‘I want you to remember every moment you believed your prayer was answered and ask yourself if your recollections are a true, perfect account. Memory is a funny thing. I know better than most how the devotion of an acolyte can skew faith into blindness. Think on it.’
He straightened.
Maeve rose, too. Her heart hammered in her chest. Almost subconsciously, she rubbed her hand over the miraculously healed stretch of skin on her arm. She could tell him about that answeredprayer, but why should she? Why did he deserve her unearned secrets?
‘Why? Why should Ithink on it? I know what I believe. I know what foundation lies beneath me. My faith isnotblind.’
Jude paused in the doorway. Slowly, he turned to face her. Darkness lurked deep in his impenetrable gaze as he cocked his head. ‘Isn’t it?’
She’d had enough.
Maeve pushed past him into the hallway. Air came thin into her tightened chest. The walls of the house closed in as she fought for breath. She couldn’t bear it anymore. Couldn’t bearhim.
Ignoring the heavy weight of his gaze on the back of her neck, Maeve hurried down the stairs and outside into the heavy near-dark beyond. The moors were vast and empty, soothing the rolling anger consuming her every thought. She pushed open the gate and strode towards the oak tree in the distance.
There, and only there, could she finally breathe.
Until she heard him call her name.
13
Jude
Jude followed a flash of pale hair in the twilit distance, grumbling under his breath. Maeve was perhaps fifty metres ahead, pushing past the gate and heading into the fields beyond. The last thing he wanted was to chase after her like some sort ofdog, but she didn’t know the moors like he did. They weren’t safe off the path, especially in the dark. Bogs pitted the heather in unseen patches, crawling roots arching from the earth like fingers. Never mind the rain sluicing down his face and freezing the air in his lungs.
What was she thinking,leaving the house on a night like this?
Blood pounded furiously in his ears, turning him into a pummelling wave. He would crash against the shore, crash againsther, one way or the other. Whether or not she would erode against him or push back remained to be seen.
‘Maeve,’ Jude called. ‘Maeve!’
He moved faster. The scrape of the wind drew tears to his eyes. Rain scoured across the exposed shape of the land, blurring the figure ahead of him.
Finally, she stopped. Her eyes widened as she caught sight of him.
The thought occurred almost lazily – he’d been so preoccupied with ensuring she stayed clear of danger that he’d neglected to watch his own feet. If he’d stopped for even a breath, he would’ve noticed the distinctive moss, the swampy water licking at his ankles. If it hadn’t been for the blastedwoman in front of him—
Too late.
Water and freezing mud filled his boots and sluiced up the back of his jumper as his left foot sank to the knee. The other jerked forward in an attempt to steady himself. His arms pinwheeled through the air as the mud stopped him in his tracks.
‘Jude!’ Maeve cried.
He barely heard her as razor-sharp panic consumed every thought. The bog wrapped fingers around both ankles, forbidding all movement. Soon, the whole lower half of his body was cemented in the mud. Fear surged through his chest as he clawed at the surrounding reeds. The more he struggled, the faster he sank. He desperately searched for anything solid, finding nothing. He was trapped.
Suddenly, Maeve loomed above him.
‘Stop,’ he tried to warn her, his words harsh and fearful. She would slip into the bog with him if she took another step. ‘Don’t come closer.Don’t, Maeve—’
He tried to force himself into stillness and remember what Elden had taught him about escaping the bog’s tenacious grip, but suddenly, her reaching hand was all he could see.
‘Stay still,’ she said, dropping to her knees and crawling forward. ‘You’re making it worse.’
Judetried. He really did, but the claustrophobia wouldn’t release its hold.
All he could think about was his trapped body and Maeve inching ever nearer. Strands of marshy grass snapped off beneath his grasping fingers. Water brushed his chin as mud hit his tongue. It couldn’t end like this – earth down his throat, water in his lungs.
‘Hold on—’ her voice cut through the panic. He tried to focus on her face as his right arm slid deeper into the muck. He forced the left high above his head. His breathing was a wrenched, choking gasp.
