Chapter 3
Scarlett
She was finally dead.
The rain fell, everyone was dressed in black, mourning the loss of such a beloved member of the church, and all I could feel was numbness.
Numbness and Thomas’ arm wrapped around my shoulders, I assume trying to comfort me in my time of such loss.
I don’t think I could label comfort if it slapped me in the face, but I knew for a fact that he was not trying to comfort me. Not in the slightest.
My shoulders were so narrow, his arm hung low on my other side, his fingers brushing my waist. All of my muscles felt so tight, my neck ached, but I didn’t dare move. This was allowed. He was comforting me.
I was born into this church, and I had been dreaming every second of my short life about leaving it, but I was a Favorite and there was only one way I was leaving this place.
The rules of a Favorite were simple:
No speaking.
No lifting your eyes above the shin, and that was pushing it.
Stay pure until the moment you marry your betrothed.
If you are not betrothed before your 20th birthday, then you were taken to Absolution, and you were never seen again.
I was lucky. I was betrothed to Thomas when I turned 9.
A gift to the Pastor’s son. I had been born with a genetic condition that changed some strands of my hair white.
A lot of strands. Because of that, I was told I was the Blessed One, and my mother had spent the first near decade of my life being cooed over in order to earn me.
But who better to get me than the son of the most powerful man in the church.
One of the most powerful men.
Pastor Master’s was one step below the Elders, who reigned over the seven churches and their branches.
The Elders were one step below the Founder, who started this church in 1991.
The idea of it spread quickly, and by 1995, all seven churches had been established, my church leading the group.
The Leaders of each church, of which mine had five, not including Pastor Masters, had been in their position for a long time, all men, although they had wives and children too.
Below the Leaders were the Pillars.
Pillars could be men and women alike. They were allowed to know the secrets of the church, just not as many as the Leaders.
There were regular people too. People who attended the church who didn’t know the truth behind what happened here.
I envied them. Sometimes I wondered what they did when they left.
Other times I didn’t allow myself the breath it gave me.
The Pillars, the Leaders, and the children of the Leaders were allowed to have Favorites, as many as they wanted, and they were allowed to marry as many as they wanted.
They could also send their Favorites to Absolution if they decided they didn’t want them as Favorites anymore.
Sometimes they did that rather than selling them at the yearly auction. I wasn’t sure why.
I wasn’t Thomas’ first Favorite, all of his had been sent away, but I was his only betrothed. I would be his only wife.
The last thing in this world I ever wanted was to marry, but as was everything in my life, I didn’t have a choice.
My purpose was to marry him, give him children, and then let him share me among the Leaders for the rest of my days. It wasn’t clear yet if I was going to have to give them children as well, but I suppose it didn’t matter if I knew it or not, I wouldn’t be allowed to say no.
That word wasn’t permitted.
As for sharing? It was up to our new husband or wife whether or not we were shared after the ceremony.
Thomas had always made it clear that he wanted to share his blessing with the church.
He was honoring God by sharing what he was blessed with, which was strange because it never felt like an honor to me.
Up until my fifth birthday, I had only been known as ‘Blessed One’ or ‘Chosen One’ depending on the day.
My present that year had been the ability to finally choose my own name.
Up until then, I had never gotten to choose a thing in my life, so I took it very seriously.
I picked the name because it reminded me of the color red.
Red was my favorite color. It still was, although I was not allowed to wear such colors.
My name is Scarlett Harris. My mother is dead, I never knew who my father was, and I now belonged to the church until the day I turned 20.
This was how my story was written since the second my mother had found out I was a girl. She didn’t care about training me to be a Pillar—I would have rebelled against that anyway—she only cared about making me a perfect Favorite to sell to the highest bidder, and I was.
I was the best Favorite, the most behaved, the most beloved there was. Nobody had ever been as good of a Favorite as me.
The Leaders and Thomas proved it every single day when I followed all the rules.
If I broke them, well, I paid the price in blood, but if I followed them? I was not punished.
As I stared at the casket they began lowering into the ground, I think I might have felt glad that my mother was dead. Although, I suppose that if I had the ability to feel anything at all, the fear I would have felt would have suffocated me.