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sweetestrequiems · 5 years

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You Are Not Alone

Request by: @boombiotch! Thank you for the request! <3 Prompt: 45) "You may technically be an adult, but you’re still my child."

Character(s): Jane Seymour / Katherine Howard (Other Queens are mentioned, but are not the focus. They come in at the end of this.)

Summary: Katherine has not been having an easy time the last few nights. A lot of her memories of her past life tend to surface as night terrors and other bouts of depression. On one certain night, Katherine sneaks on outside of the house and heads to a park to sit alone. A worried Jane calls her after seeing her door’s been left open, and heads over to the park to comfort the young queen.

TW: Mentions of Nightmares/Night Terrors. Mentions of Howard’s beheading. Mentions of Seymour’s death, and the loss of her son. There’s like... a few instances of strong/mature language.

A/N: I hope you enjoy it! This was very fun from my brain to the keyboard of my laptop. I love the mother/daughter dynamic that the Queendom has created between Howard and Seymour, and I’m very happy I was finally given the opportunity to write it. The German in this was checked by my German friend, and he made sure it was accurate. I double-checked the one Spanish phrase myself, since I speak Spanish. Everything should be accurate in terms of other languages.

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Most nights, the Tudor house was extremely quiet, with the exception of the occasional grunt of frustration from Catherine Parr’s nightly habit of staying up and writing until she got angry that she couldn’t deal with it anymore, or Katherine Howard knocking at one of the doors of the queens due to a nightmare.

This was not one of those nights.

Katherine Howard had found herself sliding into the hoodie she stole from her cousin, before pocketing her phone and silently trying to step through the house. It was a good thing she was both small and quiet. Grabbing one of the sets of keys that probably belonged to Catherine of Aragon (due to the cross keychain.), the brunette opened up and closed the front door after having paced to it, making sure to not leave evidence that she had gone outside for a nightly stroll.

Yes, a nightly stroll at 2:30 am. That totally wasn’t weird to begin with.

Pocketing the keys, Katherine let out a heavy exhale. “I don’t get it. What have I been doing wrong? I’ve been journaling, going to therapy as recommended... I really don’t understand.” The youngest queen shook her head as she walked on down the sidewalk. It was a quiet night outside, not much bustle in the street. As weird as it was, she did enjoy the city sounds. The quiet was a little odd, but she wasn’t going to complain. There were very few nights where she needed quiet, and this was one of those said nights. “I guess this is better than waking up from seeing that scaffold...”

478 years since she last stood at the Tower of London’s grounds. 478 years since she shook from the horrid anxiety and waiting of the ax. 478 years since she had lived such a morbid pain. But every subsequent night after she had woken up in the new body was nothing but a nightmare about her beheading.

The scar on her neck, which was covered by the hoodie, started to burn a little.

Clutching onto her chest for a moment, the young queen paused her walk to look around. Very few people seemed to be up this late. Even better for her. It was a luxury to Howard that she had a small, local park so close to her. Taking a deep breath, she started up her walk again, just to find herself sitting down ten minutes later. A bit of a walk for fifteen minutes, but she was not going to complain when she could have just her own alone time. Although, alone time–– with her thoughts going back constantly to her childhood and untimely death in the mid 1500′s–– was not going to help her at all.

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Jane Seymour had gotten out of bed by the time Katherine was maybe ten minutes into her walk. Originally, she was going to the kitchen to grab a glass of water, and then return to bed. But the silence of the house was really bothering her, until she heard an angry Catherine Parr groan in utter frustration, “God damn it, Cathy!” towards herself. Raising her eyebrows, she figured that nothing was to be worried about. But a blink of the eye later, and a certain glimmer caught the woman’s eye.

“Kitty?”

The door to Howard’s room was ajar, which was out of character for the queen in pink. Instead of going to the kitchen, the blonde queen approached the door, and knocked on it, for the door to only open up into the room. The fairy lights were still on and everything, but the bed was empty, and the choker with a K was on the nightstand. This was probably the only time Jane Seymour had ever audibly cursed and heard herself in the silence.

“Fuck.” And that word coming from Jane was odd to begin with.

The third queen gently closed the door, and briskly paced to her room. She had to pick up her phone and call Howard. She needed answers.

“Please pick up, please pick up...” The muttering from Jane was heard on the other end as Katherine had taken the buzzing phone out of her pockets and brought it up to her ear after answering. “Jane?” The voice on the other end brought her comfort. “Kitty! Kitty, where are you? Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m okay. Just left to take a walk. I’m in the park, just sitting on a ben––”

“Don’t move your little tail, Katherine Howard. I am on my way.”

“Jane, I’m––” The conversation was cut short. Katherine just stared at her lockscreen. A picture of her and Anne. “––okay.”

Did Jane Seymour care that she was in pajamas? Absolutely not. She just grabbed a coat from her closet and slid her shoes on. She was going to find Katherine Howard, and she was going to bring her back home. Exiting the room and grabbing her set of keys, the front door to the house opened and closed a little louder than she expected it to. The sudden noise got Catherine Parr’s attention, and forced the woman to get up from her desk.

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“Kitty? Kitty!” The blonde woman started to call out after having driven to the park, and parked nearby on the side of the street. “Kitty!” Worry was mixed into Jane’s calls for Katherine. She always walked with a purpose, but there was shaking with Jane’s steps tonight. That’s when out of the corner of her eye, she saw the bright green hoodie, and the bright pink hair to contrast it. There she was. Almost running over, and stumbling a bit when she was in front of the young queen, Seymour pulled Howard up into a tight embrace. “I’m so glad you’re okay!”

Melting into the embrace, Howard just tightly returned the hug. She was glad that she could call Jane “Mum”.

Wrapping an arm around the girl, Jane held her close as the two slowly began their paces to the car. “What’s going on, Kitty? Why are you out so late?” The feeling of Katherine’s shoulders tensing up made Jane pause right in her tracks. “Katherine? Love, it’s okay. You can talk to me.”

“It’s just––” Her voice cuts off. A sniffle. “I’m tired of it, mum. I’m tired of the nightmares! I’m tired of the pain. I’m tired of seeing my beheading every other night. I’m tired of feeling my neck burn like crazy sometimes, even when we do shows! It hurts, Jane. It hurts...” Katherine turned to face Jane and bury her face into the woman’s shoulder with a tight hug. There was some shaking. The poor girl was crying.

The queen in grey couldn’t really relate, but she knew how she could. “It’s okay, love. It's okay,” she held on to Katherine as tight as possible, her own blue eyes watering up just a little. “I know the nightmares hurt. I know... they’re difficult. I have them too. I wake up sick every morning from them. Like you, I see what happened to me. I get the constant reminder I could never hold Edward in my arms.” A slight crack. Although she was a steadfast queen that sung about having a heart of stone... she cracked sometimes. Sometimes, she couldn’t have the heart of stone she so graciously sung about.

“You’re not alone, Kitty. You won’t be. I’ll take care of you.”

A sniffle, and a nod.

“Do you want to know why?”

Another nod. Katherine Howard made herself look up, with tear-filled eyes and a quivering lip.

“Because even though you’re an adult, you’re always going to be my child. You’ll always be my daughter. I will keep you safe. I will do whatever I can to make sure––” a sniffle from Jane. Katherine finally got to see the reddening cheeks, nose, and eyes of the older queen. “––you’re happy. We’re family, Katherine. You are not alone.” With a hitched breath, Jane moved a few stray hairs out of Katherine’s face and gave her a soft and tender kiss to the center of her forehead.

Safe to say, Jane Seymour just tightly held on to Katherine Howard in a very protective embrace, with silent tears flowing from her eyes.

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3:25 am.

The remaining four queens in the house were all congregated in the living room. Anne Boleyn was hugging a pillow, evident that she was definitely still sleepy. Catherine Parr was wide awake, staring at the door with her hands interlocked in front of her face. Catherine of Aragon was quietly muttering a prayer, just hoping the two would come back. Anna of Cleves, like Parr, was staring at the door and waiting for the other two to come back.

“Do you think they’re okay?” A sleepy Boleyn yawns out.

“I hope so,” both Cleves and Parr had simultaneously spoken without even planning it. The two looked at each other, grinned, nodded, and then went back to looking at the door.

“Oye! Ya, por favor. Dejen de hablar, me tienen nerviosa con sus voces,” Aragon shot them a sharp look. She was tired. “You’re going to drive me insane with the talking. I would like to hear––”

The door opens. Howard and Seymour both freeze in their places when they see the other queens waiting for them.

“Hi...” “I’m surprised most of you are awake. I say most, because of Cathy.”

Parr furrowed her eyebrows, but then shrugged it off. “Hey, let a woman write in peace.”

“Wir haben uns schon Sorgen gemacht, meine Damen! You two just upped and disappeared,” the German queen stood up, and opened up her arms. Katherine was quick to go and accept the hug. “Where did you two go, anyways? It’s unlike either of you to disappear so... quickly and suddenly. Especially you, Jane. “

“Kitty left to go to the park. I went to follow her and make sure she was okay. She just needed reassurance, is all.”

��Meine liebe, is this true? Es ist fast 4 Uhr morgens,” Cleves furrowed her eyebrows, the concern in her facial expression. The young queen just nodded.

“Jane, are you okay? You look pretty rough,” Aragon nudged Boleyn to get up, and slide over a little so the third queen could sit down. Seymour just sighed, not really sure of what to say. “It’s been a long night. One long night and––” “You don’t have to tell us twice. Like damn, Cathy went into an uproar when she saw Kitty’s room empty, and even more of an uproar when your room was empty. She would’ve raised hell had Aragon not told her to calm down,” Boleyn just held on to the pillow, yawning a few moments after the last word of that sentence.

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4:00 am.

The other queens had managed to help Jane calm Katherine down enough to go back to bed. And in fact, they were all in bed at this point, except Katherine and Jane. A knock at Jane’s door made the woman stand up and open the door.

“Can I sleep in here?”

“Come on, dearie.”

There was a good ending to that night. As Jane began to fall asleep while holding on to Katherine, she could hear the young queen’s voice mutter something out. And considering Katherine was asleep, it almost made Jane cry from the amount of love she was feeling from the girl. “I love you, mum.” Leaving one last kiss on her forehead, Jane just smiled and let her eyes close. She responded with just a few words.

“I love you too, poppet.”

#Kano Drabbles #boombiotch #six the musical fanfic #six the musical #katherine howard #jane seymour

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