Adrian Silvercrest's Arc

Chapter 22 of 23

Adrian did not sleep. He sat at the kitchen table with the ring in his palm until the sky turned gray. Aldric came down with Hope on his hip and Eric holding his robe. Neither man spoke of what they had done. They only spoke of where she might have gone. "She took the small bag," Aldric said. "Not the winter cloak. She meant a short walk. Then she kept walking." "Dan first," Adrian said. "Then the road south." Dan met them at his gate before they knocked. His hands were dirty from the goats. He listened once, spat, and pointed past his back fields. "Not here," Dan said. "I'd tell you if she was. Try the coach road. A woman with child asked a carter for a ride four days back. He didn't take her. She kept on foot." Four days. Adrian's stomach dropped. He set Eric down and knelt so the boy could see his face. "We go find Mama," he said. Eric nodded like a man taking orders. They rode out with the children bundled between them, Aldric's horse and Adrian's, following the coach road south. At each farm they asked. Most had not seen her. One old woman had sold her bread and water two days back and said the woman looked pale. By the second afternoon they reached a hamlet where a boy was shouting in the lane. A pregnant woman had collapsed at the well. The midwife had taken her in. Adrian was off the horse before it stopped. Aldric caught the reins and Hope both. The midwife's cottage smelled of boiled cloth. Elara lay on a straw bed under a wool blanket. Her braid was undone. Her lips were cracked. Her hand rested on her belly, and the belly moved. "She's living," the midwife said. "The child too. She walked herself dry. Whose is she?" "Mine," Adrian said. "Ours." Elara opened her eyes. She saw him and turned her face to the wall. "Go home," she said. "No." "I couldn't do it again." Her voice was flat and thin. "Another one. What if this one is plain, Adrian. Just plain. Brown hair. Green eyes. Nothing in her hand. You'll look at her the way you look at the bread." He knelt by the bed. He put the ring on the blanket near her hand. He did not touch her. "I looked at nothing," he said. "That was the sin. Not what she'll be. What I stopped seeing." She did not take the ring. She did not push it away. Aldric came in with Hope. He set the baby against Elara's side. Hope pressed her cheek to her mother's arm and did not glow. Eric climbed up and lay across Elara's legs. Elara wept without sound. Her hand closed over the ring but did not put it on. "Take me somewhere that isn't home yet," she said. "I'm not ready for that house." "Then we don't go home," Adrian said.