The Year of the Witching(3)
“I’d rather tend to my sheep,” said Immanuelle.
“And what about when you’re old?” Leah demanded. “What then?”
“Then I’ll be an old shepherdess,” Immanuelle declared. “I’ll be an old sheep hag.”
Leah laughed, a loud, pretty sound that drew gazes. She had a way of doing that. “And what if a man offers his hand?”
Immanuelle smirked. “No good man with any good sense would want anything to do with me.”
“Rubbish.”
Immanuelle’s gaze shifted over to a group of young men and women about her age, maybe a little older. She watched as they laughed and flirted, making spectacles of themselves. The boys puffed out their chests, while the girls played in the shallows of the creek, hiking their skirts high above their knees in the streaming current, careful to avoid drifting too far for fear of the devils that lurked in the depths of the water.
“You know I’ll still come visit you,” said Leah, as though sensing Immanuelle’s fears. “You’ll see me on the Sabbath, and after my confinement I’ll come to you in the pasture, every week if I can.”
Immanuelle turned her attention to the food in front of them. She picked up a hunk of bread from the picnic basket and slathered it with fresh-churned butter and a bloody smear of raspberry marmalade. She took a big bite, speaking thickly through the mouthful. “The Holy Grounds are a long way from the Glades.”
“I’ll find a way.”
“It won’t be the same,” said Immanuelle, with a petulant edge to her voice that made her hate herself.
Leah ducked her head, looking hurt. She twisted the ring on her right hand with her thumb, a nervous tic she’d adopted in the days following her engagement. It was a pretty thing, a gold band set with a small river pearl, likely some heirloom passed down from the wives of prophets past.
“It’ll be enough,” said Leah hollowly. Then, more firmly, as though she was trying to convince herself: “It will have to be enough. Even if I’m forced to ride the roads on the Prophet’s own horse, I’ll find a way to see you. I won’t let things change. I swear.”
Immanuelle wanted to believe her, but she was too good at spotting lies, and she could tell there was some falsity in Leah’s voice. Still, she made no mention of it. No good would come of it anyway: Leah was bound to the Prophet, and had been since the day he first laid eyes on her two summers prior. The ring she wore was merely a placeholder, a promise wrought in gold. In due time, that promise would take the form of the seed he’d plant in her. Leah would birth a child, and the Prophet would plant his seed again, and again, as he did with all his wives while they were still young enough to bear its fruit.
“Leah!”
Immanuelle looked up to see that the group that had been playing in the river shallows was now drawing near, waving as they approached. There were four of them. Two girls, a pretty blonde Immanuelle knew only in passing from classes at the schoolhouse, and Judith Chambers, the Prophet’s newest bride. Then there were the boys. Peter, a hulking farmhand as thick-shouldered as an ox, and about as intelligent, the son of the first apostle. Next to him, with eyes narrowed against the sun, was Ezra, the Prophet’s son and successor.
Ezra was tall and dark-haired, with ink-black eyes. He was handsome too, almost wickedly so, drawing the stares of even the most pious wives and daughters. Although he was scarcely more than nineteen, he wore one of the twelve golden apostle’s daggers on a chain around his neck, an honor that most men of Bethel, despite their best efforts, went a lifetime without achieving.
The blond girl, Hope, who had called to Leah, piped up first. “You two look like you’re making the most of your day.”
Leah raised a hand to her brow to shade her eyes from the sun, smiling as she peered up at them. “Will you join us?”
Immanuelle cursed silently as the four sat down in the grass beside them. The ox boy, Peter, began rummaging through the contents of the picnic basket, helping himself to a hearty serving of bread and jam. Hope wedged herself between Immanuelle and Leah and immediately began prattling on about the latest gossip of the town, which largely centered on some poor girl who had been sent to the market stocks for tempting a local farmer into adultery. Ezra claimed the spot across from Immanuelle, and Judith flanked him, sitting so close that their shoulders touched.
As the conversation wore on, Immanuelle did her best to make herself small and unassuming, willing herself invisible. Unlike Leah, she didn’t have a stomach for socialities. In comparison to the grace and charm of Hope, Leah, and Judith, she suspected she looked about as dull as one of her sister’s corn-husk dolls.
Across the picnic basket, Ezra also sat in silence, his ceremonial dagger glinting in the sun. He seemed distracted, almost bored, not even bothering to nod along to the conversation as his gaze scanned the distant plains, east to west, then back again. He watched the horizon like he was looking for something, and Immanuelle couldn’t help but wonder what. Ezra hadn’t had his First Vision yet and wouldn’t until his father’s life was coming to an end. Such was the way of succession—a young prophet’s rise to power always meant the demise of his senior.
Beside Ezra, Judith sucked a bit of butter off the tips of her fingers, squinting at Immanuelle through the thick fringe of her lashes. She wore a yellow dress like the rest of the Prophet’s wives, but the fit was a little too snug to be modest. Her skirts tangled about her legs, and her bodice was cinched tight, nipping her waist and accentuating the sweeping dip of her hips beneath the folds of her underskirts. The seal between her eyebrows was still pink, and a little swollen, but scarring well enough.