“And the families there? Are they adequately provisioned?”
“Well enough for the present. His Grace arranged for supplies to be sent across before the bridge failed entirely.” Abrief pause. “He has been… more attentive to such matters of late.”
Eleanor did not miss the implication in the housekeeper’s tone.Because of you, it suggested.Because you have reminded him that there are people beyond these walls who depend on him.
She did not know whether to feel pride or discomfort. She had not set out to alter him. She had merely… observed. Performed the work that required doing. And somehow, in the process, she had begun to draw him back from the isolation he had wrapped about himself like armour.
“I shall inspect the cellar stores,” she said, rising from her chair. “If we are to be cut off, I wish to ensure we possess adequate provisions for the household.”
“I can send a footman—”
“I would rather see to it personally.” Eleanor summoned a weary smile. “The movement will help me remain awake.”
***
The corridors of Thornwood Park lay dim beneath the storm-darkened sky, the usual light from the windows reduced to a dull grey that rendered the house smaller, closer, more intimate. Eleanor walked slowly, fatigue weighing upon her limbs, her thoughts still circling the events of the previous hours.
He told me about Spain.
The thought returned again and again, like a tongue probing a tender place. He had entrusted her with his worst memory—the fire, the deaths, the guilt he had carried alone for years. And she had not offered hollow comfort, nor absolution she had no right to grant. She had simply remained.
Endurance is less punishing when it is not undertaken alone.
She had spoken the words for him. Yet moving through these dim corridors, surrounded by the relentless voice of a storm that refused to yield, she recognised their truth for herself as well. She had lived alone for so long—useful yet unseen, present yet invisible. And now, slowly and painfully, she was learning what it meant to share her world with someone who truly perceived her presence.
The servants’ corridor lay quieter than the principal halls, the sounds of the household softened by distance and stone. Eleanor turned toward the cellar stair—
And stopped.
***
The cat sat squarely in the centre of the corridor.
It was the grey stray—she recognised it at once, though she had encountered it only twice before. The same roughened coat. The same wary green eyes. The same gaunt, watchful bearing of a creature taught by experience to expect little kindness from the world.
It must have slipped inside through an open door during the storm. Seeking shelter. Seeking warmth. Seeking the fragile safety even wild creatures pursued when the world turned hostile.
It also stood directly between Eleanor and the only exit.
Move, she told herself.It is just a cat. A small, frightened creature. It will not hurt you.
Her body refused obedience.
Her feet seemed rooted to the stone floor. Her hands began to tremble. And somewhere deep within her chest, a terror she had not confronted in years rose like bile.
She was eight years old again.
Eight years old in her grandmother’s garden, reaching for a kitten that had appeared so soft, so harmless. Eight years old, feeling the sudden slash of claws across her palm, the shock of blood bright against her skin. Eight years old, sobbing—screaming—while adults laughed at her distress.
It is only a scratch, they had said.Do not be so childish.
What a foolish thing to weep over,they had said.It is nothing more than a cat.
She will forget it soon enough,they had said.Children always do.
But Eleanor had not forgotten. She had learned instead to conceal it—to avoid cats entirely, to shape her life so she need never confront them, to bury the irrational terror so deeply she could pretend it did not exist.
And now the terror stood before her in the dim corridor, blocking her path with unblinking green eyes that seemed to pierce her carefully constructed composure.
