Emma Joan Tallis

chapter twenty-seven: Ranger's House

"Fix your course on a star, and you'll navigate any storm."
~Leonardo da Vinci

~*~

It's strange to wander around a house that you used to own. I technically still own the house, more specifically, I own the land that the house was built on. And then I agreed to let people build on my land, with strict instructions that anything they built on the land I would pay for and own.

Let me tell you, I had a lot of money at the time, but I almost declared bankruptcy with how much the building cost. And then it was named the Chesterfield House, because a woman isn't supposed to own anything.

In the Regency era, which is when I came back, I lived at the house with Princess Augusta Frederica. The house was briefly renamed the Brunswick house because she was the Duchess of Brunswich. My goodness, she was a handful. Always insisting that I must marry Mr. so-and-so.

Well, technically she wouldn't insist on a mere 'Mister' rather, on a Duke, Marquess, maybe an earl. In her defense, her daughter did marry King George IV. So, it wasn't surprising that she wanted one of her 'dearest' friends to marry well.

Augusta wasn't very fond of England. Though, she did get me a ticket to the America's when I was compromised because of Queen Charlotte's lady in waiting. That is a rather long and boring story.

Garnet Wolseley lived in the house, and was technically the last person to use it as a home. By this point in time, it became known as Ranger's House. By the beginning of World War II, I regained ownership of the house, and let it be used for whatever the King wanted. When I left, I made sure Peggy was in charge of how Ranger's House was used.

For some unknown reason, I trusted Howard with the money I had accumulated over the centuries. He made it grow, and Tony made it flourish. It's a bit terrifying how much money I have now. When Steve and I were talking, he was a bit intimidated by how 'rich' I technically am.

I bluntly told him that I didn't care, and donated the majority of the money to various charities. In the strangeness that is the modern era, nothing has really happened. I agreed to work for SHIELD after I go all of my affairs in order.

And Steve and I talk almost every day. He still owes me a dance, and neither of us know where we stand. After New York, we didn't talk about our relationship. We just seemed to settle into a tense friendship. I'm afraid we're both waiting for the other to make some sort of move.

Slowly, Steve has begun to trust me again. Not knowing who I was, that I'm an alien, it really changed his perspective of me. It's been a slow process of trying to convince both of us that even though my heritage was a lie, who I was wasn't a lie.

As Steve begins to see that, I begin to doubt it. People recognize me occasionally from New York, and it shocks me. To me, I'm no hero. Steve, Thor, and Tony are the heroes, I'm just the woman who stayed in the background for centuries. There is very little written about me in history, I was known as Joan Tallis, that's it.

"You seem distracted today," Steve said over the phone.

I looked around the rose garden I was sitting in, "I went back to my home. It's a piece of land that I purchased with Thomas, but he died before we built a house."

There was a pause, "did you visit your daughters?"

"I did," I said as I looked around. "Yesterday... I took them here when they were four, they loved to run around."

"You don't talk about them very often," Steve said softly.

"It was such a long time ago," I said. "I barely remember what they look like."