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“This is about your husband, isn’t it? What are you doing? Are you trying to leave, Agnes?”

“Edward, please…”

“Agnes, you can’t go. We need that dowry. You know that. Father is on his way home. We–”

“I can’t marry him, Edward.”

“Of course, you can. You’ll do your duty to this familylike we all do. Now, get back in the house.”

When Agnes yelped, Frances couldn’t wait any longer. She pulled open the door and burst inside the barn. Edward’s back was to her, and he had his hand on Agnes’s arm. He was pulling her toward the other barn door in the direction of the house. Agnes saw her. She looked terrified. Frances picked up a board from a pile and rushed toward him. Before he even knew that she was there, she hit him over the head with the board, and he fell over.

“Did you–” Agnes covered her mouth with her hand.

Frances knelt down and felt under his nose.

“He’s breathing. We need to go,” she said. “Now!”

“He’s my brother.”

“Agnes.” She pulled on Agnes’s hand. “Which horse?”

“The one in the middle is the fastest.”

“Let’s go.”

“I can’t just leave him here like this.”

“Agnes.” Frances held her face in both of her hands. “He’ll be all right. We have to go before he wakes up.”

“But…” Agnes pointed at Edward.

“My love, please.”

Agnes nodded rapidly.

“Get on the horse,” Frances told her.

She helped Agnes up and found a bag in the corner of the room. She laid it over the horse, strapping it in quickly, and tossed in her few items, noticing the ones that Agnes had added to it already. It would have to be enough. She climbed up onto the horse and took the reins.

“Are you ready?”

Agnes wrapped her arms around Frances’s middle, rested her chin on her, and said, “Yes.”

CHAPTER 38

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When that board smacked into her brother’s head, her whole world had changed. Agnes had felt something akin to a strong wind hit her hard, knocking her back, and only Frances had been able to get her to focus on the task at hand: running. Even if she’d changed her mind then and wanted to stay, she couldn’t anymore. Her brother had been attacked, and she’d been party to it. He’d seen her trying to leave, and her father would not have been happy about that. Her mother would’ve been disappointed. Her brothers would’ve been angry. And she would’ve been sent to the man who would’ve been her husband with clear instructions never to return home and for him to probably never let Agnes out of his sight.

They’d ridden through the night, and Agnes had been turning around every few minutes to see if they were being followed. Seeing no one each time, she’d felt just a little bit better the farther away they’d gotten from her village. They’d stopped a few times to water the horse and give him a rest, but they hadn’t slept. Three days, they’d gone on until there were no more roads and paths through the woods. Finally, having seen no one of any interest, they’d stopped to get some rest by a river, under the cover of thick trees. Their horse had been tied and fed, and since they’d run out of food themselves, Frances had shown her some of her tricks for catching rabbits and squirrels. Agnes had found them berries, and they’d started a fire. Later that night, as they’d lain on the ground, wrapped in each other’s arms, and stared up at the stars, Agnes hadn’t ever felt so safe and so loved in her entire life.

They’d continued on like that for many weeks, finding places to hide along their route to nowhere in particular. Seven months later, they ended up in the middle of a small fieldsurrounded by woods.

“We can build it here,” Frances said.

“Build a house?”

“Yes. There’s plenty of timber right here and animals to hunt for food.” She motioned to the trees behind them. “A pond is just on the other side of those trees, and there is a river not far off. We would have water. We’d have land here to farm. It’s far away from everything and everyone who might know us, and the closest village is at least a ten-day ride from here. We’re all alone, which is what we want, right?”