Milliways Bar, November 19

[kitchen_maid]

It's warm and comfortable and cozy over by the fireplace this evening. Bar was kind enough to produce a low cradle for Susan, which Amy is rocking with one foot, murmuring a light, dreamy lullaby while she does.

Susan watches with bright blue eyes that Amy doesn't think are ever going to close, before she blinks . . . and then blinks again . . . and finally drifts off to sleep.

Amy has brought a small stack of invitations and letters and assorted correspondence she's supposed to be answering, and she starts to sort through it, to accept, to decline, to reply, to . . . surely it won't matter if she closes her eyes, just for a moment.

Just for a moment.

Or two.

Comments

[kitchen_maid]

"Sometimes," Amy says.

Susan burbles a trill of contented baby sounds.

"I'm very glad I didn't dream her."

[sai_delgado]

She cuddles the baby close, crooning softly to her, and then glances up at her friend.

"Me too, Amy, for yer sake."

[kitchen_maid]

It seems to Amy, around the edges of her brain, that there's something . . . extraordinary or improbable or . . . about this conversation, but it's hard to get the thought to come into focus, and she's not really trying.

"I think she likes you," she says, instead, smiling at both Susans.

[sai_delgado]

"Good, because I like her too, do'ee ken?" she laughs, smiling at Amy.

There's a second's pause, and then,

"What does she think of Caspian?"

[kitchen_maid]

"She likes him," Amy says. "I suspect he'll be her favorite uncle. And I think he rather likes her, too."

That might be a slight understatement.

[sai_delgado]

Susan drops a kiss on top of the baby's golden head and murmurs,

"Thee've good judgement, berry dear."

[kitchen_maid]

"She likes only the very best sort of people," Amy says.

Susan burbles cheerfully.

[sai_delgado]

"She's as wise as her ma, mayhap," Susan says cheerfully.

[kitchen_maid]

"Thank you, Susan," says Amy, equally cheerfully.

[sai_delgado]

A cozy quiet falls between them all for a few moments, and it's in that span of time that a pine log snaps in the fireplace, sending up a shower of sparks and a plume of ash.

Susan (Delgado-that-was) Allgood glances quickly at it, and oh, but her expression is soft and ruefully accepting.

"Even here, I wot-- although it's different now, of course."

She doesn't sound troubled, though, and fog-gray eyes are somehow much more knowing than they should be as a soft breeze rises from nowhere, drifting through the room to blow the ash-tinged smoke away.

The delicate scent of sun-warmed wildflowers is left in its wake.

[kitchen_maid]

Amy looks from the fireplace to Susan--to both Susans, sitting up a little straighter.

"Is everything all right?"

[sai_delgado]

"Aye," she says, soft and smiling-- and her smile is gentle and warm and almost unbearably sweet.

Susan stretches out a hand to Amy--

(Girl in the Window)

--as she says again,

"Everything's well now, say true. Do'ee kennit? Do'ee see?"

[kitchen_maid]

Amy reaches forward to take Susan's hand.

A moment, and then she nods.

"Yes," she says.

Wisdom and Grace.

"Yes, I do."

[sai_delgado]

"I'm glad," Susan tells her, squeezing her hand. The baby in her arm stirs, and she looks down quickly.

"And gladder still to have seen thee, little dear."

Susan looks back up at Amy, then.

"I'm never all that far, though, not like this, I wot."

[kitchen_maid]

"No, you're not. You're never far away at all, in a great many ways, Susan."

The firelight winks off the beads on a necklace that has hung around Amy's throat every day for almost a year and a great deal longer.

[sai_delgado]

"Thee always were a dear, true friend," she says, and then lets go of Amy's hand in order to cuddle the drowsy baby closer.

"And thee," Susan murmurs into baby Susan's hair, "will have such fun with the squirrels and Peter Aurelious and all!"

[kitchen_maid]

"I think Peter Aurelious rather startles the nursery maids, on occasion," says Amy, with a grin. "He is, after all, a frightfully protective sort."

[sai_delgado]

Her smile is sudden and bright -- and full of delighted knowledge, as well.

"There's far worse things than to have a bird looking after ye, Amy, say true."

(blackbirds both)

She brushes a finger over the pocket of her shirt, where the shape of a black feather-- or mayhap it's two, one bound about with a colorful ribbon -- can be seen easily.

"They're dear, dear creatures."

[kitchen_maid]

"They are," Amy agrees. "They're among the best things to have looking after you, really."

A pause, and then she says, "I've missed you, Susan. Ever so very much."

[sai_delgado]

She shifts the baby and moves until she is sitting beside Amy. Susan puts her free arm around the other girl as she murmurs,

"I know thee have, and I'm sorry for it, I am. I remember thee, though-- I remember everything."

Her hair smells like sunlight.

[kitchen_maid]

There's a moment of silence and utter peace, and then Amy smiles at Susan.

"You have nothing to be sorry for," Amy says, putting her hand over Susan's on her shoulder. "You remember, and I remember, and someday we'll have all the time in all the worlds to chatter away about whatever we like."

[sai_delgado]

"Aye," she says, simply.

(the peace of the clearing)

"When it's time."

(no secrets between souls)

Susan smiles back at Amy, and then looks down at the baby in her arms. Carefully, she lifts her up and holds her out to her mother.

[kitchen_maid]

"When it's time."

Amy settles her daughter back into the cradle, and then gives Susan a proper hug.

[sai_delgado]

She hugs Amy back, and as she does she whispers something in her ear--

--and what she says sounds a little like the breeze blowing through the grass, and a little like hoofbeats pounding at a run over a far-off plain, and a little like the wash of waves upon some distant shore--

(there are other worlds than these)

--and all around them, somehow, the scent of roses and lilies spreads through the air.

[kitchen_maid]

And then there's a cry from baby Susan, and Amy opens her eyes to find that they're alone by the fireplace.

It's the nineteenth of November. A year, in way time is measured here, since last she saw Susan Delgado Allgood.

Amy closes her eyes again for a second, her fingers wrapped around her necklace, and there is joy and hope and love, and she whispers to no one in particular, "Thank you."

And then she gathers her daughter up out of the cradle, and settles her in her lap, and Susan quiets a little, and wraps her own hand around her mother's necklace.

"I am," says Amy softly, "am going to tell you a story. About two girls and a picnic they had, with two squirrels and a crow and the tiniest of elephants, with pizza and grapes, sitting on the floor of room at the end of the universe, because it was too cold and too dark to go outside . . ."