Maribel’s hand stilled upon her teacup. Across the vast length of the table, Thaddeus sat frozen—his fork suspended halfway to his mouth, his grey eyes fixed upon Oliver with an expression that might have been carved from stone.
Oliver remained oblivious to the tension his words had wrought. He simply continued arranging his porridge into small mountains. “Only Thomas said his papa taught him to whittle soldiers from wood, and I thought perhaps my papa might have done something like that. With me.” He looked up, those brown eyes—so achingly like Margaret’s—bright with innocent curiosity. “Did he?”
The fork lowered. Maribel watched Thaddeus’s throat work, watched the careful mask of his composure crack along its edges as he searched for words that would not come.
“Your father,” Thaddeus began, his voice emerging rougher than usual, “was a man of many interests.”
“But did he like soldiers? The wooden kind, I mean. Or the painted ones like I have?”
The silence stretched. Maribel could hear the clock upon the mantelpiece marking each painful second, could feel the weight of Thaddeus’s struggle pressing against the very air of the room.
“He was a soldier himself,” Thaddeus said at last. “A real one. He served with me in Portugal.”
“A real soldier?” Oliver’s eyes went wide. “With a sword and everything?”
“Yes.” The word seemed to cost Thaddeus something. His knuckles had gone white around his fork, and his shoulders stiffened. “With a sword and everything.”
Oliver’s eyes widened and he opened his mouth—clearly intending to ask more questions. Maribel set down her teacup, preparing to intervene, but Thaddeus was already rising from his chair. The movement was too swift, too sharp—the motion of a man fleeing rather than departing.
“I have business to attend to.” His voice was cold, though there was something suspicious in the way he pinched the bridge of his nose. “If you will excuse me.”
He was gone before Oliver could respond, his footsteps echoing down the corridor with the measured precision of a military retreat. The breakfast room felt suddenly too large, too quiet, filled with the ghost of a conversation that had ended before it properly began.
Oliver stared at the empty doorway, his small face creased with confusion. “Did I say something wrong?”
The ache in Maribel’s chest sharpened to something almost unbearable. She rose from her own chair and crossed to kneel beside him, taking his small hands in hers.
“No, sweetheart. You said nothing wrong.”
“Then why did he leave? He always leaves.” Oliver’s lower lip trembled, though he fought valiantly to still it. “Whenever I ask about Papa, he goes away. Does he not like talking about him?”
Maribel smoothed the hair from his forehead, searching for words that would explain without wounding. “Your papa and His Grace were very close. The closest of friends—brothers, almost, though not by blood. When we lose someone we love that much...” She paused as she thought of her sister, the grief nearly overwhelming her too. “It hurts to speak about them sometimes… because we miss them so much.”
“Like how you get sad when you talk about Mama?”
She swallowed down the flash of pain that coursed through her at the innocent question.
“Yes,” Maribel whispered. “Exactly like that.”
Oliver considered this with a frown that would have bordered on petulant had it not been for his tender age. He was quiet for a while, then looked up at her. “But you still talk about her. Even when it makes you sad.”
“I do. Because I think it’s important for you to know her. To remember her, even though you were so young when...” The words caught. She steadied herself. “She loved you so much, Oliver. More than anything in this world. And your papa loved you too.”
The corners of Oliver’s mouth dropped as he looked at her. “Sometimes at night… I try to remember them, but I can’t.”
Maribel pulled her closer, tears forming in her own eyes. “Oh, my sweet boy. That doesn’t mean that you didn’t love them enough, or that you’ll forget them entirely. And I promise… I will try my best to keep their memories alive for you.”
Oliver leaned into her embrace, his small body warm against hers.
“Thank you, Maribel,” he whispered. “So you mean you will tell me more stories? About Papa and Mama?”
“As many as you want. Whenever you want to hear them.”
“Promise?”
“I promise.”
This seemed to settle him down, and Maribel marched him up to his nursery. Though she read him stories like always and watched with a tender smile as he played with his wooden soldiers, Maribel could not get the thought of Thaddeus’s barely-covered heartache out of her mind.
