The Grace Year(35)

“Keep going,” Kiersten says, urging her on. “Just a little lower.”

“What’s she doing … what’s going on?” Martha whispers.

“Shut up, dummy,” one of the girls hisses from behind her veil. “She’s making the sun go down.”

Patrice passes it on, as if everyone isn’t hanging on every syllable. “She thinks she’s making the sun set.”

“Maybe she is,” Helen whispers, staring in awe.

“It does feel earlier than yesterday,” Lucy adds.

As they’re watching her grunt and sweat and strain, I can see it in their eyes. This is what they’ve been waiting for. This is what they thought their grace year would be.

I want to tell them that the sun will set a little earlier every day until the solstice, but even I’m starting to wonder.

When the sun finally reaches its resting place, Ravenna collapses to the earth in a heap of sweat-drenched flesh. The girls rush in around her, picking her up, patting her on the back, congratulating her.

“I knew you could do it.” Kiersten reaches for the end of Ravenna’s braid, pulling the red silk ribbon free. The release I feel is undeniable. It’s not just the idea of feeling dusk move through my hair, although that must feel like heaven—it’s the sense of unwavering purpose they share.

As Ravenna kneels down to pray, they join her.

“Deliver me from evil. Let this magic burn through me so I can return a purified woman, worthy of your love and mercy.”

“Amen,” the girls whisper from beneath their veils.

Kneeling in the dirt, barefoot, eyes to God, bathed in golden light, they look like something not of this earth. No longer girls, but women on the verge of coming into their power. Their magic.

I promised myself I would keep my feet firmly rooted in the soil, that I wouldn’t give in to superstition and flights of fancy, so why am I trembling?





Dinner around the bonfire is quiet, tense. Each group clinging to their secrets. I want to air our grievances, get everything out in the open so we can work together, but that’s clearly never going to happen, not as long as Kiersten’s in charge.

“What are you staring at?” Kiersten asks.

I quickly avert my gaze.

Kiersten whispers something to Jenna, Jenna to Jessica, Jessica to Tamara, and I know they’re talking about me. I don’t know what kind of lies she’s spreading, what kind of clever new nickname she’s given me, but she’s obviously up to something.

A high-pitched shriek rings out from the forest, making everyone stop midbreath and stare into the dark woods.

“It’s one of the ghosts,” Jenna whispers. “I heard that if you get too close, they can take over your body. Make you do things you don’t want to do.”

“Isn’t that what happened to Melania Rushik?” Hannah asks. “I heard they got into her head, whispered things, beckoned her into the woods with the promise of a veil, and when she finally succumbed, they spit her body out of the barrier in twelve different pieces.”

The noise rings out again, which sets off a flurry of gasps and nervous whisperings of who the ghosts will go after first.

“It’s an elk,” I say.

“How would you know?” Tamara snaps.

“Because I used to go into the northern forests with my father this time of year to check on the trappers who didn’t make it in for trading. It’s looking for a mate.”

“Whatever it is … it’s creepy,” Helen says, nuzzling Dovey under her cloak.

“You think you know everything, but you don’t,” Jessica says, glaring at me.

“I know that we chopped enough wood to last the month, made the meals, cleaned up, built rain barrels … what did you do?”

“You’re wasting your time with all that,” Kiersten says with a placid smile. “Every day that goes by that you don’t embrace your magic is a day lost.”

“We should get to bed,” I say, standing up, faking a yawn. “We have a big day ahead of us tomorrow … you know, building a washing station, a tub … things that will actually help us survive.”

“You may think you’re helping them, but you’re not,” Kiersten says. “You’re only holding them back.”

I pretend not to hear her, but I’m bad at pretending.

“I hope that tub’s for Dirty Gertie,” one of the veiled girls calls after us. “She’s going to need it.”

Laughter erupts around the campfire. I want to go back and clobber them, but Gertie shakes her head. Short. Precise. She fixes me with the same look my mother gave me when my father delivered my veil to the church.

“Don’t,” she whispers.

As the other girls file past us into the lodging house, I hold Gertie back. “I know it was Kiersten’s lithograph. You should tell the others.”

“That’s my business,” she says firmly. “Promise you won’t interfere.”

“Promise,” I reply, feeling bad for pushing her. “But can you at least tell me why you took the blame?”

“I thought it would be easier,” Gertie says, staring straight ahead, but I can hear the emotion in her voice. “I thought if I took the blame she would—”