Maud shut Pierre’s bible. She tried not to let the drops of tears fall onto the thin pages. Her apron was soaked through from them.

  All she wanted was one day without crying. One day. Since Draka left, it was getting harder not to cry with each passing moment. Now, to the rivers with Pierre, she had another reason. How could they do that to such a good man?

  The anger came shortly after. Not at the men who crucified Jesus, but at her own village. At her uncle, at Balthazar, at Dalfur—even Aunt Leta and Greg for not stopping them—all of them for trying to crucify her father and Draka. He may speak of forgiveness, but she didn’t know if she had it in her heart to forgive them for what they did, for what they wanted to do.

  She shook more tears from her eyes. Sorrow and frustration were all she seemed to feel anymore.

  ‘Woman, why weepest thou?’ His voice sounded so distant in her ear, as if spoken into a cup when she remembered it.

  She blinked and rubbed at her eyes and her wet face. Wait, had she seen that somewhere? She reopened the bible and began skimming through Matthew again. Well, rereading Matthew after the first few pages became garbles of letters for her.

  No, she slammed the big book closed with a huff, not there. With a growl, she leaned back in her chair.

  For a bit, she stared at the door. At any moment, Pierre will knock—because he is always too polite or self-conscious or whatever to just come in even though he knows he’s expected—and explain what she was supposed to understand about that story. Only, it didn’t feel like a story the way the books of Judges, Ruth, and both Samuels did. It felt like something different. The way it might feel if she were to write about what happened the night of the storm…

  Maud pursed her brow at the book. She wanted more. Draka is God’s Paladin. Jehovah’s Paladin. And what she saw him do, what he had done for her family—he healed her parents the night the village attacked them, healed her of her shaking and colorblindness, healed her mother again of the wounds Lilith gave her—were nothing short of miracles. There was no other way of explaining it. Just like Jesus of Nazareth.

  Right?

  She wanted more. Her fingers played across the coarse hardened leather cover of the bible as if she were being tempted into sin. Only, it wasn’t that kind of temptation. What could possibly be in the next book? She flipped it open to the end of Matthew, to the beginning of Mark. Will it be about Jesus and the Disciples teaching the world how to be caring, humble, and kind, in the name of the Father?

  Father. The word resonated with her. She missed him. More than anything but her brother, she missed her Pa. And throughout all of the story, Jesus called God, ‘Father.’ Prepare for ‘Father’s kingdom.’ She liked that. It warmed her. If only she could have sacrificed herself to see Pa again.

  “Alright,” Maud leaned forward.

  Does Jesus get to see his Father again? Will the disciples be visited by God and given the same powers as Draka for their faith…other than that one who betrayed him—what was his name? Right, Judas—of course. And what about the Marys? Will they also go out and tell the good news? Maud was getting excited. She found the beginning of Mark and ran her finger along the first lines.

  She sharply growled, “It’s the same thing all over again?”

  She wasn’t sure her heart could take that punishment again. Especially if it had how Jesus was murdered at the end. And yet, she continued reading. And reading. And reading.

  Stolen novel; please report.

  Her mother slid the bedroom door opened and pulled the blanket wrapped around her tighter.

  Maud sunk into her chair. She didn’t mean to wake her. As much as she wanted her to be up and about, she also could see how sickly she became.

  Aurelie’s skin was sallow and pale, her lips cracked, and her body obviously thinned even though she kept it covered by her blanket. She looked near death.

  “I didn’t mean to wake you,” Maud hunched over as if strained by the mistake.

  “It’s alright,” Aurelie kissed the top of Maud’s head as she went for the jug of water and poured herself a cup. She sat down in her old chair across from her. “It’s getting late, you should have started the hearth for dinner by now.”

  Maud shot her mother a glare. She grabbed the bible and stood with a rub of the chair across the floor. Without another word, she went outside and slammed the door behind her.

  The sun was going down. The hearth did need to be lit and the vegetables and cured meat prepared. But to have her, of all people, remind her? She wanted to rake her nails on her face.

  ‘Honor thy father and thy mother,’ Jesus had said as if it were equal to ‘thou shalt not murder.’ She pinched her arm and looked up toward the sky, toward the heavens, toward God, and Jesus at His right hand. Then she hung her head in shame.

  She hesitated. She didn’t want to go back in, to apologize. She still felt that she was right. How dare her mother criticize her for that? She’s done nothing for months other than sleep. Nothing! All the while Maud had to clean and cook, both here and at Draka’s.

  She swept, she stirred, she cut, she washed, she did everything that her mother did and then some. If she knew how or when, she’d have begun reaping the wheat field that was overgrowing with weeds that poked through the rolling waves of green and yellow, too. She was doing everything that her mother, her brother, her father, all did, by herself, and Aurelie’s first sentence to her today was essentially, ‘Why haven’t you done this, too?’

  Maud gritted her teeth. She huffed and roared. Finally, she left the bible on the porch and threw the door open.

  Maud didn’t know what she expected, but her mother leaning her head downward, staring blankly at the table as if her own soul had departed from her, leaving the shell of body behind, was not it. Her eyes were red, but there were no tears.

  Aurelie was picking at the wood grain of the table with fingers whose nails were cracked and brittle. Her wrists—Maud tried not to gasp—they were so thin that the joints of her bones were poking through. The only color on her was the redness. Red where her fingers had been scraped by the wood, snatching a few splinters on the way. Red on the tip of her nose. The red veins in her tired eyes.

  A few times, Aurelie’s lips moved, but nothing came out. Maud didn’t even try. She waited.

  “I didn’t mean to…”

  Maud interrupted, “You did.”

  Aurelie’s neck tensed. The blanket slid from her thin shoulder and she hurriedly brought it back up again. “I only wanted…”

  How would Jesus handle this? How would Draka handle it? “I’m glad you’ve started coming out more,” Maud crossed her arms from the doorway. “I do miss you. But don’t criticize me for not doing your chores. I deserve better than that.”

  Aurelie slowly nodded. Another brittle fingernail split as she picked at a knot in the grain.

  Silence hung between them, thick as mud and hard as rock. Maud watched her mother, a skeleton with thin blonde hair and eyes nearly as pale as her skin. For the first time, her mother was unmistakably older. Aged by her grief, by her self-inflicted starvation.

  “I’m sorry,” Aurelie whispered.

  “Me too,” Maud grinned. “I got caught up with reading and didn’t realize it got so late.”

  She grabbed the bible from the porch and set it on the table on her way to light the hearth.

  “Tell me,” Aurelie stopped picking long enough to look up to Maud, her face still drooping with sorrow.