“So I tell her that she needs to allow me to attempt to convert her,” I begin, the words heavy and clumsy, like I’ve just learned to speak. “To avoid punishment?”
Renault stills, the tendons in his neck suddenly standing out. His jaw grinds and my stomach flips. “Yes, Ophelia,” he finally says. “It’s not that complicated, is it?”
“No,” I reply, meek, staring at the light golden-green liquid in my teacup. “No, I just wanted to make sure I understood.”
“Good,” he replies, leaning back, that easy posture returned to his broad shoulders. “Let me know how it goes during your visit tomorrow.”
I fiddle with my half-eaten slice of dried peach. My throat feels tight, my eyes sharp with tears waiting to be shed. I swallow and dig my fingernails into my palm. Justonce, I wish I could be strong, sure, filled with the spirit of my Lord’s grace. I yearn for Saintess Lucia’s statue in the garden and the cold marble floor of the Foundling’s Chapel and the bite of the flail.
“I actually might be seeing her again tonight,” I offer, nibbling on the fruit. I taste nothing. “She needs to bathe to prevent infection. I know she is our enemy, but I volunteered to be present, to protect her modesty. The knights will need to approve, of course.”
Every blood vessel in my body pounds, shame curling around my ankles and dragging me down. I do not know how Renault will react, and I do not know why I volunteered these words to him, why I am always regretting whatever comes out of my mouth in his presence. A shuddering breath escapes me as I look down at the shimmering stone courtyard. A dull-faced weed grows through a crack, defying the godly order of the space.
“An excellent idea,” Renault says, his tone enthused. I look up, daring to smile, just a little. My betrothed gazes at me with a pleased expression on his handsome face. “She’ll be in a vulnerable position. You can show her your own vulnerability in that moment, and it will feel like a genuine exchange of intimacy. Wonderful work, Ophelia.”
The praise dances across my skin like the first spring day after a long, hard winter. I cling to it with both hands, my fingers scrabbling and desperate. “I’m so glad you think so,” I say, feeling the apples of my cheeks redden with heat.
Renault finishes his meal, sopping up the remaining spiced oil with a chunk of bread. “Well, I’ll need to ensure the rest of theknights go along with our little plan,” he says, beaming at me. “Why don’t you run off to the gardens for a little bit? I believe Carina is eager for your assistance wrangling the blackberry harvest.”
At this moment, I want only to abandon my fiancé and the rest of my meal—no matter the pangs of hunger in my stomach—for the safety of the gardens and my dearest friend. How I wish to scramble to my feet, childlike, and run for the brambles, my hair streaming behind me, a gold silk banner.
Instead, as I must, I demur. “Oh, are you sure?” I ask, dabbing at the corner of my mouth with a handkerchief pulled from my pockets. “Is there no more work you need assistance with in the Sanctum?”
“Not today, my lovely Ophelia,” he replies, getting to his feet. “Run along now. I’ll send a page with news of the knights’ decision as soon as I know.”
Apprehension twists low in my gut, and I swallow down something sour. “Yes, Renault,” I reply, lowering my gaze as he presses a chaste kiss to the top of my head. Then he is gone, his tall frame disappearing behind the sweeps and angles of the Libris Sanctum’s dark stone. A long exhale unhinges itself from my mouth, as if I’ve been holding my breath without even realizing it.
“Anything else, Miss?” comes a voice from my elbow.
I startle and turn, only to see Alta—the kitchen maid—hovering beside my table. “Oh, no,” I reply with a nervous, inelegant wave of my hand. “Thank you so much, Alta.”
My fellow foundling studies me, her gaze drifting to the path Renault has taken off the terrace. Then she smiles. “Of course, Ophelia,” she replies in a low voice. She glances in each direction and, finding no one paying us any mind, leans closer. “I’m so happy for you. Not just a noble fiancé, but of the House Amadeus? And so very handsome, too? How wonderful.”
Her tone is genuine, her eyes light, and Alta means nothing but kindness—yet her words land on me heavy as millstones. How fortunate I am to have been Spared, how unfairly lucky to have been born with this face and this body—excluding my leg, of course.
I thank her, stacking Renault’s plate with mine, but all I feel is a pit at the bottom of my stomach. A girl like Alta should be in my place. Surely she’s never lusted over a fellow woman or claimed to remember nothing of her dead, blasphemous mother or wished to be glorified for her intelligence.
“Take care,” Alta says with a broad smile before heading back to the kitchens.
I stand before the guilt can drag me to the ground, though I find myself unsteady even with my cane. A cold breeze tears through the courtyard, bringing with it the sharp scent of the sea.
I should go to my room and change out of this pretty day dress. But the call of penance will sing too loudly—that clear-headed relief of pain and torn flesh, the comfort of the flail’s worn handle between my fingers. No, I’ll go straight to the gardens, borrow an apron from the potter’s shed, and be sure to mind the blackberries as I work.
I am already mottled with enough stains, I think.
By the time I reach the blackberry brambles, the sun is beginning to break through the cloud cover. Carina is there, her hair tied back with a faded scarf, picking berries at double the pace of the novices, who generally seem to be more focused on giggling and whispering to each other. Anni ago, one of us might have sternly corrected them—reminded them oftheir vow to the First Son, to the holy path they are meant to walk.
But now, with Carina and I both in our third decades, something in us has softened. The novices are just girls, and so we allow them to giggle and gossip and sometimes even cry, supplementing their gathering baskets with our own pickings so nothing is amiss. I wanted to take the divine cloth, once—wanted to make my novice’s vows at ten and six. I know how difficult the road is for our sacred young women. I will not begrudge them a moment’s levity among the blackberries, half-drunk on early autumn sunlight.
“Carina,” I murmur in greeting as I fall in beside her, reaching into the thick dark of the bushes.
“Ophelia.” She beams at me, pausing her picking for a moment, the lines around her eyes crinkling. “I’m sorry to make a plea for your return so quickly. I know you’re excited about Renault’s newest research.”
“No, no,” I reply, the words punctuated by the thudding of berries into my basket. “I’m happy you did.”
Carina pauses, her hands gone still as she looks up at me. That is the danger of kindred spirits, I suppose—there is no hiding. “What’s wrong?” she asks, her arms crossed now. “Oh, of course, you don’thaveto talk about it. Only if you want to. I’m here whenever you’re ready.”
My throat constricts as my chest warms pleasantly. I tell myself to say nothing, driving a blackberry thorn into the fat pad of my thumb, as if the pain might hold me to the promises I’ve made. But I am adrift in a sea of strange, terrifying longing for things I should not even want in the first place, and I cannot stop myself from clambering onto the sun-kissed rocks of Carina’s shoreline.
