Page 41 of A Curse of Hope and Shadows: Part I
“So, she didn’t tell you about the tail,” Dimitri said, putting on a grin as it lashed out behind him, “but whatdidshe tell you about me?”
“That she quite preferred your company to ours.”
“Leonie!” Adeline hissed, her cheeks red. “I did not say that!”
“It was implied.”
Dimitri hoped the redness in his cheek could be explained by Leonie’s prodding. She examined his hand with intense fascination, fingers tracing every muscle, every knuckle. “What’s the dexterity in this hand like?”
“Not great.”
“Hmm. Stay here. I want to check something in thisfascinatinganatomy book I was reading last night. Don’t get dressed!”
She raced off without another word.
Dimitri stared after her. “She reads anatomy books forfun?” he asked incredulously. “How old is she?”
“Thirteen,” said Adeline, smiling at the spot where her sister once stood. It was different from the smiles he’d seen her wear before. She was proud. “We’re all quite smart in this family, but Leonie… Leonie is something else. A prodigy. We… our parents always planned to send her to this fancy academy for healers, but the money dried up after they died, so…”
“The job at the manor.” Dimitri shook his head. “You took it for her.”
Adeline nodded, and Dimitri’s eyes fell behind her, to the books on midwifery, and model pelvis. Possible that they were Adeline’s. Possible that they were Leonie’s. And yet…
“Your mother,” he started, “she was the village midwife, wasn’t she?”
Adeline’s face fell, and he had his answer.
“And your little sister…”
“Mama died giving birth to her.”
Realisation stirred inside him, like the twisting of a knife.
“You were there. That’s why… that’s why you had to give it up.”
Adeline’s throat bobbed. “There was nothing I could do,” she said. “I’ve been over it in my head a thousand times… Mama even told me that there was nothing that could be done before… Sometimes these things just happen. But I just couldn’t do it again. All the delight and joy had been sucked away. A midwife is supposed to be calm and level headed. I couldn’t be that afterwards. Not for that. There’s… there’s only so much you can hide behind a smile.”
Her eyes brimmed with silver, and the knife-like feeling twisted once more in his gut. Dimitri reached out to touch her cheek, but before he could, Leonie banged back into the room, and the moment—or whatever it was—was quickly lost.
Chapter Eleven: Days in the Sun
Leonie dropped a thick tome on the table and flicked to a section, barely glancing at the two of them. She propped open the book near the back.
Taking his hand, she began to massage between the knuckles, asking him a series of questions at the same time, mostly things he’d already told Adeline.
“You really haven’t been gossiping about me, have you?”
“She told us about your chess-playing and your dry humour and least favourite foods but she might have left out some finer details,” Leonie said, still massaging his hand. “Likeallthe fun ones! Who cares what you eat for breakfast?”
“Adeline, apparently.” He smiled, not quite knowing why her observations warmed him so.
“I was talking more about the fine quality of the meals and dispelling any rumours that you drank virgin blood like tea.”
Dimitri cringed. “People say that I do that?”
“My idiot brothers do, but they’re idiots.”
“Not Elliott, though,” Leonie hastened. “We quite like him.” She drew back her hand from his. “Does that seem any different, to you?”
