Suddenly, I understand, though the darkness of it is so horrifying, I nearly faint. “Are you suggesting that I…” Words fail me and I flail my hand toward the door. “That I did this?”
“Of course not, Shae,” he says, and I let out a shaky breath. “But there are procedures.” He loops his thumbs into his belt. “We can’t control what others may think. These are rules for your protection. Surely, you can understand.” He extends a hand. “We’ll get you settled. And I’ll report the death. We’ll figure this out, Shae. Justice will be served.”
He reaches for my arm.
“No.” I stumble backward, away from him. “No, I can’t. I won’t leave. The sheep … the farm…”
“Shae,” he says, warning in his voice. I’ve never argued with the constable before, and the edge in his tone frightens me. I freeze, staring at him, feeling like a trapped wild animal. All I want to do is bolt back inside my house and slam the door. Back where it is safe.
Except it isn’t safe there.
My mother’s body lies strewn across the floor.
He sees my hesitation and lunges toward me, going for my arm again. The dogs pick up their barking, and in the chaos of the noise, I panic.
“No! Stop!” I don’t know what’s come over me, but I won’t be dragged away. Tears run down my face, uncontrollable. “You can’t take me away. You can’t make me leave her!”
Vaguely, I realize he has wrestled my arms behind my back and is holding me in a sort of half embrace, even as I keep struggling. Even as the sobs wrack me harder and harder.
“Don’t do this, Shae. Don’t fight me,” he’s saying, quiet, close to my ear. I can hear the whisper of a threat mixed in with the kindness. “I’m doing this for you,” he says. “For Aster. For justice.” And he’s pulling me away.
I try one last time, a wail launching from my throat as I heave my weight against his arms. “Ma!” I cry out, but it’s too late. He’s got me by the waist and is dragging me away, and it’s all I can do to stay upright as we stagger like that all the way downhill, until I can no longer see the house or the farm.
Everything I have ever loved, gone.
* * *
Days blur together in a haze. I’ve been installed in Fiona’s home, and they’ve welcomed me with open arms and sympathetic words, but I can barely hear them. Words are too hard. They keep me busy—with mending and darning and other mindless chores—but there is no salve for the dark, festering pain that lives in my head. Time either passes too slowly or too quickly depending on how much I think about Ma’s death. The images replay in my head—her body on the floor, the blood on the walls. My conversation with the Bard in the marketplace—with Ravod, who briefly had seemed kind. Is that what put us in danger in the first place? My conversation with Mads, our kiss. Falling asleep while Ma was home alone. I could have done something. Could have stopped it. Beneath everything is the image of the Gondalese ox.
Did I leave it out?
The constable would have known if my mother’s death was an official punishment for possession of contraband—unless someone else wanted to rid the town of my cursed family, taking it upon themselves to do the job. Every time I arrive at this thought, panic threatens to consume me. I’m not safe here. It could have been anyone. We are trained to report one another, to turn our backs on those we love.
But worse than all of it—the terror, the endless theories, the guilt, the wondering—is the ache in my chest. My heart physically feels like it has been broken.
Perhaps it has.
I pour my energy into helping Fiona’s family in the shop to keep from dwelling on my grief, but the pity in their faces is too much to bear. And no matter how hard I try, come nightfall, the dreams always find me, feral and full of horror.
The only activity that calms me is my needlework—unspooling the strange and haunting images of my dreams into the thread. But even this feels sinful, like it is part of the curse. I’m afraid of what it means.
Which is why, when I hear Fiona awaken—I’ve been granted a bedroll near the hearth in her bedroom—I hide the needlework beneath my pillow where she can’t see it.
She sits up in her bed and smiles. It hurts to look at—painted on, forced. “Can you stomach a bit of breakfast today?”
I make myself smile back. “Sure.” With the exception of Fiona, and her father, who offers a terse nod in my direction when I sit, her family completely ignores me as they chat happily at the table.
It’s a little jarring hearing so much noise during a meal. I became so accustomed to eating in comfortable silence with Ma over the years. Sometimes I’d remark on my day or update her on the sheep, only for us to lapse back into the usual quiet. Fiona’s family is the opposite—jokes, arguments, stories, and gossip get shared right along with the food. It reminds me of a time so long ago that it is only a fragment of a memory, tugging at the furthest reaches of my mind. Before Kieran’s death, when Pa was around, and Ma was not silent. A memory of a family I used to know.
Morning after morning, I grow more distant—detached—from it all. I wonder if I’ll ever feel normal like them. It seems more and more like I’ve never been normal and I never will be.
It is good of Fiona and her family to let me stay, I know. But I’m reminded constantly that I do not belong here. Fiona’s kindness cannot change that. As long as I remain, I am useful. That is all. The rest is up to me.
The bulk of my chores keeps me from the front of the store where Fiona works as the clerk, so I barely see her over the course of the day. Her father likes to keep her up front because she is pretty and friendly. He thinks it makes people more comfortable and they will buy more. He may be right. Fiona does have a way with people. Many of the “customers” are handsome boys from the village who stop by only to talk with her.
Though my mind is terrorized with darkness and doubts, one question burns through—where is Mads? Why hasn’t he come?
I hate that I don’t know. I hate that I keep wondering—it is all I do. I love Fiona, her gentle sweetness, her sunny smile, her endless confidence—but Mads is the one who has always made me feel anchored.
But Mads is nowhere to be found. He has not come by the shop, yet he must know where I’ve been staying. Someone must have told him what happened. In a town like Aster, secrets have a way of coming out.
Somehow, I can’t fathom the idea that the rest of the world hasn’t been altered forever the way I have. That my mother’s death didn’t split the skies apart, cause birds to swim and fish to fly.
I take a shaky breath as I carry a heavy bag of prairie flour into the back of the store. I’m mostly relegated to the stockroom, taking inventory and measuring provisions so they can be brought to the front and sold. On the rare occasion I’m allowed into the shop proper, it’s to shelve things. I’m not supposed to talk to anyone, not that they are particularly hasty to strike up conversation with the local outcast, but I have explicit orders to stay out of sight and keep out of trouble.
My one lifeline is the hope that Dunne finds Ma’s killer and punishes them. I cling to it when everything else seems bleakest. At the very least, I’ll have justice. Ma will have justice.