History of a goddess

“Go on,” she says, shooing the schoolgirls away. “Enough chatter.”

They scamper away in a swirl of too-bright colors, their faces aglow. In contrast, Amma looks exhausted, hair tied tightly back, dark circles beneath her eyes. I know she must have been up since before sunrise hanging and cutting meat. I pull out the measly trout to place on her scale.

“Long day?” Her hands are already moving to wrap the fish in paper.

I smile at her as best I can. “It’ll be better in the spring.” Amma’s my best friend in the world, but even she doesn’t know how bad things have gotten for Papa and me. If she knew that I was about to be bled, she’d pity me—or worse, offer to help. I don’t want that. She has enough troubles.

She gives me a bloodstained hour-coin for the fish and adds a strip of dried meat as a gift for me. When I accept them, she doesn’t take her hand from mine. “I was hoping you’d come by today,” she says, her voice lower now. “There’s something I need to tell you.”

Her fingers are icy and her tone too serious. “What?” I say, trying to keep my voice light. 

“Has Jacob finally asked you to run away with him?” Jacob is a local boy whose obvious crush on Amma has been the subject of our jokes for years.

She shakes her head and doesn’t smile. “I’m leaving the village,” she says, still gripping my hands tightly. “I’m going to work at Everless. They’re hiring servants to help with preparations for the wedding.” She smiles uncertainly.

The smile slips from my own face and cold spills through my chest. “Everless,” I repeat after her numbly.

“Jules, I’ve heard they’re paying a year on the month.” Her eyes are bright now. “A whole year! Can you imagine?”

A year they’ve stolen from us,I think.

“But . . .” My throat is tight. Most of the time, I try to hold the memories of Everless, of my childhood, at bay. But Amma’s face, full of hope, is bringing it all back to me in a flood—the labyrinthine halls, the sweeping lawn, Roan’s smile. Then, the memory of flames burns everything else away. My mouth suddenly tastes bitter.

“Haven’t you heard the rumors?” I ask. Her smile falters, and I pause, hating to puncture her happiness. But I can’t take the words back, so I plow on instead. “That they’re only hiring girls. Pretty women. The elder Lord Gerling treats servants like toys, right under his wife’s nose.”

“That’s a risk I’ll have to take,” she says softly. Her hands fall from mine. “Alia is going too, and Karina—her husband is gambling away their time.” I can see the anger in her eyes—Karina is like a mother to her, and it enrages Amma to watch her suffer. “No one has work. Everless is the only real chance I’ve got, Jules.”

I want to argue further, to convince her that the fate of an Everless girl is thankless and degrading, that they all just become the title without a name of their own, but I can’t. Amma’s right—those who serve the Gerlings are compensated well, at least by Crofton’s standards, though the blood-irons they’re paid are taken—stolen—from people like Amma, me, and Papa.

But I know what it is to be hungry, and Amma doesn’t share my hatred of the Gerlings, or my knowledge of their cruelty. So I smile at Amma as best I can.

“I’m sure it’ll be wonderful,” I say, hoping she doesn’t hear the doubt in my voice.

“Just think, I’ll see the Queen with my own eyes,” she gushes. While Papa secretly scorns the Queen, in most families, she is little less than a goddess. She might as well be a goddess: she’s been alive since the time of the Sorceress. When blood-iron spread through everyone’s veins, invaders descended from other kingdoms. The Queen, then the head of the Semperan army, crushed them, and has been ruling ever since.

***Download NovelToon to enjoy a better reading experience!***