The Grace Year

by Kim Liggett

  I join her. “Yesterday, she was lying on her right side, with her legs curled up.”

  “And now she’s flat on her back?” she asks, blinking rapidly. “Are you saying the ghost is real?”

  “I hope so.” I stare down at the ribbon fluttering in the breeze.

  “How can you say that?”

  “Because the alternative is even more frightening.”

  “Tierney. You’re scaring me,” she says, taking a step back. “What could be worse than a vengeful ghost?”

  “A vengeful poacher,” I whisper. “Anders.” Even saying his name makes me feel sick to my stomach. “He found me with Ryker, told me that if I didn’t cross back over he would kill us both.”

  “Does Ryker know ab—”

  “No. No.” I squeeze her hand tight. I can’t bear to hear her say another word.

  “But the curse…”

  “There is no curse,” I say, thinking of the vial at the apothecary. “It’s smallpox. Anders survived a bout of it last year, and now he believes he’s immune. He said he’d come back for me if I didn’t follow his orders.”

  “But you followed his orders, right?” she asks, getting short of breath.

  I wince in her direction.

  “Oh God, Tierney.” She starts to pace. “But that still doesn’t explain this.” She nods toward the girl.

  “Anders,” I say, swallowing hard. “He likes to play with bones.”

  “What do you mean, likes to play with bones?”

  “He makes … wind chimes and things out of them.”

  “Tierney!” She raises her voice. “A poacher was in the camp … we have to tell the others … we have to warn them.”

  “No,” I say in a panic. “Not yet. Not until I’m certain.”

  “You sound pretty convincing to me.”

  “Tonight, I’m going to stay here, hidden on the ridge,” I say as I pick up the harness to show her. “I need to see it with my own eyes first.”

  “Fine,” she says, putting her hands on her hips. “Then I’m staying with you.”

  “You can’t.” I drop the rope.

  “Of course I can. I’m a part of this now.”

  “This isn’t a game.” I grab her by the shoulders. “You don’t know what they’re like … what they do to us.” Her face goes ashen and I soften my grip. “Besides, I need you to take care of the others. If something happens to me…” I set my jaw. I’m struggling to finish my thought when Gertie rescues me.

  “I’ll do it. But I have conditions.”

  “Name it.”

  “When you’re back, when you’re sure, you need to tell them the truth.”

  I open my mouth to argue; she cuts me off. “Nonnegotiable.”

  “Fine,” I reluctantly agree.

  “And when this is done,” she says, her eyes welling up, “you need to go back to him. You have no choice. You took care of me out here. Now let me take care of you.”

  I nod. Anything to get her to stop, to not say another word.

  * * *

  We spend the rest of the day on the ridge. I show her the garden, telling her about the seeds June sewed into the lining of my cloak, how the storm washed it all away, and the miracle I came back to.

  As we share the last summer tomato, we sit on the edge of the spring, talking for hours, until our feet are wrinkled up like old prunes. For a brief moment, I forget about everything, all of the horror we’ve witnessed, but as soon as the sun begins to set, and I have to send her back to the camp, it all comes back to me. That’s the problem with letting the light in—after it’s been taken away from you, it feels even darker than it was before.

  As the moon starts to rise, I get into the harness and lower myself over the ridge, just low enough that I’m covered, but high enough that if I stretch my neck, I can still see her bones. It’s torture having to stay still for this long, but at least I have my back turned to the shore, to the tip of Ryker’s shelter that I imagine I can see peeking up through the trees. Even that small thought seems to open up a fresh wound in me. I know Gertie’s right, about everything, but I have to get through this first.

  Gripping the rope, I concentrate on what’s in front of me. June’s garden clinging to the hillside. I decide to count everything. What can be more mind numbing than that? Twelve squash, sixty-one beans, eighteen scallions—I do it over and over again until numbers are meaningless, just lines and swirls held together by connective tissue. And when the moon is highest in the sky, and I can no longer feel my legs, I’m thinking about calling it, just going back to the camp, accepting that this was just my imagination getting the better of me, when I hear something splash in the spring. It could be the muskrat hoping for another mollusk, but it sounds bigger than that. Unafraid.

  As heavy wet steps climb the ridge, I hear breath. In and out. Out and in. And when the footsteps reach the top of the ridge, that familiar sound swells in my ears: the scratching of the ribbon—slow, steady, deliberate, obsessive—followed by the clattering of bones.

  Stretching up to peek over the ledge, I accidentally brush my knee against the hillside, causing a small clump of dirt to tumble to the depths.

  I’m holding my breath, hoping I didn’t give myself away, when the scratching sound stops. The bones go still.

  Heavy steps walk straight toward me. I’m clinging to the ropes, praying I’m hidden enough in the darkness to avoid being seen. But the moon is so bright. Fertile. Relentless.

  The tip of a boot edges over the ridge. I’m afraid to look up. Afraid not to.

  As I slowly raise my eyes, a breeze rushes in from the west, causing the charcoal-gray fabric to billow over me, hiding me from sight, covering me in a darkness so deep that it feels like I’m in a freefall.

  When I come to, there’s an eerie red glow shining over the horizon. At home, we call this a devil’s morn. They say if you’re caught in this light, great misfortune will come your way. But what could be worse than this? I must’ve passed out, but if he’d seen me, I’d be dead right now. I guess I owe my life to the western wind. To Eve. Maybe we’re even now.

  As I pull myself up to the ridge and crawl out of the harness, I feel like a woman who’s been lost at sea for years. My body aches, the indentations from the ropes feel like they’ll never recover, my legs and arms tingle as if they’ve been asleep for days, but that’s nothing compared to what’s been done to her.

  Dragging my body over to the dead girl’s remains, I have to choke back the bile clinging to the back of my throat. There, for everyone to see, the girl’s bones have been laid out in painstaking detail, spread-eagle with two black calla lilies placed in her eye sockets—the flower of ill will. Death. “Legs spread, arms flat, eyes to God,” I whisper.

  As I pluck the bad omens from her eyes, I notice the dark red stain smeared across the mandible, all the way around, where her lips would’ve been.

  Spitting on the bottom of my chemise, I’m trying to rub it away, when I realize it’s blood.

  I wrench up whatever’s left in my stomach.

  There’s only one person who’s not afraid of the curse …

  who likes to play with bones …

  who knows the language of flowers and where to procure them.

  Anders said he’d come back for me. He kept his promise.

  Now maybe it’s time to break mine.

  As I head back to camp, there are no eager faces around the campfire waiting to be fed, no Gertie tidying up the larder. No Dovey annoying me with her incessant coo. I’m wondering if everyone’s still asleep, but when I peek in the lodging house, I find it’s empty.

  A horrifying thought creeps in. Ryker told me that if the poachers no longer feared the curse, every girl in the camp would be dead by sunrise.

  Running into the clearing, I’m starting to panic when I hear hushed voices, weeping, coming from the back of the lodging house.

  I should be relieved to see them unharmed, but the way they’re huddled together in a tight circle, sta
ring down at the ground, gives me pause.

  “What is it?” I ask, unable to hide the nervous tremor in my voice. “What’s happened?”

  Before anyone has a chance to answer, Kiersten advances on me, fire in her eyes, veins bulging from her neck. “Give me your hands,” she screams. “Let me see your hands!”

  I’m looking around, desperately trying to figure out what’s going on. Gertrude meets my gaze, but all she can do is shake her head, tears streaming down her face.

  Kiersten grabs my hands, inspecting them from every angle. “She must’ve scrubbed it off.”

  “Scrubbed what off?” I ask, my breath shallow in my chest.

  “Don’t play innocent with me. Where did the blood come from?”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “This.” She yanks me over so I’m standing directly in front of the back wall of the lodging house.

  There, written in dark red blood, is the word WHORE.

  And below it, on the soft dirt, lies a bird, neck snapped, wings spread, a yellow nasturtium placed on its chest. The symbol of betrayal.

  “Dovey,” I whisper.

  Looking around at their distraught faces, I realize they think I did this. This is exactly what Anders wants. He wants them to turn on me. Cast me out.

  “I … I didn’t do this…,” I sputter.

  “I suppose you want us to believe a ghost did this. How could you do this to Helen? The weakest among us—”

  “Wait … where is Helen?” I ask.

  “If this is about your stupid cloak, you can ju—”

  “Where’s Helen?” I shout.

  “We thought she was with you,” Becca says, looking up at me, eyes red with tears.

  “Why would you think that?” I ask.

  “Last night, we saw her skipping into the woods,” Martha says.

  “Was she wearing my cloak?” I whisper.

  “We tried to get it from her,” Nanette says, “but she said it gave her powers.”

  As I take off running toward the woods, Kiersten’s yelling after me, “This isn’t over, Tierney. You have to answer for what you’ve done.”

  My heart is hammering. My stomach is so tight you could pound it like a drum. I’m tearing down the path, calling out her name, when I see the tattered hem of my cloak peeking out from beneath a willow.

  The dread I feel is overwhelming, but when I pull the edge of the wool and realize it’s not attached to her body, I let out a huge burst of air. “Calm down,” I whisper. She probably just got too warm and dropped it, but as I dust it off and put it back on, I notice something odd: a wide swath of clean fresh dirt leading under the tree. As if someone had been dragged—

  Clawing through the veil of stringy limbs, I find her hidden underneath. “Helen.” I gently shake her shoulder, but she’s already gone cold. Sinking beside her, I see her red ribbon is coiled around her throat so tightly, it cut into her skin. Just like the girl on the ridge. I’m racking my brain, searching for answers, but I can’t understand why he would just leave her body here? A kill like this is all he needs.

  But it’s not about that, is it? This is personal. This is about me.

  He won’t stop until he gets what he wants.

  And I’m going to give it to him.

  As they load Helen’s body onto the wagon, Kiersten drags me by my hair to the punishment tree.

  “Get the hatchet,” she calls out.

  I’m trying to think of anything I can say to get out of this, but I’m tired of lying—to them, to myself. Gertie’s right. The truth has come to the surface, whether I’m ready for it or not.

  “There’s a poacher in the encampment,” I yell.

  Kiersten laughs as she drops me in front of the tree. “It’s always someone else’s fault, right, Tierney?”

  “It’s my fault. It’s all my fault,” I say. “I’m the reason Helen’s dead.” My eyes well up as I look back at Helen’s body. “She was wearing my cloak. He thought it was me.”

  “Is that why you were so upset about it going missing?” Vivi asks.

  “Don’t listen to her lies. She’s just trying to trick us,” Kiersten says.

  “It’s all true.” Gertie steps forward. “The ghost you saw in the clearing, the sound we kept hearing in the woods, it’s a poacher. Tierney escaped from him, climbed back through a breach in the eastern fence, and now he’s come to claim his prize … the kill that got away from him.”

  “The figure at the larder door,” Hannah says with wide eyes. “I thought it was a ghost, but it was the shrouds they wear.”

  “You’re not seriously listening to this, are you?” Kiersten grabs the hatchet from Jenna and raises it.

  “If you kill me,” I say, holding up my hands, “he’ll take revenge on every single one of you. He wants me. I’m the only one who can stop this.”

  “I think she might be telling the truth.” Jenna sidles next to her. “Why else would he have left Helen’s body behind?”

  Kiersten kicks the edge of my boot. “How?”

  “I’ll go into the woods. I’ll wait for him.”

  “And we’re supposed to trust you?” She huffs, tightening her grip.

  “What do you have to lose?” I say. “Either way, you win. If I kill him or he kills me … all of this will end.”

  “Kiersten, please.” Jenna pulls on her arm. “We’re so close to going home. Let him have her.”

  Kiersten takes in a deep breath through her nostrils, and then lowers the blade.

  I’m shocked she’s agreeing to this so easily, but I’m not about to wait around for her to change her mind.

  As I turn and walk toward the perimeter she says, “But first, you have to put Helen outside the gate.”

  My body freezes in place. “I can’t,” I whisper.

  “You want her sisters to be punished? You want her body to be unaccounted for? She deserves an honorable death. And since it was your fault—”

  “Don’t make me do this,” I say, my face contorting in agony, but I know she’s right. This is my responsibility.

  As I walk toward Helen’s body, the girls step back, giving me a wide berth. Gertie gives me a supportive nod, but I can see she’s on the verge of falling apart. We all are.

  I push the wagon to the barrier, then open the gate; the high-pitched groan of the rusty hinges settles deep inside my gut. Putting my hands under her arms, I lift her off the wagon, but I’m so shaky that I end up dropping her in an ugly heap. Tears are streaming down my face. I can hardly catch my breath. This is not what she deserves.

  Even though I can hear the call of the poachers, see their shadowy figures emerging from the tree line, I take my time. I’ve seen plenty of dead bodies in the healing house before, but never one that’s been a friend.

  And Helen was my friend.

  Straightening out her limbs, her dress, I close her eyelid and place her hands together on her chest. Out of respect. Love.

  I only hope someone will do the same for me.

  Walking to the ridge feels like something out of a dream … a nightmare.

  I feel dead inside. But maybe that’s exactly what I need to get through this.

  Setting up a guide rope, I gather as many fallen branches as I can find and start to dig.

  I dig through the morning, I dig through the afternoon, and when the sun begins to set, still red on the horizon, I stop. I wanted to dig so deep that I’d reach the devil himself, but this will have to do.

  Honing the branches into needle-sharp points, twenty in all, I bury the blunt ends into the bottom of the pit. It’s primitive, but so is Anders.

  With bloodied, blistered hands, I climb the rope to the surface. It feels good to breathe again. To feel the air on my face. I head down to the spring and plunge my aching hands into the cool water. I want to leave them there until I can’t feel them anymore, but I’m done trying to numb myself. Untying the veil from the rocks, I stretch it over the pit until it’s taut and then tack dow
n the sides with hawthorn spikes. It would be a lot easier to use rocks, but I can’t afford anything to impede his steps. I need a clean drop.

  Sprinkling a thin layer of fresh dirt over the surface, I stand back to survey my work.

  This is the best I can do.

  This is all I have left in me.

  As I sit on the ridge, staring past the woods, the barrier, beyond the shore, I acknowledge the three moons that have passed since I last saw Ryker. I want to tell myself it’s easier now, that sometimes I can’t remember his face, or the sound of his voice, but I cling to the memories like stolen jewels, only to be taken out on special occasions. But it’s no use hiding them away anymore. He’s with me all the time now.

  As dark comes, I don’t bother trying to conceal myself. I want him to see me. And who would dare try to hide from this moon?

  Just before dawn, I hear footsteps coming up the incline, past the spring, toward the ridge. It takes everything I have not to look back, but I won’t give him the satisfaction of seeing my fear.

  When he reaches the top of the ridge, I know the moment he sees me, because the scratching sound grows more intense … fevered.

  With each step closer, it feels like he’s hacking away pieces of me, until I’m nothing but a pile of discarded flesh.

  I’m convinced he’s seen my trap, that he’s making his way around it right now to slit my throat, when I hear the most beautiful sound in the world—the wet crunching sound of his body being impaled.

  In the dim early light, I walk to the edge of the trap. I’ve spent the entire night fantasizing about what I’m going to say to him, but as I gaze down at the figure, flesh twisted around spikes, I see a face I never expected to see. It’s so shocking that it takes me a minute to even place him … to form his name. “H-Hans,” I finally manage to get out. “What are you doing here?”

  “The barrier. I thought you needed my help,” he whispers, coughing up a fresh stream of blood. “I told you I’d come for you.”