fic: it takes a village (temeraire)
yuletide reveal, part the first!
title: it takes a village
fandom: Temeraire (Naomi Novik)
pairing: Laurence/Tharkay
rating: G
word count: 2871
summary: Rescuing that baby from the burning house was only the beginning of Laurence's troubles. And, of course, Tharkay's.
notes: To the surprise of ABSOLUTELY NOBODY who follows me on twitter, the babyfic was by me. This was an expansion/revision of an idea novembersmith and I once riffed upon here yea these many years ago, and I am unspeakably grateful that she gave me the okay to use it as the springboard for this fic! And also for her beta services. And to mardia, aramley, and t-lyrical for beta-ing and hand-holding, and laura47 for hosting yuletide parties and telling me I should just write the babyfic if I wanted to. Basically I needed a lot of help. Thank you, everybody!
Laurence was not on official patrol when he saw the column of smoke rising toward the sky, but an innate sense of duty (combined with Temeraire's inexhaustible spirit of inquiry) impelled him to investigate. Even so, he was inclined to leave the burning house they discovered, once it became apparent that it would not set the surroundings ablaze, and go to notify the appropriate authorities. Then he heard the faint cry from within.
*
"Laurence," Tharkay asked, with absolutely no inflection, "is that a baby?"
"Its entire family was burnt up in the fire!" Laurence said defensively. "There was no-one for miles, even to ask their name. I certainly couldn't leave it there."
"And so... you decided that you were somehow qualified as the infant's caretaker?"
"Well, better than letting it burn or starve to death," Laurence snapped, meaning to add that he would of course immediately begin a search for a suitable family to take it in. He tightened his grip on the small bundle; the increased pressure woke the baby, and it began to wail.
"Oh, no," Laurence said. He stared down at it blankly. "What do I do?"
"How should I know? I've never had a baby!"
"Oh, now, now, who's a sweet little darling?" Granby cooed, swooping into the room to lift the baby out of Laurence's grasp. It stopped screaming, seemingly more out of confusion than anything else. "Who's a lovely, lovely sweet girl? Whatever is the matter, sweetheart? Are you hungry, hmm?" He bounced the baby up and down a little, and it settled with a final, uncertain hiccup. "Well, let's go get you something to eat, shall we?"
"John," Laurence said.
"Oh, there's no need to worry, Laurence; I had cousins, you know." Granby flashed him a quick smile and carried the baby off, presumably to find Gong Su. Laurence could hear him crooning to it until he turned the corner.
"I hope you're happy," Tharkay said, with all the awful ring of prophecy in his words. "You'll never be rid of that baby now."
*
"Do all human hatchlings look like that?" Temeraire inquired, peering down at Laurence's armful of freshly-washed, -fed and -bundled infant with an alarming degree of curiosity. "It looks the same as Harcourt's. How do you tell them apart?"
"Well, they are more distinctive at close distance," Laurence prevaricated: to his untrained eye, children below the age of ten all looked more-or-less the same as well. His attempt at deflection backfired as Temeraire leaned even closer, until he worried that the baby would wake up to a faceful of gleaming fangs. "Temeraire, pray do not - "
"I think it is very boring-looking," Temeraire snorted. "It cannot even talk or breathe fire, like Iskierka could."
"What? What about me?" Iskierka demanded, waking from her nap on Temeraire's other side. "What is that thing?"
"It is a baby, dearest," Granby said soothingly. He had stayed out of the way while Laurence attempted to explain the situation to Temeraire, but now he came over and took the baby so he could show it to Iskierka. Laurence handed the infant over with poorly disguised relief; so far it had been quiet, but he still had no idea how Granby had calmed it down earlier, or what he would do if it began to scream again. "See? Isn't she lovely?"
"What is it good for?" Iskierka asked.
Tharkay, lurking somewhere behind Laurence, coughed and said lowly, "Very little." Laurence ignored him; Granby did not appear to have heard.
"Well, she is too small to do anything now," he was telling his increasingly skeptical looking dragon. "She needs someone to take care of her, and when she grows up she will be a person, like me and Laurence and Tharkay. Or, well, she is a girl baby, so she will be a woman, like Harcourt or Admiral Roland."
Iskierka seemed to have fixated on only one aspect of his speech. "Who is going to take care of it?" There was an awkward pause, as the baby stirred and Granby had to turn his attention to soothing it before it started to cry. Iskierka watched with narrowed, jealous eyes, and finally exploded, "You are not going to take care of that stupid useless thing that cannot even fly! You are my captain! It can't have you!"
"Oh, no, I mean, Laurence is that one who - " Granby began.
"Laurence is the one who what?" Temeraire asked, looming dangerously.
"Well, he…" Granby's voice trailed off in the face of Temeraire's all too evident displeasure. Laurence braced himself for the ensuing argument.
"Laurence is my captain and the baby can't have him either. But," Temeraire added, unaware of the turmoil his begrudging generosity was about to cause, "Tharkay does not have a dragon, so I suppose it can have him instead."
Throughout the variety of adventures and misadventures upon which they had embarked together, Laurence had never before seen Tharkay's imperturbable countenance so near to manifest dismay.
*
"It would be unconscionable of me to so impose upon you," Laurence said wretchedly, visions of poor orphanages in London and the neglected children he had seen on the streets of Sydney dancing before his eyes. Tharkay said nothing, not to Laurence and not to the awkward armful of baby beginning to grumble against his chest.
"I will speak to Iskierka again," Granby offered. He was fidgeting, and as the baby started to grizzle in earnest he finally burst out, "Only you are holding her all wrong, Tenzing, let me - "
"With all the will in the world," Tharkay said. He was perhaps aiming for his usual dry tone; if so, he had badly missed the mark, landing closer to panicked than superior. "Please, take it."
"John, Iskierka - " Laurence said.
"Oh," Granby said. "Oh, well - I mean, that is," and he let his arms drop, looking dejected. "At least - you support her head, see? Like - no, no, here - " He adjusted Tharkay's arms for him, and made some nonsense noises to the baby that miraculously kept it from erupting into full-blown wails. "I will show you how to feed her, it really is very easy once you get the knack for it…"
"John," Laurence said again, more quietly. "I cannot ask this. I will - find someone to take the baby, or an orphanage, there must be - "
"I can talk Iskierka 'round, if you only give me - "
"No," Tharkay said abruptly. He looked down at the baby and bounced it a little, experimentally. "No, I can keep her."
"Just until the dragons give over," Granby assured both Laurence and Tharkay, glancing from one to the other with a mixture of anxiousness and relief.
Tharkay's expression had resumed its usual ironical cast. "Of course. Until then."
The baby began to cry.
*
If there was any concrete benefit to be found in lately having acquired a helpless infant, Laurence reflected, it might be that Emily Roland was plainly reconsidering any activity which might bestow another upon her in the near future. Temeraire disliked having any of his crew assist in the baby's care and feeding, but so long as Laurence himself was not holding her he had been willing to compromise, and of course Tharkay could not manage entirely on his own. Granby's attempts to persuade Iskierka to allow him even a part-share in the work in looking after the human hatchling, unsurprisingly, had thus far proven unsuccessful.
"The damned thing must be changed again," Roland complained, then added, red-cheeked, "Begging your pardon, sir," when she realized Laurence had overheard. "Sipho, it's your turn, isn't it?"
Sipho was inclined to grumble at being dragged away from his books, but Roland's determination to change as few diapers as possible was stronger than even his passion for education. Before any substantial action could be taken towards correcting the infant's state, however, Tharkay materialized, with his odd instinct for when he was needed - less remarkable now that the fact was presaged by such an almighty racket - and set about providing his charge with fresh garments as were necessary. The entire operation took less than five minutes, experience having rendered Tharkay thoroughly efficient, and then he would no doubt have handed the entire bundle over to Roland and disappeared as quickly as he had come, had Laurence not detained him in conversation.
It was an awkward situation, to be sure, and Laurence did not like to carp: no one could deny that Tharkay was tending with great diligence to the infant's needs. Through trial and error and a great deal of coaching from Granby, he had mastered the diverse arts of feeding and changing the baby, managing the spitting-up and putting her to bed so that (for the most part) she would not wake every living creature within a five-mile radius with her wailing, although Laurence darkly suspected on a few occasions that the judicious application of opium must have helped with the last. And certainly Tharkay did as well at these tasks as any of them except Granby and perhaps Demane, far better than Laurence himself would have done, if Temeraire had granted him liberty to make the attempt, and all with a child that had been foisted upon him in the most haphazard of fashions, and yet, and yet.
Little though he knew about the matter, he could not help but feel that parenting was more than simply attending to a baby's physical needs. "Have you chosen a name yet?" Laurence asked.
"I have no desire to put her into harness," Tharkay replied dryly. "The need does not strike me as pressing. But if you have any preference in the matter, please, voice it. I suppose it cannot hurt to have the thing established now, although I doubt she minds answering to Baby at present."
"I do not like to presume," Laurence said, uncomfortably aware of his presumption. "It should be your choice, of course."
Tharkay looked down at the baby with a faintly reflective expression. Demane had demonstrated a manner of wrapping a sash to form a sling, which Tharkay was using to secure her to his chest; she was not sleeping, but she was quiet for the moment. "It is no small thing, to be responsible for the naming of a living creature," Tharkay said at last. Belatedly, Laurence thought of Tharkay's bird, currently banished from his shoulder lest it forget its training and attack the baby; he had never heard Tharkay call it by name, either.
Tharkay vanished to wherever it was he went before Laurence could think of anything to say in reply. This time, he took the baby with him.
*
"I hardly know if I should say anything, let alone what," Laurence said in deep frustration. Granby nodded, the model of sympathy, and concealed a yawn behind his hand. Iskierka and Temeraire had both long since nodded off; their captains were to all intents and purposes left alone to linger over their nightcap. "It is not as though he neglects her, or would; he is perfectly responsible. I just cannot be easy in my mind."
"Every man has a different style as captain," Granby offered. "Or woman, I suppose. I don't imagine it's too much different with children, you know, and most turn out all right in the end. And," he added, "I'm sure Iskierka will give in soon; I know Tharkay did not precisely volunteer as nursemaid, but it's only temporary, after all."
Laurence, not nearly so sanguine about Granby's powers of persuasion, made a noncommittal noise. Before they could continue their conversation, the sound of a baby crying became faintly audible, and Laurence cocked his head to one side to listen as it grew louder. Finally Tharkay stumbled into the clearing where the dragons were sleeping, wailing baby clutched in his arms.
"She will not stop crying this past three hours, but she is not hungry or wet," he said, a little wild-eyed; "John, she must be sick, what do I do?"
"It is probably only a bit of colic," Granby said, startled, and held out his arms. Laurence coughed, glancing at Iskierka's slumberous, steaming coils, but Granby only rolled his eyes. "Oh, stuff, she will simply have to come to terms with it. Ridiculous, the way she carries on, as if I could replace her with a baby… Here, Tenzing, let me take her," because Tharkay had proven surprisingly resistant to having the baby taken from him. "Shh, shh, let me have a look at you."
"What is wrong with her?" Tharkay demanded. "She is a good girl, she would not cry for nothing."
"Babies cry," Granby said absently, his attention absorbed by his examination, "it is their greatest occupation in life, you had do better to worry if she didn't. She has no fever, no rash; it is only colic, truly."
"Then how do you make her stop?" Laurence asked, wincing; the baby was really quite loud.
"Babies cry," Granby repeated. "Nothing to do but hold her until she wears herself out. Walk about a bit, my aunt used to do that with my cousins. I know you're tired," he added in a crooning voice to the baby herself. "I know it hurts, shh. There's a good girl." The crying did not abate in the slightest.
"What is that noise?" Temeraire asked, stirring.
"Nothing to worry you, my dear; go back to sleep," Laurence said. Temeraire grumbled a little and then subsided back into slumber. "Here, I can take her, John. Tenzing, you must be near to out of your mind if she has been carrying on like this all night; do you go and get some rest. John and I can certainly mind her for a while. It is absurd to be laying all the burden on you, simply because the dragons do not like to see us with the baby."
"No," Tharkay said immediately. An expression that might have been surprise flitted briefly over his face, and just as quickly was gone. "No, I thank you, but I do not wish to leave her. I will stay."
*
The sky was already turning pink when the baby finally fell asleep. Granby was long since gone, sprawled out crosswise over Laurence's bedroll and snoring, Laurence could say from long experience, like a drunken sailor; they had all been taking it in turns to walk with the baby before that, but even without him Laurence and Tharkay had managed surprisingly well.
Laurence completed his circuit of the clearing and sat down beside Tharkay. "I never cared much for children," Tharkay remarked, apropos of nothing. He brushed two fingers over the patch of fuzz that passed for the baby's hair, careful not to wake her. "In all my travels, I have never met man or animal with greater capacity for malice or cruelty."
"Only if they are not taught better by their parents, or whoever has the keeping of them," Laurence ventured. "We were all of us children once."
Tharkay laughed softly. "So we were, so we were. I wonder what manner of child you might have been, Will Laurence. I do wonder." Laurence remained silent, at a loss for words, and Tharkay eventually went on, "I have given some thought to what you said, about her name. Perhaps it would be best to take care of it sooner than late."
"Have you any candidates, then?"
"Oh, nothing so formal. What would you suggest?"
"Ah… Elizabeth?" Laurence suggested, dredging through mostly-forgotten history and literature lessons. "Portia? Camilla?"
The sound Tharkay made most closely resembled a snort. "I am not naming her for any heroine of your misbegotten empire or its much-romanticized predecessors." Laurence glanced at him in incredulity and noticed the dark circles under his eyes; if Laurence himself was weary, having spent only the one night with the baby, Tharkay must have been exhausted to a delirium resembling intoxication. "I considered Jane, but I doubt Admiral Roland would appreciate the sentiment."
Laurence hesitated. "Sarah?"
"Even less appropriate than Jane, I rather think," Tharkay said, without noticeable pause. "An awkward namesake, would you not agree?"
"Name her Wilhelmina and have done with it, if you want your blasted namesake," Granby mumbled. A startled silence fell, and he very audibly resumed snoring.
Tharkay yawned, too widely to conceal, and then laughed. "I will think on it."
"Good Lord, please do not," Laurence blurted.
"Who better than her noble rescuer?" From the glint in his eye, Laurence suspected - hoped - that Tharkay was teasing, but it was always difficult to tell. Deeming discretion the better part of valor, he opted not to ask. "Here, Temeraire will be waking any moment," Tharkay said, holding out his arms, and for a wearily fuddled heartbeat, Laurence could not understand why; then he carefully laid the sleeping baby in them. Tharkay leaned back against the bulk of Temeraire's side, holding her close to his chest. "Wilhelmina," he mused aloud, clearly halfway to sleep himself. "Not a bad name, really."
Laurence almost argued, but he was very tired as well. The baby was finally sleeping and Temeraire had not woken yet, and the rest could wait. Tharkay's head slowly tipped over onto his shoulder; the tickle of hair against his chin was the last thing Laurence felt as he drifted off to sleep.
title: it takes a village
fandom: Temeraire (Naomi Novik)
pairing: Laurence/Tharkay
rating: G
word count: 2871
summary: Rescuing that baby from the burning house was only the beginning of Laurence's troubles. And, of course, Tharkay's.
notes: To the surprise of ABSOLUTELY NOBODY who follows me on twitter, the babyfic was by me. This was an expansion/revision of an idea novembersmith and I once riffed upon here yea these many years ago, and I am unspeakably grateful that she gave me the okay to use it as the springboard for this fic! And also for her beta services. And to mardia, aramley, and t-lyrical for beta-ing and hand-holding, and laura47 for hosting yuletide parties and telling me I should just write the babyfic if I wanted to. Basically I needed a lot of help. Thank you, everybody!
Laurence was not on official patrol when he saw the column of smoke rising toward the sky, but an innate sense of duty (combined with Temeraire's inexhaustible spirit of inquiry) impelled him to investigate. Even so, he was inclined to leave the burning house they discovered, once it became apparent that it would not set the surroundings ablaze, and go to notify the appropriate authorities. Then he heard the faint cry from within.
*
"Laurence," Tharkay asked, with absolutely no inflection, "is that a baby?"
"Its entire family was burnt up in the fire!" Laurence said defensively. "There was no-one for miles, even to ask their name. I certainly couldn't leave it there."
"And so... you decided that you were somehow qualified as the infant's caretaker?"
"Well, better than letting it burn or starve to death," Laurence snapped, meaning to add that he would of course immediately begin a search for a suitable family to take it in. He tightened his grip on the small bundle; the increased pressure woke the baby, and it began to wail.
"Oh, no," Laurence said. He stared down at it blankly. "What do I do?"
"How should I know? I've never had a baby!"
"Oh, now, now, who's a sweet little darling?" Granby cooed, swooping into the room to lift the baby out of Laurence's grasp. It stopped screaming, seemingly more out of confusion than anything else. "Who's a lovely, lovely sweet girl? Whatever is the matter, sweetheart? Are you hungry, hmm?" He bounced the baby up and down a little, and it settled with a final, uncertain hiccup. "Well, let's go get you something to eat, shall we?"
"John," Laurence said.
"Oh, there's no need to worry, Laurence; I had cousins, you know." Granby flashed him a quick smile and carried the baby off, presumably to find Gong Su. Laurence could hear him crooning to it until he turned the corner.
"I hope you're happy," Tharkay said, with all the awful ring of prophecy in his words. "You'll never be rid of that baby now."
*
"Do all human hatchlings look like that?" Temeraire inquired, peering down at Laurence's armful of freshly-washed, -fed and -bundled infant with an alarming degree of curiosity. "It looks the same as Harcourt's. How do you tell them apart?"
"Well, they are more distinctive at close distance," Laurence prevaricated: to his untrained eye, children below the age of ten all looked more-or-less the same as well. His attempt at deflection backfired as Temeraire leaned even closer, until he worried that the baby would wake up to a faceful of gleaming fangs. "Temeraire, pray do not - "
"I think it is very boring-looking," Temeraire snorted. "It cannot even talk or breathe fire, like Iskierka could."
"What? What about me?" Iskierka demanded, waking from her nap on Temeraire's other side. "What is that thing?"
"It is a baby, dearest," Granby said soothingly. He had stayed out of the way while Laurence attempted to explain the situation to Temeraire, but now he came over and took the baby so he could show it to Iskierka. Laurence handed the infant over with poorly disguised relief; so far it had been quiet, but he still had no idea how Granby had calmed it down earlier, or what he would do if it began to scream again. "See? Isn't she lovely?"
"What is it good for?" Iskierka asked.
Tharkay, lurking somewhere behind Laurence, coughed and said lowly, "Very little." Laurence ignored him; Granby did not appear to have heard.
"Well, she is too small to do anything now," he was telling his increasingly skeptical looking dragon. "She needs someone to take care of her, and when she grows up she will be a person, like me and Laurence and Tharkay. Or, well, she is a girl baby, so she will be a woman, like Harcourt or Admiral Roland."
Iskierka seemed to have fixated on only one aspect of his speech. "Who is going to take care of it?" There was an awkward pause, as the baby stirred and Granby had to turn his attention to soothing it before it started to cry. Iskierka watched with narrowed, jealous eyes, and finally exploded, "You are not going to take care of that stupid useless thing that cannot even fly! You are my captain! It can't have you!"
"Oh, no, I mean, Laurence is that one who - " Granby began.
"Laurence is the one who what?" Temeraire asked, looming dangerously.
"Well, he…" Granby's voice trailed off in the face of Temeraire's all too evident displeasure. Laurence braced himself for the ensuing argument.
"Laurence is my captain and the baby can't have him either. But," Temeraire added, unaware of the turmoil his begrudging generosity was about to cause, "Tharkay does not have a dragon, so I suppose it can have him instead."
Throughout the variety of adventures and misadventures upon which they had embarked together, Laurence had never before seen Tharkay's imperturbable countenance so near to manifest dismay.
*
"It would be unconscionable of me to so impose upon you," Laurence said wretchedly, visions of poor orphanages in London and the neglected children he had seen on the streets of Sydney dancing before his eyes. Tharkay said nothing, not to Laurence and not to the awkward armful of baby beginning to grumble against his chest.
"I will speak to Iskierka again," Granby offered. He was fidgeting, and as the baby started to grizzle in earnest he finally burst out, "Only you are holding her all wrong, Tenzing, let me - "
"With all the will in the world," Tharkay said. He was perhaps aiming for his usual dry tone; if so, he had badly missed the mark, landing closer to panicked than superior. "Please, take it."
"John, Iskierka - " Laurence said.
"Oh," Granby said. "Oh, well - I mean, that is," and he let his arms drop, looking dejected. "At least - you support her head, see? Like - no, no, here - " He adjusted Tharkay's arms for him, and made some nonsense noises to the baby that miraculously kept it from erupting into full-blown wails. "I will show you how to feed her, it really is very easy once you get the knack for it…"
"John," Laurence said again, more quietly. "I cannot ask this. I will - find someone to take the baby, or an orphanage, there must be - "
"I can talk Iskierka 'round, if you only give me - "
"No," Tharkay said abruptly. He looked down at the baby and bounced it a little, experimentally. "No, I can keep her."
"Just until the dragons give over," Granby assured both Laurence and Tharkay, glancing from one to the other with a mixture of anxiousness and relief.
Tharkay's expression had resumed its usual ironical cast. "Of course. Until then."
The baby began to cry.
*
If there was any concrete benefit to be found in lately having acquired a helpless infant, Laurence reflected, it might be that Emily Roland was plainly reconsidering any activity which might bestow another upon her in the near future. Temeraire disliked having any of his crew assist in the baby's care and feeding, but so long as Laurence himself was not holding her he had been willing to compromise, and of course Tharkay could not manage entirely on his own. Granby's attempts to persuade Iskierka to allow him even a part-share in the work in looking after the human hatchling, unsurprisingly, had thus far proven unsuccessful.
"The damned thing must be changed again," Roland complained, then added, red-cheeked, "Begging your pardon, sir," when she realized Laurence had overheard. "Sipho, it's your turn, isn't it?"
Sipho was inclined to grumble at being dragged away from his books, but Roland's determination to change as few diapers as possible was stronger than even his passion for education. Before any substantial action could be taken towards correcting the infant's state, however, Tharkay materialized, with his odd instinct for when he was needed - less remarkable now that the fact was presaged by such an almighty racket - and set about providing his charge with fresh garments as were necessary. The entire operation took less than five minutes, experience having rendered Tharkay thoroughly efficient, and then he would no doubt have handed the entire bundle over to Roland and disappeared as quickly as he had come, had Laurence not detained him in conversation.
It was an awkward situation, to be sure, and Laurence did not like to carp: no one could deny that Tharkay was tending with great diligence to the infant's needs. Through trial and error and a great deal of coaching from Granby, he had mastered the diverse arts of feeding and changing the baby, managing the spitting-up and putting her to bed so that (for the most part) she would not wake every living creature within a five-mile radius with her wailing, although Laurence darkly suspected on a few occasions that the judicious application of opium must have helped with the last. And certainly Tharkay did as well at these tasks as any of them except Granby and perhaps Demane, far better than Laurence himself would have done, if Temeraire had granted him liberty to make the attempt, and all with a child that had been foisted upon him in the most haphazard of fashions, and yet, and yet.
Little though he knew about the matter, he could not help but feel that parenting was more than simply attending to a baby's physical needs. "Have you chosen a name yet?" Laurence asked.
"I have no desire to put her into harness," Tharkay replied dryly. "The need does not strike me as pressing. But if you have any preference in the matter, please, voice it. I suppose it cannot hurt to have the thing established now, although I doubt she minds answering to Baby at present."
"I do not like to presume," Laurence said, uncomfortably aware of his presumption. "It should be your choice, of course."
Tharkay looked down at the baby with a faintly reflective expression. Demane had demonstrated a manner of wrapping a sash to form a sling, which Tharkay was using to secure her to his chest; she was not sleeping, but she was quiet for the moment. "It is no small thing, to be responsible for the naming of a living creature," Tharkay said at last. Belatedly, Laurence thought of Tharkay's bird, currently banished from his shoulder lest it forget its training and attack the baby; he had never heard Tharkay call it by name, either.
Tharkay vanished to wherever it was he went before Laurence could think of anything to say in reply. This time, he took the baby with him.
*
"I hardly know if I should say anything, let alone what," Laurence said in deep frustration. Granby nodded, the model of sympathy, and concealed a yawn behind his hand. Iskierka and Temeraire had both long since nodded off; their captains were to all intents and purposes left alone to linger over their nightcap. "It is not as though he neglects her, or would; he is perfectly responsible. I just cannot be easy in my mind."
"Every man has a different style as captain," Granby offered. "Or woman, I suppose. I don't imagine it's too much different with children, you know, and most turn out all right in the end. And," he added, "I'm sure Iskierka will give in soon; I know Tharkay did not precisely volunteer as nursemaid, but it's only temporary, after all."
Laurence, not nearly so sanguine about Granby's powers of persuasion, made a noncommittal noise. Before they could continue their conversation, the sound of a baby crying became faintly audible, and Laurence cocked his head to one side to listen as it grew louder. Finally Tharkay stumbled into the clearing where the dragons were sleeping, wailing baby clutched in his arms.
"She will not stop crying this past three hours, but she is not hungry or wet," he said, a little wild-eyed; "John, she must be sick, what do I do?"
"It is probably only a bit of colic," Granby said, startled, and held out his arms. Laurence coughed, glancing at Iskierka's slumberous, steaming coils, but Granby only rolled his eyes. "Oh, stuff, she will simply have to come to terms with it. Ridiculous, the way she carries on, as if I could replace her with a baby… Here, Tenzing, let me take her," because Tharkay had proven surprisingly resistant to having the baby taken from him. "Shh, shh, let me have a look at you."
"What is wrong with her?" Tharkay demanded. "She is a good girl, she would not cry for nothing."
"Babies cry," Granby said absently, his attention absorbed by his examination, "it is their greatest occupation in life, you had do better to worry if she didn't. She has no fever, no rash; it is only colic, truly."
"Then how do you make her stop?" Laurence asked, wincing; the baby was really quite loud.
"Babies cry," Granby repeated. "Nothing to do but hold her until she wears herself out. Walk about a bit, my aunt used to do that with my cousins. I know you're tired," he added in a crooning voice to the baby herself. "I know it hurts, shh. There's a good girl." The crying did not abate in the slightest.
"What is that noise?" Temeraire asked, stirring.
"Nothing to worry you, my dear; go back to sleep," Laurence said. Temeraire grumbled a little and then subsided back into slumber. "Here, I can take her, John. Tenzing, you must be near to out of your mind if she has been carrying on like this all night; do you go and get some rest. John and I can certainly mind her for a while. It is absurd to be laying all the burden on you, simply because the dragons do not like to see us with the baby."
"No," Tharkay said immediately. An expression that might have been surprise flitted briefly over his face, and just as quickly was gone. "No, I thank you, but I do not wish to leave her. I will stay."
*
The sky was already turning pink when the baby finally fell asleep. Granby was long since gone, sprawled out crosswise over Laurence's bedroll and snoring, Laurence could say from long experience, like a drunken sailor; they had all been taking it in turns to walk with the baby before that, but even without him Laurence and Tharkay had managed surprisingly well.
Laurence completed his circuit of the clearing and sat down beside Tharkay. "I never cared much for children," Tharkay remarked, apropos of nothing. He brushed two fingers over the patch of fuzz that passed for the baby's hair, careful not to wake her. "In all my travels, I have never met man or animal with greater capacity for malice or cruelty."
"Only if they are not taught better by their parents, or whoever has the keeping of them," Laurence ventured. "We were all of us children once."
Tharkay laughed softly. "So we were, so we were. I wonder what manner of child you might have been, Will Laurence. I do wonder." Laurence remained silent, at a loss for words, and Tharkay eventually went on, "I have given some thought to what you said, about her name. Perhaps it would be best to take care of it sooner than late."
"Have you any candidates, then?"
"Oh, nothing so formal. What would you suggest?"
"Ah… Elizabeth?" Laurence suggested, dredging through mostly-forgotten history and literature lessons. "Portia? Camilla?"
The sound Tharkay made most closely resembled a snort. "I am not naming her for any heroine of your misbegotten empire or its much-romanticized predecessors." Laurence glanced at him in incredulity and noticed the dark circles under his eyes; if Laurence himself was weary, having spent only the one night with the baby, Tharkay must have been exhausted to a delirium resembling intoxication. "I considered Jane, but I doubt Admiral Roland would appreciate the sentiment."
Laurence hesitated. "Sarah?"
"Even less appropriate than Jane, I rather think," Tharkay said, without noticeable pause. "An awkward namesake, would you not agree?"
"Name her Wilhelmina and have done with it, if you want your blasted namesake," Granby mumbled. A startled silence fell, and he very audibly resumed snoring.
Tharkay yawned, too widely to conceal, and then laughed. "I will think on it."
"Good Lord, please do not," Laurence blurted.
"Who better than her noble rescuer?" From the glint in his eye, Laurence suspected - hoped - that Tharkay was teasing, but it was always difficult to tell. Deeming discretion the better part of valor, he opted not to ask. "Here, Temeraire will be waking any moment," Tharkay said, holding out his arms, and for a wearily fuddled heartbeat, Laurence could not understand why; then he carefully laid the sleeping baby in them. Tharkay leaned back against the bulk of Temeraire's side, holding her close to his chest. "Wilhelmina," he mused aloud, clearly halfway to sleep himself. "Not a bad name, really."
Laurence almost argued, but he was very tired as well. The baby was finally sleeping and Temeraire had not woken yet, and the rest could wait. Tharkay's head slowly tipped over onto his shoulder; the tickle of hair against his chin was the last thing Laurence felt as he drifted off to sleep.