#mathilde geffard

[aneurins-barnard]

BARKSKINS // Episode 1 New France

[quietparanoiac]

"How is she?" "The same. Shaking like a leaf, poor thing." "Aye. I wish to discover her name. Reunite her with her family."

[calamity-bean]

for your consideration

[windsweptlassie]

Thinking about the symbolism surrounding Hamish, Randall, and the prune tart...you know, something something about how the tart is first introduced as something Randall Cross likes, and it becomes one of Hamish’s favorite thing, to the point that it’s a joke among people who know him, and the fact that Hamish seems to be fate-bound to walk the same path as Randall, that he’s always been irreversibly tied to Randall Cross. Like, the prune tart is shorthand for that red string of fate between them, like it’s symbolic of a bloody body (cut it open and find out what’s inside), like the tart is used as a tactic of negotiation AND intimidation by Mathilde and Hamish. And trying to figure out what it all means.

[irrationalanthem]

Anyone else think this was oddly under played? Sure it was because of Cross but none of the adults picked up on it? I know Mathilde saw Renardette do the carving so the second part is BS, but I liked the idea, plus Mathilde has cannon issues with tables.

[itslaurenmae]

anew

I just finished watching NatGeo’s Barkskins last night, so I’ve written this short little ficlet about a few of the characters. You can also read it on ao3 here.

Mathilde Geffard had been many things in her life: oldest daughter, favorite sister, young bride, second wife, childless mother, widow. Innkeeper’s wife, now the innkeeper.

As she cut vegetables for the day’s stew one chilly fall morning, she remembered something her mother had always said to her after a hard winter - “we begin anew.”

“We begin anew,” Mathilde said to Francis when the ship landed in Quebec City. “This is a place to make a life.”

We begin anew, she said to the ground as they buried their daughter that cold winter morning, the sound of the church bells echoing in the frosty air.

We begin anew, she said to the mirror the morning after Francis died, his throat sliced for reluctantly doing the right thing.

He hadn’t been a bright man, but he had figured out in just enough time to shut up and listen to her. It had gotten him killed, and while Mathilde wasn’t exactly happy he was dead, she certainly wasn’t sad, either.

“We begin anew,” Mathilde said to Renardette, wiping a cloth across the young girl’s forehead. This child could not replace the one she’d lost, but Mathilde wouldn’t be able to live with herself if she let just anyone take her away.

Renardette said nothing as Mathilde repeated the sentiment like a prayer. But the child also didn’t look way from Mathilde as she’d held her hand and scrubbed away the dirt and grime.

“We begin anew,” Mathilde said to Delphine, wiping a tear from her cheek. “He is not the man for you, but he is not the only man. Come, stay with me. Help me, I’ll help you.”

How she’d become something of a mother to two young women not of her body was indeed, wholly new.

First Renardette, with her fox-shaped birthmark that she refuses to hide behind a curtain of hair any more.

“Up,” Renardette said one day, pointing at her hair as she handed Mathilde her brush.

“You want me to braid your hair?”

“Up,” Renardette repeated. Mathilde obliged. Renardette, with her quiet steps and wide, all-seeing eyes. We begin anew.

And then Delphine, her mark hidden, so marred by a man that couldn’t control her - a mark so unsettling it had driven her first husband to annul their marriage.

“Mister Cooke is kind,” Delphine said after coming back from Cooke’s place of business. “He made me tea and we sat by the fire. He showed me this.” She opened her hand and showed Mathilde a tiger’s claw. We begin anew.

Two girls marked by someone or something else, signs of their otherness etched onto and into their skin - Renardette with her birthmark and Delphine with her scarred abdomen.

And Mathilde - innkeeper’s wife now innkeeper, childless mother of two.

They were looking into the future now together, cutting vegetables and cooking and making do. We begin anew.

[historygirl1994]

I tried to write a Renardette fic.  Not sure how I feel about how it came out, but here it is

https://archiveofourown.org/works/25233706

[aneurins-barnard]

BARKSKINS // 1.06 The Wobble