He was still watching her. He did not look away.
Chapter twenty-three
What Grew in the Garden
Violet
Violet woke to the low, familiar ache in her belly and lay still in the dark, sorting through what she felt. Relief was the first of it. She was not carrying a child into a house where wives did not survive their carrying. But underneath, unwanted and undeniable, was its opposite. Some part of her she had not consulted had wanted a child. Something of his that would not leave with the dawn.
She was still sitting with both feelings when the morning post came up, and among the cards was her mother’s hand, crossed and recrossed to spare the paper. She broke the seal and read it standing at the window in her dressing gown with the grey light coming in.
The Circle was agreed. The third leaf was belladonna, not the harmless cousin any of them might keep in a drawer, but deadly nightshade, dried and steeped and dressed to pass for it. Her mother’s final lines were not in the language of herbs.Comehome, Violet. Comfort means naught to any of us without your safety. Come home. I beg you.
Violet folded the letter small and put it in her pocket. She stood at the window for some time. The garden was grey below her, the paths empty, the house quiet around her in a way that no longer felt like peace.
She could not carry this alone. And there was only one person in the house she trusted because she had seen his face in the dark of a carriage when he told her about Elizabeth, and no man living could have worn that grief and been the one who caused it.
She would tell him tonight. She would take him where the walls could not carry it.
Violet found Henry in his study after dinner, the lamp drawn close and a stack of correspondence at his elbow. He rose when she came in, one of the courtesies he never once forgot, even on the nights he could barely look at her.
“Violet.”
“I am sorry to disturb you. Will you walk with me? In the garden.”
He looked at the black windows, then at her. He did not ask why and followed.
The cold met them at the door. The paths lay grey under a thin moon, and the house stood lit at their backs, every window a held breath. She drew him away from it, onto the gravel, until the light fell behind them and there was only the crunch of their own steps and somewhere distantly, the muffled rush of the subterranean stream.
“I did not want to say this where the walls could carry it,” she said.
He turned his head toward her but did not speak. They walked.
“You asked me to tell you when my courses came.” She kept her eyes on the pale line of the path. “They came. Last night.”
A few steps passed in silence.
“Are you well?”
“I am well. It is what it is.”
They walked the length of the south border without speaking. The boxwood hedge threw a low dark line along one side, and the moon found the gravel between their feet. She could hear his breathing, steady and close. “There is more,” she said at last.
He stopped. She felt him turn toward her in the dark.
“The tea. The special blend that Mr Vexley orders from the apothecary.” She saw Henry’s face harden and drew a breath.
“What of it?”
“I saved the leaves and took them to my mother, and my mother took them to a circle of women who have spent their lives in stillrooms.” She let that sink in before continuing. “They are agreed. The third leaf is belladonna.”
She heard the gravel shift under his weight. He had gone still.
“The fertility tea, they called it. It was never meant to help me conceive.”
The silence that followed had a quality she could feel against her skin. The garden was very dark. The house behind them glowed at every window like something watching.
“How much of it have you had since we last talked? Your afternoon teas.” His voice came low and fast. “Violet. How much?”
