Free Whisper of Souls: A Prophecy of the Sisters Novella by Michelle Zink

next to her sister, Alice looked as innocent as any child. Bending toward her, Adelaide kissed Alice’s cheek and wished for that innocence to remain as long as possible. She was rising when she felt the small arms work their way around her neck, squeezing her in an embrace.
    Adelaide pulled back, studying her daughter. “It’s very late. You must go back to sleep, my darling.”
    Alice put her small hand to her mother’s cheek, her expression earnest. “I’m sorry, Mother.”
    There was no sarcasm, no hidden meaning in the words. It was as if, for this one moment, Alice was a woman. As if she knew exactly what her mother had suffered and exactly what she would suffer still.
    Adelaide swallowed the tears that rose in her throat. “I’m sorry, too. But I will always love you, Alice. And I will always be with you.”
    Kissing her daughter one last time, Adelaide left the room as quickly as her feet would carry her. There was no time for second thoughts. She had searched and searched for another answer. There wasn’t one.
    That it was painful was of no matter.
    Adelaide stopped outside the girls’ chamber. Tiny flames flickered in the sconces that lined the hall, left alight for the maid who attended to Henry in the night.
    Adelaide could not take her eyes off the closed door across the hall. A moment later, she stepped toward it and turned the knob.
    The chamber was spare save for the crib in the center of the room. She walked slowly toward it, her heart thudding in her chest, her breathing shallow. She stopped at the rail and peered over the side.
    Henry lay on his back, his tiny legs splayed out in front of him, his mouth partially open. He had again kicked off his blanket. Adelaide reached down to pull it over him. He stirred, his small head moving back and forth in the moment before he opened his eyes. They were blue, she noticed. A deep and beautiful blue, as clear as the lake reflecting the sky in summer. She’d been too exhausted to take note immediately after his birth, too full of sorrow when they’d brought him to her a week later.
    A sputter erupted from his mouth and she froze, her hands still on the blanket, now pulled up to his chest. The cry grew louder and more urgent.
    “Shhhhhh,” she said softly, patting his stomach.
    Her ministrations did no good. He continued to cry, his face scrunched up, tiny tears leaking from his eyes. Lifting him from the cradle was instinctual.
    She picked him up with the blanket, holding him close to her chest as she paced the floor. She had held Lia and Alice just this way when they cried. Now she bounced Henry ever so slightly and was relieved when he became silent.
    “There, there, little one,” she whispered. “Everything will be all right, you’ll see.”
    She lowered herself to the rocking chair by the fire, settling Henry in the crook of her arm. He gazed up at her, and for a moment, she thought that he understood everything. That he knew exactly why she was here, and why it had taken her so long to come. That he forgave her.
    She rocked slowly back and forth, letting her fingers trace his tiny features. Thomas’s nose, the eyes that came from her side of the family. Eyes that always began as blue and later turned green. Lia and Alice’s eyes.
    She lifted him to her chest, lowering her face to the silky thatch of dark hair. She inhaled, breathing in the scent of him. Tears fell from her cheeks as she whispered, “I’m sorry, Henry. I’m so, so sorry.”
    She didn’t know how long she rocked him, but the fire had dimmed by the time he was asleep in her arms. She looked down at his serene face and wished him this kind of peace all his life through.
    Then she carried him to the cradle and set him gently inside, careful to cover him with the blanket.
     
    She hardly registered the bite of cold air against her skin even though she had not bothered with a cloak. The moon was full and heavy, the sky a deep indigo, almost like that of the Otherworlds. She put