Father appeared beside Mother, kneeling beside her. “How are you feeling, darling?” He placed the back of his hand against her cheek. “Warm.”
Mother laid a hand on Father’s knee gently. “Gideon, I’m fine.” She turned her head to look up at me. “Does he want you to visit him?”
“I … I think so.” The specters appeared day after day at twilight. If I walked near the carriage, they gestured inside. I’d never once stepped foot in it since that first night it had brought me home.
“She should go visit him,” said Father. “It’s rude of her not to. He ought to be able to see her.”
“Gideon, no.” Mother cupped Father’s cheek in her hand. “How many times have I told you? You can’t rush these things. Let her be.”
It was odd how I’d finally gotten a man of my own as she wanted, and here she was, the only one to counsel patience. I ran the chisel over Arrow’s wooden rump too hard, nicking it. Tossing the figure and the chisel down on the ground in frustration, I sighed and cradled my knees against my chest.
“Aubree—”
Mother put her finger over Father’s mouth to stop him. “Go tell them she’s not coming today.”
He may not have been compelled to follow her orders, but he did anyway. I poked my head out from my knees. “Thank you.”
Mother pulled one of my hands away from my knees to squeeze it. She cradled her wooden lily with her other fingers. “I just want you to be happy. I need to know you’re happy.”
Would I ever be happy again? “Don’t.” I squeezed her back and did my best to smile. “Don’t talk like that.”
Mother pulled her hand out of mine and placed it over her wooden flower. We sat quietly for a moment. The specters crawled back into the carriage, never once opening their mouths to respond to Father. The driver flicked his wrists, and the horses turned around by crossing the grass. They’d done that so often over the past few months, the lilies were crushed and broken in that small patch of grass in front of our home.
“Noll,” said Mother, her voice quiet. She coughed a few times. “Let love find you.”
“It did.” I clutched my knees even tighter. “And I don’t want it.” Not from anyone but Jurij.
Mother patted the flower in her lap. “I won’t rush you. It’s not fair that it took so long for love to find you. You haven’t had enough of a chance to get used to it.”
“You mean like Elfriede got used to Jurij?” Until she tires of him. If she hasn’t already.
Mother nodded weakly. “You were right, you know. She used to be so cold to him. One day, she stood inside the house, helping me wipe the dishes. She looked out the window in the kitchen, at you two running off to play beyond the hills. When she saw you whap him across the side with your tree branch—”
“Elgar.”
Mother smiled. “Right. She asked me, ‘What if I never Return Jurij’s love? What if he’s doomed to walk around with his face hidden forever? What if I send him to the commune?’”
So I was right. She only forced herself to fall in love so she wouldn’t feel guilty.
With a grunt, Mother placed her wooden flower in my lap. “I told her that love, even when you didn’t expect to find it, can prove a beautiful thing.”
And what of the love that never came from where you hoped to find it?
Father kneeled down beside Mother, sliding his arm around her back. I carefully set the wooden lily beside my attempt at a dog and did the same, reaching across her shoulders to support her other side. Father grimaced as I did; he probably hoped to support his goddess all on his own. I wasn’t sorry to disappoint him.
The three of us walked across the knoll and back into the house, a distance that might have taken either Father or I a tenth of the time on our own. Neither of us minded the pace, though, and for once, it was peaceful, with the tepid breeze that rustled the lilies all around us.
I tucked a strand of golden hair behind Mother’s ear just as we reached the door. Father nodded toward it. “Open that, will you?”
As I did so, I got a fairly good view of the figure seated at our table, lit by the small lantern on the table before him. His hand, still clutching the lantern, trembled.
“Luuk? Jurij isn’t here. He and Elfriede—”
“It’s Nissa.” Luuk’s muffled voice was shakier than ever. “Her mother’s dead.”
***
Mother was the last one living. The illness had claimed the lives of three women in the village, one by one.
And because life without a goddess is apparently too much for men to handle, three men died shortly thereafter. Vanished, out of grief. Poor Nissa had no one left but Luuk, and because she was his goddess, Mistress Tailor decided to let her live with them.
Because she was his goddess. I need to see him. I need to ask him to save Mother. It was ridiculous. What would I do, command the lord to save her? Why would he be able to save her? But you have to try.