Page 25 of The Girl Who Fell Through Time (To Fall Through Time #1)

D orian doesn’t come down for breakfast the next morning. This isn’t unusual, but what is unusual is that he isn’t scribbling away in his study or out on business. Selene doesn’t want to pry or draw attention to his injuries if he doesn’t want it, but she is concerned.

“Is Dorian all right, do you think?” she asks Ariella as she clears away the breakfast.

“Exhausted, poor thing,” she says. “I did pop my head around the door just to check he was still alive. He never rests. I’ve no plans to wake him.”

Selene hasn’t any either, yet, despite Ariella’s assurances, she finds herself peeking into his room on the way back to her own. He’s sleeping soundly still.

She hears when he rises. He scrambles out of bed, murmuring about “How bloody late it is” and yelling about why no one saw fit to wake him. He bangs about the bathroom and storms out the corridor to his study.

He gives everyone a wide berth for the rest of the day, but eventually ventures out at dinner time. He still looks tired. No one else mentions this. They’re clearly used to the dark shadows under his eyes.

Selene passes him the potatoes. “What is it that you do in your office all day?” she asks, as politely as she can.

It’s better than asking about Luna and who she might be.

She knows Dorian takes the running of his estate very seriously, but she can’t imagine that it takes this much work. The Duke never—

The Duke had secretaries and stewards, she reminds herself. He never did everything by himself.

Dorian doesn’t answer immediately. “A lot of book balancing,” he admits. “Supply routes. Town planning. Forward planning—trying to anticipate things that might happen. Future deaths, births, natural disasters. How to accommodate and prepare.”

Not for the first time, Selene desperately wishes she’d paid more attention to the things happening outside her bubble in the last year of her life. She’d be much more helpful that way.

“Can I help at all?” she asks anyway, genuinely meaning it.

Dorian blinks. “What you’re already doing here at the house is more than enough.”

Selene doubts that’s true. What she’s doing here at the house is entirely for her benefit. There’s no altruism there, whereas Dorian looks like he’s killing himself keeping the village alive.

It can’t be healthy, all he’s doing.

He heads back to his study after dinner.

Selene assists Ariella and Rookwood with cleaning up.

Soren is running an errand elsewhere. Selene is not very good at cleaning—Ariella still fusses when she tries—but she is, at least, capable of carrying plates.

Tonight, she’s permitted to dry dishes. She quite likes the routine of this, and the soft chatter of Rookwood and Ariella in the background.

“That chutney you picked up earlier went down a treat,” Rookwood says, scrubbing a pan in the sink.

Ariella doesn’t look up from her sewing. “I’ll let Mrs Jones know when I next see her.”

Selene keeps scrubbing, chewing her lip.

“Are you all right, Selene?” Rookwood asks. “You’re awfully quiet.”

“Does anyone ever worry about Dorian?” she says.

A short, hard pause breezes through the room. Ariella and Rookwood exchange glances.

“Of course we do,” says Ariella eventually.

“He has the weight of the world on his shoulders, that boy. He’s always been like that, of course.

Got worse after his father’s death, and then after…

” She shakes the thought away. “He thinks he has to do everything himself. Soren helps where he can, of course, and we try… but he’s not very good at accepting help.

So we just make sure he’s eating, and do what we can. ”

Selene nods. She wants to help. She wants to do something. If she knew anything about this part of the world from her future, she would.

Wanting isn’t good enough. She needs to do something.

“Do you mind if I retire for the night?” she asks them.

“You don’t need to ask,” Ariella reminds her. “We’ll see you in the morning.”

Selene heads off without another word, but she doesn’t go to bed.

Instead, she goes to the library. She finds the most recent newspaper she can, and spreads it out, along with a map of the area.

Finally, she locates an empty notebook (Dorian, it seems, collects stationary) and splits the book into sections.

Births, deaths, crimes, natural disasters, weddings, seasons, investments…

She will remember something. She will.

Certain things are easier than others. She remembers births, engagements, weddings and society events with almost crystal perfect clarity, whatever good that knowledge will give her.

She writes them all down, dates them as well as she can.

Other things are harder, but she tries her best. There was a shortage of green crops during post harvest. Was there a drought during the summer?

Of course, there is one date that sticks with her. Four months from now, her grandmother will die.

She remembers that date well.

For hours, Selene scans through the newspaper, trying to trigger something, getting very little.

It’s almost midnight by the time she gives up.

She packs everything away and takes her notebook with her, hoping that inspiration will strike at some point in the night.

It seems like an important thing to keep lying around, so she tucks it into a hat box.

She lies on the bed, still fully clothed, and thinks.

Mistress Stripe comes to sit beside her.

Selene’s fingers absent-mindedly wind through her fur.

She’s too awake to sleep, and it’s late.

Her mind drifts back to Dorian. Dorian who’s likely still up, quietly burning himself away. More than helping other people, she wants to help him.

An idea strikes her. It might be foolish—and she does risk some embarrassment—but this is Dorian, and she doubts that he’ll be angry.

It’s worth a try, isn’t it?

Someone—Ariella probably, maybe Marta—has left a decanter with some wine in on the table by the window… the one set for two. Selene helps herself to a glass and lets it se ttle. It stops her nerves from fraying, makes her courage easier to gather.

She takes a sip of a second glass and stands up, making her way to Dorian’s study.

She knocks on the door.

“Who is it?” comes Dorian’s reply.

“It’s Selene.”

Silence. “One moment.”

There’s the sound of rustling papers, and something like a curtain, and then Dorian appears in the gap at the door. “Are you all right?” he asks.

Confidence, Selene reminds herself. You were confident, once. “This arrangement doesn’t suit me anymore,” she tells him.

Dorian frowns. “I’m sorry?”

“This deal we have where we spend one meal together a day. It no longer works for me.”

“You don’t wish to eat together?”

“On the contrary, I find myself just as spoiled and greedy as ever,” Selene continues, not letting him object. “I want more. I want you to play a game with me. Just one. Your choice. One game a day, in the evening, just the two of us.”

She expects him to make further protests—to rebuff her, dismiss her, maybe even to be angry. Hasn’t he already done enough for her? He is not here to entertain her.

“Why?” he asks instead.

“Why what?”

“Why do you want me to play a game with you? Ariella or Rookwood would be more than happy to—”

“I don’t want them,” she says. “I want you.”

Dorian raises an eyebrow in clear disbelief.

The lie—or at least the unspoken truth—rattles out of her. “You work too hard,” she tells him. “I am trying to force you to relax. You are a very good husband, and I should hate for you to expire and to find myself once more thrown onto the marriage mart.”

Dorian laughs. “I’m a terrible husband,” he tells her.

She wants to tell him that he isn’t, but she also doesn’t want to lose the lightness of this moment. “You could be worse.”

To this, Dorian says nothing.

“So?” she prompts. “Will you join me?”

“You are becoming increasingly hard to say no to.”

Selene claps her hands. “Hurrah! What would you like to start with? I shall play anything you like. I’ve not been taught much but simple card games—my father told me I didn’t have the head for chess—but—”

“Your father was an idiot,” Dorian snaps, with more venom that she thought had in him.

He seems to realise what he’s said a second later.

“Not to be rude, but no one knows what they’re good at unless they’re allowed to try.

I… I have a game I think you’d like. Give me a moment to tidy up here, and I’ll bring it upstairs to your room. ”

“My room?” Selene queries, quite forgetting that they are married and that it’s perfectly acceptable for him to be in her room.

“Unless you wish to play somewhere else?”

“No, no, that will do fine. I’ll… see you shortly.”

She heads upstairs. There’s something intimate about inviting someone into the space where you sleep, but she can’t think why.

It’s not like they’re sitting on the bed.

He stayed there for hours when she had her sprained ankle, but…

that was different, somehow, like the injury was a barrier between them.

She sits down to await his arrival. Mistress Stripe curls up on the window seat behind the curtain, her long fluffy tail occasionally poking out.

Dorian arrives not long after, unfolding a board on the table. She’s seen its like before, though she can’t remember where. It’s a pretty game, divided into four sections painted to resemble seasons, with four starting spots and four places labelled ‘home’.

“It’s called Last Man Home,” Dorian explains. “Have you ever played?”

“It looks familiar, but I can’t remember anything about it.”

“It’s a blend of luck and strategy,” Dorian continues. “Players have seven cards at any one time to use to get five counters around a board. You can use your cards in any way, in any order. You need the right combination of strategy and luck to get your people home…”