Page 45 of The Year of the Witching

Immanuelle obeyed, skirts sweeping around her ankles as she ducked into the kitchen, grabbing a basin of water and a bundle of dried yarrow flower from the herb box beneath the sink. She raced upstairs as fast as she could without tripping on the hem of her skirts and entered the children’s room.

There, she found Anna tightening the knots around Glory’s wrists, tethering her to the headboard to keep her from escaping, as she had tried to do six times since the night she first took ill. Anna tied the cloth cuffs so tight there were bruises around her daughter’s wrists, but it couldn’t be helped. Nearly half of those afflicted with the blight had maimed or even killed themselves in the throes of their madness, jumping out of windows or bashing their own heads in, as Honor had nearly done the night Immanuelle found her.

At her mother’s touch, Glory thrashed and shrieked, legs tangling in her sheets, her cheeks bright with fever.

Immanuelle set the basin beside the bed, took the yarrow from her mouth, and grabbed the bowl on the nightstand. She crushed the blooms as best she could, mashing them into a paste. Then she added a little water—still faintly tinged by the last traces of the blood plague—and mixed the pulp with her fingers.

It was Martha who administered the draught, seizing Glory firmly by the base of her neck and thrusting her upright, the way one holds a squalling newborn. She forced the bowl to her mouth, and Glory thrashed and spat, dragging at her binds, her eyes rolling back in her skull as the draught dribbled between her lips and down her chin.

Honor lay across the room with her eyes closed, her blankets tucked beneath her chin. Immanuelle put a hand to her cheek and winced. The fever raged in her yet. The girl lay so still Immanuelle had to slip a finger beneath her nose just to see if she was breathing. She hadn’t stirred once since the blight had arrived. That night, she’d struck herself into a deep slumber they feared she’d never wake from.

It went on like that for hours—Glory thrashing in her bed, Honor comatose, Anna weeping on a chair in the corner—until Immanuelle couldn’t bear it anymore. She left the farmhouse for the pastures. Days ago, their farmhand, Josiah, had been called back to his own home in the distant Glades to tend to his blight-sick wife. So apart from Immanuelle, there was no one to keep watch over the grazing sheep.

As she crossed the pastures, crook in hand, she weighed the options available to her. Her darkest fears had become reality. The sacrifice she’d made at the pond hadn’t worked after all. Blight was upon them, and if it didn’t end soon, Immanuelle feared the lives of her sisters would be forfeit. But what could she do to stop it?

Her blood offering hadn’t been enough to break the curse, and she had no one to turn to for aid. The Church seemed helpless in the face of such great evil. Immanuelle considered turning to Ezra for help, as she had done before, but decided against it. He’d made it plain that he wanted no part in plagues or witchcraft, no part of her. The last time she’d dragged him into her schemes he’d almost paid a mortal price. It seemed cruel to call upon him again.

But if not Ezra, whom could she turn to? There had to be someone, something. A cure or scheme to stop this. She had to believe that, on principle alone, because if she didn’t, it meant that hope was lost and her sisters were going to die.

A memory surfaced at the back of her mind, an image of hercensus papers, the witch mark below her name and the names of the Wards who came before her. Was it possible that the very answers she sought—about the plagues, and the witches and a way to defeat them—could be waiting for her in the Outskirts, in the form of the family she had never known? If the witch mark was any indication at all, they were versed in the magic of the Darkwood and the coven that walked its corridors. If there was any help to be found in Bethel, Immanuelle was certain she’d find it with them.

But how could she slip away to the Outskirts unnoticed, with Honor and Glory as sick as they were? There was no way she could excuse her absence for more than an hour, and she would need at least a day to find her kin in the Outskirts.

Immanuelle frowned, staring past the flock of grazing sheep, to the windows of Abram’s workshop glowing in the distance. An idea took shape at the back of her mind.

Abram.Of course.

Immanuelle might not have been able to win Martha over... but perhaps Abram would be more sympathetic. He was kindhearted, gentler than Martha, and less pious than Anna. Perhaps he would see the merit in her desires to reach out to her kin in the Outskirts.

Emboldened by this idea, Immanuelle herded the last of the sheep into the corral where they spent their nights and started toward Abram’s workshop. It was a humble space. The wood floors were dusted with a thick carpet of sawdust. As usual, a series of half-finished projects cluttered the workspace—a pair of tree-trunk side tables, a stool, and a dollhouse that was no doubt intended to be a gift for Honor’s birthday.

Paintings adorned the walls, all of them her mother’s. There were sweeping landscapes on wood panels, parchment painted with faint watercolor flowers, a few still lifes. There was even aself-portrait, which featured Miriam, smiling, with her hair unbound.

Immanuelle peered over Abram’s shoulder to see what he was working on and stopped dead. There, on the table, was a small, half-carved coffin. It was big enough for only one member of the Moore family: Honor.

“She’s still... with us,” said Abram without looking up from his work. “I just want to be ready... if the worst comes.”

Immanuelle began to shake. “She’s going to wake up.”

“Perhaps. But if she doesn’t... I have to be prepared... Always promised myself... that if I had to... bury another child... I would do it properly. In a coffin... of my own making. I missed that chance... with your mother. I’ll not... have it happen again. Even if... I have to collect... her bones from the... pyre, I intend... to give her... a proper burial. Should it... come to that.”

Immanuelle knew what he referred to. Bethelan custom mandated that the blameless were buried and the sinful were burned, in the hopes that the flames of the pyre would purge them of their sins and allow them passage into the realm of purgatory. On account of her crimes, Miriam had died in dishonor and, as a result, she never had a proper coffin or burial plot in the graveyard where her ancestors were laid to rest. “Do you miss her?”

“More than you know.”

Immanuelle took a seat on the stool beside him. “And do you regret breaking Protocol to hide her here, years ago?”

Abram’s hand tightened around his chisel, but he shook his head.

“Even though it was a sin?”

“Better to take sin upon... one’s own shoulders... than allow harm... to befall others. Sometimes a person... has an obligation... to act in the interest of the... greater good.”

This was her moment, and Immanuelle was quick to seize it. “During that time, did my mother ever speak of my father?”

Abram faltered, then lowered his tool. “More than she did... anyone else. When the madness... took her she used... to call for him. Claimed his ghost... was wandering the... halls. She’d say he was... calling her home. I like to think... that he did in the end.”

Immanuelle’s throat clenched so tightly she could barely speak. “I want to go to the Outskirts, Pa. I want to know the people that knew him. I want to meet his kin.Mykin.”

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