Chapter 6
Kit
Iskirted the square, unwilling to face any of the stragglers closing up their stalls while I felt like a fuse that was dangerously close to burning down.
I couldn’t face Penny, either, not until I figured out how to tell him that his half-brother had nearly succeeded in killing us both.
Not when I was still stinging from Levitt’s betrayal. I was too raw.
Once I hit the outer road, I peeled off and trudged through the knee-deep snow in the direction of the pecan orchard. With everything out of season, it would be the one place in Ashpoint I might find solitude.
As the last rays of sun disappeared, the moon lit the world in shades of watery blue.
The shadows of distant trees stretched over the snow like hundreds of skeletal fingers reaching for me.
It looked far different than it had just a few months prior when Penny brought me here after our ill-fated tavern dinner, more ominous now than inviting.
He’d kissed me for the first time here, and the memory of both of our bumbling reactions to that sparked a pang of longing in me.
He was back at home waiting for me now, and despite my need to cool my anger and hurt before I faced him again, all I wanted was to let him fold me up in his arms and squeeze some comfort into me. Maybe offer him some in return.
But what I had to tell him was going to hurt him. I was tired of having to give him bad news about Merrick and watch him suffer with each new awful revelation. He’d been through enough. I didn’t want to have to drop this on him, too.
I paused to take a couple of deep breaths when I reached the tree line. The cold air seized in my lungs on the third inhale and prompted a reflexive cough. In response, there was a gasp from somewhere deeper in the orchard, and the crunch of snow under boots.
It seemed there was nowhere in Ashpoint where I could go to be alone.
I was ready to turn back toward town until a familiar face peeked out from behind one of the trees. The glare of moonlight from the snow cast a cool blue glow on Rosie’s normally warm mahogany skin, and her braids swished in the icy breeze. She looked as tired as I felt.
“You startled me,” she said as she stepped fully into view. “I didn’t expect anyone else to be out here.”
“Me neither.”
I slogged through the deep drifts between us and found her standing in front of a bench tucked between two tree trunks. There was just enough space cleared on the seat for her to sit, and she brushed away the rest of the snow as she gestured for me to join her.
The last time I’d seen her had been at the skinning after the third Oath.
She’d looked a fright, then, pale and tearful and horrified.
There was still a bit of that haunted air about her now.
She looked thinner, some of the roundness in her cheeks gone as if grief had worn her down as much physically as it had emotionally.
She huddled on the other end of the bench, staring out into the dark. She was shivering even under her heavy cloak, so I held up the edge of my own in invitation. Her eyes flicked up to mine while she considered.
“Are you like this with everyone?” she asked with a hint of humor in her voice.
“What do you mean?”
She grinned and tugged on the lifted edge of my cloak before tucking herself underneath it. “So… mothering.”
Blush burned my cheeks, and I cleared my throat. “Only with my friends, I guess.”
Her smile softened. “You’re a good friend, Kit.”
Not good enough for Levitt to punish the men who tried to kill me, apparently. The bitter betrayal I’d felt in the Ossuary burned up my throat like bile. I swallowed it down.
“So, what are you doing out here?” I asked in an attempt to divert my attention away from the conversation I’d walked out of a few minutes before.
Rosie pulled the edge of my cloak tighter around herself. “I needed to get away from my family for a while. I love them, and they’ve been wonderful the last few weeks, but…” She shrugged. “I haven’t had much chance to be alone. I was starting to get a little overwhelmed.”
I nodded. “Sometimes it's good to be by yourself for a while.”
Her forehead scrunched. “They’re so careful around me now, like they’re afraid to say the wrong thing, but I wish everything would go back to the way it was.
Though, I guess it’s not the same anymore.
Not for a lot of us.” She tipped her head to look over at me with a tight smile.
“But you didn’t come out here for this. Sorry. ”
“I don’t mind. Really. I’m the one who asked, right?”
She chuckled. “I guess so.”
We lapsed into quiet until she tapped her foot against mine. “Why are you out here? I’m not used to seeing you without Penny around.”
“It’s nothing,” I said. “You don’t need my trouble on top of your own.”
Her eyes narrowed, and she fixed me with a scolding look. “I’m the one who asked, right?”
It was hard to argue with my own logic, so I eased into the story from the very beginning.
Leaving out our real reason for coming to Ashpoint, I explained how Penny and I met, Merrick’s unexpected presence here, and the tensions between the half-brothers.
I only touched briefly on how badly Penny and I reacted to the hemlock, mostly because I didn’t want to dwell on it myself, and ended with my conversation with Levitt and the news that Merrick was actively trying to kill Penny and me, though I kept Isla’s involvement to myself.
It would be cruel to put her at risk if nothing was going to come of it.
Rosie listened while I rambled, her brows drawing lower over her dark eyes the further I got. By the time I neared the end of the story, her hands were curled into fists around the edges of our cloaks in her lap.
“When I first got here, I was glad to see Levitt as the Right Hand,” I said.
“I thought we finally had someone in leadership who could steer us right.” I scoffed.
“But it looks like I was wrong. All the same things that happened under my father are still happening. Levitt is proving himself to be ineffective and too cowardly to face the corruption in his own leadership. He’d rather roll over and close his eyes than do the hard thing. ”
I regretted that bit of brutal honesty as soon as it came out of my mouth, and Rosie’s stunned expression made me feel no better.
“I’m sorry,” I said quickly. “I shouldn’t have unloaded all of that on you. I don’t have anyone else I can talk to about this other than Penny, so it’s been building for a while, and—”
“I have concerns about how things are run, too,” she blurted. She took a slow breath and chewed at her bottom lip before continuing. “I think… maybe it was a mistake to start our Oaths. And maybe it would be a mistake to continue them.”
Thoma had voiced a similar sentiment, but I was shocked to hear it from Rosie.
She’d gone into her Oaths with her eyes wide open so far as I could tell.
Having grown up here, she must have known what the rituals entailed.
But seeing strangers go through the trials was very different to enduring them personally.
Losing someone from town had a smaller impact than losing someone close.
And, for all the drama Tessa caused, she and Rosie had seemed close.
“Sometimes I think we should just leave,” she admitted softly, breaking me out of my own thoughts.
“Pack our things and go and pretend we were never here. Find somewhere else to settle and go on with our lives. I think my parents would leave if I suggested it, but I’m afraid we wouldn’t be allowed to go. ”
“What’s allowed doesn’t matter,” I said. “Break the rules. You certainly wouldn’t be the first ones. If you truly want to go, we’ll find a way to make it happen.” I chuckled bitterly. “Gods, maybe we’ll even come with you.”
Leaving was the safest option. I’d briefly entertained the idea of taking Penny and running during the third Oath, but I was too late. He drank the hemlock, and we were stuck. But now, knowing that Merrick wouldn’t relent in trying to finish what he started that night, I considered it again.
Eastcliff wouldn’t be safe, but no one knew I had ties to Forstford.
We could pick up Sayla and Amelina on our way and bring them with us.
It would forfeit the farm, but we could make it work.
We’d be alive and safe, and that would be enough.
If nothing else, I knew I needed some kind of contingency plan for Penny should anything happen to me.
“I don’t even know where we’d go,” Rosie said. “We’ve been here my whole life. We don’t have anyone else out there to go to.” She sniffed and straightened, and her pained expression smoothed into one of manufactured calm. “It’s fine. We’ll be fine. The worst is over, right?”
I shrugged. “Depends on your definition of ‘worst,’ I suppose. None of the other Oaths are inherently deadly, not like the third, but they present their own challenges.”
Anders’s news from the day before came to the forefront of my mind, and I wondered now what I’d wondered then.
“Speaking of the next Oaths,” I began, “did anyone approach you about being our third? Did you decline?”
Though I doubted Rosie would want to be paired with Otis and Isla, I could understand her hesitance to spend time on the road with Penny and me.
She’d had a few weeks and some distance to come to terms with the fact that we were involved and he didn’t feel for her what she felt for him, but like Thoma, I worried it might be hard for her to see us together.
A frown pulled at her lips. “No. It wasn’t given to me as an option.
One of the messengers came and told me I would be joining Isla and Otis for the next two Oaths.
I would much rather be joining you two than them.
I like Isla well enough, but Otis makes me uncomfortable.
Especially now knowing that he was involved with Merrick’s plot. ”
That meant our being paired with Anders was likely deliberate. With Levitt so worried about his own position and standing, he wouldn’t have dared push back if Merrick suggested the groupings. I couldn’t help but wonder what Merrick had up his ridiculous ceremonial sleeve for us in all of this.
For the first time since I reconnected with Levitt, I felt like Penny and I were genuinely on our own here. I’d gotten used to the quiet, behind the scenes support, but the time for that was clearly over. Now it was up to us to keep ourselves safe.
“Be careful with Otis,” I said. “Make sure you keep something on you to defend yourself with, should it ever come to that.”
She cracked a weary smile. “Maybe I need one of those knives like you made for Penny.”
“Not sure I’ll have time to make you one before the fourth Oath, but I can certainly try. We’ll find something to hold you over.”
Rosie chuckled. “I’m sure I’ll manage. But speaking of Penny…” She bumped her shoulder into mine. “Congratulations on your courtship.”
Heat rose to my cheeks again, and I couldn’t help a smile of my own. “Told you about that, did he?”
“And he looked about as pleased as you do.” Her smile broke into a grin. “I’m happy for you both. You make quite the pair.”
I had the sudden realization that all the last traces of sunlight were gone from the western sky, and Penny was sitting at home waiting for me. He would be worrying himself sick by now.
“Thank you,” I said then motioned toward town. “I really should be getting back to him before he sends out a search party. Will you let me walk you home?”
Rosie ducked out from under the edge of my cloak and shook her head with a smile. “As I said: mothering.” She got to her feet and offered a hand to pull me up. “But yes. You may walk me home.”
We made the trek in companionable quiet. When we reached the Saunders’ home, Rosie climbed the stoop and paused to look back at me.
“Goodnight, Kit. And thank you for the talk.”
“Any time. Goodnight, Rosie.”
She reached for the latch, and I caught her arm before she could open the door. Her brows rose in an unspoken question.
I let my hand drop and tucked it into the folds of my cloak before speaking.
“One last thing: are there any kittens left that aren’t spoken for?”
She chuckled. “You want a third?”
“Not for me.” I gestured vaguely in the direction of Reimond’s family’s home. “For Thoma.”
Her face pinched like she was in pain, and she nodded.
“There are still two who don’t have homes lined up.
I haven’t seen Thoma since—” Her breath hitched, and I knew she was remembering the skinning.
She sniffed, shook herself, then let out a rush of breath.
“Tell him to come by, and he’s welcome to meet them. ”
“Maybe just hang on to one of them for him for a bit? He’s not been home since the third Oath, but I think he’d appreciate the company when he does finally go back. It just… might be a while yet.”
She gave another soft smile. “You really are a good friend, Kit. The kitten will be here whenever he’s ready.”
“Thank you. Goodnight, Rosie.”
“Goodnight, Kit.”
Once she was safely inside, I turned toward home. I still didn’t know how I was going to tell Penny what Levitt had told me, but I’d put it off long enough.
It was time to break his heart again.