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Darkness takes me.

As we pull away, Marrow Ridge burns behind us—faith reduced to material again, hymn erased by flame—and something settles into place inside my chest that has nothing to do with relief.

Selah didn’t save me the way people mean when they say save.

She put her hands on the thing that owned me and tore its claim out by the root.

She burned the crown.

And now, whatever I am—whatever survived that room—doesn’t belong to the Iron Gospel anymore.

Which means it belongs to me.

And I don’t yet know how to carry that without her.

XLII

Back to Basics

Days Later

Cass doesn’t tell me what they did to her.

She moves like someone who’s already decided her body is private territory. She changes behind closed doors now. She flinches when I reach too fast—not away from me, just…inward, like she’s folding something delicate and sharp where I can’t cut myself on it.

I don’t ask.

Not because I don’t want to know.

Because I can feel the edges of it pressing against the air when she breathes, and I understand—deep in my bones—that whatever she carries won’t survive being named aloud yet.

Or maybe she won’t.

So we circle each other instead.

We cook. We clean. We mend things that don’t matter. We talk about weather that doesn’t change and supplies we don’t need and plans that feel like placeholders for a future that hasn’t decided whether it wants us.

At night, I hear her pacing.

She moves slow and careful, like every step belongs to a count she’s afraid to finish.

The farm keeps time the way it always has. Dawn comes thin and pale. The animals don’t wander far. The silence feels…managed. Like if we don’t touch it too hard, it won’t collapse into something louder.

It breaks on the fourth morning—not loudly, but softly—standing beneath the shade tree beside a grave that never settled right, where the one person who ever made this place feel like home is learning how to rest without us.

The dirt still looks wrong. Not fresh enough to excuse itself, not old enough to pretend it belongs there. Like the ground tried to accept her and stopped halfway through. I press the toe of my boot into it without meaning to, just to feel something give, and the soil caves too easily. Scarlett always hated uneven ground. Said it made her ankles ache before the rest of her even knew to complain.

Cass stands a few feet back. Not beside me. Not touching. Close enough to count as present, far enough to be safe from whatever might spill if I turn my head too fast. She hasn’t said much since we came back. She eats when reminded. Sleeps in fragments. Keeps her hands busy like stillness might pull her under if she lets it.

I don’t look at her yet.

The tree’s leaves whisper overhead, a dry, polite sound that has nothing to do with mourning. Sunlight filters through in broken pieces, catching on the rough wood of the marker, the small offerings we couldn’t bring ourselves to move—Scarlett’s bandana folded twice, a chipped mug turned on its side because she always said upright cups invited dust. The house watches from behind us, windows dull and patient, pretending this is just another morning it survived.

My chest tightens, just enough to remind me that breathing is still a choice.

“You left.” The words come out quieter than I mean them to, which somehow makes them worse.

Cass doesn’t answer right away.