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intheheartTitle: Triptych
Rating: PG.
Summary: Gail and her late, unlamented husband.
AU: EPIC PIRATE AU
Notes: Expanding on something Gail said in the story of doom. Sadly, I do not have the nifty hover-for-translation code, but it's very, very basic Portuguese, I promise.
She met him in church, or rather just outside, walking out with her mother. She held her prayerbook and her sister's hand, and never dreamed that she'd abandon both for him before the year was out.
"My lady," he said, and bowed over her hand.
She flushed despite herself, clutched her prayerbook like a shield. "I am not a lady," she said, for she wasn't-- her father was only a baronet.
"Ah," he said, "but you can be mine."
Her mother hustled her and her sister away before she could decipher that, but she looked back, and saw him smiling.
--
Portugal, green and sea-washed, made her desperately homesick. And she feared the Spanish, so very close. Her husband-- that word still thrilled her, a little-- told her Portugal and Spain were not the same, even with the same king. He told her she was being silly.
She missed her family. He told her they didn't miss her; they cut her off, didn't they? They didn't-- her father refused him her dowry, not at all the same thing-- but she held her tongue.
She had just begun to realize that she left everything she knew for a man who didn't exist.
--
She learned a little Portuguese in the time she had been there. Olá, sim, não. Por favor. Obrigada. Bébé, as her pregnancy became obvious. Her husband spat puta at her when she told him of the child. She knew what that meant, too.
And morte. She knew that, now.
Afogado, they told her. He drowned. The women clustered around her, murmuring comfort in words she didn't know, patting her hands. They fed her, bathed her, put her carefully to bed, where she lay awake and watched darkness creep over the ceiling.
Morte. Afogado.
The relief overwhelmed her in a wave.
Rating: PG.
Summary: Gail and her late, unlamented husband.
AU: EPIC PIRATE AU
Notes: Expanding on something Gail said in the story of doom. Sadly, I do not have the nifty hover-for-translation code, but it's very, very basic Portuguese, I promise.
She met him in church, or rather just outside, walking out with her mother. She held her prayerbook and her sister's hand, and never dreamed that she'd abandon both for him before the year was out.
"My lady," he said, and bowed over her hand.
She flushed despite herself, clutched her prayerbook like a shield. "I am not a lady," she said, for she wasn't-- her father was only a baronet.
"Ah," he said, "but you can be mine."
Her mother hustled her and her sister away before she could decipher that, but she looked back, and saw him smiling.
--
Portugal, green and sea-washed, made her desperately homesick. And she feared the Spanish, so very close. Her husband-- that word still thrilled her, a little-- told her Portugal and Spain were not the same, even with the same king. He told her she was being silly.
She missed her family. He told her they didn't miss her; they cut her off, didn't they? They didn't-- her father refused him her dowry, not at all the same thing-- but she held her tongue.
She had just begun to realize that she left everything she knew for a man who didn't exist.
--
She learned a little Portuguese in the time she had been there. Olá, sim, não. Por favor. Obrigada. Bébé, as her pregnancy became obvious. Her husband spat puta at her when she told him of the child. She knew what that meant, too.
And morte. She knew that, now.
Afogado, they told her. He drowned. The women clustered around her, murmuring comfort in words she didn't know, patting her hands. They fed her, bathed her, put her carefully to bed, where she lay awake and watched darkness creep over the ceiling.
Morte. Afogado.
The relief overwhelmed her in a wave.
