“What’s your plan for tomorrow? We go to the social and…what, exactly?”
“We watch. We glean every scrap of information we can. See what disputes break out. See where the frictions are. I’m positive everything will lead us directly to the Dark Watchers.”
“And then we…we kill them?” I hazarded to guess.
Ephraim looked queasy at the prospect. “You see now the necessity of keeping the matter quiet, don’t you?”
I didn’t like not telling Sadie. She needed to know, needed to be warned. It felt as though I was somehow lying to her. A lie of omission.
But I could also understand Ephraim’s reticence. She was eight. All it would take was a whisper of her prized secret to Trinity Brewster, and suddenly the entire town would be abuzz with the story.
After a moment, I agreed.
“Excellent. It’s settled, then.” Ephraim shifted his voice back to Ezra’s accent. “Tomorrow the Downings shall be front and center at the Falls’s social.”
One sack of flour.
A bowl of eggs, gathered fresh from the henhouse that morning.
Two apples so shriveled, they hardly deserved the title.
A few spices, nearly petrified and probably without flavor.
I drummed my fingers on the kitchen table, eyeing each ingredient with disdain. We were due to leave for the social in a few hours, and I couldn’t come up with a single idea for a dish to bring.
Mama always brought a honey cake, but I had no honey, no cream, and certainly no sugar.
If everything had been normal, I would have sliced up green beans, simmered them with little white onions and fat cuts of bacon, but without the usual spring rains, our seedlings had withered and shriveled.
A custard, perhaps, I thought, staring at all those eggs. It wasn’t a dish anyone would ever expect to see at a picnic, but it truly was all we could spare.
But what would I flavor it with?
I pushed the jars of spices about, eyeing the mustard seeds.
Deviled eggs it would be.
I set to work, boiling the eggs.
“You’re not wearing that, are you?” Merry asked, coming up behind me.
“I’ll change before we leave.” From the corner of my eye, I caught a swish of her blue check skirt. It was her best dress and only came out for the most special of occasions. “Pretty.”
“Does it look all right?” she asked. “I thought I’d done well, but Sadie said I look like a clown.”
I turned. Bright circles of pink dotted her peach complexion. “Oh. What did you use?” I asked, drawing her over to the washbasin. After dampening a handkerchief with water, I removed half the offending color from her cheeks, leaving behind a more subtle blush.
“There’s a cluster of thimbleberries down by the creek—they’re not ripe enough to eat yet,” she added quickly, seeing my hopes rise. “But I thought I could use one or two for today. I just remember how Papa would tell stories about when he fell in love with Mama….” She pushed back a ringlet of hair framing her face, uncomfortably self-conscious. I studied the new curls with pained understanding. She must have spent nearly an hour at the hearth, bullying her stick-straight hair into this softer style with Mama’s old curling rods.
“The Schäfers’ wedding reception. He spotted her across the churchyard, through a haze of fabric banners.”
“And even though he’d grown up alongside her his whole life,” Merry jumped in, taking on Papa’s familiar cadence.
“He was still surprised to see the pretty girl with the pink cheeks and the sparkling eyes,” we finished together.
She smiled shyly, toying with the curls again. “I miss them.”
“Me too,” I admitted.
“I thought they’d be home by now. It’s nearly summer.”
I agreed but didn’t want to say it out loud. Each day that went by without their arrival soured my stomach. Where were they? Had something happened to Mama? Or to their wagon as they returned? I tried to not picture it, but as I lay in bed at night, just on the cusp of sleep, horrible images would fill my mind.
Papa, wandering alone and bereft in a city too big and busy for his grief…Mama trapped beneath the heavy axle of a torn-apart wagon, unable to reach our little brother, his cries filling the surrounding woods, the pines red with sprays of blood.
And now…knowing there were monsters—real, actual monsters—in the trees…
Had the Dark Watchers gotten our parents?
“Is there someone whose eye you’re hoping to catch today?” I asked, forcing away my gruesome reverie. I longed to return to a time when our biggest problem of the day was Sadie upsetting Merry’s tender feelings.
“Of course not,” she lied, flustered. “There are far bigger things to worry about today than boys.”
“Merry.”
“Thomas,” she disclosed quickly, a flush rising to her cheeks, burning even more brightly than the thimbleberries. “I know—I know,” she protested, even as I said nothing. “He was our cousin up until yesterday. But…even before that, I’d catch him staring at me, and I wondered…There was just something not very cousin-like in those stares, you know? But it’s stupid to be thinking of that.” Her gaze flickered to outside, toward the pines, and I knew she was trying to spot a Dark Watcher. “I just thought…it would be nice to be ready…in case anyone decides to notice me.”
“Oh, Merry,” I murmured, pulling her into a hug. I kissed the top of her blond head. “I’m certain there will be a whole lot of young men noticing you today. And if Thomas doesn’t see how special you are, he’s a fool.”
“You should go get ready,” she said, flushed but pleased. “I’ll finish up in here…” She paused, studying the ingredients, then sighed. “Really? Deviled eggs?”
* * *
I ran my hand over the bodice of my dress, smoothing the pin tucks and adjusting the ruffled collar. It was my first time wearing the blush-colored voile Whitaker had brought back from the city. The dress had turned out even better than I’d dreamed it would. I took a practice spin. The long lengths of dotted Swiss swirled about my ankles in a delightful froth.
I only wished Whitaker was here to see it. When I imagined dancing with a young man at the social, it was his arms I was in.
No.
I cast such foolish thoughts away as quickly as jerking a hand from a sizzling skillet. Memories of him burned just as hot but with far more destruction.