How is Lady Anna its been ages since we've heard of her and Bertie. Well Bertie was at the old man's party.
I hope she is at-least making friends.

Thats good that she's friends with Trudi, I don't like how Brit and Ogive make fun of her. Maybe that is one of the reasons why I'm not that fond of Ogive, oh well.

I hope in the future Anna and Cecily can become friends.

Lothere we haven't reached that chapter yet.

Well since Brit is friends with Ogive that leaves her out maybe, Emma might befriend Cecily.

Wait...Cecily put out? Did I miss something?
God, I dislike Anna. More than nearly any other character, I think. Maybe it's because we've never gotten her POV, but she just...ugh. Shallow, manipulative, self-righteous, materialistic, whiny...need I go on?

Wow...that is a surprise. With Caedwulf? Really? Oh, Cecily...

Illegetimate kids cause drama, and I love drama in stories.

Cassie why are you so surprise don't you remember that other girl he almost slept with before he caught Brit and Brinstan together?

Correct. I'd expect Caedwulf to sleep with anything in a skirt. I just didn't see it coming from her.

Cecily is the blacksmith's daughter, so she lives at the smithy. We vaguely saw the ground floor of the smithy through the gloom in "Eirik faces his wife", when Eirik runs in there to puke in a corner. As I said in some other comment elsewhere, Cecily was sleeping just upstairs at the time, in the living quarters over the actual smithy.

Oh, I don't blame Brit at all, though she feels a little guilty about doing it. It's not very gracious of her. But how unbearable, to be forced to play hostess to your husband's ex? Especially since she thinks Anna did sleep with him?

Brit is quite fond of Dunstan and he of her, but I still think there's a lot of childish awkwardness and giddiness there. They aren't and will never be Alred and Matilda, but I think they could be quite happy together once they stop trying to behave the way they think they ought to behave if they're in loooove.

I was thinking about that just today when we were talking about dresses. (Dresses! The one millionth word! Even though it was in the context of Lili's little dresses with the big bellies... )

*cough*

What I meant to say was that I was wondering whatever became of Matilda's red dresses (for surely she had more than one) and what would happen to them in the future. I began fantasizing about Gwynn getting one altered for her lumpy dumpling self just as Brit did with Maud's dress, and I imagined Alred presenting her with her mother's famous ruby headdress (*cough* vampire *cough*)...

But of course, although Gwynn looks more like Matilda, Margaret resembles her much more in personality. However, I have this odd feeling that Alred has a sort of Matilda-worshipping affection for Gwynn that he does not have for Margaret. He loves Margaret madly, of course, but I think he has this sort of starry-eyed romantic love for Gwynn's starry-eyed romanticness. Like he thinks she is more like Matilda even though she is not. Because in fact Gwynn is very much like him, without the melancholy.

I hope this makes sense. Gwynn is the one who is going to carry on the Matilda torch in his heart, even though she is the one less fit to bear it. So she will get her mother's Psalter, her mother's jewels, etc.... And Margaret will just have to make her own way.

This is a theme I want to explore in the coming years. I think Alred's relationship with his daughters and his daughter-in-law will be quite interesting. Especially once the violet-eyed knights start showing up, and the wooing commences.

Oh good it's not just me!

I originally intended for Margaret to be his absolute favorite child, which was kind of apparent in her babyhood when he would not be separated from her. She was the only one he had a habit of carrying everywhere, even around on horseback. But somehow he always seems to come back to Gwynn.

Margaret will be fun to write. She is a bit wild, but she has her head square on her shoulders. (Emma meanwhile is wild, wild, wild.)

Margaret won't be like Matilda in her mad adoration of her father, though. I think Matilda had a very starry-eyed love for her father, and Margaret doesn't have any stars in her eyes at all. At least not at age eleven. Perhaps when her own knight-of-unusual-eye-color arrives she will acquire a few.

I think she's funny with poor old Conrad for now though.

I wonder how wild Emma will be she ans Cubby seem wild enough as it is.

Okay Cubby isn't that wild but he might be in the future. And Maud wasn't that wild.

I shall rise to Cubby's defense here. He's simply adorable. Remember, he spent a lot of time trying his hardest to gain his mother's love, only to be pushed away.
So, I can only imagine he's extremely sensitive too, using his playful, brave side to cover up any insecurities he might have.

He could try to live up to his father's reputation. However, Cubby appears very reserved too. A complete contrast to Cedric really.

I have to raise my hat to you, for bringing in an assortment of characters, each with their own personalities. That's extremely hard to do, even at the best of times, without at least one character overlapping another one.
(I hope that made sense to you)

Well, you had to have a fertile imagination, just to create all these characters in the first place. Without you, this story wouldn't have blossomed the way it has, and built up quite a fan base too.

It's really funny though. A friend of mine told me that a few of her characters in her story, 'speak' to her, rather than she dictate whatever they have to do.
And now, from reading all your comments, I can completely understand.

If, for example, Cat refuses to speak to you, to reveal her innermost thoughts, then there's nothing you can do about it. She'll tell you in her own good time.

**please note, I only used Cat as an example**