Chapter Text
Winter in Gautier was dreary. Even though the landscape was beautiful if you caught it at the right moment, it was beautiful in an aloof way, too cold to be hospitable, too white and gray and blue to be welcoming. The pastures were barren, either covered in frozen mud or snow, the livestock shut away in barns to keep them from freezing to death as the weather dropped so that any bits of moisture in the air crystallized and fell to the ground to join the rest of the sleet.
As Sylvain trudged across the grounds of the Gautier estate, he found himself wishing something would change. Anything.
Anything had to be better than being cold and lonely in Gautier, the second worst post in all of Faerghus to be stationed at while waiting for war to break on the front lines or die in waiting. (Second worst because dear goddess, what was Ingrid doing besides going mad up in Galatea?)
Sylvain stopped at the servants entrance to the grand house, kicking his boots against the door jamb before stepping over the threshold. He prepared to be scolded for entering through the kitchens, but he wasn’t planning on taking dinner in the dining room. It wasn’t just Matthias’s penchant for saving resources that kept the dining room chilly enough to see one’s breath on especially cold days. The air between his parents sparked with frigid antagonism when he was in the room. No kid should have to sit through that, especially not a disappointing one who was full grown and had nothing to show for it.
***
Sylvain grumbled as Marie-Claire, the younger of the maid Marie’s, insisted on banking the fire in his bedchamber. It was full dark out, and her walk to the servants quarters would be a cold one. If she was fishing for an invitation to stay, she was swimming up the wrong stream. Not that Sylvain hadn’t slept with maids before, even ones ten years his senior; but that was when he thought he’d have places to run away to, and the heart to stay away.
Life was easier here when he stayed out of the way and didn’t do anything to remind his father that his second son in both birth order and favor was taking up space and resources.
Not that Sylvain’s mother was much better. When she had realized that giving Matthias a son with a crest didn’t make him love her, she turned her attention elsewhere and not to the child she never wanted. He was an annoyance at best, so keeping his profile low was the only way to get through the winter without spawning any cabin madness.
Stretching out in bed, careful not to brush his feet against the pan of coals making laying under the familiarly worn sheets of his childhood bed bearable, Sylvain groaned and coughed and snorted. All very undignified sounds for a crested heir to make in bed in front of a woman, maid or not. Still, Marie-Claire finished her coal-poking and turned to Sylvain to give a quick curtsy.
“Anything else, sir?” She moved to smooth out the tattered quilt Sylvain insisted stay on his bed as the top cover.
“No, thank you Marie-Claire.” He yawned in the middle of his words and she took the hint, curtsying once more before backing out of his room.
The door latch fell heavy into place as she closed the door and Sylvain sighed with relief before rolling over to his side and folding his pillow so it wrapped from ear to ear, shielding them from the cold that would soon take over this room.
“233 days down, unknown to go.” He whispered as his eyelids drooped, the ritual complete enough that sleep could now take him.
***
The sky was still dark when Sylvain woke, his toes almost as cold as his nose was. He tried rolling over—taking his pillow with him—so his face was buried in the sheets while his ears remained covered. Even with the barricade, he could hear movement outside. Probably the butler shuffling his way up the frozen incline leading to the servant’s entrance. Belay - Butler Belanger in front of Sylvain’s father - had been with their family since before his father was born, and his father before that. He should have retired long ago, but his son Edouard was, in short, more like Sylvain’s reputation than Sylvain ever was and old Belay hated him for it.
The shuffling turned into chatter turned into hubbub. Sylvain tried flattening himself before deciding that the hubbub was worth investigating. Wincing, Sylvain slipped out of the covers into the too cold bedroom. The ripple of raised cold-bumps rampaged across his extremities even under his long underwear. He grabbed the wonky knit socks that Annette had given him for his birthday and his heart clenched. His time at the academy had been fucked by all the ridiculous events that had marred what should have been a standard noble’s education, but he had made some good friends while he was there. Tucking the legs of his underwear into the socks helped quell the cold, and he further insulated with a pair of thick wool pants before slipping into his soft house shoes to add another layer between his feet and the worn rug that did hardly nothing against the cold tile floor. Finally, he held the edges of his sleeves as he shoved his arms through the thick housecoat stitched over with the family crest.
Ostentatious. Gaudy. Unnecessary. Many other words that Sylvain had learned to apply not to himself, but to the name he carried. Which was basically the same as saying it about himself, but the distance was helpful some days.
Bursting into the kitchen, Sylvain instantly regretted all of the layers. The kitchen was always warm but he didn’t expect it to be this warm this early in the morning. Loosening his robe to off-put all of the heat that was suddenly trapped in his chest, Sylvain looked around for Eloise. She had been the family cook for as long as Sylvain had been alive, and had been a scullery maid before that. Truth be told, Sylvain didn’t know if he ever knew her family name, or if she even knew it at this point.
“What’s going on, Ellie?” he called cheerfully, reaching out for a cheese pastry that was cooling. Normally Eloise would have smacked his hand, but this time, she seemed to be blocking his view of something in a large basket.
Pushing his luck, Sylvain took a bite of the pastry as the hustle of the kitchen stilled around him.
“Young Master, perhaps you’d like to return to your chambers?” Old Belay said, his voice somehow painful to hear from all the pity in it.
“Perhaps I’d like to see what’s caused such a racket,” Sylvain said, stepping forward.
Eloise’s red face, permanently singed by how closely she watched her pastries and stews, winced as she tried to cover up a distinct sound coming from within the woven basket behind her.
It sounded like the litter of puppies that Miklan had taken from Sylvain when he was just a boy, all blind and mewing and floppy as rags they were.
“If this is all because some bitch whelped, I’ll be very upset,” Sylvain tried to joke again, noticing how tight the lines on Belay’s face became at his joke. He didn’t like when Sylvain was casual around the house staff, but then again he didn’t really like when Sylvain did anything, really.
“Why are you all being so weird?” Sylvain finally asked, a small seed sprouting into a gnawing hole in his stomach.
No one met his eyes and, feeling suddenly very trapped, Sylvain reached behind Eloise to slide the basket out from behind her.
It wasn’t a litter of puppies in the basket, and everything froze around Sylvain. He could count the minutes between his heartbeats, his eyes darting around trying to make sense of what he saw in front of him.
A small infant, stirring, their pale pink face tinged with blue from the cold. Their hair was a soft downy red, instantly recognizable. Crumpled in their fist, nails still blue around the beds, a letter in a choppy, unlearned script.
This is the bastard daughter of Miklan Gautier, conceived in the nights before his death. I relinquish all claims to the babe. Cle la Daeser le protege et le corda.
The infant stirred, inhaling in a gulp before her face wrinkled. Sylvain turned and ran out the first door he came upon, the door leading out into the winter pre-dawn.
The first step into the sludge of the night’s snow should have woken him up, made him turn back, but he ran blindly into the dark night, going wherever his frozen feet carried him.
***
Sylvain opened his eyes, his muscles cramping, his socks and long underwear soggy up to his knees.
He wasn’t freezing, despite being wet and in his current state of undress. There was straw in his hair, scratching at his neck and wrists. He had run to the place he had felt safest as a child: the primary hayloft in the large cattle barn. Far from the main house.
Despite the fact that his mother always complained at the stench of his clothes when he returned from a day of hiding from lessons and his parents and Miklan, he liked the smell. The sweet dry smell of hay and the rich earthy smell of the cattle manure and the wet warmth of their breath. It smelled of safety.
Swinging his legs out, Sylvain tried to maneuver gently from the crevice he had wedged himself into; it had been much more comfortable when he was a child maybe a third his current size. Now, he cracked his head on a rough board as he sat too early.
“Fucking shitting Sothis!” he growled, his hand smarting with dozens of imaginary needles as he reached for his sore head, the blood finally starting to flow to his extremities unimpeded.
“Fuck,” he said again, softer this time, as he looked at his hand for any sign of blood from where his head made the barn shudder with it’s impact.
Below, the cattle barely reacted, just chewing and shuffling and snorting. The heat radiating from their bodies made the entire barn tolerable for Sylvain to have slept or dissociate or whatever had happened in the amount of time—unknown—that Sylvain had cowered in the corner. He couldn’t fault them for not falling over themselves in concern for his mental state, not when they had already exuded so much warmth to him.
Still.
Running away hadn’t ever solved any of his problems. Not when he ran to the mountains, or to the old empty well, or to Garreg Mach. Consequences always found their way back to him.
As Sylvain stumbled to the ladder down, he briefly considered throwing himself off the loft’s ledge instead of taking the normal way down. The floor was covered in hay and sawdust, though, and this height wasn’t enough to guarantee anything more than some bruises and maybe some broken bones. And with his luck, he’d have to live a long and miserable life suffering from those wounds. No, better to climb down the ladder and hope the goddess took mercy on him and struck him with an aneurysm.
His feet touched solid ground with not even a splinter to show the goddess was listening to his prayers. It’s probably better that she didn’t listen to him; it’s not like Sylvain meant any of the things he said to women anyways.
Chuckling darkly, Sylvain pulled his house-robe tighter around him. A few of the older cattle tried to push their heads through the slats of their stalls, nosing at Sylvain for sugar cubes or apple slices or any of the other treats he’d normally sneak them when he came to clear his head. He reached out, letting his fingers sink into the soft swirls of fur on their foreheads, giving little scritches to the ones he knew liked it, soft pets to others.
“Sorry ladies, I don’t have anything nice for you today. Maybe tomorrow I’ll bring you something.”
Saints knew he’d probably need time and space tomorrow to clear his head.
As he pushed open the sliding door, Sylvain was greeted with the soft haze of recent twilight which meant, if he hurried, he could probably still make it to dinner. His parents would be expecting him, and if he left them to eat on their own after this morning’s discovery, he would pay for it with an earful from each of them later. Better to get it over now.
Making sure to secure the door, Sylvain turned towards the main house, his careful wending turning into a trot and then a sliding run as the cold of the frozen night began to seep into his bones, the hem of his sleepwear crusting into ice. He didn’t even have to think about which entrance to take; if he went through the front door in this state, he’d never hear the end of it from Marie-Claire the elder.
It was only as he passed over the threshold into the bustling warmth of the kitchen that he began to shake violently with the cold. Over Eloise’s shouting and the crackling of the fire in the hearth, an infant’s wail continued as though the tiny creature was nothing but bellows for lungs. The shouting stopped, and the clanking of pots and pans settled, and even the fire’s crackling seemed to dim as Sylvain reached out, rubbing his hands together close to the metal door of the bread oven, the warmth of it enough to send sharp, cold burning from his fingertips up his arms.
“Babe’s crying.” Sylvain said, trying to be nonchalant despite the fact that he was in a sorry state of soaked undress, his slippers more ice than anything else, his teeth chattering so that talking was a hazard to his poor tongue.
“Ain’t no one here the time or the skill to be carrying for an infant,” Eloise groused, reaching over with a ladle to slap the wrist of a stablehand-turned-kitchen boy who was reaching into a stewpot with an unclean hand.
Sylvain didn’t disagree but it still seemed wrong to let the little thing wail.
“Oh go on,” Eloise chided, shooing him. “She’s fed and warm, and the same can’t be said of you. Go get changed and get on to the dining room. Complain to your father over dinner and get him to place the thing with a nursemaid and get her out of my kitchen. That will solve things for all of us.”
Eloise finished the sentiment with a disapproving clucking noise. A sound Sylvain knew quite well. She never made it at him when she was actually disappointed in his behavior; no, this is one for when she pitied him and had given him advice that would make his life easier if he could but follow it. If his father would allow it.
Sighing, Sylvain moved towards the door that would take him up the servants stairs, but a strong arm grabbed his wrist, nails cutting into his skin, his nerves not awake enough yet to feel the pain of them, just the pressure. Belay had just entered the room, just in time to snare Sylvain right as he was escaping.
Old Belay made a simple gesture and Sylvain sighed, slowly stripping off his slippers, socks, and then sleep pants. Belay let him keep the house-robe mostly for modesty, but at least now he wouldn’t be trailing melting snow throughout the house that he was sure the maids had just cleaned.
In record time, Sylvain was in clean clothes suitable for the family dinner table. He was finally warm, though his nose was running now. Perhaps he could still summon up a fever to give a plausible excuse for his absence from the family table. Except he knew no one else would be able to ask his father what was to be done with the surrendered bastard. One more mess from Mik— one more mess for Sylvain to clean up for the family.
The barn had been cool, but the dining room was down right chilly. Sylvain could almost hear the ice cracking as he pulled his chair out without making eye contact with either of his parents.
His father grunted and Old Belay was suddenly at the table, ladling out dinner as though no one at the table could muster the temerity to serve themselves. No, no one at Gautier estate could take up a problem and solve it for themselves; they just all sat around, waiting for servants to serve turnip porridge to them.
Sylvain opened his mouth to speak but his voice merely cracked, no words coming forth. He took a large swig of wine, wishing his parents—his mother, actually—believed in anything stronger than what was strictly necessary to ensure health. If he could get sloshed, it would be so much easier to speak his mind.
“I heard from Olivier that Sylvain was good enough to check in on the care of the livestock today.”
The comment from his father seemed innocent enough, except for the accusatory tone. It was one Sylvain was well accustomed to; he shirked his duties often enough as a boy that the tone had never really left his head. Maybe that was why he shied away from ownership over any task that he could fail. Or sought failure in others. It didn’t matter anymore anyways. Sylvain’s hand shook, wine spotting the light blue tablecloth, as he set down his cup.
His mother frowned at him, her thin lips pressed even thinner as though that might spread the displeasure, dissipate it. “Unlikely that he might care for the wellbeing of his family’s livelihood.”
“Camila.” Matthias’s voice was firm, and for a moment Sylvain dared to believe that his heart’s restless thuds would slow. His ears were ringing and Belay hadn’t even dished out the second course.
“I— something surprised me this morning.” Sylvain offered. He could hardly hear his childish plaints over the ringing in his ears. His arms and chest itched from how he was sweating, the air thick around him as though the summer bogged down on him already.
His parents seemed to ignore him. Matthias passed over a small letter to his wife, who scanned the hand on the front before tossing it aside unread. The tight script looked like it could have been from Gilbert or any other knight who was more used to wielding a sword than a pen, though both swung with guilt and shame. Probably another request for Marquis Gautier and his wife to come summer in Fhirdiad, a transparent ploy to gain control of the reserve of guards at the Sreng border, repercussions be damned.
From what Sylvain could tell, things were tense in Fhirdiad, and lines were slowly being drawn. Dimitri wasn’t doing well, and there were many conflicting thoughts on what should be done to unify Faerghus as it became clear that Adrestia was not content with destroying Garreg Mach and much of the religious structure that gave clarity to the masses about who the ruling class was and why they should be revered.
Sylvain shook his head as if to clear it; he couldn’t be getting distracted about what that fool girl was doing all the way in Adrestia when he had another emergency that landed on his doorstep this morning.
“Cornelia is amassing power; we would do best not to get caught up on either side until we see which way the pendulum swings,” he heard his mother saying.
She always had a head for politics; once she realized her marriage would never be one of love, she settled into the comfort of politics with surprising ease. At least, that’s what Sylvain’s nursemaid had whispered over him when they thought he was too young to understand or remember.
“That’s not the only grab for power we need to address,” Matthias growled out. Sylvain knew the rough voice masked pain, not anger.
“It would be better for our son and Gautier itself if it disappeared,” Camila said, making eye contact with Belanger for the first time that dinner.
“Humanely,” she added as Belay reached to serve the final portion, a whitefish with plum sauce.
Sylvain looked between his mother and father, mouth open. What did she mean, disappear? There was no love lost between Camila and Miklan, that was certain. But an innocent infant? Surely Belanger would take the babe into town and find a home for it. Send it out with a rider from Galatea or Charon or even Rowe. That far away, a babe with unknown origins could live a full life without the shame of a bastard name.
“Shut your mouth, Sylvain. You look like the fish on your plate.”
Sylvain closed his mouth, opened it again, then sourly took another sip of his wine, though it burned like vinegar as it went down. His mother’s tone brokered no questions, and so he would not question her here. She couldn’t stop the questions he scrawled on his heart, the way he inscribed every letter on the veins that carried his life’s blood that he took from her from his heart to every part of his being. It was a message of fear, of pain, of loathing and longing, of bitter love and sweet hate. A concoction he had been swallowing since he returned home from Garreg Mach and for many years prior to that.
“Thank you for dinner, mother.” His tone was cold too; his mother had learned to play politics for attention, but he had been born into it. “It was flawless, as always.”
He pushed away from the table, not caring how he scraped the waxed wooden flooring.
***
It was late, most of the rest of the house was tucked away in whatever little corners they could warm. Previously sequestered in his room, a ravenous hunger drove Sylvain to brave the chill. Due to his tantrum, the first thing he had eaten today had been the few bites he could force down at dinner. Eloise always acted affronted when he crept into the kitchen to steal scraps, but she had never punished him for it, not when he was little and not now.
Outside the swinging kitchen door, he could hear low voices arguing. The tone flared hot, then quiet, the same way most arguments tended to rupture and fade.
Embracing the warmth from the bread ovens and hearth fire, Sylvain pushed through the door in time to see Belay about to exit, infant basket in hand. Eloise looked to Sylvain, her ruddy face even redder than normal, hot tear tracks fresh on her round cheeks. Sylvain looked between her and the closing door, fresh horror washing over him.
Once more, he charged out into the freezing cold wearing naught but a housecoat, longjohns, and slippers. Belay was setting the basket down on the corner of the topmost stair, his lanky arms looking more spider than man as he solemnly performed his mistress’s wishes to dispose of her stepson’s bastard infant.
“Belay!” Sylvain yelled needlessly. Belanger’s hearing was not that bad and he was not that far away.
“Return inside, Master Sylvain. Your mother would never forgive me if you caught ill on my watch.”
“Caught ill? Me? Yet you would freeze a helpless babe?” Sylvain snatched up the basket, rattling the small life inside to a fitful wake.
“To sleep and not wake is not so bad a fate,” Belay argued, reaching for the basket that now shook with Sylvain’s rage and the infant’s cries.
“You sick fuck,” Sylvain ground out through teeth clenched so hard his mouth grew numb. He turned and rushed inside, careful not to slip or spill the precious cargo he bore. Once inside, Sylvain considered throwing the bolt on the door, but thought twice when he remembered Belay’s age and the biting wind. Eloise looked up from where she sat at the hearth, her face now soot-streaked, two hand-prints pressed over her eyes where she had been weeping. Sylvain met her eyes but didn’t say anything. He paused only to toss two biscuits into the basket before rushing to his room. Once inside, he did throw the bolt so Marie-Claire wouldn’t try to slide between his sheets while he cradled an infant.
It was only as Sylvain set the basket down on his bed and looked at the flailing infant that he realized. He didn’t know what to do with one of these. He had never cared to learn once he drew the line between Gautier steer breeding stock and himself; if cattle did not need to help raise their young, neither would he.
But now he was here, alone, resource-less, and tired. And the baby wouldn’t stop crying.