1306 - When Lightning Strikes Twice...
Author's note: This year was a particularly hard one for the Chapmans, it's just how the challenge rolls went! Doing a pre CW to say that the second half of the chapter gets very dark, proceed with caution.
All was peaceful in the Chapman home during the dark winter months. The young parents kept their five thriving children warm in their stone bungalow and gave them lots of love and attention as they waited out the harsh weather that brewed outdoors.
With each child growing fast Byrhtnoth had to get his hammer and axe out once again and build a few more cots for his toddlers. They had placed four handcrafted wooden cribs near the fireplace beneath the parent's room and also used up any leftover stone to create a new wall to separate the baby room with Pipa's new bedroom. The pair started to feel cramped in their home again and knew they would remodel their home in the warm months so Byrhtnoth made sure to make the partition wall temporary.
Pipa's room was small and featured the ladder up to her parent's bedroom but privacy wasn't exactly necessary in times like these, for all they knew the closer they were to each other the better! They used up their reserved hay for their horse to make a mattress and some plucked chicken feathers to make a soft pillow for Pipa to rest on. A thin linen curtain closed her room off from her younger sisters' room but unfortunately didn't block out any noise whatsoever.
It is in these moments that Pipa would hear the cries from her siblings quicker than her parents and she would awake and see if she could help them. Most mornings, or nights, it was just that they woke up and wanted to wander around the bungalow but other times they were hungry so Pipa had to go wake her mother so she could breastfeed them.
Although it had started to become a little stale the family tried to savour the homemade honey cake that Olyff baked for Pipa's fifth birthday. They didn't know when they would have the privilege of experiencing another delicacy like that again so they indulged for as long as they possibly could.
The winter ended quickly as the frosty weather turned to rain and hard downpours began throughout the first half of the year. It wasn't all bad as there was less work to do with the farm's crops but Olyff still worried that they would flood over, yielding no food for the year.
Pipa was the only one with no anxiety towards the weather as she would sneak off when her mother was at work in the garden and splash around the big puddles that pooled near the river bank not far from home. She got away with it for a good month before Olyff scolded her and complained she could come down with a serious illness but deep down she understood she was still a child, she will be doing childish things!
The family kept their spirits high regardless and Olyff continued to teach her eldest daughter how to manage different chores around the farm. It was now Pipa's responsibility to feed the chickens, cows and horse and collect the eggs every morning which she found entertaining, often playing around with the baby chicks for a few minutes before heading back home with her yield of eggs.
Although she was still far too young to ride Beauty, their family horse, she was curious to get closer to it and learn its behaviours. In the evenings when Byrhtnoth would arrive home after a day of fishing he would ask Pipa to help with brushing the dust off of Beauty and sometimes even clean her hooves if she wasn't too tired. Pipa's parents always showered her with words of encouragement as she really was a great help on the farm.
With Pipa's involvement in the farm's duties Byrhtnoth was far more at ease to begin travelling on fishing trips for several days especially the closer they got to the summer months. He found himself in unique and stunning locations that were just on the outskirts of Praaven, with one particular location being a flooded field with a stone henge protruding from the center. Pipa was excited to hear about his travels when he came home but it was Linyeve who took the most interest to his fishing tales.
It was in the summer months that all of their girls began to have their growth spurts and start acting even more independent. Linyeve was excited to keep up conversations with her family now and Eddida was very close in skill alongside her sister. Teffan was highly influenced by her sisters to learn to speak fast and stuck to their side anywhere they went. And baby Mabel was a sleepy one but she continued to reach all her milestones with ease.
With the continuous chaos that ensued at the Chapman stead Olyff completely missed the first signs of pregnancy as she was always in motion taking care of her children and the home. She was unsure when she would be due now but she could feel her belly grow and some sensitivities reemerge, although they weren't as strong as they used to be.
Perhaps my body has gotten used to pregnancy now, she thought as she looked at her multiple children crawl around the bungalow.
To their surprise the rain stopped for a full month and prevented their crops from flooding over. Olyff couldn't help but feel her prayers to The Watcher answered but now a new problem arose, gathering more water from the river or village well for their crops to stay hydrated. Byrhtnoth tried to solve this problem in between his fishing trips but still Olyff sometimes had to trust Pipa to watch the children when she made the quick trip herself while she was early into her pregnancy.
But Olyff's belly grew fast as summer was coming to a close and she felt more anxious than ever to when the baby would be due... how did she miss the first signs so easily? Nevertheless she was endlessly proud of Pipa for being a big help around the home.
One time they gathered at the basins outside and spoke as they worked away, Pipa washing the dishes and Olyff the clothes.
"Need any help there, sweetheart?" asked Olyff.
"No mam, it's just dishes I'm washing," giggled Pipa, surprised by her question. "But thank you. I seriously don't mind doing more chores if you need, I know my sisters are a lot to handle."
"Oh no, don't worry about that dear," answered Olyff as she shook her head, "you have been doing plenty around the home and also minding your sisters when I'm away. You're simply the best daughter I could ever have, and the best big sister too!" Pipa smiled with pride to herself after hearing that.
As she finished washing the dishes she started drying them and sitting near her mother. She suddenly asked, "mam, what does it feel like to be pregnant?"
Olyff was taken aback by her question and stopped scrubbing the clothes in the basin for a few seconds before replying, "it's not something you have to worry about for at least ten more years, honey."
"I know but doesn't it feel... strange? That's a baby growing inside of your belly... how does it work?" She pondered with a puzzled expression, confused by the miracle of life.
"Trust me honey, if I knew the details to that I'd share it with you... that's why it's called a miracle and we only have The Watcher to thank for it," responded Olyff wisely. Pipa looked up to the darkening sky skeptically, The Watcher is something her parents occasionally talk about but they never really explained it to her. What is this mystical being that... watches her?
But that thought was for another time as Olyff handed her some cleaned clothes and asked her to bring them in and hang them near the fire and to also check on her sisters.
The sun started to set earlier and earlier every day and it seemed that Praaven was soon to step into the autumn months. Olyff's belly continued to grow but still seemed too small to guarantee a birth soon. But one thing for sure was that her late pregnancy exhaustion was setting in and Pipa had to do most of the care for her sisters, leaving Olyff to only clean and feed her babies.
One evening after Byrhtnoth was home after a week long fishing trip he ate a hearty bowl of fish stew while his wife bathed in the bath near the fire. They struck up a conversation with Byrhtnoth reminiscing on his adventures,
"There was a magnificent river I found in the middle of a thick forest that yielded a bountiful amount of fish! I stayed there for several days and it almost seemed to be unoccupied territory, I didn't meet a single soul during my stay there." He chewed through his spoonful before declaring, "I made a hefty amount of coin my dear, so much that I decided to finally purchase us a plot of land across from ours for farming!"
Olyff stopped scrubbing her body and looked at him with disbelief. "And what about consulting with your wife beforehand?" she half joked.
"Ah, I know I know, it was a rash decision, but my love... we have more land to grow crops on! This will only guarantee us more coin in the long term!" he beamed. Olyff relaxed back into the tub but still wrinkled her nose in displeasure.
"I applaud your efforts but weren't we thinking of doing construction to the home?" she questioned, trying to not worry for the near future as she rubbed her pregnant belly under the water.
"I have several contacts that will supply us with materials and if I get a chance to go back to that same river perhaps we would have the funds to hire an extra set of hands to build alongside me!" reasoned Byrhtnoth.
"Oh, you tradesman," smiled Olyff as she playfully rolled her eyes. "Thank you for always looking out for us, my dear."
"Always and forever," responded Byrhtnoth before rising to clean up his bowl and kissing Olyff on her wet forehead before heading to the basin.
CW: Difficult Labor, Miscarriage.
That same night when Olyff slept close to her husband after one of his week long fishing trips she felt an intense shooting pain in her lower abdomen. As she recoiled in shock she assessed the situation and realised this was no simple contraction. For the first time ever true and honest panic set in. She shook her husband awake fast and even between the sleep in his eyes, once he saw his wife's bewildered face, he shot straight up out of bed.
He began to ask her many questions, he was as new to a difficult labor like this as she was. Olyff's pain was so bad that her legs buckled underneath her and she planted herself back on the bed. Byrhtnoth assured her that she should continue to breathe through her contractions while he fetched warm water and clean linens.
On his way down the ladder he heard Pipa stir in her bed and she asked in a sleepy voice, "is the baby coming?"
"It seems so, yes," answered her father in a hasty tone. She began to realise something wasn't quite right.
"Dad..?" Her voice trailed off as she saw his hands shake as he collected everything he needed for the labor. She decided it was best for her to not get involved and instead mind her siblings until the news of a new baby broke out from her parents.
The labor was once again fast but unlike any other Olyff had before. She groaned and tried to stifle her screams but some pains were as if a demon was grasping at her insides and trying to rip them out and her agonised voice echoed against the stone bungalow walls. Blood unfortunately stained the linens around her and she grew faint but in the end a baby boy emerged.
Byrtnoth delivered the newborn and watched his wife slump back in their bed from exhaustion, breathing very heavily. He tried to clean off his new baby boy but couldn't help but stop once the baby never made a sound. He examined his child and tried to get a reaction from it but was met with only silence.
Olyff raised her head and slurred a question, "how is he? Why isn't he crying?"
The realisation hit Byrhtnoth first... their son was a stillborn. Tears welled in his eyes as he turned around and looked at his blood stained wife, the mother to all his healthy children. He felt cursed, things were going so well for them, why did this happen?
"Oh no..." Olyff's face went white, "Please, oh Watcher, don't let it be so." She collapsed back in bed and covered her face with her hands and began to uncontrollably sob. Her husband watched the scene as if he was watching from above, observing through The Watcher's eyes. He could not bare to stand idle and wrapped their sleeping child in linens and set him down on his side of the bed.
He crouched near Olyff and began to make a shh noise and comfort her in between his own tears. Eventually she finally revealed her face to him and their sad eyes met, twinning in the shock of what they had just gone through.
"Let me clean you up," Byrhtnoth whispered while choking back further tears and he began soaking any clean fabric that was left in water and gently stroking his wife's red skin. Her bleeding had thankfully stopped once the baby was out in the world, only a mess was left.
As Olyff was being cleaned by her husband she turned her head to stare at her child born asleep. He lay so still and small it was surreal, a sight that no mother should see. She felt like she stopped breathing and could only feel hot tears roll down her face and onto the pillow underneath her. She couldn't take her eyes away from her son even when her husband tried to speak to her that he would fetch a small box to lay him in for the night.
Pipa didn't dare ask any questions when she saw her father's red eyes when he emerged downstairs. Although she didn't fully understand how bad the scene was she knew something bad had happened among her mother's painful screams. It made her afraid of growing up and going through the same ordeal, being thankful in that moment that she was only five years old. She watched her siblings for a little while longer before retreating back to her bed and trying to block out the sound of her mother crying above her.
As Byrhtnoth picked up their stillborn child Olyff shouted a desperate "no!" and grabbed her husband's arm to stop him. He flinched but still held their child with soft hands, waiting for his wife's next move.
"I want to give him a name before we say goodbye," she spoke with a broken voice. Her husband nodded in agreement.
"He would have been Eawulf... a strong and noble name." Olyff's mouth curled to a smile and she kissed one of his small hands goodbye, sitting up in bed preparing to change into a new nightgown. Byrhtnoth placed their child into a small crate and looked at him for a minute or so before saying his own goodbyes and placing the lid on top.
Once he rose up he turned to see his wife standing aimlessly in the middle of the room, donned in clean clothing now. Once their eyes met he rushed to her and held her tight and didn't let go. Olyff felt like she melted in his arms and let out sobs filled with grief, she just faced one of her worst fears and somehow made it out alive but she could feel a part of her had died alongside her child. She doesn't know how long she cried but eventually the pair fell back into bed and drifted into the night.
CW OVER.
The loss of their son took a toll on the parents as the autumn leaves began to fall from the trees surrounding the countryside. For a while Olyff would find herself crying at any sudden moment but especially most often after caring for her youngest daughter, Mabel. She wasn't a newborn anymore but she was still the youngest out of all of her children.
Grief also stopped any kind of intimacy between the pair and Byrhtnoth found it easier to travel on fishing trips during his loss. He didn't stay too much in his head though as he filled out his promise to his wife and finalised agreements on materials and labor to rebuild their home. The only time after the first month of the passing of Eawulf where he and his wife would interact was when they planned how they wanted their home to be built.
As Olyff spent all her time caring for her remaining children and with the harvest of their crops almost finished Pipa wanted to contribute to the family funds a little bit. In her time learning to cook as she grew up she learned how to make simple biscuits and pastries over the fire and she walked to the Sunday market in the village every week to sell what she could, making quite enough to give coin to her parents and to afford a treat here and there.
When the trees were almost fully bare and the golden leaves turned brown they began their quick remodeling of their abode. Winter was around the corner but the future felt too uncertain and they wanted to guarantee enough space for everyone in the home during snowfall so Byrhtnoth and two more men from Lughaven began to break down some walls and extend new ones.
In moments when the bedrooms of the bungalow were broken down and uninhabitable the family moved into the small shack that was built on the farm across the road. It was close quarters those nights but the proximity kept them close and warm.
Mabel had reached her first birthday in the middle of construction and her hair became wild and untamable. Olyff remembered her mother having similar hair so it was half a challenge for her to maintain. She still felt quite disconnected from her children and husband as she processed her grief.
CW: Infant death.
It was probably in these dissociated moments when Olyff failed to notice Mabel's declining health. Pipa was the first to notice that Mabel felt lighter and skinnier and she didn't cry as much or want to play like her other sisters. When met with this information Olyff felt nothing. A part of her knew that was wrong but it felt like her soul was already shredded apart from another death, how was she meant to understand this situation?
The renovation came to a close and once they fully moved back into their large bungalow all Mabel did was sleep. Olyff foolishly tried to feed her youngest but Mabel refused anything at all and it was only once her mother held her close did she give up and draw her last breath.
As soon as Olyff felt her youngest daughter go limp in her arms did the realisation set in and a sudden rush of grief washed over her once again. She pulled her daughter away from her and watched her pale lifeless skin before her eyes.
I don't deserve to be a mother, she thought in still silence, I killed my own child from neglect.
It was perfect timing for Byrhtnoth to step into their bedroom after bathing the remnants of construction away. He felt like the air in the room was stiff and uncanny and only when he saw his wife's expression did he understand what happened. He hurried over to her side and put his hand under Mabel's limp head.
"Sh-she just-" Olyff choked.
"No need to speak," snapped Byrhtnoth, trying to prevent his voice from shaking. "What's done is done and it wasn't your fault."
He met Olyff's gaze and her eyes said a thousand words. She looked at him like he was lying to her, manipulating her, calling her crazy, a witch, a curse. But he met her back with sympathy and sorrow, he was just defeated with another loss in one year and he didn't want to argue this death.
Byrhtnoth gently took Mabel into his arms and placed her back into the crib that stood not too far from their bed. Olyff watched in frozen horror, emotions of all kinds building up in her chest.
"She has been laid to sleep for tonight," he confirmed as he gazed down upon his youngest. "She did not die tonight. Tomorrow we will deal with it." His legs led him to bed and he changed into his night tunic before pulling back the blanket and laying down.
Olyff watched him until he lay comfortably and then looked back at her child beside her. Disbelief, that is the emotion she finally landed on. Her husband wasn't far from the truth, Mabel truly did look like she was deep in slumber, only a little more pale than she was a few months ago. There was nothing she could do so she prepared for bed also and lay down near her husband.
CW OVER.
It had been months since she shared a kiss, hug or a loving moment with her husband and they both knew it wasn't because they fell out of love, they both had to process their grief in their own ways and unfortunately that meant they had to be isolated from each other. As the pair lay in silence, with only the quiet breeze blowing in through their window, Olyff felt her hand move on its own and find her husband's.
He didn't react, he just let her hold it and lay in that moment. It was the first bit of affection in months, it didn't feel fully right but they let it happen. The longer the parents processed what had happened that night the less they wanted to sleep. They simultaneously moved their heads to look at each other in the dark, only the dim flickering light from a candle illuminated their dark features. Neither of them wanted to talk but they suddenly wanted to be there for each other.
Byrhtnoth squeezed Olyff's hand, she squeezed back. She rolled towards her husband and lay her head on his chest, closing her eyes and listening to a new noise that pierced her ears. The low thumping of her husband's heartbeat shook the small tears out of her eyes and down onto his tunic. They still didn't want to talk, they just drifted off to sleep.
They didn't sleep much that night and when Olyff awoke it was still dark outside. As she lay in stillness she heard the light pitter patter of rain on their straw roof above them and reality began to sink in again. As the room came into focus again she sharply sat up to look towards the crib with Mabel in it and saw her husband crouched beside it.
CW: Burial planning, grief.
Olyff hugged her knees and met the gaze of Byrhtnoth, still not knowing whether she should say anything. He broke the silence first,
"I think we should bury her near our local church," he said softly, loud enough so she could hear but not enough to wake the children downstairs. Olyff nodded, he continued.
"We have some coin to spare, materials for the home ended up a little cheaper than expected. Perhaps we can place Cyneswith and Eawulf near Mabel too."
Oh my, Cyneswith, thought Olyff to herself as her heart sank into her stomach. It felt like an eternity since she was mentioned in the home. She began to bite her lip to try not to cry, she knew she would explode in a fit of grief once again but her husband knows her better than that. He rose up and kept his eyes on his wife, she bit her lip harder before she felt like she could draw blood.
He was standing by the bed now and she looked up at him, he looked blurry through the tears that flooded her eyes. Olyff couldn't aim herself perfectly into her husbands arms but he caught her nonetheless. She buried her head into Byrhtnoth's shoulder and let out a silent scream, she felt as if the grief from the three of her dead children welled up deep in her heart and she was going to spontaneously combust.
Byrhtnoth whispered into his wife's bushy hair as he comforted her,
"It is not your fault they have passed nor it is mine. The Watcher has a plan for all of this, we cannot do anything but try our best." The last line felt more of a comfort to himself than it was for her but he tightened his arms around Olyff's waist as he said,
"I've missed you so much Olyff."
They were a mess. Their hair tangled between each other and their fingers gripped into one another's clothes. All they were were a stifle of grief and pain but they were together again.
"I've missed you to Byrhtnoth," cried Olyff, her voice only a whistling tone. "So, so, so much."
CW OVER.
Author's note: Phew. 1306 is over. Good job to anyone who finished reading this chapter in full, it was tough to type but I really wanted to express the anguish and grief people would feel during this time. I can promise you that 1307 won't be this tough to get through!
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