Hepsie and Steen Cade
Hepsie and Steen were about as happy as anyone could be they reckoned. Well if they had a baby then they would be the happiest. But right now they were as happy as anyone could be without having that baby. And Hepsie did love babies almost as much as she loved Steen. Her old mother had passed down to her the talent for midwifery before she had died, and Hepsie had helped a number of women through difficult childbirths, despite her young age.
So when she heard that the king was leaving she knew she and Steen should go because her talents were going to be sorely needed on the island. Steen was sad to leave his family but he would go where Hepsie would. She was the only thing that mattered to him. He had loved her for as long as he could remember. When they were children he had pulled her long black plaits and rubbed dirt on her face. But she had always managed to get him back, whether it be a slimy frog down the back of his trousers or hay carefully hidden in his porridge. But he had loved her even then and as they grew she had become more lovely, her rosie cheeks and her soft mouth that he so loved to kiss.
Her mother had finally insisted they be married even though Hepsie was young at 16, he was only 18 himself, when she had caught them out in the barn kissing between the bales of hay. So they had been married early before anything untoward had happened. And it still hadn’t but they were very young and he was sure it would not be long before Hepsie was expecting. Now they were standing together looking towards Mhalwae with their hands helds tightly, like frightened children. She looked as worried as he felt so he tickled her till she squeaked and forgot she was scared.
Aww… the quintessential happy family couple! I assume these two will have quite the brood, unless there’s a surprising twist involving her being barren or something. Wow, now there’s a midwife’s worst nightmare…
I see we’ve gone down to the ‘lower’ class. I love that you can tell just by the characters and their clothing. Wonderful job!
Let’s hope her talents extend to helping women conceive in the first place. We have a lot of so-far-childless couples… so far…
Yes… there definitely needs to be some extensive baby-making on Mhalwae. Hmmm… in Australia there was this saying when they were trying to get population expansion… I think it was “one for yourself and one for your country” or something along those lines. Well here it will be more like one for yourself and ten for your country =).
Actually I already know who is going to get pregnant and when… I have been using Lothere’s pregnancy stats (thanks again for those =) and I can’t stop rolling (yes I am using my roleplaying dice… gee all those different sided dice come in handy for rolling random aspects in the sims) and so far they have given me some kick-ass storylines. Isn’t it great when the dice roll exactly what you wanted anyway… because I decided I wanted it to be very random (so far I have only changed one detail with the rolling and everything else has been great).
Hey Verity! Your story is awesome! I really like this couple, I think they are my favorites actually. I love babies and midwifery too so that girl is awesome, and its nice to see two people so happy with each other. Good writing Verity!
Thanks Tiana =). I’m really glad you like it so far. And I have to admit Hepsie and Steen are my favourite couple too… they are just so cute and such good people. I even love their names… I didn’t realise until recently Hepsie is actually short for Hepzibah… how cool is that (Hepsie would laugh so much if she knew her name was so fancy =).