The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue - V. E. Schwab Page 0,23
her finger. She has thought of it, of course, in darker moments, tired moments, but she will not be the one to break.
She tips her hand, and lets the ring fall over the edge of the balcony, down, down, into the dark.
Back inside, Addie pours herself another glass of wine and climbs into the magnificent bed, folds herself beneath the down duvet and between the Egyptian sheets, and wishes she’d gone into the Alloway, wishes that she’d sat at the bar and waited for Toby, with his messy curls and shy smile. Toby, who smells of honey, and plays bodies like instruments, and takes up so much space in bed.
Villon-sur-Sarthe, France
July 30, 1714
XIII
A hand shakes Adeline awake.
For a moment, she is out of place, out of time. Sleep clings to her edges, and with it, the dream—it must have been a dream—of prayers made to silent gods, of deals made in the dark, of being forgotten.
Her imagination has always been a vivid thing.
“Wake up,” says a voice, one she has known all her life.
The hand again, firm on her shoulder, and she blinks away the last of sleep to find the wooden planks of a barn ceiling, straw pricking her skin, and Isabelle kneeling beside her, blond hair braided into a crown, brows drawn tight with worry. Her face has waned a little with every child, each birth stealing a little more of her life.
“Get up, you fool.”
That is what Isabelle should say, the chiding softened by the kindness in her voice. But her lips are pursed with worry, her forehead furrowed with concern. She has always frowned like that, fully, with her whole face, but when Adeline reaches out to press one thumb into the space between the other girl’s brows (to smooth away the worry, the way she has a thousand times before) Isabelle draws back, away from the touch of a stranger.
Not a dream, then.
“Mathieu,” Isabelle calls over her shoulder, and Adeline sees her oldest son standing in the barn’s open doorway, clutching a pail. “Go and get a blanket.”
The boy vanishes into the sun.
“Who are you?” asks Isabelle, and Adeline starts to answer, forgetting that the name won’t come. It lodges in her throat.
“What happened to you?” presses Isabelle. “Are you lost?”
Adeline nods.
“Where did you come from?”
“Here.”
Isabelle’s frown deepens. “Villon? But that’s not possible. We would have met. I’ve lived here all my life.”
“So have I,” she murmurs, and Isabelle must see the truth as a delusion, because she shakes her head as if clearing away a thought.
“That boy,” she mutters, “where has he gone?”
She turns her gaze fully back to Adeline. “Can you stand?”
Arm in arm, they walk into the yard. Adeline is filthy, but Isabelle doesn’t let go, and her throat tightens at the simple kindness, the warmth of the other girl’s touch. Isabelle treats her like a wild thing, her voice soft, her motions slow as she leads Adeline to the house.
“Are you hurt?”
Yes, she thinks. But she knows Isabelle is speaking of scrapes and cuts and simple wounds, and of those, she is less certain. She looks down at herself. In the darkness, the worst was hidden. In the light of morning, it’s on display. Adeline’s dress, spoiled. Her slippers, ruined. Her skin, painted with the forest floor. She felt the scratch and tear of brambles in the woods last night, but she can find no angry welts, no cuts, no signs of blood.
“No,” she says softly, as they step inside the house.
There is no sign of Mathieu, or Henri, their second child—just the baby, Sara, sleeping in a basket by the hearth. Isabelle sits Adeline in a chair across from the infant, and sets a pot of water over the fire.
“You’re being so kind,” Adeline whispers.
“‘I was a stranger and you welcomed me,’” says Isabelle.
It is a Bible verse.
She brings a basin to the table, along with a cloth. Kneeling at Adeline’s feet, she coaxes the dirty slippers off, sets them by the hearth, then takes Adeline’s hands and begins to clean the forest floor from her fingers, the soil from beneath her nails.
As she works, Isabelle peppers her with questions, and Adeline tries to answer, she really does, but her name is still a shape she cannot say, and when she speaks of her life in the village, of the shadow in the woods, of the deal she made, the words make it across her lips, but stop before they reach the other girl’s ears. Isabelle’s face goes blank, her