A Gift of Love

by A Gift of Love (lit)

  The child clambered out of bed, his dewy brow creased in puzzlement, his stuffed horse clutched under his arm. "Papa? What's the matter?"

  "I need your help." Tristan leaned down and scooped Gabriel up in his arms. The child smelled of dreamland and cinnamon, milk and innocence. Tristan buried his face for a moment amid the tumbled gold of Gabriel's curls.

  "What help do you need, Papa?"

  "Turning back this infernal clock. It says Christmas is over. Reach up and stop that pendulum at once." Gabriel gaped at Tristan as if he feared his father had gone mad. Tristan's mouth widened in a grin. Gabriel smiled an uncertain answer and did as he was bid, the clock giving one disgruntled tick before it went still.

  "Now turn the hands backward," Tristan instructed, as the boy carefully swept the clock hands around, his eyes darting warily to his father.

  "There! Stop!"

  The boy jerked his hands back as if the clock had suddenly transformed into a dove and taken flight. "Papa— what—what is it? You're acting so—so strange."

  "Happy Christmas, Gabriel."

  "Ch-Christmas? Christmas is over, Papa."

  "No, son. It's just beginning. And we aren't going to waste a single moment."

  The child's eyes glistened. "It's the magic, isn't it? Alaina made magic!"

  Tristan's throat constricted at the knowledge of how true his son's words were. "Yes. Alaina made the magic. Don't you want to see?"

  Gabriel scrambled down and bolted for the door, but Tristan caught the tail of his little nightshirt. "Oh, no, young man. Put on your breeches."

  "But, Papa!"

  "You can't very well race all over London in your nightshirt." He bent down to whisper in Gabriel's ear. "Your bottom would turn blue with cold."

  The boy stared at him for a moment, then a peal of laughter rang out—silvery as bells, more beautiful than any sound Tristan had ever heard. It was the first time he had ever surprised laughter from his son.

  Tristan's eyes burned. The little boy darted about, dragging off his nightshirt, tugging on his clothes. But his small, eager fingers were trembling too much with excitement to fasten the buttons on his shirt.

  "Papa, will you help me? I'm all crooked, and they won't go through their holes."

  Tristan knelt down and treasured each small button, each wriggle of delight Gabriel gave as he danced from one foot to the other in impatience.

  "Where is. Alaina? She missed Christmas yesterday, too. No! I mean today! She almost missed Christmas."

  "Alaina is attempting to set the house afire again." Tristan grinned, savoring the secret as he fastened up Gabriel's little boots.

  Then he gathered his son in his arms and carried him down the wide stairway to where the drawing room doors stood closed.

  "Alaina?" Gabriel called out. "Alaina, where are you?"

  Tristan shoved open the door. Gabriel froze in his arms as a rush of pine-scented air swept out to greet them.

  There, atop a table covered with bright red cloth, stood a tree in a bucket of sand, the evergreen branches laden with cookies and gilded nuts, candies and ribbons, and a myriad of tiny burning candies that glinted like stars upon the branches.

  "Oh, Papa! Wh-what is it?" Gabriel gasped in awe. "It really is magic!"

  "When your mama was a little girl, back in Germany, they celebrated Christmas by bringing a tree into the house and filling it with treats and presents. The first year she came to live with us, I made her a Christmas tree so she wouldn't be so homesick."

  "Did it make her happy, Papa?" Gabriel asked breathlessly.

  Tristan felt a bittersweet stab of memory. "She cried."

  Gabriel laid a soft palm against his face. "That wasn't your fault, Papa. You tried to make her happy."

  It was as if the child, with his too-wise eyes and his gentle soul, were speaking of so much more than the tree Tristan had constructed so many years ago.

  Tristan forced his lips into a smile. "I hope you're not going to cry."

  "No! I want to see it, all of it!"

  He set Gabriel down, and the boy raced to the tree, the candleshine not half so bright as his eyes, his fingers reaching out to touch a bright orange bound with ribbon and a tiny gingerbread cookie shaped like a rocking horse.

  "You can pluck your breakfast right off the tree," Alaina said, stepping from behind the branches.

  "No! It's too pretty ever to eat! Can't we keep it just like this forever and ever?"

  "I'm too hungry to wait," Tristan said. "I have to taste something or I might be tempted to try a helping of little boy!"

  Gabriel plucked off a cookie and pushed it into Tristan's hand. "Here, Papa. I want you to have the first taste."

  "There are presents, too. Can you find them?" Alaina asked.

  The child turned to the tree again, dancing around it. He gasped as he found a brigade of lead soldiers taking cover among the branches—then a bright red top—and a pair of ice skates. Tristan's heart swelled at each jubilant cry as he lifted the boy to pluck off his presents.

  Then suddenly, Gabriel gasped. "Papa, look!" He pointed at something hanging from one of the topmost branches. Tristan's brow furrowed in confusion as he lifted Gabriel to pluck it down.

  "I don't remember putting anything like this on the tree," he observed, looking down at the small circlet of dull silver that glinted in the boy's hand.

  Tristan gazed down at it—four swans woven of Celtic interlacing formed the circle of what seemed to be a brooch, each of the birds wearing a tiny crown. A pin was thrust through the center of it, dividing it in half.

  "What is it?" Gabriel asked.

  "It looks like a brooch of some kind," Tristan said, turning to Alaina.

  "It's a penannular. The ancient Celts used them to fasten their cloaks," Alaina said. "This one represents an old Irish tale, the Children of Lir."

  "What is Lir?" Gabriel fingered the gleaming brooch with wonder.

  "Lir was a king who so loved his children that their wicked stepmother grew jealous and turned them into swans. So they must spend forever traversing the lakes of Ireland, longing for their beloved father."

  "It's exquisite." Tristan's voice roughened at the poignancy of the tale. He hurt for the father, his children forever beyond his reach—as Gabriel soon would be.

  "The penannular should be beautiful!" Her cheeks pinkened, her eyes a little shy. "My father always told me that it was the clasp to a fairy's cloak."

  "A-A fairy? But I thought you were an angel. Are fairies and angels friends?" Gabriel asked.

  "Of course! Unless they crash into each other while they're flying about. Then they quarrel."

  Gabriel's mouth rounded into a soft O. "How did it get here?"

  "My father stole it away on a misty night from the fairy king himself," Alaina said. "Da always said that was why our family had to flee Ireland. Now it belongs to you, Gabriel. So that you'll remember. . . remember me when you see it."

  A knot of panic rose in Tristan's chest as he imagined what it would be like when Alaina went away. And she would go away, he knew. Soon, too soon.

  "I don't need a fairy brooch to remember you, Alaina," Gabriel said. "I've decided Papa and I need you. Even if you go up to heaven, we'll go too, and we won't be the teensiest bit afraid."

  Tristan's heart wrenched. What would it be like for Gabriel when he was forced to watch Alaina walk away? What betrayal would Gabriel's eyes show when his own father put him in a coach that carried him to his aunt's house—far from his nursery and Cook and Burrows and Tristan himself?

  He couldn't bear the thought, so he turned back to the tree, reaching up to grab a gingerbread lady from one of the top branches.

  "Be careful!" Alaina warned, but it was too late. A heavy object tumbled down through the branches, breaking cookies, scattering candies; the box landed with a thud at Tristan's feet.

  "What the devil?"

  "It's for you, Tristan." Alaina looked up at him, with such tenderness, such understanding, such shimme
ring hope, his fingers trembled.

  He hunkered down and picked it up, unfastening the tiny catch that held the wooden box closed. He opened it, and his heart stopped. Paints—all pristine, their colors vivid and untouched, glowed like jewels in the candlelight. Brushes, their bristles silky sable, lay pillowed among whatever supplies he might need.

  When in God's name had she bought them? Had she slipped away while he was gathering presents for his son? How had she hidden them on the journey back home? How much had they cost her—this woman with her threadbare garments, her agonizingly familiar eyes, and a heart far more generous than her purse's contents must be? Could she possibly know what the gift meant to him?

  "Alaina," he choked out, "I don't know what to say."

  "Don't say anything. Use them, Tristan. It wasn't too late for Christmas. It's not too late for this."

  The possibility was too astonishing to grasp. He stood there, clutching the box, searching for words—words that had failed him as his eye and his brush and the colors of his imagination never had.

  "But, Papa, we didn't get anything for Alaina," Gabriel whispered.

  What could you give to an angel? What possible gift half so precious as the treasures of the heart Alaina had given him? Suddenly Tristan froze, his eyes captured by the light twinkling through a waterfall of glass prisms decorating one of the candlesticks. He crossed to where they hung, picking one of the bits of shining glass from its hook.

  "Here, Alaina," Tristan said, tucking it into her hand.

  "You don't have to—I don't need anything—"

  "Papa, you should give her the whole candlestick," Gabriel said. "What can she do with just one prism?"

  "Whenever things get too dark, she can pull it out of her pocket and hold it up to the light." He dangled it before the candle flame, a hundred bright bits of blue light dancing across the room. His gaze caught hers, held it. "You'll always have a star to wish upon."

  Alaina flung her arms around Tristan, holding him tight for a long moment. As if she never wanted to let him go. How long had it been since anyone had clung to him this way? Not to chain him, but rather with fierce emotion, opening the sky to him, handing him wings disguised as paintbrushes and vivid colors. He could feel the sweet wetness of tears dampening his shirt, seeping deep into the broken places in his heart. A shudder went through him as the coldness cracked, the bitterness forever sweetened.

  "What would you wish, Alaina?" He breathed against her fragrant curls."—if I could promise it would come true? I'd give you anything in my power."

  A tiny cry tore from her breast. "I can't have my wish. I can't ever have it. But I'll keep your gift forever," she whispered against his heart, her words making Tristan agonizingly aware she would be far away, beyond his reach, when she made crystal stars dance upon the sky.

  A sudden knock at the door made Tristan straighten, and he cursed the interruption, knowing he would trade half of his life if he could just stand in this room, with Gabriel's face shining and Alaina in his arms a little longer.

  "I wonder who the blazes that could be?"

  At that instant, Burrows tapped on the entryway, the old man's face beaming. "It's a gentleman for Master Gabriel, sir."

  Tristan shook himself inwardly, releasing Alaina, feeling as if she'd taken his heart with her. "You'd best go see who it is, boy."

  Gabriel rushed out to the door, Tristan and Alaina following in his wake. The boy tugged open the door, revealing a portly gentleman with straw in his hair.

  "Is this the residence of Master Gabriel Ramsey?"

  "I'm Gabriel Ramsey."

  "There be someone in the garden right anxious to make yer acquaintance, young sir."

  "Papa?" Gabriel glanced up at Tristan doubtfully. Tristan ruffled the child's hair.

  "Go on, boy," Tristan urged.

  Gabriel took a step out into a wonderland of ice crystals and snow like spun sugar, kissed by the morning sun. He made his way along the garden path, wandering as if he were entering the fairy king's domain. As he rounded the rose vines to where the lopsided snowman still grinned, he stumbled to a halt. There, beside it, was tied a glorious black pony, wearing a silver-mounted saddle.

  "P-Papa?" Gabriel whispered.

  "He's yours, Gabriel," Tristan said, an odd thickness in his throat. "Happy Christmas."

  The boy whooped in delight, racing toward the pony, flinging his arms about its neck. Golden curls glinted against the animal's sleek midnight coat. The patient beast snuffled against him, nudging him with a velvety muzzle, eyes soft and wise with that special expression the best ponies always had—as if they were listening to a child's private pain and fears and dreams that would never be shared with another soul.

  Tristan ached, wondering what secrets Gabriel and this pony would share. Would he cry into that silky mane when Tristan sent him away?

  Tristan banished his melancholy thoughts and strode over to his son, catching the boy beneath the arms and lifting him into the saddle.

  "Papa, this pony has the same name as you do! It's right here in silver: Tristan!"

  "The name is on the saddle because it was mine when I was a little boy. You see, I got a Christmas pony once, too."

  "What was your pony's name, Papa?"

  "Galahad. I wanted my pony to have a properly noble name before we went out to tame dragons." Dragons spun of a child's imagination, far easier to vanquish than the kind that stalked a man's soul.

  "I'm going to name my pony Galahad, too. And we can go riding together in the park and check to see if the swans have crowns like on my fairy pin."

  "Any swans in the lake now would have their tail feathers frozen."

  "In spring and summer we could ride every day together," the child said, suddenly weighed down by some emotion that stole a measure of joy from his face. "Unless you were too busy working. Then I would just wait real quiet in the hallway until you can come to play."

  "Or maybe you could come right in and tell me to get the devil outside, there are important things to do. Knights to slay and dragons whose fire needs to be extinguished."

  A shimmer of hope burned in the child's eyes. "Do you really think— Oh, Papa, can we wait an extra day for Christmas every year?" Gabriel asked.

  "Why would you want to do that?"

  "Because I want every Christmas to be just like this! With a tree full of presents, and Alaina and you and me all together. Papa, I always wondered what heaven was like. If it was angels and harps and clouds and things. But I was wrong. Heaven's the most wondrous place you could ever choose to be. Maybe we got heaven right here since Alaina's come."

  Tristan stole a glance at the woman who stood in the snow, her blue gown like a splash of sky, her golden eyes brimming with tears. Heaven . . . had she drifted it down to them on angel's wings? Carried it with her through the window, along with the kissing bough? Or had it been in her eyes forever?

  Tristan wanted to close the space between them, gather her into his arms and beg her to stay in a world where Christmas never ended and Gabriel laughed and Tristan could feel the colors and shapes and images welling up inside him, like a melody about to be sung.

  Maybe we got heaven right here since Alaina's come. . . Gabriel's words echoed through Tristan's mind. There was only one cloud marring the beauty of this day- How were they ever going to let Alaina go?

  Nine

  THERE HAD NEVER BEEN A MORE PERFECT DAY. Tristan cradled his son in his arms, carrying that precious burden up the stairs to bed. He was certain it was past midnight, but he didn't care if the clocks never started again and time stood still forever at Alaina MacShane's command.

  Laughter—the old house had rung with it. Joy—it had bubbled over in delicious abandon. And Tristan knew that in all of London no one had had a Christmas stuffed with more delight than he had.

  For the first time in seven years, Tristan had truly gotten to know his own son. And the child he had discovered was a treasure beyond imagining—a tenderhearted, sensitive, brav
e little boy who had fought his battles too long alone. A winsome waif whose droll observations had made Tristan laugh inside until his heart ached with the sweetest pain he'd ever known.

  Knights had been vanquished, enchanted swans transformed back into princes and princesses, during wild gallops through the snow-drifted park, Tristan's gelding keeping pace with the energetic bobbling of the pony Gabriel had christened Galahad. They'd returned at dusk, wind-stung and breathless, to find a feast stirred up by Cook and a flour-splashed Alaina, who had invited both servants to share the table that meal.

  By the time that night was done, Burrows and Cook had been regarding her the same way Gabriel did—as if she were an angel fallen down from heaven. And Tristan was certain he'd never forget the picture of her—laughing and rosy and breathless—kneeling down to claim Gabriel's kiss beneath the sphere of candles and greenery that had been her first gift to the two of them.

  It felt so right to come home to that lovely, animated smile of welcome, the light dancing over the freckles sprinkled like fairy dust across her nose. It had seemed so perfect when she had scooped Gabriel into her arms, heedless of the snow feathering over her gown and onto the floor. And when her eyes had met Tristan's own, alive with heart-stopping tenderness, he felt the luminous beauty of a new vision shivering to life, a fragile picture more beautiful than anything captured on canvas—a cluster of auburn-haired little moppets frolicking about Alaina's skirts, their faces bright with mischief, as she came to welcome him into her arms, into her bed.

  "Papa . . ." Gabriel's groggy voice jarred Tristan from his thoughts as he bent to nestle the boy in amid the coverlets. "Promise me ... you won't go to heaven for a long, long time. Promise you'll stay with me forever."

  "I'll always be with you, Gabriel. Loving you, watching over you, no matter where you are."

  "But if I'm at Aunt Beth's, I won't be able to lie outside your study with my books and soldiers so I can hear your voice when I play."