The animals fell silent. The dogs stopped chasing. My sister’s legs ceased moving midstride, and she toppled onto the ground.

I stopped running, my chest heaving in and out as I stared at her still form. “Joss?” What had happened?

Very slowly, she turned her face to look at me, tears streaking her cheeks. “She isn’t coming, Cécile.” She scrambled to her feet and ran into the house.

Her words made my stomach clench, but I went after her, barely managing to cut her off before she made it to the stairs. Forced into the kitchen, she scurried over to the far side of the table.

“What do you girls think you’re doing?” Gran demanded, slamming down the bread dough she was kneading. “You’re tracking mud all over my clean floor, and both of you have chores to do.”

“Joss took my letter!” I shouted.

Gran hefted a wooden spoon. “Josette de Troyes, give your sister back her letter.”

Joss shook her head rapidly, her cheeks flushed red. Why was she doing this? She was going to ruin everything.

“Give it to me!” I demanded, holding out one hand. It was no wonder our mother never came to see us, why she never invited us into the city. Why would she want to? Why would she waste her time on two muddy, squabbling farm girls in the middle of nowhere when she could be dining nightly with Trianon’s finest? And why wouldn’t my idiot sister understand that if we ever wanted to see her, we had to be better?

“I won’t.” The vehemence of Joss’s voice startled me out of my silent rant. “Not until you promise to stop watching for her. To quit waiting for her. To quit wanting her in our lives!” Silence hung in the room as we stared each other down, it dawning on me for the first time that maybe my sister didn’t feel the same way about our mother as I did.

“Why?” I whispered. “Why would I want to forget my own mother? Why would you?”

Joss’s bottom lip trembled, and with one free hand, she wiped away the tear carving a track in the mud on her face. “Because she forgot about us.”

My stomach lurched, and my ears filled with a dull roar. Everything seemed far too bright, forcing me to suck in a deep breath to settle my nerves. “She didn’t forget,” I said, forcing the words out through numb lips. “The letter says she’s coming for my birthday. It’s written on the paper in your hands.” Not that she could read it any better than I could.

Joss’s shoulders shuddered. “Not any more it doesn’t.”

I gasped as she flung my letter into the fireplace. Shoving the table out of the way, I dived toward the flames, but it was too late. All I could do was watch the paper turn to ash, the sound of a wooden spoon cracking against Joss’s backside barely registering in my ears as Gran berated her for what she had done before sending her out to finish my chores.