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Malin sighedand let her head fall back against my shoulder. The horse we shared was old and steady, and the forest path we took was smooth for now. I kept hold on the reins, and wrapped my other arm around her waist, pulling her firmly against my chest.
“Kase, do you remember the night you stumbled over a loose slat in the loft, and when you started to cry, you blamed the sliver of moon for not lighting your way?”
“Your memory is slipping. I did not cry.”
“Kase Eriksson, youdidcry.”
“Lies.”
I did recall the night I’d skinned my big toe so badly it bled all over the straw. And I did cry like a damn little. I’d tried to hide my face, insisting I got an eyeful of straw and that was the reason for the tears.
“This moon reminds me of that night.” Malin tilted her face to the sky.
Above us, the crescent moon cast faint blue shadows over the leaves and branches, creating the illusion of long, spindly fingers reaching across the forest floor.
“We told such stories that night,” she said.
I pressed a kiss to the crook of her neck. “You told stories until I stopped crying.”
“I knew you cried.” Malin pinched my thigh, then nestled against me once again. “Do you ever wonder what might’ve been if we’d never gone to the Masque av Aska as children, if we’d never been separated?”
“Yes.” My voice was rough and low. I breathed in the clean scent of her freshly washed hair. “I told you, thoughts of you kept me alive. When it was unbearable at the palace, I would dream up a new life with a new future, and you were the focus of my world.”
“How did it go in your mind? Pretend we grew up together in the loft and that we were never parted.”
My face heated. I’d never shared my simple, dull dreams with anyone before. They seemed so ridiculous compared to the lives we lived.
“Kase? What do you see in a different life?”
Malin’s voice was soft, filled with fatigue, but when she looked at me with those big, pleading eyes, how could I deny her?
“I turn seventeen, finally old enough to take a position as an apprentice with the carpenter at the docks,” I whispered. “Then at night, I still work the fields at House Strom, saving every copper of penge.”
“Then what?”
“A turn later, the day I turn eighteen, I go to Jens with my purse of penge and prove I can buy a tenement room at the docks. I tell him I can keep food on the table, and I can take care of his girl.”
“Then?” Malin’s voice cracks.
My throat grew dry. I had not thought of my old dreams for turns. To think of them now, to know they’d never be burned behind my eyes.
I cleared the scratch away. “He gives me his blessing, and I take vows with the most beautiful girl in Mörplatts. I get a full position with the carpenter and make even more penge. We feel like bleeding royals when we can buy new shoes each turn.”
Malin laughs. It’s wet and she tries to hide the small sniffle. “Is that the end?”
“No.” I tightened my grip on her body. “A little comes. Then another. Maybe a third.”
“Three?”
“I can’t keep my hands off you, obviously. Not to mention, I’m the most sought-after carpenter in the township.”
“Naturally.”
“I build us a cottage by the fjords, and we fill it with those littles.”
“We must have hogs,” Malin interjects. “And a goat. I was skilled at making cheese from the goats at House Strom.”
“You have a pen full of goats. You make the best goat cheese in all of Klockglas.” I glance at the moon. “Every night, on my walk back from the docks, I pick those yellow flowers you always loved by the side of the trade road. I listen to you tell tales to our littles as they fall asleep. They never go to bed cold, or hungry, or wondering if they’re loved.”
