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The mourning period in Mayfair is not a quiet thing as manifested by a heavy, physical presence that drapes itself over the furniture like the black crepe on the mirrors. Since John passed in the Kilmartin home just streets away, the air in the Bridgerton household has grown thin and stagnant. Every clock tick sounds like a judgment while every shadow in the corner seems to stretch further than the light allows.
Penelope walks the hallways of her home as if she is navigating a minefield of sorrow and fear. The fear is a whisper at first, catching her in the narrow, dim corridor near the servant's stairs; a place where the drafts of the old house usually carry nothing but the scent of beeswax. But today, she hears a voice. It is unfamiliar, accented with a melodic, rhythmic lilt she doesn't recognize from the local village girls or the sturdy Londoners in her employ.
"It is the Sukob," the voice murmurs. "The clashing of fates. Two siblings, one year... the universe does not like to be so generous, child. It demands a balance. If one couple finds the sun, the other must find the shadow. John Stirling was the first payment. But the spirits... they always look for the pair to make the scales sit level."
Penelope freezes, her hand pressing so hard against the cold wall that the wood grain imprints on her palm. She breathes shallowly, her mind racing. She assumes it must be the girl she’d heard whispered about during the maid wars, Maria. The war that frantic competition where the great houses of Mayfair poached exotic and skilled staff to prove their status. Surely, Lady Danbury or perhaps even the Mondriches had loaned a new girl to help with the mountain of mourning embroidery.
The words take root in Penelope’s mind, sprouting into a thicket of thorns that scratches at her sanity. From that day on, she begins to watch Colin with the intensity of a hawk, waiting for the sky to fall on his golden head.
The paranoia manifests first in the drawing room. Colin is standing on a footstool, reaching for a leather-bound volume on the top shelf of the library. It is a simple task, one he has done a thousand times, but to Penelope, the stool looks like a trapdoor to the abyss of death.
"Colin, get down!" she shrieks, dropping her embroidery hoop.
She rushes over, bracing her weight against the small wooden stool with such force that it wobbles. Colin stumbles, his hand gripping the shelf to steady himself as he looks down at her with wide, startled eyes.
"Pen! I was only reaching for a book on botany. I didn't realize it was a feat of daring-do." He smiles.
"The legs! One of the legs looked... crooked," she pants, her eyes darting to the sturdy oak feet of the stool. "If it had snapped, you would have fallen... you could have hit the corner of the marble mantel." She pants. "Head injuries, Colin! They are notoriously unpredictable!"
Colin hops down, a slow, amused grin spreading across his face. He catches her waist, pulling her flush against him. "My love, if I am to be taken down by a library stool, I expect it to be a more valiant struggle than that. Besides," he leans down, whispering against her ear, "I have you to break my fall... though I suspect you’d rather tackle me than catch me lately."
He gives her a quick, playful squeeze before kissing her nose. His lightheartedness only makes her skin itch. He doesn't understand. The universe is watching, and he is making jokes at the reaper.
The next afternoon, the danger moves to the nursery. Penelope is sitting at a small pillow rug, trying to focus on a column for Whistledown that refuses to flow, while Colin sits on the bigger rug with little Elliot. They are sharing a bowl of sliced apples and soft bread, a domestic scene of pure peace.
Penelope watches them out of the corner of her eye, her quill hovering.
Colin is laughing, making a face at Elliot as he pops a piece of bread into his mouth. Suddenly, his laughter cuts off. He gasps, his hand flying to his throat, his face turning a startling shade of pink and he begins to cough; a harsh, hacking sound.
Penelope is out of her chair before she can scream. She hits him square in the back with both hands, a blow so forceful it nearly sends him face-first into the nursery rug.
"Breathe! Colin, breathe!" she wails, her face white with terror.
Colin lets out a final, violent cough, and a small piece of bread flies across the floor which earned a laugh from Elliot. He gasps for air, leaning his forehead against his hand while Elliot then watches with wide, confused eyes.
"Pen..." Colin wheezes, his voice hoarse. "I... I’m fine. It just went down the wrong way."
"You were choking! You were turning blue! I saw it!" She is trembling so hard her teeth are literally chattering.
Colin recovers his breath, reaching out to snag her hand. He pulls her down onto the rug beside him, his expression melting into something dangerously sweet. "I was merely over-eager for my snack, Pen. It’s a common Bridgerton affliction... my appetite is far more dangerous than any bread crust." He brings her hand to his lips, his eyes twinkling. "Perhaps you should just feed me from now on? To ensure the proper size of my bites? It would be very romantic, if a bit humiliating."
He laughs, a rich, vibrant sound, and Elliot mimics him with a bubbly giggle. Penelope wants to scream. They are laughing at the brink of the grave.
The signs then continue to multiply. At a quiet family dinner, a footman bumps the table. A salt cellar tips, spilling a snowy white mound across the dark mahogany like a funeral shroud. Penelope feels the blood drain from her face until her skin matches the salt. She has read about this.
"I’ll tidy that," Colin says, reaching out a hand, his expression casual.
"No! Don't touch it!" Penelope’s hand shoots out, knocking his arm aside. In the scramble, Colin’s elbow catches his wine glass. It doesn't break, but it wobbles violently, and a silver fork catches the edge of his hand.
A tiny, bright red bead of blood blooms on his knuckle.
"Oh no," Penelope breathes, her eyes wide with horro. "The debt. It’s starting. It’s demanding its share."
Colin looks at the scratch, then back at her. A slow, gentle smile spreading across his face. He doesn't look annoyed; he looks as though he is watching something precious and fragile that he must protect at all costs. "Pen, it’s a scratch. I’ve had worse injuries from a stubborn quill or a particularly sharp piece of toast." He brings his hand to his mouth, sucking the bead of blood away with a wink that is meant to be rakish but is softened by the tenderness in his gaze. "See? all mended... if the universe wants my blood, it’s going to have to try a lot harder than a dinner fork."
"It isn't funny, Colin," she hisses, her eyes shimmering with unshed tears.
"It is a little funny," he whispers back, reaching under the table to find her hand. He interlaces their fingers, his thumb stroking soothing yet rhythmic circles over her skin. "You are my fierce protector, my Lady Whistledown turned Knight, and I love you for it. But I promise I am perfectly, boringly safe.
Penelope knew better.
But the safety feels like a cruel illusion by Friday night. The house is silent, the kind of silence that feels like a held breath before a scream. Penelope finally settles Elliot in the nursery, kissing his warm and milk-scented cheek a dozen times then she goes to find Colin in the study.
She pushes the door open. The fire has died to a bed of glowing, ruby embers that cast long shadows across the rows of books. Colin is slumped over the desk, his head resting on his arms, perfectly, terrifyingly still. An empty brandy glass sits by his hand, reflecting the dull red of the coals.
The room is a vacuum.
Penelope approaches, her own breath hitching in her throat. She reaches out, touching his hand. It is lukewarm, not the furnace-heat he usually radiates. She leans down, her ear inches from his mouth, waiting for the sigh of a breath, the rustle of his shirt.
Nothing.
The blood roars in her ears; a frantic, rhythmic thump-thump-thump that is her own heart, but in the grip of her panic, she thinks the room has gone silent because his life has stopped.
"No," she whimpers. The sound is small, broken. "No, no, no... not you. Please."
She grabs his shoulders and shakes him with the strength of a woman possessed, her fingers digging into the wool of his coat. "Colin! Wake up! You cannot do this! I will not let you be the debt! Colin!"
Colin’s head snaps up with a sharp, strangled gasp. He jolts so violently he knocks the empty glass, sending it shattering across the floor in a spray of crystal. "Wha... Pen? Is the house falling down? Is Elliot-"
He sits there, blinking, his hair a wild thicket of bronze curls, looking utterly disoriented and vulnerable. Penelope falls back against the bookshelves, sobbing so hard she can barely stand, her lungs burning with the air she’d forgotten to breathe.
"You're alive," she chokes out.
Colin rubs his eyes, the fog of a very deep, brandy-assisted nap clearing. "I should hope so... though... admittedly, my heart is currently trying to exit through my ribs. Those ledgers, Pen... they’re a death sentence for the mind. I must have just... drifted off. Why are you-" He stops, seeing the raw, naked agony in her eyes. "Darling, come here."
He reaches for her, but Penelope steps back, her voice rising in a frantic yet pained pitch. "You can't die on me! I'll kill you!"
Colin freezes.
A slow, bewildered smile tugs at his mouth, the kind of smile that says he would follow her into any madness. "Wouldn't I be already dead?"
Penelope stares at him, the absurdity and the terror colliding in her chest like two storm fronts. Without a word, she turns and flees the room.
She is sitting on the edge of their bed, her face buried in her hands, when the door creaks open. Colin crosses the room in three long strides and kneels on the rug between her knees, forcing her to look at him.
"Tell me," he says, his voice a low, commanding velvet. "Tell me exactly what is haunting you."
The words spill out of her like a broken levee. She tells him about Maria, the girl she thought was loaned from the Maid Wars, and the Sukob form Spain's East Colonies, the Philippines. She tells him about the clashing weddings and the split luck that has left Francesca a widow.
"Every time you trip, Colin... every time you bleed or sleep too deeply, I feel the shadows reaching for you," she sobs. "John is gone... the universe wants the balance back."
Colin does not pull away. He reaches up, his large and warm hands cupping her face, his thumbs brushing away the salt of her tears. He looks at her with such profound love.
"Penelope," he whispers. "Look at me. Look into my eyes... I am not a ghost, I am not a debt. I am a man who loves you more than I have words to write in a thousand journals. If there is a balance in this world, it isn't kept by spirits counting weddings. It is kept by how we hold each other in the dark."
He takes her hand and presses it firmly against his chest, over the thundering rhythm of his heart. "Feel that? That is for you. It isn't going to stop because of a calendar or a superstition... I am staying, I am here... I am yours until the stars go dark."
He leans in, kissing her with a tenderness that tastes of salt and a promise. "John loved us. Don't let the fear of losing me keep you from living with me, Pen. I need you present. I need you here."
The next morning, they are in the breakfast room and the sun is finally streaming through the windows. A messenger arrives with a note from Francesca, which interrupted their banter.
"She’s with child," Penelope whispers, a smile finally breaking across her face. "John’s child. Oh, Colin, a baby. A piece of him is staying."
Her mind whirs. A new life. Surely this is the omen. The balance is restored. "I must tell Maria. Rae!"
Rae, her ever-silent and loyal maid, appears in the doorway.
"Rae, where is Maria? The girl from the Philippines? I must tell her the news."
Rae tilts her head, her expression one of polite, genuine confusion. "Maria, ma'am? We have no maid named Maria. All our girls are local girls, ma'am."
Penelope’s smile falters. A cold, sharp needle of dread pricks her skin. "No, she’s new... loaned, perhaps? From the Maid Wars? I heard her in the hallway near the servant's stairs. She spoke of the Sukob."
Rae’s face remains a blank slate of duty. "Ma'am, I’ve managed the staff since we moved in... there has been no one loaned. Maria the infamous embroider is yet to arrive...no one with an accent like that has crossed the threshold."
The teacup in Penelope’s hand rattles violently against the saucer. She looks at Colin, her eyes wide and searching for an anchor, but she finds him staring at Rae with a sudden, sharp focus.
"Pen," Colin says, his voice losing its playfulness. It’s the voice of the man who untangles messy ledgers. "Rae, are you certain? No one visiting? No one helping with the mourning crepe?"
"Quite certain, sir. I’ve seen every face."
"Very well." Colin nods to dismiss Rae.
As Rae retreats, the room feels as though the oxygen has been sucked out of it. Penelope’s breath comes in shallow hitches. "I heard her, Colin. I didn't imagine a name. I didn't imagine the word Sukob. How could I know a word I’ve never heard?"
Colin stands, but he doesn't move toward her yet. His mind works like a clockwork engine as his eyes dart toward the hallway to look at anything that makes sense. Then, like a detective seeing the final piece of evidence click into place, he looks at the heavy, leather-bound volume of Eastern Folklore, Superstition, and Mythic Lores sitting on the buffet table; the book he had brought down from the bedroom earlier that morning.
He opens it, his fingers fly through the pages until he finds it. The Sukob: A Philippine Superstition.
"Penelope," he says, his voice a low, urgent hum. "Look at this."
He turns the book around. There, in the margins, are pencil notes in her own graceful script; notes she must have made in the dead of night when her mind was racing with grief.
"You weren't hearing a maid, Pen," he whispers, the horror in his voice melting into a heartbreaking realization. "You were reading the words aloud to yourself. You were so tired, so fractured by the loss of John, that you conjured a voice to speak the fears you couldn't admit were your own. There was no Maria... apart from the infamous embroider. There was only you, trying to make sense of the senseless."
The gut punch of it hits her all at once. The "mystery" wasn't a spirit; it was the haunting of her own brilliant, over-exhausted mind. The horror of her own internal descent makes her knees buckle, but Colin is there, his arms a fortress of his love.
"I love you," he says, his voice thick with a sudden, fierce devotion. "I love you so much it frightens me sometimes, but I will never, ever leave you to fight your own shadows alone."
He pulls her up, tucking her head under his chin. "I love you, Penelope Bridgerton... not because you are perfect, you are to me... but because you feel everything so deeply... and I promise you, I will stay alive for a very, very long time; if only to give you more material for your books."
He pulls back, his eyes dancing with a light that finally drapes over her fears.
"I have a better idea than ancient things," he says, his thumb grazing her lower lip. "I think we shall take that book and put it on the very highest shelf of the library. And in its place, I think I shall read to you from our family journal. Real things... safe things."
He leans down, a wicked, beautiful spark in his eyes. "And remember, Pen... if I ever do try to sneak off to the afterlife without your permission, you’ve already promised to kill me. And since I’m quite terrified of your temper, I think it’s much safer for me to stay right here."
Penelope lets out a real laugh then, a bright, clear sound. "You are impossible... and I love you, Colin."
"I love you more," he murmurs, kissing her deeply as the morning sun washes over them. "And I am yours. Always."
The nursery is bathed in the kind of honeyed afternoon light that makes everything seem gilded. There is no mourning crepe here; the windows are thrown wide, and the scent of jasmine from the gardens below drifts in, chasing away the lingering, stale chill of the hallways.
Penelope stands in the doorway, her hand resting on the frame. For a moment, she just watches.
Colin is on his hands and knees on the thick, woven rug. He has a wooden horse in one hand and a miniature carriage in the other, and he is narrating a truly harrowing journey through the "Mountains of Scone" for a delighted Elliot. The toddler is perched on a pile of cushions, his small hands clapping as Colin makes a series of increasingly ridiculous sound effects.
"And then," Colin says, his voice dropping to a theatrical whisper, "the brave Sir Elliot reached the summit, only to find the Great Dragon of Featherington awaiting him!"
Elliot squeals, lunging forward to grab the wooden horse. Colin lets out a dramatic "Oof!" as he is tackled, collapsing onto the rug with a grin that could rival the brightness of the sun.
Penelope feels a lump form in her throat, but this time, it isn't the cold knot of the Sukob. It is something warm and heavy; the weight of a reality so vibrant it makes the superstition she’d been drowning in seem like nothing more than ink and paper.
"Is the great Sir Elliot winning?" she asks, her voice steady and light as she steps into the room.
Colin rolls onto his back, Elliot perched precariously on his stomach. He looks up at her, his bronze curls tousled and his cravat hopelessly crooked. "I’m afraid so, Pen. He’s quite ruthless. I may need a rescue, or at the very least, a kiss to restore my strength."
Penelope kneels beside them, with the silk of her skirts pooling around her. She reaches out, her fingers brushing against Colin’s cheek. His skin is hot and pulsing with life, with health, with the sheer, stubborn vitality of a man who refuses to be a ghost.
"I think I can manage that," she whispers.
She leans down, pressing a lingering kiss to his lips. It tastes of tea and contentment. When she pulls back, she sees the way he is looking at her, not with the worry of the past week, but with a quiet yet teadying adoration. He reaches up, tucking a stray red curl behind her ear.
"No more voices in the hallway, Pen?" he asks softly, his eyes searching hers.
Penelope looks at Elliot, who is currently trying to fit the wooden horse’s head into his mouth, and then back at her husband. The memory of "Maria" is already fading, becoming a blurry dream born of exhaustion.
"No," she says firmly. "Only yours... and his." She reaches for Elliot.
"Good," Colin murmurs, pulling her down until she is lying on the rug beside him. Elliot crawls over, wedging himself between them so his small and warm weight a physical anchor. "Because I’ve decided that if the universe wants a balance, it’s going to have to accept our happiness as the standard. We shall just have to be twice as joyful to make up for the shadows."
He catches her hand, interlacing their fingers over Elliot’s back. "I love you, Penelope. More than any story, real or imagined."
"I love you, Colin," she breathes, closing her eyes and letting the warmth of the sun and her family wash over her.
There is no debt to be paid. There is only this: the messy, beautiful, loud reality of being alive together.