Chapter 17
Aweek passed beneath the same pale sky, though the light felt different. It carried no warmth, only glare. The air shimmered above the rooftops, and the wind moved dust through the streets in long, slow veils. The town had split in two.
Half of Rosewood gathered each night at the church.
They came with lanterns and hymn sheets, their shadows stretched thin across the ground.
Father Harlan led them, his voice deep and certain, the same calm rhythm he had used for weddings, baptisms, and every burial since the pulse.
Now he spoke of signs and cleansing, of silence as proof that the world had been remade by God’s hand.
The other half followed Mary Anne and Sheriff Hale.
They met in the square after sundown, when the heat lifted enough to stand still without fainting.
They spoke quietly about wells, food, and sickness.
Their prayers were lists, their hymns the scrape of shovels.
Every evening felt heavier, and every decision slower.
It was like trying to rebuild a body with shaking hands.
Mary Anne spent most of her mornings at the clinic. The small building smelled of vinegar, sweat, and old bandages. She had scrubbed the counters until the wood lost color, but the stench never left. When she opened the window, hot air poured in, not relief.
On the eighth morning, Hale arrived covered in dust. His hat hung by its strap, and the sweat on his neck had dried white. He set the bucket down with a dull clank. The water inside was green at the edges. “Straight from the south well,” he said.
Mary Anne bent to look. The surface rippled with a slick, faintly iridescent film. She dipped a stick into it and lifted a string of algae that clung like wet silk. “Don’t let anyone drink this,” she said.
“They already did. Two of the kids are sick. Fever and cramps. I’ve got them lying in the shade by the store.”
“We’ll boil everything from now on. Even rainwater.”
“They won’t listen,” Hale said. “You tell them to boil, and he tells them to pray. Guess who they’d rather believe?”
“Then make them,” she said. “Post men at the well. No buckets unless the water’s boiled.”
“We’re running low on men, Doc. Half of them spend their nights kneeling in that church.”
“Then take the other half.”
“You sound like him, you know. When you give orders like that.”
She almost smiled. “Then let’s hope I’m louder.”
He left the bucket and walked toward the square.
The sun caught his badge, the faint gleam dulled by dust. By midday, the air thickened until breathing hurt.
Mary Anne moved through it anyway, stopping at houses, checking on the sick.
Most of them were dehydrated, though some had rashes blooming across their skin.
She washed what wounds she could with boiled water and rags.
At one house, she found a mother kneeling beside her son, whispering the same line over and over.
“Faith protects,” the woman said. “Faith protects.”
The boy’s lips were cracked. His eyes rolled weakly toward her when she kneeled.
Mary Anne touched his forehead. “He needs water. Cool, clean water.”
The woman shook her head. “Father says to wait until the fever breaks. Then he’ll be cleansed.”
“The fever will kill him.”
“God gives and takes.”
Mary Anne stood slowly. “Then He’s taking because you’re letting Him.”
She left the house before she said more. Outside, the sun hit her full in the face. The light was sharp enough to sting. She tasted dust on her tongue and realized she had gone all morning without drinking.
The market at the edge of town had turned into a battlefield of whispers.
Tables that once held produce displayed whatever could be traded—jars of beans, strips of dried meat, bits of wire, and rope.
People bartered in silence, glancing over their shoulders between words.
Two women stood arguing near the water barrels.
“I filled this yesterday,” one said.
“Then prove it,” the other snapped.
“You think I’d steal from you?”
“Enough,” she said. “We divide what’s left, fair and even. That’s the rule.”
“Rules don’t feed us,” one woman said.
“They keep you alive. Start breaking them, and no one eats at all.”
The woman glared but stepped back. Around them, others watched in silence. The sound of prayer drifted faintly from the church, carried on the dry wind. Mary Anne felt the crowd’s attention slide away from her, toward the sound of faith that promised something easier than work.
Hale joined her a few minutes later. He was chewing on a dry piece of jerky, his jaw working slowly. “They’re slipping,” he said.
“They’re scared,” she said.
“They were scared last week, too. Now they’re angry.”
“They’ll get hungrier before they get any smarter.”
He gave a low chuckle that didn’t sound like laughter. “Are you always this hopeful?”
“I used to be worse.”
“They think he can talk to God.”
“Then God should’ve told him to wash his hands,” she said.
Hale almost smiled. “That’s your bedside manner?”
“Only with the living.”
The rest of the afternoon passed in a haze of heat and exhaustion.
Mary Anne worked until her vision blurred.
She changed bandages, sorted the remaining medical supplies, and boiled water in a tin pot until her arms ached from carrying it.
By late in the day, the sky had turned orange and heavy.
The smell of smoke drifted from the hills, faint but steady.
As the sun fell, the first bells rang from the church tower.
There was no electricity to power them, only hands pulling a rope.
The sound was uneven, each toll wobbling through the air like a slow heartbeat.
Mary Anne stepped outside the clinic and leaned against the doorframe.
Across the square, she could see the glow of candles through the church windows.
Hale approached from the far end of the street. His boots kicked up small puffs of dust that caught the light like ash. “They’re saying the pulse was a sign,” he said. “A cleansing of sin. Some think we’re next if we keep fighting it.”
“If faith could purify water, I’d let them pray all day.”
“You could shut him down.”
“How?” she said.
“People still listen to you.”
“They used to. Now they just hear noise.”
He shifted his weight. “You can’t let him split them any further. Once that happens, we won’t be a town anymore. We’ll be two camps waiting to starve.”
She met his eyes. “Then help me stop it.”
“I’ll try, but I can’t arrest a sermon.”
He started back toward the square. Mary Anne stayed where she was, watching the small forms inside the church bow and rise, bow and rise.
Their voices drifted out into the street, blending into one chant.
The sound reminded her of the machines that used to hum through the clinic at night.
She turned away and walked back inside. Her reflection in the window looked pale—eyes sunken, skin drawn tight over cheekbones.
She poured a cup of boiled water and drank half before realizing she was shaking.
Outside, a scream cut through the singing. She grabbed her bag and ran toward the noise. Near the well, two men were fighting, hands locked around each other’s throats. Another man tried to pull them apart and caught an elbow to the jaw. Buckets spilled, water pooling dark in the dust.
“Stop it,” she shouted.
One man shoved the other hard enough that his head hit the well’s stone rim with a crack. The crowd gasped. The man slumped to the ground, blood already spreading beneath his hair.
Mary Anne kneeled beside him, pressing a cloth to the wound. “Get me clean water,” she said.
No one moved. They just stared. The hymn from the church swelled again, voices rising.
“I said water.”
A boy ran to the bucket by the trough and brought it back. The surface shimmered with dirt, but it was all they had. She poured it over the wound anyway and pressed the cloth again. His pulse was weak but there.
Hale arrived a moment later, rifle slung across his shoulder. He took one look and cursed. “Is this the first?”
“Yeah, and it won’t be the last,” Mary Anne said.
He helped her lift the man. Together, they carried him toward the clinic. The crowd parted to let them through. When they reached the steps, Hale lowered the man onto a cot. Mary Anne worked in silence, cleaning, stitching, and wrapping. Her hands moved fast, precisely.
Hale stood in the doorway, watching. “You can’t hold this together forever,” he said quietly.
“Then I’ll hold it until it breaks,” she said.
Outside, the chanting rolled on. The church doors were wide open now. Candles burned in the windows, flickering gold against the dark. Mary Anne leaned in the doorway of the clinic, arms folded. The wind had died completely. She could hear every word of the hymn drifting across the square.
Hale’s men moved along the edges of town, their lanterns swinging low.
Shadows crossed the walls like ghosts. Mary Anne looked toward the church and then at the patrols.
Two worlds breathing the same air, divided by a single street.
The hymn ended, but the echo lingered, heavy as heat.
The town she grew up in felt foreign, divided by belief instead of streets.