Chapter Seventy-Seven
Grace
The helicopter jerks, the roar vibrating all through me, every whomp of the blades pulsing against my skull.
Shadows and colors start to sharpen. Whatever they gave me is wearing off. I wish it wasn’t. Because now, my whole body is paralyzed with fear.
Cold air stings my cheeks when the doors open. The scent of manure fills my nose. Dust and dirt. The cloying stench of oleander.
Hands clamp around my arms. Someone—I can’t see well enough to know who—cuts through the straps holding me down.
I’m hauled up, dragged out of the helicopter. Rocks bite into my feet through my fuzzy purple socks. Isabel’s gift. I’ll lose those soon. Along with my favorite pajamas. Forced back into the white dress I wore for three long years.
Tears well in my eyes. I try to make my legs work, but they’re too heavy. Too weak. The men jerk me forward, and a voice I’ve heard in so many of my nightmares is suddenly right in front of me.
“Blessed evening, Nova.”
I blink up at the man, and memories come flooding back to me. Pain. Fear. Soul-crushing despair.
Brother Malone.
Shit. He wants an answer. I have to answer or he’ll hurt me. But I can’t.
“Breaking the rules already? I told Brother Marvin it was a mistake to wait so long to return you to us. You will answer me when I speak to you!” His hand clamps down on my shoulder, squeezing hard enough I see stars.
With a tiny whimper, my shaky legs give out completely.
If it weren’t for the other two holding me up, I’d be face down in the dirt.
“She can’t, asshole!” Parker shouts. Two more of Prophet’s clerics muscle her forward.
Zip ties cut into her wrists, but her legs are free, and she fights with everything she has, twisting and kicking.
One of her boots catches the guy on her right in the shin hard enough that he falls, taking her down with him.
She’s up again in a heartbeat, ducks her shoulder, and tries to ram the brother holding my left arm. But before she reaches me, she’s caught around the waist and thrown to the ground.
Brother Malone chuckles as he stalks forward and plants his boot in the center of her chest. “Two hundred and sixteen of us. One of you. Brother Marvin said you were smart. Guess he doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”
“Fuck you, asshole,” Parker manages, each word punctuated by a pained gasp. Brother Malone shifts more of his weight forward.
“Stop!” That’s what I want to say. But it comes out garbled, the word shattering on my lips.
Parker makes a small, pained sound.
He’s going to break her ribs. Or her breastbone.
“St….st…” It’s the best I can do.
“What’s wrong with her?” Brother Malone asks, finally removing his boot so Parker can breathe.
The glare she gives him could freeze Hell itself. The clerics haul her to her feet, and Malone grabs her chin hard enough to bruise. “Rule number one. Women do not speak unless spoken to. Rule number two. If a brother asks you a question, you answer.”
“Fuck…you…and your…rules,” Parker wheezes.
His hand flies, hitting her cheek with a sickening crack.
“Rule number three. Members of the Blessed Flock are not allowed to swear,” he growls.
“Good thing…I’m not one…of them.” Parker stands up a little straighter. “Grace can’t speak. Because you assholes stole her from her hospital bed twenty-four hours after she had fuckin’ brain surgery.”
Brother Malone hits her again, but this time, with a closed fist. She slumps forward, blood dripping from her mouth.
“Bring them,” Brother Malone snaps. “Prophet says the preparations for tomorrow’s ceremony need to start immediately.”
Terror steals my breath in an instant. The clerics on either side of me clamp down on my arms, half-carrying, half-dragging me past the barn. The horses spook as the helicopter lifts off again, stamping and tossing their heads. The blades stir the air so fast, dust stings my eyes.
Parker. Where is Parker? I twist, straining against the men dragging me up the hill.
She staggers between two clerics I don’t know—or can’t remember—her eyes glassy, her lip split and swollen.
She looks wrecked—but she’s still fighting.
I see it in the way her shoulders set, the way she keeps jerking against their grip, like if she just times it right, she’ll break free.
Her gaze locks on mine, hard and steady, before she drops her eyes to her hands, zip tied in front of her.
I follow her gaze. Her fingers are moving. Slowly. Carefully.
A-J W-I-L-L C-O-M-E.
AJ will come.
God, I want to believe her. But the memories claw at me—sentry towers, men with AK-47s laughing in the darkness. If AJ comes here…they’ll kill him. They’ll kill him because of me.
My throat burns. Tears streak hot down my cheeks. My arms feel like stone, my fingers thick and useless, but I force them to move. I can’t let my last words on this earth be nothing but broken sounds from my broken brain. I point to her, then start to form letters.
N-O G-I-V-E U-P.
Don’t give up.
Parker sees it. She jerks her chin at me, fierce, protective even now when all hope for me is gone. Her lip trembles but her eyes—God, her eyes burn. She understands. She won’t stop.
They drag us higher, toward the glow at the heart of the compound. The altar looms ahead like a sadistic beacon, ringed by lanterns and a trench of open flame. My stomach heaves. Every instinct screams at me to run, but I can’t. All I can do is stumble forward, and pray Parker finds a way out.
I half expect them to tie me to the altar and leave me there until tomorrow night. But Brother Malone takes a hard left, and we’re forced to follow.
My body remembers this path, even if my brain hasn’t caught up yet.
Nausea crawls up my throat. I can’t let them lock me in that room again. But…what choice do I have?
Memories slam into me with every breath, every step across the warped floorboards. Some are only fragments. Others…in full technicolor.
The house smells the same. Like sweat and oleander. The rough plank flooring snags on my socks. Up the stairs, down the hall, past Prophet’s bedroom, to a door where padlocks dangle open on two thick hasps, like they’ve been waiting for me.
One of the clerics shoves me inside. My legs give out, and I twist at the last second, collapsing onto the narrow bed instead of the floor. The lumpy mattress provides almost no cushion, and I stare up at the plain wooden ceiling with tears in my eyes.
I choke on a broken sob. Almost a word.
No.
They drag Parker in next. She thrashes, landing a solid kick to somewhere vital, but the two men muscle her into the corner anyway. Her chest heaves, and her gray eyes flash with pure fury.
Heavy footsteps thud down the hall. Familiar. Terrifying.
I scramble back on the bed until my spine hits the wall, curling inward, trying to make myself as small as possible. It won’t help. There’s nowhere for me to go. But still, I try. My knees come up tight to my chest, arms locked around them like that will somehow stop Prophet from hurting me.
“Blessed evening, Nova.” His voice is almost tender. Reverent. “Welcome home.”
“That isn’t her name, asshole,” Parker snarls. She springs up, her hands balled into fists, but Brother Malone is faster. He catches her with an arm around her waist and throws her back against the wall. Her left leg slides out from under her, and she crashes to the floor.
“It is her only name,” Prophet says, the edge to his voice sending a chill down my spine. “And she knows it. Don’t you, Nova?”
Tears clog my throat. I nod, though every part of me wants to scream.
“Grace, no. You’re not his. You were never his!” Parker scoots closer to the bed and clamps her fingers around my ankle like an anchor. Her voice is raw, frantic. “Promise me, Grace. Promise me you won’t give him the satisfaction.”
For a heartbeat, I think I can. I think I can be strong for her. But then Prophet’s hand shoots out, closing around her throat. He hauls her upright like she weighs nothing. Parker kicks, claws, fights with every ounce of fury she has left, and finally, spits in his face.
“Defiance is expected. For a time. But a week in the box will cure you of that spirit.” Prophet’s tone is too calm. Calm is always followed by pain. “What did Brother Marvin say her name was?”
“Parker Elmore,” Brother Malone answers.
“No more. Now, you are Sister Willow. Soon, you will be my fifth wife.”
My lungs seize. Sister Willow. God, no. Please, no. Not Parker.
Parker thrashes, wheezing as Prophet tightens his grip. And then it hits me—the memory slamming into me so hard, my entire body shudders.
The sound. The endless, droning vibration, so low it rattled every bone in my body, yet so loud my skull felt like it was cracking apart.
No melody. No words. Just an unrelenting frequency tearing through my chest until my heartbeat wasn’t mine anymore.
The air itself vibrated until I couldn’t tell where my body ended and the noise began.
And the lights. Always on. Blinding. White-hot. Hours blurred into days. The suffocating heat of the day and the biting, bone-deep cold at night. No silence. No darkness. No escape.
A week will destroy her.
It destroyed me.
Something inside me fractures. She’s only here because of me. Because she wouldn’t leave my side. Because she thought she could protect me.
Prophet shoves Parker at Brother Malone. “Take her. When I release her, she’ll beg me for the sacred honor of being my wife.”
“No!” The cry rips from me, broken and jagged, but the closest thing to an actual word I’ve managed. I reach for Parker, but my arms are weak, my body too heavy, my chest crushed under the weight of what Prophet is about to do to her.
“Grace!” she screams, kicking and bucking as Brother Malone drags her toward the door. Her voice cracks, fury giving way to raw terror. “Don’t you let him win! Promise me! Grace!”
Her voice fades as Brother Malone hauls her down the corridor, but I can still hear the echoes of her rage, the pounding of her boots against the wood for several long moments, until finally, a door slams below us.
And then the silence crushes me.
Prophet turns his gaze to me, his eyes burning with a kind of devotion that makes my skin crawl.
“It’s time to prepare for the ceremony.”
“Wh…?” It’s too early. If he’s waiting for the full moon…it’s tomorrow.
The door creaks open. A cleric stands in the hallway, his arms crossed over his chest. One of Prophet’s wives enters, her dark pink dress brushing her toes and a bundle of white fabric in her hands. A dress. Silk. Plain. Like the one I was found in.
“Strip,” Prophet orders. “The rags of your old life sully the purity the Glorious One demands. Put on the dress, then lie down on the bed.” His smile sharpens. “If you refuse, Brother Vincent will help you.”
My hands shake so violently, I can’t grip the hem of my pajama top. But all it takes is one step by Brother Vincent and I force myself to work the buttons open.
I peel my clothes off, a piece at a time. Each one hits the floor like a blow. My skin prickles with shame as I drag the dress over my head.
It fits so well, it’s like it was made for me.
Because it was.
I lie on the bed, braced for him to tie me down. Or drag me into the darkness and bind me to the altar. My breath catches with each shift of his shadow.
He snaps his fingers. One by one, his wives rush in, silent, their arms loaded down with flowers. Oleanders.
Prophet arranges them himself. Carefully. Deliberately. As though he’s building a shrine. The air thickens with their cloying sweetness until every breath scorches my throat. Until the weight of the scent presses down on my chest. Until I can’t breathe without choking.
He smooths a hand over the blooms near my hip, almost tenderly. “Blessed night, Nova,” he murmurs. “Sleep well. Tomorrow you will ascend in glory and fulfill the destiny the Glorious One has chosen.”
The door slams shut. The locks thunk.
I sob until my body shakes, until there’s nothing left but raw sound. Rage claws its way up next, jagged and wild. But too soon, my strength is gone, leaving only silence and the suffocating sweetness of oleander.