by Megan Bannen
Daughter Ina used to wax on and on about the Father’s love, the warmth He brought to her heart, but as I pray the Vessel’s Prayer, the Father fills me with His purpose alone, cool and distant. There is no sense of value or worth in who I am, only in what I can do for Him.
Elath’s humming grows more insistent inside me. I push against it, begging it—Her—to go away. She pushes back, terrifying, yes, but also dangerously beautiful. I remember how easy it was to sing The Ludoïd when I tapped into that power, how strong I felt, how right it was. I don’t lift the lid, and yet a hint of that power escapes, billowing through me like steam, intoxicatingly warm.
You have given me life to reflect the light of Heaven for all to see.
I am filled with the symphony of life and death, melody and harmony, mingling into one complete whole. I’m supposed to be a Vessel of the Father, but when the prayer draws to a close, the only spirit who remains inside me now is Elath, not the One True God. Who may not be true. And who may not be the only one.
Considering the circumstances, it makes sense to challenge what I was taught, but in my heart, it feels weak to let my faith die so easily. I sit back on my heels, wishing with all my heart that I could turn back time and spend the rest of my days at the Convent of Saint Vinnica, blissfully ignorant of the world. I want to live in a universe where Zofia is still alive, where neither one of us has turned her back on the god who chose us. In my dream, she told me that the world is an easier place to bear when you don’t have to question it, but now, thanks to her, I have no choice but to question it.
I don’t want to doubt! I shout at her in my mind since I can’t argue with her in person. I don’t want any of this!
Tavik’s voice cuts into my thoughts. “So, do you press your forehead against the earth when you pray because the Father is the source of life, in your view, and all life comes from the earth?”
Startled, I get to my feet. Tavik stays where he is, lounging against a tree with a blanket draped over his shoulders. He doesn’t care if I watch his prayer, but it feels so invasive to know he has watched mine.
“Because . . .” My long hands try to articulate what my words cannot. They’re like a pair of birds fluttering before me. “Because as a Vessel, I submit myself to the Father so that He will favor me and fill me with His Word.” Only I didn’t exactly submit myself to the Father’s will alone this time, did I? But Tavik doesn’t need to know that.
“And by submitting yourself to the Father, you earn your spot in heaven?”
“No. A Vessel’s place is not in heaven.”
He cocks his head, confused. “But if you don’t go to heaven, what happens when you die?”
“I’ll become a soulswift.”
He leans toward me, disbelieving. “I don’t think I heard you right. What?”
“That’s what a soulswift is: a Vessel who has transcended her mortal body to become a bird who carries the souls of the faithful to the Father in heaven. That is how a Vessel attains eternal life after death. Did you not know?”
“That would explain why you don’t enjoy watching me manhandle messengers. I wish I’d known.”
“Now you do.”
“So you’ve seen this happen, this transformation of a woman into a bird?”
“No. No one has seen it. No mortal can watch the transformation, because to see it happen is to see the Father. A Vessel’s body is placed in the Crypt of Saint Vinnica, and after the miracle, she is able to fly free through one of the tunnels that lead to the outside.”
“Then how do you know it’s true?”
“How do you know the Father is true? Or, in your case, the Mother? Faith.” It’s hard to have this conversation when my own faith feels like it’s burning up right alongside the fiery presence inside me.
“So this bowing you do is all about submission to the Father’s will. It’s not about the fact that the Father’s ribs are the bones of the earth?”
Now it’s my turn to tilt my head in confusion. “The Father resides in heaven above. He has no ribs. He has no body.”
Tavik gives an incredulous laugh, pushing his growing mop of dark curls out of his face with both hands, but they spring right back into place. “This is the craziest conversation I’ve had in my life.”
“Bodies are earthly vessels,” I tell him, repeating the lesson by rote without feeling anything resembling conviction. “They are inherently sinful. The Father is without sin, so He does not have a body.”
“If your god doesn’t have a body, how do you know he’s a he?”
“Well . . .” My eyes shift back and forth. I feel like I’m standing over a trapdoor that’s about to open under my feet. “He just is.”
“So he has a penis? An aphysical penis? Is that a thing?”
My face burns with embarrassment, and I’m not even the one who said the word. “Would you please stop saying that?”
He looks at me like I’m the one who’s being ridiculous. “What?”
“That . . . word.”
“Penis?” he guesses completely without shame.
“Tavik,” I warn him.
“You Ovinists are so weird!” he laughs. “You do know that half the population has a penis, right?”
“Stop!”
“Penis!” he sings operatically. “Penis, penis, penis!”
I level him with an icy glare, but he only cackles in reply.
“I’m sorry,” he tells me as he wipes away a tear of hilarity from the corner of his eye. “It’s just so much fun to poke holes in Ovinist absurdities.”
“I was not put on this earth to entertain you.”
“Whew, you’ve got that right,” he says, and not only do I stop scowling at him, he even manages to coax a grudging smile out of me. Honestly, it’s hard to stay mad at Tavik, and not just because he’s nice to look at.
Although he is very nice to look at.
Twenty-Seven
There’s a soulswift waiting for Tavik at the last stop on Ambrus’s map, a farm called Illesmaat—the family name, Illes, plus the Old Rosvanian word for freehold, maat. Whatever the message says pulls down on the corners of Tavik’s mouth.
“Are you going to read it to me?” I press him.
“It’s just the usual,” he mutters, but the usual appears to be something that makes Tavik increasingly uneasy each time he hears from his captain. He’s so distracted by the contents of DeRopa’s tiny missive that he fails to notice the very pretty girl who lives at Illesmaat with her mother and father and two older brothers.
Mera is petite and has thick honey-colored hair, and is the picture of femininity when contrasted with my towering, knight-garbed form. Ten years in a convent didn’t equip me to interact with a normal girl like her, and my mouth feels as if it’s been glued shut. I keep thinking of the new Daughters back at Saint Vinnica, what a disaster I made of that, and they weren’t even normal like this girl. What am I supposed to say to her? How am I supposed to act? Making matters worse is the fact that she hasn’t taken her eyes off Tavik since we arrived. It’s irritating, even if I was guilty of the same thing when I first met him. He’s just a boy, for the love of the Father.
Tavik crumples the message in his fist, spreads out Ambrus’s map on a long dining table, and asks Illes, “Where is Gulachen?” in Rosvanian.
“Here.” Illes points to a place in southest Rosvania.
“The Kantari army has made it all the way to Gulachen?” I ask in alarm.
Tavik nods.
“Your people have been battling their way northeast for weeks, but no one can figure out where they’re going or why. Where are they going?” Illes asks.
Tavik and I look at each other over the table, and an unspoken question bubbles up between us, one I can’t believe we haven’t asked ourselves until now: If Tavik sent word to DeRopa that he has the Vessel containing Elath’s soul and that we’re on the move, why are the Kantari still trying to reach the Convent of Saint Vinnica?
“Is the Goodson still on the K
ings Road?” Tavik asks Illes, redirecting the conversation, but I’m determined to discuss the movements of the Kantari army with him the next chance I get, especially since something in DeRopa’s message clearly has him rattled.
In the meantime, Illes is shaking his head in answer to Tavik’s second question. “The Milk Road lost the Goodson at Juprachen. The only thing I can tell you is that he’s no longer heading west, at least, not on the Kings Road, and he doesn’t appear to have taken any of the major trade routes running out of the city either.”
I snap to attention. “Is he still in Juprachen?”
“Possibly, but if he is, he doesn’t seem to be staying at any of the religious houses, so I think it unlikely.”
Tavik nudges my elbow, and I fill him in as my finger brushes over the map until it lands on Juprachen. “Where would he go from here?”
“You know him better than I do. You tell me,” Tavik says in Kantari.
Not wanting to be rude, I stick with Rosvanian for the sake of our hosts. “What if he’s not moving toward something, but away from something. Could it be that Brother Miklos is after him too?”
Tavik makes his opinion known via a heavy sigh rather than words.
“We heard you thought there might have been a coup,” says Illes. “If there’s dissent within the Order, then the Mother is truly blessing us.”
“Where is Brother Miklos now?” Tavik asks.
“The last report says he hanged five Elathians in Varos da Manveld,” Illes answers, his words sharp with resentment.
Tavik frowns at the point on the map labeled Varos da Manveld, only twenty-five miles to our east, but my eyes scan ahead, searching all roads leading out of Juprachen. If I look long enough and hard enough, I know I can figure out where the Goodson has gone, and why. I’m so preoccupied with my search that I don’t pay much attention as Tavik scribbles a hurried reply to his captain and sends it off with the same soulswift who delivered DeRopa’s message. He stands at the back door, watching the bird fly south, and he keeps his back to me when he says, “I think we should rest here a few days.”
Considering the fact that Brother Miklos is hard on our heels, it’s probably foolhardy to let down my guard, but when Mistress Illes offers to pour me a bath the next morning, I’m tempted to hug her. I peel the knight’s uniform from my body like a snake shedding skin, and I’m deliriously grateful to be a girl again. That, at least, puts me on equal footing with Mera.
I watch her with wary eyes as she fetches water from the well and helps her mother heat it, a good and obedient daughter with her “Yes, Mama” and “Thank you, Mama” and “How can I help, Mama?” If she finds me strange, at least she doesn’t show it.
As I ease myself into the blessedly warm water of the tub, I can hear Tavik outside playing some kind of game that involves kicking a ball around with the two older boys, shouting and laughing and not feeling a need to save the world for a change.
“Don’t you worry. I’ll make sure you have as much privacy as you need,” says Mistress Illes, handing me a soft cloth so I can rub weeks’ worth of road grime off my skin.
“Would you like the verbena soap or the rose soap?” Mera asks, blinking her big brown eyes at me. It’s so rare that anyone offers me a choice in anything that I’m stymied. Is one better than the other? Is there a right answer?
“I like the verbena better,” she says, giving me the bar that looks yellow rather than pink. Then she leans in with a conspiratorial grin and whispers, “The rose soap will make you smell like my grandma.”
She holds my gaze, her eyes twinkling with amusement, and I have to stifle a giggle. Then, just as quickly, I have to stifle the urge to bawl. Because being with Mera is like being with Zofia. It’s like being normal.
Three male voices outside shout at once, followed by a cacophony of clucking chickens. Mistress Illes rushes to the window and shouts, “What on earth? Petor, get that ball out of the chicken run! You’re scaring them half to death.” She growls in irritation and tells Mera to look after me as she dashes out the kitchen door to save her hens from the boys’ game.
As soon as her mother is gone, Mera props her elbows up on the side of the tub. “Holy Father, I thought she’d never leave. Now we can finally talk.”
“Oh. Okay.” I am naked in a bathtub in a stranger’s kitchen, and though I appreciate the fact that Mera treats me as if I’m not terrifying, I am suddenly feeling very trapped and very, very vulnerable.
“Are you really a Daughter of Saint Vinnica?”
“Yes,” I say, then amend, “I was.”
“A Vessel?”
She’s looking at me with an eagerness that makes me lie just to protect my own sense of privacy, what little is afforded me in my current situation. “No.”
“What is it like? I mean, wow. A Daughter.”
I scrub at my skin a little faster, trying to get through my bath and escape Mera’s questions as quickly as possible. “We just pray and study. You know.”
“No, I definitely do not know.” She looks over her shoulder before leaning in a bit closer. “Is it true, what they say about Daughters?”
“I don’t know. What do they say?” I cross my arms over my small breasts.
“That the women . . . you know.”
“Heal the sick?”
“No.”
“Grow medicinal herbs?”
“Fall in love with each other,” she whispers. “Kiss.”
“No!” I nearly shout. But then I remember Daughter Miv and Daughter Lunella, and how I once walked in on them in the garden shed, the way they stepped apart from one another like opposing magnets. I was so young, I didn’t understand what I saw, but now I have to wonder. “At least, I never kissed a girl. Or a boy. There’s not a lot of kissing at a convent.”
“Well, I’ve kissed a girl before,” Mera declares, moving back to hop up onto the kitchen table, her legs swinging back and forth.
“You have?”
“Mm-hmm.” The satisfied grin on her face informs me that she either enjoyed it or enjoyed the daringness of it.
“Oh.” My first reaction is shock, but then again, what do I care who kisses whom? I’m hardly in a place to judge anyone.
“Please tell me you’ve at least kissed that boy you’re with,” says Mera.
“What? No!” But then I remember that I have, in fact, kissed Tavik on our fake wedding day. And then I think of all the times I’ve watched him pray, the times I’ve had that giddy urge to touch his skin. The bathwater has gone cool, but all of a sudden the kitchen feels stiflingly hot.
“So you’re not together?”
“Of course we’re together.” I wish Mera’s mother would return. She’s easier to handle with her mother around.
“Honey, when I say together, I mean together together.”
“He’s my friend.”
Mera goes over to the window to watch the boys. “He’s a mighty fine friend,” she says before looking back at me. “Come on. Be honest. Are you seriously trying to tell me you haven’t been even a little bit tempted?”
“Tempted to what? Kiss him?”
“At the minimum.”
“No!”
Elath’s presence inside me stutters, and I get the oddest sensation that She’s laughing at me. Now all I can think about is the way Tavik linked his fingers with mine when we made our ring swear or whatever he called it. I feel like I’m reminding myself as much as Mera when I say, “I’m a Daughter.”
“You’re something. Let me just say, if it were me on the road with that guy, we’d definitely be sharing the same tent.”
She’s staring out the window at Tavik once again. I stand up so fast I nearly slip and fall. “I’m ready to get out now.”
She takes an unembarrassed eyeful of my naked body as water streams off my skin. “Wow, you have freckles everywhere.”
I breathe my irritation in deeply through my nose. “Yes, I know. May I have that towel now, please?”
“It wasn’t
an insult,” she says, reaching up to drape the towel over my shoulders. “You’re really pretty, you know.”
I draw the towel closer around me, feeling strangely small. “Am I?”
Mera nods and gives me an encouraging smile I probably don’t deserve considering how distrustful I’ve been of her.
I’ve spent so much time worrying about my appearance, but it never had anything to do with beauty. What use is beauty to women who will live their lives behind the high stone walls of the convent? But out here in the larger world, it matters more than I care to admit, especially when I think of how I must look compared to Mera.
“I wish I were tall like you. You’re so elegant,” she tells me wistfully, and I don’t think she’s lying. I grin at her, feeling at once sheepish and pleased.
“I’m a giant,” I joke awkwardly.
“No, you’re a girl.”
She helps me step out of the tub and exchanges the towel for Mistress Illes’s robe, which is too small for me, but at least it’s clean and smells good. We stand side by side at the window in companionable silence and watch Tavik kick a ball around with Mera’s brothers. He plays fair, passing the ball with his foot as if he were a regular boy, not a Two-Swords who can bend the laws of reality. He catches us watching at the window, and one of those big bright smiles spreads across his face.
Mera sighs beside me. “You are so lucky.”
I have something that is either a goddess or a demon inside me, two different religious factions believe they have the right to dictate my actions, I’m exhausted every day and all the time, and whatever I choose to do with my body will determine the fate of the world. Lucky is not how I would describe myself.
But then Tavik waves, not at pretty Mera, who is a normal girl, but at me, and a little knife of longing jabs me in the heart, an emotion that I could not possibly define as friendship.
Don’t, I tell myself. Just don’t.
Tavik is still smiling and waving when the ball hits him on the side of the head and bounces off. He cringes, and it’s clear that his ego smarts more than his cranium. Mera bursts out laughing, and her brothers laugh, and even Tavik laughs, but no one laughs as hard as I do. Mera has to hold me up, because I’m staggering under the hilarity of it.