The Journal of Vincent Du Maurier Trilogy (Books 1, 2, 3) (79 page)

Daybreak

The morning proved
cold, but I took Saba with me for a walk along the Dáal river. She was bundled
in the fur of the Arctic fox her grandfather had trapped himself. He and Freyit
had nurtured a long-lived competition, and Gerenios had beaten the master three
seasons in a row.

“Is the fish awake?”
Saba’s little hand squeezed mine and I thought how big she had gotten.

“I think perhaps they
are still asleep,” I said.

“We shouldn’t fish
them, then.”

“Should we let them
get rested enough to escape our nets?”

“Yes,” she said.

“What will we eat for
supper if not fish?”

“Berries,” she said
with a shrug. The fox fur slipped from her shoulders, and I leaned down to
adjust it. “Thank you, daddy.”

Her voice was the
echo of her four older sisters, and Saba’s compassionate character was due in
thanks to her mother.

The day Netta
Bijarnarson was bound to me
in the grove at the foot of the birch trees in front of the entire colony, she
thought of one thing apart from our union, feeding those who came to witness us
unite. From the moment I met her, I loved her. It was not hard to see she had
come from a place of pain, suffered under worse circumstances in another part
of the world.

“She was enslaved, Dagur,” Gerenios had told me.
“Your kin have freed her from wretched conditions, and she will never forget
it.”

He was correct in thinking her loyalty would be
steadfast. She, like me, understood our burden, and did not waver.

As I held little Saba’s hand, I thought of her
mother’s vigor. She had given birth to five girls in a short period of time,
and still she kept up with other responsibilities. I admired the mother of the
new world, and the woman to whom I was bound.

“Is that Evie,” Saba
said, pointing to the kneeling figure. She was at the water’s edge, her hands
in her lap, a hood pulled up over her head. Evelina wore a sable cape that
marked her for the widowhood she felt, and hid her gaunt frame. She seemed to
have wasted away in the seasons since I met her, despite the succor available
to her.

“Good morning,” Saba
cried from a distance. Several wren trumped out a song, as chorus to my little
girl’s cheery hello.

Evelina turned to
greet us with a nod and a wave.

“Why don’t you cross
the rocks, and collect some grubs for the fish,” I said to Saba. She giggled as
she tore off, stomping her feet through the shallow riverbed. I smiled after
her, keeping a careful eye as she crossed.

“She’ll be as big as
Beatrice soon,” Evelina said. “What are you feeding that child, Dagur?”

I pulled up to where
she knelt but remained standing. “The frost season was lean, but she seems to have
defied it. She is a wonder.”

“I saw Hannah and
Andor cozying up the night before last.”

“Netta thinks they’ll
make a fine match when she’s ready,” I said. “But I don’t like to plan such
things.”

“Fathers never do,”
she said.

“When do you expect
Veor and Lucia to return?”

“They’re close,” she
said. “I’ve sensed them for days now.”

“Do you think they
were successful?”

Evelina studied Saba
as she crouched down, digging into the soil for grubs. She had a small pail at
her side, and used the spade I had gifted her for her last fête.

“Peter thinks I
should know,” she said. “He’s certain I’m renouncing some gift to see the
future.”

“Isn’t he the mind
reader?”

The corners of her
mouth turned upward and a smile broke across her face. It was still the most
beautiful aspect I’d ever seen, though that was a secret I would take to my
grave. I didn’t need a reprimand from Netta, or my grandmother, for that
matter. Neither of them could know how many times I’d dreamed of the benevolent
Evelina, and the spark of wrath that marked her for Vincent.

“I felt him,” she
said.

“Maybe you can read
minds.”

“Your face is always
an open book, Dagur. Most of us can tell what you’re thinking.”

I was sure a crimson
hue rose to my cheeks since they burned like wildfire.

“Last night, as I sat
by the hearth,” she said, “I heard his voice.”

“What did he say?”

“Evelina.”

“Did you answer?”

“I tossed another log
on the fire and blew the embers.”

Saba called to us,
holding out her pail. “Got six,” she yelled, her voice garbled by the sound of
the ravine.

Evelina sighed and
said, “The future comes, Dagur, and I am grateful Saba will see it.”

“Are you worried?”

“For what?”

“His return.”

She turned to me, batting
the long dark eyelashes every one of my girls had inherited, and said, “I can
hardly wait.”

Her lips parted
slightly and the points of her subtle fangs beckoned to me. I dropped to my
knees, and kneeled beside her, pulling up the sleeve of my coat to bare my arm.
I made my proffer and she took it with modest haste. Saba watched from across
the river, smiling at the gesture she knew so well, the birthright she would
claim when she came of age. I returned her smile and gave a small wave with my
other hand, as she went back to her chore of searching for grubs nested in the
dirt beneath the bog birches.

THE
END

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Also by K. P. Ambroziak

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The Journal of Vincent Du Maurier

Book 1

Book 2

Book 3