by Tillie Cole
Mae? It was my Mae? I could not concentrate . . .
I opened my mouth to reply. I tried to speak but I was unsure if my words came out. I was so tired. I just wanted to sleep. I needed to sleep. Just for a little while more. Warmth suddenly filled my hand. I forced my swollen eyes to open. The light outside almost blinded me. Then a pair of blue eyes met mine . . . Mae.
My stomach fell when I saw she was crying. “Shh,” I wanted to say. I was not sure if I did. “I love you,” I wanted to tell her, but I did not know if my voice failed me.
I saw Mae’s mouth moving, but I could not hear everything she was saying. I thought I managed to reply to the words I picked out through the loud ringing in my ears. But it was not enough. Blackness had started to seep into my vision.
“Disobeyed . . . ” I said when Mae asked me what had happened. I tried to tell her what I did. But my thoughts did not come quickly, everything was delayed and too slow. “I think . . . I was . . . drugged . . . ” She said more, but I kept forgetting what Mae was saying; what I had said in response.
“ . . . I am dying, Mae . . . I want to be with our Lord . . . ”
Mae tried to fight for me. I tried to tell her it was too late. A sickening feeling rolled in my stomach. I tightened my grip on Mae’s hand as I tasted blood in my mouth. I coughed, feeling the coppery wetness fall down my chin. I heard Mae cry out. And I heard the sweet sound of my Lilah too. But the darkness kept creeping in, chasing away my vision.
I was so tired.
I closed my eyes, holding on to the sisters I loved unconditionally as I passed . . .
I let the darkness carry me away . . . I just wanted to die . . .
But in the dark, there had been glimpses of light. Quiet, unfamiliar voices talked to me, telling I was going to be safe. They cleaned me. As I fell in and out of consciousness, I felt like I was floating.
When I fully woke again, it was in a small room. There was a little window in the far wall, and I was on a mattress—it felt strange. It was not comfortable, but it was better than the one I had slept on for years.
I tried to move, but I was too weak. Sweat trickled down my neck; an almost unbearable heat cocooned my aching body.
Then a door opened and my breath caught in my throat. A man walked through. When he saw I was awake, he stopped in his tracks. He swallowed, and I watched with confusion, and a hint of apprehension, as his dark eyes began to fill with tears.
My heart raced in my chest. “You are free,” he said softly. Three words that stunned me into stillness. “You are no longer in the main commune. You were rescued from a cell. A friend found you and was able to get you out of the commune.”
The man placed a hand on his chest. “I am Brother Stephen. I have no desire to hurt you . . . no one will ever hurt you again . . . ”
*****
“I wanted to come back. I wanted to come back and get you all.” I inhaled, trying to keep my composure. “We planned to, when I was fit, to try and get you all out too . . . but then we got word of the massacre. Of the prophet dying . . . and I was told you were all gone. I”—my breath hitched—“I could not bear the pain.”
“Bella,” Mae said, sniffing. I looked down at the table; my hand had been covered by all three of my sisters’ hands.
Seconds of heavy silence passed. “I wanted to die in that cell. After Gabriel had tortured me so much, I just wanted to die.” I ducked my head. “I had always tried to be strong, I needed to protect you all . . . but I could not. It haunted me every time the disciple guards would come for you.” I turned to Maddie. “Especially you, sister. What he would do to you.”
“It is okay,” Maddie said bravely.
I shook my head, feeling the wave of ire returning. “It is not. None of it is okay. It was why I acted out. I just could not bear it any longer.” I swallowed and whispered, “It was foolish. I was foolish. It only made things worse.”
Silence stretched for a few moments, then Mae said, “It made things better, Bella.” I blinked away the mist of sadness from my eyes and looked at my sister. “Your death . . . ” Mae shrugged and tightened her hand on mine. “It changed everything for us. It set what would result in saving us into action.” Mae leaned forward and ran her hand down my cheek. “I found this home. I found Styx. It was the Hangmen who killed Prophet David.” Mae paused and I watched her expression fall.
“What is it?” I asked.
“All would have been right then, but then Rider . . . ”
I took a deep inhale. “He turned on these men . . . on you.”
None of my sisters responded. That was all the answer I needed.
Mae looked quickly toward the door, then leaned in closer. “Bella, he was wrong. What Rider did was wrong, but he let me go. He could have forced me to go with him . . . but in the end whatever goodness was left in his soul let me go.”
As I stared into my sister’s eyes, I saw something that completely broke my heart. I heard it in her soft voice. “He wanted you,” I said. “Rider . . . he wanted you.”
Mae sat back in her seat and I saw the discomfort in her worried expression. All the fight drained from my body. I had given him my heart. But he had only wanted Mae.
I removed my hand from under my sisters’ and brought it to my chest. Something inside was aching so much that I feared there was something wrong. “Bella,” Mae said softly.
I shook my head. “No,” I assured her. “I am fine.”
“You love him,” Maddie stated. My shattered heart still managed to pound. I opened my mouth to refute the claim, but my soul would not let me lie.
No. I do not know him . . . I do not love . . .
My shoulders sagged in defeat. I had fallen for a pretender.
Lilah wiped a tear from her face, the movement drawing my attention. She winced, the simple movement of lifting her arm causing her to flinch in pain.
“You are in pain,” I said and pointed to her stomach. Lilah blanched. She had always displayed her every emotion on her face. “Because of Rider,” I said, remembering the accusations her husband had yelled at me. I tried to remember exactly what he had said. My bottom lip trembled. “Rider allowed you to be taken by many men. Hurt and punished . . . it has left you unable to have a child.”
Lilah’s blue eyes closed and she took in a long breath. “I was with child, but I lost it.” Lilah’s lips pressed together and I knew she was fighting to hold back her tears. Maddie and Mae had their eyes cast down at the table. I struggled to cope with all that I was hearing. It never ended. The pain, the loss . . . it was never-ending. There was always more to come.
“I had to have surgery to help correct that,” Lilah said, her voice cracking a little at the end. I reached over the table and threaded my fingers through hers. Lilah cast a small smile at our joined fingers. “They took me. Rider sanctioned the kidnapping, but, Bella . . . ” Lilah paused, looking warily around, as if checking we were still alone. “I believe that Rider tried to stop the punishments. When we spoke, he begged me to comply . . . I believe he wanted to help me.”
I was frozen, unable to move. A shadow crossed Lilah’s face. “It was his brother, Judah, that caused me this pain. He was the master of that plan.”
“Rider told us he did not know this had happened to Lilah,” Mae told me. “He only believed that the Hangmen had come for her and killed his men. He said he did not know what those men had done to Lilah first.”
Silence fell. “And I believed him,” Maddie said.
I turned to my youngest sister. Maddie’s doe eyes were fixed on me, imploring me to listen. “When we were kidnapped, we all thought Rider had organized it.”
“But he had not?” I finished for her, trying to let all of this new information sink in. They had been kidnapped? Hurt?
My sisters . . . no . . .
“He let us go,” Mae added. “He had no knowledge of our capture. I saw it in his eyes, Bella. He no longer wanted us back. Something within him had changed. Gone was the prophet, and retur
ned was a hint of the Rider I had known as a friend.”
My conflicted thoughts and feelings became too much to bear, and I turned my head away. “Bella?” Maddie said, squeezing my hand. “Are you okay?”
I wanted to say yes, but instead I shook my head. Because I was not okay. I was very far from okay. “The man I met in the cell. Rider. He was the kindest, most caring man I have ever encountered. I . . . he helped me. We”—I sucked in a harsh breath and lifted my left hand—“we were married. I . . . we . . . ” I could not divulge the rest. I could not tell my sisters that the man who had caused them such pain was the man who had brought me nothing but healing.
I could not tell them that I had joined with him. And that for once in my life, I had welcomed it . . . it had meant something to me. It had meant everything to me.
But Mae whispered, “The ceremonial joining.” Her blue eyes widened.
“Yes,” I confessed. My hands shook. “I vowed myself to him . . . and he . . . ”
“Was he kind to you?” Lilah asked, concern thick in her tone. “Was he gentle, when he . . . ?”
“Yes,” I said and couldn’t stop a smile creeping onto my lips. “He was perfect.”
“He was pure when I knew him,” Mae told me. “He was saving himself for the Cursed marriage. He told me he never took part in a Lord’s Sharing. He had never had a woman.”
“He still had never.” I swallowed the lump of sadness in my throat. “He was pure. He . . . he has only been with me. I was it for him. And in every way that counts, he was it for me too.” I expelled a mirthless laugh. “I gifted him my trust and heart. I never thought I would ever be able to do that with anyone. But I did with him . . . and now I discover he was not the man I believed him to be.”
I stood and walked to the large window in the kitchen. It was black outside but for a few distant lights. I folded my arms over my chest, suddenly feeling cold.
“I am not so sure you are right,” Mae said.
I tensed, then looked at my sister, still seated at the table. Mae nervously glanced to my other two sisters and shifted on her chair. “Our husbands are blinded by their hatred of him for what he did to them. For what he allowed to happen to us, especially Lilah. But . . . ” She took a breath and continued, “In my heart I do not think he is a bad man. I have thought about this often, Bella. Rider was a good friend to me, and I believe that friendship was sincere, even though his later actions made it appear otherwise. For a time, I feared he was lost to the faith, but when he let us go, I saw the light within him shine through.” Mae sighed. “And today I saw that he had fully returned. Rider. Not Cain, but the man he was away from The Order. He brought you back to us. A bad man could not, would not, have done that.”
I let her words sink in. I tasted my falling tears on my lips. “I am so confused,” I admitted. “Too much has happened. I . . . I do not know what to think anymore . . . I . . . I . . . ”
The front door opened, and my heart fell when Mae’s love walked through. In the light, I saw him up close for the first time. He was tall and broad, with searching hazel eyes. His skin was covered with colored ink markings. He was terrifying to look at.
As if feeling my stare, he looked over at me, and I could feel him assessing me too. He shook his head in disbelief.
Mae went to his side. Despite our presence, Styx pulled her in for a heated kiss. I blushed at the sight. I knew then that this man was powerful. He took what he wanted, whenever he wanted it.
When he broke the kiss, he lifted his hands and communicated something to Mae. I saw my sister pale.
“No,” she said in shock. Styx stood stoic in response.
“What?” I asked.
“Can I tell her?” Mae asked. He nodded. Styx kept his eyes on me as Mae spoke. “Rider has informed Styx that The Order plan to attack us.”
My heart raced as I remembered the gun practice, the prophet arming our people for the end of days, the sermons of hate. “Yes,” I said. “Judah is preparing them for the end.”
Mae looked down at the floor. “So the Hangmen are going in first.” She paused, then added, “The Hangmen and Rider.”
White-hot fear surged through my veins. “No,” I whispered. “He will kill Rider. Judah, his twin . . . he will kill him.”
Styx shrugged, the action igniting a fire inside me. Without conscious thought I found myself rushing forward to where he stood. “Bella,” Mae called, reaching out for my arm. I wrenched it away from her touch.
Styx raised his eyebrow at me, crossing his arms over his chest. It only served to infuriate me more. “You have no idea,” I said, trying my hardest to control my overwrought emotions. “You have no idea what Judah has been doing to Rider for weeks and weeks. He has hurt him in every way possible. He cast him aside, severing any fraternal bond they might have once shared. And it broke Rider’s heart. His only family, the only person he has ever loved, tossed him aside because he tried to do the right thing.” My legs shook with anger, but I did not back down. “Rider killed a man when he finally witnessed a Lord’s Sharing. He went against all that he has ever known to stop what he just knew was wrong. He was the prophet, yet he stopped one of The Order’s most important practices. Do you know what that was like for him? No, you could not, because you did not live in that place. But I did. WE did!” Mae tried to reach for me again, but I faced her and shouted, “NO!”
Mae stepped back, and I turned to face Styx once more. “He risked everything to save me. I do not know how he did it, but he switched places with his brother to save me from being taken by him. He turned on his flesh and blood to save me and return me to my sisters. And now you send him back into their arms . . . they will kill him.”
I waited for Styx to speak, to say something. But all he did was run his tongue along his bottom lip and shrug. I reared back in shock. I looked at my sisters. Lilah and Maddie had their heads bowed, and Mae . . . Mae rocked on her feet, yet she said nothing.
“What kind of people are you?” I asked, feeling ice trickle down my spine.
Mae’s lover used his hands to communicate with her again. Mae paled further and shook her head. He worked his hands more insistently, and this time, Mae looked at me and said, “Styx wants me to tell you . . . tell you that you do not know Rider like you think you do. And that now you are here with us, you have no place with him. Rider will never be welcome here. Ever.”
I laughed. I laughed and laughed as I shook my head in disbelief. “Bella,” Mae said. She was upset by this sudden tension between her love and me, I could see it.
“No,” I said softly. “I just . . . I just need to sleep. I need to be alone.”
“We just got you back,” Maddie said, and my heart almost broke for my timid little sister.
“I know, sister,” I said. “But I cannot take all of this in. I am struggling to see how this life is different.” I met eyes with Styx again. “To me it appears that you have simply exchanged one controlling environment for another. I am worried that you are not free here at all. You have simply been given a greater cage in which to roam.”
My words were like a trigger to Mae’s lover. His face reddened with barely suppressed rage. Mae took hold of his arm and made him face her. She put her hands on his cheeks, and he closed his eyes, breathing in deeply. Her touch seemed to calm the man down.
“Maddie,” Mae said. “Please show Bella your old room. She can rest there.”
Maddie took my hand. I let her lead me away, up wooden stairs to a bedroom. Maddie hovered by the door as I walked to the bed and sat down. I let my eyes drift around the pretty furnishings, then out of the large window that overlooked a grass verge.
“Bella,” Maddie finally said. I looked at my sister. Her head was down and her hands were clasped in front of her. “I just . . . I just want you to be happy.”
My heart shattered at her words, because I knew that she meant it. Maddie had the kindest heart I had ever known.
“I know you do.”
Movement fro
m the window caught my eye, and I saw a large dark figure emerge from the trees. My stomach flipped. He was the most terrifying man I had ever seen. “Someone is coming,” I announced. Maddie sighed.
“That will be Flame. He never leaves me for long.”
“That is your husband?”
Maddie nodded, and I saw her happiness light her from inside. “Yes. He is the one I love. He is the other half of my soul.”
Flame stopped below the window and stared up at me. He looked to my side, and his lip curled into the beginnings of a smile. Maddie. Maddie had moved beside me.
My sister pressed a kiss to my cheek and walked toward the door. I dropped my head, feeling an ache begin to throb behind my eyes.
“Bella?”
“Yes?”
“I do not know much about matters of the heart. But I know what it is like to harbor feelings for a man people greatly disapprove of. Who people regard as wrong, unsalvageable or sinful.” Maddie blushed. “But I also know what it is like when you are in their arms. In their hearts. It is different. You can make them different . . . you can show them that they too can be saved, even when they believe they are a lost cause.” Maddie looked me directly in the eyes. “I know what Rider has done is bad. And I can see how much of a toll all this has been on you. But . . . but I do not believe he is evil. He may be lost, confused . . . but I believe he can be saved. You, Bella. You can save him. You have that ability.”
“MADDIE!” I jumped as a loud roar of my sister’s name came from below the window.
Maddie smiled. “I must go.”
Maddie disappeared out of sight. I realized that gone was my timid little broken girl. In her place was a grown and strong woman. One that had just shaken my world.
Chapter Fourteen
Bella
I lay down on the bed and tried to close my eyes. The hours ticked by. I tried to find sleep, but it did not come. All I could think of was Rider. I needed to speak to him. I needed to hear all this from him.
The bedroom door creaked open. In the moonlight, I saw Mae enter the room. I sat up as she padded silently to my bed. Without speaking, she handed me a key. I frowned as I took it from her hand.