Weeks had passed since they had left St-Guilhem-le-Desert, eventually settling in an abandoned farmhouse in the middle of nowhere. Ludovic had patched up the holes in the roof, and Lucille had placed bunches of wildflowers in every room, trying to make it seem more like a home, but the shadow of what had happened hung over them all.

Ludovic no longer shared a bed with the women – it was too much for Régine, and Lucille wouldn't let her sleep alone. They curled up together at night, Lucille soothing Régine through the nightmares, and all Ludovic could do was lie in his small bed in a separate room and listen to Régine crying. There was nothing he could do to help. She didn't go for her walks anymore. No one else lived for miles around, but Régine barely even left the house.

When she started throwing up in the mornings, Ludovic was naive enough to think it was caused by the trauma she'd suffered. But when her stomach started to swell, he realised the truth.

Régine was pregnant.

"What are you doing to do?" Ludovic asked as they sat around the kitchen table one night, the women eating bowls of soup that Lucille had made. Ludovic hadn't been allowed to cook anything since they moved here.

"What do you mean?" Régine asked. Her voice was always flat these days, like someone had hollowed her out and left behind an empty shell.

Ludovic and Lucille exchanged looks.

"There are herbs that can end a pregnancy," said Lucille carefully. "If you –"

"No."

Lucille blinked.

"I know you mean well," said Régine, stroking Lucille's hand, "and I understand why you would think that I don't want this, but . . . I do." She pressed one hand to the curve of her stomach.

"Are you sure?"

nodded, and for the first time since that terrible morning, there was a spark of something in her eyes.

"I'll also understand if you two don't want to be a part of this," she said.

"We're not going anywhere," said Ludovic. "If you truly want this, then we'll be with you the whole time."

"Raising a child is hard work," Régine warned.

He ached to hug her, even to touch her hand, but male contact was something she just couldn't cope with yet. Maybe she never would again.

"It'll be easier with three of us," he said.

Régine gave him the glimmer of a smile – a shadow of what it used to be, but still more than he'd seen in weeks. Tentatively she slid her hand across the table and brushed her fingertips against his.

"I love you," she said softly. She looked at Lucille. "I love you, too."

Lucille kissed her cheek.

Régine patted her stomach again, and in her eyes was an echo of the defiance that Ludovic had seen years ago, in the tumbrel. "We're going to be a family," she said.

"We're already a family. We're just waiting for our newest member," Ludovic said.

That newest member arrived earlier than expected. Towards the end of the pregnancy, they'd debated whether they should try to find a midwife – Ludovic thought they should, since none of them had any experience with childbirth, but Lucille supported Régine's insistence that she didn't want a stranger coming into their home. Being pregnant had helped chase away some of the shadows that had been haunting her, but those shadows hadn't gone far. She still spent almost all her time indoors. She still couldn't sleep in the same bed as Ludovic. They had hugged once, but she'd stiffened in his arms like she couldn't stand his touch.

Then she went suddenly into labour, and there was no time to send for help.

Lucille took Régine into their bedroom, and shut the door to keep Ludovic out. He paced the narrow corridor outside the room, bubbling with frustration. Lucille said that childbirth was something only women should be involved with – men had no place being in the room. But that didn't make sense to Ludovic. Lucille had no more experience with this sort of thing than he did. She'd never given birth herself – never even been pregnant. But arguing that he should be allowed to help would only make things harder for the women.

He listened to the sounds of Régine panting and groaning, and Lucille's soft, soothing voice as she talked the other woman through each contraction, and paced that corridor until the sun came up, his stomach a hard knot of nerves.

Lucille had assured him that it was normal for this to take a long time, but as the hours drifted by, his anxiety wound tighter and tighter until he felt like he was going to snap.

Then, at last, the high-pitched wail of a baby.

Ludovic sagged against the wall, head hanging. She'd done it. His brave, beautiful, brilliant Régine –

The door opened, and Ludovic straightened up, expecting to see Lucille smiling at him, a newborn in her arms. But Lucille was pale and wild-eyed, her hands stained red.

Ice rushed through Ludovic's veins.

"She won't stop bleeding," Lucille said.

The bedroom smelled stale, like sweat and blood and exhaustion. Régine lay in bed, the linens twisted around her legs. Her face was flushed, sweat matting her head to her cheeks and forehead, and there was so much blood, all over the bed, coating her legs. Her heartbeat raced.

"I don't know what to do," Lucille whispered, wringing her hands.

"She's not supposed to bleed like this?" Ludovic said.

"No."

Panic briefly flared, and he fought to suppress it. "I'll get some clean linens. Try to keep her awake."

As he dashed out of the room, he realised he hadn't even seen the baby, or heard it cry again, and the fear inside him grew colder, sharper, but he couldn't think about anything other than Régine. He knew what a struggling heart sounded like – Régine's life was hanging in the balance.

He fetched the linens and ran back to the bedroom, where Lucille was talking urgently to Régine, holding the other woman's hand and stroking her forehead

"Please stay with us," she whispered, her voice ragged with pent-up tears. "Please don't go."

But as Ludovic stood in the doorway, the linens in his hands, he realised what Lucille hadn't.

Régine had already gone.

She'd quietly slipped away while he was out of the room. The useless linens fell from his hands.

Lucille was crying now, awful realisation sinking in. She bent over Régine's body, leaning her head on Régine's chest, where her heart no longer beat.

Ludovic's gaze landed on a small bundle, on the bed next to Régine, and his chest gave a terrible lurch because the baby still hadn't cried. They couldn't lose both of them.

The bundle twitched, a tiny limb stirring, and Ludovic moved hesitantly closer to the bed. Blue eyes stared up at him from a hastily assembled swaddle.

"It's a girl," Lucille said, lifting her head from Régine's chest, and staring at the baby with reddened eyes.

"Hello, little girl," said Ludovic, carefully lifting her. She was so tiny, so fragile, and in that moment he felt a fear like he had never felt before – that he would drop her or damage her or wouldn't be able to take care of her.

"She'll never get to meet her mother," said Lucille, fresh tears brimming in her eyes.

Ludovic cradled the baby in the crook of his elbow, and she made a small snuffling noise.

"No," he said, "but she still has parents. She has us."

The baby snuffled again and Ludovic gently rocked her until she quieted.

"When her labour first started, Régine told me she'd chosen a name," said Lucille. "If it was a girl, she wanted her to be called Marie."

"Marie," Ludovic repeated, and touched the baby's cheek with one fingertip.

She wasn't his child, but as Marie peered up at him, Ludovic felt a swell of fierce protectiveness that was totally different to anything he'd ever felt before.

"What do we do?" Lucille asked, still holding Régine's limp hand.

"We raise her and love her as our own, just as we planned. She was going to have three parents, and now she has two, but we can still make her happy."

He couldn't begin to process the awful grief of Régine's death, couldn't even bring himself to look at her body again, focusing instead on little Marie. There'd be time to mourn later.

First, they had a baby to take care of.

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