Fic: Loyalty for Felicity, chapter 3
Jan. 22nd, 2013 10:38 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerFic: Loyalty for Felicity
Fandom: American Girls - Felicity
Rating: G
It was too late, Mrs. Merriman said, for Elizabeth to walk back through Williamsburg: she would have to stay the night. Felicity could have kissed her mother for it
“Thank you, Mrs. Merriman,” Elizabeth said with a pretty curtsey. “Our ship doesn’t leave till the afternoon.”
But as soon as Felicity shut her bedroom door, Elizabeth’s good manners fled, and she grabbed Felicity’s hands so tightly as to be painful. “We have to run away,” Elizabeth said, low but fierce.
Felicity was stunned. She had often imagined running away to join the Patriot armies, but – proper Elizabeth! “What do you mean?” Felicity gasped.
Elizabeth moved restlessly around the room, her emotions so high that she seemed almost feverish. “They mean to marry me to my cousin,” she said, her eyes widening so that the reflected candle flames seemed to dance in her irises. “I can’t stand him, Felicity. He is a horrid boy with a perpetually running nose.”
“Perhaps he’s changed,” Felicity said. “It’s been five years since you’ve seen him.”
“He’s cruel to horses!” Elizabeth cried, forgetting for the moment to keep her voice soft.
“Oh.” Felicity sat on her bed, her skirts billowing about her. She smoothed them. Her mind whirled like a spindle, and like a spindle, a slender thread of an idea began to form under Felicity’s hands. “We’ll have to dress as boys,” she said.
“All right,” said Elizabeth.
“We still have some of Ben’s outgrown clothes,” said Felicity. “And we’ll both ride Penny – it’s horse-stealing otherwise; she’s the only one that’s mine – and we’ll go…”
There was the rub. Where could they go? Elizabeth would never join the Patriot Army. And they could not just roam the countryside: they would be taken for runaway apprentices, even horse thieves.
“We don’t need to run for long,” Elizabeth said. She leaned against the bedpost, her cheek pressed against the wood and her eyelashes shadowing her face. “Just long enough for the boat to leave without me.”
“But your parents will just wait for the next boat, surely,” Felicity objected.
“No,” said Elizabeth. “They’ve always liked Annabelle better anyway. And this way, we’ll be together, you and I – oh, Felicity, that stupid fight – ”
“Oh, it was my fault!” Felicity cried, bounding to her feet. “I’m so sorry, Elizabeth. I was so terribly rude, and I didn’t mean – I mean I did mean, but – oh…”
“Hush,” said Elizabeth. She wrapped her arms around Felicity, burying her nose in Felicity’s shoulders. Her face was hot, like she was holding back tears. “Or I shall have to be angry with you again, and then we can’t run away together, and I’ll have to go to England and I’ll never see you again.”
Felicity’s eyes filled with tears. “No,” she said, hugging Elizabeth fiercely. “This has been the worst summer of my life. I couldn’t bear never seeing you again.”
“It’s been my worst summer too,” Elizabeth said.
Felicity gave her one last squeeze, then stepped back and looked her in the face. “I’ve got an idea.” Felicity said. “Ever since Grandfather died, Mama’s been saying that we ought not to leave its running to the overseer.” Elizabeth looked puzzled. “Oh, don’t you see! Mother doesn’t think I’m responsible enough to run it on my own, but you are so responsible, surely she’ll see we can run it together! And we’ll never need to be apart again.”
“Oh, Felicity, it’s wonderful!” Elizabeth cried, and flung her arms around Felicity again.
When the house was quiet, Felicity fetched Ben’s old clothes. Slender Elizabeth made a sweet boy, but Felicity –
“Oh, I wish I weren’t a girl,” Felicity said, stomping a foot on the floor. When she was nine, she had made a perfect boy: but with her breasts, no one would mistake her for one now!
“I’m glad you’re a girl,” Elizabeth said stoutly. “You’d have run away to join the army long since if you weren’t, and I should be heartbroken.”
Felicity sighed.
“Perhaps you can…tie them back?” Elizabeth suggested.
It worked well enough. They slipped out of the house to the stable, Elizabeth holding tight to Felicity’s arm. Her trembling fingers told of her fear, but even when she stumbled over a root in the garden, she didn’t make a sound.
And they were off!
Penny’s hoofs seemed terribly loud in the eerie, empty streets of Williamsburg. Felicity remembered the night that she and Ben and Isaac had gone to warn the townsfolk that the British were taking the powder out of the garrison. She shivered. She had not realized then how dangerous their errand had been.
How dark it was! Felicity loved riding so much that she sometimes lost track of time and came home in the deep purple dusk, with owls hooting and bats swooping low overhead. But never before had she ridden after midnight.
And never before had her late rides taken her into the forest, where the trees overhead screened the thin milky light of the moon. She could barely see the road. And as for looking into the trees – they could have been riding between black walls for all Felicity could see anything.
She could hear, though, and the sounds were not nearly as comforting as owl’s hoots. In the forest, twigs cracked; frogs croaked; strange things creaked and flapped and squeaked in the night. Far away, something gave a dying shriek. Sweat dripped down Felicity’s back.
Behind her, Elizabeth shivered. “Are you scared?” Felicity asked.
“Cold,” Elizabeth said.
Cold? But it was August, and more than warm enough. Probably she just didn’t want to admit she was frightened. “Maybe we should sing?” Felicity suggested. “For the English – ” She cleared her throat, and tried again. “For the English charm me with their smiles and yet they fail to bind me – ”
Elizabeth joined in. “For the heart falls back to wear its bound, to the girl I left behind me.”
But their voices seemed so high and thin and small in that vast darkness that they fell silent again at once. The sounds of the forest seemed to press in on them.
On and on they rode, and even Felicity, who loved riding, grew tired of it. Sometimes they got off and walked beside Penny to give the horse a rest. It felt like time wasn’t really passing: like they had always been riding and walking through the dark woods, with the strange frightening sounds in the undergrowth, and the trees casting fat shadows across the path, hiding roots and stones that made them stumble.
“I don’t think I can walk any farther,” Elizabeth said, hoarse-voiced. Water: they should have brought that too. Oh, why hadn’t they planned this better?
“Ride Penny,” Felicity said, holding her hands for Elizabeth to use as a mounting stirrup. “I’ll lead her.”
Slowly, slowly the moon moved across the sky; and slowly, slowly the sky began to soften toward gray; and just when Felicity thought she would never be able to lift her foot for another step, she saw the neat fence that marked the entrance to her grandfather’s plantation.
“Elizabeth!” Felicity cheered. “We’re almost there!”
Elizabeth lifted her head at Felicity. Her face looked flushed, but she grinned tiredly.
Felicity climbed the fence to remount Penny. She wanted to enter the plantation in style. The fence wobbled beneath her feet. The overseer clearly was not keeping the place up as he should. Felicity was secretly glad: all the more reason to let her and Elizabeth take over, after all!
They rode down the lane of oak trees leading toward the plantation. Felicity felt some of the tension of the night drain out of her, just following that familiar path. “It’s lovely, isn’t it?” she said to Elizabeth.
“Yes,” Elizabeth said. But she didn’t sound enthusiastic about it. Felicity felt a flicker of irritation – but of course Elizabeth must be exhausted.
A snapped twig was all the warning they got. Suddenly a man loomed out of the trees and grabbed Penny’s reins. Penny reared. Elizabeth screamed and grabbed Felicity’s waist.
“Who’s that now?” the man said, tugging viciously at the reins.. His red nose shown in the moonlight, and Felicity recognized him: the overseer. “Deserters, maybe, stealing an officer’s mount? Down, girl!” he barked, and smacked Penny’s neck.
Penny reared again. “Stop it!” Felicity shouted at the overseer, but he hit Penny again. Again Penny reared, and Felicity’s hat flew off, so her hair tumbled around her face.
“What’s this now?” the overseer barked, so surprised that he let go of Penny’s reins. Penny shied away, and Felicity stroked her mare’s head, murmuring soothing things and hating the overseer. Elizabeth held onto her so hard that Felicity’s ribs ached from the touch. “What’s this,” he said, striding toward them and reaching for Felicity’s hair.
She smacked his hand away. His face darkened and he grabbed her arm. “Unhand me!” she ordered. “I’m Felicity Merriman. I own this plantation; my family pays your wages. Unhand me now!”
He let go. But his eyes lingered rudely on her trousered legs. Felicity’s heart pounded in her throat. “Fetch Dido,” she ordered. He didn’t leave, and something like panic bubbled in her throat. “Go on,” she ordered.
“You don’t want help stabling that pretty horse?” the overseer leered.
“No,” Felicity said frostily, and finally, finally he left, whistling. Whistling! Felicity felt sick and shaky.
Her knees almost buckled under her as she slid off Penny’s back. And the shakiness didn’t leave her as she and Elizabeth entered the plantation house. Somehow, although she knew it couldn’t be so, Felicity had imagined the house as warm and welcoming as it had been when her grandfather was alive: full of sunshine, spotlessly clean, smelling of her grandfather’s pipe tobacco.
Instead, it was dark and stuffy, the shutters shut tight. A thin layer of dust had settled on everything, and it puffed up around their feet as they walked. Elizabeth coughed.
“I’m so sorry,” Felicity said, her throat clenching with something like despair.
“No, no!” Elizabeth protested, coughing. “This just means there’s so much for us to do, Felicity. If we get it all cleaned up before your mother finds us, she’ll have to let us stay. Don’t you think?”
Felicity looked at a thin line of light that slipped between a crooked shutter. All their hopes suddenly seemed very small and silly. “Yes,” she said.
“She has to let us stay,” said Elizabeth, and to Felicity’s astonishment, Elizabeth burst into tears and sat down on the bottom stair.
“She will!” Felicity said, sitting next to her and putting an arm around Elizabeth’s shoulder. She pulled her friend close, pulling off the cap that had hidden Elizabeth’s hair and smoothing out her friend’s curls. Elizabeth seemed to radiate heat, like a brick warmed for a wintertime sleigh ride.
Felicity’s heart beat at her throat again, worse even than when they confronted the overseer. “I’ll…I’ll get us some water,” Felicity faltered. “And maybe you ought to lie down, and…”
Elizabeth looked up at her. Her cheeks were so red as to seem rouged, especially given how pale the skin around her mouth was.
Felicity gave a little strangled sound and hugged Elizabeth again, burying her face in Elizabeth’s hair. Elizabeth was fine. Everything was fine. Everything was going to be fine.
“My land,” said Dido. Felicity released Elizabeth and stumbled to her feet, glaring at the slender, stooped slave woman so ferociously that Dido stopped staring at Felicity’s trousers and instead looked meekly at her own bare feet.
“The house is dirty!” Felicity shouted.
“I’m sorry, miss,” Dido said. “We didn’t know you were coming.”
Felicity could have shouted for an hour and been glad of it. But Grandfather always said it was the coward’s way to shout at slaves when you were angry about something else - angry or frightened.
Just thinking about her grandfather made Felicity’s eyes fill with tears again. Oh, she was so tired. “It’s not your fault,” she said. “We came all in a hurry – oh, Dido, this is Elizabeth – stand up?” she said to Elizabeth. Elizabeth grasped the rail and pulled herself half to her feet, then fell back on the step.
Felicity kept talking, faster and faster, as if she could bring things back under control just by talking. “We had to, you know, they were going to marry Elizabeth to her cousin who beats horses – any man who beats horses would make a horrid husband, don’t you think? I can’t abide people who hit horses. The overseer hit Penny! He’s a nasty man! Next time I see my mother I’m telling her we ought to hire a new one.”
“He’s an overseer,” Dido replied.
“I don’t care. He shouldn’t hit horses. I don’t think it helps them any. There’s nothing in the Bible about sparing the rod and spoiling the horse, Dido. I bet horses don’t even have original sin.”
But Dido wasn’t listening. She knelt beside Elizabeth, lifting Elizabeth’s chin with her fingers. “Stick out your tongue, doll,” she said gently.
Elizabeth did. Felicity shrank back at her friend’s scarlet tongue, spotted all over with swollen red dots. “What is it?” Felicity asked, trying not to sound panicked.
Dido looked up at Felicity, and Felicity was startled to see something like pity in her eyes. “It’s scarlet fever, miss,” she said.
Fandom: American Girls - Felicity
Rating: G
It was too late, Mrs. Merriman said, for Elizabeth to walk back through Williamsburg: she would have to stay the night. Felicity could have kissed her mother for it
“Thank you, Mrs. Merriman,” Elizabeth said with a pretty curtsey. “Our ship doesn’t leave till the afternoon.”
But as soon as Felicity shut her bedroom door, Elizabeth’s good manners fled, and she grabbed Felicity’s hands so tightly as to be painful. “We have to run away,” Elizabeth said, low but fierce.
Felicity was stunned. She had often imagined running away to join the Patriot armies, but – proper Elizabeth! “What do you mean?” Felicity gasped.
Elizabeth moved restlessly around the room, her emotions so high that she seemed almost feverish. “They mean to marry me to my cousin,” she said, her eyes widening so that the reflected candle flames seemed to dance in her irises. “I can’t stand him, Felicity. He is a horrid boy with a perpetually running nose.”
“Perhaps he’s changed,” Felicity said. “It’s been five years since you’ve seen him.”
“He’s cruel to horses!” Elizabeth cried, forgetting for the moment to keep her voice soft.
“Oh.” Felicity sat on her bed, her skirts billowing about her. She smoothed them. Her mind whirled like a spindle, and like a spindle, a slender thread of an idea began to form under Felicity’s hands. “We’ll have to dress as boys,” she said.
“All right,” said Elizabeth.
“We still have some of Ben’s outgrown clothes,” said Felicity. “And we’ll both ride Penny – it’s horse-stealing otherwise; she’s the only one that’s mine – and we’ll go…”
There was the rub. Where could they go? Elizabeth would never join the Patriot Army. And they could not just roam the countryside: they would be taken for runaway apprentices, even horse thieves.
“We don’t need to run for long,” Elizabeth said. She leaned against the bedpost, her cheek pressed against the wood and her eyelashes shadowing her face. “Just long enough for the boat to leave without me.”
“But your parents will just wait for the next boat, surely,” Felicity objected.
“No,” said Elizabeth. “They’ve always liked Annabelle better anyway. And this way, we’ll be together, you and I – oh, Felicity, that stupid fight – ”
“Oh, it was my fault!” Felicity cried, bounding to her feet. “I’m so sorry, Elizabeth. I was so terribly rude, and I didn’t mean – I mean I did mean, but – oh…”
“Hush,” said Elizabeth. She wrapped her arms around Felicity, burying her nose in Felicity’s shoulders. Her face was hot, like she was holding back tears. “Or I shall have to be angry with you again, and then we can’t run away together, and I’ll have to go to England and I’ll never see you again.”
Felicity’s eyes filled with tears. “No,” she said, hugging Elizabeth fiercely. “This has been the worst summer of my life. I couldn’t bear never seeing you again.”
“It’s been my worst summer too,” Elizabeth said.
Felicity gave her one last squeeze, then stepped back and looked her in the face. “I’ve got an idea.” Felicity said. “Ever since Grandfather died, Mama’s been saying that we ought not to leave its running to the overseer.” Elizabeth looked puzzled. “Oh, don’t you see! Mother doesn’t think I’m responsible enough to run it on my own, but you are so responsible, surely she’ll see we can run it together! And we’ll never need to be apart again.”
“Oh, Felicity, it’s wonderful!” Elizabeth cried, and flung her arms around Felicity again.
When the house was quiet, Felicity fetched Ben’s old clothes. Slender Elizabeth made a sweet boy, but Felicity –
“Oh, I wish I weren’t a girl,” Felicity said, stomping a foot on the floor. When she was nine, she had made a perfect boy: but with her breasts, no one would mistake her for one now!
“I’m glad you’re a girl,” Elizabeth said stoutly. “You’d have run away to join the army long since if you weren’t, and I should be heartbroken.”
Felicity sighed.
“Perhaps you can…tie them back?” Elizabeth suggested.
It worked well enough. They slipped out of the house to the stable, Elizabeth holding tight to Felicity’s arm. Her trembling fingers told of her fear, but even when she stumbled over a root in the garden, she didn’t make a sound.
And they were off!
Penny’s hoofs seemed terribly loud in the eerie, empty streets of Williamsburg. Felicity remembered the night that she and Ben and Isaac had gone to warn the townsfolk that the British were taking the powder out of the garrison. She shivered. She had not realized then how dangerous their errand had been.
How dark it was! Felicity loved riding so much that she sometimes lost track of time and came home in the deep purple dusk, with owls hooting and bats swooping low overhead. But never before had she ridden after midnight.
And never before had her late rides taken her into the forest, where the trees overhead screened the thin milky light of the moon. She could barely see the road. And as for looking into the trees – they could have been riding between black walls for all Felicity could see anything.
She could hear, though, and the sounds were not nearly as comforting as owl’s hoots. In the forest, twigs cracked; frogs croaked; strange things creaked and flapped and squeaked in the night. Far away, something gave a dying shriek. Sweat dripped down Felicity’s back.
Behind her, Elizabeth shivered. “Are you scared?” Felicity asked.
“Cold,” Elizabeth said.
Cold? But it was August, and more than warm enough. Probably she just didn’t want to admit she was frightened. “Maybe we should sing?” Felicity suggested. “For the English – ” She cleared her throat, and tried again. “For the English charm me with their smiles and yet they fail to bind me – ”
Elizabeth joined in. “For the heart falls back to wear its bound, to the girl I left behind me.”
But their voices seemed so high and thin and small in that vast darkness that they fell silent again at once. The sounds of the forest seemed to press in on them.
On and on they rode, and even Felicity, who loved riding, grew tired of it. Sometimes they got off and walked beside Penny to give the horse a rest. It felt like time wasn’t really passing: like they had always been riding and walking through the dark woods, with the strange frightening sounds in the undergrowth, and the trees casting fat shadows across the path, hiding roots and stones that made them stumble.
“I don’t think I can walk any farther,” Elizabeth said, hoarse-voiced. Water: they should have brought that too. Oh, why hadn’t they planned this better?
“Ride Penny,” Felicity said, holding her hands for Elizabeth to use as a mounting stirrup. “I’ll lead her.”
Slowly, slowly the moon moved across the sky; and slowly, slowly the sky began to soften toward gray; and just when Felicity thought she would never be able to lift her foot for another step, she saw the neat fence that marked the entrance to her grandfather’s plantation.
“Elizabeth!” Felicity cheered. “We’re almost there!”
Elizabeth lifted her head at Felicity. Her face looked flushed, but she grinned tiredly.
Felicity climbed the fence to remount Penny. She wanted to enter the plantation in style. The fence wobbled beneath her feet. The overseer clearly was not keeping the place up as he should. Felicity was secretly glad: all the more reason to let her and Elizabeth take over, after all!
They rode down the lane of oak trees leading toward the plantation. Felicity felt some of the tension of the night drain out of her, just following that familiar path. “It’s lovely, isn’t it?” she said to Elizabeth.
“Yes,” Elizabeth said. But she didn’t sound enthusiastic about it. Felicity felt a flicker of irritation – but of course Elizabeth must be exhausted.
A snapped twig was all the warning they got. Suddenly a man loomed out of the trees and grabbed Penny’s reins. Penny reared. Elizabeth screamed and grabbed Felicity’s waist.
“Who’s that now?” the man said, tugging viciously at the reins.. His red nose shown in the moonlight, and Felicity recognized him: the overseer. “Deserters, maybe, stealing an officer’s mount? Down, girl!” he barked, and smacked Penny’s neck.
Penny reared again. “Stop it!” Felicity shouted at the overseer, but he hit Penny again. Again Penny reared, and Felicity’s hat flew off, so her hair tumbled around her face.
“What’s this now?” the overseer barked, so surprised that he let go of Penny’s reins. Penny shied away, and Felicity stroked her mare’s head, murmuring soothing things and hating the overseer. Elizabeth held onto her so hard that Felicity’s ribs ached from the touch. “What’s this,” he said, striding toward them and reaching for Felicity’s hair.
She smacked his hand away. His face darkened and he grabbed her arm. “Unhand me!” she ordered. “I’m Felicity Merriman. I own this plantation; my family pays your wages. Unhand me now!”
He let go. But his eyes lingered rudely on her trousered legs. Felicity’s heart pounded in her throat. “Fetch Dido,” she ordered. He didn’t leave, and something like panic bubbled in her throat. “Go on,” she ordered.
“You don’t want help stabling that pretty horse?” the overseer leered.
“No,” Felicity said frostily, and finally, finally he left, whistling. Whistling! Felicity felt sick and shaky.
Her knees almost buckled under her as she slid off Penny’s back. And the shakiness didn’t leave her as she and Elizabeth entered the plantation house. Somehow, although she knew it couldn’t be so, Felicity had imagined the house as warm and welcoming as it had been when her grandfather was alive: full of sunshine, spotlessly clean, smelling of her grandfather’s pipe tobacco.
Instead, it was dark and stuffy, the shutters shut tight. A thin layer of dust had settled on everything, and it puffed up around their feet as they walked. Elizabeth coughed.
“I’m so sorry,” Felicity said, her throat clenching with something like despair.
“No, no!” Elizabeth protested, coughing. “This just means there’s so much for us to do, Felicity. If we get it all cleaned up before your mother finds us, she’ll have to let us stay. Don’t you think?”
Felicity looked at a thin line of light that slipped between a crooked shutter. All their hopes suddenly seemed very small and silly. “Yes,” she said.
“She has to let us stay,” said Elizabeth, and to Felicity’s astonishment, Elizabeth burst into tears and sat down on the bottom stair.
“She will!” Felicity said, sitting next to her and putting an arm around Elizabeth’s shoulder. She pulled her friend close, pulling off the cap that had hidden Elizabeth’s hair and smoothing out her friend’s curls. Elizabeth seemed to radiate heat, like a brick warmed for a wintertime sleigh ride.
Felicity’s heart beat at her throat again, worse even than when they confronted the overseer. “I’ll…I’ll get us some water,” Felicity faltered. “And maybe you ought to lie down, and…”
Elizabeth looked up at her. Her cheeks were so red as to seem rouged, especially given how pale the skin around her mouth was.
Felicity gave a little strangled sound and hugged Elizabeth again, burying her face in Elizabeth’s hair. Elizabeth was fine. Everything was fine. Everything was going to be fine.
“My land,” said Dido. Felicity released Elizabeth and stumbled to her feet, glaring at the slender, stooped slave woman so ferociously that Dido stopped staring at Felicity’s trousers and instead looked meekly at her own bare feet.
“The house is dirty!” Felicity shouted.
“I’m sorry, miss,” Dido said. “We didn’t know you were coming.”
Felicity could have shouted for an hour and been glad of it. But Grandfather always said it was the coward’s way to shout at slaves when you were angry about something else - angry or frightened.
Just thinking about her grandfather made Felicity’s eyes fill with tears again. Oh, she was so tired. “It’s not your fault,” she said. “We came all in a hurry – oh, Dido, this is Elizabeth – stand up?” she said to Elizabeth. Elizabeth grasped the rail and pulled herself half to her feet, then fell back on the step.
Felicity kept talking, faster and faster, as if she could bring things back under control just by talking. “We had to, you know, they were going to marry Elizabeth to her cousin who beats horses – any man who beats horses would make a horrid husband, don’t you think? I can’t abide people who hit horses. The overseer hit Penny! He’s a nasty man! Next time I see my mother I’m telling her we ought to hire a new one.”
“He’s an overseer,” Dido replied.
“I don’t care. He shouldn’t hit horses. I don’t think it helps them any. There’s nothing in the Bible about sparing the rod and spoiling the horse, Dido. I bet horses don’t even have original sin.”
But Dido wasn’t listening. She knelt beside Elizabeth, lifting Elizabeth’s chin with her fingers. “Stick out your tongue, doll,” she said gently.
Elizabeth did. Felicity shrank back at her friend’s scarlet tongue, spotted all over with swollen red dots. “What is it?” Felicity asked, trying not to sound panicked.
Dido looked up at Felicity, and Felicity was startled to see something like pity in her eyes. “It’s scarlet fever, miss,” she said.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2013-01-23 05:23 am (UTC)That overseer was *scary*
no subject
Date: 2013-01-23 05:47 am (UTC)I'm pretty sure being scary is a job requirement for overseers.
no subject
Date: 2013-01-23 07:54 am (UTC)Cliffhanger, argh argh!
no subject
Date: 2013-01-23 01:22 pm (UTC)The next chapter should not take as long as this one did before it's posted!