WARNING: SPOILERS!!! ~A Watty's 2019 Submission!

Saved for the Pure Hearted Heroine

Nicky awoke to Gascon crying and sighed. The poor baby had been keeping everyone up something horribly and Harmony was miserable. She was always trying to keep the baby quiet, insisting that she should leave the journey and go to Al Mamoon to hide, but Nicky didn't want her to go.
She heard Harmony get up, shushing the baby. Nicky went to her, and heard her humming. It was the lullaby! The same lullaby that Oliver used to play for Nicky on that record! And Harmony sounded exactly the same as the singer on the record.
Nicky crept down the hall of the ship and peeked into the bedroom where Harmony was walking around with Gascon. Then Nicky got bumped into, and saw Swaine running in.
"Harmony, what's wrong? Is he okay?" Swaine asked, looking at her worried.
"Swaine, I'm fine. Please, go back to sleep." Harmony whispered. He groaned and sat down in the rocking chair in the corner.
"I can't go back to sleep. I'm worried about you. I mean, you gave birth to a child early in the middle of a battle. A child I was unaware that you were having." Harmony tossed her hair, sighing.
"Once more, it's not like you were the only one, Swaine. I still haven't even told Marcassin, and he's the father!" Swaine stood and put his hands on Harmony's shoulders.
"I know, but you' re my sister now. Times are different. Marcassin would be counting on me to help you and he doesn't even know that he has a son..." Gascon began to fuss again, and Harmony bounced him up and down.
"Swaine, I understand. He is your nephew after all. But if you'd just let me leave, I'll hide in Al Mamoon. There's no one there-"
"But the Flyers." He interrupted. "And even if their leader is gone, they'll still attack you and the baby. No, you're both going to stay with us." Then there was creaking sound and Nicky cursed under her breath. She'd moved. Swaine went to the door and opened it to find her.
"Nicky..." he looked at Harmony, who seemed distressed as Gascon began to cry and she tried to quiet him, so as not to wake anybody else. "How much of that did you hear?"
"All of it." She whispered, ashamed to be caught eavesdropping. Harmony looked from Gascon to Nicky, then back at Gascon, then back to Nicky, and smiled.
"Nicky? Would you like to try and get him to sleep?" Nicky was startled by the question, but nodded.
"O-okay..." She said. She sat in the rocking chair and Harmony handed the baby over. Gascon cried in Nicky's arms as she rocked back and forth, singing the lullaby. "Over hills, green as a spring time, chasing a lonely cloud, white as snow."
"Someday soon, I mean to catch it, hold tight and up into the sky I'll go." Nicky looked up and saw Harmony had sung with her. Nicky grinned, then continued to sing.
"I think of what you told me. However sad life seems, that sometimes tears, can turn to dreams... if I could only be with you once more. And hold you tightly to my heart. We could walk this road together. And never, ever be apart. Each and every heart will be healed. On our journey through another world..." the baby was soothed by her song. When she came to the end, Gascon was asleep.
Harmony gently lifted him from Nicky's arms and laid him in the cradle. Then she went over to Nicky.
"Here, Nicky. May I walk you back to your room? I'd like to ask you about that song." Swaine began to protest, saying that both girls needed sleep and how they never listened to him, but they ignored him and walked to Nicky's room.
"How did you know that song? Dad had an old record with it on it." Nicky asked Harmony.
"That record was given to your father from your grandmother Alicia." Harmony explained. "The song itself is something I gave to Alicia to sing to her child when she left."
"Was it you who sang it on the record?" Nicky had to ask. Harmony nodded.
"Alicia held the song close to her as she travelled to the other world, she put it onto that record and played it for Oliver many times when he was young." Nicky's lip quivered, tears forming in her eyes as she thought of her father, when he would soothe her fevers and calm her nerves with that song...
"Oh, Nichole." Oliver had said, rubbing her back as she cried, in pain from fever. "Would you like me to play your song?" She nodded. He went over to the old record player that had sat in this room for years and turned on the record. Then he came back over and sat beside her. She sat up, shaking, curling up in his arms. He handed her Mr. Drippy, which she held close as he rocked her back and forth to the rhythm of the music.
In the present, Nicky wiped her eyes, not wanting to cry in front of Harmony. She hadn't seen the woman cry yet, nor had she heard of her crying in the stories. She was a tough woman. Her eyes would water, but she would just brush it away and keep going. She was Nicky's idol. Harmony hugged Nicky close.
"It's okay to cry." She whispered.
"You don't have to be tough."
"But you're so tough." Nicky told her. "You told Dad once that you cried only one time, when your mother died." Harmony pulled away, smiling.
"Oh, Nicky. Everyone cries, sweetie. But there is truly only two people who have ever seen me cry true tears. Your father and I once wept together over the lost of our mothers, when we were at Perdida many years ago. And Marcassin once made me cry." Nicky looked shocked at Harmony's words.
"But I thought Marcassin loved you! Why would he have made you cry?" "Because he loved me I cried." The Songstress told her. "He had told me he loved me for the very first time, and I had been living a thief's life under a false name. And I had been told by a very wise woman, it's either your happiness or the world's. I hadn't know what she meant at the time, but when I did, I painfully chose the world over Marcassin. But he loved me so much, he still waited until I said yes." Nicky smiled at that as Harmony opened the door to her bedroom, leading her to her hammock. "And I have a feeling a certain someone is going to wait for you to say yes." Nicky tilted her head.
"Who?" She asked. Harmony smiled knowingly."That pirate boy seems to like you." Nicky made an ick face.
"Jayden? No, we're just friends." Harmony laughed as she left."Oh, Nicky." She said.
"That's how Oliver and Esther started. Then Oliver married Myrtle." Then she shut the door, leaving Nicky with her thoughts. Did Jayden really like her? He had stuck by her this whole journey, even after she had left him back at the Deep Dark Woods. But he couldn't actually like her, could he?
"...I mean, how could he like me?" She asked herself. She did a spell that made a mirror appear and looked herself over. She was rather grungy looking. Her shoes looked like they had seen better days, her left sleeve had a tear in the elbow. Her ponytail was falling out again and she had dirt on her face. What part of that would Jayden like? She sighed and crawled back into the hammock, falling out twice. She had a long few days ahead of her.