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He grimaces, his hands moving in a steady rhythm as he milks a goat. His voice comes out low, distant. “There is nothing else up there, Amyrah.”
“But you’re wrong. I saw it as clearly as I see you now. It wasn’t black at all, but the purest blue imaginable. It felt as though it went on forever.” He refuses to look at me, flaring my frustration. “You may not have witnessed it, but I’m sure others did if they were at the ceremony.”
He rests an elbow on a knee, staring at the straw beneath his feet. “Amyrah ...” He rubs his face. The nanny goat bleats impatiently.
I rush forward, kneeling at his feet and clutching his arm. “Don’t you see what this means? This darkness is just a passing thing.”
His hand falls as he considers me in my sphere of light. “Fine. Let’s say you are right, and it is not something that continues forever. What can you possibly do about it?”
I draw back, his bluntness smarting. His shoulders rise and fall with his steadying breaths, and he closes his eyes. I swallow back my anger. This can’t end like our last argument.
“You think I’m only going to get myself hurt,” I whisper, “but inside I’m gasping for light. Real light. Every time I see it, my soul craves more. I can’t sit back and watch people stumble around in darkness, or what they think is light.”
He sits up straight and rests his palms on his knees, sighing deeply. His gentle eyes find mine. “I know.”
My stomach unknots itself.
The milking completed, I pick up the pail and step into the warm Zomré morning. Father follows close behind.
“I am going to Utsanek again today,” he says, heading toward the lean-to along the sheds. He bends and lifts the handles of the small wooden cart. “We need fresh feed for the goats. A few of them will be kidding soon.” The cart bounces out of its ruts and onto the packed dirt path. Father smiles at me. “Should we go together?”
“I’d love that. Let me get some things together.”
I screw the lid on the milk pail and climb down to the stream. Lowering the jug down, I slip it into a gap Father created with rocks, and the icy water flows around it.
Back in our yard, Father follows me to the cottage. He leans against the doorframe and watches as I dump the few remaining nuts into a bowl and add the empty basket to the stack I’ll take to the market. He motions for me to give him the handled one full of eggs I collected this morning. Looking around the cottage, I try to think of anything I’m forgetting.
It looks cheerful today, with a crackling fire in the smooth-stoned hearth, a vase of tiny pink flowers on the mantelpiece, and the scrubbed table in front of it, adorned with a centerpiece of bolétis. I take in the neatly arranged storage shelves with their textured baskets, the two narrow beds draped with simple but sumptuous wools. My eyes fall on the purse on the foot of my bed.
When I grab it, something thuds to the floor. The book. Father bends to retrieve it, and his face goes white.
“Where did you get this?” He rasps, shaking fingers touching the cover gingerly.
I move closer to him, watching the lines deepen on his face. “Bryn’s wife gave it to me the first time I met her.”
Pada’s jaw quavers. He swallows forcefully. “I got rid of it long ago.”
I frown. “You’ve seen it before?”
He cautiously lifts the front cover, still acting like he’s in the presence of a specter.
“Why would you want to throw it away?”
He looks at me now, sparkling tears losing themselves in his thick beard. One long finger taps at the page, and I peer down. A faint E.C. is traced inside the cover. I hadn’t noticed it.
“Because it belonged to your mother.”
I grab the book before it falls from his hands. He backs up until his legs rest against his bed, and he sinks down.
He takes some time before he speaks. “She read from it every day. Every single day. I acted like I didn’t care, but only because I envied her faith.” He laughs dryly. “Or feared what it could do if I let it in.”
I join him on the bed, regarding the book with renewed wonder.
“After she died, I raged against Elyon. I wanted even less to do with him than I had before. I went into the forest and threw this thing away as far as I could. I hoped the decay would take it, that I’d never have to hear anything about Elyon again.”
“Someone must have picked it up,” I say, wonder filling me.
He shakes his head. “I can’t believe it.”
