Page 181 of The Seven Rings
“Much gratitude.” He grabbed her hand before she straightened. “What you’re doing? What you’ve done upstairs? It makes a difference. Collin lost his heart, and let a lot of it go. You’ve brought the heart back.”
Now she laid her cheek against his. “I feel that. I really feel that. But we’ve brought the heart back. And we’re not nearly done.”
She straightened. “I’ll let any of our four-legged family out who wants to go in the yard. You put out the food.”
She started for the door, paused, and looked back. “I really loved waltzing with you.”
“And we’re not nearly done.”
That put a bounce in her step as she walked down the hallway with Mookie and Yoda following. Since neither Pye nor Jones came out of Cleo’s bedroom, she decided Owen had already left for the day.
She tended to start hers early, but he, invariably, started earlier.
She found her assumption correct when she reached the kitchen and found a note.
All pets fed, and don’t let them tell you different.
She looked down at the dogs. “There will be no second breakfast, but you’re welcome to go out and play.”
Clover played “Good Morning Starshine” while Sonya let them out, got coffee. Then watched them romp around while the coffee kicked in.
Color had begun to bloom in the woods. Hints of gold and orange and red splashed against the deep green of the pines.
“If I were Cleo, and since it’s a beautiful morning, I’d grab a hoodie and do the yoga in the garden. But I’m not Cleo, and I need somebody telling me what to do next.”
Once she’d polished off her coffee, she filled a water bottle and made her way down to the gym.
After spreading out a mat, she scrolled through programs until she found one that seemed best for stretching overworked muscles.
The fact that it started with breathing suited her, so she sat cross-legged on her mat, hands in prayer. Within ninety seconds, she feared the soothing voice and the mindful breathing would put her right back to sleep.
Then she rose, began the first gentle stretches, following along with the calm-eyed woman with the smooth ponytail on the wall screen.
By the time the instructor told her to step to the front of the mat for sun salutations, she felt relaxed but awake. And enjoyed having someone who seemed to care about her well-being telling her when and how to move, when and how to breathe.
By the second sun salutation, her muscles had loosened, her body just flowed along with the voice.
Warrior One. Inhale, exhale. One more breath. Warrior Two. Gaze over your extended left arm.
Both her body and her mind flowed with the voice, with the movements, the poses. Almost like a trance, she thought vaguely as she moved to plank, Chaturanga, Up Dog, Down Dog. Then back to repeat the whole sequence on the other side.
And the voice, so quiet, so soothing, guided her through to the next set of Warrior poses.
You’re no warrior, Sonya. You fear because you’re pathetic and weak. You have nothing, you are nothing.
“No.” Sonya sighed it as, almost dreaming, she continued to move through the poses.
No true Poole. The manor knows it. The manor rejects you.
“No,” she said again as the cold coated her skin.
I could kill you with a thought and no one would weep. I give you the gift of allowing you to take your own life. To have that moment of courage. Outside, Sonya, outside. The sea waits for you. Spare yourself the pain, and end it.
“No.” Shivering, she pulled back.
On-screen the instructor continued to move, so fluid, so graceful, even while blood poured down her face, down her long, limber arms and legs.
She turned her head, grinned at Sonya with teeth as sharp as a shark’s.
