No longer mourn for me when I am dead
Than you shall hear the surly sullen bell
Give warning to the world that I am fled
From this vile world, with vilest worms to dwell:
Nay, if you read this line, remember not
The hand that writ it; for I love you so,
That I in your sweet thoughts would be forgot,
If thinking on me then should make you woe.
O! if,?I say, you look upon this verse,
When I perhaps compounded am with clay,
Do not so much as my poor name rehearse,
But let your love even with my life decay;
Lest the wise world should look into your moan,
And mock you with me after I am gone.
- Sonnet 71, Shakespeare

?The year comes,? Colwyn spoke into the silence from behind her.

The pen in Sylvia?s hand stilled above the shiny ink drying to a dull patina on the parchment. Afternoon once more and the children napping or studying as the routine of their own lives ran their courses. ?Yes, well I know it.? Pen to paper, the soft scratch and quick lines renewed.

?Miriam and I worry over you, my lady.?

That was not unexpected in fact, but the stating so openly drew a frown. ?I appreciate the concerns, but what do you anticipate will happen? The day after celebrating the year of my daughter?s birth I shall fling myself from the highest tower in mourning of my husband?s death??

The way Colwyn blanched then flushed revealed his thoughts had careened along that line, but the speaking of them had put it to its shame. He bowed, hands moving behind his back to hide the boney fidgeting. ?Of course not, my lady. Only there will be questions. Is there to be a formal acknowledgement of his passing??

Sylvia set down the pen and turned on her seat, dragging the rippled length of her gown around the feet of the chair. ?There should be something. Kieran waited a year before his formal declaration. I worry for Cian, though, to do so. Tell me, Colwyn, what traditions speak to such a thing??

?If you permit, my lady, I will send for the castellan, Lord Gethryn, to draw up a possible reception. It will be a quiet affair, I assure you, but the people will know and be aware that their own respects are welcome to be paid, and that the turning continues with Baron Cian. You must set the example for the people.?

It was not the first time it had been said to her. Each time she heard it in the time of Kieran?s passing she wanted to crawl into the tomb with him and drink in the air of death until she succumbed. Pitiful, selfish desire to escape was powerful and disdainful in a melancholy mixture. ?What will be expected of Cian??

?I will judge Lord Gethryn to caution in that matter. A limited moment with you and Lord Keefe behind him in procession to the tombs through the city might be best.?

The path wound in her mind. It was the longer way to the crypt of Yransea family. Through the back gate was a shorter route, more serene amongst woods into the low hills, but also private. That way would not do for a public affirmation of the year gone by. The longer way would serve the people?s needs, she hoped. ?That will do, yes. But he will be allowed to come back the shorter way??

Colwyn nodded. ?May I see to it??

It was, of all things, the best she could expect. At least Aidan and Beata would not be made part of the spectacle meant to soothe and ease the minds of masses that felt they owned the family more than the family belonged to each other. Clamoring, demanding, criticizing the throng would have their way, and in this tiny window of her pain, she would let them share and be satiated. ?Yes, Colwyn, and thank you.?

Those last words weighted down with so much gratitude over the year. Colwyn had carried on with his duties for Keefe and Cian as he had carried so long for Kieran and the short while for Logan before. It was the twitch of a smile that revealed he understood her in the fullness of meaning.

He bowed before parting, and Sylvia turned back to her letters. The wheel charm dangled at her wrist, but the lamp amulet necklace rested on the desk. Of recent, it felt uncomfortable, chaffing at her neck, though no marks did it leave behind when she removed it. It stayed in the open on the top of the desk next to the candle. Her eyes drew to it from time to time, imagining the flicker of true light from its amber center. It had become impossible to wear it.

The work of the day done, she rose from the desk and went to claim her son from his studies to speak with him before he heard of the coming procession from any else.

"I would prefer Cian be led. He is unsettled, and to expect him to face what we ask of him and keep mind to directing a full grown horse beneath him is more ridiculous," Sylvia protested, but did not look up from her writing desk.

The deluge of things to be done had crashed upon her in few days. The whispering, hinting, soothing voice glinting in the back of her mind spoke of this being a good turn. To keep busy, she could not dwell on loss. Activity, demands upon her mind, could drain her down into deeper sleep at night and distract her from the year coming.

"Of course, my lady, I understand. I will lead him." Colwyn relented at last.

"And have you collapse at the end of it? Colwyn, I do not doubt your heart, just the body to do as you will. As much as we all hate to admit our gathering years-" the last year aging them all "- I will not have it. Find one of the courtiers, and able one and one that does not expect favor for a drunken father, to lead it. This court has gone into stasis too long." She had every intention of stirring things up a little while she was away. The walking on tenterhooks and misunderstandings had to stop. Those seeking favor in the court of Yransea had better direct their attentions to her or Lord Keefe and not the council.

"Very well, my lady. I will instruct Lord Gethryn. Is there anything else?"

Sylvia did look up at last, the letter near completion, and gave him a smile and softer words. "Thank you, Colwyn, no. I am sure Lord Keefe is in need of you with the arrival of His Highness."

The manservant bowed out and she returned to her letter. She hoped the matter of the Merchant Guild would be settled quickly. If within the day, the better, though she doubted Maelgwn would leave as quickly. Had it not been for the attack upon the warehouse threatening the barony's interests, she as ex-officio member of the Merchant Guild, one of her few titular duties Kieran had been most happy to hand to her, would have stood as the third vote in the hearing. All agreed, however, that her interests in the matter compromised the situation, and Maelgwn offered his council as he was arriving with his wife to honor the year passing of Kieran.

It would be the last time, the last day, that mention of Kieran's passing would be spoken. From that day on, he would be nothing more than a note in the histories and a symbol on an old Harvest Festival banner. The thought stabbed deep into the center of Sylvia and she gasped to choke away the threat of tears. The barony would not longer mourn him, but she ached at the thought of his being so expunged from daily life.

The door creaked open from the nursery, and Sylvia fought to regain her composure and complete the letter to Marghaid who could not attend being overcome with the trials of a difficult pregnancy. "My lady," Miriam began as she held Beata's hand to help the girl walk, "your daughter wishes to see you."

Sylvia signed off on the letter and turned to hold out her hands to her daughter with a smile. The smile was matched in a grin of seven little teeth. Miriam let go the toddler's hand and the soft whapping of shoeless feet pattered over the floor. Little chubby arms outstretched and Sylvia scooped her up with a cheer. "That was a fast walk, my treasure." She kissed the girl's curly black hair and grinned at the giggling glee.

"A year tomorrow, my lady. She will love her party. Very much a people person." Miriam reached to reclaim Beata. Too well the woman knew the Baroness had much more work to do.

Reluctantly Sylvia gave Beata back over with a kiss to the soft cheek. "Yes, like her father." She watched them walk out to the main hall, no doubt Beata would be going to try her walking and fumbling type run on the green of the garden grass.

Sealing the letter, Sylvia sat and returned to her work of the day. The hearing, the party, and the following day's processional all to be prepared for and attended. It let her mind drive on like a whip to her heart, not letting it stop to dwell in the loss.

?My lady,? Miriam whispered at Sylvia?s shoulder. Like a fox, the woman was acutely attuned to the children in her keeping. It was the years of nursemaid to the children of Yransea that made her indispensible. The loss of her own son years ago, a man whom Sylvia had held little good will, did not tarnish their relationship or trust.

Beata had been starting to fuss, finding her dark green dress to be displeasing and plucking at its lacings. The continued unsteady mass of people wound around the room, clustering among themselves in pockets of shared memories and plotting of the future. Cian stood next to Lord Keefe a few steps away to meet those who would share their words of fealty, letting custom have its year reminder to the passing of one baron and the rising of another. Aidan and Beata had done their best to keep still, Aidan at her side and Beata in her arms. It was too much for them to be hushed and confined for the hour.

?Yes, thank you, Miriam,? Sylvia felt the smile on her mouth, but it was a reflexive gesture without possession of her conscious or kindness. Beata went willing to her nurse?s arms and Aidan followed behind to depart.

Her eldest child was not free to leave, though his years, too, brought him short in the understanding of all said to him and his reason to be there other than he was to succeed his dead father in name only for another several years. The charge on him was as mysterious and gaping as the great maw of the crypt. She had seen him quiver the first time on the procession earlier that day when they came up to the hillocks that entombed Cian?s ancestors.

Sylvia stepped up behind him and set a hand to his shoulder. Forest eyes, his father?s eyes, rose up to seek hers. In them was the weary determination to make his father proud and do as he was told. Also lurking in the corners was the pleading to be set free of it. She wondered if he saw the same in her own eyes.

Turning her hand over, setting palm up, she silently asked for his hand and he took it and gripped tight with his fingers still round in the softness of childhood. Her hand held close the small one, she gave him a smile, an honest, soft smile to which there was no return grin. Only he looked back to the cavalcade of ministers and merchants, priests and politicians who broke from their own words to share some with the trio who now ruled the kingdom.

In the vague shadowy room she woke with a back jarring jolt. The image that had so startled her faded away as an ember from a fire flies fast and free into the sky. The hour escaped her, though the waning light that slipped between curtains someone had closed while she slept spoke of twilight. One hand reached to quiet the twing of her back, and finding herself not much out of sort, she sat upright. Fingertips brushed against her cheek to find them hot and her eyes raw, soothed by the pressing of her fingers to closed lids. Fighting the twisted confines of her skirts she rose from bed and went to find her children.

Miriam met her at the door. ?Here, my lady, a cloth for your face. The children have eaten, and I suggest you do the same.?

Taking the cool, moist cloth from the woman?s aged hands, Sylvia brushed it across her cheeks and eyes to rid the sensation of ache and weeping. ?I am not hungry, thank you. I think a walk might do me well.?

?I will call for a guard then.?

Sylvia finished with the cloth and over took Miriam before she could reach the door. ?No, that will not be necessary. I will be on the manor grounds.? Offering the woman a smile and the cloth back. ?Thank you.? She opened the solid door, its silence spoke to the care of its hinges. ?Let my children know I will see them before they are tucked into bed.?

?Very well, my lady.?

The halls were alive again. The ceremony was done. Tradition had its way with their lives and spat them back into the routine of living. Sylvia felt as much a haunt of the corridors as the fabled ghosts of ancient lords and ladies strolling the halls in attempt to claim a half life not theirs. They were but rumors and tales meant to frighten children. It was just that way she felt. Half there and half not. It had not pressed so hard upon her before. She thought she had mourned him properly. That she should be past the torn feeling. She was weaker than she presented to others.

Kieran had shown her how to love in truth. She had never had an honest example before her. Her father had used her mother. Her mother had been bitter. Her stepmother a manipulative ambitious woman, and she and her father had no true regard for each other more than status and station afforded. It was here in this home with Kieran she had learned, and he had been taken from her too soon. She was a work half done.

Wandering thoughts and drifted to wandering feet. Carried up stairs and around corners until she was out upon the battlements, looking through over the merlons to the wooded hills beyond. There she stood and let the summer breeze play with her hair and caress her cheeks.


Cian rubbed his eyes and his nose. He did not like missing Mum at meals. She was sad. He knew it. But she said she had been proud of him. He had done just what he was told, and she had taken him from it when he was tired. He had done things right, so where was she? ?Miriam, where?s Mum? Why did she not eat with us??

Miriam was his nurse and she was like a comfortable, kindly bear from stories. She was there to protect him, cuddle him, and pat his nose when he went astray. She was not as big as a bear, but she gave big hugs that swallowed him in her softness. She did not lie to him. She was like a grandma. Others had grandmas. Gaer had a grandma. Miriam was like her. They must make grandmas that way. Soft and nice and smell sweet. ?Your mother was sleeping when we ate, and now she is walking.?

Cian closed the book he had been reading and frowned more. ?I want to walk. Where is she walking??

Aidan perked up. ?I wanna walk, too, yesth pleasth.?

?No, to neither of you. Come now, Cian will you read to us??

This was not going to do. ?No, I won?t. Mum?s sad. I want to see her and make her better.?

?Cian.?

It may have been only his name, but he knew what the sound meant. The sound meant a whole barrel of things adults did not want to say or already said and did not want to say again. Feeling put out by the denial, he started to roam the room. Fingers played among the things there. A little ivy sculpture of brass, a book or piece of paper, and a wooden carving of a bird in flight all got his examination of touch. He huffed over to his mum?s writing desk and started to finger his way through her things there.

The pile of messages were still there, not moved. Mum never left her messages undone. She did them when he was riding. She must not have seen them. Picking up the one on top, he recognized the seal and swung it high above his head. ?Mum didn?t see this! She will want to see this!? Without a word he raced from the room with Miriam calling after. Miriam would not be able to leave Beata and Aidan behind. Besides, there were servants all over. It was not like he was running away. He was running to find his mum. ?I?m going to find Mum!? he called over his shoulder and ran on.