He was dressed immaculately; more formally than she had ever seen him, in a dark coat and crisp white cravat, his boots polished to a mirror shine. His face was pale but composed, his jaw set with determination. He looked, she thought, like a man going into battle.
Behind him came Boggins, equally formal in a suit that probably cost more than most villagers earned in a month. His expression was carefully neutral, but there was something in the set of his shoulders that suggested readiness. Preparation for whatever was about to happen.
The whispers died instantly. Every head in the church turned to watch as the Duke of Corvenwell walked down the center aisle, past row after row of stunned villagers, toward the front of the church.
Toward the pew reserved for the lord of the manor.
It had been empty for years, decades, really. Frederick’s father had stopped attending services long before his death, preferring to conduct his spiritual business in private, away from the prying eyes of common folk. And Frederick himself had never shown any interest in village worship. The pew had become a kind of monument to the family's absence; a reminder that the Hawthornes considered themselves above such common rituals.
The velvet cushions were dusty. The prayer books in the rack were yellowed with age. No one had sat in that pew for so long that some of the younger villagers probably didn't even know what it was for.
Until today.
Frederick reached the pew and stopped. He didn't sit down immediately. Instead, he turned to face the congregation, to face Lydia, in her seat at the back, and their eyes met.
She couldn't read his expression. She couldn't tell if he was angry, or hurt, or something else entirely. His grey-blue eyes held hers for a long moment, searching for something she couldn't name.
What are you doing?She wanted to ask.Why are you here? What are you planning?
But she couldn't speak, and she couldn'tmove. She could only sit there, frozen, as the man she loved and the man she had abandoned stood in a church full of witnesses and looked at her like she held the answer to every question he'd ever asked.
Then he turned and took his seat.
The whispers resumed, louder than before.
"What is he doing here?"
"He never comes to services."
"After what happened with the blacksmith's niece…"
"He must be making some kind of point…"
"Did you see the way he looked at her?"
Reverend Clarke emerged from the vestry, his expression betraying surprise at the unusual congregation. He was an older man, white-haired and gentle, who had presided over Ashwick's spiritual life for nearly thirty years. He had married couples, buried the dead, christened the newborn, and weathered every scandal the village had produced.
But even he seemed uncertain in the face of this.
His eyes flickered to Frederick, then to Lydia, then back to Frederick. Whatever he was thinking, he kept it to himself.
"Let us pray," he said.
***
The service passed in a blur.
Lydia heard nothing and saw nothing. Her entire awareness was focused on the back of Frederick’s head, utterly still and utterly unreadable.
She tried to follow the prayers. She tried to mouth the familiar words of the liturgy, to stand when everyone stood and kneel when everyone knelt. But her mind was elsewhere, spinning through possibilities, trying to anticipate what Frederick was planning.
Because he was planning something. She was certain of it.
The Duke of Corvenwell did not attend village church services. He did not dress in his finest clothes for a Sunday morning in Ashwick. He did not bring his valet as a witness and sit in the family pew that had been empty for a generation.
Unless he intended to make a statement.
He's going to do something, she realised.Something public. Something that can't be taken back.
