"Doesn't mean they'll care," he said, finally releasing me. "It only means they'll know I took their wives from them. They'll be sure I'm the enemy - because I am."
"No," I said. "We're simply surviving, Tobias."
"And killing them in the process."
We were almost in bed when the lights dimmed, warning they'd go out soon. When Tobias turned toward me, I pressed closer, hugging him while we were lying on our sides. That was how we fell asleep - and how we woke when the real morning came.
But the lack of sleep took its toll. Both of us were moving slowly, so when he suggested getting breakfast in the dining hall, I agreed readily. Only part of it was because I wanted to hear what others thought had happened.
Linked on his arm, we were halfway there when a girl called my name. I paused, looking back to see who'd recognized me, and found Zuriah running toward me.
"Mrs. Warren!" she called again, slowing only when she was close enough to merely walk fast. "I'm sorry, Mr. Warren, but Mrs. Worthington wanted me to give a message to your wife." Then she looked at me. "Juness Chatham was lost last night."
Juness? I'd met her in the laundry, like so many other wives. She'd been worried about surviving long enough to escape, and now she was gone? Dead? There was no way Zuriah meant that, did she?
Before I could ask, Tobias did. "Lost?" He sounded confused.
I could feel my head turning from side to side as if I could somehow negate this. "Not Juness. Zuriah, how did she pass?"
"Her..." Zuriah glanced at Tobias nervously, then lowered her voice even more. "Her husband took too long responding. He was demoted. He punished her for delaying him, but when she didn't get up..." Her eyes jumped to Tobias again, then back to me. "He called for assistance, but Mrs. Worthington said her pupils were not responding."
"Brain damage," I said, mostly for Tobias. "He beat her to death?"
"Callah!" Zuriah hissed, looking at Tobias one more time, but this time was as if she was reminding me he was there.
"Go," Tobias told me. "The women need you, Callah. I'll bring something back so you'll have a meal."
"Thank you," I said, clasping his arm before I caught Zuriah's arm and turned her away. "Does everyone know?"
"We're telling as many as we can," she assured me. "Ms. Lawton has all the younger wives collecting the rest. Most are asking for a knitting needle or crochet hook because we know what that means now. I just... You said your husband..."
"Respects me," I told her. "A husband's place is to care for his wife. A woman's place is to care for all. He understands that and is proud I can help. Now, when did this happen?"
"I don't know," Zuriah admitted. "It was sometime after the alarm, but I don't know when. I do know Mrs. Worthington treated her in the infirmary. She just..." The girl's lower lip slipped into her mouth as if she was ready to choke up. "Callah, she didn't make it! It wasn't a child that killed her. It was her husband's own fault."
"I know," I said just as we reached the women's facilities.
My anger was rising. Juness hadn't been a friend to me, but she'd been kind. She'd cared. She'd also been worried, and that made something hot and hard burn in my chest. This was more than anger.
I didn't have a word for it, but I had a feeling this was what had driven Ayla. This fire was impossible to ignore. It demanded I do something, but what? I couldn't save the woman, not now that she was already dead, and I refused to cry. That accomplished nothing.
So I kept my tone civil and told Zuriah, "This is why I help, okay? It's why you come to me any time you're injured, and - "
I stopped hard just inside the door - because there wasn't room to move! Normally, there were a handful of women in here at a time. I always saw faces I couldn't put a name to, but right now, the entire room was packed. Some women had laundry with them. Others made no effort to pretend they were here to work. All of them were facing inward, riveted by what was going on near the sinks.
"Let Callah in," Mrs. Worthington called, lifting her hand to wave me forward.
"I just heard," I said as I wove through the people. "What's going on?"
But it was Miriam Lawton who answered. "As of today, we are done. They cannot claim we are so necessary that they must wed us younger than ever before, then claim we're so worthless that our lives do not matter!"
"Yeah!" women grumbled all around me.
"And from now on," Mrs. Worthington said, "I will treat any women who need assistance in the infirmary."
"I will treat anyone who needs it in my suite," I said. "Until such time as I have need of it, my nursery is serving as a healing area for women - with my husband's consent."
"What?" someone gasped.
