Stepsister(51)

“Girls don’t fight. Stay here and cut cabbages for us, all right? Soldiers need to eat.”

Isabelle forced a smile and waved them off. They trundled out of the farmyard and down the drive. She was back in the cabbage rows by the time they turned onto the road.

For several long minutes, she watched them go, holding her harvesting knife as if she were gripping the hilt of Tanaquill’s sword. A terrible longing took hold of her as she did, a yearning buried so deep inside her, she couldn’t even name it any more. It was a hunger deeper and more ferocious than the need for mere food, a hunger that sang in her blood and echoed in her bones.

Isabelle turned away and, with a heavy sigh, bent her back to the cabbages. She, Tavi, and Maman had many more to cut if they were going to eat tonight.

As she worked, she worried about empty wagons and empty bellies.

She needn’t have, though. The stomach is easily satisfied.

It’s the hunger in our hearts that kills us.





Fifty-Five


It was dusk, Isabelle’s favorite time of day.

And she was spending it in her favorite place, the Wildwood.

Isabelle had ridden Martin across the LeBenêts’ land and dismounted as soon as they'd reached the woods in order to give the old horse a rest. As they made their way through the trees, Isabelle took a deep breath of the clear forest air. It had been years since she’d set foot in the Wildwood. She’d forgotten how intoxicating the scent of the forest was—a mixture of damp, rotting leaves, resiny pine needles, and the dark, mineralish waters of the rocky streams they crossed. She took note of all the familiar markers as she walked—the giant white bolder, the tree felled by lightning, a stand of white birches—though she could have found her way blindfolded.

Finally, she reached her destination—a hidden bower far within the woods. Everything was just as she remembered it—the leafy canopy, the shaggy berry bushes, even the little heart. It was still there on a mossy bank, shaped of stones and walnut shells. Some were missing, but most remained, bleached by rain and snow.

Isabelle sat down on the soft moss and touched one of the stones. She had tried her best to not think of Felix since her visit to the marquis’s, but now everything came rushing back. She could see him, and herself, right here, just as they were the day they’d made the heart.

They’d been best friends. Soul mates. Since the day her mother had married Ella’s father and had brought her and Tavi to live at the Maison Douleur. He was the groom’s son and had loved horses every bit as much as she did. They’d ridden over hill and dale together, through streams and meadows, deep into the Wildwood.

From the start, Maman had disapproved. Two years ago, when Isabelle had turned fourteen and Felix sixteen, she’d declared that Isabelle was too old to be acting like a hoyden. It was time to give up riding and learn to sing and dance and do all the things that made one a proper lady, but Isabelle wanted no part of that. She’d escaped with Felix every chance she got. She’d adored him. Loved him. And then, one day, she’d discovered she was in love with him.

They’d ridden into the Wildwood and had stopped at the top of the Devil’s Hollow, a wooded canyon. As much as they liked to explore, they knew better than to venture down into the Hollow, for it was haunted. Instead, they’d flung themselves down on the mossy bank and had eaten the cherries and chocolate cake that Isabelle had filched from the kitchen.

As they were finishing, and Felix was wiping cherry juice off Isabelle’s chin with his sleeve, they’d heard a twig snap behind them.

Slowly, they’d turned around. A red deer had walked up behind them. She was only a few yards away and with her were twin fawns, still wobbly on their spindly legs. Their blunt black noses were shiny and wet, their soft coats dappled white, their dark eyes huge and trusting. As the doe grazed and the fawns stared at the pair of strange animals sitting on the bank, Isabelle had felt like her heart would burst with joy. Never had she seen anything so beautiful. Instinctively, she’d reached for Felix’s hand. He’d taken it and held it and hadn’t let go even after the deer had gone.

She’d looked down at their hands and then up at him questioningly, and he’d answered her. With a kiss. She’d caught her breath and laughed; then she’d kissed him back.

He’d smelled like all the things she loved—horses, leather, lavender, and hay.

He’d tasted like cherries and chocolate and boy.

He’d felt safely familiar and dangerously new.

Before they’d left, they’d made the heart together. Isabelle could still see them, side by side, placing the stones and shells …

“What a pretty picture,” said a voice at Isabelle’s side.

Isabelle jumped; she gasped. The images were swept away like rose petals in the wind.

Tanaquill laughed. “Ah, mortal happiness,” she said. “As fleeting as the dawn, as fragile as a dragonfly’s wing. You poor creatures have it, you lose it, and then you spend the rest of your lives torturing yourselves with memories until old age carries you off in some slow, bloodless death.” She wiped a crimson smudge from the corner of her mouth with her thumb and licked it. “Better a quick and bloody one, if you ask me.”

“You … you could see what I saw?” Isabelle said, her heart still jumping from her scare.

“Of course. The heart leaves echoes. They linger like ghosts.”