“I really am twenty-six,” I said sidestepping the body question. “Do you know where my brother is?”
He dropped another bale, glanced over at Pony, who was nibbling at grass just a few feet away from us. “He claimed House Gray several years ago and requested positions among the histories and libraries in other Houses.”
“What does that mean?”
“He’s House Gray, and works in one-year contracts for other Houses. The last House he worked for was House Silver.”
“Vice?” Silver was the House that dealt with entertainment, drugs, sex, and any other pleasure humanity could think up.
I cut the string on the last bale. “Has he been in contact with you?”
“That’s difficult to answer.”
“Yesornoshould work.” I stabbed a few flakes of hay off the bale and tossed them to one side, inhaling the sweet, dusty green scent as it drifted up from around my boots.
Pony made another soft sound, easing a little closer.
“Yes.”
“But?”
He was silent as he broke open another bale.
“But?” I repeated waving the pitchfork his way.
“Your brother has a certain . . . intensity,” he said eyeing the tines of my pitchfork. “It seems to run in the family. The last few messages from him have lacked that.”
“Can messages be forged?”
“This is the modern age, Matilda. Everything can be forged.” He scooped up a handful of hay, then walked slowly toward Pony, his hands low.
I set the tines in the ground and leaned one elbow on the handle. “And my mother’s message?”
“We didn’t wait to disprove it. I left the moment it came over the transom. Before any other House could intercept it.”
“So it might not be real?”
He stopped an arm’s length from Pony and held out the hay. Pony nibbled at dirt, trying not to look interested even though its eye was locked on his offering.
“Might not. And yet here you are,” he said. “Just as she said. And here is your farm—your father’s farm. Just as she said. As real as can be.”
Pony raised its head, and Abraham leaned away from the horn and lifted his hand so Pony could wrap its lips around the hay. He ran his other hand down Pony’s neck.
The man looked as comfortable out here as a frog in a puddle.
“Could I see it?” I asked. “My mother’s message?” It came out a little softer than I’d meant.
The look that crossed his face—kindness and regret—was more than I knew how to deal with.
“Or not,” I said. “It’s fine. This is enough for Pony. Let’s go.”
I strode to the truck, tossed the pitchfork in the back, and got behind the wheel.
Abraham gave Pony one more pat, then propped the pitchfork over his shoulder and sauntered back to the truck. He put the pitchfork in the back and got in.
“I’ll show you her message,” he said. “When we get to House Gray. I promise.”
“Thank you.” I started the engine and drove through the falling dusk.
