The Bluestocking’s Absolutely Brilliant Betrothal (The Notorious Briarwoods #6)

Epilogue

Heron House

Five Years Later

C hildren ran back and forth across the lawn. There were almost twenty of them.

Some of them were children of the Briarwoods, and some of them were children from all across the continent. Well, children from France, who had been displaced across the continent.

And Aurelia? She was those orphaned children’s mother now. There were ten of them.

She would’ve never imagined that she would be a mother to such a brood, but she was. Ten parts of her heart were running around, and she watched each one go about, playing safely.

She had chosen them. No. That wasn’t quite right. They had chosen her.

They’d found her all across Europe. They’d lost their mothers and fathers to the war and executions destroying France.

It had been harrowing to realize that there would be so many orphans of the revolution. Orphans of parents who simply could not carry on after such devastation across the continent and the fallout of one of the bloodiest times in human history.

Blood was still being spilled, of course, and blood would likely be spilled for some time to come because war was always hungry.

But these children, who laughed and danced and ate apples and candies and played games, and who were rushing down towards the river? Their joy in this moment made it all worthwhile. Sometimes they woke in the night crying, but Aurelia and Achilles were always ready to help them.

Her father watched the merry antics from his chair, sitting under the shade of a willow tree, and Aurelia’s mother held his hand as she sat beside him. It seemed that, though he could no longer walk on his own, her father would not stop for any illness. And the love between her parents would continue for some time.

Aurelia walked with her hand entwined with Achilles’. They had done exactly as they’d planned. They’d opened several shelters, and many people had been housed in them, but no one had known what to do with the children.

She had.

She could still remember being that little girl standing outside her mother’s door, abandoned and alone, or at least fearing that she would be so.

She’d not understood what true abandonment was then, but she did now.

And she had made a vow: no child she found would ever feel alone or abandoned. She would take them to her heart and to her home.

She had not had a child of her own. Not yet. She still wasn’t entirely certain if it was what she wanted, but she did know this: if she was gifted with one, if a child came into her body and into her life, she would not be afraid. She would welcome it, and she would love that child just as she loved the children who had found her, who needed a mother and a father.

She wasn’t alone anymore.

Far from it. She never had to be afraid of being alone again. And she would certainly never choose it for herself.

She glanced up at Achilles, and he looked down at her and mouthed, “I love you.”

He was the most marvelous of fathers to the children. Always playing and laughing, pulling them up on his shoulders, tossing balls, making jokes, reciting Shakespeare.

All the children had been accepted by the Briarwoods. They were a very large family now, perhaps the largest family in all of London, with the most striking variety of children from every walk of life. Some were the children of tailors, some were the children of those who had owned restaurants, and some were the children of aristocrats, but they had all found one thing together—love.

They had all found love. And that was the most important thing of all.

The End