Chapter 27 #2
A puff of air escaped me. I knew better than to be indignant with Thoma gawking, Rosie stifling a stream of laughter, and Kit as stern as ever.
Crossing my arms, I rolled my eyes aside and muttered, “Merrick and I used to share a home, you know. We’d talk at all hours.
It’s not so strange when you think of it that way. ”
When Kit didn’t respond, I chanced a look at his face and found his expression flat.
“You’re a gods-awful liar, Pen,” he said.
My arms fell to my sides, and I slumped. “I know.”
I also knew I’d only just begun owning up to my brash behavior, which Kit confirmed. “I trust you’ll tell me the whole truth later tonight,” he said, “when our house isn’t bursting with people. They’re waiting for you.”
He motioned toward the room where our guests grouped in clusters sharing small talk and infrequent glances our direction. We’d called them here for more than stew, after all, and Kit and I had decided I would be the voice of this movement. The man of words while he was the man of action.
A flurry of nerves swirled inside me. I enjoyed talking—too much, I’d been told—but it was novel to speak to a crowd who actually cared what I had to say.
Thoma and Rosie stepped aside and cleared the path forward, but I didn’t move.
I swallowed, stalling, until Kit’s fingers trailed down my back and settled at the base of my spine.
A precious point of contact, and the support I desperately needed.
Rosie flashed me a smile then gave a shrill whistle, calling for quiet in the house.
All eyes targeted her, then me, and the silence gave me ample room to speak.
“Hello, everyone,” I began, quietly at first, then gaining volume along with my confidence.
“It’s good to have you here. Some of you may know that Kit and I are about to be gone for a while tending to my family’s farm, so we wanted to make sure there was a plan in place for things to continue in our absence. ”
I revisited the communication measures we’d put in place, including the code meant to be used at Rosie’s bakery stand that always made me giggle.
Any customer who ordered a “pumpernickel pie” was to be given a written missive providing details about our plans for the future of Ashpoint and an invitation to join our cause.
Along with the new additions here with us, I expected more when Kit and I returned from Eastcliff, so that part of the meeting was mostly encouragement to continue speaking with friends and neighbors and spreading the word.
I was detailing our strategy, getting to the part where Kit would take over for Merrick, which both pleased and petrified me, when one of the new attendees piped up.
“If you become Shroud Warden, Levitt still outranks you.” The statement of fact came from a balding man I’d seen running a stall in the town square. He sold furs and hides stripped from the animals he caught in the woods below the encampment in the foothills.
Despite that I had been speaking, his attention and inquiry was clearly meant for Kit as he carried on. “How will you protect us if he sees this as rebellion? As betrayal? What if he calls for our heads?”
I glanced over at Kit, sharing a bit of the concern myself. For as much as we had discussed this plan, there were still so many unanswered questions. Outcomes I hadn’t considered or would rather not.
Kit shook his head, sweeping dark curls across his forehead. “I don't expect that to happen. Levitt is a reasonable man—”
“Can he be reasonably dispatched?” the fur trader countered. “Are you willing to take his place if it becomes necessary?”
The thought of Kit unseating Levitt, giving his hand to the Vessel and his fealty even more fully to the cult made my stomach wrench, as did the idea of what would be required to make any of that happen.
“Dispatched?” I repeated. “You mean kill him?”
“I won’t kill him,” Kit cut in. His hand crept around to squeeze my side. “If it comes to that, he can be jailed.”
“And executed?” the fur trader pressed.
I winced.
I hadn’t expected this to be clean. Or maybe I had.
I assumed the people of Ashpoint could be reasoned with, and when they realized the truth about Eeus and Paneus and what community truly meant, they would gladly change.
Some opposition was inevitable, especially from my cad of a half-brother, but I wasn’t ready to start marching people to the gallows.
Others in the room seemed to share my unease, and murmured conversations began to break out. It was chaotic enough that Kit had to nearly shout to restore order.
“It’s not my intention for anyone to die!” he called over the noise. “Not by our hands.” He looked over at me, and I cupped my hand over where his rested on my hip. The tension in his features eased before he faced the crowd again.
“Penny and I came to this place intending to destroy it, but I see now that it's the only home many of you have.” He paused and glanced around at the gathered families. “It is community. Or it can be.”
In the corner of the room, Thoma and Rosie nodded along, and Kit drew a steeling breath.
“So, I think it might be better to establish Ashpoint as a township,” he continued. “That means we need to make connections outside the walls. Legitimate ones. The city needs to be able to sustain itself without robbing other towns of their resources. We’ll need our own.”
Of course I hadn’t forgotten stripping the mission in Wendwood of their supplies.
The hospitality of Margot and Elise was like a slap in the face knowing what we’d done and what it would cost them and their neighbors.
I may not have been able to make it up to them, but I could prevent the same from happening to other folk.
“I can help with that,” I said, earning a quizzical look from Kit. “You brought me here because of my farm, right?”
I hadn’t meant it as an accusation, but it struck Kit all the same. His cheeks paled, and I rushed to explain.
“I pledged it to Ashpoint, and I would gladly honor that to sustain the people here after the Bone Men are gone.”
“You're sure Pen?” Kit asked.
He still looked a bit sick, either from guilt or from remembering the state of my family property when he saw it last. After my father’s death, things had fallen into disrepair and fields had gone fallow.
It seemed a stretch to think of us providing enough crops to sustain a town. More than a stretch. An impossibility.
Even still, I nodded. I would give whatever I could. “And there are other farms in Eastcliff that could help, as well.”
“A township, then?” Rosie’s mother called across the cramped room. “How are we to be recognized without involving the militia?”
Again, I deferred to Kit, trusting him to have the answers to questions I hadn’t even considered.
It came as a relief that he did. “Involving the militia is the first step,” he replied in a measured tone.
“What?” a woman within the group squawked.
“Levitt and I will approach them.” Kit hurried to speak before the rumbling of concern got out of hand. “We'll be prepared with information about the members of the cult who don't share our views, and those who have committed the most heinous crimes.”
“Are you so eager to go the way of your father?” It was the same voice again, coming from near the kitchen.
“Excuse me?”
Kit swiveled that direction and searched, as I did, for the dissenter.
Sitting at the dining table, an elderly woman aimed her gaze toward us. She looked weary but also severe. Judging by her age, she had likely been in Ashpoint since Kit was a child. I became surer of that assumption as she spoke.
“Have you not committed heinous crimes?” She stabbed a gnarled finger at Kit, and I fought the urge to step in front of him to shield him from her scorn.
I barely had time to budge before she opened her criticism to the others in the house.
“Hasn’t everyone who wears Eeus's mark? Do you not fear for your lives?”
My lips parted to protest or defend, but I could think of nothing to say. Considering I was meant to be the voice of this movement, I'd been far too quiet this time. Unprepared. Ignorant. And a bit taken aback by the myriad obstacles that stood in the way of our success.
My hand moved away from Kit's, and I touched it to my chest, pressing my fingertips against the brand burned over my heart. I had already suffered for this cause. Sacrificed for it. I shuddered to think I might be asked to give more. Perhaps everything.
Untethered from me, Kit stepped forward. As pale as he had been earlier, he was flushed now. Not in the charming way he got when I kissed him or nibbled on his ears. This was the heat of anger. At the very least, a stern resolve.
He squared himself with the old woman. “I believe the militia will see that the information we have to give them is valuable enough to buy us our lives.”
I wasn’t sure if our guests were convinced, pacified, or just hungry, but the interrogation ended there. While everyone else filled their mouths and bellies, I stirred my stew and considered the things I hadn’t before.
By the time the house had emptied and Kit was pushing a broom around the living room, I’d corralled my thoughts enough to ask him, “Had you thought about it?”
Kit paused by the fireplace and glanced over at me. I sat on the couch with Nutmeg tucked in the crook of my elbow. I poked her belly while she batted at my fingers.
“Had I thought about what?” Kit asked.
“About the militia,” I replied, studying the soft fuzz on Nutmeg’s stomach while avoiding Kit’s eyes. “That they could hang us.” When he didn’t reply, I looked up and frowned. “By rights, they should.”
“No.” Kit propped the broom against the wall. “They shouldn’t kill us.” He crossed his arms and turned toward me, trying to look stern. But I saw the glint of worry in his eyes. “Merrick would like to kill us, though,” he continued. “Perhaps even more so now. What exactly did you say to him?”
Nutmeg sank her claws into my finger and kicked out with her back feet, prompting me to offload her onto the floor. She darted over to the dust pile Kit had created and barreled through it, tracking dirt as she skittered into the kitchen.
I smiled at the mess, but Kit kept watching me, waiting.
After a moment, I sighed and slumped back on the sofa cushions. “I told him to stay away. From you. From us. From the farm. I told him we were done. And I told Violette you’d never be with her because…” I ducked my head as heat surged into my cheeks. “Because you chose me instead.”
Kit lingered, braced. When I said nothing else, he nodded and reached for the broom. “That’s very true,” he said.
Rolling onto my side, I pulled my legs up, then stretched out on the couch, remembering nights spent crowded into the narrow space before Kit agreed to share my bed.
Those were fond memories, and they felt so long ago, though it had only been a matter of months.
It was staggering to think of how much had changed since I left home.
Since I met Kit and came with him to Ashpoint.
While the future most often seemed bright, that night it looked bleak.
“Should I be worried?” I asked in the growing quiet.
“Never,” Kit replied over the swish of the broom’s bristles across the hardwood. “I would choose you again today, tomorrow, and always. It was one of the easiest decisions of my life.”
The declaration made my heart pound, and a smile stretched across my face. But it didn’t stay there because that wasn’t what I meant, and I suspected Kit knew as much.
“I’m not worried about us,” I said. “But I am worried about losing you.”
He set the broom aside once more and padded over to the couch. Stooping, he grabbed my legs and lifted them, then slid underneath to sit with my knees draped across his lap. He reached out to take my hand and brought it to rest on my stomach.
“I wouldn’t leave you, Pen,” he said, his brows pinched and eyes earnest.
“What if you can’t help it?” I asked. “What if it’s out of your control? What if—”
“Penny,” Kit cut in, commanding my attention while his thumb brushed over my knuckles. “Do you trust me?”
He’d posed that same question months ago when we found ourselves at a mission far from here. I’d asked him not to leave me then. Begged when my fear got the better of me.
He stayed. More than that, he kept me with him. We were always together. I fancied the notion that we always would be and, yes, I trusted him.
I nodded, and Kit gave my fingers a squeeze.
“Then don’t worry,” he said. “I do enough of it for both of us.”
He brought my hand to his lips for a kiss, then released me to stand. He slid out from under my legs and returned to the waiting broom.
The bristles swished, and his bare feet thumped along behind, and I worried.
I worried until it was time to go to bed, where I laid beneath the blankets with Kit curled against me.
I stared at the ceiling while my thoughts raced, and I worried until my mind was so worn out I couldn’t help but fall asleep.