ll make of her. She has a bit of a stick up her arse, maybe you two will have that in common. Sit around and be all proper once the war is at its end. She speaks fluent German and French, so don’t worry about your English.”
“Brother,” Ludwig sighed, then jogged a little to catch up. When the two entered the main courtyard, it was chaotic, as expected, with groaning injured men bandaged and sleeping or, in worst cases, dying.
A few doctors flitted around, a few nurses following them as they went.
“Hmm. There,” Gilbert said, pointing to one lady in particular.
The woman threw a pail of water on a table, spilling watery blood down onto the drain below. Her sleeves were rolled up, showing off incredibly thin wrists. No jewellery, though her right ring finger had a distinct pale mark, a circle where she would have normally worn a ring. Without looking back, she knew it was a nation watching her, and immediately launched into a complaint.
“Mr Beilschmidt, it’s rude to stare. You cannot be here, unless you’ve lost a hand, which I would not put past you,” the woman sighed, turning around. As Gilbert said, her German was faultless. It was Low German, which no doubt pleased Prussia. She rested a watery hand on her waist, and Ludwig’s eyes widened. She was tiny. His hands, much larger than hers, looked as though they could quite easily wrap either side around her waist, touching the tips of his fingers over her back. To pick her up and move her out of the way would have been no challenge whatsoever.
…This was England?
Gilbert did not seem ruffled by the chiding, only doing his odd little guffaw and stepping closer through the bloody water. The woman made a face, unnerved that he would just so blithely ignore such a dirty environment.
“Never mind that Sister Kirkland.” The woman’s drooped face became even more disgusted at Gilbert making fun of a ward sister’s title. “I wanted you to meet someone.”
Her green eyes went behind Gilbert’s head, catching the gaze of Ludwig. Her disdainful expression fell away, seemingly making her look much younger (and prettier, if Ludwig were honest with himself).
“Now?” she asked. “Gilbert I am covered in blood.”
“Ah, good, so is he!” Prussia reached behind himself, grabbing Germany and yanking him forward. “Ludwig, this is Evelyn Kirkland, our little island nation of shopkeepers.”
“Please don’t quote Napoleon at me,” England - Evelyn - complained.
“Which one?” Gilbert laughed, slapping Ludwig’s back. Ludwig grunted, but did not laugh the way his brother had. “Well then. There you have it, you got what you wanted. Off we go.”
“Uh, wait.” England coughed, shooing Gilbert to the side. She had to look up quite a bit to meet Ludwig’s eyes. He had not looked away from her since she had turned around. “I wished to speak to you one to one, if you would allow it. I understand war is not the place to make acquaintances, but perhaps we can take a moment.”
Very forward. Rather shameless.
She stared, awaiting a response. Twitching, she looked at Gilbert, then snapped in English, “What? Gilbert, does he not speak without your permission? Go away!”
“Oh!” He laughed, uncaring as always. “I see. Very well. Unchaperoned it is. Feel free to jump straight to first name basis, what use is surnames here? We all know each other well. Farewell. I’ll find you when we have to move out.”
“Hmph, goodbye Gilbert,” Evelyn pushed.
Ludwig watched his brother leave, noting once that he slipped on what appeared to be a puddle of gore on the floor. He bit his tongue, turning around and being relieved that England had missed it, returning to her task of wiping down and scrubbing the table.
“I would have offered my hand to kiss as a greeting but you will forgive me for skipping the formalities on this occasion. You really cannot stay in this building if you are not sick,” she clarified. “I will not be of much use to you in the next few days. Honestly, Prussia’s timing is impeccable.”
“He said you wanted to be the first nation to meet me, outside of the states.”
She paused, only for a moment, enjoying the sound of his voice, now that he chose to speak. “I’m surprised he remembered such a thing. I last asked it of him nineteen years ago.”
“Why?”
She poured another bucket of water around, this one cleaning any soapy suds away. She passed the bucket to Ludwig seemingly without thought. He looked down, confused as to what to do with it, before setting it next to another empty can. When he straightened up, she was on her hands and knees near his feet, scrubbing and pushing the water into the floor drains. Her hands were bare, rubbed raw and red and cracked, but she did not seem too bothered.
“Why did I ask to be the first to meet you? Everyone in Europe is so old, all of us. So many grudges and betrayals and resentment. New nations do not appear often, even rarer is one as powerful as a unified German state. The fact that you are an adult grown is proof of this. We’re all attracted to power, it is our nature, therefore you’ll have to forgive me, if I wanted to be the first to meet you.” She looked up, blowing air out her mouth at such an angle that her white veil fluttered, her dress spread around her as if she were wearing the grandest of gowns. “Perhaps I overestimated my importance. I figured you would want to meet me too as soon as the opportunity arose.”
Ludwig continued to stare, fascinated.
“I did,” he replied, surprising himself that his response was phrased almost like a question, shocked at himself for admitting such a thing so openly.
Evelyn looked immensely pleased at his confirmation however, and that settled his confusion somewhat. She liked honesty and plain spoken conversations. He inspected her once again, noting how very fragile she looked, and yet quite content doing physical labour.
“It must have been difficult for you,” she spoke once more, “being born into war. Gilbert said he wanted to be a brother, to be a mentor. I am glad you were not completely alone and thrown into the deep end. Perhaps it would have been better though, to not be born from conflict. It can have odd effects down the line.”
It was true that the past couple of years Gilbert had spent mostly trying educate him on what exactly Ludwig was, and doing so in relative isolation at the same time. England, he had heard, had a habit similar in intent to Gilbert's fraternity, of picking up settler colonies and raising them akin to a human mother. She was the only one of those initial waves of Empire - Spain, Portugal, France, Britain - who maintained such a relationship with any of her colonies. A pretence, he had thought it initially. Gilbert had claimed as much, calling it more than a little odd, but Ludwig saw some merit in the action. Being an adult and having to go through the realisation that you were an immortal spirit where there was no written rule book on how or why you existed was hard enough; enduring the same thing as a child, as a colony, with no support surely must be hell.
England sighed, moving back onto her calves, catching her breath for a moment. Evelyn knew how it looked. A soldier in a war hospital, gun still strapped to his back, standing over a nurse as she knelt amongst bloodied floors. The white veil and dress weren’t exactly helping matters.
How romantic, she scoffed. Gilbert truly had ruined it by introducing them now. Nothing for it, she supposed, Ludwig may as well have understood what he was dealing with sooner or later.
“You do not speak much,” she declared. “I am not putting you off, I hope, on the floor like this. I suppose, the longer you exist on this planet, the more rules of proprietary become rather silly and obstructive, though they do have their uses every now and then for putting people in their place. Mine, I may add, is not necessarily scrubbing the floors.”
“Then why are you?”
She sighed, returning to her task. “Men fight. My brothers love to do it, so do I, I admit, when given the chance, but, in recent years… well. We do what we can in the spaces we are given. Nursing seems to be a good compromise. Beat my aggression out into cleaning and helping doctors saw off limbs. Who knew?”
Glib. Sarcastic. Liked the sound of her own voice. Smart. Opinionated. Self-depreciative and melancholic.
“...I do not know what to say.”
She smiled, but it wasn’t a particularly pleasant smile. Rather broken looking in fact. She stood up with a little groan, swiping at the mess on her dress.
“Treat me as a friend. I think we could be good ones, if allowed. Would you like that?”
Ludwig did not smile back, but got a pensive expression on his strong features. He was quite handsome, England mused, more so than Hanover or Prussia certainly, though she was a little disappointed at his colouring, if she were honest with herself. Darker hair was always lovelier to her, and golden hair and blue eyes reminded her too much of her eldest boys. The thought made her stomach churn slightly.
“Gilbert said you wanting to meet me was one of several favours; what were the others?”
“Oh! He mentioned that did he? Hmm. Actually, I must yell at him. He is not doing a good job of the second.” She moved to a table, collecting a cloth and washing her hands once more. Her skin was cracking, in desperate need of a rest and some oil, and yet she did not flinch plunging them into hot water.
England waved Ludwig over, yelling in English to a doctor that she was going to grab supplies in the neighbouring tents. The pair of nations walked out the building, it taking nearly two steps of hers to keep up with one stride of his.
“I asked him to be kind to Vicky. Those Hohenzollerns… Oh Ludwig, I do apologise, but I find them rather autocratic. Even Augusta is said to be horrid to her, and they’re both liberal! And these hospitals are not a ‘theatre of charity’. Tell your King that. Vicky is doing the right thing.”#
He kept his mouth shut. Nevermind that his soon to be Crown Prince was accused of weakness, of being too influenced by a liberal English wife, of a land of people who’s monarchs willingly gave up any power for the sake of peace. A land of compromises, bargaining even. Something Evelyn had seemingly passed on to those settler colonies of hers.
Shopkeepers, Gilbert had called her. Unambitious and yet inheriting the world. Barely ten minutes in each other’s presence, and she was chiding him. Out of love for her Princess, Ludwig recognised this, but it still made him a little agitated, and yet also impressed. She had her convictions, just as he was discovering that he had his own.
She was a lovely little thing, but already he could see why she rarely had much to do with European politics anymore. She had no skill for it.
“Gilbert is always polite to her.”
“And you?”
Ludwig burned red. “Of course.”
Maybe politics would simply have to remain off the table for conversational topics. That was fine.
Evelyn narrowed her eyes, just a little, then said no more of the topic. “I will leave you now. I must get back to work. Men continue to trickle in. Poor boys.”
“You do not enjoy war?”
“Oh, there’s a question.”
Indeed. And she gave no answer. She twirled directly in front of Germany, inspecting him very closely. Looking for something.
“I won't pretend we do not have our differences. But I would like to get to know you beyond any politics. What operas and ballets do you love? Do you hunt? I like my garden, do you spend much time outdoors? Do you understand what I mean?”
There was an open invitation there. To her Royal Opera House, to go game shooting, to go on walks in her large open gardens and rolling green hills. She was openly asking to be courted.
Ludwig stared, shocked at the forwardness of such a request.
“You wish me to call on you?”
Her cheeks, high and defined, turned a rather charming shade of pink. “I think we have both been isolated these past years. Perhaps we can be of help to each other. I admit I was selfish, in asking to see you before any other. You will be a popular man in the coming years. I wished to be a priority.”
Germany laughed, finally, flattered in a manner he never had quite been before.
“That will upset France and Russia.”
“Francis will understand, we are playing a long game with each other. And Ivan and I have never enjoyed each other’s company. Anything that spites him delights me.” Her look became earnest. “The same will apply to yourself. Is a friendship with me worth upsetting France and Russia?”
France, yes. Russia, maybe. Worth trying, if nothing else.
“I will write to you, then, and see if something can be arranged.”
England's odd smile grew, the pink in her face spreading to her ears. She did something she had not done for another nation in many years, and deeply curtsied.
“Good afternoon Ludwig.”
She left, leaving his somewhat awed farewell lost to the winds.
Gilbert seemingly appeared from nowhere, clapping his little brother on the shoulder.
“Told you, you two would find each other interesting.”
“She is… not what I expected.”
“Ah, none of Europe's powers will be, I can guarantee that. But tell me little brother, have you done something that will piss off the French?”
“Even if I have, what can they do about it now?”
Ludwig watched the woman enter a tent, the shadow of her slight figure visible in the afternoon sun, unsure of why he had agreed to pursue any kind of non-formal relationship with her. She had not truly put that much pressure on him. An open invitation was one easily ignored, but for all her talking, each question she had answered seemed to spring open five more.
“That's the way to think about it,” Gilbert praised. “Now come on, we have a capital to put under siege.”
*****
History Notes:
- In 1867 the provinces and colonies of Canada (split into Ontario and Quebec); New Brunswick and Nova Scotia combined to have one parliament. The other provinces joined later. Confederation was less of a change in the colonies relationship with the UK, but did create a more centrally governed nation. The British public was quite in favour of union, a marked change from 100 years prior.
- Australia’s time as a dumping ground for convicts was coming to an end. The last ship left Britain in 1867, filled with mostly Fenians, a group of Irish Nationalists on both sides of the Atlantic which had been putting pressure within Canada, America, Ireland and Britain. They would lose a lot of English sympathy when, in late 1867, during a botched jailbreak, an explosion killed 12 and injured 100 in the neighbouring residential street.
- After a messy time in the Crimea, Florence Nightingale created nursing schools, professionalised the career, and made strides towards cleanliness and sanitation. She was also a statistician and had a contentious relationship with Jamaican nurse Mary Seacole.
- Elizabeth Garrett Anderson was the first was the first woman to qualify in Britain as a physician and surgeon, the co-founder of the first hospital staffed by women, the first dean of a British medical school, and the first female mayor in Britain. Her sister, Millicent Garrett Fawcett, led Britain's largest women's suffrage movement, the NUWSS, and is the first and only woman to have a statue in Parliament Square.
- John Snow and William Budd did a lot of work in figuring out how infections can spread, particularly cholera and typhoid, through infected water.
- German Unification began its final stages in 1866 and was complete by 1871. The Franco-Prussian War came about following a Spanish Succession crisis, when it came down to a Bourbon or potentially a Hohenzollern taking the throne. France freaked out at the idea of being surrounded by Germans. Thus a very short war ensued, where France got their butt utterly whipped, they lost their emperor, finally settled on being a republic once and for all, and confirmed Germany’s right to exist. The declaration of a German Empire took place at the Palace of Versailles - France wasn’t going to let go of the humiliation anytime soon. Even then, however, murky stories about Prussian - now German - war crimes made people antsy about a state which had built so much of its reputation off war.
- The British public donated a lot of money to the Red Cross and other organisations for field hospitals on both sides. Dozens of doctors and nurses went over to help. They were based for a time at Sedan in France, the battle there resulted in the capture of Emperor Napoleon III and over a hundred thousand French troops.
- Apparently, Hanoverian German is easier to understand. I thought it made sense for England to speak Low German as it’s closely related to Frisian and English, as opposed to the standardised High German found today.
Link to Chapter Ten.
Also available on Ao3 or Tumblr.
Chapter Nine: 1867-1870, or Canadian Confederation and the Franco-Prussian War
Windsor, England
“I still believe Newfoundland will be yours. They will see it one day.”
“Ah,” Canada replied, resisting the urge to scuff his polished shoes. He had not been dressed in such fancy clothes for a long time. A black overcoat, embroidered with golden thread. Court dress, England had explained during the fittings. Another quiet gift made without much fanfare.
Maman was all dressed up too, in a way he rarely saw her. Pearls and diamonds on a tiara and necklace along with the set of opals that Jack had given her as a Christmas gift a few years ago that she’d had set into rings and bracelets and brooches. She sparkled in the brightly lit room, but her smile was tainted with melancholia.
Jack and Maia squeezed past, laughing and chasing each other. The two were well into adolescence now - Maia in particular had almost grown at the rate of a human.
“Mattie, Mattie,” Zee gasped as Jack got his hands around her, pinching her nose, she shook him off with an elbow to the gut. He wheezed, laughing all the same.
“Children, please try to calm down a little,” Evelyn chided weakly. It had been over half a century, Jack would calm down when he exhausted himself. That took some doing.
Maia put her hands against Matthew’s cheeks, squeezing so tightly his lips puckered.
“You are the most handsome man here tonight,” Zee declared in no uncertain terms.
Despite her grip, Matthew’s smile was visible. Matthew felt handsome. Evelyn’s expression melted, then as she caught Jack out in her side view, she sighed. He was pouting, being denied attention. Evelyn ran her fingers through his hair, but he twitched away.
“All of you do. Now you two will you please -”
Jack shoved Maia, ripping her away from Matthew. She stumbled over her skirt, which unlike her mother was still short enough for her ankles to be exposed. She zipped off again, neat and tidily running and skipping through the room, unnoticed and unremarkable.
There were several other adolescents and children, some visibly much younger than herself, and yet they all were placed in a corner, keeping quietly to themselves. Beatrice and Leopold, the youngest of the Queen’s children and yet seemingly at ages with Jack and Maia, watched the two siblings wrestle, ignorant and uncaring of decorum. The little ten year old princess, the shyest of the Queen’s children, clung to her fourteen year old brother, looking very much like she wished someone would play with her like that; Leopold himself was bookish and introverted, so very the opposite of England’s youngest two. Victoria was not present, doing as she had done since Albert had died and leaving all and every public appearance of the Crown to the Prince of Wales and his Danish wife.
At this gathering of MPs and Lords and Royals, most did not quite know who the two raucous children belonged to, Jack in particular received dirty looks every now and then, which only served to cause Evelyn to give even more poisonous glares of warning behind their backs.
Canada drew his mother’s attention back - to where it should have been, he bitterly mused - by returning to the original point of conversation.
“Yes. It’s odd to have parts of yourself floating unconnected,” Matthew said.
“You are connected through me,” England replied, eyes returning to Canada a moment after she spoke. “And I hope you remain so for some time.” She took his hands, squeezing tight. “My boy. My Dominion.”
Matthew smiled once more, bashful, and Evelyn returned it, though her eyebrows were drawn up into a frown. Her nose turned red.
“Nothing changes for you?” she asked.
He slowly shook his head. “Not for me.”
It was a change, but not as grand as what she had built it up to be. At least in his own mind. Each province had been responsible for years now, this was just a case of combining Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick into one central Parliament. And the new title. Dominion. There had been such debates over what title he was to claim - Kingdom (too equal with Britain and too likely to antagonise America) or Confederation (which was better than regular federation for reasons that curiously sounded like the influence of America and his messy system) but in the end Dominion had been chosen. A grand title that reminded Matthew of a fairy tale kingdom that never truly existed. One of Evelyn’s old bedtime stories.
“I want you home every winter for Christmas and the New Year,” she pushed. Her cheeks were becoming as red as her nose, muscles in her neck very tight.
“Promise.”
She smiled wider, but it fell almost instantaneously. “And you’ll write to me? About everything, not just politics.”
“Even what I had for breakfast.”
Evelyn nodded. “That is all I want.”
She kissed him softly and quickly, another blessing to his temple. “Oh darling. My wonderful, dutiful, kind gentle boy. Well done.”
It was not a clean cut. It was not an end. Hypothetically, she could still veto some laws; she could still muster him for war if needed; her Queen was still his Queen.
And yet.
“Are you… are you proud?” he asked, hating how weak he sounded.
His mother’s eyes widened, taken aback. “You need ask?”
It was Canada’s turn to tighten his hold on England’s fingers, looking at her with a desperate confusion and uncertainty. They stared at each other for a long while, Evelyn despairing that it needed to be spelled out to be understood.
“Of course I am. My pride and joy and my dearest heart. Hmm? Don’t forget that. Please.”
Matthew sighed. “Thank you.”
She kissed him again, the mood thoroughly ruined. How had her two eldest boys not understood how she felt about them? What was she doing wrong?
The answer came very slowly, an answer she had known for a very long time, and was awfully inconvenient to come to in the centre of a crowded room. She had never voiced it to Matthew, afraid of what he actually thought of her.
“This is… impossible. Isn’t it?” she asked. “The two will never fit.”
“T…Two?” he said, eyebrows drawn into a frown.
“Nevermind. Just get that bloody railway built, won’t you? All that fuss over a train track, my goodness.”
That was a rather glib way of looking at it, but yes, Matthew mused, a cross continental railway through the provinces (and who was to pay for it) had been a topic of much debate these past months.
Before he could reply, there was a crashing sound, someone knocking over a priceless ornament, or something similar. The two jerked around, England’s long skirt swinging, to see Jack frozen over a shattered golden vase. Maia, standing adjacent, was slack jawed. She caught her mother’s eye, then yelped across the crowded and fanciful hall.
“Ma, Jack’s made a mess!”
Evelyn gasped, pushing past many bearded and moustachioed minister, British and Canadian alike, leaving Matthew behind, blinking at how quickly her attention had been redirected.
Jack was taller than her now, as all her boys seemed to be, and like the other two was awkward and gangly, although his clumsiness was far more pronounced. He instantly began to collect the shards when England got close.
“I can pay,” he stammered. “I’m sorry. Sorry, it was an accident and - ow!”
He hissed, a short splatter of blood joining the shards. Jack dropped the pieces to the ground
“Don't be stupid. It's just a vase. Austrian. I think. Maia, go find someone to tidy up, and let me clean your hand sweetheart. You would be surprised where you can pick up an infection from.”
Shaking a little, shying away from the judgemental and tutting sight of the elderly men, Jack allowed Evelyn to remove him from the hall. Matthew remained, just a little awkward, until another one of the Princesses sought to rescue him. Louise, he recognised. Definitely the prettiest of the Queen's daughters.
Jack was quiet as they left, until he wasn't.
“How can you stand them?”
“Who?” Evelyn teased, turning the copper tap on in the kitchen. Clean water burst forth, and she pushed his hand underneath, letting the water run red. Her fingertips remained soiled, but almost absent-mindedly she wiped them on her red dress, as if she were wearing an apron and not a priceless ball-gown. Staff bustled around them, used to their mistress and her bustling children paying little mind to social norms.
Jack swallowed a sneer. “Those old…”
“Fat shits?”
A ghost of a smile went over his lips. “Your words”
“Oh, I know you. You would use something far cruder.”
Jack laughed, but it did not last long.
Her fingers ran through his dark hair, tufts of brunette which singled him out against his blond brother and mother. Not as dark as his sister, whose hair was the colour of corvid feathers, but a warm colour which matched his sun-kissed skin and freckles. Evelyn used to have freckles, but she had barely spent a day in the sun for years, and most had faded away. Kisses from fairies would give you them, supposedly.
It showed then, how long it had been since England had been kissed.
“Sweetheart, you are looking awfully morbid. It does not suit you.”
“The last convict ship leaves soon, right?”
“Right,” she confirmed, a single eyebrow raised in question. “It’s such a good thing, is it not? No more shame. Your people will matter just as much as Matthew’s.”
Not hers, Jack noted. Her people still mattered more. And his did not matter as much as Matthew's. It wasn’t just Britain’s convicts that were sent his way, Canadian ones were his too. Those rebellions from the 30s which were neatly tied up in a bow in a box buried in the back garden never to be discussed again.
“Do you know who’s on the Hougoumont? Like where they come from?”
Sometimes Evelyn’s face would do a funny thing. The colour, what little there was, would leach out, leaving behind a grey sort of sick pallor. The warm green eyes, that green and pleasant land, would freeze, reminding people more of dying fenlands than pastoral hills. She knew the angle Jack was getting at, and clammed up as a result.
“Mary,” England yelled over her shoulder. “Is there boiled water anywhere?”
An old woman pulled her head out of the oven from where she was inspecting some form of tart. “It will be cooling now, my lady, but there’s some water left in the kettle.”
“Perfect.” England turned away to rummage through the cupboard. Opening the lid of the copper kettle, Evelyn threw salt and another white powder inside, the sizzle making Jack warily watch his mother. Turning off the tap, she poured the mixture onto Jack’s cut. He hissed, swearing.
“Please watch your mouth.”
Jack ignored her. “It won’t get infected, so why”-
“Better safe than sorry,” England uttered, tossing the kettle uncaringly into the sink for someone else to clean. Taking a fresh rag, she dried his hands, then her own. Already the cut had stopped bleeding, needing no bandage. “Come on. Let’s go for a walk, get some fresh air.”
“Ma…”
She took his arm. “A turn about the garden. Please.”
Never could a dispute take place in public. Never could arguments be had, or emotions run high. It was very difficult for the representation of the Australian colonies, who only knew how to wear his heart on his sleeve. Sarcasm was about the worst lie he could put forth.
Do not let your feelings (very natural and usual ones), Ma had once said, sounding almost as if quoting someone, and not entirely sure she believed it herself, of momentary irritation and discomfort be seen by others. Don't, as you so often do, let every little feeling be read in your face and seen in your manner.
Jack had argued bottling things up did not seem very healthy. She saw emotions as something inherently private, something to be guarded and only shown for those who she trusted. Only family got to see her emotions at their most uncontrolled. Jack thought such a thing very sad.
“Why does it matter who’s on that ship?” she asked as they walked along. “They’re the last of them. What matters is you’re able to look forward now. Be a second chance for honest people like your brother and sister.”
“Are they Aunt Erin’s people?” he pushed, feeling an inevitable irritation at the dismissal of his people, honest or otherwise.
“Why does that matter?” She scoffed. “It’s the same group that terrorised your brother, yes. The same group who are constantly threatening Manchester and London and Liverpool; places my sister has her people call home and meld with mine. It’s all such a mess sweetheart. I know what is happening is not ideal but…”
Not ideal seemed an understatement.
“Alfred said that”-
“What did Alfred say?” Evelyn asked, abruptly regretting ever asking for correspondence between her eldest and youngest boys.
If it were Canada she had questioned, the shy boy would have trailed off, unwilling to upset his mother for the sake of making a point. Australia had no such compunction, so doggedly made his point.
“That it's important to have empathy for all involved.”
“Alfred said that did he? He does not practise what he preaches. I do not understand why you care about her people…”
She paused, stopping in the middle of the path.
“Jack,” she called, staring at the ground. “Jack, you do love me more than her, don’t you?”
In the dark, in the moonlight and glowing light coming from the manor, Jack distinctly paled.
“That - It - You cannot compare a love for a mother to an aunt!” he laughed, a decidedly fake sounding one.
Something in Evelyn's chest splintered. A familiar scenario, a familiar feeling. Desperation, that dreaded and madness inducing emotion, took hold.
“No, you cannot. Because her love for you does not compare to mine.”
England tugged at Australia's jacket collars, neatening out an issue which did not exist. She was frowning directly into his sternum, as if burning a hole right through his heart. “She tossed you away at the first opportunity. Said she refused to be anything to you. I was sick and grieving for a lost child and you gave me a reason to get out of bed and see the sun. I adore you, how can I not? Despite everything that those fucks in there claim is to your detriment, I care not one whit. Erin would… Erin will abandon you the moment you do not show her an appropriate amount of pity. Her love is conditional. Mine is not.”
“You don't mean that.”
Her grip became white knuckled, her words a deranged hiss, earnest and entreating and frightening as she argued, “She said, she literally said she did not want to be your mother, that she did not want you, that you were a replacement and somewhere to dump the undesirables! Called the fact that I loved Alfred and Matthew madness and yet gave you to me regardless! Do not feel sympathy for her Jack, she does not deserve it.”
“Why are you telling me this?” he asked, voice rough and sounding like he was very close to tears. “You’re being unfair.”
Horrified at his reaction, angry at her sister’s influence despite her lack of presence, England slowly loosened her hold on her youngest boy's coat. She was desperate for him to understand, realising her behaviour was off putting and yet unable to stop herself.
“Because I cannot bear the thought of you feeling torn in two when you need not be. You must understand. You're my beautiful sweetheart. Mine. And Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, all of it, is yours. Your people are ours. It is inevitable that these three facts pull in different directions sometimes. I… I want to believe it is manageable, however. That we can be happy. And you'll be given as grand a day as Matthew has had, to be the centre of attention and praised and adored. In time. He was patient, so must you be. I know it's slow, sweetheart. I know you're impatient and feel ready. But you know, to be a parent is to say and do things that a child might not understand, might resent, but I swear it is for the best. It may take a while for you to understand, but one day you will, and you will thank me for it.”
Jack was quiet, watching his mother’s outburst with furrowed brows.
“Do not look at me like that,” she said.
“...Like what?” he whispered.
“Like I am mad or -” Her hands dropped down, and she stepped back with a flinch, as if coming back to herself, only for a moment, then she appeared miserable again. “You can go back with the ship if you like. In November.”
Jack’s frown only deepened. “Ma, don’t be like this.”
“Like what? You are unhappy here, you always have been, every time you visit, you do not like it amongst the snobbery of my upper class, you feel picked on and excluded, you did not like school, which I have been very understanding about. So. What is to be done about it?”
“Do you want me to go?” he asked, eyes shining.
The muscles in Evelyn’s neck bulged as she swallowed. “I want you to be happy. With me.”
“I am. It’s just they”- he gestured back at the house, the people standing at the top of the stairs not so discreetly watching them - “don’t make it easy. And then you say things which are so… so awful, like you want people to be miserable.”
“I do not!” She held her hands to her throat, wrapping around the pearls and tightening them and tugging until they pressed into her neck, creating imprints and nearly obstructing her breathing. “I will take it back then, if it will make you stay and be happy. I cannot be sorry that the last group of convicts are Fenians, but I don’t know what would be preferable to you. The entire situation is shit, you know that. Just as I know you will make something good out of it all, regardless of the convicts and their crimes.” Reluctantly, with a tight voice, Evelyn added, “And your aunt does love you, she does. I love you more. I ask the same of you, that’s all.”
Jack said nothing, and Evelyn, for the first time that he could remember, lost her temper at him.
“Stop looking at me like that!” she shrieked. What little colour she had passed away, the red marks on her neck growing starker.
Jack flinched, and immediately her demeanour shifted, apologetic without once saying the words ‘I am sorry’.
“Wait, wait, oh sweetheart, come here. I'm alright, you just made me panic. If you want to stay then stay, and I will do what I can for you. Come here.”
Her arms wrapped around his shoulders, and slowly he hugged her back, completely caught off guard by her erratic and dreadful hypocritical behaviour. Matthew's big day was affecting her more than she maybe realised, but that wasn’t that only issue.
“I didn’t mean to upset you,” he half apologised. She accepted it with a coo, rubbing his back in an attempt to be reassuring.
“I get a bit high strung, that is all. I know you would never hurt me. Shall we go back?”
Nothing felt resolved, but Jack accepted that maybe tonight was not going to be the best timing for such heavy conversations. He couldn't ruin the evening for Matthew. He had smiled more brightly in one day than what had felt like months, years even.
A ghost of a smile appeared in England's lips as Australia guided her back to the stone buildings. All manner of outbursts seemed set aside for the moment.
“If I could have it my way, you know, we would all be human. I would be a widowed English country woman with my three boys and one girl and we would be safe and happy and left alone. One of you would inherit the estate, one of you would join the navy, and one of you would join the church or go to university and become a barrister.”
There was no need to explain which boy would have taken on what role. England actually giggled at the fantasy.
“I’d keep Maia with me for as long as I was able, until she likely eloped with some handsome army officer or similar, someone below her station. That would be the worst of our problems.”
“I’d drag her back,” Jack laughed at the thought of Maia running off with any man, let alone someone from the army. “No man would be good enough.”
“Ha! I’m sure.”
“What happened then? To our imaginary father?”
“Hmm,” she pondered the thought. “Funny. I can’t picture one.”
“We didn’t need one.”
They walked back up the steps and inside, Jack not so subtly passing his mother off to Maia, who smiled brightly, utterly ignorant if anything that had transpired. He walked over to Matthew, whose frown lines seemed to be growing permanently etched between his brows.
“She’s quite mad you know,” Jack muttered. Matthew, still slightly taller than his younger brother, did not look surprised, only saddened and unusually angry. Defensive.
“And?” he pushed.
“She tried to strangle herself,” Jack complained, and Matthew did note the marks on her neck from where she had pulled at her jewellery. “Then she talks about wanting to be human… I can't keep up with her. If she isn't stuck in bed relapsing she's all manic and excitable.”
“I swear to God if you try and call up any ‘doctor’ -”
“No!” Jack cried, offended that Matthew thought he would do such a thing. “Besides, they would never listen to me; I’m too young and foreign to them.”
Matthew only grew more consternated. “You want her to be locked away?
“No! For God… Come on Mattie. Look. She’s lonely, right? And bored. Anyone would go mad being watched the way she is. Even just now I could feel eyes on us when we walked around the garden. I hate it. I want our mother back, stable.”
“Well… suggestions are welcome.”
Jack looked down at the cut on his hand, cleaned and disinfected. “She knows a heck of a lot about sanitation and stuff like that, doesn’t she?”
“Well, she talks to the Nightingale lady a lot I think, and um… some sisters called Garrett. Doctors when they write back - Budd and Snow when he was still alive and… Oh. I get it.”
Jack smiled. “I bet she wants to do it - nursing - and she listens to your advice more than mine, Mister Dominion.”
Matthew looked over at Jack, not entirely convinced, then over to his mother, who was politely engaged in conversation with some elderly woman, holding her hand gently and bent over, remaining on the lady’s eye level. Charming, when she wanted to be.
“...I’ll try.”
*****
Sedan, France
“I have someone for you to meet, Ludwig.” Gilbert slapped a hand on Ludwig’s shoulder, dragging the man down a little. Both in uniform, they were walking along the road leading to one of the field hospitals. Neutral nations had sent over doctors and nurses of their own, helping the wounded and dying, French or German alike.
“Who?”
“Ah. Don’t get too excited. Or, maybe. Well. It’s not France. From what I hear he is in Paris. No, I am actually fulfilling a favour right now. England asked to be the first foreign nation to meet you, amongst other things. That hasn’t happened, obviously, thanks to Austria, but… well. Don’t tell her that.”
Ludwig stopped, boots quieting on the gravel path. Up ahead was a generally chaotic series of tents built up around two central stone buildings. Men, mostly, in white coats or white armbands marking them as medical personnel, seeing to soldiers in grey and blue. Women, their hair pinned up and back behind white veils, with dresses that exposed their lace up boots and white aprons, moved where required. A few, Ludwig noted, were stained red.
“England wanted to meet me first? She is here? Is this appropriate?”
Gilbert scoffed, waving on the new nation - fully an adult and yet so ignorant of how much of the way their lives worked. The two walked over
“Don’t worry yourself. England has seen much worse than a tired soldier. I tell you, you should have seen her when she was allowed to fight. Scrappy. Now… I don’t know what you’ll make of her. She has a bit of a stick up her arse, maybe you two will have that in common. Sit around and be all proper once the war is at its end. She speaks fluent German and French, so don’t worry about your English.”
“Brother,” Ludwig sighed, then jogged a little to catch up. When the two entered the main courtyard, it was chaotic, as expected, with groaning injured men bandaged and sleeping or, in worst cases, dying.
A few doctors flitted around, a few nurses following them as they went.
“Hmm. There,” Gilbert said, pointing to one lady in particular.
The woman threw a pail of water on a table, spilling watery blood down onto the drain below. Her sleeves were rolled up, showing off incredibly thin wrists. No jewellery, though her right ring finger had a distinct pale mark, a circle where she would have normally worn a ring. Without looking back, she knew it was a nation watching her, and immediately launched into a complaint.
“Mr Beilschmidt, it’s rude to stare. You cannot be here, unless you’ve lost a hand, which I would not put past you,” the woman sighed, turning around. As Gilbert said, her German was faultless. It was Low German, which no doubt pleased Prussia. She rested a watery hand on her waist, and Ludwig’s eyes widened. She was tiny. His hands, much larger than hers, looked as though they could quite easily wrap either side around her waist, touching the tips of his fingers over her back. To pick her up and move her out of the way would have been no challenge whatsoever.
…This was England?
Gilbert did not seem ruffled by the chiding, only doing his odd little guffaw and stepping closer through the bloody water. The woman made a face, unnerved that he would just so blithely ignore such a dirty environment.
“Never mind that Sister Kirkland.” The woman’s drooped face became even more disgusted at Gilbert making fun of a ward sister’s title. “I wanted you to meet someone.”
Her green eyes went behind Gilbert’s head, catching the gaze of Ludwig. Her disdainful expression fell away, seemingly making her look much younger (and prettier, if Ludwig were honest with himself).
“Now?” she asked. “Gilbert I am covered in blood.”
“Ah, good, so is he!” Prussia reached behind himself, grabbing Germany and yanking him forward. “Ludwig, this is Evelyn Kirkland, our little island nation of shopkeepers.”
“Please don’t quote Napoleon at me,” England - Evelyn - complained.
“Which one?” Gilbert laughed, slapping Ludwig’s back. Ludwig grunted, but did not laugh the way his brother had. “Well then. There you have it, you got what you wanted. Off we go.”
“Uh, wait.” England coughed, shooing Gilbert to the side. She had to look up quite a bit to meet Ludwig’s eyes. He had not looked away from her since she had turned around. “I wished to speak to you one to one, if you would allow it. I understand war is not the place to make acquaintances, but perhaps we can take a moment.”
Very forward. Rather shameless.
She stared, awaiting a response. Twitching, she looked at Gilbert, then snapped in English, “What? Gilbert, does he not speak without your permission? Go away!”
“Oh!” He laughed, uncaring as always. “I see. Very well. Unchaperoned it is. Feel free to jump straight to first name basis, what use is surnames here? We all know each other well. Farewell. I’ll find you when we have to move out.”
“Hmph, goodbye Gilbert,” Evelyn pushed.
Ludwig watched his brother leave, noting once that he slipped on what appeared to be a puddle of gore on the floor. He bit his tongue, turning around and being relieved that England had missed it, returning to her task of wiping down and scrubbing the table.
“I would have offered my hand to kiss as a greeting but you will forgive me for skipping the formalities on this occasion. You really cannot stay in this building if you are not sick,” she clarified. “I will not be of much use to you in the next few days. Honestly, Prussia’s timing is impeccable.”
“He said you wanted to be the first nation to meet me, outside of the states.”
She paused, only for a moment, enjoying the sound of his voice, now that he chose to speak. “I’m surprised he remembered such a thing. I last asked it of him nineteen years ago.”
“Why?”
She poured another bucket of water around, this one cleaning any soapy suds away. She passed the bucket to Ludwig seemingly without thought. He looked down, confused as to what to do with it, before setting it next to another empty can. When he straightened up, she was on her hands and knees near his feet, scrubbing and pushing the water into the floor drains. Her hands were bare, rubbed raw and red and cracked, but she did not seem too bothered.
“Why did I ask to be the first to meet you? Everyone in Europe is so old, all of us. So many grudges and betrayals and resentment. New nations do not appear often, even rarer is one as powerful as a unified German state. The fact that you are an adult grown is proof of this. We’re all attracted to power, it is our nature, therefore you’ll have to forgive me, if I wanted to be the first to meet you.” She looked up, blowing air out her mouth at such an angle that her white veil fluttered, her dress spread around her as if she were wearing the grandest of gowns. “Perhaps I overestimated my importance. I figured you would want to meet me too as soon as the opportunity arose.”
Ludwig continued to stare, fascinated.
“I did,” he replied, surprising himself that his response was phrased almost like a question, shocked at himself for admitting such a thing so openly.
Evelyn looked immensely pleased at his confirmation however, and that settled his confusion somewhat. She liked honesty and plain spoken conversations. He inspected her once again, noting how very fragile she looked, and yet quite content doing physical labour.
“It must have been difficult for you,” she spoke once more, “being born into war. Gilbert said he wanted to be a brother, to be a mentor. I am glad you were not completely alone and thrown into the deep end. Perhaps it would have been better though, to not be born from conflict. It can have odd effects down the line.”
It was true that the past couple of years Gilbert had spent mostly trying educate him on what exactly Ludwig was, and doing so in relative isolation at the same time. England, he had heard, had a habit similar in intent to Gilbert's fraternity, of picking up settler colonies and raising them akin to a human mother. She was the only one of those initial waves of Empire - Spain, Portugal, France, Britain - who maintained such a relationship with any of her colonies. A pretence, he had thought it initially. Gilbert had claimed as much, calling it more than a little odd, but Ludwig saw some merit in the action. Being an adult and having to go through the realisation that you were an immortal spirit where there was no written rule book on how or why you existed was hard enough; enduring the same thing as a child, as a colony, with no support surely must be hell.
England sighed, moving back onto her calves, catching her breath for a moment. Evelyn knew how it looked. A soldier in a war hospital, gun still strapped to his back, standing over a nurse as she knelt amongst bloodied floors. The white veil and dress weren’t exactly helping matters.
How romantic, she scoffed. Gilbert truly had ruined it by introducing them now. Nothing for it, she supposed, Ludwig may as well have understood what he was dealing with sooner or later.
“You do not speak much,” she declared. “I am not putting you off, I hope, on the floor like this. I suppose, the longer you exist on this planet, the more rules of proprietary become rather silly and obstructive, though they do have their uses every now and then for putting people in their place. Mine, I may add, is not necessarily scrubbing the floors.”
“Then why are you?”
She sighed, returning to her task. “Men fight. My brothers love to do it, so do I, I admit, when given the chance, but, in recent years… well. We do what we can in the spaces we are given. Nursing seems to be a good compromise. Beat my aggression out into cleaning and helping doctors saw off limbs. Who knew?”
Glib. Sarcastic. Liked the sound of her own voice. Smart. Opinionated. Self-depreciative and melancholic.
“...I do not know what to say.”
She smiled, but it wasn’t a particularly pleasant smile. Rather broken looking in fact. She stood up with a little groan, swiping at the mess on her dress.
“Treat me as a friend. I think we could be good ones, if allowed. Would you like that?”
Ludwig did not smile back, but got a pensive expression on his strong features. He was quite handsome, England mused, more so than Hanover or Prussia certainly, though she was a little disappointed at his colouring, if she were honest with herself. Darker hair was always lovelier to her, and golden hair and blue eyes reminded her too much of her eldest boys. The thought made her stomach churn slightly.
“Gilbert said you wanting to meet me was one of several favours; what were the others?”
“Oh! He mentioned that did he? Hmm. Actually, I must yell at him. He is not doing a good job of the second.” She moved to a table, collecting a cloth and washing her hands once more. Her skin was cracking, in desperate need of a rest and some oil, and yet she did not flinch plunging them into hot water.
England waved Ludwig over, yelling in English to a doctor that she was going to grab supplies in the neighbouring tents. The pair of nations walked out the building, it taking nearly two steps of hers to keep up with one stride of his.
“I asked him to be kind to Vicky. Those Hohenzollerns… Oh Ludwig, I do apologise, but I find them rather autocratic. Even Augusta is said to be horrid to her, and they’re both liberal! And these hospitals are not a ‘theatre of charity’. Tell your King that. Vicky is doing the right thing.”#
He kept his mouth shut. Nevermind that his soon to be Crown Prince was accused of weakness, of being too influenced by a liberal English wife, of a land of people who’s monarchs willingly gave up any power for the sake of peace. A land of compromises, bargaining even. Something Evelyn had seemingly passed on to those settler colonies of hers.
Shopkeepers, Gilbert had called her. Unambitious and yet inheriting the world. Barely ten minutes in each other’s presence, and she was chiding him. Out of love for her Princess, Ludwig recognised this, but it still made him a little agitated, and yet also impressed. She had her convictions, just as he was discovering that he had his own.
She was a lovely little thing, but already he could see why she rarely had much to do with European politics anymore. She had no skill for it.
“Gilbert is always polite to her.”
“And you?”
Ludwig burned red. “Of course.”
Maybe politics would simply have to remain off the table for conversational topics. That was fine.
Evelyn narrowed her eyes, just a little, then said no more of the topic. “I will leave you now. I must get back to work. Men continue to trickle in. Poor boys.”
“You do not enjoy war?”
“Oh, there’s a question.”
Indeed. And she gave no answer. She twirled directly in front of Germany, inspecting him very closely. Looking for something.
“I won't pretend we do not have our differences. But I would like to get to know you beyond any politics. What operas and ballets do you love? Do you hunt? I like my garden, do you spend much time outdoors? Do you understand what I mean?”
There was an open invitation there. To her Royal Opera House, to go game shooting, to go on walks in her large open gardens and rolling green hills. She was openly asking to be courted.
Ludwig stared, shocked at the forwardness of such a request.
“You wish me to call on you?”
Her cheeks, high and defined, turned a rather charming shade of pink. “I think we have both been isolated these past years. Perhaps we can be of help to each other. I admit I was selfish, in asking to see you before any other. You will be a popular man in the coming years. I wished to be a priority.”
Germany laughed, finally, flattered in a manner he never had quite been before.
“That will upset France and Russia.”
“Francis will understand, we are playing a long game with each other. And Ivan and I have never enjoyed each other’s company. Anything that spites him delights me.” Her look became earnest. “The same will apply to yourself. Is a friendship with me worth upsetting France and Russia?”
France, yes. Russia, maybe. Worth trying, if nothing else.
“I will write to you, then, and see if something can be arranged.”
England's odd smile grew, the pink in her face spreading to her ears. She did something she had not done for another nation in many years, and deeply curtsied.
“Good afternoon Ludwig.”
She left, leaving his somewhat awed farewell lost to the winds.
Gilbert seemingly appeared from nowhere, clapping his little brother on the shoulder.
“Told you, you two would find each other interesting.”
“She is… not what I expected.”
“Ah, none of Europe's powers will be, I can guarantee that. But tell me little brother, have you done something that will piss off the French?”
“Even if I have, what can they do about it now?”
Ludwig watched the woman enter a tent, the shadow of her slight figure visible in the afternoon sun, unsure of why he had agreed to pursue any kind of non-formal relationship with her. She had not truly put that much pressure on him. An open invitation was one easily ignored, but for all her talking, each question she had answered seemed to spring open five more.
“That's the way to think about it,” Gilbert praised. “Now come on, we have a capital to put under siege.”
*****
History Notes:
- In 1867 the provinces and colonies of Canada (split into Ontario and Quebec); New Brunswick and Nova Scotia combined to have one parliament. The other provinces joined later. Confederation was less of a change in the colonies relationship with the UK, but did create a more centrally governed nation. The British public was quite in favour of union, a marked change from 100 years prior.
- Australia’s time as a dumping ground for convicts was coming to an end. The last ship left Britain in 1867, filled with mostly Fenians, a group of Irish Nationalists on both sides of the Atlantic which had been putting pressure within Canada, America, Ireland and Britain. They would lose a lot of English sympathy when, in late 1867, during a botched jailbreak, an explosion killed 12 and injured 100 in the neighbouring residential street.
- After a messy time in the Crimea, Florence Nightingale created nursing schools, professionalised the career, and made strides towards cleanliness and sanitation. She was also a statistician and had a contentious relationship with Jamaican nurse Mary Seacole.
- Elizabeth Garrett Anderson was the first was the first woman to qualify in Britain as a physician and surgeon, the co-founder of the first hospital staffed by women, the first dean of a British medical school, and the first female mayor in Britain. Her sister, Millicent Garrett Fawcett, led Britain's largest women's suffrage movement, the NUWSS, and is the first and only woman to have a statue in Parliament Square.
- John Snow and William Budd did a lot of work in figuring out how infections can spread, particularly cholera and typhoid, through infected water.
- German Unification began its final stages in 1866 and was complete by 1871. The Franco-Prussian War came about following a Spanish Succession crisis, when it came down to a Bourbon or potentially a Hohenzollern taking the throne. France freaked out at the idea of being surrounded by Germans. Thus a very short war ensued, where France got their butt utterly whipped, they lost their emperor, finally settled on being a republic once and for all, and confirmed Germany’s right to exist. The declaration of a German Empire took place at the Palace of Versailles - France wasn’t going to let go of the humiliation anytime soon. Even then, however, murky stories about Prussian - now German - war crimes made people antsy about a state which had built so much of its reputation off war.
- The British public donated a lot of money to the Red Cross and other organisations for field hospitals on both sides. Dozens of doctors and nurses went over to help. They were based for a time at Sedan in France, the battle there resulted in the capture of Emperor Napoleon III and over a hundred thousand French troops.
- Apparently, Hanoverian German is easier to understand. I thought it made sense for England to speak Low German as it’s closely related to Frisian and English, as opposed to the standardised High German found today.
Link to Chapter Ten.
