Page 42 of Reflections of Silence

Not that I wanted to return to her, but this place called to me, to us all, and she damn well knew it. None of us could stay away from her readings, desperate to know our pasts wouldn’t collide and destroy the futures of those we loved.

Or that we would earn love in some future version of our twisted selves.

As I climbed aboard the small punt and made my way back through the convoluted river system to where Dolion waited,sans river monster, the skin draped over his shoulders like a cloak, his words echoed through my mind.

I love.

A simple but powerful statement, and a fool’s errand.

But we all wore that facade here.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

GISELLA

Stars decorated the sky when I awoke, clammy and cold. A breeze fluttered a hot wind against my naked skin. I closed my eyes, hoping to return to the nothingness of slumber, but sleep evaded me. After tossing for some time, my stomach convinced me to rise on my new schedule.

I dressed carelessly in a gown that had been laid out—Minette was running my life for now—rolled my hair into a bun and pinned it to the crown of my head. Fresh slippers were lined in neat rows by the door. The ones I destroyed the night before were nowhere in sight.

Averting my eyes from Sebastian’s room, situated across the hall from mine, I peered out of my door. Every inch of me craved him. Yesterday, I would have sought him out, regardless of the time of day, or if I would encounter him in his still state. Today, that option had been removed from me. I don’t know if he had even come home after the events of last night and somehow, the thought that I had evicted him from his own home made me feel worse.

Amy, what have you done to me?

My mind screamed the question into nothingness as I slipped a calm, brittle facade over my emotions, walking down the stairs at a sedate gait to find anyone at all.

I didn’t have to search for Charleton, though I knew the hour was late—this household didn’t run the usual hours and was too far from anywhere for anyone to care. He greeted me at the entrance to the dining room.

“Madame.” He dipped his head a little, a sign of respect I hadn’t earned. “I will have dinner made up for you.” He gestured to someone out of sight, and turned back to me, a half-smile on his face.

“Is he—” I stepped through the doorway, halting in the empty room.

Charleton frowned. “I believe the master is away, madame. Would you like to dine in the library, perhaps?”

I nodded, turning to conceal the tears that sprang to my eyes, and made my way back to the small library, refusing the memories of my last encounter with Sebastian in this room that sprang to the forefront of my mind.

I ate alone that night, and the night after.

By the third day after our argument, I managed to wake myself soon after dawn. My internal clock had been thrown out of sync by the alternating days and nights spent with my husband, but I missed the sunlight. Needing to do more than eat, and return to my bed, I sought some other form of occupation.

Minette flustered around me, but I waved her down.

“I’m glad to have any company at all,” I smiled. She dipped into a quick curtsey. “The estate—what other functions does it have?”

Minette stared at me in surprise. “None, madame.”

“None?”

She shook her head, curls bobbing around her heart-shaped face. “The estate provides…distance to the master, is all.”

“He uses it to hide here? No rents, no livestock? Plantation?”

“None.”

I raised my eyebrows. He let a place like this run into the ground because he was afraid of the people? “Well, I’m sure there can be some function that might be derived from the land.”

Alarm flared in her eyes. “He might not like that, ma’am.”

“He might not like a few things. Are there any neighbors?”

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