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When I get to the cabin, Connor is gone. When he returns, he doesn’t ask me what Louise wanted, and I don’t ask him where he’s been. He’s in a strange mood the whole day, one moment seemingly unable to speak to me, the next reaching out as I pass to seize my hand and hold it, not meeting my eyes, for long seconds before he relinquishes his grip.

No invitation comes for dinner. We eat what’s left in the fridge instead, making only tepid conversation.

The next morning, I wake up alone. I sit up, hand reaching for the empty space beside me. I never sleep longer than Connor. He’s never managed to get out of bed without rousing me, but he’s gone. I get out of bed quickly, combing my hair with my fingers as I walk out into the main room. Connor is there. He’s dressed already in warm clothes, drinking a mug of coffee. His boots are by the door, his coat over the back of the kitchen chair beside him. He’s getting ready to go out.

“What time is it?” I ask, shaking off the shadows of strange dreams.

“We have a few minutes. I set your stuff out.” He nods over to the bench, where my boots and coat are waiting. I tense. “You should get dressed and grab something to eat.” He sounds normal; he doesn’t meet my eyes.

“I talked to Granddad yesterday,” he says. “I told him. Some of it. I told him it wasn’t your fault, everything that happened.”

“Is that what you really think?” I ask.

“I think… I think I have no idea what you’ve been through,” Connor says. It sounds too much like I don’t actually know you to bring any relief.

“I didn’t set out to lie to you.”

A tendon at his jaw flares. I stand in the tortured silence wishing he would just say the words— it’s okay, I forgive you, I understand, I love you, it doesn’t matter. But of course it matters. A thing like this, it needs time. The one thing we’ve never bothered with, in this relationship.

Connor holds out my coat. I slide my arms into the sleeves, one by one, and when I turn, he zips it up until his fingers bump the underside of my chin.

“Better get moving,” he says, and so we do.

Magnus and Nick are waiting for us. They have a pair of four-wheelers with them, built for the snow, with gear packed on the back. Nick carries a metal thermos that steams, the smell of coffee wafting out of it. He holds it out to offer me a swig. I shake my head; he shrugs. This qualifies as a conversation, this early in the morning.

“We’ll be splitting up,” Magnus says without preamble when we arrive. “Connor, you’ll go with Nick. Been a while since you were out so do what he says. Miss Scott, you’ll be with me.”

Unpleasant surprise twists in my gut, but I nod.

“This many people tramping through the woods, we’re not likely to get anything. More of a hike with weapons than a hunt,” Magnus says. He doesn’t sound too upset about it. “Could get lucky, though. If you don’t just yammer the whole time and scare off everything within a mile radius.”

I’m provided with a vest—bright orange and reflective. Magnus lets me get settled on the four-wheeler before he starts it up. I look over my shoulder at Connor. He’s watching me, but as soon as I catch his eye, he turns to examine the gear on the back of the other vehicle.

For a while, the sound of the motor drowns out any need for conversation. Magnus takes us well away from the cabins. The guys trail behind for a stretch before they break off. Not long after that, Magnus stops and cuts the engine.

“You said you’ve used rifles in the past, is that right?” Magnus asks.

“Only a handful of times,” I confess.

He grunts. “A bow’s trickier. Which is why some folks don’t bother with them. This time of year we get poachers up here. Mr. Vance does the rounds, tries to scare them off, but I’m pretty sure there have been a few lurking around.” I give him an alarmed look and he chuckles. “Don’t worry. They might be skirting the law, but they’re still only hunting deer. Now, I’m not too worried about bagging anything today. Plenty of opportunity for you to practice,” he tells me. He looks around at the clearing we’ve come to. “Good enough spot. We can waste a few arrows teaching you how to shoot straight.”

With dawn only beginning to nudge the horizon, I sink about twenty arrows into trees, bushes, and snowdrifts, few of them the ones I was aiming at. Each draw makes the burn on my hand twinge, but I refuse to complain. Magnus criticizes my stance, the angle of my arms, the direction of my gaze. He stands five feet away at all times, never draws close, never touches me, but the weight of his scrutiny is claustrophobic.

I find I most enjoy the moment when I’ve pulled the arrow back. The smooth glide of the string through the pulleys hardly registers as effort, but in that ease the entire violence of the release is concealed.

At last Magnus declares me good enough for the time being—or else is simply out of patience. He directs us along a snow-laden track. I don’t imagine I’ll be shooting at anything living in any case.

Magnus is a man of few words. He moves carefully, quietly. I go where he directs me.

What must be an hour since we left, he looks up from where he’s crouched down, deer tracks scattered out in front of him. They’re not fresh, last night’s dusting cupped in each depression, yet he’s lingered here. “Connor told me a bit about what happened to you,” he says.

I shift uncomfortably. “It’s not really something I like to talk about.”

“I imagine not.” He flicks his thumb across his chin. “Do you regret it?”

My lips part, but no answer comes. It should be an easy question, shouldn’t it? “I wish it hadn’t happened.”

“We can’t regret the things we couldn’t control,” he says. “Do you regret your part in it? Your choices?”

I think of that girl in Peter Frey’s room. She should have kept her head down. She should have been obedient, patient. She should have stayed quiet in her cage.

“No,” I say. “It got me out of there.”

“And the man you hurt?” He doesn’t call him my father. I’m grateful for that.

“I’m glad he didn’t die,” I say. It’s not the same thing as regret.

He grunts. “Sometimes terrible things happen, and they require terrible choices. In the end I suppose the difference between regretting those choices and finding peace with them is a matter of the outcome,” Magnus says. “You did what you had to. I understand that. The failure wasn’t yours. You should’ve been taken care of.” He stands. He checks over his gear, but it has the air of something to do while he thinks. “Why are you really marrying Connor?”

I blink. It’s not the question I was expecting. “I love him,” I say. It sounds stupid now, after everything I’ve learned.

It’s no less true.

He gives me a skeptical look. “Smart girls like you don’t get married this fast without a reason.”

I search his face for a hint of what it is he wants from me. He offers none. “When I’m with Connor, I feel like I belong to someone,” I say quietly. “I’ve never felt that before. But it’s not just that. It’s—I need that. The idea of losing it is terrible.”

The idea that it was a lie all along is terrifying.

“You’re giving him a hell of a lot of power,” he says. My mouth shuts so quickly my teeth click. “Nobody can be your savior. Sets you up for disaster and puts them in an impossible position. What happens if he turns out to just be human?”

“That’s not what I mean,” I say.

“Rose was like that,” he says. “Besotted, that’s the word. The whole world revolved around Liam, as far as she was concerned. He was like air and water and food to her. Then…” He paused.

I can tell from the way his words feel caged, carefully contained, that there is a great deal he is leaving unsaid. “You said Liam was soft. Nick said he was… charming.” It isn’t exactly what Nick had said, had implied, but it’s close enough.

“He wanted to be everyone’s hero.” Magnus sets off again. His voice is still quiet, and I have to stay close not to lose the syllables. “He lived for the way people looked at him. He lived to make other people smile.”

“That’s lovely,” I say.

A sound of disagreement. “He would shine, but only if there was someone there to notice it. He wasn’t a bad man. But he was desperate for it. He made some bad decisions because he needed that adoration. Needed to be that hero.”

“You think Connor’s like that?”

“I think you are,” he says.

I laugh a little. “I’m no one’s hero.”

“Maybe not. But you want to be the one who makes Connor smile. You want to be looked at, not seen. That’s what it is, not belonging. That’s what you’re feeling.”

“You have no idea what I’m feeling. You don’t know anything about my relationship,” I say. “You don’t know me.”

“I know exactly who you are,” Magnus says. He looks back at me. I count to three in my head before he even blinks, longer before I breathe. I expect him to say it now—to confront me with the truth. Do you really know? Then tell me , I think, willing him to say it. Tell me who the hell I am, because I don’t know.

“When they realize you aren’t perfect, it doesn’t end well,” Magnus says. “You’re young. You’re pretty. You’re a smart girl. This isn’t your only chance. Connor isn’t the only man who would worship you.”

“Why are you all so determined to drive me away?” My voice is so soft it barely bruises the air.

“I like you, girl,” Magnus says. “And that’s why I’m bothering to tell you. It isn’t worth it. You should leave before you get hurt.”

“That’s like telling me to cut my arm off to avoid getting hurt,” I say, strangely calm.

He watches me for the space of a breath, two. Then, seeming to come to some kind of decision, he gives an almost-imperceptible nod. “There’s a buck close by,” he says. “I’m going to go around. You head that way.” A gloved finger points. “There’s a flat-topped boulder that way. Wait there. I’ll come collect you.”

He doesn’t wait for me to confirm. He strides off. So this is why he asked me out here. Not to get the measure of me—he already had that. To tell me to leave.

I follow his directions. It isn’t far, but the trek seems slowed by the flurry of thoughts in my mind. Everything he said about knowing me—does he? Has he guessed who I am, or did he know all along?

Why did you bring me here, Connor?

Up ahead, I spot the gray hump of the rock that Magnus told me about. It sits in a small clearing, but the clearing isn’t empty. A buck grazes there, indifferent to my approach. It raises its head without particular purpose, nose testing the air. Its ears flick, twitch, like it’s heard something—me, probably.

My bow hangs by my side. I make no effort to lift it, all urge to prove myself evaporating at the sight of its breath fogging the air, its dark eyes glistening with animal intelligence. I creep toward it, pressing myself close to the trunk of a tree and staying low, out of sight.

The buck moves forward a single step. You might mistake it for relaxed, the way it’s standing. You might think that it feels safe. But a creature like that knows that it is never safe. That there is always something waiting for it to slow, to take a wrong step. Something like me.

Suddenly the buck’s head jerks, ears swiveling toward some sound I didn’t catch. It looks toward the trees ahead of it, frozen in sudden alarm, and my gaze follows. For an instant, I think I see something—the barest hint of movement. A gray glint of metal. And then the deer bursts forward in violent motion, bounding for the other side of the clearing.

The brown flank passes me. In that instant I see what is directly on the other side of the clearing. A figure in an orange vest stands among the trees.

Connor, with an arrow drawn back, aiming directly for where the deer just was. Where I still am, directly beyond it.

Connor, releasing the arrow.