Ingratitude (fic, Slave Breakers 'verse)
Jul. 16th, 2008 01:42 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
maculategiraffeRyan turned over restlessly, imagining that he could hear his bones creak. He wasn't an old man, not really, not yet, or at least he'd never thought of himself that way. But Helen's death had aged him-- that and the constant presence of a child whose face had Helen's delicate features as viewed through a distorting, masculine mirror, with eyes he must have gotten off the father Ryan had refused ever to meet. Helen's own eyes had been blue, a sweet dark blue, ringed with black lashes in her fair face; she'd been a pretty girl, a pretty, sweet girl, and she could have married anyone she wanted-- a doctor, a lawyer, a nobleman. She could have had as many brats as she wanted, then, and still been able to support her doting father in his old age. After everything he'd done for her.
And he'd done everything, after his own wife had run off, leaving him with a seven-year-old daughter he'd barely spoken to before then. At first he'd thought to sell her, but by the time she was old enough, he'd gotten genuinely fond of her-- such a sweet, pretty thing she'd been, all along, with supper always on the table right on time, and a sudden dazzling smile she seemed to save only for him. He'd been sure she'd do all right by her old man if he kept her around, and the Ravens knew he'd done all right by her; he'd spent his hard-earned money on pretty clothes for her, spared her from any hard work that might ruin her soft skin, given her every opportunity to put herself in the way of good luck. She'd known perfectly well what was expected. And what had the ungrateful slut done but let a damn farmer knock her up, and insisted, despite Ryan's assurance that there were measures to be taken, on marrying the fool.
Cried and cried when Ryan cut her off, too, all the prettiness leaching out of her puffy, wet, white-and-red face, her blue eyes narrowed to slits between swollen lids. As if she'd been the one who'd been cheated out of her rights, robbed of all her highest hopes; as if Ryan were being cruel.
Well, a man had his pride, and he'd kept his; he hadn't spoken to the selfish bitch from that day on, and he'd burned, unopened, the letters that arrived in her handwriting, until one day a letter in a different handwriting informed him that Helen and her farmer were both dead-- dead of some easily treatable disease, no doubt, if they'd had good sense-- leaving the little bastard that had started it all on Ryan's hands.
At least it was a boy, and thus couldn't get pregnant and break Ryan's heart a second time, even if he hadn't had better sense this time than to fall for Helen's whorish tricks as performed by her sly little cub. Ryan had made it clear from the first that he didn't feel the slightest interest in being anyone's "granddad," and taking a firm hand had worked, more or less; Helen's bright, affectionate smile, so disconcerting on a boy's face, and that trick of widening his eyes in hurt bewilderment when Ryan snapped at him, had both disappeared fairly quickly. The kid kept his odd gray eyes down, now, most of the time, and he didn't smile at all, at least not in Ryan's presence. He shirked his chores to play with the neighborhood children, and he probably smiled and laughed and jabbered to them promiscuously enough, but Ryan didn't have to hear it.
Not like he had to hear-- for the love of Thor-- the brat snivelling into his pillow at night. After all Ryan had done for him. Taken him in. Fed and clothed him. Set up a cot in his own bedroom-- there wasn't really room for a kid anywhere in the house, but there was less lack of room in Ryan's bedroom than anywhere else, and besides, this way he could keep a better eye on the clumsy little whelp.
"Bran!" he barked, and heard a sharp, hiccuping intake of breath that made him even angrier-- as if he were the one disturbing everyone's sleep-- and a whiny little quaver on the answering, "Sir?"
"Quit that noise!"
"Yes, sir," said Bran, and in the relative quiet that ensued, Ryan turned over again, still restless, and if her blubbering idiot son hadn't been there, breathing thickly, he would have been able to stop thinking about Helen, and her stupidity, and her ingratitude, and the letters he'd burned without reading them. The ones that had come so shortly before her death. What might have been in them. If he'd known.
He could have slept.
Without counting the days, again, until Bran's fifteenth birthday. Only one less than last night.
(Author's note: I live to serve.)
And he'd done everything, after his own wife had run off, leaving him with a seven-year-old daughter he'd barely spoken to before then. At first he'd thought to sell her, but by the time she was old enough, he'd gotten genuinely fond of her-- such a sweet, pretty thing she'd been, all along, with supper always on the table right on time, and a sudden dazzling smile she seemed to save only for him. He'd been sure she'd do all right by her old man if he kept her around, and the Ravens knew he'd done all right by her; he'd spent his hard-earned money on pretty clothes for her, spared her from any hard work that might ruin her soft skin, given her every opportunity to put herself in the way of good luck. She'd known perfectly well what was expected. And what had the ungrateful slut done but let a damn farmer knock her up, and insisted, despite Ryan's assurance that there were measures to be taken, on marrying the fool.
Cried and cried when Ryan cut her off, too, all the prettiness leaching out of her puffy, wet, white-and-red face, her blue eyes narrowed to slits between swollen lids. As if she'd been the one who'd been cheated out of her rights, robbed of all her highest hopes; as if Ryan were being cruel.
Well, a man had his pride, and he'd kept his; he hadn't spoken to the selfish bitch from that day on, and he'd burned, unopened, the letters that arrived in her handwriting, until one day a letter in a different handwriting informed him that Helen and her farmer were both dead-- dead of some easily treatable disease, no doubt, if they'd had good sense-- leaving the little bastard that had started it all on Ryan's hands.
At least it was a boy, and thus couldn't get pregnant and break Ryan's heart a second time, even if he hadn't had better sense this time than to fall for Helen's whorish tricks as performed by her sly little cub. Ryan had made it clear from the first that he didn't feel the slightest interest in being anyone's "granddad," and taking a firm hand had worked, more or less; Helen's bright, affectionate smile, so disconcerting on a boy's face, and that trick of widening his eyes in hurt bewilderment when Ryan snapped at him, had both disappeared fairly quickly. The kid kept his odd gray eyes down, now, most of the time, and he didn't smile at all, at least not in Ryan's presence. He shirked his chores to play with the neighborhood children, and he probably smiled and laughed and jabbered to them promiscuously enough, but Ryan didn't have to hear it.
Not like he had to hear-- for the love of Thor-- the brat snivelling into his pillow at night. After all Ryan had done for him. Taken him in. Fed and clothed him. Set up a cot in his own bedroom-- there wasn't really room for a kid anywhere in the house, but there was less lack of room in Ryan's bedroom than anywhere else, and besides, this way he could keep a better eye on the clumsy little whelp.
"Bran!" he barked, and heard a sharp, hiccuping intake of breath that made him even angrier-- as if he were the one disturbing everyone's sleep-- and a whiny little quaver on the answering, "Sir?"
"Quit that noise!"
"Yes, sir," said Bran, and in the relative quiet that ensued, Ryan turned over again, still restless, and if her blubbering idiot son hadn't been there, breathing thickly, he would have been able to stop thinking about Helen, and her stupidity, and her ingratitude, and the letters he'd burned without reading them. The ones that had come so shortly before her death. What might have been in them. If he'd known.
He could have slept.
Without counting the days, again, until Bran's fifteenth birthday. Only one less than last night.
(Author's note: I live to serve.)
