Page 27 of The Year of the Witching

“Did you find what you were looking for?” Ezra’s voice echoed in the quiet.

Immanuelle shook her head. The pond where she’d encountered Lilith wasn’t marked anywhere. “Would the library have something more specific? Like a map of the Darkwood?”

Ezra frowned. Once again, she wondered if she’d gone too far, or trusted him too easily. “As far as I know, there’s no map of the forest,” he said, and he closed the book. “But I might be able to help you. I used to play in the Darkwood when I was younger, and I still know the area well enough. There’s a good chance that if you know where you want to go, I can get you there.”

Immanuelle gaped. “You went into the woods as...a child?”

“Sometimes, when I found a way to sneak out of the Haven.” Ezra shrugged like it was nothing, but he looked a little proud. “Of course, I never stayed after sundown. I wasn’t too keen on the idea of the woodland witches ripping the flesh off my bones.”

Immanuelle shivered, thinking back to the witches, with their hungry eyes and hooked fingers. “You’d have been lucky if that’s all they did.”

He scoffed, like it was a joke, like all the legends of the Darkwood were merely fodder for wives’ tales.

“You don’t believe the stories?” she asked, incredulous. “You don’t believe the witches are real?”

“It isn’t a question of belief.”

“Then what is it?”

He took his time to think over his answer. At last, he said, “It’s a question of who’s being creative with the truth.”

Immanuelle wasn’t entirely sure what he meant by that, but it felt close to blasphemy. “Creative truths don’t explain away centuries of disappearances in the woods.”

“People don’t disappear in the woods. They escape. That’s why they never return: because they don’t want to.”

Immanuelle couldn’t imagine anyone intentionally leaving Bethel. After all, where would they go? To the godless, heathen cities in the west? To the lifeless ruins in the east? No one would seek solace in places like those. Beyond Bethel, there was nothing. There was no other place to go. “And all the missing children? What happened to all of them?”

Ezra shrugged. “The Darkwood is a dangerous place. Predators have to eat, and out there a defenseless child is just food for the wolves.”

“Then where are all the bodies? The bones?”

“Nature has a way of cleaning up its messes. My guess is the animals get to the corpses before anyone else has the chance to.”

“And what about the blood plague?”

“What about it?”

“Well, if it didn’t come from the forest, then what’s the source of it all? Is it really so hard for you to believe that there could be something in the Darkwood that wants its due? That the legends are true, and the witches who died never left, and now they want...” She traced her fingers across the carvings on the altar, recognizing the words from David Ford’s tombstone:Blood for blood. “Vengeance.”

Ezra started to reply, but before he had the chance to speak, there was the jangle of keys and the sharpclickof a lock’s bolt slipping out of place. He twisted to face her, his expression panicked. “There’s a door at the back of the library, behind the shelves of themedical section. It leads to a flight of stairs that feeds into the cellars. Go down the hall, through the doors at its end. I’ll meet you by the front gate.” The doors opened with a resounding groan.“Go, now!”

Immanuelle broke for the two nearest shelves, ducking behind them as a lone man crossed into the center aisle. “Back in the library again?”

Although the voice was hoarse, Immanuelle immediately recognized it from past Sabbaths and feasts.

It belonged to the Prophet.

“I thought I might do some research,” said Ezra.

The Prophet nodded, doubling back so he stood by a shelf that was only a few feet from Immanuelle. She retreated, trying her best to step lightly on the cobbles.

The Prophet lingered, nothing but a few books between them. Up close, Immanuelle was certain she didn’t mistake the poorly veiled contempt in his expression when he regarded Ezra. His upper lip curled a bit when he spoke. “Research on what?”

Ezra’s eyes went to Immanuelle.Go,his gaze seemed to say. But she crouched, frozen, behind the shelf, afraid she’d be caught by the Prophet if she moved so much as an inch.

Ezra shifted his attention back to his father, his expression unreadable. “Mother is suffering from her...bruising afflictionyet again. I was looking for a way to ease her pain, but I’m beginning to think I won’t find a cure behind these walls.”

The Prophet flinched at the veiled threat, his composure failing him for a moment. But he regained himself quickly, slid a book off the shelf nearest to him, a thick tome with no title, and thumbed slowly through the pages. “If your mother is ailing, have her call upon a physician. I have more important work for you.”

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