Mark looked up and saw the Corsair on his black horse looming above him. He swung hard with his rifle, just missing the Corsair’s head. The man held the torch miles high above Mark’s head, it seemed. He suddenly felt like a little boy again, trying to grasp for a toy his older brother held just out of reach. He knew, somehow, he never would reach it. Where were the others? Still on the ground, wrestling the other Corsair. Why didn’t they fire? He’d ordered them to fire. They didn’t want to shoot their old comrades. Too many confused thoughts and feelings. The smoke was filling his lungs. If he could just reach higher to get the torch.
The young Corsair seemed to be grinning at him, knowing he had the advantage. Mark pulled his knife from his right boot, stabbing the Corsair’s foot with full force. Everything slowed. Blood began to drip in the snow. The Corsair cried out. His voice carried from far away on a sea of smoke. The torch fell, spinning in the air, hurtling toward a shining bush of dead and brown twigs. With a burst of flames, Mark could no longer see anything but the fire before him.
24
STANDING ON THEIR OWN
T he wind cried with the shrill voice of a wounded animal. The few brown leaves still clinging to the branches pushed and rustled against each other like children fighting for space. Empty branches scratched against the closed windows of Sophie’s house by the sea, the waves breaking in the background.
As Sam walked slowly into the house, he heard the echoes of silence and emptiness. The house smelled musty after being closed up for over a week. The cold inside the house was almost more piercing than the open cold he’d left outside. Shadows played in the dusty light through the curtains.
“Sophie?” Sam didn’t need to call for her to know she wasn’t there. But he called anyway. He went from room to room, willing her to appear, desperate for his hope to take shape in her lithe form. Only empty rooms and clouds of dust greeted him. This would be his life from now on, he thought. Empty rooms.
He went to the pump in the kitchen to wash the dirt from his hands from digging Daisy’s grave. He wished he would never have to dig another. There had been too many graves. Too many buried. How could it continue? Who would even be left in the coming days to dig the graves? Simeon? The Corsairs? He’d seen how they had treated the dead, left to rot in the sun. And where was Sophie? Would he have to find her and bury her as well?
As he looked for a towel to dry his cold, chapped hands, he started thinking of how he would get back across the Border to retrieve Sophie. There wasn’t a towel in the kitchen. Everything was in disarray with Sophie gone. It always would be.
Sam brushed his hands along his coat and felt something in his pocket he hadn’t realized was there. He pulled out the letter and recognized Gemma’s handwriting. When had she given him this, he wondered.
Dear Sam,
You will find this after I have gone. It’s the way I wanted it. I almost don’t have the words to write here. You were always better in that area. I always thought so much more could be said with a look or a touch of the hand. In those days when we had no one else but each other, how much the touch of your hand could comfort me.
“Don’t you dare,” he said aloud to the empty room. His mind started to race before even finishing the letter. Where would she go? What would Gemma do in her present state? Kyle was in the town square. Would she go after him there?
Our lives have gone on in different directions, ways that no one could have predicted. All I can hope now is that you don’t hate me. Because I have loved you. Always.
“No, no! Damn it! You’re not going out this way. I won’t let you.”
* * * * *
Kyle walked out into the brisk air outside the Government Office. The blood in his ears was beating like a drum calling for a charge. He stood perfectly still under the office porch, breathing in and breathing out, willing his heart to stop beating. He held the medicine for Gemma. She needed a tranquilizer to help her sleep. He had underestimated how much the child Daisy had meant to her. He had suspected for some time they worked together with the Watch, but he hadn’t fully realized their connection. He should have listened more carefully when she kept asking him to apply to have a child. He should have listened. And now all he could hear were her screams in his ears, pushing his nerves and his guilt to the breaking point. She had to be sedated not just for her own sake, but for his. Perhaps he could explain to her in time. Perhaps she’d even come to understand. He’d only meant to frighten the girl to get the information about Foxglove he needed. He was only trying to complete his mission. She wasn’t supposed to die.
“Kyle!” The voice was familiar, yet strange. He opened his eyes to see Gemma’s haggard face dangerously close to his.
“What are you doing here? I was just on my way back.”
“I needed to walk,” she said quietly. “So I thought I’d come meet you.”
“Honey, you need to rest. Let’s get you home. I’ve got the medication for you. It will help.”
“What happened to Daisy?” she asked him in her strange other voice that was hers, yet not hers. It was layered with something Kyle couldn’t place. It sat in the back of her throat like bile. An edge. Fear mixed with accusation and anger. But behind it all was a kind of resignation.
“Let’s not do this here.” Kyle looked around to see if anyone had heard her.
“Tell me what happened.” The volume of her voice was rising like boiling water.
“Sweetheart, I told you what happened, remember? I know this has been hard for you. I know how much she meant to you.” Kyle attempted to put his arm around her shoulder, but she shrugged him away, taking a step back.
“I know what you told me. Tell me again.”
“Gemma, I don’t think that’s a good idea. Why don’t we get you home to rest and later . . .”
“Tell me!”
He looked over his shoulders again and saw people coming out of the Government Office, others looking up from their booths in the market. “Keep your voice down, alright? I don’t know much more than you do. Some villagers found her early this morning. She’d gone out to pick some blackberries and must have slipped and fell. She hit her head.”
“Is that what happened?” The tears started to form in her red eyes.
“Yes, that’s what happened.”
“Then how do you explain these?” Gemma shoved the three photographs hard into Kyle’s chest, making him catch his breath. He gathered them up before they fell to the ground.
“What are these?”
“You tell me.”
He looked slowly at each individual picture in silence. Gemma watched the color drain from his face, then his ears turned red, followed by his cold cheeks. “Where did you get these?” he asked.
“Does it matter?”
Kyle stood up straighter, almost at attention. “Yes, as a matter of fact, it does. Did you get them from the Watch, Gemma?”
“You can call me Foxglove.”
* * * * *
Sam couldn’t remember the last time he’d run this fast. The winter air was burning his lungs as he gasped for breath. But he couldn’t stop. He had to get back to Jesse’s Hollow before Gemma did something stupid. He wondered if he should have taken the time to saddle Pip and ride into town. Too late for that now. He took every shortcut he knew. Through fields, splashing across the stream as it changed course and zigzagged through the woods, crossing his path in several places. He still had the pistol in his belt. He was prepared as he was going to be, if he could only get his legs to move faster.
Through time and distance, pleasure and pain, my love for you will live on, even when all else is dust. I loved you in the sunlight and the firelight, in the moonlight and the starlight. I loved you when the dark was blinding and when the light was too bright for us to see. And despite all that love I had for you, I let you go. As I now ask you to let me go. You are with Sophie. And it’s the way it should be. Sophie is stronger than me. Always has been.
* * * * *
Soph
ie sat at the small wooden table in the cabin, allowing Jesse to fuss over her, bring her food and water, wiping her face down with a warm cloth.
“You’ve been through quite the ordeal, love. But we’ll soon set you to rights.”
“We don’t have much time, Jesse.”
“Now, what are you going on about?” Jesse was bustling through the kitchen and into the bedroom, bringing Sophie a clean tunic.
“A war is coming, Jesse. I saw the smoke from the Forbidden Grounds. It’s already begun.”
Zacharias joined them, finally leaving his rocking chair. “But Colonel Goodson . . .”
“Yes,” Sophie interrupted, “the colonel said there is no war and we’re in prison. But call it what you will, there will be a fight. You can feel it coming, can’t you?”
Jesse stilled her movements and looked into Sophie’s eyes, mirroring her own fear. “You know we can.”
“Yes, and it worries me,” Zacharias added. “We have limited supplies of food and necessities. As soon as the fight begins, that’s all we’ll have. There will be no more government supplies. They’ve got us completely dependent on them and they know it. I don’t know what kind of a war this is going to be. In fact, I don’t know why they haven’t just cut off our supplies before this.”
Jesse, ever hopeful, offered, “Maybe that shows a little bit of humanity left in them.”
“Not likely,” Sophie responded. “Just look at what they did to that poor child Daisy.”
“You think that was the Corsairs?” Z asked, astonished at the cruelty he couldn’t even imagine.
“I don’t know for sure. But I do worry that Foxglove will try to punish whoever did this to her. She was very attached to Daisy.”
Ethan walked in the door just as Sophie was speaking. “It’s Kyle. Kyle did it.”
Sophie was up in a second, taking Ethan in her arms. They each took a moment to breathe and let it sink in that they hadn’t lost each other. She held him for a few moments before she asked him the question burning in her mind. “Now, what is this you’re saying?”
“Kyle killed my friend Daisy. Sophie, Daisy’s dead.” Ethan crumpled in her arms like a rag doll under the weight of the past few days. Sophie brought him to the chair in front of the fire, rocking him as she should have a much younger child.
“I know. I know, sweetie. It’s terrible. You can cry.”
“I don’t want to cry. I want to do something.”
“Where’s Sam?”
“We had a photograph of what Kyle did. That’s where Sam is. He went to accuse Kyle. But if Gemma is still alive, she’ll go after him too. She’ll never forgive him for what he did to Daisy.”
“Gemma?” Sophie blinked, shaking her head, trying to register what Ethan was saying.
Jesse walked up behind her, placing her hand on Sophie’s shaking shoulder. “You didn’t know, did you, that Gemma is Foxglove.”
“Gemma as in Sam’s . . .”
“Yes, my dear,” Zacharias confirmed.
Sophie’s face showed her pain, but she didn’t hesitate. “She’s going to go after Kyle. Whether she’s in her right mind or not. I know exactly what she’s feeling. She wants to kill whoever killed her child. I have to go to her. She needs me. Ethan, you say Sam’s gone to their house? But it’s Market Day. They’ll be in the square. That’s where I have to go.”
“You can’t go alone, my girl. Zack and I will go with you.”
“I can’t ask you to do that, Jesse. It’ll be dangerous, especially if Kyle is actually working with the Corsairs. We have no idea what we’ll be walking into.”
“Exactly. Now, we’re not as frail as all that. No arguments. Ethan will stay here with the twins and the rest of us will go.”
Sophie smiled in resignation. “Alright. Do you have any weapons here?”
* * * * *
Kyle placed his face within a whisper distance of Gemma’s. “You don’t know what you’re saying. I want you to think very carefully about the consequences of your actions. I don’t want to have to . . .”
“The consequences?! She was just a child! What consequences did she deserve, you bastard?! What could ever justify what I’m seeing in these pictures? You murdered a child!”
Kyle looked down at his Corsair boots. He couldn’t see a clear path to his mission. He felt the air closing in around him. Gemma’s fist across his face took him by surprise, and before he could catch his balance, she’d jumped on him, hitting, gnashing, and tearing at him like a wildcat.
“You must think, boy! Think about the consequences of your actions.” Simeon’s voice is in his ear, the underlying music of the blows being rained down upon him. One fist, a boot, another fist in the stomach, another fist to his face. He sees a blend of colors more convoluted than a rainbow. There are hideous streaks of red, blue, green, and brown all around him, tying him into a ball.
“Think about the consequences!”
“You must think about the consequences!” Kyle shouted at the balled-up form on the ground before him. “I’ve been ordered to kill Foxglove. We must stay the course and complete the mission.” His fists moved on their own without any direction from his mind.
Gemma tried to see through her hands covering her face. A crowd had gathered around them but made no move to intervene. In the monochrome din of gray and empty faces, Gemma looked for help that would not come. But she didn’t really want help. If she had, she wouldn’t have confronted Kyle alone. Who is to say when we really die? Somewhere along the way, a string is pulled that will unravel the rest of our lives. Daisy was that string for Gemma. The thread that had kept her life together. In a way, Gemma knew she was already dead. She had known it since she held Daisy’s lifeless body in her arms. She had felt herself draw her last real breath and known that every moment of her life after that was a stolen one. She was no longer meant to be here.
Suddenly the blows stopped. There was a moment of peace as her brain began to feel the places of pain all over her body. She heard a voice in her ear, “Gemma, stay down. Please stay down. I’ll try to get you out later. Don’t get up. Stay down.”
Gemma struggled to match that voice with the voice of Kyle screaming about consequences, but it was the same.
* * * * *
Sam’s body had forced him to slow to a jog for the past mile. But as he came to the road that led into the square at Jesse’s Hollow, he pushed again into a sprint. The empty branches of the trees along the road blurred together into jagged lines. The smell of smoke was sharp in his nostrils. Heat and cold blended into a confusing soup of temperature coursing through his body. He ignored the burning in his muscles, lungs, and face.
The light is gone now, Sam. There’s nothing left but this one last fight, and I have to do it on my own. It’s my enemy to kill. And I will do it, even if it takes my last breath. Hold on to the ones you love, Sam. And hold out for a better life. You deserve it. Live free or die. Love, Gemma
* * * * *
From his vantage point on the wooden stage in the middle of the square, Simeon stood at ease, his legs parted into a triangle, his hands behind his back, surveying the citizens of Boswell going through their last Market Day, though none of them knew it would be their last. He watched with pleasure as the smoke continued to rise out of the Forbidden Grounds, and all of these little ants just continued to go about their days as they were expected to do. So predictable.
“Sir,” a young lieutenant interrupted his thoughts.
“Have my orders been fulfilled, Lieutenant?”
“Yes, sir. The fire has begun.”
“Excellent. You are dismissed. Go and avail yourself of some of the delicious concoctions these citizens can come up with out of limited rations. They really are quite inventive.”
“But sir . . .”
“Yes, what is it?”
“There’s news from Jesse’s Hollow.”
“Well?”
“Your son has found Foxglove. He has her in the town square there. Apparently,
a crowd is forming. There may be some trouble.”
“Nonsense. Look at the little busy ants here. Jesse’s Hollow is the same. But I will go be with my son in his hour of triumph. Bring me my horse, Lieutenant.”
“Yes, sir.”
* * * * *
“Sophie Bryan,” the young soldier read her ID card. “You are a citizen of Boswell, not Jesse’s Hollow. You must attend Market Day there. Please step back.”
“But sir, I’ve come to trade.”
“All trade has been suspended until further notice. Please return to your own village.”
“Sir . . .”
“Silence, or I will have you arrested. You, old man, old woman. You may pass. Your ID cards are in order. Move along.”
Sophie turned, whispering to Jesse and Zacharias as they passed by her. “Get to Gemma if you can. I’ll find another way.”
Jesse looked at Zack, trying to think of something they could do to get Sophie past the guards. She wasn’t at all sure there was anything the two of them could do alone to help Gemma if she had gotten herself in trouble.
* * * * *
Gemma stood slowly, her legs shaky beneath her. One eye was swollen shut, and she winced as the slightest movement brushed against her wounds. Kyle seemed surprised to see her standing, and he hesitated. She stole his moment of hesitation to touch his hand. “We never really knew each other, did we?” she said softly, speaking to him as easily as if they were in their own living room having a normal conversation. “I’ve only done what I had to do. But you should know, for every time you knock me down, I’ll still rise. You know what you’ll have to do to stop me.”
Kyle clenched the fist of the hand she had touched, but still waited, looking into her face and the evidence of his actions.
“Do it!” Simeon’s voice traveled over the heads of the gathered citizens.
A Light From the Ashes Page 46