Since the moment he had met her, he had always been able to read Sidra’s face. She was an openhearted woman, honest and genuine and fearless. He remembered the night when he had first held her, skin to skin. When she had invited him to share her bed at last, months after they had wed. The wonder, the pleasure that had been in her eyes when she looked at him.
He regarded her now, standing like a stranger in their house, and he couldn’t read her face. He didn’t know what she was feeling, what she was thinking. It felt like a wall had risen between them.
She lifted her eyes to his, as if she also felt the distance. Her voice was reserved when she asked, “Why are you here, Torin?”
“I came to be with you tonight, Sidra.”
She blinked, surprised. It made him realize how few nights they had spent together. And even then, Maisie had often slept between them in the bed.
“Oh,” Sidra said. “You … you didn’t have to do that.”
He studied her, his pulse throbbing in his temples. Did she want him to leave? “I can go, if you would rather that.”
“No,” she answered. “Stay, Torin. We shouldn’t be alone tonight. And I have something I need to tell you.”
Why did his stomach drop? He braced himself and motioned to the countless dishes, scattered across the kitchen. “We both need to eat. But you should change into some dry clothes first.”
She nodded. While she went to the bedroom, Torin perused the offerings. He eventually brought a bannock, a cauldron of cold stew, and a bottle of wine to the table, careful not to disturb Sidra’s herbs.
She returned a few moments later, dressed in a floor-length chemise. Torin noted that she had laced the collar tight, to conceal the bruises on her chest as if they didn’t exist, and he felt a lance of pain in his stomach. He didn’t want her to feel as if she had to hide things from him.
She looked at the stew he had chosen.
“Should I heat it?” she asked.
Torin should have thought of that. He wordlessly stoked a fire in the hearth, and Sidra set the cauldron over the iron hook. While they waited for the food to warm, he glanced at her.
“You have something to tell me?” he prompted.
“Yes,” Sidra said, rubbing her arms with a shiver. “I know what the Orenna flower does.”
He frowned as she brought the red flower to him. The very one he had once carried to her.
Slowly, she told him everything. The legend she had read in the tattered book. How she had planned to come home today to fetch her herbs and thought otherwise when she saw the crimson flower. How the petals had tasted, and how they had opened her eyes to the spirit realm.
Torin’s shock gave way to anger. “You should have spoken to me first, Sid. Before you ate this. What if it was poison?”
Sidra was quiet. There was something far worse lurking in her eyes. “I think it saved me, Torin.”
He listened as she continued about the reflection in the loch. Torin went cold with dread. He imagined Sidra swimming down into the darkness, only to return after a hundred years had passed. He would be long dead, his bones in a grave. He would have never known what had befallen her. He would have lost his daughter and his wife in the span of a day, and it would have obliterated him.
“At first, I didn’t realize it was a trick,” Sidra whispered. “But then I remembered how my eyes were open, and I could see all the threads … the spirit that wanted to claim me, and the one that wanted me to rise. If not for Orenna, I think I would have kept swimming the deep.” She paused, her gaze on the fire. The stew was bubbling now, but neither of them made to remove it. “I’m sorry, Torin. I didn’t mean to make you or Graeme worry. I just needed to do something to find Maisie. And I didn’t realize so much time had passed. I dove into the loch at midday and returned at dusk, but only because I thought Maisie was in the water. It looked just like her.”
Torin reached out to caress Sidra’s hair. “Don’t go back there, Sidra. Don’t ever return to that loch.”
She met his stare. She was remorseful and sad, but there was also a hint of defiance in her, and he knew he couldn’t command her. Not even to spare his heart.
Sidra turned away to lift the cauldron from the fire, giving him no chance to speak further. She carried the pot to the table and served two bowls.
Torin sat across from her. He tried to eat, but the food was like ash in his mouth. He broke the bannock and offered her a piece, but even Sidra struggled to eat. She pushed the stew around with her spoon.