The Girl Behind the Red Rope Page 3

  Women’s clothing was designed to hide the body from the eyes of men. We wore white to symbolize our purity as the bride of Jesus. Stains of any kind were a sign of waning devotion. But I’d begun painting simple designs on my white undergarments when I was sixteen because I missed wearing color and I didn’t think Jesus would mind. No one could see the red and yellow flowers I’d painted. In fact, I’d convinced myself that they were a gift to him as much as to me.

  But seeing the simple designs painted on my undergarments now, I felt a pang of guilt. The smallest sin was as black as the greatest sin—plenty of sermons using many Scriptures had made that utterly clear. Black was black. Whether lust or dust, sin was sin. And I was covered in it.

  Stepping under the flowing water, I grabbed the bristle brush, harsh but necessary, and scrubbed. My hands, my arms, my legs, my shoulders, every inch. My skin turned pink from the agitation and scalding water.

  I treasured the absolution of that pain. Slowly I washed my sins down the drain. Tomorrow would be a new day.

  But still . . . still I knew that inside, both Jamie and I were dirty. Guilty. And the guilty had to be punished.

  Dear God, what was happening to me?

  Chapter

  Three

  “GRACE! WAIT A SECOND.”

  I was hurrying to the Chapel the next morning after a disturbing sleep when Alice’s voice called to me from behind. I stopped and turned to see her holding the hem of her dress off the ground as she approached me with bright eyes.

  “Good morning, Alice. We’re going to be late.”

  “We have a moment. Please, just a moment.”

  She was pregnant, I thought. I could see the light in her eyes. And for Alice, being pregnant meant that she would be allowed to move in with her husband, David.

  “You’re pregnant?”

  Alice pulled up, blinking. “What makes you say that?”

  “Just a guess. You look like the sun.” She was a redhead and reminded me of women who might have modeled back in the days when we had at least some magazines to read and approved television to watch.

  A daring smile revealed Alice’s perfect teeth. “I think I might be!”

  “You’re late?”

  “Three days.” She whispered it like a great secret. I couldn’t help but be a little jealous, not of her pregnancy as much as for her affection for David. Why couldn’t they have found someone young and handsome for me, like Samuel, who was twenty-three and single? Not that I was drawn to Samuel, but at least he was my age and we might figure life out together with our child.

  “You’re not thrilled for me?” Alice asked.

  “I am.” I forced a smile. My stomach was still in knots from the previous day, but I was happy for her. “Very much so. But you can’t know after only three days.”

  “Of course not. I’m going to the clinic this afternoon.” Her eyes darted over my shoulder. “David is over the moon.”

  “I’m sure he is.” I took her hand, getting over my selfishness. “I hope it’s true. I really do.”

  “Me too.” She blushed. “It is true, I can feel it. It’s as though the whole world has shifted. A woman was made to live with a man, don’t you think?”

  A squeal sounded behind me before I could answer, and I turned to see little Bart from the Hansen family rushing up to us.

  “Miss Grace, Miss Grace!” The four-year-old boy collided with me, wrapping his arms around my legs.

  “Well hello, Bart!” I grabbed him under his arms and swung him up to my hip, Alice momentarily forgotten. “My, aren’t you getting big,” I said, poking his side.

  He threw his head back, giggling.

  “Soon you’ll be tall enough to reach the moon and go on wild adventures with me.”

  “Mommy says adventures aren’t good.”

  “Then we’ll just laugh in joy as we fly around the moon with our animal friends and look at the beautiful world God made. And maybe eat strawberry ice cream, because maybe the moon is made out of ice cream.”

  “What’s ice cream?”

  “A sweet dessert that is cold and tastes like a little bit of heaven on earth. But you have to grow another inch first. Deal?”

  He grinned wide. “Deal!”

  “Don’t tell a soul,” Alice said to me over her shoulder, hurrying for the Chapel.

  “My lips are sealed.”

  I set Bart down and stooped, my thoughts back on the troubles that had kept me tossing and turning through the night. “Hurry to Chapel, Bart. It’s about to start.”

  He ran up the slope, arms spread like a bird, mind no doubt lost on flying around the moon. I followed him quickly.

  The entire flock had already gathered in the small Chapel perched on top of the hill north of town when I entered. Early morning rays cast strips of light across the wood floor and illuminated Harrison Pierce’s strong face where he stood at the pulpit. A required daily activity for every member, seven a.m. Chapel was typically one of my favorite moments of each day, because I often was allowed to take the children outside to play while the rest prayed. It was my special role and I was good at it.

  But today I was so torn by my indiscretion that I walked straight for my assigned pew and took my seat between Andrew and Jamie. I was still dirty inside. I had to get clean, and getting clean required confession.

  But I was afraid of what might happen to me. Even more, to Jamie.

  “Good morning, Grace,” Andrew said.

  “Good morning, Andrew.”

  My eyes swept across the familiar faces of the flock. Margaret Holden, a middle-aged woman often chided for her inability to keep her mouth shut, sat in the row across from me with her silent but stern husband, Daniel, and their three young boys. Tanner Rifle, a gray-haired guardian with a military past, and his teenage daughter, Megan, sat in the next row. His plump wife, Sandra, whispered to Rebecca Teller, an elderly woman who occupied one of the seven council member seats. Her quiet grace and wisdom were respected by all.

  The following row was filled with the Martin family—six children aging from seventeen to one, and their parents, George and Lucy, who were perfectly behaved but rarely seemed to notice each other as far as I could tell. In front of me sat Tyler Smith and his wife, Veronica. They ran the general store with their three children—an irony since the Smith children were allergic to nearly everything they sold.

  So many faces, stories, and histories, all of which I knew nearly as well as my own, gathered here. And they knew me just as well. Every time I caught an eye I wondered if they could sense my guilt.

  “Good morning, dearly beloved,” Harrison began. “I see we are all here and in good spirits. Let us begin with a prayer.”

  I closed my eyes and heard the prayer, but my mind quickly moved to other things. Alice. David. Jamie.

  I felt Andrew’s elbow brush mine, so I withdrew. Touching, even for the married, wasn’t permitted in the holy house, and for that I was grateful because I didn’t like being touched by Andrew in any way, at any time.

  I’d accepted my place at his side in public but still couldn’t imagine living with him the way Alice and David could be together. He still lived in the house he’d occupied with his first wife, Bethany, before her tragic death two years earlier. Her cancer had since increased the community’s vigilance to follow all laws regarding food to the letter.

  I’d been told that the council deliberated our pairing for some time. Still in his late forties, Andrew had plenty of healthy life left, and unable to have children with Bethany, he felt lacking.

  Rose had assured me that I would grow to love him, but until then it was more important that I honor and respect him. Not only was he a man, he was an elder in the community, and he’d picked me, so for that I should feel blessed. Maybe I would get pregnant and have a son who looked like Lukas. I could hardly imagine anything as wonderful.

  Submitting to my role as Andrew’s wife by spending two nights a week with him was a price I really had no choice but to pa
y for such a blessing. So maybe I should be grateful.

  “Remember, family, the trickery of evil,” Harrison was saying. His voice was rich and comforting. His wife, Rose, and their three children listened attentively from the front pew. “It masquerades in sheep’s clothing and hides its fangs behind alluring lies. It makes promises to entice your flesh, and if you believe lies and give in to falsehoods of the world, you too become like the world, subjecting yourself to the ravages of sin.”

  He paused, his words sinking into my brain and igniting my shame.

  “Remember always that the thief comes to steal the hearts of the bride. Soon a wolf will come in sheep’s clothing to test us, as Sylous has spoken through our sister Rose. A Fury dressed as a friend will arrive when we least expect it. The darkness of its heresy will masquerade as light to plunge us into punishment. The Fury will come, but when it does, we will not yield!”

  He slapped the pulpit hard and I jumped. A chorus of amens filled the sanctuary, punctuated by a handful of nevers!

  “We will throw that evil out and stand firm in our inheritance as the bride,” Harrison continued. “An inheritance we earn by believing the truth and submitting to the one by whose blood we are saved into our holy calling. And so we protect our hearts from the evil of the world. We must never forget the danger that comes for us. Fear it, beloved saints. Use that fear to be vigilant. When you feel afraid, run, for surely you are getting too close to the evil of the world. Safeguard your hearts. Only then will we be faithful when the time of great testing is upon us.”

  We knew all too well that Haven Valley would endure a great test before the end. A final attempt of evil to gain entrance into our hearts by coming to us as an angel of light. If our guard was down, we would never recognize it.

  I hoped Jamie was listening. For his sake and mine, I hoped he was even now seeing the foolishness of his defiance.

  Even as I thought it, Jamie shifted on my right. A sign of guilt. Good.

  And then he was standing.

  “What if the evil of the world’s already gone?” he asked.

  The entire room stilled. I felt the blood drain from my face. He was committing suicide!

  “What if we’ve already been tested and passed that test and we sit here without knowing? I think it’s time to leave this place and find out for ourselves.”

  The congregation was too shocked to react.

  Harrison’s right brow arched. “And what would cause you to believe this?”

  I knew what he would say. And a small piece of me knew that as soon as he said it, Haven Valley would forever be changed.

  “Because,” Jamie said, “I’ve been out beyond the perimeter, and there are no more Fury.”

  Chapter

  Four

  BEN WEATHERS WATCHED AS THE FLAMES OF THE FIRE he’d built inside the small rock pit lapped against the night. He leaned back in the squat folding chair and stroked his thick, unkempt beard. Refining fires, he thought, were the kind he’d been walking through the last several months. Turning what he thought he knew to ash so that something new could grow in its place.

  A beautiful thing indeed. A single tear slipped from the corner of his eye. The thought of his transformation stirred his emotions. He hoped to never get used to the way it felt, but he knew it would surely happen. This was, after all, still the world of up and down.

  Ben chuckled at himself and wiped the tear from his cheek. A smaller laugh joined his, and Ben raised his eyes across the fire to where Eli sat.

  “Something funny?” Ben asked.

  “I’m laughing because you’re laughing,” the boy replied.

  “You think my laugh is funny?” Ben teased.

  Eli grinned and gave Ben a grin. How he loved the boy. The sheer expansiveness of the emotion caught him off guard at times. He had the same love for his other children, the one gone too early, the two stolen and taken off the grid to live separate from him. Or at least that’s the story his mind always wanted him to believe. The story he was still letting go of.

  It didn’t matter if they’d been taken or if they’d gone willingly. It only mattered that, with any luck, he would see them soon and share with them the gift he’d discovered.

  Eli.

  Eli, the orphan boy Ben had adopted as his own. In a world ravaged by the darkness, this child had been his saving grace. Without him, Ben would have succumbed to the great scourge of fear.

  “Are you afraid?” Eli asked. Even in the dark, Ben could see the brightness of the boy’s blue eyes. The rest of him—dark brown hair, freckled cheeks, short frame for his twelve years of age—was different from his other children. But those blue eyes reminded him of them constantly. All three had those beautiful blue eyes.

  “Yes,” Ben said.

  Eli was drawing circles in the dirt at his feet with a long stick he’d collected when they’d arrived at the campsite. They’d been on the road for several days. After months of searching, Ben had finally narrowed down the likely location of the valley Rose had taken his children to. But it had been over ten years ago now. There were no guarantees.

  A familiar stab of shame filled his gut and he didn’t fight it. The only way to be free of shame was to let himself feel it. Shame for not seeking out his surviving children earlier, for letting them leave at all, for not protecting them the way a father was supposed to, for failing them according to the standards of the world.

  Shame was just a feeling, he thought, and it was okay.

  Ben shifted and exhaled. A wave of coughing overtook him and he bent over, fist at his mouth. The disease was progressing quickly. Intensifying. The headaches, the heat spells, the nausea—all getting worse with each passing day.

  “We could stop at a doctor on the way,” Eli said.

  Ben shook his head. “I don’t want to waste time.”

  Eli didn’t argue. “Do you need me to get you anything?”

  Ben smiled. “Nah, I have all I need.”

  Eli thought about this for a moment before a sly grin pulled at his mouth. “Except powdered donuts. We ran out of those yesterday.”

  Ben chuckled and Eli’s smile widened.

  “We’ll get some in the morning,” Ben said.

  The two fell into silence, the space in which they normally operated. Simply being together without needing to speak, each one was occupied with his own thoughts. Eli had never really been much of a talker, which suited Ben fine. And when the boy did speak, it was best to listen.

  Ben’s thoughts returned to the distant past. To the moments that had redirected his life. Falling in love with Julianna, getting married, having three children, joining the Holy Family, the pain of their misalignment, the day she was given what they called true sight, the way he’d cursed her for believing such nonsense, the death of little Lukas, the day she’d vanished with the others, bent on following Rose Pierce to a glorious end.

  He’d let them go, not realizing then what regret and loneliness would follow. It had launched him onto a path of self-destruction. The world had fallen apart. Then Eli had come to his rescue.

  “It’s okay to be afraid,” Eli said.

  Ben looked at his face through the flames. “Are you ever afraid?”

  Eli looked up at the stars that hung over them and let the question stand. The fire crackled and popped. He looked back at Ben, the fire dancing in his eyes. “Not really, no.”

  Emotion rose in Ben’s throat. “Then I will try to be more like you.”

  “You already are,” Eli said.

  For long minutes they sat, lost in their own thoughts, until Eli playfully toppled from the small stump and sprawled to his back by the campfire. “I wish we had donuts now,” he said with a dramatic sigh.

  Ben began to laugh. Encouraged, Eli stretched his arms toward the sky and cried, “Will this night never end?”

  Then they laughed together, lost in the wonder of what they knew and where they were.

  That night Ben dreamed of Jamie and Grace, as he always did, an
d of the time when they would all be laughing together once again.

  Chapter

  Five

  ROSE PIERCE WATCHED THE ENTIRE CHAPEL STILL AS Jamie Weathers’s words filled the air around them. I’ve been out beyond the perimeter, and there are no more Fury. She felt the vein behind her ear pulse, and she swallowed her panic. That can’t be, she thought.

  A sharp whimper broke the silence. The boy’s mother, Julianna. The frail woman had paled and held her palm over her mouth. And for good reason, Rose thought. Her son dared to stand on holy ground and speak blasphemy. Rose felt the urge to stand and defile the sinner herself but knew better.

  The Chapel began to stir back to life. Whispers, murmurs of disbelief, silent prayers, confusion. They hummed around her like static. Rose glanced at her three perfectly controlled children and gave them a nod. Stay where you are. She glanced at her husband.

  Harrison’s face remained stoic, but she knew his mind better than anyone. Behind his stone expression his brain was churning, uploading the information being presented. He wasn’t easily subjected to his emotions but bound himself to faith and belief above all things—the perfect, incorruptible partner for the radical journey that many couldn’t handle.

  Which was why Sylous had picked Harrison for her.

  She felt the energy in the room suddenly shift, and the familiar change nearly took her breath away.

  Sylous was here.

  She closed her eyes to let her heart settle. He always had this effect when he came. The hairs on the back of her neck rose, and for an extended moment Rose relished her private encounter with him. It was as though he pulled her from reality for a long breath before returning her mind, body, and heart back to the room.