I was awoken by pains in the morning that cramped from my lower abdomen rolling down my thighs. The pains weren’t particularly close together but when I went through the third bout I decided to wake Philip. He was groggy and at first tried to dismiss me but I wasn’t about to give up so readily. “Philip, Philip, please. I don’t know what to do. What shall I do?”
“I will go get the palace doctor and Comtesse DeGeneres,” he grumbled before rolling out of bed. Pushing myself into a sitting position and resting my hand on my stomach, I flung prayer after prayer up to the Mother Mary.
Chaney barrelled in when Philip was gone, I told her what was happening. “I think it is time, Your Highness.” She had smiled, drawing back the curtains permitting the early traces of dawn to spill into the room. Chaney was just leaving when Philip came back a little het up, snapping, demanding to know what she was still doing lingering in our chamber.
She practically dropped to the floor, “Beg your pardon Your Majesty.” She hurried out where the doctor and Comtesse DeGeneres rushed in taking her place.
Some of the Dauphin’s man servants came and got him dressed appropriately while the doctor checked that I was alright. “Yes,” he nodded standing up straight, “I do believe that the time is upon us. We will have a new little royal in a short time.”
The Comtesse dashed off to inform the King, Queen, other royals and courtiers and all too soon the room was becoming awfully crowded. Philip stood as close as he was permitted, shifting around restlessly, fidgeting more each time a contraction hit me. When the King made his entrance everyone dropped to the floor before getting up, chattering away, fanning themselves, cracking jokes and hoping for a boy.
It was a fairly long labor that stretched on past the morning well into the afternoon before my waters broke and everything began to gain momentum. The contractions became more frequent with less time and as a midwife dabbed at my brow I wanted to cry. I was scared, not knowing what to expect and in a lot of rolling pain that was much more than when I had lost the my first baby. It just kept coming on and on, in a relentless kind of way. I hated how I had become some kind of spectacle with the courtiers and everyone staring, waiting and gossiping about me as I lay on a bed trying to give birth. “When you feel the urge to push, Your Highness, I would like you to do so. Follow your body.” The doctor told me calmly so during the next contraction I pushed down as arduously as I could. Cool water was constantly dabbed at my brow.
“Josepha,” I whimpered quietly as the contraction ceased and I was provided three seconds of practically no pain. The agony was almost delirious it became too much.
Catching a glimpse of Philip I saw that his forehead was creased in concern as he tried to make eye contact with me. He gave a flickering smile of support but that was about all he could do. My face scrunched up in pain and concentration when I next pushed, this guttural moan escaping from between my lips. It was quite unlike me. “Good girl,” the doctor muttered as he stared up my shift with an expression of utter attentiveness and professionalism. “You’re going to have to keep pushing the next time, ok? I want you to try and breathe while you do it.” I listened and a long, quiet noise groaned from the back of my throat as I tried to breathe and deliver at the same time. “The head!” He announced so that the room became shushed as I kept pushing, finally, he pulled the baby out and I lay there panting, my hair drenched in sweat with my chest heaving from the effort. My body ached and lying there in sweat I felt quite tender.
The doctor tied off the umbilical cord as everyone waited for the announcement of the sex. “Boy!” The room erupted with people cheering and soon I could hear bells chiming and clanging from all over the place. While my baby was cleaned the midwife massaged my stomach for the afterbirth, once delievered was disposed of as well.
I was exhausted, yet positively aching to hold the child that I’d been carrying inside of me for months. He had been taken away to be paraded around the palace while only the King, Dauphin, midwife and doctor stayed. Chaney snuck in beginning opening windows for which I was grateful. Philip clutched my clammy hand in both of his, his eyes shining with tears of joy.
“Congratulations my love,” he beamed, “We have done it, produced a healthy heir that is currently screaming his lungs out with the courtiers.”
I cleared my throat giving a weak smile, “Thank God.”
“You did exquisitely well today.” He patted my forehead appraisingly. “I am so very proud of you…What shall we name our son?”
I was so very tired that we could have called the child Dog and I would not have minded at that moment. “Whatever you so wish, My Lord.”
“The Dauphine is tired,” the midwife jumped in on my behalf, “To avoid her getting an illness it is important that we allow her to rest now.”
The Dauphin nodded, “Of course,” he kissed my forehead, bowed then departed with his father. I closed my eyes as I listened to the sound of the birds chirping outside I fell sound asleep.
******
I was weak but sure on the fast road to recovery two days later as I sat in a rocking chair clutching my little prince in my arms gazing down at his chubby rosy face. “You truly are quite delectable,” I cooed down into his deep brown eyes, tapping the end of his nose making him blink. “Positively adorable.” The Comtesse DeGeneres was clinging to me like a bad odor with the wet nurse lurking on standby as well. I was not permitted to breastfeed my son, it misshaped the breast although I doubt neither the Dauphin or I would have minded but those were the rules I had to abide by.
At the very first sound of the prince’s grumbles he would be snatched out of my arms and stolen away, me watching with a furrowed brow after him. I wrote to Josepha although news had fast spread and she had already been informed. Katherine wrote too which pleased me no end and she said how her twins were learning new words every single day. She said it was “a miracle really seeing as they had such a complicated birth” although she never went into specifics.
Agate arrived the next day in a huge green dress with her fire like hair piled full volume on top of her head and I took her to see the young August. “Oh is he not just divine!” She beamed as I passed her to him.
“You are holding the future King, my friend,” I spoke softly as I grinned down at the baby. “Do be careful.”
“Oh you truly are blessed, Anna.” She clutched him snugly to her where he tried to grasp one of her many bows. “Oui!” She cooed. “Oui, little prince. Appreciating a lady’s dress will get you a great far in this world.”
“In this court especially.” I snorted. “A lot of the courtiers beg to see him but with a smug smile I refuse. It is a small pleasure that I relic in!”
“You are cruel my friend,” she grinned as she pulled faces at my little August. “Why ever do you refuse?” I watched them for a while, softly content in the fact that she was holding my living, breathing baby boy. That her arms shaped around his tiny body and her cooing face focused on him proved that he was real and he truly was mine.
“As if his new mind needs to be tainted by their sour eyes! No, as his mother it is my duty to protect him from as much as I can, those included.”
“Well, I’m glad I passed the test.” Agate laughed, the baby gurgled. Comtesse DeGeneres and the wet nurse rustled from the sidelines. Agate glanced back at them nervously. “What is their problem?”
I sighed, pulling my shawl a little tighter around my shoulders, “They like to take him off of me at every chance they get.”
“You need to rest, Your Majesty.” Comtesse DeGeneres spoke as she swiftly strode over holding her arms out impatiently at Agate who blinked a little resentfully. “The nurse is here to ease the transition into motherhood as easily as possible.” She clicked her tongue at Agate who handed the baby over. He was quickly dumped in the wet nurse’s arms who then hurried off.
“You mean to relieve me of my mothering duties,” I turned to look her in the eye. There was something about giving birth to another life that made a woman feisty about her offspring. All I knew was that his life was the most precious gem in the entire world to me and his innocence was paramount.
“Not at all,” she did not look perturbed, “He will always address you as ‘mama’.”
“And you would do well Comtesse DeGeneres to not refer to our future King merely as ‘he’.” I snarled coldly.
She was flabbergasted but recovered thickly. Living at the court required having thick skin something I was still in the process of growing. “Apologies, Your Majesty.” I just stared until she bobbed her head and left the room.
Agate watched after her, stunned, then turned to grin openly at me. “Well you certainly put her in her place!”
“About time too,” I muttered staring at the closed door a little dreamily. Then I smiled at my friend and grasped her hand in my own. “Do tell me how your children are getting on?”
Her lips tightened, “It is a control thing really.” We sat opposite each other on comfortable armchairs. “They live in another manor while I am to stay in the one nearest to the palace with my husband.” My mouth dropped open in horror for my friend. “I fear I have brought this on myself. I was never particularly discreet about my lovers which to be fair to my husband I did to annoy him…But alas that has horribly backfired on me. My childish ways have actually cost me my children.”
I lent forward, “What would you like me to do, Agate? As Dauphine I must possess some power to get you your children back.”
Her eyes had welled with tears but I could see as she fought to control them. “I have tried threatening him with you-sorry,” she added quickly which I brushed aside immediately, “He says that he is good friends with the King who has higher power than you or the Dauphin. He says the king already knows of my situation and my husband has also said that if you try to get my children back then he’ll ruin you too.”
I blinked in shock and although I wanted to care solely about my dearest friend the threat of ruin concerned me also. “What do you mean? How could he ruin me?”
She sniffed tucking some flyaway hair behind her ear, truly troubled by her situation. But then, I'd learnt that Agate was a very passionate woman, feeling deeply about everything in one way or another. “He knows about your feelings towards Madame DuBois. He feels that because he is quite influential towards the King that he can turn him against you for you not taking to his mistress kindly.”
I breathed out a sigh of relief, “He holds nothing over me! Do you not see, Agate? There is full evidence that my marriage with the Dauphin is consummated, we have a son, an heir to the throne. The King would never turn against me, not now and besides the marriage is sealed, what could he possibly do?”
“You may still have the right to live here my friend but being out of the King’s favour in his court is a very hard life.” A tear leaked onto her cheek and my heart ached for her. Shaking her head dramatically she concluded, “I have lost them.”
“No,” I shook my head, “What about the Dauphin? I could explain everything to Philip and he could then speak to the King. Without committing treason there is nothing the Duc de Toures could do to stop us.”
“He’d know it’s from you though,” she insisted, “Know that it was you that filled the Dauphin in and insist that you and I have thread him lies which would make it worse for implicating him. I know you have my best interests at heart and you are risking more than anything anyone has for me before just by thinking these plans but there is truly no way out of this.” She clenched her hands into balls of hatred and fury on the arms of her seat. The dazzling orange sunlight burned brilliantly on the side of her face tilted towards it as well as reflecting fire into her hair. “I truly despise him for what he has done to me. It is torture to know that they are here but I can never behold them again.” Another tear leaked onto her cheek.
“You should have come to me sooner, Agate.” I whispered, watching as she battled frantically with her emotions. “Do not fear, we will find a way around this…Maybe we could get him banished.”
“The only way to be truly rid of the bastard is to kill him off.” She spat venomously. We both went quiet as we stared off then slowly our eyes met. “A mother’s love might be murder.” She whispered menacingly.
My eyes went wide, “We cannot comprehend the idea!”
“You know the governess my children live with is strict beyond belief and used to beat my children black and blue with a cane and a plank of wood? She nearly took one of my son’s eyes out once…” I was silent, astounded that either of us was even delving into the thought at all. “What horrors she must be subjecting them to day in and day out is beyond me. I feel queasy thinking about it.”
“Murder is a great sin,” I blurted out. “I beg of you to hear what you’re suggesting, Agate. This is a rash thought indeed.”
“How else can I free my children and I?” She begged suddenly dropping off of her chair and onto her knees before me. Her emerald dress pooled massively around her, like she was sinking in some elegant green ocean. This visit had abruptly taken a dark twist. “Will you not at least entertain the idea, Anna?”
“No!” I jumped to my feet, “How can you even ask that of me?”
“From one mother to another…My dearest friend, closest ally, please, I beg of you, help me.” Looking down upon her she looked either absolutely desperate or absolutely delirious.
“We will conjure another plan, Agate, but I will hear no more of murder do you hear? I beg of you, if you speak of it again I will have to ask you to leave. There must be another way around the matter and we will find what it is. But there are better ways than simply to kill off the enemy…” She did not look convinced so as I pulled her to her feet I quickly thought back through a lot of our conversations in help. “Murder is a man’s tool. We will find a way that will ruin and humiliate the Duc so that his punishment shall last and your revenge far sweeter.”
She breathed out shakily, cheeks stained with the tracks of her tears, “You’re right.” Blinking she rubbed her forehead. “I cannot believe I could even begin to accept that to kill would be an option.”
“We are intelligent and sly, the game will be far sweeter when we can reap the rewards of his downfall and still be able to check up on them in years to come.” I said giving Agate a kiss on the cheek. “You must rest, you may stay at the palace if you so wish.” Agate thanked me profoundly, saying that she’d head home to pack a few things and she’d be back by the morrow.