Free The Four Realms by Adrian Faulkner

  Stupid of me."
    He stood and edged round his desk, knocking a big pile of papers off his desk in the process.  
    "Oh, one last thing."
    "Yes?"
    "Ernest used to carry a notebook with him."
    Maureen nodded, she remembered the tatty thing well, had even offered to buy him a new one.   He'd refused, of course, saying that it was the notes not the condition of the notebook that was important.
    "You wouldn't happen to know if he had it with him on his,” Rofen chose his words carefully, "last trip?"
    Maureen thought about it for a second.   It bothered her that she couldn't really remember anything special about that last time she'd seen him.   All she could remember was that she'd told him not to stay late due to the impending snow shower but couldn't picture his reaction.   How terrible, she thought.   Her last time with Ernest and she couldn't remember it.
    "I honestly don't know," she said fighting back her emotions again.   "He didn't always bring it with him."
    "It's alright," said Rofen.   "I didn't mean to upset you.   We'll check in his home, see if we can find it there."
    Maureen dabbed at her eyes.   Stay strong , she told herself.   You can fall to pieces once you're back home, but don't do it here.   This isn't the proper place to grieve .
    "It's all just been a bit sudden," she said.
    "Understandable," Rofen replied.   "I'll get Joseph to escort you back home."
    Rofen opened the door to his office looked up and down the corridor outside.   "Joseph!   Joseph?" he shouted.   "The size of a house and he can never be found."
    #
    Joseph escorted Maureen back to the doorway in silence.   Whether he had been told, she couldn't be sure but she was too busy trying not to break down to explain things to him.   She hoped he would not think her rude.
    However, when she got back into her cellar and closed the door, the tears were not forthcoming; almost as if her grief had remained behind in Venefasia.   No, that wasn't true, she told herself as she locked the door and hung up the iron key with a sigh.   Her grief was still there, it just wasn't ready to manifest itself yet.   It would hatch when it was good and ready.
    She took herself off to bed, the house seeming even colder now that she'd returned. The cats greeted her at the top of the stairs.   They were probably hungry, she thought, but she wasn't going back downstairs to feed them.   She overfed them as it was, one night wouldn't kill them.
    Maureen couldn't sleep that night.   The moonlight reflected the snow and lit up her bedroom in a strange blue glow.   She was paranoid, especially given how cold the house now was, that her pipes might freeze. She'd turned a tap on in the bathroom, which now splashed and gurgled, whilst the water tank refilling above tried its best to drown it out.   She could feel the draft coming in from her old rotting windows.   Wrapped up in several layers of clothes and under several blankets and quilts, she still felt frozen.   What kind of life was it when you had to wear a woolly hat to bed?
    The thought that Ernest was gone played heavily on her mind.   Life somehow seemed more boring without him.   Today should have been a memorable day - her first day in Venefasia - but it was memorable for all the wrong reasons.   What use were memorable things when there was no-one to share those experiences with?   And who did she have now?   All her friends were dead.   She just felt she was cheating time.   Perhaps if the cold took her in the night it wouldn't be a bad thing.   No , she flashed those thoughts out of her mind.   She never had been, and never would be a quitter.
    She tried to focus on the Inquisitor's visit tomorrow, but found herself just getting herself all worked up that she had no milk.   Perhaps she could ask Sally, she thought to herself, and then quickly flushed the idiocy of that idea out of her mind.
    So instead she thought of Ernest, trying to remember what the last thing they'd said to