The Year of the Witching(76)
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
To be a woman is to be a sacrifice.
—FROM THE WRITINGS OF TEMAN, THE FIRST WIFE OF THE THIRD PROPHET, OMAAR
TUCKED INTO BED, under a thick covering of quilts and bearskins, Immanuelle lay awake listening to the hushed tones of chatter on the other side of the wall. The conversation between Vera and her companion sounded like the rapid-fire beginnings of an argument, but their hissing whispers made it difficult to distinguish anything more than a few words.
“Dangerous” was one that came up often. “Obligation” was another.
Immanuelle closed her eyes, trying not to cry. She wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting to find upon arriving in Ishmel, but it wasn’t this. Perhaps she had been naive to expect a warmer welcome. After all, shared blood didn’t negate the fact that she and Vera were strangers. Still, Immanuelle had hoped that her arrival would be met with something more than outright coldness. Her disappointment, when coupled with the sting of Martha’s betrayal, was almost too much to bear. To be shunned by one grandmother—the woman who had raised her like a daughter—was bad enough. But to be cast aside by another, mere days later, seemed like a particularly cruel punishment.
The night wore on, but she didn’t feel tired, due perhaps to the disorientation caused by the never-ending night. Without the rise and fall of the sun, she found that she was often caught in the limbo between waking and sleeping.
To pass the time, Immanuelle let her gaze roam around the bedroom. It was a well-kept place, tastefully decorated, with mirrors and little paintings hanging on the walls. The dozen candles that cluttered the top of the dresser were unlit, but the cast-iron stove in the corner glowed softly, limning the room with a haze of firelight. If the dust on the nightstand was any indication at all, the bedroom was rarely used. This struck Immanuelle as odd, given that it was the second of two in the house.
Eventually, she fell into a fitful slumber—filled with the sort of thin dreams that are prone to fading the moment one becomes conscious again. She didn’t know how long she slept, but when she woke, it was to darkness and the smell of fresh-fried bacon.
Immanuelle sat up and slipped out of bed, surprised to see that she was dressed in a thick nightgown, though she had no memory of changing out of her damp travel clothes. There was a knit shawl draped over the headboard, and she wrapped it around her shoulders before leaving the bedroom. The parlor was candlelit, aglow with kerosene lamps and a wrought iron chandelier that dangled from the ceiling by a thick chain. In the far corner of the room, a cast-iron stove, which Sage stood in front of, humming a trilling song that sounded far livelier than any hymn Immanuelle knew.
Sage turned to set a platter on the table and startled at the sight of her. “You’re just as soft-footed as Vera. I can never hear when she’s approaching.”
“Forgive me,” said Immanuelle, stalling in the space between the parlor and the kitchen, unsure of where to go or what to do.
Sage waved her off with a smile. “Please, eat.”
Immanuelle obeyed, settling herself in front of a large plate of eggs and thick-cut bacon, roast potato, and fat-fried corn cake. She was famished, and she ate like it, but Sage seemed delighted by her ravenous appetite.
“You look so much like her,” said Sage wistfully. “I just knew you were Vera’s kin the moment I laid eyes on you.”
“Are you a Ward too?”
Sage shook her head. “Gods no. Just a road rat like most of those in Ishmel. I don’t think I would have ever settled down if I hadn’t met Vera.”
“And you’ve been . . .” Immanuelle searched for the right word. “Together, all this time?”
“Eleven years,” said Sage, with no small amount of pride. “I suppose you could say we’re very well matched.”
In truth, Immanuelle wasn’t entirely sure what Sage was trying to say, but she thought it might have something to do with the way that the Lovers clung to each other in the woods. Then there was the matter of the spare room, sparse and untouched, and the larger bedroom with two night tables instead of one and a mattress too big for a single person. “I’m glad she found you.”
Sage blushed, seeming touched. “Well, that’s very kind of you.”
Immanuelle sopped up a bit of egg yolk with a piece of fried corn cake. “Where is she?”
“Vera went to a council meeting in the village,” said Sage, leaning across the table to refill Immanuelle’s mug of tea. “She’ll be back soon, I’m sure. She won’t want to stay away long. Not while you’re here.”
A small silence. Immanuelle finished the last of the food on her plate. “Have you been touched by the plagues?”
Sage shook her head, then faltered. “Not in the same way you were. Our waters were only laced with blood for a few days. But we heard stories of the taint that afflicted Bethel. Once we found a woman, naked and mad with fever, roaming the mountain wilds just beyond Ishmel’s edge. Her head was cut with that mark your women wear, so we knew she was Bethelan. She died in the village, just a few days after we found her. Nothing the doctors did could ease her suffering. No tincture or herb could touch it.” She paused for a beat, frowning at the memory. “But we have not been made to endure the same horrors your people have. Whatever that evil is, it’s been largely contained in the borders of Bethel. But Vera thinks there’s a chance the contagion could spread to Ishmel, with time.”