Winterkill (6 page)

His eyes are keen; he's interested in my answer. He hasn't looked on me this way for as long as I can remember. The words are burning my mouth, ready to burst forth: Brother Stockham out so far, that trail . . .

“Somebody been complaining about our gatherings?” The worry on his brow is back. No, not just worry—fear.

“No.”

“You haven't been missing work at Soeur Manon's, have you?”

“No, Pa—”

“Because if people are talking about our contributions—”

“Pa! It's nothing like that!”

“So why are you asking?”

I swallow the words. “It's nothing. Just . . . never mind.”

I grab our dishes and take them to the dish bucket, squeezing my eyes tight against the heavy feeling of tears as I scrub. What's changed isn't that I've stopped talking; it's that our Stain matters more than ever, and Pa doesn't trust I won't make it worse.

Course, mayhap he's right to worry.

I'm grateful to leave the kitchen to take our dishwater to the wastewater ditch. My shoulder is still stiff from Watch, and when I put the bucket on our stoop to get a better grasp, I'm caught just outside the door by Edith.

“Where going, Em?”

I gesture at my bucket.

“Sister Healer, after?”

I nod. “You stay here,” I say, firm.

Edith's got this habit of chasing off after the nearest thing that takes her fancy. Usually it's harmless things—flying bugs or chickens or other children. It's only been a problem the once.

But once was enough.

It was two years ago and her ma, Sister Ann, was in charge of the gatherers bringing in the last of the garden harvests. The walls weren't fortified against the winter storms, though
La Prise
was heavy on the wind. When it's near, the underbelly of the air has an edge to it you recognize in your bones. It was there that day, but everyone had their heads to their tasks, trying desperate to get in the last of the stores before Affirmation started the next day. Two-year-old Edith was with the other youngsters in the garden corner near the south gates, close enough for the workers to keep an eye on. But she must've wandered away when Sister Ann's back was turned. Was twenty minutes or more before anyone noticed.

And then, so sudden,
La Prise
was howling around us in breath-stealing gusts of wind and snowflakes big as river stones. It came shrieking in over the walls, whipping our hair and cloaks about, blinding us.

Everyone gathered up the valuables and took cover, but Edith was nowhere. We searched for her, every corner of the fortification, but the snow was coming so furious it was hard to see two strides away. And when orders came to fortify the wall, to close the gates against the storm, Sister Ann was frantic.

I'd always known her as a virtues-upholding sort, but
I could see in her eyes that day she was thinking of defying Council by heading outside the gates. Her thin mouth was set in a line and her hands were shaking. It was awful, but watching Tom was worse. His face was so pale, eyes red-rimmed and wet. He knew his ma would have to risk punishment by death for a chance at finding Edith alive, and it was clear he didn't know who he could bear to lose.

And then a Watcher saved us all the anguish. While he was fortifying the south gates, he spotted Edith on the outside, cowering against a corner of the wall—near frozen in place.

Soeur Manon brought her round with healing broths, and in two days she was the same curious child we all knew. She was fine. Everything was fine. And there's no way she remembers it today; no way she remembers the terror and desperation.

But I remember.

And I don't mind when she wants to stand close and ask me about my day.

“Stay here,” I say again. “I'll tell you about it after dinner.”

A smile cracks her face wide. She nods and retreats inside.

I'm crossing toward the south quarter when I glimpse Kane, outside his quarters. He's helping a woman—his ma?—mend a barrel. His shirtsleeves are rolled back, and I can't help but stare a moment at his forearms. They're real strong, capable. I'm horrified to feel my heart race.

A small boy bangs out the door of their quarters—Kane's brother, I'm guessing. He sidles up to stand close and Kane smiles. It's not that funny smile he gave me at Talks; it's wide, certain. Then he gestures for the boy to hand him the
rope on the ground, and when he glances over, he catches me looking. I duck my head, scowl at my bucket, and hurry off to the ditch.

Foolish.

I have to give my root sack to Soeur Manon half full. I can't figure if she thinks I left before finishing my chore yesterday or if she thinks there just aren't that many roots to be found, but she doesn't complain. She sends me for a few handfuls of the horsetail that grows around the flats. I scrub her hearth as she prepares a tea from the horsetail she says helps rid the body of
“trop de l'eau.”
Then I take it to a family in the west quarter. When I'm done with my chores, I head to the riverbank to find Tom.

A Councilman—Brother Jameson—is standing outside Brother Stockham's quarters as I pass by. He's alone; no devout admirers cling to his cloak right now. Often he's standing in a crowd of followers waiting to hear him proclaim.

I swallow a spike of fear, set my jaw, and walk normal as I can. There are two dozen Councilmen, all men whose fathers before them were Council and, in some cases, their grandpas. There's a pecking order in the group, and Brother Jameson is at the top.

Council has usual duties like the rest of us, but not near so many. Most of their time is spent discussing settlement matters and hearing concerns. They impose order and enforce the law. They get the best rations and quarters, and they're called by their surnames as a show of respect.

It's not right to covet others' lots, but I know most people would trade their chores for a chance at being Council. No
one tends to trade up to Watch, but if they could choose to be Council, they'd do it in a heartbeat.

I'd rather dig roots all day than be one of them. There's something right smug about the way they carry themselves. And Jameson eyeballs the rest of us like we're something to suffer—lost sheep that would use his rations and wander off cliffs if he wasn't here to set us straight. Always preaching on the virtues like we need the reminder.

He nods his jowly face at me, his ice-blue eyes unsmiling. I give a polite nod back, then duck my head and keep on. It takes an excruciating long time to get out the gates. I keep my eyes low until I'm halfway across the Watch flats.

I head to the river, the sun beating hot on my dark hair. Sandpipers are picking their way along the shallows. The cliffs on the far side of the river are buzzing with swallows swooping and diving from their nests in the banks. All these birds will be gone soon—fleeing
La Prise
. My eye traces the well-worn trail that heads diagonal up the bank to where the sheep are taken to graze in the day. They've pretty well eaten everything within safe traveling distance by this time of year, and we can't risk going further afield and grazing them out overnight, so there's no one up there right now, save mayhap a bison herd scout or two.

I glance at the tops of the cliffs, picturing the plains sweeping to the horizon in every direction. I've been up once to see, but I remember trembling along with the prairie grass. It was all unnatural large, unnatural empty.

Tom waves at me from the bank—he's got something in his hand.

“That a bone?” I get close.

He nods. “Bison,” he says and hands it over. It's stained with dirt. I trace a finger along the smooth edge that ends in a sharpened point.

“Lost People.”

He shrugs.

“This the only one?”

“Don't know. Just found it in the shale.”

“Let's keep looking.” I start down the bank, trying not to drag my bad foot, but when I don't hear him following me, I stop and look back.

Tom hooks his thumbs in his
ceinture
. “Where were you yesterday?”

We'd planned to meet at the river. We get a bit of free time almost every afternoon, and we always spend it together. I look at the bone, then scratch the point along my palm. “I forgot.”

He steps past me, picks a stone from the shale and throws it at the river. “Doesn't answer the question.”

I watch his face a moment. His head is tilted like he's thinking and his voice is mild, but his prairie-sky eyes are hard. Worried.

Two sets of eyes already today, worried about me, about what I'm up to. Couldn't tell my pa the truth, but Tom's different. Tom and I already share secrets.

“I—I was out in the woods.”

His mouth pops open. “What? Why?”

“Don't know. Just . . .” I can't tell Tom about why. Can't tell him I was thinking it'd be better for my pa if I didn't come back; that it'd be better for him without a Wayward daughter to worry after. Tom wouldn't like that much, and
besides, I'm not sure I believe it now. I'm not so sure I wasn't being childish.

“I saw something out there.” That isn't a lie.

“What?”

“A scrap of cloth.”

Tom's eyebrows raise. “Lost People?”

“Don't know. But Tom, there was something else. A”—I look at the river as I say it—“a trail.”

“A trail.”

“In the woods.”

He's quiet a moment. I look back at him. There's a flash of something in his eyes—something akin to longing. And then the worry clouds in. “You didn't follow it.”

I rub my brow.

“Em?”

“Just a little ways.”

“Almighty, Em! You were just on Watch for Waywardness. Why would you do that?”

“I don't know! It's . . .” I fumble for an explanation. “Sometimes I can't help myself.”

Tom frowns. “That's not true, and you know it. You make a choice. There are things we can't help, but you chasing off into the woods isn't one of them.”

I bite back a reply. I know what kinds of “things” he's speaking on. He's speaking on the secret he keeps: the thing that marks him Wayward without anyone but me knowing.

Soeur Manon calls them
ginup
, a First Peoples word for two-spirited: born with the medicines of both woman and man. Oftentimes a man will love another man, or a woman another woman. She told me when the people of the Old
Country arrived in the east, they imprisoned any of the First Peoples who were
ginup
the way they did their own people and forbade anyone to live that life. Nobody admits to being two-spirited; binding and producing children is a duty. And of course I keep Tom's secret. Soeur Manon doesn't know who I'm thinking of when I ask after it.

I know being
ginup
worries him. If Council knew . . . well, I'm not right sure what they'd do. Put him on more dangerous tasks than candle dipping, that's sure, hoping he'd end up in the Cleansing Waters, where all of our dead are cast. But would they send him to the Crossroads? He might be right that it's best to keep our heads down, but . . .

“But why would there be a trail there?”

“Could be an old trail that Council needs for something.”

“Like what?”

Tom chews on his lip. “Guess I don't rightly know. But Em, whatever it is, it's none of our concern.”

But Tom doesn't know how far into the woods I went. And if I want to tell him about Brother Stockham and how strange it was, I'll need to confess as much. I look him over. Oftentimes I wonder if he weren't already harboring a secret, he'd be less afraid of my wanderings, my daydreamings. He's keen to gather left-behinds and talk about them, sure, but telling him how bad I want to get back to that trail? It would only worry him sick.

Don't want that. He's the only person I ever feel truly easy around.

“All right,” I say, taking the scarred hand that isn't holding the fishing line. “It's none of our concern.”

He's quiet a moment. Then he gives me a smile, and squeezes my hand. “All right, then.”

The river shimmers and dances—looks like a thousand trout flashing belly-up in the sun. Tom pulls a spool of gut line from inside his
ceinture
. He nods at the water. “Reckon we should fish?”

By the time we get back to our quarters, the river and Tom have put me back at ease. The sun was so hot he took off his moccasins, rolled up his leggings, and waded in. I took off my
ceinture
and rolled back my sleeves—wishing all the while I could take off my moccasins too. My bad foot could've used the cool, but then Tom would've had to see it.

Even so, it was real nice, sitting in the sun while Tom caught nothing.

I'm retying my belt and he's carrying his moccasins when his ma—Sister Ann—greets us outside their quarters door. She gives his bare feet a long look, then tosses her head in the direction of the sheep barns. “Your pa needs help with the feeding.”

He nods and goes past her. I'm about to head to our door, but she stops me with a hand on my shoulder. Her gray eyes are serious. “Em, a moment.” Edith appears behind her, looking eager. “Go inside,” she says gentle.

Edith disappears, and Sister Ann closes the door and leads us away from the step.

Tom's ma knows the goings-on of our quarters. If Soeur Manon has nothing for me to do I come to her for chores. She's a force to be reckoned with, and the voice of command
in Tom's family. She's been kind to me and my pa over the years, but she doesn't talk much to me. I can't figure what she might want to speak on now.

“Roll down your sleeves.” Her tone isn't unkind, but I hurry to pull them over my forearms, embarrassed. She looks me over, her tight bun pulling at the sides of her thin face. “Emmeline, your sixteenth life day is in a few days.”

I nod.

“And you will be eligible.”