“I’m Essence,” she replied in a soft, childlike voice.
“Nice.”
She laughed. “I may change it again. I feel different sometimes.”
“Does anyone use their real names?”
“I never ask.” She gazed through me as she spoke, almost as though I wasn’t there at all.
“Are we the only ones who sleep in here?” I pressed.
“There’s another girl, too.”
“What’s her name?”
“Misty. She works in the kitchens.”
“No one else? There’s four beds.”
She had to think hard about that. “There was another woman, but she moved to a private room last fall when there was an opening.”
“An opening. Someone got married, huh?”
“No.”
“Then what happened?”
“It was a woman, and she got sick. I haven’t seen her, so I think she left.”
“Do a lot leave?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“What do you do here?”
“I tend the herbs in the greenhouse.”
Ah, so that explained why I was her roommate. “I’m interested in herbs, too. I brought some herbal remedy books.”
“That’s nice.” Essence closed her eyes, ending any hope of extracting more information. “Turn out the light when you’re ready, okay?”
I sat on my own bed, feeling suddenly restless. Now that the fear and cold were at bay, my body was raring to go, the sleep I’d had in the van enough to last me a few more hours. Did I dare sneak out and take a peek around?
I stood and started for the door but found I wasn’t brave enough to leave the room. Inclar’s corpse being missing was even more frightening than my knowing where it had been. Could someone have come across it as I had and moved it to protect the children? Surely they would call the police in that case.
Of course, that didn’t really matter because Ethan was already on his way to talk to the police. I hoped he didn’t try to call me on the radio, though, now that Korin had it. Ethan wasn’t supposed to call, but he might in an emergency.
I crossed to the narrow dresser where Scarlet had put the belongings she’d considered acceptable. My underclothes were all there, as well as my face cleanser, moisturizer, and Jake’s comfrey salve. In the second drawer I found a half-dozen T-shirts with the commune logos. The next drawer held the two pairs of jeans I’d brought and a pair of the sturdy homemade work pants I’d seen both the men and the women wearing here. The bottom drawer held socks in good condition but obviously not new.
The small closet, I found, was divided into four slots. One was empty, two had five or six hanging items, and one held a dress and skirt near my size. Like the socks, they were in good condition but had obviously been washed before. Below these were a pair of sturdy oxfords, which I could tell right away were too large. I bent to touch them, but the imprints were so faint I couldn’t tell who they might have belonged to. At least they weren’t negative. My feet weren’t as sensitive at feeling imprints as my hands, and normally people didn’t feel anything strongly enough at foot level to leave much of an imprint, but wearing strongly imprinted shoes could be as severe a problem for me as stepping barefooted into that confessional had been.
I cast a glance at Essence, but she didn’t move and her eyes were still shut. I ran my hands across the clothes in the closet, unsurprised when nothing of interest jumped out at me. Above the sparse clothing were small shelves, one for each person. Mine held my two herb texts and my parents’ poetry book, one was empty, and the other two held a scattering of paper and pens, bead jewelry, a lovely clay vase, a bottle of lotion without a label, and a faceless religious figurine with a cross on its chest. Nothing more.
I was amazed at the simplicity of the way these people lived. I had never been one to care much about clothing or new things, but my antiques meant something to me. Touching them, seeing them, caring for them. It had nothing to do with the value of the object, but the beauty of the items themselves, the care given them by their original makers or owners, the feeling of connection and continuity. My two roommates had nothing like that. They had tossed off their past lives like so much refuse and hadn’t filled them with any substitutes that I could see. No journal, no needlework, no pictures, nothing that gave a hint of who they had become.
I wondered what kind of pain they were in to live this way and what kind of people they had left behind.
I felt compelled to touch the few objects that had either been kept by or given to the women in this shared room. Taking a deep breath, I rested my finger tentatively on the stack of paper and felt nothing strong enough to evoke a scene. The pen was the same, as though my ability had deserted me.
I could only be so lucky.
The tiny, pretty vase was different. It carried a decidedly contented feeling, and I could clearly see the face of the young man who’d made this for one of my roommates. He had a shy expression, the reddest hair I’d ever seen, and a myriad of freckles on his boyish face. No words accompanied what I saw, and I felt almost as though I were peering through a haze because nothing except the boy’s face was clear. Odd.
When I touched the religious figurine, swirling images leapt to life, leaving me sickened and weak. Evil images of darkness. Horror. Fear. Hurry . . . they’re coming. “Take this. It’s all I have left.” I pressed the figurine into another woman’s hand. Tears leaked down my face. Pain. Soon there would be more screaming.
That was all. I couldn’t see either of the woman’s faces. I didn’t know if that was because of my reaction or because the skewed perception belonged to the woman who had owned the object. But the imprints were beginning to replay. Why couldn’t I put the figurine down? I didn’t want to experience the imprints again, but the figurine remained in my hand as if glued there.
A sound came from the door behind me, and as I whirled to face whoever had entered the room, my fingers lost their hold on the figurine. I bent, grappling to save it, but it shattered on the floor. All there was to do was to look at the broken pieces while I hugged myself, trying not to be sick. I wondered if my roommates would harbor resentment toward me now.
I glanced at Essence, lying on her bed, but beyond cracking an eye for a brief instant, she didn’t acknowledge the newcomer or my error. My eyes slid back to the plump young woman standing before me. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to break it. I shouldn’t have touched it.”
“It’s okay,” the woman assured me. “Don’t look so upset. It was just an old thing someone gave me. I never liked it, but I didn’t know what to do with it. You can touch anything of mine you want any time. I don’t mind.”
She smiled, and in that instant recognition came to me. This was the young woman I’d seen in the mirror imprint left on her hairbrush, the time when she’d been so angry at her father that she’d wanted to throw it at him.
I’d found Victoria Fullmer.
Chapter 16
I shouldn’t have been surprised to see Victoria, given that I knew she’d joined Harmony Farms and Jake had said he thought he’d spotted her. It wasn’t even unusual that we were rooming together, as she was one of the more recent residents. But I was surprised—and saddened—at her appearance. The nineteen-year-old had aged dreadfully, the sudden weight gain doing most of the damage. But there was also a fearfulness in her that I hadn’t felt in her imprints, a fear I hadn’t noticed in the other disciples. Or hadn’t wanted to notice. Victoria’s weight wasn’t a matter of genes or part of the process of aging but a protective covering. I saw that as clearly as if she’d told me herself. Unlike with Scarlet, the weight didn’t sit at all naturally on Victoria’s small frame. The Fullmers would be horrified to see their daughter now.
Victoria—called Misty, now—helped me clean up the broken bits of the figurine before slipping out of her shoes, exchanging her skirt and blouse for pajamas, and climbing rather laboriously to the top half of my bunk and stretching out. Even her to
es were swollen, reminding me of cute, chubby baby feet, except that her toenails were in desperate need of a trim.
“I moved up here when I heard you were coming,” she said, her breathing strained.
“If you’d rather have the bottom bunk, we can trade.”
“It’s okay. I don’t mind at all.”
Minutes later she was asleep. I’d lived at home during my brief stint in college, so I didn’t know for sure how dorms were, but these roommates didn’t fit into my idea of sisterly bonding. I’d chatted more with complete strangers I’d never see again. If I’d actually joined Harmony Farms, I’d be having second thoughts about now.
I was being selfish, of course. Neither of my roommates had any idea that I’d been lost in the woods and had discovered a dead body. They didn’t know I could read imprints. Of all possible gifts, why did I have this particular one? I could have personally gotten more out of, say, premonition. Winning a lottery would give me an opportunity to help a lot of people.
I started to set my earrings on the dresser but changed my mind at the last moment and nestled them inside my extra underclothes. Once the light was off and I was in bed, I felt even more sorry for myself. I bitterly missed Tawnia and Jake and Bret. Was Tawnia drawing now? Had she seen me in the trees with Inclar’s body? I hoped not. She’d be freaking out even without the pregnancy hormones.
I wasn’t in the least tired. Every nerve felt alive, perhaps because of all the honey I’d taken in my hot tea. Come to think of it, I might be feeling restless because drinking so much tea had made my bladder stretch tight again. But no way was I going to tromp through those dark woods alone to the outhouse, not with a murderer loose.
Or was there really a murderer? I’d started to doubt myself, thinking maybe Inclar had been sleeping or passed out. I’d never been one for flights of fancy, but this place was getting to me. Or maybe Ethan’s worry was getting to me. I’d met Victoria—at least I could report that to her family. Now I only had to find Marcie. If she was here in the singles’ dorm, she would have to be one of the women who came back late, like Victoria. Or perhaps she was among the families. After a year she might have remarried and was maybe even expecting another child.
I didn’t believe it. Tawnia’s picture hadn’t shown a happy woman but someone who’d desperately needed help, and after seeing Scarlet, I believed in Tawnia’s newfound talent as I’d been forced to believe in mine. Had our birth mother also been gifted in some odd way? Or maybe another relative? Since our birth mother and the doctor who’d delivered us were both dead and no other blood relatives were in sight, it was possible we would never know.
Wherever my ability came from, I felt good about helping Ethan find Marcie and hopefully talking Victoria into coming with me when I left.
Aside from my stretched bladder, I was warm and comfortable. Except now that I was alone in the dark, accompanied only by the soft snores of my two companions, my mind went inevitably to the day’s events and particularly the two kisses. One too brief to really savor, and Jake’s, the kiss that hadn’t felt like friendship. Even thinking about it made my heart feel funny. Not funny ha-ha but funny as though I might pass out.
Or was that my bladder?
I pushed myself to my feet. Well, while I was awake, I could at least investigate the women’s dorm. On stockinged feet, I crept slowly to the door. The wooden floor creaked, but neither of my companions stirred. Our door was one of the few closed, and it squeaked as I opened it. I guess I should have thought to bring oil. Shannon would get a kick out of that idea, if he ever found out. He and his fellow detectives probably carried a can around in their pocket whenever they planned to sneak around.
Or did detectives always get a warrant first? Probably.
I felt my way down the hallway, lit only by the moonlight filtering through the sheer curtains over the single windows between each set of bunks. In each room everyone seemed profoundly asleep, as though exhaustion had irrevocably claimed them. Shadows reared up in the corners of the room and seemed to flit and dance as I passed, but the movement was only in my imagination.
It was weird. Subdued. Otherworldly. There was no reading with a flashlight or giggling in the dark. Were the women drugged, or just plain overworked?
I didn’t think I’d find the answer here, but I was determined to check every room. My heart thumped furiously as I opened the few closed doors, not a lock in sight, but those rooms were tiny and had only a single bed with a sleeping woman. Most of them were older. One gray-haired granny had her mouth wide open under her hooked nose, snoring loud enough to wake her neighbors. No wonder she slept by herself.
Besides the closet and the bathing room, there was nothing else to see. Every bed was occupied, except the one in my room and another in the room next door. Thus, the reason for Jake and his supposed building skills.
I saw no one who remotely resembled Marcie, though I might have been mistaken in the dark. Had she left the commune? If so, why hadn’t she contacted her brother? Or was she somewhere else? Perhaps in that dark room where Tawnia had drawn her.
An urgency I couldn’t explain fell over me. I needed to find Marcie.
I was hungry, too, despite the dinner I’d eaten. Ravenous, in fact. Only Tawnia would understand how that could be true. I wondered if I could find my way to the kitchen for a snack. I mean, it wasn’t as if the fasting day had begun, and I didn’t intend to follow it anyway. I’d fast for a good cause but not for joining a commune. I also thought about emptying my bladder somehow in the bathing room, but I remembered Harmony saying the refuse water went to the fields. That was why they only used biodegradable soaps, toothpastes, and shampoos, so using an inside drain was out of the question.
But I really, really did not want to go to the woods. Maybe they had a port-a-potty somewhere.
The outside door to the women’s dorms didn’t have a lock, either, so I went out onto the long porch overlooking the deserted square. The lights atop the poles were still on but dimmer now, with only the bottom half of the crystal glass gleaming as though there might be two bulbs inside, one for regular use and one to act as a nightlight. The brightness of the moon overhead did a far better job at illuminating the square than the dim light. The tables were gone, and there was no litter anywhere to be seen. Several lights filtered through curtained windows in the married dorm, but even as I watched, they winked out.
The porch moaned horribly as I crossed it, and the outside air was cool, though I was well protected in my long-sleeved flannel nightgown. I edged down the stairs, my feet feeling confined and almost clumsy inside their stockings. It was amazing how the thin covering insulated my feet from the usual sensations.
Only the smallest sound gave warning, and then an arm went around me and another over my mouth. I experienced a sense of déjà-vu, though I realized how unlikely it would be that Ethan could have sneaked back so quickly. That left the person who had killed Inclar. My heart pounded in my chest. I readied my elbow for attack.
“It’s me,” Jake whispered before I launched the jab. When he was sure I understood, he started to release me.
I avoided my first reaction to sag with relief and slapped his hands away.
“Sorry. I didn’t want you to scream.”
I certainly was jumpy enough to have screamed, but I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of knowing that.
He was looking at me oddly, and I realized it was because of my gown. “I didn’t pack pajamas,” I said defensively. Another small point of contention between me and my sister. She believed in pajamas, three fresh pair a week. I, on the other hand, didn’t see any harm in sleeping in underclothes or a T-shirt as long as it was fairly clean.
“Looks like something my grandma wears.”
Great. Just the image I wanted him to have of me. “I saw Victoria,” I said to distract him. “No Marcie, though. Unless she’s in the married housing.”
“I don’t think so. I watched them pretty carefully as they went inside tonight. I did som
e looking around, too, and there are no hidden rooms that I can find.”
“You’ve been in there?” I jerked my head toward the front house.
He nodded. “Kitchen, big work room, laundry, offices, and rooms for Korin and Gabe. No basement.”
“Do you think Marcie left? Maybe we could ask around.”
He shook his head. “We’ll have to be careful. I mentioned the possibility of leaving to one of the men, and he wouldn’t even look at me after that.”
“There have to be work places here,” I said, thinking of Tawnia’s picture. “Where they make the soaps and things. Maybe she’s there.”
“The kitchen’s big enough for that. And the meeting room has tables that probably double as work stations for some of those crafts they sell.”
“Well, they have barns and a henhouse.”
“Two barns from what I’ve been able to learn, a big one out behind the married housing and a smaller one beyond the outhouses.”
“Oh, and a greenhouse,” I added, remembering my new roommate and her herbs. “They raise their own food, so they could have a lot more buildings we don’t know about. Any of them could have a secret room.”
“Let’s go look for them.”
I glanced reluctantly toward the woods, but I wasn’t quite so afraid now that Jake was with me. Besides, the police would be here soon. “I need a pit stop first,” I confessed.
“I want to get another look at where you saw Inclar’s body, anyway. Look what I brought.” This time instead of the borrowed lantern, he held up a chunky blue flashlight, the one he used at the store back in Portland during blackouts. It had the most powerful beam I’d ever seen.
“They let you keep it? They took Ethan’s phone and the radio he gave me.”
“Didn’t seem to bother them. They did say something about the batteries running out eventually. Apparently, they don’t restock batteries often.”
“Probably because they’re more expensive than whatever’s in those smelly lanterns. Plus, they’re hard to recycle. Not good for Mother Earth.” I caught his smile. “Hey, I can’t help it if I happen to agree with some of their beliefs. Humans can be terrible for the environment. I think I’d give up my cell phone altogether if it weren’t for Tawnia.”
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