The Beauty of Darkness - Mary E. Pearson Page 0,104

some things I couldn’t put off. Whether it was prudent or not didn’t matter. With every passing day, it burned through me. I had to know, one way or the other.

“Hello, Mikael.”

He stopped mid-stride in the narrow alley behind the pub, a girl with beautiful auburn curls still clinging to his arm. He shook her loose and told her to go on, that he would meet her later.

He stared at me, my face still hidden in the shadows of my hood. But he knew my voice.

“Pauline.”

Hearing my name on his lips sent shivers swirling down my spine, every timbre of his voice as sweet and buttery smooth as I remembered.

“You didn’t come,” I said, barely able to form the words.

He stepped toward me, and I clutched the basket I held in front of my belly tighter. His expression held worry and remorse. “I had to reenlist, Pauline. I needed the money. My family—”

“You told me you had no family.”

He paused, looking down, but only briefly, as if ashamed. “I don’t like to talk about them.”

My heart tugged. “You could have told me.”

He changed the subject from family to us. “I’ve missed you terribly,” he said and took another step toward me, his hand reaching out, as if he’d already forgotten about the auburn-haired girl. I set the basket down and pushed back the cloak from my shoulders.

“I’ve missed you too.”

He stopped and stared at my rounded belly, the shock registering in his expression, the moment drawing out as long as a final breath, and then a short awkward puff of air escaped from his mouth. His arms that had just been reaching out to me folded neatly across his chest. “Congratulations,” he said, and then more carefully, “who’s the father?”

In those few words, for a fleeting moment, I wasn’t seeing Mikael at all, but Lia, her long hair disheveled around her shoulders, her eyes glistening, her breaths coming in frightened gulps, her voice as fragile as spring ice. He’s dead, Pauline. I am so sorry, he’s dead.

Mikael stared at me, waiting for a response. I was a virgin when he met me. He was well aware that he was the only one. His lips pressed tight, and his pupils shrank to sharp beads. I could see his thoughts spinning, smooth, silky, already renegotiating whatever I would say.

“He’s no one you’d know,” I answered.

His chest rose in a relieved breath.

And I turned and walked away.

CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

By the end of the day, Natiya still hadn’t found Pauline. There weren’t more than a dozen inns in Civica, and Natiya claimed she had gone to them all. All she got were shrugs to her inquiries. By my calculations, Pauline’s belly should be round with eight months of baby by now—an innkeeper would notice that.

My mind raced with something I hadn’t considered. What if she had lost the baby? Enzo hadn’t mentioned her condition back in Terravin. What if—

And then another possibility.

What if she couldn’t be found because she was already in prison?

“You’re looking drawn,” Father Maguire said as I absorbed Natiya’s news. “Have you eaten?”

I shook my head. What little I had nibbled was now on a Civica street. He sat me down at a table in a room no larger than a closet. It contained a table, a chair, a narrow cot, and single hook on the wall. The room was on the abbey grounds and meant for single traveling priests when they visited the archives and for nothing more. Natiya and I couldn’t stay here long. It would draw attention. I had gone to the millpond cottage today to see if Kaden had shown, but there was still no sign of him. Cold fingers had gripped my spine. Please let him be all right.

I rested my head in my hands. With Natiya’s lack of success already discussed, the priest asked me how my day had gone. I answered with silence and reviewed the news in my head.

My father was ill with an unknown ailment brought on by the wickedness of Princess Arabella’s betrayal. No one had seen the queen since my father took ill, and in fact, the whole of the queen’s court had gone into seclusion, mourning the lost company of soldiers. I couldn’t even get to my aunt Bernette. The citadelle was guarded as if it held every last treasure on the continent. My brothers, whom I desperately needed to see, were away—along with the squads I had counted on for support. Pauline couldn’t be found. And Prince Walther was