Author's Notes

Don't really know how to do this anymore, but I'm stubborn as all hell.

Take Courage, Wear It on Your Sleeve

It began with a headache.

Nothing very terrible, Darcy averred when Elizabeth noticed he wasn't quite himself as Elena practiced reading aloud to them that evening. Only a dull twinge behind his eyes. She would have fussed and clucked over him a little more had not Christopher and Benjamin's make-believe battle between their toy soldiers devolved into genuine squabbling. The pair of them had been strangely churlish all day, and she and Darcy had stepped in more than once to break up the shrieking matches that flared up between them over nothing.

Elizabeth lifted a hand, wordlessly telling him to stay seated with Elena, and rose to intervene.

Her attempts to soothe their bitter tempers, which seemed to stem only in part from the newly one-legged soldier by their knees, were all but unavailing. But they were four and two years old, and if there were reasons more profound for their peevishness, they certainly weren't capable of discerning them, let alone expressing them explicitly. Christopher rubbed angrily at the tears streaking his cheeks and stuck his tongue out at his brother, provoking Benjamin to let out a particularly indignant wail. As Elizabeth gently but firmly scolded that this was not how good little boys behaved, she saw Darcy wince from the corner of her eye.

"Fitzwilliam." She waited for his eyes to meet hers. "To bed. We could all do with an early night. Miss Hart and I will take care of bedtime with the children."

Her accent brooked no arguments, so she thought nothing of it when her husband did not protest, only kissed her and the children good night.

"But, Mama," Elena pouted as her mother smoothed the quilt over her, "I was not being naughty. Can't I please stay up?"

From the next room, Elizabeth could hear the nursemaid trying to coax her grumpy boys into their nightclothes. "I know, my darling, but Papa is very tired, and I think your brothers need some extra sleep so they aren't so cross tomorrow." She feathered a kiss at her daughter's temple. "But because you were mama's very good girl today, you can keep reading your story until I come back to blow out your candle."

Even with Miss Hart's help, it was a struggle to settle the boys. But at last it was managed, Benjamin nuzzling the stuffed fox toy he had been inseparable from of late, and Christopher sprawled on his back and snoring lightly in a way that was so reminiscent of his father that she had to repress the laugh that wanted to bubble from her lips.

Elena was curled around her book and fast asleep when she returned. She slipped it out from under her hands before putting out the candle and retiring to her own rooms.

.*.

Elizabeth stretched as she felt the autumn morning's sunlight warm on her cheek. By the time she managed to lift her heavy eyelids, she saw that Darcy was already awake beside her.

Her eyes were drifting shut again as she murmured, "How is your head this morning?" His answering hum was a raspy, listless thing and she wondered if he too was finding it difficult to shake the sleep that draped upon her like a thick winter cloak. "If you're still feeling poorly, I'll send to the apothecary for something."

When still no answer came, she forced her eyes open. "Fitzwilliam?"

He was staring back at her, but his eyes were glassy and unfocused. She pushed herself up onto one elbow, hovering over him. "Fitzwilliam?" she repeated, her voice sharp with burgeoning alarm.

It seemed a prodigious effort for him to turn his head, and when his wandering gaze finally fixed on her once more, his expression was vaguely confused. "'lizbeth," he slurred with a tongue that was clumsy and slow.

Properly awake now, she could see the unnatural flush to his skin and how a few damp curls clung to his brow. She touched the back of her hand there.

He was burning.

She hardly remembered leaving the bed, but suddenly found herself up and pulling on the bell cord. Her lady's maid's light knock to announce herself entering the room came much too quickly for her to have come in response to her mistress's summons, but Elizabeth was frantic enough for that detail to escape her.

"Lily," she all but panted as she slipped into a sensible dress, "please have someone summon Dr Neil at once. And tell Mrs Reynolds I need her and a basin of cold water."

"The doctor's been sent for, madam, and he should be here within the half-hour. I'll go see about—"

"He has?" Her face crinkled in distracted confusion. "But how…?"

"James was sent to call him as soon as we heard word from Miss Hart."

Elizabeth's fingers stumbled then clenched convulsively over the buttons she had been fastening. "Word from Miss Hart?" she echoed faintly, sure she could not have heard right.

Lily looked upon her as though she had gone mad, and perhaps she had. Her eyes went past her mistress to the bed where Darcy lay in his stupor and her face contorted in dismay. "Oh forgive me, Mrs Darcy! I was come to tell you, but I thought perhaps Miss Hart had already done so herself, seeing as you asked for the doc—"

Elizabeth heard nothing more as she rushed from the room.

.*.

"Are you sure you don't want us to stay?"

Georgiana's face was colorless and tight with anxiety as she clasped Elizabeth's hands. Elizabeth squeezed her cold fingers around hers gratefully.

The morning had dissipated in a fog of terror that still clouded her senses. How she had not crumpled upon bursting into the nursery she did not know, but it was a near thing when she found Christopher and Benjamin fidgeting restlessly in their beds, both of them dangerously hot and with cheeks that were red, red, red.

By the time she assured herself that Elena was hale, if not bewildered by her mama rousing her to ask if she felt well and touching her face all over, Neil arrived.

After completing his examinations of all three patients, his face was set in grim lines as he took Elizabeth and Mrs Reynolds aside to share his diagnosis. "I'm afraid it's scarlet fever."

His words, a confirmation of Elizabeth's worst fear, bore down on her like a tangible weight. She'd heard the stories of entire households struck down by this disease, had seen several children in Meryton herself with cheeks painted like her sons'. Almost none lived out the week.

She brought a hand to her breast, feeling something deep and vital inside her splinter in a way she was sure could never be mended.

"Mrs Darcy," she heard Neil say, though his voice was muffled beneath the savage beating of her heart. "Elizabeth," he tried again. "It's serious, but not hopeless."

Releasing a shuddering breath, she drew her shoulders back and met his gaze. "Tell me what to do."

As Neil set about applying his treatments, Elizabeth and the staff did everything they could to make her husband and children as comfortable as possible. She stole away from the fracas for a few precious minutes and dashed off a hardly coherent letter to send to Georgiana by express post.

Georgiana married Anthony Carrington almost five months ago. Their southern Derbyshire estate, Halestone, was only a two hours' journey from Pemberley. She had not meant for them to come, only to explain and plead to let her send Elena to stay with them until the danger had passed. But the heady wave of relief she felt when Darcy's sister and her husband arrived that afternoon expunged any exasperation she might have felt at the reckless way they imperiled themselves in breaching a house of malady.

"You've no idea what a comfort for me it will be to have Elena away—" A sob caught in her throat, but she swallowed most of it and buried the rest in her daughter's sweet-smelling hair as she held her close. She was frightened enough as it was without seeing her mama cry. "—from here and safe. We'll manage."

"But Mama." Elena's voice was so tiny, so unlike herself, that it plucked painfully at Elizabeth's heartstrings. "I don't want to go. I want to stay with you. I want to see Papa."

With Miss Hart helping her tend to the boys, Elizabeth had asked Lily to occupy Elena in her bedroom to limit her exposure to the illness. Her daughter knew something was wrong, but all she'd been told was that her brothers and her papa were not feeling well and that she would be going to stay with her aunt and uncle while Elizabeth took care of them.

Though it was the only thing to be done, it had not been an easy decision for her to make. Her daughter was nearly six and would soon be too much grown for Elizabeth to hold her as she was now, but never had she been separated from her child for more than a few hours since the day she was born.

Looking into eyes that were a mirror of her own, she told her gently, "Papa is sleeping, darling. He needs to sleep so he can get better."

"That's right," Georgiana chimed in, attempting something like cheerfulness. "Your mama's going to be very busy helping him and your brothers feel better, and your Uncle Anthony and I want so much for you to come and visit with us. Won't you please? I've missed you so. And just as soon as your papa and Christopher and Benjamin are well again, we'll bring you home to tell them all about the wonderful things we'll do together."

It was obvious she wasn't entirely convinced, but they were able to coax Elena from clinging to her mother. When she was seated in the carriage next to Georgiana, Anthony turned to Elizabeth, his voice pitched low.

"If there's anything we can do, anything at all, please write. We're at your disposal."

"Thank you," she replied thickly. "This," she gestured to her daughter, snuggled under a throw and into her aunt's side as she listened raptly to whatever Georgiana was whispering conspiratorially to her, "is more help than you could ever know."

.*.

Elizabeth rubbed circles along Christopher's heaving back. When he was still again, she handed the basin of sick off to Miss Hart to be disposed of and poured a glass of water from the ewer on his bedside table. Lifting him upright so that he was half cradled against her, she helped him drink until he turned away.

No sooner was he tucked beneath the covers than whimpers arose from across the room where Benjamin was curled up on his side, miserable and small. She sank to her knees by his bedside, stroking back his hair. His strawberry tongue poked out to lick at his dry lips and she made him drink too.

He couldn't seem to get comfortable, so she took him into her arms. His hot little head rested wearily on her shoulder, and he croaked, "Want my fox."

Her lips trembled. One of the first things Neil had ordered to avoid the illness from spreading was to have clothes, linens, and anything that Darcy and the boys had recently and extensively been in contact with burned for fear of contamination. Ridiculous as she knew it to be, she wept bitterly upon realizing that Benjamin's beloved stuffed fox would have to be numbered among those items. Nor had she the heart to tell him, not yet.

"I know, darling," she crooned past the lump in her throat, "I know."

Continuing to comb her fingers through his riotous curls, she hummed softly by his ear until his face lost its pinched look and his breathing evened. When she felt his body go slack with deep sleep, she relinquished him to his bed, and Miss Hart returned to take up her vigil. With a lingering look at her sons, Elizabeth rose and went from the room. Four days into this tumultuous routine infirmity brought upon them all, the nursemaid knew to call her without delay if there was any change.

In any other circumstance, leaving her children in this condition would be unthinkable, but her heart was being torn in more directions than she was physically capable of obliging. Though she was far too stubborn and too desperate—a formidable combination in her at the best of times—to let that keep her from trying.

The awful, wet rattle of her husband's labored breathing met her at the door. While Christopher and Benjamin's fevers had—thank God, thank God—finally begun to abate, the same could not be said for Darcy. If anything, he was getting worse. He'd not regained consciousness for the last two days and could hardly hold down water when they were able to force it past his lips, let alone something more substantial.

He was shivering when she reached his side, his teeth chattering with the violence of it, though his face was coated in a sheen of sweat. Sitting on the bed beside him, she wrung out the washcloths steeping in a basin of cold water and began placing them as makeshift cool compresses at his forehead, wrists, and inner thighs the way Neil had shown her.

As she took up the last washcloth to bathe his face and body, Mrs Reynolds entered the room and set down a tray with tea and light fare.

"Thank you," said Elizabeth quietly, not pausing in her task.

She felt the housekeeper carefully regarding her. "Mrs Darcy, let me sit with him for a time so that you can rest," she prevailed upon her as she had done each day, only to be refused. To-day was no different.

But rather than slipping from the room as usual, Mrs Reynolds continued to press her, more maternal chastisement than servant in her tone. "There's nothing to be gained in going on as you have, save running yourself so ragged that you come to be sick as well. Only sleep a few hours, to keep up your strength."

Impossible. Truly, she was touched by Mrs Reynolds's concern, but the pretense she was affecting was a fragile one, and the instant she stopped doing—had time enough to think—it would all come undone. She would come undone. And then what use would she be?

Movement beneath her hand.

Mrs Reynolds's soft exclamation confirmed it was no desperate figment of her imagination. Their gazes met in synchronous exhilaration, only to flit apart to watch for the moment Darcy's eyes opened.

It never came. Instead, his occasional tossing and turning escalated into something altogether more erratic, his muscles and limbs thrashing more and more wildly until he almost seemed to be having convulsions. His breaths were horrific, strangled gasps, his overworked lungs seemingly incapable of drawing in enough air. As Mrs Reynolds dashed out to call on help, Elizabeth caught one of his twitching hands and pressed it to her breast, clutching it just as fiercely as she did to the tattered shreds of her sanity while her world burned around her.

"Breathe, Fitzwilliam. Breathe."

The hope that had sprouted up inside her shriveled to ash and scattered in the wake of his shallow, pained breaths.

.*.

Never had such utterly disparate feelings inhabited Elizabeth's frame at once.

Her boys were on the mend—alert, albeit weak and scratching endlessly at their rashes. But they were eating, talking, even smiling. Darcy's condition had materially deteriorated, his fever taking a turn into the rheumatic.

There was nothing more to be done. The fever would break in its own time, or...

The fever would break.

Neither helplessness nor inaction had ever suited Elizabeth well. Ineffectual a treatment as it was, when she settled in at Darcy's bedside that evening, she brought a book. Perhaps her father's habits were more deeply ingrained in her than she ever supposed.

She was compelled to pause oftener than was her wont, the inescapable weight in her breast leaving her short of breath, but she continued reading aloud in jagged fragments. The hiss and pop of the fire mingled with her voice to blanket the room in a halcyon veneer.

.*.

It was the preternatural silence that jarred her awake.

Halfway between sleep and waking as she sat there in the gloaming, fatigue and frayed nerves (heaven forbid she ever use the expression in her mother's presence) hummed beneath her skin. Her eyes flickered to the smoldering embers in the hearth, the only source of light. She took up the book situated precariously on her knees, closed it, and rose to place it on the mantel. Standing there, the vague sense of unease continued to creep over her.

The feeling crescendoed when she realized that the ragged sound of Darcy's breathing, her unfaltering companion all this wretched se'nnight, was absent.

Blindly, she staggered towards the bed. Her sight grew accustomed to the dark by degrees until she could make out his features, so very still against the pillow.

God, no. Please, God, no.

The hysteria that had been festering ever since she woke to find him in a fevered delirium throbbed behind her eyes, pulsed through her veins, welled up in her throat, until she thought the only release of it would be to scream.

And then his chest rose high with the easiest, steadiest breath she'd seen him take in days.

The tension keeping her upright seeped away until her body refused to support her an instant longer. She caught herself on the edge of the bed to prevent from dropping to the floor entirely. She was lightheaded, disbelief and hope and—above it all—relief churning and frothing together until she had to rest her head on the counterpane.

"Elizabeth?"

She looked up to find gray eyes, a bit bleary, but open and blessedly lucid, watching her.

A bone-deep tremor started at her numb fingertips and rippled through her entire body. The dam in her chest cracked, crumbled, and the sound that tore from her throat was frightful even to her.

With a movement that certainly looked as inelegant as it felt, Elizabeth flung herself across her husband's wasted chest, burrowed her face in his neck, and sobbed.

Now that it was no longer needed, her courage forsook her. A cascade of repressed grief wrenched out of her in wave after wave. It was difficult to stop once she started, so she didn't try. Instead, she focused on the comfort of his bristled, sweat-stale skin, warm but no longer an inferno.

Daybreak streaked rose and gold across the sky when at last her crying faded. Darcy's hand was sluggishly stroking up and down her spine, and he was murmuring into her hair. Not one word he said had she understood, but just the sound of his voice was balm for her soul. She felt wrung out as she leaned away only far enough to see his dear face, taking in everything from his ashen complexion, leeched of that terrible ruddy blaze of color, to the abysmal state of his hair. Her eyes blurred with fresh tears.

"Elizabeth," he said again hoarsely.

Oh, how selfish she was. She forced herself to leave his arms, hurrying to pour a glass of water. Her hands fluttered over him irresolutely before asking, "Do you feel strong enough to try to sit up?"

At his nod, she helped raise him gently, cautiously, but he couldn't stop the harsh groan that left him as his muscles protested the movement after being bedridden for so long. Propping him up with a legion of pillows at his back, she made him drain first one glass, then another, before letting him fall back on the pillows, exhausted and seeming to fall into a light doze.

Tracing his jaw even as she stood, she whispered, "I'll be but a moment."

She all but ran to the servants' hall, creating a stir of the staff's breakfast when she appeared, disheveled and with overbright eyes, but it was a joyous one once they understood the master was awake. Elizabeth left it to Mrs Reynolds to arrange with cook for clear broth and anything light Darcy's stomach could handle to be prepared. James was sent out once again to bring this latest news to Neil.

On her way back to their rooms, she stopped in the nursery to inquire with Miss Hart how the boys had passed the night, pressing the nursemaid's hand in wordless gratitude. She stayed a beat more, soaking in the sight of her children sleeping peacefully, before stepping out again.

Mrs Reynolds was just behind Elizabeth with a tray, and Darcy roused as they entered the room. The housekeeper was visibly emotional, but she held her composure admirably, patting his cheek fondly like he was a small boy and then bustling out again.

Feeding him the contents of the bowl was an undertaking Elizabeth performed with militant efficiency until it was empty. For a minute or two, he let her bluster about, drawing the drapes for his sensitive eyes and needlessly fluffing his pillows. Once she was in reach, he grasped her wrist with fingers that were stronger than they had been a quarter of an hour ago and tugged her to sit on the bed beside him.

Without a task on which to focus her nervous energy, the consciousness of his warm gaze alone was eliciting tears. Impatiently, she tried to blink them away. His thumb brushed an errant drop from her lashes, then continued to sweep back and forth across her cheekbone soothingly. She squeezed her eyes closed, just feeling.

"You look as if you haven't slept in days. Was it so bad to deserve this state you've worked yourself into just for me?"

Her eyes snapped open, but she hesitated. He must have seen something change in her expression, for his hold on her tightened, urging her to speak.

"Not just for you," she answered slowly, fighting to keep both her voice and her hands steady.

Darcy tensed, thumb pausing. "What do you mean?"

"The boys—"

Those scant two words had hardly left her lips before he was scrabbling to free himself from the bedclothes, tangling himself more hopelessly in his frenzy.

"Be calm! They're well, they're well now!"

She pushed down on his shoulders and his arms gave out, sending him crashing back onto the bed. It was a sobering testament to how great a toll his illness had taken that she was able to overpower him.

But he continued to struggle against her. "I want to see them," he panted. "I have to—"

"You will," she promised quickly, "when they awaken, and after Neil examines you."

Reluctantly, he went still. "And Elena?"

"At Halestone with Georgiana and Anthony. I'll write to them while Neil is with you. She'll be over the moon to see you."

She could see the questions gathering in his eyes, but all he said was, "Tell me everything."

She didn't tell him everything, or at least, she painted it all in such broad strokes and hopeful shades that it conveyed not a fraction of the misery, the terror, the anguish that had curdled Pemberley's very air. Even if she wished to, what words could have adequately explained it?

The tender empathy shining in his eyes told her somehow he knew. "How you must have suffered." He was cupping her face again. "I am so sorry."

Heart too full to speak, the tears splashed unbidden down her cheeks. How tiresome it was to cry so often. She left them unchecked, only bringing her forehead to rest on his shoulder.

.*.

Benjamin inquisitively stroked the stubble on Darcy's face, giggling as his hand was sprinkled with scratchy kisses for his trouble. Christopher was drowsing with his head pillowed on her lap. It was past their bedtime, but the thought of taking them to the nursery and disturbing the contentment on her husband's face persuaded Elizabeth to put it off.

Benjamin had just dropped off when the sound of running feet approached their door. It was all the warning they had before Elena came bursting in.

"Papa! Mama!"

Still wearing her coat and mittens, she crawled up the bed and over her sleeping brothers until she could hug her mother. Then she whirled to throw her arms around her father's neck, and with the arm that wasn't full of Benjamin, he pulled her closer, tucking her under his chin.

"Are you feeling better?"

"So much better. Mama took very good care of us all." She let him go only to sit between them on the bed and cuddle into Darcy's side. "Now, tell me all about your visit with Aunt Georgiana."

Elizabeth knew she ought to go downstairs to greet Georgiana and Anthony and ensure a room was readied for them, but as Elena's bright buzz of words washed over her, she lingered just a little longer, indulging herself in this moment of having her family whole and happy and together again.

End Author's Notes

Hand to God this wasn't intentional, but I worked out where this falls on the timeline I made forever ago, and basically, Darcy baby number four is totally a result of celebratory oh-thank-God-you're-not-dead-I-love-you-never-leave-me "alone time" after this nightmare. I'm so okay with that.

(N.B.: I could've lied, just pretended this was my plan all along and that I think things through to that level of detail, but let's be real, we all know I'm not and never was that good.)

Transitional noises, I'm marking this story complete. Not to say I won't still have something to add to this collection from time to time as usual, but since each chapter is self-contained, and children have been conceived, born, and cut teeth in the space between my updates, it makes sense. To be clear, that's not a veiled reference to me having children; just, you know, generally speaking about the development of hypothetical children during my radio silence. I'll stop now.