Much as Mary was glad to see Simon made it, she squeezed him a little harder in warning. If anyone was likely to turn her beloved children off the righteous path – it was Simon. The boy was trouble, and didn’t have Ben’s fear of God to rein him in proper.

But he invoked Matthew, and her son backed him up. He looked and sounded more like Paul every day. Matthew, on the other hand, still had the occasional awful bouts of coughs ever since he could barely walk. It was a miracle he’d made it through at all! Paul had been home a lot more often at night during that (even though she’d been pregnant! he always disappeared when she was pregnant) and they’d managed to scrounge the money up for some belladonna smokes to clear it up.

She cast a suspicious look Luke’s way (was Simon being a bad influence?) … but to their immense fortune, Matthew let out a round of coughs. She raced over to the cabinet. Matthew cast a look over his shoulder to Luke and Simon that distinctly implied a new debt to him.

“Sorry, Aunt Hannah, you’re right!” Matthew called back to her, and did as bid.

His voice sounded remarkably clear for “a cough”.

Eighty-one, eighty-two, eighty-..!

Lory squawked and windmill-slapped Simon’s hands away with her pen still clutched. She grimaced, putting her quill pen back in its stand, capping the well, and arching away from her homework lest she get it wet. A few drops strayed onto it, anyway.

“Simon! You’re so gross!”

God. He was so full of himself. One day he was going to piss off the wrong person.

She didn’t like Simon, but at the same time he often felt like the lowest-stakes relative to deal with. The rest demanded an elaborate ruse. She took off the hat and chucked it in the rest of their dirty garments. Rolled her eyes and mouthed along to Luke’s complaint as she sunk back into her seat, raking wet hands on the sides of her dry skirt.

God damn it, Simon. She’d lost count!