Chapter 4

The moment those words left the Dowager Lady's mouth, Felicity's body went rigid. The smile froze on her face, and her eyes filled with shock.

10,000 gold pieces?

She had only arranged for someone to forge Edric's handwriting on the divorce decree and for Finch to deliver it. She had never authorized anyone to withdraw gold.

She knew that the household's gold was kept in the storeroom and could only be released with a written order from the Dowager Lady or from Edric himself. She did not have the authority to touch it.

Where had the 10,000 gold pieces come from, and who had sent them to me?

Had Finch acted on his own, or had someone else in the household intervened?

A sharp thread of unease wound through Felicity's chest, the unmistakable feeling that this plan had slipped beyond her control.

She had designed this scheme to humiliate me, to cause a scene, to watch me beg, grovel, and refuse to leave. Instead, I had walked out with my head held high and 10,000 gold pieces in hand.

That gold sat like a thorn in Felicity's mind, and she could not find a moment's peace.

She forced down the panic rising inside her and went on making conversation with the Dowager Lady, but her thoughts were already far away, consumed entirely by the question of where that gold had come from.

By then, I had already left the capital with my parents, and we had traveled south until we reached the Southlands.

The Southlands were a region of rivers and gentle countryside, with beautiful scenery and kind, honest people, far removed from the politics and scheming of the capital. It was exactly the right place to build a home.

I used the money to purchase the finest estate in the area, a grand property on the shore of a lake, with a large courtyard, several wings, a sunlit parlor, and a garden. It was more than enough for our family, and would be more than enough for eight children to run around and play in someday.

The servants had the house cleaned from top to bottom, with thick carpets laid across the floors and hearths burning in every room, warm and inviting.

I leaned back against the settee, resting a hand on my still-flat stomach, and felt the presence of eight tiny lives inside me. The corners of my mouth lifted on their own.

Outside the window, a soft rain drifted over the Southlands. Inside, the air was warm and still. My parents were talking quietly in the next room, and everything felt safe and good.

I closed my eyes and let myself imagine the days ahead. I would wake to the view of the lake in the morning and spend the afternoons with my parents over tea.

Once the children were born, I would teach them to talk and walk and take them through every lane and market in the Southlands. There would be no more coldness from the Regent's household and no more sidelong looks from people who despised me—just a family, together, in peace.

Just the thought of it made me smile.

Half a year passed in the blink of an eye.

In those six months, I rested and cared for myself, and my belly steadily grew rounder. All eight heartbeats remained strong and stable, and life in the Southlands was quiet and happy.

Meanwhile, the war at the frontier had finally come to an end. Edric had won a decisive victory and was leading his forces home.

On the day of his return to the capital, he went straight to the palace to meet the king and discuss matters of the frontier. By the time he emerged, it was deep into the night.

Finch had been waiting at the gates of the Regent's household for hours. The moment he saw Edric approaching, he hurried forward with a bow and followed his lord into the study.

Candlelight flickered across the walls of the study as Edric shed his dust-covered cloak and took his seat behind the desk.

Days of hard travel and hours of council with the king had left him visibly drained, with heavy shadows beneath his eyes, and even the usual severity of his expression had softened under the weight of the exhaustion.

Finch stood to one side and spoke quietly.

"My Lord, in the six months you were at the frontier, I kept a record of everything that happened in the household. It was all included in the dispatches I sent to the front. Did you have a chance to read them?"

Edric raised a hand and pressed his fingers against the bridge of his nose. He was about to respond when his gaze swept across the desk and stopped abruptly.

Sitting on the desk was a divorce decree, folded with precise, deliberate care.

The handwriting on it was his, or nearly so, carrying the faint stiffness of someone who had studied his script and tried too hard to replicate it. On the acknowledgment line, written in an elegant, unmistakable hand, were two words.

Suvanne Thayne.