Chapter Text
Spoonful after spoonful, Tim ate. He didn’t care if it scalded his tongue or if it was his last decent meal. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had a real, homemade meal.
By the time the spoon clanked against the bowl and his stomach was finally satisfied, the realization dawned on his face. A small blush crept upon his cheeks as he tried his best to not shrink in the stool. He had made himself a fool, not only by eating like a starving stray in front of Lord Wayne’s son, but also by crying into his bowl like a child.
The apology was already on his tongue when he finally looked up. The Lord’s eyes held no malice. Only a deep, quiet warmth—the kind Tim had only ever heard the servants of the inner estate murmur about.
“Call me Dick,” he said, wrinkling his nose. “‘My lord’ makes me feel ancient.”
Tim looked at him as if he’d lost his mind. Call him by his given name? That was unthinkable. He opened his mouth, then closed it again. The word sat heavy in his mouth. If the steward ever heard a laundry boy calling Lord Wayne’s son by his given name, they’d flog him for insolence—
“Master Dick,” he offered instead, quietly.
Dick sighed, but he was smiling. “I suppose that’s progress.”
He took the stool beside Tim, settling onto it as easily as if they were two fellow workers trading stories after a long day, and not a master and his servant.
“You’re one of the outside servants, right? Laundry, judging by your hands.” His gaze dropped to Tim’s knuckles, red and swollen from long hours scrubbing with lye. A small frown appeared on his face. “I don’t think I’ve seen you before.”
“I wash the clothes, Master Dick. Down at the washhouse.” Tim tucked his hands into his lap, hiding the calluses and rough patches left by hours of scrubbing floors. “The steward doesn’t like people like me mixing with the rest of the household.”
“How long have you been here?”
Tim hesitated, weighing how much to say. He knew he had no reason to be ashamed of where he came from, yet he braced himself anyway, as if they'd pick apart every word.
“Since I was eight, Master Dick.”
“Eight,” Master Dick repeated, the cheer draining from his voice. His jaw tightened as if the word had left a bitter taste in his mouth. “You were eight when they brought you.”
Something flickered across Dick’s face, a tangle of emotions too quick to name. “And your family?”
“Farmers, from the southern fields.” Tim lowered his gaze, fixing it on the empty bowl. “There was a frost one winter. The crops didn’t make it.”
No one needed to say more. Everyone knew how stories like his went among the lower class. A failed harvest, a debt they couldn’t pay, a contract signed in desperation, and a boy hauled off on a cart. For people like Tim, those stories were nothing new.
It was just the way the world worked: harsh, perhaps, but it had always been that way. No amount of kindness from Master Dick would change that. He still had a contract to pay, years, if not decades, of hard work ahead of him.
Dick was quiet for a moment. “How much is left on your contract?”
That made Tim hesitate. Truthfully, he didn’t know. Ever since they brought him here from the fields, they'd drilled into him that servants didn’t ask questions or make demands. The steward kept the ledgers. Tim simply worked.
“I don’t know,” he answered truthfully. “I haven’t kept track. It’s just—I never thought of it.” He picked at a loose thread on his sleeve. “The steward says I’m still far from paying it.”
“You never thought of it,” he said slowly, as if turning the words over, testing their weight. A sharp edge in his eyes, something that hadn’t been there before, cold and quiet beneath all that warmth. “Or nobody ever let you.”
Tim didn’t know how to answer that. It didn’t sound like a question. Servants like him weren’t supposed to question how things were done, much less who did them. He kept his eyes on the thin film of broth sitting at the bottom of the bowl. That was a dangerous road to walk.
He stayed silent, waiting for Lord Wayne’s son to change the subject. To his discomfort, he didn’t.
“Who keeps the ledgers?” Dick asked, with a new and sharper interest. Tim flinched. “The steward? Or is it someone else? An accountant?”
Tim’s fingers curled in his lap.
“I don’t— Servants aren’t—” He stopped, then tried again, quieter, in the careful tone that had been drilled into him for speaking to his owners. “It’s not my place to ask.”
For a moment, neither of them spoke as a comfortable silence fell. The hearth fire cracked once and sank lower. Somewhere overhead, a door shut, then another. The footmen were locking up.
That was when Tim realized the time. It was late, past seven, maybe. He paled. Nearly two hours had passed since he’d left his post, and the steward would know it by morning. Unless he wanted a beating, he needed to leave now.
He shoved the stool back so hard it toppled, clattering to the floor. He flinched.
“I— I have to go, Master Dick. There’s still the washing, and the sheets need—”
“Sit down.”
Two words stopped him cold.
His voice gentled. “Please. Just a little longer.”
Tim righted the stool and sat back down.
Dick dragged a hand down his face. Up close, Tim could see how tired he was. Dark shadows sat under his eyes, his shirt was creased, and a pale stain on his shoulder looked a lot like spit-up.
“Tell me something, then,” he said. “How does a laundry boy know more about babies than three wet nurses?”