“Bastard! Can’t his witch handle that?”
“Selene Fairchild!” she scolds me, hands on her hips. “Lori is a sweetheart. She doesn’t deserve your ire.”
She’s right. Father’s wife is indeed everything a councilman’s wife should be—beautiful, elegant, well-read. Practically perfect in every way. Apart from the one thing I’ll never get over. She marriedhim.
“Well, she must be a saint to have married our father. That, or incredibly stupid.”
“Selene…”
“Kat…” I mimic her stance. She sticks her tongue out at me, and I mimic that, too. Being older doesn’t mean I’m more mature.
We both burst into laughter and embrace again.
“I really have missed you,” I sigh.
“I bet! But you know I couldn’t miss your birthday.”
As if I could ever forget I share my birth with that cursed day. “There’s nothing to celebrate.”
“Of course there is,” she insists. “You’re turning twenty-four! And I’m not letting you get away with locking yourself up on the ranch again. Besides, tomorrow’s the big day. Everyone in town’s already buzzing.”
My smile withers. “The Day of Blood and Silk?”
Kat frowns. “You don’t have to say it like that. It’s supposed to be acelebration.”
“So they say.”
The Bloodmoon Offering. A “blessing” that only comes once every two years. They carry girls dressed in crimson and white to the lake’s edge like royalty. Their prayers rise with the mist, sending the people into a religious frenzy, clapping, crying, singing. As if sacrifice were something sacred.
But I know what waits in the silence beyond the veil. I’ve seen the truth no one dares speak aloud. No gilded carriage can disguise that, not once you know.
There is no glory in being chosen. Only fire. Only ash. Only bone.
“Ugh, you’re such a buzzkill! Now, I’ve come all this way, and I’m starving. Is that Miss Mable’s famous stew?!” Her eyes light up, and I nod.
“Yes. There’s some on the stove if you want.”
And just like that, she’s bounding into the house.
Later, we sit at the small dining table beside the kitchen.
“Miss Mable really does know how to cook,” Kat sighs happily, then takes the cup of tea I pour her. “Your tea tastes… different. Not your usual peppermint and ginger.”
“It’s a new brew,” I tell her.
She smiles, “I like it,” she says, lifting the cup again.
“Where is everyone, by the way? You’re not running a ranch this size all by yourself, are you?”
“I sent them home early,” I say, shaking my head. “Tomorrow’s an important day.” My smile falters as a sharp pulse of pain flares along my back.
Mother was the only one who believed me when I told them what I saw—what happened that night. She begged the Council to investigate. Instead, they called it blasphemy. Said I was confused. Imaginative.
For my “healing,” they sentenced me to a year of atonement.
Sometimes I wonder if they were right. If I imagined it all.
But every other spring, when the scar burns hot beneath my skin, just like tonight, I remember.
