Chapter 24
24
A DAY BEFORE THE TITHE , I hammer the final blow. Its ring shimmers with clarity inside the hot, stuffy forge, dawn creeping across the threshold in strips of dappled violet and gold.
My arm shakes as I lower the hammer onto the anvil. Seventeen hours from shapeless metal to sharpened blade and it is nearly done. Grasping the hilt, I drive the dagger into the bucket of salt water at my feet. A hiss of steam erupts where water and hot metal collide. When it clears, I hold the blade aloft, inspecting its tapering from every angle, the lovely, flattened gleam. It will do.
I hang it on the wall to cool with the others. Twenty-six daggers, all iron-forged. A six-month task, now complete.
The sun continues its climb behind the mountain as I emerge into the brightness of full day. The wind does not blow. It hasn’t for many weeks now. I have wondered why, and I worry.
Upon reaching the abbess’ house, I knock on the door.
“Enter.”
Pushing it open, I step inside the foyer and head down the short hallway where Mother Mabel’s office is located. She sits at her desk, penning a message. Beside the open window at her back, Meirlach hangs from a wall mount, a pillar of sharpened steel capped in gold.
At the interruption, she lifts her head, sets down her quill. “Brielle. What can I do for you?”
“I’ve finished the last of the daggers,” I say, nudging the door open further. “They’re ready for transport into Under.”
Her smile is brief, gone within the next heartbeat, but the affection in her eyes lingers as she gestures to the vacant seat across from her desk. “That’s wonderful news. All twenty-six are accounted for?”
“Yes, Mother Mabel.” I perch on the edge of the chair, hands folded in my lap.
“Excellent. Your hard work has not gone unnoticed. This will benefit all of Thornbrook. Pierus will appreciate your contribution as well.”
I do not care to benefit the Orchid King. I forge the daggers so we may continue to lease Thornbrook’s land for another seven years. “I’m happy to serve Thornbrook in any way I can.”
The skin around her eyes smooths, all fine lines pressed into dewy youth. “Indeed. What would we do without you?”
I’ve asked that question myself. In time, the Abbess on High would train another novitiate to replace me. Someone needs to light the forge.
I push to my feet. “If that is all.”
She holds up a hand. “Forgive me, Brielle, but I have to ask. Are you all right?” Concern shadows her gaze. “You seem troubled.”
My body feels heavy in uncomfortable ways. There is much to say, but I’m not sure whether I have the strength for this conversation. I feel myself spiraling, warmth in my face and sweat on my palms.
“When you returned to Thornbrook, it was clear the trials of your journey had changed you.” Though not the gentlest woman, Mother Mabel speaks kindly, perhaps sensing my distress. “You stood taller. You walked with surety. You did not cower in the face of adversity. But there has been a deadness to your gaze that concerns me.”
A deadness. That sounds about right.
She shifts the quill and parchment to the corner of her desk, making room for her hands. The long, belled sleeves of her alb hiss as they pass over the naked wood. “Do you know why a novitiate must complete a task prior to taking their final vows?”
“To prove their worth?”
“To an extent.” Fingers interlaced, she leans forward, commanding my attention with little effort. “Because many women join Thornbrook at such a young age, it is unfair to assume they seek the same life once they become adults. The task is a catalyst. It helps a novitiate determine what future they seek. A life in service to the Father? A life beyond that?”
The mission did test me. It snapped me into pieces and forced me to question if they fit together as seamlessly as they had a year before. Mother Mable cannot know the agony of the experience. How out of place I feel. How confused.
“I gave you space,” she continues, “because it was clear you needed to process what had occurred. However, there has been little change since you returned.” Set beneath pale eyebrows, her black eyes lock on to mine, apprehension swimming in their depths. “Will you tell me what plagues you?”
Facing Mother Mabel is never easy. In the morning bright, it seems impossible. She has given me council in my darkest hours. She made room for me at Thornbrook despite my questionable upbringing. I feel that I’ve failed her. “I’ve been struggling, Mother Mabel. It’s true.”
A brief nod. “There’s no shame in it. Have you spoken to the Father about this?”
“I have not.” My guilt is too great.
“Remember that the Father loves you. We only need to ask for His forgiveness.”
“What if—” Shame hurtles up my airway and sticks at the back of my tongue. How could she possibly have known of my needs? Even I did not know. “What if I do not deserve it?”
At once, she rises, skirting the desk in a cloud of sweet incense, hands gentle on my shoulders. “Brielle.”
My heart thunders from the abbess’ intense scrutiny.
“Have you broken your vows? You have not given your body to another, have you?”
I cannot bear the disappointment, nor the accusatory tone. She knows. I have never been able to hide what I feel.
“Are you still pure?”
I hesitate. Technically, I am still a virgin, so I nod. “I am.”
The deepest, most soulful sigh leaves the abbess. Surprisingly, she is smiling. “Please do not despair if you made a mistake. We all do. That you still wish to be a shepherd of the Father proves your loyalty despite your trials.” She strokes my cheek. The display of affection is more than I could have hoped for.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
“You have a good heart, Brielle. I hate to see you suffering.” She frowns, drops her hand. “Promise me you will speak to the Father tonight.”
“I will.”
Satisfied, Mother Mabel returns to her desk. “Speaking of the quest.” Tap, tap, tap goes her fingertip atop the desk. “Can I ask what happened in the Grotto? I admit I was certain you would obtain Meirlach first.”
Revealing these underlying truths—that I do not believe I deserve the station, that I fear my altering mind—puts my past, present, and future into question. I must gift Mother Mabel the truth, but just enough to avoid further inquiry. “Harper entered the Grotto, as did I. She is equally worthy of the spot.”
“She slayed the Stallion?”
“The Stallion is not dead.”
Her eyebrows climb high onto her forehead in permanent fixation. “You’re telling me you and Harper managed to escape the Grotto without taking the Stallion’s life?” Before I can respond, she shakes her head, mouth slanting into her cheek with wry amusement. “You were undoubtedly lucky. Kelpies are a conniving lot, and the flesh of a virgin is an undeniable temptation.”
Was it luck? I bested him fairly, blade to blade. He questioned my will, and I proved mine would not bend. Something nags at me though. “May I ask, Mother Mabel, how you know so much about the Stallion?”
“You are not the only one to have entered his Grotto and survived.”
I am frozen in sudden memory. What was it the Stallion had said? Only once before has a mortal entered my lair and escaped with their life.
How did Mother Mabel acquire the necessary information to best the Stallion? I would expect the fair folk to know such details, not a woman from Carterhaugh. Then again, she was held captive in Under, long ago. Was her visit to the Stallion connected with her escape?
“But,” the abbess continues, unaware of my mental backflips, “the question remains of how Harper claimed Meirlach first. You and I both know she hasn’t the means to defeat a creature as shrewd as the Stallion. She barely knows the difference between a knife and a fork.”
Mother Mabel’s opinion of Harper doesn’t sit well with me. It borders on disrespectful. “Harper may have her faults, but she has her strengths, too.” Despite her complaints, she faced Under tenaciously, plowing forward with fierce resolve. It’s hard not to respect someone who defies the rules so easily.
“I had complete faith that you would return to Thornbrook victorious,” Mother Mabel says. “The position was always supposed to be yours.”
Does she sense my dishonesty? Yes, I won Meirlach, but when the time arrived, I insisted Harper take ownership of the sword instead. Anyway, if the position was supposed to be mine, why pit me against someone else?
“Well.” She sighs and folds her hands atop her desk. “There is always next year.”
Next year . It rings hollowly. Will I have to complete another soul-destroying quest to prove my worth? The thought tires me.
My attention shifts to Meirlach. The ruby-inlaid pommel winks like a fiery eye.
Mother Mabel notices the direction of my gaze and smiles. She appears more relaxed in the weapon’s presence. Reassured, even. “Beautiful, isn’t it?”
“It is.” A true work of artistry. The fuller is the straightest I have seen, the rounded groove extending the length of the blade.
“Meirlach has been in the Stallion’s possession for a long time. So long, in fact, that its existence passed into myth.” Opening a drawer in her desk, she pulls out the Text. “Admittedly, I was not aware of its existence until my captivity. An unfortunate, if fortuitous, turn of events.”
My skin prickles in sudden awareness. Rarely does Mother Mabel speak of that time. In all my years as a novitiate, I have only heard her mention it once.
“Seven years,” she whispers, “and all I had was the Text. The Book of Change was my salvation. It told me of Meirlach. It reminded me all was not lost. Days after I learned of its existence, I met another prisoner, a mortal man who was an adept swordsman. He taught me how to wield a blade. He reminded me I was strong. I vowed to continue my training once I returned aboveground, and I have.”
I’m arranging pieces of information into a natural flow. Seven years may have passed in Carterhaugh, but how many lifetimes did Mother Mabel experience in Under, trapped in the strange enchantment of the realm? At some point, Mother Mabel visited the Grotto. She also escaped with her life. Whatever she stole from the Stallion, it wasn’t Meirlach. Perhaps she was unable to outwit it. I communicate these thoughts to the abbess.
“Brielle.” The sound is caught firmly between fondness and exasperation. “Are you suggesting I lacked the cunning needed to steal Meirlach? If so, I don’t appreciate having my shortcomings pointed out. You should know better.”
I am twenty-one years of age, yet in this moment, I feel like a child. Know better. I have weathered this chiding before. “I apologize, Mother Mabel.”
She sighs. “No, you’re right. I was unable to take Meirlach from the Stallion. That is why the acquisition is so vital. With this blade”—she sweeps an arm toward the weapon—“we can guarantee our protection.”
Something she did not have when the Orchid King stole away those three novitiates decades ago. We, as women, must go to greater lengths to protect ourselves. To work twice as hard as any man but reap only half the rewards.
“Is that why you sought the Father?” I ask. “For protection?”
Silence.
Tucked into my lap, my hands bunch, sweaty skin growing warmer with every heartbeat. I’ve overstepped. Mother Mabel’s bristling gaze is evidence enough. “I apologize—”
“To an extent,” she clips out. “I grew up poor, Brielle. Very poor. We lived in a one-room hut on the outskirts of Aranglen. I never knew my father, not really. He left my mother days following my brother’s birth.
“It was a difficult life, as you can imagine. When I was a girl of fourteen, my brother took ill following an unusual cold snap, then my mother.” Though her face tightens, she maintains composure. “They were dead within the month, and I was orphaned, with no prospects for work.”
I had no idea. “I’m so sorry.”
Her nostrils flare, and she holds up a hand. “Do not pity me. We all face trials in life. Those just happened to be mine.”
I stare at the abbess, a mortal woman who has not aged since her escape from Under decades ago. Whatever words of comfort I might offer, she does not want them.
“Luckily,” she goes on, “a woman noticed me wandering the market one evening and brought me to Clovenshire—Aranglen’s abbey. I began as a novitiate. Two years later, I took my final vows. I stayed as an acolyte for another decade, deepening my relationship with the Father. Following my thirteenth year at the abbey, I was elected Abbess of Thornbrook. I’ve been here ever since.”
It makes perfect sense that Mother Mabel would climb the ranks. Those of us abandoned by the world must work hard to put down roots. “Do you ever consider returning to your old life?”
“By the Father, no. Who would I turn to? Where would I call home? Those who do not have His will in their lives… I pity them.” The tips of her fingers skim the Text’s leather cover with reverence. “They are lost, as I was, as you were.”
I’m not so sure. Kilkare’s residents do not seem lost. They are mothers and painters and carpenters and bakers and merchants and brothers and believers. Most welcome the Father in their lives, though not to the same extent as the Daughters of Thornbrook. It is enough for them.
Mother Mabel leans back in her chair, studying me. “Is that what you want, Brielle? To go out into the world and leave us?”
“N-no,” I breathe, horrified by the thought. “Of course not.” My heart thuds, but I’m uncertain where the fear stems from. “It was a curiosity, nothing more.”
She nods, appeased. “Thornbrook is your place. It will always be your place.”
My place, but not my home. I do not miss the distinction.
For I am a bladesmith, but I did not place a hammer in my hand. Mother Mabel did. I did not choose to come to Thornbrook. My mother abandoned me. The Text tells me how to interpret the world, what is acceptable and what is not, what morals shape a woman or a man.
I love the Father, but can I not love Him without the title of novitiate? I’m not rushing to leave. I don’t want to leave. But I wonder what else awaits me out there, what shape my life would take if I chose differently.
“Have you given thought to my proposal?”
I refocus on Mother Mabel. Last week, she asked if I was interested in participating in the tithe tomorrow evening. It would give me an excuse to return to Under and search for Zephyrus. Alternatively, I could abandon the West Wind as he abandoned me. I could stay here, in Carterhaugh. I could forget.
“If I could offer you some advice?” It is kindly, her tone. For whatever reason, my throat tightens with impending tears. “Go to the church tonight. Speak to the Father. Maybe He can help guide your path.”
I gaze out the window. A blue sky speckled with wistful clouds, the perfect day for a morning stroll. How quickly my mind returns to a green-eyed god.
“It is your choice, in the end,” Mother Mabel says. “Should you choose to participate, we will gather in the quadrangle tomorrow at dusk. Take the day to think about it.”
Bowing my head, I reply, “I will.”
Pushing to my feet, I make my way to the door. Before I depart, however, I’ve one more question that needs answering. “Why did the fair folk let you live?”
Mother Mabel stares at me coldly. “They did not let me live. Seven years I was trapped in Under, enduring countless horrors, without hope of ever escaping. I did what I had to do to return to Carterhaugh, and I don’t regret it.” A thin, dark smile crawls across her mouth. “It turns out, there are some things not even Under can break.”