Epilogue #2
Vesper didn’t like that thought. But she knew her father was only being pragmatic about the situation.
Still, there were days when she didn’t want to be pragmatic.
She wanted to take the boys and travel to Ireland to find her husband.
It was tragic that her children hadn’t even met their father yet, something that very much hurt her heart.
He was missing out on so much of their lives.
Without anything to say to her father, she began to take the steps to the keep only to come to a halt when Gabriel escaped McCloud’s clutches and ran off screaming.
Vesper and Margaretha watched McCloud as the man tried to corral the squirrely little boy, but Gabriel had no intention of being captured by his grandfather.
He began to run around the wagon that was being repaired in the bailey, much to the amusement of the soldiers.
Because he was being so fussy, Margaretha set Gavin to his feet as well, holding tight to his little hand so she wouldn’t be in the same position that McCloud was, but Gavin had learned a trick with his grandmother – if he bit her fingers, she would release him, so he clamped down with his baby teeth, forcing a yelp from his grandmother but she most definitely released him.
He was off like a shot, running into the bailey and screaming with glee.
“That little beast!” Margaretha said, rubbing the spot where he’d nipped her. “He bit me! Again!”
Vesper couldn’t help but grin at her naughty boys. “They are very clever, both of them,” she said. “Would you not say so?”
Margaretha shook her head. “Naughty little beasts.”
Vesper began to laugh. “I am sure Val will be very proud of their resourcefulness.”
“If I do not beat it out of them before he knows what devil spawns he has fathered.”
Vesper continued to laugh, turning to put her hand on Margaretha in a gesture of pity only to see that Margaretha was smiling, too.
“You are the one who wanted grandchildren,” she reminded her.
“I must have been mad.”
Still chuckling, Vesper headed off after Gavin, who tended to be the faster of the two.
Margaretha didn’t run these days as McCloud did, so chasing down the twins fell to Vesper and her father.
As they tried to run down the two little boys, over by the main entrance, the men threw the big iron bolt across the gate and began pulling the gates open.
The old gates creaked and groaned on their hinges as they were opened. Seeing daylight beyond the gate, Gavin switched course and began to run for the opening. Vesper picked up her pace after him, reaching him just about the time the gates opened enough to admit men on horseback.
Vesper wasn’t paying any attention to the men who had entered Holystone; she was more concerned about her sons who very much needed to eat and sleep.
Gavin was screaming in her ear as she walked away from the gates, so much so that she barely heard someone shout her name.
In fact, the shout came twice before she turned around to see who was calling her.
A very big knight had entered at the head of a large contingent of men, all of them looking seasoned and, quite frankly, weary and beaten.
Mail was damaged, tunics were dirty, and horses were shaggy from a brutal winter.
As Vesper peered at the men curiously, because some of them were still coming in through the gate, the big knight ripped his helm off.
“Vesper!”
It was Val.
Realization hit Vesper so hard that her knees nearly buckled.
In fact, she almost stumbled with the baby in her arms but she caught herself, astonished to the bone as Val vaulted from his horse and began running in her direction.
Vesper could hardly believe it; all she could do was stand there and gasp.
He was here! God, how many times had she dreamed of this moment?
It seemed like a million, at the very least. But when the moment finally came, it came so subtly that she found she was hardly prepared.
Was it a dream?
Was he truly here?
He called her name again, snapping her out of her shock.
With a cry, Vesper forced her legs to work, running towards Val only to be intercepted by Gabriel, who had escaped McCloud and was running for parts unknown.
She managed to reach out and grab her other son, who threw himself onto the ground and began to scream.
Now, she had two screaming boys in her arms as she tried to run to Val but she simply couldn’t do it.
Too much struggle, perhaps too much shock, had her stumbling to her knees.
It didn’t matter, however. Val was on her so quickly that she could hardly draw a breath before he was kissing her furiously, his arms going around both her and their screaming sons.
After the first few eager kisses, Val began to roar with laughter at the first sights and sounds of his children.
His sons.
“God’s Bones,” he said, his white teeth gleaming beneath his dark and heavy beard. “I have dreamt of this moment. My God, I cannot tell you how much I have dreamt of this moment and when it finally comes, it is pure chaos.”
Vesper was weeping with joy, laughing with Val in spite of herself. “My sweet darling,” she murmured, kissing him as he kissed her in return. “This is not how I dreamt it, either. I cannot even put my arms around you because if I let go of them, they will run off and we will lose them both.”
Val had tears in his eyes as he pulled Gabriel from his mother, holding the boy in front of him and looking into a handsome little face that looked very much like his own. Gabriel, however, had no idea who the strange man was and didn’t take kindly to him, so he tried to kick and push him away.
But it made no difference to Val. He was instantly, and completely, in love with his child. Seeing that little face satisfied something deep within his soul.
“Which one is he?” he asked Vesper. “Gabriel or Gavin?”
“Gabriel,” Vesper said, wiping the tears from her face as she watched Val gaze upon his son for the first time. “He is your second born. Gavin was first. You can tell Gabriel from Gavin because he has a big dimple in his left cheek. See it when he opens his mouth?”
Val could, indeed, see it. “Gabriel,” he repeated reverently. “See how strong he is! And big! I did not imagine them to be so big!”
He said it with awe as the child tried to pull away. But Vesper forced Gavin to his feet and she took hold of Gabriel’s arm, forcing the boy to stand as well even though Val still had his hands on him. She spoke firmly but softly to her sons.
“Gabriel?” she said. “Gavin? Listen to me. This is Dada. Do you remember how I read you Dada’s missives? Do you remember how I told you he was fighting a great war? He has come home to see you. You must embrace him and show him that you love him.”
Gabriel wasn’t quite calm enough to grasp what his mother was telling him but Gavin was.
He was the more introspective child, one of deep thought and feeling.
He peered at Val, going to stand beside his fussing brother and looking Val in the eye.
Val’s gaze moved back and forth between the two boys, mirror images of each other, and his heart couldn’t have been more full at the moment. It was joy beyond measure.
“Greetings, Gavin,” he said to the boy who was staring at him. “You are a very big lad. Do you know how to ride a horse yet? Has your mother taught you?”
Vesper moved in close to Val, putting her arms around him and laying her head on his shoulder as he spoke to their sons.
The feel of him in her arms threatened to bring tears again but she struggled against them.
“I have not,” she said hoarsely. “But my father has put them on ponies and led them about the stable yard.”
The mention of McCloud caught Val off-guard but he didn’t say anything; not now. He was too upswept in the first look at his boys to let anything spoil that.
“I see,” he said. Then, he simply shook his head.
“I cannot believe I am actually looking at them. I have prayed for this day since I received your missive telling me that you were with child. I have imagined the faces of my sons a thousand times over in my mind but it does not compare to the beauty I see before me. They look so much like my father that it is truly astonishing.”
“They look like you,” Vesper whispered, still holding him as she turned to look at him.
“Why did you not send word that your arrival was imminent? I have been waiting almost two and a half years for this day and now I can hardly believe it. I always imagined what I would say to you at this moment but now I cannot recall any of it.”
Val took his eyes off of the boys long enough to look at her. “Tell me that you love me as if we have never been apart.”
She snaked her fingers up into his long, shaggy hair, gently caressing his head. “I love you as if we have never been apart.”
“Truly?”
“Truly.”
“And I love you more than I ever have. You are what has kept me alive these many months, Vesper. The thought of returning home to you and our children.”
Vesper pulled him towards her, her forehead coming to rest against his mouth as he tenderly kissed her. It was a gentle and surreal moment, wrought with raw emotion between two people who had missed each other dreadfully.
“Please tell me you are home to stay,” she murmured. “For if you are not, the children and I are returning with you to Ireland. I cannot stand to be away from you for another two and a half years, Val. It would kill me.”
“I am not returning to Ireland,” he said, his cheek on the top of her head as he felt the softness of her hair. “Henry has need of me here in England. It seems that there are rebellions afoot.”
“We have heard that also.”
“I am home to stay, sweetheart. I promise. Be at ease.”