The room went still. Even the wind stopped.
Maeve’s mouth fell open, lips making the shape of a curse, but no sound. Nora made a squeak, like a trapped mouse. Sully’s head jerked as if I’d slapped him, and for once, he looked completely lost.
“I—” I started, but the words tangled. “I wasn’t sure, before he died. Then I thought it didn’t matter. But when he came back…”
Sully’s jaw worked, but no words. His hand floated up, trembling, then dropped. He stared at my belly, flat as it everwas, like he expected to see a sign. He looked at my face, searching for the lie.
Maeve caught her breath, then sucked it in through her nose, hard. “You didn’t think to mention this before?”
I shook my head, slow. “I didn’t want it to be true. But it is.”
Sully moved then, not fast but deliberate, and for a second I thought he’d fall. He knelt in front of me, palms up, eyes fixed on my middle. I’d never seen him look so frightened. Not of dying, not of the world, just this one thing.
He whispered, “Are you sure?”
I nodded.
He touched the leather ring on my finger. “I’m sorry,” he said, and the words made no sense, but they cut anyway.
Maeve sat down hard, all the fight leaking out of her at once. She buried her head in her hands. “Oh, Catherine,” she whispered. “What have you done?”
Nora made a small, sad sound, and I realized she’d been crying for a while, just silent tears leaking down her face.
For the first time, I felt the fear for real—not just the kind that pricks your skin, but the kind that hollows you out, makes you want to dig a hole and hide inside. I put my hands over my stomach, not sure what I was feeling for. There was nothing there. Not yet.
Sully rose, slow and careful, and hugged me. Not tight, just enough to let me know he was there. His face was wet against my cheek. I didn’t want to let go, ever.
Maeve looked up, red-eyed and shaking. “You can’t run, Cat. You’ll never make it to the graveyard. The patrols will be on us by noon.”
“We’ll make it,” I said. “We have to.”
Nora moved to the window, peering through the warped glass. She brushed her sleeve across her face and said, “They’re already in the lane.”
The clock ticked. I looked at Sully, then Maeve, then back to the window. My hand stayed on my belly, like a shield.
We had to go, or we’d all be dead by sundown.
A noise outside. Heavy, deliberate. A horse’s hooves, then the slow, wet slap of boots on mud. We all froze. I saw Sully’s eyes flick to the door, then the window, mapping exits in a heartbeat.
“They’re at the gate,” Nora said.
Maeve’s face went white. All the years of being the strong one, the caretaker, the stone wall against the world—gone in a second.
“We have to go,” I said.
Sully nodded. “I’ll take the back. Cat, you lead your sisters out through the root cellar, keep low till you hit the field. I’ll draw them off.”
“Like hell,” I said, grabbing his hand before he could move. “We go together, or not at all.”
He started to argue, but I squeezed his fingers so hard his knuckles popped. He looked down, and I saw the fear in him then—real fear, not the kind that came from pain or bullets, but the kind that said maybe, just maybe, he didn’t know how this would end.
He nodded. “Alright.”
I grabbed Nora by the shoulders and made her look at me. “You ready?”
She nodded, lips tight.
We hustled through the back hall, Sully leading, ducking low. The church felt smaller, the air thick with every secret we’d ever kept. I grabbed a coat, wrapped it around Nora, then shouldered the pack. Sully checked the door, then pushed it open, slow, like he expected the world to explode.
