15. Penny
Penny
Aweek had passed since our return to Ashpoint, and Kit had yet to recover. He was aloof. Gone all day at work and, when he was home, he managed to still be away. Mentally, emotionally, he kept himself apart from me.
I was busier than ever. Cedric kept long hours at the smithy and insisted I was present for every one of them.
His patience had long since run out, and he’d given up trying to keep his unkind thoughts to himself.
My days were littered with his biting comments and sideways scowls, and it was all I could do to try in vain to please him.
All of it left me feeling lonely, living with the blacksmith’s scorn and sleeping next to Kit’s ghost.
I still wanted to help. My mother and sister. My intended. Myself.
But I didn’t know where to begin.
After seeing my family farm brought under the Bone Men’s control, I’d had too much to say. I didn’t think Kit couldn’t bear it, and I was loathe to add another burden to the weight steadily burying him, so I wrote it down.
I penned a letter. Then another. And a third.
I burned them all.
I sat on the floor in front of our hearth—a few feet back, of course—and pitched the wadded balls of paper into the flames. I watched them blacken and scorch and the ashes fly away, carrying the words farther than I could.
Long ago, I’d told Kit I felt like a curse. The imperfect son, unworthy of the legacy bestowed upon me. When my father willed the farm to me, I was overwhelmed. With sorrow. With guilt. With responsibility.
I felt the same way now.
That was what brought me here and kept me. That suffocating sense of obligation. Of being responsible for so many things I wanted no part of. But I was in this now. Kit was right that it would do no good to run.
I'd spent most of my life fighting for my own happiness. Battling with my curse and, gods, I could use a win. A break. A sign.
But maybe I'd already gotten one.
I'd been given an epiphany by the Symbiarch in Wendwood, the kind woman who told me the truth about Eeus and Paneus. The gods were lovers like Kit and me. Misunderstood, just like us.
Part of my lifelong struggle, maybe the bulk of it, could have been eased if I'd only been understood.
Maybe Eeus felt the same way. Did he look upon the people of Ashpoint stealing corpses and making bricks out of bones and feel horribly, hideously misinterpreted?
Represented as an abomination, some cruel and vengeful being who was, actually, capable of love, of care, of creating the community so many of my neighbors sought.
That night, I'd been lying next to Kit since full dark.
Early bedtimes were part of his new routine—often without dinner no matter what I cooked, and he hardly ate during the day either—though he spent very little of the night actually sleeping.
It seemed to be easier than talking or even looking at me.
He just closed his eyes and clutched the sheets and went farther away.
He was dozing now, and peaceful enough. With his back to me and his body curled, I could slip away without disturbing him.
I didn't intend to go far.
The kittens bounded off the straw mattress and followed me into the hall. The second bedroom had been unoccupied and largely untouched since Kit and I moved into his father's old room. I had plans for the space; it seemed the ideal place to guarantee privacy.
I didn't like keeping things from Kit, but I didn't fully trust this.
Didn't want to admit it because I knew how he felt about the god the cult worshipped.
He'd been open to the idea of Eeus’s true nature being warped by the Bone Men's whims. Even Merrick wanted to bind the god. Control him. And if that was what Kit’s cruel father and my conniving half-brother aimed for, I would do the opposite.
Padding into the vacant room, I went to the small dresser on the far wall.
When I'd first come to live here, I'd stored my meager belongings in those drawers.
Kit had outfitted me since then. He lavished me with gifts of clothes and ingredients for baking and all the paper and pencils I could use.
Our walls were adorned with dozens of sketches he treated like fine art: flowers and insects rendered in lifelike color. But this space was largely bare.
There were a few things, though. I’d collected items on our travels. Dead bugs and pussy willow branches. Pretty rocks and leaves I’d left out to dry, then packed into this dresser. I dug them out, arranging them on the floor in a circle around where I knelt.
It wasn’t exactly an altar, but it was an offering. All the precious things I’d amassed during my months in Ashpoint. They were memories. Moments that had shaped me and brought me to this point.
I’d brought my sketchbook, too. It sat on the floor outside the ring of items, and I pulled it across my thighs.
I flipped it open to the last page and the notes I’d made back in Wendwood during my conversation with Sybil.
About the Bone Men’s rituals and how they differed from the original method to call upon the gods.
It was a crime. A bastardization of something that should have been profound.
I was sorry for it.
So, that was where I would start. Smoothing my hands across the open page, I drew a settling breath. Then, I began.
It wasn’t quite a prayer, more of a wish, and I rambled my way through it, my voice quiet so I didn’t rouse Kit in the next room.
“I don’t even know if I’m doing this right. I was never devout like Mother. Never really a believer, and I’m not sure I have the right words, but I’m here because I don’t know what else to do.”
I scrubbed my fingers over my scalp. “I think they’re wrong about who you are. I think you could be good. Better at least, than…” My brow furrowed. It felt like too much to explain, and I figured a god must know, anyway, so I settled to say, “All this.”
I sighed. “But if that’s really who you are—if you want what they’ve done—then I don’t know why I’m even trying…
” I trailed off again. Glancing over my shoulder, I looked toward the bedroom door cracked open behind me.
Kit was part of this. Something good. A blessing big enough to counter my curse.
He was more evidence than even Sybil’s words. Our love could be a basis for my hope.
“There has to be more to you than that,” I whispered, more to myself than the distant god. “There must be.”
Turning my hands upward, I rested them on my thighs, opening my posture to the sky.
“If you’re listening, I need help. For my mother.
For my sister. For Kit. They’re trapped in this, and we’re trying to change things.
We’re trying to pull people out. But I don’t know if I’m strong enough or brave enough or even… good enough.”
Anxious sweat beaded at my hairline, and I swallowed hard.
“And I’m scared. Really scared. So please, if there’s any part of you that hates what’s been done in your name, help me.
Make me worthy. Maybe I can be your vessel.
Because people are going to die if I don’t get this right, and I can’t save them alone. ”
My knees tingled with numbness as I pushed myself up at last. I looked down at the ring of treasures like a map of my journey the past half-year. Scooping my sketchbook to my chest, I considered my notes, the real rituals needed to summon Eeus.
I already had Eeus’s mark branded on my chest. I had no way to know if its design resembled what had been used in the past, but I could only assume it would count. Next was an offering, which was what I’d just done. That made two.
Third was a purifying tea. The Bone Men made us drink hemlock, but the actual oath wasn’t meant to be so dangerous.
Perhaps Isla could get me a blend that would be sufficient…
That would require speaking to her, which I hadn’t done since we’d stumbled onto the Bone Men’s invasion in Eastcliff.
I still worried she lied about her brother and covered for his involvement in the takeover of my family’s farm.
It chafed me to ask her for favors, and worried me, too.
If she was in league with Otis, and Merrick by proxy, I shouldn’t give her the opportunity to poison me…
I would have to think on it.
For the fourth Oath, I could help someone in need. There were plenty of folks around Ashpoint who may have need of me. Even Rosie’s family, which brought me to the fifth ritual about spreading abundance. If Rosie and I made an extra-large batch of pastries, we could share them… abundantly.
The sixth and seventh rites weren’t quite as clear, but I had a start. And a prayer. And I hoped that would be enough to see me through.