Proper Princess

Epilogue

"Hush," Elizabeth cooed, bouncing the restless toddler on her lap- already, she was pregnant again, so the poor child had little space to sit. 

"Give me my nephew," I interjected, reaching my arms out for Felix- named after his Father, as the first son Elizabeth had birthed following a little girl. 

Baby Felix came easily enough to me, and settled into place on my lap- I was only a few months along, myself, so he had plenty of room to sit near my knee. 

Elizabeth made a face at me, rather envious of how quickly I got her own child to stop crying. "Is the little Tomboy-Amelia a little homemaker, now?"

Beside Elizabeth, her husband burst into laughter as I made a face at the both of them. 

"Homemaker," Eli scoffed, still struggling to calm his chuckling. "Boy or girl, any child of Meli's is going to come out throwing punches. She won't have time to keep home, she'll be so busy trying to keep the child from falling out of trees and crafting slingshots to fire at the poor saps down on Maine Street."

Despite myself, I smiled. "Luckily, I have the best help in the world when it comes to handling such matters."

Our eyes all moved to Miss Lancing, who was out in the field with my Robert, laughing along with the children. Robert had hoisted our little whisp of a niece into the air- she was nearing her third birthday now- and Emily and Lottie were buzzing around Miss Lancing like happy little bees. 

"I am so glad Lottie has taken so well to the house," I admitted quietly, despite the children being well out of earshot. "I know the school is one of the best, but..."

"But some children simply do not take to boarding," Elizabeth agreed. "It was kind of you to take her in."

I laughed. "How could I not, with how smitten she is with Emily? T'would be a sin to separate the two of them."

Indeed, little Lottie was blending in to our home very well- Robert had torn down all of the old and crumbling factories near the outskirts of England, leaving only one standing.

My Factory. Which he had then had crafted into a grand home- perhaps even grander than the one I had grown up in. With all of the land freed now that the crumbling buildings were gone, trees and flowers were free to grow along the paths that I had grown up traveling with so many other orphaned children.

And now Lottie and Emily were free to travel them, as well. Complete with the tin roof atop the building restored, so we could all listen to the sounds created by the rain throughout most of the year. It was perhaps one of the most lovely parts of living somewhere so prone to showers throughout most of the year.

Across the garden, Lottie and Emily suddenly began to argue over something- likely a game the two of them had been playing. Miss Lancing was quick to separate them, and work to redirect their attention.

Elizabeth shook her head. "Those two already in your care, and yet you are pregnant with a third."

As if on cue, Marie, Elizabeth's oldest, suddenly burst into tears as Lottie plucked a flower that Marie had, apparently, been thinking about looking at. When Miss Lancing shooed Marie away from Lottie when the toddler tried to snatch the flower away, Marie turned and ran towards us in a fit of hysterics. 

Fighting off a laugh as Elizabeth reached for her oldest child, I sipped at my tea. "Do not forget that you are pregnant, as well, Elizabeth."

She shook her head in amusement, but still cradled Marie in her arms. She had taken to motherhood exceedingly well, despite her horror when she had first felt Marie moving inside of her.