Day of Fate

Author Note: Julian Fellowes' brainchild, not mine - I wish! Just a heads-up - I've taken artistic license with some crucial things, but it will make sense.

On an overcast November day at Brancaster Castle, Edith was sitting in her dressing room. She sighed. She pulled on the mechanism that opened one of the drawers. Inside that drawer was a miniature portrait. She made a slightly strangled noise in her throat. All of a sudden she heard a knock at the door. She was jolted back to reality so vividly she didn't take it upon herself to hide the portrait from any visitors.

"Mama?" Marigold asked her mother, tossing her dark fringe out of her eyes.

"Yes darling?" Edith pondered, trying her best to keep up appearances. But just as Marigold was about ask her question, she briefly forgot it upon seeing the portrait.

"How come I've never seen that frame?" she asked her mother.

Edith's complexion flushed as she realised it was still in plain sight. Not even her lady's maid Kate was allowed to see. Rubbing her temples, she took a deep breath.

"Well... Marigold sweetheart I had hoped to have this talk with you when you were a little older but I guess now is as good a time as any. Don't worry, it's a good thing."

"Oh, well... Aunt Mary already had a talk like that with Sybbie..." Marigold said gently, trying to calm her mother's nerves, quickly thinking how weird it was to be doing so.

"What? Oh, heavens no! Not that talk, oh my goodness!" Edith exclaimed, the misconception breaking the building tension and causing a few laughs from both. "Where to start... do you remember mine and Papa's wedding?" she asked.

"No. But of course you've always been married to him - I'm Marigold Pelham." she said. Edith smiled sadly, the light-blue eyes of her child looking back at her.

"Not always, honey. It's a long story. Have you ever wondered why he has dark blue eyes a different tint from yours?" the strawberry-blonde questioned. Marigold paused. "Some of your questions will be answered if you look at my frame." her mother said in a calming tone, passing it to her. Marigold set her sight on a medium brown-haired man, tall build and light blue eyes- she gasped. It was almost like she was looking at a grown-up male version of herself. "That's your real papa. Michael Gregson."

"Why didn't you ever tell me Papa Pelham wasn't an actual blood relative?" Marigold pondered after a good few seconds of eerie silence, putting Bertie's surname in front because she could already feel a weird pull to the man in the picture. In her nearly eleven years her mama had never kept any secrets from her. Not massive ones.

"Like I said, it's a long story. And he... would've loved to know you were here." Edith said glumly, wiping away a stray tear. This shook Marigold - her mother wasn't one for crying. "And before you wonder, he wasn't killed in a car accident like your Uncle Matthew. He... he was killed though. You see, he was married when he met me. He ran The Sketch actually. We became good friends when I joined the staff and soon fell in love, but he was still married. For a complicated reason he couldn't get a divorce. He loved me so much he found out he could get one if he became a German citizen." she trailed. Marigold knew bits about the Great War, so she knew it would've been risky for her papa - gosh, it felt odd to call him that - to do that. But he had clearly adored her mama, which made her smile in a somewhat melancholy way.

"Something tells me this won't have too happy an ending." she said. Edith nodded.

"Mm-hm. Obviously, before he left, I became pregnant with you. Your Great-Aunt Rosamund helped me get to Switzerland soon enough and stuck by me in those months. Switzerland is close to Germany on the map of course, and god do I wish I could've told your papa. But the main focus was getting you into the world safely. Long story short, we got back to Downton, and I didn't know what had happened to him. Until..." Edith trailed, choking slightly on her words. "Until after a long time I learned he'd run into a group of rebels in Munich and come off worse. You were ten months old when it happened." she finished, wiping back a tear. Marigold turned pale. Oh poor Papa! she thought glumly, her heart clenching. After another brief thought, she did some mental arithmetic... her eleventh birthday was in two months.

"Was... was it around this time?" she asked her mother nervously. Edith nodded.

"Ten years ago today." the Crawley daughter said sadly. "Don't get me wrong, Papa Pelham and I have had a very happy marriage, despite you not having any brothers or sisters, and I love him very much. But part of me will always love Michael Gregson. We could've been so happy, and in an oddly restrained way, we were for a time." she finished wistfully. Marigold's throat was almost burning as a thought occurred to her.

"Do you know... where Papa is buried?" she asked nervously, pulling on her own hair.

"Somewhere in Munich, dearest. I've wanted to try to find his grave once you were old enough, but Germany is a bit touch and go with tourists' safety at the moment." Edith said, eyes unusually stormy. "I swear to you we will visit and find him one day. I owe it to him, for all he went through in his attempt to marry me." the blonde said.

"Do you mind if I keep the miniature in my room?" Marigold pondered wholeheartedly. Edith locked eyes with her daughter and shook her head, pulling her close in for a hug and whispering 'I don't mind at all' into her dark hair.

"Why don't you go search for Jenny? She must be wondering where you've got to. You both could find the card deck and the three of us could have a game of blackjack?" she asked gently, referring to Marigold's governess. Marigold nearly skipped from her mother's room, excited at the prospect of some girly time.

"You'd be so proud of her, Michael." Edith whispered to thin air, sighing in an entirely sad way. "Every time I take her down to London, we go to dinner at the Rules. It just seems appropriate." she finished this little monologue by running her fingers over the miniature, looking into the eyes. Marigold's eyes. Edith would find that grave one day.

AN: Bertie and Edith are a good match, but Marigold deserved to know the truth, and I just loved Edith and Michael's relationship. If some readers/reviewers want it, I'll write a sequel with closure where mother and daughter go to Munich. Of course, this is set in 1933 so history experts will know why Edith was hesitant here.