Chapter 34

“Where have you been?” Anna didn't bother about hiding how much she had missed Barbara's company for the last couple of days. “You said you would join me that day, and you were suddenly gone.”

“Sorry, I didn't tell you.” Barbara's face was without any visible expressions of emotions of any sort, and that was usual. “I was out of the territory for a while.”

“Really…” Anna looked over to Barbara as they went on with their lonely walk down the path to the stream. There wasn't any other better meeting place where they could be perfectly alone, so they didn't mind visiting the stream too often. “Where did you go?”

“I would rather not talk about it.” Barbara's response came just before Anna said the last words of her question. The answer seemed premeditated, and that was disturbing as much as it was suspicious. “At least for now.”

Anna was briefly taken aback, but she couldn't complain or coerce her to give her a better response. She was convinced that she wasn't really concerned about what