The Grace Year(28)

Taking inventory and setting up the larder is a tense undertaking. We end up having to count everything aloud, in unison, just like we did in our first year of arithmetic at the schoolhouse, only this time we’re not counting beads, we’re counting the things that will keep us alive over the next year. It’s going to be tight, but as Kiersten seems more than happy to point out, not all of us will make it to the end. You’d think that would somehow bring us closer together, bind us in a common cause, but it feels tenuous at best, like there’s only a single silk thread connecting us—one false move, one false accusation, and everything will unravel.

After gathering stray limbs from the perimeter, any kindling that seems dry enough to catch, I try to teach them how to build a proper fire, the same way my father taught me, but there’s little interest. A few pay attention—mostly girls who will be assigned this type of work upon their return, Helen, Martha, Lucy—but Kiersten and the rest of her followers seem annoyed that I’m even bothering them with something so mundane.

It’s only when Gertrude offers to take the first meal shift that they suddenly take an interest.

“She can’t make our food … it’ll be dirty,” Tamara says.

Heated whispers erupt on the subject of Gertie, but she just goes about her business of filling the kettle with water, pretending not to notice. Maybe she’s so used to it now that it doesn’t even bother her. But it bothers me.

“Gertrude and I will take the first shift. If you don’t like it, you can make your own,” I say, which seems to quiet them down.

No matter what she did, there’s no reason for her punishment to continue here. Veiled or not, depraved or saints, we’re all equals in death.

As the conversation shifts to what they think their magic will be, Gertie and I work on putting supper together. It’s meager, just some beans with a few rashers of thick-cut bacon thrown in for flavor, but all we can really taste is the well water—it has a pungent, earthy aftertaste that seems to cling to the roof of your mouth. Looking around at this landlocked parcel, I guess we should be grateful we have drinking water at all.

As we eat supper, the nervous chatter fades away to make room for the new world around us. Beyond the crackling fire, the sound of spoons scraping against the bottom of tin bowls, we find ourselves listening to the forest pressing in on us—the breeze rustling the last of the autumn leaves, the strange skittering sounds of unknown creatures, the lake water lapping against the pebbled shore. But it’s not the water or the wind or the woods that has us on edge—it’s the absence of the call of the poachers. Are they even out there? Or maybe that’s exactly what they want us to think … how they’ll lure us out. Not by cunning sweetness or threatening words … but by silence.

I can’t stop thinking about the poacher I came face-to-face with on the trail. The look in his eyes—I try rubbing the chill from my arms, but it’s no use. He could’ve killed me right then and there. I was fair game. I’m not sure what stopped him. But then again, I’m not even sure if he was real. Out here, the veil between our world and the unknown feels so thin that you could punch a hole right through it.

The wind moves through the camp, making the firelight dance.

“I wonder if it’s them?” Nanette says, staring into the woods.

“Who?” Dena asks.

“The ghosts,” Jenna replies.

Katie pulls her cloak tighter. “I heard it’s the souls of all the grace year girls who died here.”

“Katie should know,” Helen whispers to me, the bird cooing in her lap. “All three of her sisters were poached.”

“But they’re not all benevolent spirits,” Jenna adds.

“What do you mean?” Meg asks.

“The unclaimed girls, the ones who vanished, they still cling to their magic, even in death.”

Though we’re forbidden from speaking of the grace year back home, it seems we’ve all heard bits and pieces. Maybe truth, maybe lies, probably something in between. I can’t help thinking that if we put all the pieces together we could somehow solve this elaborate puzzle, but it feels too slippery. Elusive. Like trying to catch smoke.

“There was a veiled girl in my sister’s year who went into the woods,” Nanette says. “It was near the end of her grace year. There was something haunting her every move. She would wake up to find her braid was different, the end of her ribbon hog-tied to her ankle. There were whispers in the dark. And when she finally went into the forest to confront her tormentor, she never came back. Her body was unaccounted for.”

“Olga Vetrone?” Jessica whispers.

Nanette nods.

A chill breaks out over my flesh. That was the girl Hans joined the guard for. I’ll never forget his face when he came into the square that day, and then watching her little sister being banished to the outskirts.

A deep thud comes from the gate. A few girls scream, gasp for breath, but every single one of us stands at attention. There’s something in here with us.

With trembling hands, Jenna holds up a lantern, illuminating the outline of a large lump on the ground in front of the gate.

“What is it?” someone whispers. “A body?”

“Maybe it’s a poacher…”

Taking cautious steps, we move in one huddled mass to investigate.