Tempered (A Daughters of the People Novel) (Daughters of the People Series) (13 page)

The story didn’t
take long. Lynette read with a clear voice, holding the children’s attention,
and invited their participation. After, she led the surprisingly well-behaved
group through a simple song accompanied by hand movements the children
mimicked.

As soon as the
song ended, the kids stood and found their parents. Lali bounced up to him with
Becka in tow, her bright eyes shining.

“This is my
puppy, Airn,” she said to Becka. “Isn’t he pretty?”

Becka tilted her
head back so far, Aaron thought she’d tip over. She blinked at him, her
cornflower blue eyes solemn as she took his measure. “He’s taller than my puppy.”

Lali sighed
happily and gazed at him with a soft smile. “He’s a good puppy, too. He makes
pictures and tells me stories from his head.”

Becka screwed
her face into a thoughtful frown. “My puppy doesn’t do that.”

Charlotte came
up behind the girls and grinned at him. “You look confused.”

“I am,” he
admitted. He stared down at the little girls, trying to sort out their
conversation. Lali’s gazed back at him with an adoring expression and his heart
turned over and fell right into her tiny hands. “Lali keeps calling me her
puppy. I thought it was her way of telling me she likes me, but Becka says she
has a puppy, so now, yeah, I’m a little confused.”

“A puppy?”
Charlotte looked from one girl to the other, then smiled as her brow cleared.
“Oh. Poppy, not puppy. Becka calls her dad Poppy.”

“Oh.” He knelt
in front of Lali and gathered her into a tight hug. Hawthorne had said Lali
missed her father, but she’d never told him what had happened to Lali’s
parents. He’d meant to ask and never found the right time, and now he cursed
the lack. Why hadn’t he pushed Hawthorne to explain? “I’m not her father.”

Charlotte knelt
beside him and pulled Becka into a hug. “You’re Hawthorne’s man though, right?”

He huffed out a
laugh. “Not quite.”

“Lali must
believe so.”

“Puppy,” Lali
said. She clapped her hands against his cheeks and smiled. “We has to go do the
crafts now, Airn.”

“Ok, kiddo.” He
accepted the kiss she pressed to his mouth. Her sweet little girl kiss took on
a whole new meaning in light of the puppy nickname. “I’ll be right there.”

“Okey dokey.”
She wiggled out of his arms and threaded her fingers through Becka’s, and then
they were gone, skipping out of the children’s section together.

Aaron stood
slowly and held out his hand to Charlotte, pulling her into a stand.

“Thanks.” She
inhaled slowly and blew the breath out on a huff. “This being mortal gig is for
the birds.”

“Excuse me?”

Her eyebrows
inched upward above her round, blue eyes. “Hawthorne hasn’t told you yet?”

“Ah, told me
what?”

She pinned him
with a speculative look. “About the People. Ruby said you were lovers. I
thought you were just being discreet when you denied it, but now…”

Heat crept into
Aaron’s cheeks. “Does everybody think that?”

“Pretty much,
and anybody who doesn’t will find out soon enough.” She placed a gentle hand on
his shoulder and squeezed. “It’s none of my business, but if you care about
Lali at all, consider carefully what happens between you and Hawthorne. Lali
doesn’t need another heartbreak, not so soon after losing her parents.”

Aaron rubbed a
knuckle over his forehead. “She didn’t tell me.”

“Seems like
Hawthorne is holding an awful lot back.” Charlotte’s hand dropped away. “Ever
wonder why?”

He stuffed his
hands into his pockets and hunched his shoulders. “Pretty sure I know why.”

“Fix it before it’s
too late.” Soft whimpers came from the stroller. Charlotte bent down and lifted
an infant out, placed him carefully on her shoulder. “My youngest. Thank the
Goddess my brother took my middle son to work with him or I’d have my hands
full today.”

“Wait, is your
brother Bobby Upton?”

Charlotte
shifted her weight from one leg to the other, patting her son’s back. “That’s
him. You’ve met?”

“The first day I
got here.” Aaron tried to keep his expression impassive and failed miserably
judging by the smile spreading across Charlotte’s face. “He kissed Hawthorne.”

“Did he?”
Charlotte’s smile turned into a grin. “He’s a rascal.”

“Hunh. That’s
one word for it.”

The baby’s
whimpers escalated into cries. “Oh, crud. That’s my cue. Could you keep an eye
on Becka for me while I feed this one?”

“I’ve got it.”

“I really
appreciate it.” She pulled a diaper bag from behind the stroller and nudged it
to the side, out of the way. “Introduce yourself around. And don’t forget to
mention which Daughter you belong to.”

“Lali?

“Hawthorne.
Daughter with a capital D, not…” She huffed out a laugh. “Never mind. You’ll be
fine.” She pushed through the doors of the children’s section as the baby’s
cries turned into sobs.

Aaron rubbed his
forehead against the confusion gathering there.
Goddesses and Daughters and
puppies, oh my
. His life had become a parody of a children’s story.

He snagged
Lali’s backpack from the rug and trailed a group of gossiping fathers into a
conference room where Lynette and two other members of the library’s staff were
guiding the kids through a series of Halloween-themed crafts. He took his place
behind Lali and Becka and helped them glue triangular eyes onto an orange
Jack-o-lantern made of construction paper, threaded pipe cleaners into egg
cartons for spiders, and unwound gauze from around Becka’s hands during the
making of a mummy from an empty toilet paper roll.

Halfway through
the final craft, he bumped into another father, a familiar looking
African-American with close-cropped hair and a slim, athletic build who held a
wiggling little boy up to the table.

“Sorry,” Aaron
said. “Too many people, not enough room.”

“It’s ok. We’re
used to it.” The man’s face creased into a smile. “Jim Hornby.”

“Aaron
Kesselman.” He hesitated a moment. “Hawthorne?”

“Right. I heard
she’d taken a lover.” Jim laughed as dismay flicked across Aaron’s face. “Get
used to it, man. Tellowee’s a really small town. Everybody knows everybody
else’s business, and they like it that way.”

“I’m beginning
to get that.” Aaron shook his head ruefully. “It’s a world apart from San
Francisco.”

“I hear you.
Chicago, born and raised. Small town life’s hard to crack.”

“Wait, are you
Jim Hornby the baseball player?” Aaron laughed around his astonishment. “Holy
cow. I thought I recognized you.”

“Retired now and
happily married. I met my wife while she was in Chicago doing a little scouting
for the IECS. We started dating and fell in love, and the next thing I know,
she’s submitted her will to me.” Jim jiggled the little boy. “That’s how we got
this one.”

Aaron glanced
between the former baseball player and his son. “I have no idea what you’re
talking about.”

“Hawthorne
hasn’t told you.” Jim’s lips compressed into a thin slash across his ebony
face. “I can’t believe she’d risk herself that way, or the People.”

“Told me what?
What People?”

Jim leaned
closer and dropped his voice. “Living with a Daughter’s hard enough, you feel
me? Do yourself a favor and get Hawthorne to explain about the People before
you’re in too deep.”

Aaron’s heart
dropped into his stomach. Why was everybody so concerned about Hawthorne not
telling him things? And what by all that was holy had Jim been talking about?
His head spun with Lali’s puppy revelation and the conversations with Jim and
Charlotte. When Aaron and Lali got home, he and Hawthorne were going to have a
really long chat.

And this time,
he would follow through and make sure it actually happened.

“I gotta go
man.” Jim stood and lifted his laughing son onto his shoulders. “See you next
time.”

“Yeah,” Aaron
said faintly. “Nice to meet you.”

Lali beamed and
held up her finished craft. “All done.”

“Great.”

He scouted the
crowd for Charlotte, and breathed a sigh of relief when he spotted her talking
to another woman. Hopefully, Maria would be by soon to pick him and Lali up,
but until then, he still had a gauntlet to run helping Lali pick out books.

How many of the
damn things would he have to face unprepared? Sooner or later, the town had to
run out of people and gossip and strange lingo.

Didn’t it?

He shouldered
Lali’s backpack and held out his hands for the little girl and her friend. Hawthorne
had to come clean with him, whatever it took.

Hawthorne used
the silence left in the wake of Aaron and Lali’s departure to her advantage,
allowing it to spool between her and her niece and prick the younger Daughter
into making the first move.

Isolde pursed
her lips and sank gracefully into one of the two Queen Anne style chairs placed
in front of Hawthorne’s desk. “Your household is as disordered as ever, Hawthorne.”

“Do not fool
yourself into believing that I shall tolerate your criticism, Isolde.”
Hawthorne folded her hands in her lap, regarding the other woman with a calm
countenance. “The love I felt for my sister must be earned by her progeny.”

Isolde’s full,
red lips curved into a sly smile. “Have I not won your regard, Aunt, by taking
your place on the Council and relieving you of the burden of service to the
People?”

“For which I am
grateful,” Hawthorne acknowledged with a nod.

“Perhaps,”
Isolde murmured. “Or perhaps, as the eldest of the line of Bagda, you are ready
to assume your rightful place on the Council.”

“I am quite
content to leave such duties to you, niece.”

“And yet you sic
human dogs on me, delving into my private affairs as if I were an untrustworthy
stranger instead of the only surviving daughter of your beloved sister.” Isolde
leaned forward, her expression politely curious. “Tell me, Hawthorne, to what
do I owe this unexpected pleasure?”

“I am merely
caring for my house, fulfilling my duties as an elder.”

Isolde’s light
laughter echoed in the room. “Tending house requires a full check into my life?
Really, Hawthorne. How gullible do you believe me to be?”

“None
whatsoever.” Weariness weighed on Hawthorne, driven by the weight of responsibility
and the tedious need to guard every word carefully, to time even the most
casual inquiry perfectly in order to achieve the maximum benefit. “Perhaps an
unsavory rumor has reached my ear.”

“Since when does
Hawthorne the Beheader heed the trifles of town gossip?”

“Since that
gossip involves the only surviving daughter of my beloved sister. It is said
you have betrayed the People, though the hows and whys are not yet fully known.”

Isolde’s smile
was crafted as carefully as her words. “Of course, such betrayal could never
be. I have and always have had the best interests of the People at my heart.”

Hawthorne
leveled an even stare upon her niece. “And do those best interests involve an
alliance with the Eternal Order?”

“Why, Aunt, you
jest. The Order is a figment of the imagination, a morality tale meant to
frighten children and nothing more.”

“We both know
this is not so.”

“I know nothing
of the sort. First the Blade and now you.” Isolde crossed her ankles, the
epitome of prim and proper elegance. “The burden of age has twisted your mind
to paranoia.”

“Has it?”
Hawthorne believed nothing of the sort, though a small amount of paranoia was
healthy. It had guarded her life through nearly two millennia. “You would have
me trust you unquestionably?”

“One does not
blindly trust. I believe you were the one to impart that lesson.”

“As was my duty.”
Hawthorne rose, content that she had gathered as much as she would from Una’s
daughter. For the moment. “Please give my best wishes to your husband. He has
not visited in months and I miss his counsel.”

“I shall tell
him.” Isolde stood and moved around the desk, bussing Hawthorne’s cheek. “Well
met, Maetyrm.”

“Well met,
child. Be well.”

Isolde bowed
slightly and left, her heels clicking against the hardwood floor in sharp taps.

Hawthorne walked
to the coffee table where Aaron had left his work and picked up his recreation
of Una. The likeness was uncanny and pricked at the well of longing and sorrow
buried deep within Hawthorne, carefully hidden from the outside world. Una would
never live again. Her seed would die with the intractable Isolde, who had
refused to have children. But for Hawthorne’s lingering memories and the work
of the man who had come into her life in the most unexpected fashion, it would
be as if Una had never lived.

She pushed the
melancholy away and settled onto the sofa with her laptop, allowing work to
absorb her concentration.

* * *

An hour later,
voices sounded from the vicinity of the front door, rousing Hawthorne from her
work. The lilt of Maria’s accented words, the deep smoothness of Aaron’s reply,
the bright bubble of Lali’s laughter. Tiny feet scampered through the house,
their beat along the floor growing louder. A moment later, the little girl
burst into the room, her face wreathed with pleasure.

“Look, Nana.”
Lali climbed onto the sofa pulling a grocery bag full of crafts behind her.
“Look what puppy and me made.”

Hawthorne set
her laptop aside and listened patiently to Lali’s chatter, filled with Becka
and Aaron and Missy Charlotte and all the happenings from that day’s library
visit.

Aaron entered
the room at a slower pace, his expression much heavier than Lali’s.

As soon as her
granddaughter wound down, Aaron sent her out of the room to find Maria and
crossed his arms over his chest, glowering down at Hawthorne. “We need to
talk.”

She patted the
sofa, deliberately mimicking his frequent requests to sit.

He ignored her.
“What happened to Lali’s parents?”

“They died in a
car accident not long after her birth.” She folded her hands in her lap and
girded herself for yet another battle of words. Would that everything could be
solved with a strong arm and a sharp blade. “Why do you wish to know?”

He wheezed out a
disbelieving laugh. “How can you ask me that? It’s Lali.”

“Yes, this is
so. Yet, you have never asked before.”

“Not because I
don’t care. You’re so damn
closed
.”

“I have not
always been so with you. There was a time when I was willing to explain and was
met by your rejection.”

“Don’t talk to
me about DragonCon,” he said in a harsh voice. “You fed me a line of bull…”

“There was no
bull between us, Aaron.” Hawthorne stood and faced him, biting back the anger
and hurt. Why did he continue to accuse her of lying? “You chose not to believe
me.”

“You chose to…”
He compressed his lips into a thin line and gazed at her with eyes gone flat.
“Why isn’t Ruby raising her?”

“Ruby and I
agreed that Lali would receive better care in my household. A Daughter of
Ruby’s age…”

“What does that
mean? All I got at the library was an earful of Goddesses and Daughters and
People, and a whole lot of censure because you hadn’t told me what any of it
meant.”

“I offered to
show you once.”

“You offered me
proof of a lie.” Aaron shoved his hands through his hair, clenching them into
fists around the curly brown strands. “No one lives to be two thousand years
old, Hawthorne. It’s impossible.”

The
inevitability of his continued disbelief tugged at her heart, squeezing
painfully. “Is it?”

“Yes, of course.
Christ. When are you gonna give up this nonsense and come clean with me?”

“When you find a
way to trust me, Aaron.” She met his confused gaze evenly. “You cannot continue
to believe only part of my story. Either it is wholly true or wholly false. It
cannot be both.”

“I…” He dropped
his hands and stared at her with such longing it took her breath. “I want to
believe you.”

“Wanting and
doing are not the same thing,” she said gently. “We have much work to do this
day. Tomorrow is Halloween and I wish to spend it preparing for the children
who will come by begging for treats.”

He nodded, a
dazed gesture that tugged at her heart. “I can take Lali out, if you want to
stay here, or vice versa.”

“Whatever you
wish.”

“I like her.” He
lifted one shoulder into a shrug. “She thinks I’m her father.”

“You would make
a fine father.” Though Hawthorne had her doubts on whether he would make a good
father for an immortal Daughter such as Lali, particularly when he could not
find it in his heart to trust her own tale. “Come, Aaron. Our work awaits.”

“Yeah.” He
stared at her, his expression helpless and lost, like a child left to fend for
himself in unfamiliar surroundings. “Yeah.”

She enfolded his
hand in her own and led him to the couch, retrieved his work from the table and
placed it in his lap. And reined in the tender emotions the man beside her
stirred in the hidden recesses of her heart.

* * *

The next day,
Aaron took a break from work and alternated his time between Lali and the
kitchen, where Hawthorne and Maria cooked up a storm of baked goods. After only
a week around the spunky little girl, he’d already lost his heart to her, and
suspected she knew it. It was no hardship to love someone who held nothing
back.

Unlike some
people he could mention.

He’d come away
from his discussion with Hawthorne more confused than ever and, after a restless
night with little sleep, had finally decided to let it go until he could coax
her into trusting him again. If she could do that, maybe she’d open up and tell
him the truth instead of clinging to her outrageous tale.

The one thing
that really bothered him, the one thing he couldn’t let go, was her insistence
that he had to either believe everything she said or discount all of it as
false. In a single sentence, she’d pinpointed the heart of his conflict.

That evening,
Hawthorne helped Lali into her costume while Aaron thumbed through a magazine
he’d dug out of the stash under the coffee table in Hawthorne’s office.
The
World of the People
. He’d never heard of it before and had been curious to
see if it covered the mysterious People everybody kept mentioning.

At first glance,
it seemed like a combination of a local newspaper and a typical gossip
magazine. A familiar looking blonde woman graced the cover, her serious eyes
forthright as she stared into the camera and out at the magazine’s audience.
The caption read, “An Interview with the Blade.” Given her upper tier corporate
attire, he figured she must be a bigwig of some sort.

He flipped
through the pages, stopping to read gossip. Recent college graduates, Daughters
who had submitted their wills (
There was that term again
, he thought), promotions.
Most of the women had unusual surnames or were listed under nicknames, like
Eleanor Shadowfell, who was apparently a member of the Council of Seven. What
that might be, he had no clue.

He passed over a
plea for help needed in identifying the remains of a Daughter found in a grave
in a recent archaeological dig in Sweden, skimmed through an article on
advances in small weapons technologies, earmarking it for research, and finally
hit the article on the Blade. The lead picture showed the woman from the front
cover leaning against an antique desk in a casual pose.
Rebecca Upton
discusses her life as the Director of the IECS and the role of the People in
modern society
.

Hunh.
Interesting.

He turned the
page and began reading.
Rebecca the Blade has long been known as one of the
People’s fiercest warriors…

His breath
caught in his throat.
Rebecca the Blade
. He backed up and began again,
read the whole thing through, then focused on the pullout sections. One
chronicled the Blade’s history from her role in the Battle of Hastings in 1066,
during which she earned her famous sword, Silverthorn, to her assumption of the
directorate of the Institute for Early Cultural Studies in 1985, a few years
after she
submitted her will
to her now-husband, Robert, and gave birth
to a Son, Bobby. There was even a picture of her dressed in a leather vest and
pants, and holding her sword in a ready stance, her delicate features set in
hard, dangerous lines.
Though the Blade now uses words as her weapon, her
renowned skill with the sword is as strong as ever
, a blurb underneath
read.

His heart
thumped into overdrive. No. This had to be a joke. Hawthorne had planted the
magazine for him to find, her demented way of reminding him of the first time
they’d met, when she’d pinned him against a door and demanded to know how he’d
learned of the People.

The People.
Rebecca the Blade. The Chronicler.

A memory flashed
through his mind, of the delicate, middle-aged blonde who had greeted him
during his first run through Tellowee.
Dear God in Heaven
. Hawthorne had
hired a local to pose as this Blade, knowing he’d used that name in his own
work.

No, wait
. He shook his
head as another memory pounced. Charlotte had told him her mother was Rebecca
Upton and her brother Bobby, whom Aaron had met. They were real people, but
what did it all mean? The sword, the nickname, the completely fake history
printed in a seemingly real magazine?