Page 49 of The Seeker
Then there was his voice…
Meera remembered her mother’s machinations. “Sorry. I’ve never danced to anything that sounds like this.”
The bedroom door opened and Sabine emerged in a summer-yellow dress that reached her knees. “Oh, I love this song!” She glanced at Meera. “Don’t you, Meera?”
“I don’t know it.” She moved to the window to track her father and Roch’s progress. They were debating something in the garden with Roch looking overwhelmed and frustrated and Maarut looking like he was counseling the younger scribe. He had a hand on Roch’s shoulder. The two chairs were upright, but nothing else had been moved.
“Sabine,” Meera said in cheerful voice, “why don’t you and Rhys dance?”
“Oh, I’m sure he wouldn’t be interested in dancing with me.” Sabine played the reluctant partner, but Meera could tell she wanted to dance with Rhys. “He’syourfriend.”
“But we’re here to visit you,” Rhys said smoothly. “I’d be delighted if you danced with me, Miss Sabine.” Rhys had slipped into French with ease. “We can show Meera what she’s missing.”
Sabine giggled, her energy buoyant. Rhys held out his hand and she went to him. They danced a fast-stepping number in the space where the breakfast area had once been before Sabine threw the table and two chairs out the front door. Roch and Maarut were turning the table upright from its precarious perch on the front porch as Rhys and Sabine danced and chatted about favorite songs and places to dance.
Rhys played along with the talk of balls and socials that must have happened before the Rending, exhibiting a light charm Meera had never seen from him before. Sabine spoke of humans long dead and a city that mostly existed in history books.
“So I said to the governor that he must not do it, but you know human men always ignore their women.”
“Are you saying the governor ignored you entirely? How rude.”
“Entirely! He sent troops to those people, and all because he was angry with the English.” She spit out the wordEnglish. “Who likes the English, I ask?”
Rhys smiled. “I certainly don’t.”
“Tout à fait. But what do the native people have to do with it?”
“Nothing at all, I’m sure.”
“Nothing,” Sabine said firmly. “You are correct, nothing. But they sent the soldiers and…” A stricken look crossed Sabine’s face. “No, that wasn’t how it happened.”
Meera moved closer, sensing a shift. “Sabine?”
She shook her head, frowning. “It wasn’t humans, was it? It was our people they killed.”
Rhys held Sabine lightly. The flirtatious woman had disappeared. Something dark swam behind her eyes.
“It wasn’t them,” she whispered. “It wasn’t the humans who died.”
Meera had witnessed this many times. The turn was coming. Sabine would cycle from anger to frivolity to mania rapidly, but then at some point—usually the third day of an episode—the melancholy would come. And with the melancholy came memory and grief.
Then… clarity.
Roch must have sensed Sabine’s shift in mood, because he came running in the house just as she slumped against Rhys’s chest.
“Roch?”
He grabbed her from Rhys’s arms. “Come with me. I have you. Come now.”
“Roch, they’re all gone.” The raw pain in Sabine’s voice was enough to tear Meera in two. It was as if Sabine was remembering the death of her family for the first time, over and over again. “They’re gone,” she sobbed. “They’re gone, and there is no one left. The house was burning and they were all gone.”
“I know.” He kissed the top of her head. “I know they’re gone, but I’m here.”
“Don’t leave me.” She gripped his shirt. “Don’t ever leave me.”
“I promise I won’t.”
Roch led a weeping Sabine into the bedroom while Rhys stood helpless, watching them from the center of the room as the gramophone switched to the next song. It was another fast dancing number, but there was no more joy in the cottage. Meera moved to the turntable and removed the record. Then she picked another from the table and put it on.
