The Grace Year(95)

No one says a word, but I can tell they’re worried about being punished themselves—guilt by association. And I don’t blame them.

“I’m not asking you to join in. No grand gestures,” I assure them. “When we reach the gates of the county, I want you to step away from me, pretend you don’t know me, but I will say my piece. I owe it to every fallen grace year girl. I owe it to myself.”



* * *



We spend the last night doing what we should have done all along.

After washing out the privy, cleaning the larder, tidying the clearing, we get to work untangling the bed frames. The girls decide to set up the beds in one large continuous circle. There’s something about it that gets to me. I think about Ryker telling me about the women in the outskirts who meet with the usurper in the woods, how they join hands and stand in a circle. It’s easy for the men of the county to scoff at such things, the silly work of women, but they must not think it’s all that silly or they wouldn’t be working so hard to stop the usurper. I hope they haven’t caught her—I hope she’s still out there.

Someone tugs at my cloak and I flinch.

“I just want to mend it for you,” Martha says.

Taking a deep breath, I let it go, laying it in her hands as if it’s made of gold. And for me, it is. It saved my life more than once out here. “Thank you.” I squeeze her hand. I’m grateful she thought of mending it. I want June to see that it survived. That I made full use of her gift.

As I walk around the camp, taking it all in, I see they managed to bind together enough timber to cover the well. They even scorched POISON into the wood for good measure.

The only thing left hanging over us, hanging over the entire encampment, is the punishment tree. Forty-seven years of hate and violence dangling from its limbs.

“Maybe we can strip the branches. Bury the offerings,” Jessica says.

“We can do better than that,” Gertie says as she pries the hatchet from the chopping block. Back home, vandal izing the punishment tree would be sacrilege, instant death, but who’s going to tell, who’s going to see? Kiersten was right about one thing—we are the only Gods here.

Taking turns, pouring all of our sadness and rage into each swing, we hack into the trunk. Braids, toes, fingers, and teeth rattle in the trembling branches, and when the tree finally drops, I feel the weight of it in every inch of my body. Even though I won’t be here to see the ramifications of this, it’s enough to witness its demise. I know I’m a far cry from the girl from my dreams, but I want to believe there’s a part of her that lives in me … in every single one of us.

After burning the hacked-up tree and everything it stood for, we bury the ashes and decorate the stump with weeds—clover, wood sorrel, and buttercups. They’re low flowers, seldom used anymore in the county, but they once symbolized fragility, peace, and solitude.

Just seeing the display makes me realize how much we’ve lost out here, but maybe we had to destroy everything in order for something to be born anew.

From death there is life.



* * *



Just before dawn, we cut a fresh trail to the ridge, setting up markers as we go, so the next year of girls will be able to find the spring … June’s garden.

When we reach the top of the incline, Martha begins to hum. The women of the county aren’t allowed to hum—the men think it’s a way we can hide magic spells—but maybe that’s exactly what we need right now, a spell to make this okay.

Taking off our clothes, we lay them on the rocks and beat out a year’s worth of dirt and blood, lies and secrets. The girls try not to stare, but I can feel their eyes on my skin.

As we step into the cold water to bathe under the waning moon, we open up to each other, giving voice to every fallen girl’s name, telling stories to remember them by. Maybe it’s the moonlight or the gravity of going home, but it feels pure. Like we can finally be clean of this. It makes me wonder if Eve is looking down at us now with a benevolent gaze. Maybe this is all she ever wanted.

When the sun rises, mellow and hazy on the eastern shore, we sit on the edge of the ridge and braid each other’s hair, tidy up our rags, shine our tattered boots.

It may seem futile, a lost cause, something the men will never notice, but we’re not doing it for them. It’s for us … for the women of the outskirts, the county, young and old, wives and laborers alike. When they see us marching home, they’ll know change is in the air.





THE RETURN





As the guards approach the gate, clubs in hand, their thick-soled boots heavy against the earth, we don’t wait for them to come knocking. We open the gate wide, filing out in silence.

We keep our heads bowed to the ground, and not only so they’ll think we’ve dispelled our magic. We do it out of reverence for everyone who’s walked this path before. Everyone who will be forced to walk it in the future.

When I hear the gate close behind me, a tightness spreads throughout my chest. Leaving this place feels like I’m leaving Ryker, but then the wind finds me, rustling a strand of hair loose from my braid. Maybe he’s standing right next to me, whispering my name.

“It won’t be long,” I whisper back.

“This one’s talking to herself.” A guard nods toward me.