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We need to talk. Would you be a dear and come down to the loop? As soon as possible.
Sincerely, Mrs E. Avocet
The notes had landed at Balenciaga Wren's doorstep with one of her peculiar pigeons, and she had not been late to react. If there was one thing she knew, it was that when someone sent you a letter like that, you better hurry.
Once at Miss Bunting & Avocet's Academy for Ymbrynes, Balenciaga finds Rosemary Bunting greeting her at the door. Just looking at the woman, she can tell that something is more wrong than she thought. The older woman's face carries a look of pity, her lips pulling upwards in a half-smile to try and negate her worries.
"Esmeralda is in her study, why don't you go talk to her?" Miss Bunting speaks softly, her hands stroking Balenciaga's arms and back. Trying to comfort, even though she doesn't seem to know how.
"Won't you tell me what it is about?" Balenciaga counters, curious and frightened all at the same time. "The letter was most unspecific."
Rosemary's face sink, a gentle frown replacing the earlier half-smile. "It's about Althea." She says quietly, bracing herself for how her sister Ymbryne will react.
Balenciaga swears. Quietly, but not quietly enough for Rosemary not to frown deeper at the exclamation.
"She loves you, dear." Miss Bunting informed steadily. "You're her hero, the one who saved her life." She reminds her, as though it will make a difference to the other woman.
Balenciaga shook her head. "I'm not good with children." She informed her sister Ymbryne firmly.
In response, the older woman simply sighed. "And never have been. I know, I know." It was not the first time this conversation had been had, and both parties doubted it would be the last.
Without saying any more, Balenciaga happily moved on to Esmeralda Avocet's office, carefully pushing the door open and slipping inside, before closing it again.
"You wanted to talk to me?"
She smiles at the woman that sits in the chair by the desk, filling out endless forms of paperwork that came with being a headmistress and council member.
"Oh, Balenciaga." When Esmeralda looked up, she smiled, pushing the papers aside and focusing on her old friend. "Thank you for coming so quickly. I assume Rosemary already informed you, that this pertains to Althea?" She asks.
Balenciaga nodded, knowing the question hardly needed an answer. "Quite. And I explained to her that this is starting to drag on. I do not deal with peculiar children, Esmeralda. Star struck as Althea may be, I'm animals only for a reason." She insisted.
Time and time again, for going on a year since she rescued the poor child, Miss Avocet had continued to summon her. And despite the dangers of travelling these days, with the Wights winning more and more ground, she had attended each time.
It was as though she expected something different. But the same thing always greeted her. The little girl, running straight imto her embrace and holding on tight. With endless questions and overly loving touches, she frightened Balenciaga to no end.
She did not want her and felt, at last, that she had to put her foot down. Her heart would not bare to go on this way.
Something serious filled Miss Avocet's features, much the same way it had Miss Bunting, at her angry rant. "Balenciaga, you will want to care! And not only for how fond she has become of you... though you certainly made an impression on her." She speaks softly, trying to persuade the woman to change her mind much like her partner had moments before. "You will want to love her."
"God knows why." Balenciaga counters, only speaking more harshly in reply. "She is sweet, sure, but I only had care of her for a few days. You are her carers now." She sighed deeply, leaning back in her chair. The girl and her feelings for Balenciaga was an enigma, and she could not figure it out.
"Balenciaga, do remember when we first found you?" Miss Avocet change the subject suddenly, her voice hard as steel.
Something was horribly wrong, but she wasn't coming out with it. Frustrating as the old woman was, she insisted on speaking in riddles that noone ever understood.
At least Balenciaga didn't.
Upset, she glared at her old mentor. "I remember when Rosemary did, via Bonnie. What in the world has gotten into you? You look as though someone died!"
"What happened with your daughter?" Miss Avocet spits it out at last, Balenciaga's own impatiens having flared her fragile temperament. "Tell me, Balenciaga, what did you do with your family?"
The question shocks the younger woman. It also comes with an immediate emotional backlash, tears welling up in her troubled eyes as she started to speak. "I don't know, Esmeralda. I really don't! I abandoned her to be here. She is wherever my husband took her." She swallows, trying to push back the fresh tears that come as she finish answering the cruel question.
It was a choice she made, and she stood by it, but the memories of her sacrifice could still make her choke. The guilt of being so cruel only left her when she could forget about it all together, and for that reason alone, she did not take care of children.
If she did, her own emotions would cause her to drown.
Miss Avocet shakes her head slowly. It was not what she had been going for, and her frustrations at not reaching out made her blind to her sister Ymbryne's emotional turmoil. "Don't you see something you recognize?" She asks, leaning forward to stare Balenciaga down. "In Althea?"
She is not sure what Esmeralda is actually referring to, but having once been reminded of her daughter, it is where Balenciaga's thoughts wander. She doesn't do it often, but when she concentrate she recalls the long, wavy hair - so much like her own - and the tiny set mouth and hard gray eyes, both traits belonging to her former husband.
She remembered all those things of the child she carried, and she likewise saw all those things in tiny Althea.
"Miss Avocet, has grandma co..."
The door opens without the guest knocking first, and suddenly there she is. Althea, with her wavy ginger hair laying like a blanket over her shoulders and chest, the edges of her dress swishing around bare feet as she walked.
She swallows the rest of her sentence, and draws back, trying to disappear before either Ymbryne can catch her.
"Althea!" Miss Avocet calls for her. "Whatever have you done with your socks and shoes, girl?"
The girl tense, then relax, the question obviously another than she had expected. "I forgot about them." She said shyly, looking down at her naked toes.
"Then go get them at once!" Miss Avocet snapped, her sharp command chasing the young girl out of the room before she has time to ask a second time. Like anyone else who had ever been under Miss Avocet's tutelage, she knew not to let the woman wait.
Watching her go, Balenciaga sighed obce more. Her heart ache, and it's hard to breath. "You could be kinder." She told the older woman softly, for once taking the child in defense. "She is only a child. Now, will you please tell me what this is all about? What has the girl done."
Miss Avocet shook her head. "I'm raising a proper woman." She insisted proudly. Then, her face returned to that pitying, pained state that held the secret Balenciaga wished to know. "I called you here because I proved Althea's lineage at last. I thought the girl might be mistaken...but now, I can say it surely. She is yours, Balenciaga!"
The words are surprising, and Balenciaga jumps out of her chair in shock and anger. In a matter of seconds, her brain has already understood, while her heart struggles to catch up.
"Esmeralda, what…" She falters, then tries again. "Esmeralda, it can't be! She's not Beatrice. She is not my daughter!" She says, her daughter's name rolling off her tongue as tears roll down her cheeks.
"No I'm not. Beatrice was my mother."
Miss Avocet gasps, and Balenciaga doesn't even have to turn around to know her mistake. She had, in her anger and upset, made the most fundemental error. She had spoken without thinking, not expecting the girl to return without knocking.
Slowly, she turns around, speaking straight to the little girl . "How...how long have you known?" She asks, coughing as her voice refuses to cooperate. "Did you know?"
The girl blush, and nods. "Since I saw you transform. Mama always said you were a bird. A beautiful, tiny brown bird. A Wren." She explained, excited. "She used to tell me you'd gone to be with the other birds, in the place where birds live."
Balenciaga got the acute feeling that she couldn't breath. No air entered her lungs, no matter how hard she tried to force it into them. Such a sweet child, all she had wanted for the past year...was her grandmother. "Beatrice was peculiar." It's a statement, but she phrases it like a question, because she doesn't know.
Most peculiar children did not start to exhibit signs of peculiar powers until they were right around four years old, and her daughter had still not been near that age when she left her. Certainly, Balenciaga had never noticed anything peculiar about the little baby.
It didn't mean, however, that she hadn't wondered since.
"Mama could do things like me. She would bring down my fevers with a touch of a finger on my head." Althea continued to explain, bravely taking her grandmother's hand and starting to freeze it. They both observed in fascination as the ice started to spread up over her bony fingers and covering the back of her hand. "Like this. Like I can do." When the hand is encased, she stops the ice from spreading further, letting go to allow her grandmother to inspect the work.
Balenciaga looked at her heavy, frozen hand, and swallows. "What happened to Beatrice?" She asks, looking back at Miss Avocet. It was a question that she needed answered, but it was not fair to pose it to the girl herself. "How did Althea end up in Miss Hawk's old loop?"
Miss Avocet came up to Balenciaga, putting a hand on her arm. "Perhaps this is not a discussion for three?" She suggests quietly, nodding her head to Althea.
Althea frown, looking down at her now shoe clad feet in sorrow. She shakes her head, but her demeanor shows she doesn't think it'll make a difference.
"Oh, no, don't look like that." Surprisingly, Balenciaga feels for the girl. She bends down in front of her, lifting her head so their eyes can meet. "I will see you when me and Esmeralda have talked, okay? Wait outside, and I swear I'll come to see you when we are done talking." She promises, her voice sugar sweet.
The girl peered at her with doubtful eyes. Their grey color gave them a sense of severity at odds with her age. "You won't go? Like you went when Mama was sleeping. You said you'd be back, but you went to be with other birds instead." She peers over at Miss Avocet, and Balenciaga's heart clenches.
"I promise." She insists, holding on tight to the girl's hand as she leads her out of the room, closing the door behind her. Sighing, her head rest against the warm wood. "I'll be back." She promises as the girl is barred off from her.
"Beatrice is dead." Once alone, Miss Avocet doesn't mince words. She never knew how, anyhow. "I suspect you already figured out as much, but she died. A house fire."
"Coincidence I suppose?" Miss Wren question. With an innate ability for ice and cold, being burnt alive would be an unusually painful way of dying, and she doesn't want to believe it to have been on purpose.
"There was no Wights involved at least. She still had her eyes when the body was found." Miss Avocet replied, shrugging. "It seems more likely a suicide. She'd turned over her daughter to Miss Hawk only days earlier. Fearing she'd no longer be able to keep her safe, as her powers had started to manifest." She puts an arm around her sister, pulling her close as Balenciaga begins to sob helplessly. She closes her own eyes, the sounds of her sisters cries cutting at her heart. "She was offered refuge, too, but refused."
Balenciaga couldn't keep her emotions at bay. She felt weak at the knees hearing this, and naturally she blamed herself. What would Beatrice had thought, if she could've seen her? First she left her - all alone with a man who did not know how to cook his own dinner, much less look after a two year old little girl. Then, when the second chance came, she had spent a year refusing her granddaughter. Every attempt to approche, every time that girl had only wished from the attention of a woman who was supposed to love her.
She had always rejected her in the end - Rejected her, because she did not deal with children. Because she couldn't stand to repeat the mistake, that she had comitted the day she birthed her own daughter.
For Ymbrynes, attachments were dangerous - they were in their nature, yet it risked bringing them down. In these days, with Wights and Hollows sniffing up their skirts, it might even be lethal.
She remembered Althea standing there in the remains of the ruined house, the bodies of her fellow peculiars and Ymbryne strewn across the floors around her.
"Have you come to take care of me?"
When she opens the door out into the corridor again after her conversation with Esmeralda, Althea poses the same question that she had that awful night. Again, Balenciaga shakes her head, but this time it is different.
"I don't care for children. Only animals. But you like them, don't you?" She asks, looking straight into her eyes and smiling slightly.
Althea nods her head, her eyes sparkling. "I do! I love when you tell me about all the weird, peculiar animals in the world. And Miss Bunting let me read her books about them." She says proudly, and her lips pull upwards also. "We're not allowed to borrow from their personal library normally...only if we ask and they pick them out."
Balnciaga nodded. "Well then, Althea, how would you like…" She paused, unsure how to formulate the proposition. "How would you like to be grandma's protege? One day someone will need to take over my menagerie loop. Care for the animals. Someone I can trust with all my heart to do the right thing. Who better than you?" She suggests.
The girl's eyes open wide, shocked, but she is soon grinning. "Oh grandma! I'd love to!" She exclaims, hugging her tight around the waist. "Thank you!"
Balenciaga smile, hugging her back. For once, her heart didn't ache at the touch. "You will need to stay here with Miss Avocet. But I will come every so often to see you...just like I've done this past year." She assured the girl as her face fell. "And in between, I will make sure you follow a special curriculum with the Ymbrynes." She explained. "How does that sound?"
"It sounds like a lot of fun." The girl said, her response measured. Seemingly, she may have expected more.
Balenciaga sighed. She was rusty at the game, and needed to dust off her abilities soon if she wanted this to be a success.
Gently, she sat down on her knees so that she'd be the same height as Althea. "Althea, love, look at me." The pet name does wonders, and she stares straight at those big, light eyes. "I would never let another peculiar or Ymbryne out there close to my animals. I don't trust them with what I love the most." She grips her hands, holding on tight to the small fists. "The only one I would ever trust, would be my own flesh."
Althea burst into tears. She threw herself around Balcneciaga's neck, holding on tight and crying quietly against her shoulder.
"I love you grandma." She whispered, resting against the older woman.
Balenciaga held her tight, gently slipping an arm under her legs to pick her up.
"Love you too, Althea."