Otto rolled his eyes.
“Perhaps it’s a philosophical question,” Mrs. Pariseau said. “Would we eat people in order of value to the group, or in order of stature?”
“You better stop her, now,” Captain Hardy murmured to his wife. “Before there’s bloodshed.”
Delilah stifled a laugh. “I think I might want to hear some of the answers,” she whispered.
“Well, you don’t want to eat any of the ladies, because we’ll keep everyone’s flagging spirits up with inspiring embroidered pillows,” Daphne said. She held up her project, which would eventually read “Bless this Home” but currently said only “BLE.”
She blushed delightedly when everyone laughed.
Such had the lines of reality blurred that Lorcan felt a genuine glow of pride at how everyone seemed to enjoy her. And a delight in her obvious delight.
As if she was truly his.
“It’s going to be pretty,” he said, encouragingly.
She smiled across at him, and his heart contracted in an odd way, half pleasure, half pain.
For two days, they sat across from each other for coffee and a scone in the morning.
For two days she had spooned sugar into his cup and poured, and he had cut her scone into pieces.
They were kind to each other, and even amusing.
And though every bit of his body remained exquisitely, nearly torturously attuned to every bitof hers—the way her hands moved, the light on her hair, the curve of her lips, the sway of her hips when she walked—they had not touched each other again.
They were intelligent people who understood self-preservation, and this was how they were going about preserving themselves. So be it.
But he had spent an afternoon teaching her how to use her astrolabe, and he could truthfully say those few hours were among the best in his life so far, for reasons he could not quite articulate. It was peaceful and easy and amusing and nourishing. The way her eyes lit with comprehension. The way she laughed. The speed with which she learned. The pleasure he took in imparting knowledge had been a surprise, but it had a good deal to do with how much she wanted to know and the fact that he could give it to her.
Mostly it was a good afternoon because he was there and she was there and they were together and this realization had subtly, somberly haunted him since then.
“We’ll need the strong men to tear the furniture apart for firewood for, er, cooking,” Captain Hardy mused delicately from his chair.
“But big, strong men willeatthe most,” Mrs. Pariseau wisely noted. “We can keep a lot of ladies alive for weeks on the amount of food our musician friends here eat in a day.”
The boys merely beamed with pride at this.
“A fellow at White’s by name of Havelstock told me his wife eats the equivalent of three men now that she’s with child,” St. John volunteered.
Daphne went so abruptly, rigidly still that Lorcan felt it like a blow.
And then color and light fled from her face so abruptly it was like watching an eclipse. Something had blotted her out, just like that.
Her eyes were blankly stunned. Her graceful hands paused on her embroidery.
He stared, ice gathering in his gut, as she remained fixed in that position for several of his own heartbeats.
Then she glanced up at the ladies and produced a little smile. She cleared her throat. “If you would all please excuse me for a moment. I just need to fetch my...” She gestured vaguely with her embroidery and stood.
He thought he detected the faintest strain in her voice.
They nodded and murmured and smiled and she set aside her embroidery and hurried out of the room.
She didn’t glance back at him. It was as though she’d forgotten he existed.
He was motionless. Suddenly no other sound in the world was audible but her footsteps crossing the foyer.