FOUR

I woke the moment the churchmen began their trek along the boundary of my property. The feel of their footsteps yanked me from a sound sleep, and I rolled from the hammock to the porch floor, dislodging the cats, who hissed and arched their backs in displeasure. Heart pounding, I pushed through the screened porch door and stepped onto the grass. There were three churchmen, treading steadily, carrying equipment that clanked, making the animals dart away or crouch and grow still, as was their nature.

But I’d been wrong. They weren’t on my property, they were a good fifty feet out, on the Peays’ farm, which adjoined my property to the northeast. And they were crossing over into the Vaughn farm. I realized that these weren’t men here to kill me. These were the watchers who spied on my property from the deer stand on the neighbor’s land, churchmen who had been there off and on for months. And I realized that I hadn’t seen them during the time when Jackie had attacked. He had sent them home, taken their place. That made sense. But, I had never before been able to feel the watchers that far out. This was new and unsettling, as if, with the gift of Brother’s Ephraim’s body and soul, my woods had grown, had spread their borders.

Overhead the leaves rustled uneasily.

I felt the men climb the wooden ladder nailed to an old bur oak, and settle on the deer stand that was built like a triangular treehouse, secured to the bur oak and two black walnut trees. One of them peed off the side of the deer stand. Stupid, that. Deer would avoid the place now. I didn’t feel worry or anger off the men. More that friendly, chatty emotion men exuded when they were with their friends and intending to be sociable for a few hours. I had never picked up so much from people on my land. It was more than disconcerting. Surely this awareness would dissipate over time.

I went inside and, working without light, opened up the wood box’s dampers and added two split logs to the firebox, both summer woods—wood that burns cool. One was a hefty piece of poplar and a smaller, dryer piece of pine. They would make more ash than the harder, faster-burning wood, but they were fine for keeping a fire going all day. The small pine lit right up, and I closed the wood box door. With the hand pump I added more well water to the hot water heater. It was something I had to attend to carefully, because too little water in the tank could allow the seams to melt, and replacement was expensive. The pump to the hot water tank wasn’t automatic. The well and cistern were on high ground, so gravity kept the rest of the entire system filled, but I had to hand-fill the hot water tank.

It was still dark when I washed up and dressed in fresh clothes, browns and greens, muted shades. I gathered my keys, library books, some baskets, and my purse, and walked silently to my garden, missing the dogs in the dark of predawn, their noses damp and cool as they poked at me, sniffing, warm bodies pressed against me, tails slowly swinging. The grass was wet with dew that wicked up into my skirt hem. It was too dark to get a good look at the garden, but the ground beneath my shoes told me that a bean plant was broken and weeping from the shooting yesterday, but was still alive; I’d lost some late tomatoes, including a huge, dark brown purple I had been trying to save for seeds, but the garden wasn’t traumatized—it would live. I raided it for cucumbers, several brown tomatoes, black tomatoes, and a dozen small purple tomatoes to trade at the market, a colorful mixture of peppers, and a mess of beans that would have gone stringy soon. All the veggies went into the baskets I carried, while in the back of my mind I was thinking that the plants needed pruning and the entire garden needed mulching and nothing was getting done out here in the soil and no foodstuffs were getting put up for winter. My garden was suffering another day with lack of care, this time because of Rick and Paka.

I stowed the produce in the bed of the truck, along with a few treats for Kristy, one of the librarians who was also a gardener. We had become friends, and I didn’t have many, so the few I had were special. Whenever I went to town, I always put a thing or two in the truck for her.

I started the old Chevy, which coughed when it turned over, but ran quiet, and backed quickly around, hoping to keep the backup lights from being seen by my watchers. Without headlights, I made my way along the crushed-rock drive and on down the mountain. I was able to feel my woods all the way, which was new and a little disquieting, but it let me know that the men hadn’t moved from the deer stand and probably hadn’t seen me leave. They would have no idea where I’d gone, and might not know what to do about my absence, without making the long walk back to the church compound to ask for instructions. Hopefully by the time orders were relayed—on foot, thanks to the lack of cell signals—I would be back home and the repair men would be here.

It was after sunrise when I pulled into a street parking spot for the second day of a weeklong farmers’ market. Normally, it ran only on Wednesdays, but the city fathers were trying new things to bring people and money into town, like an extended schedule for the farmers’ market for fall produce. I parked the truck in an inconspicuous spot and made my way through the park, feeling odd, but oddly right, to be wearing one of my new skirts, sturdy shoes instead of work boots, and a button-up blouse over a T-shirt. I’d chosen a dark green skirt and matching T, with a white overblouse, colors and shapes close to the garb worn by the churchwomen, though theirs were all hand-sewn, and I had purchased mine at a local clothing store.

Going to market was wise in ways other than just seeing my family. I traded even or received cash for my veggies and jams and preserves. I didn’t reckon I’d be getting a check from PsyLED right away. It might take weeks to be paid and enjoy the freedom of having money, a disposable income.

Fleetingly I wondered if freedom would make me dangerous, as the churchmen claimed freedom did to a woman. And then decided that if it did, I didn’t care.

Spreading a small blanket on the dew-wet grass, I tied my hair back with an elastic and sat, my small pocketbook in my lap, my back to a tree, my baskets close to my knees. I set a wide-brimmed hat on the blanket and slipped off my shoes, placing my feet in the grass and working my toes into the soil. I leaned back against the tree bark. Contact with tree and earth shivered through me, sudden, shocking. I drew in a slow breath, feeling the power of my land even here, so far away from my woods. That had never happened before. Never had my woods found me when I was off-site. I breathed out, letting the electric tingle settle into me, into my bones and my viscera.

This was more. Too much more. Even in my resistant brain I knew my magic had changed. Grown.

Brother Ephraim’s blood and death had been far more powerful than I could have known. For the first time I felt a twinge of worry about his passing into the woods, his blood smelling so odd. Maybe he had been sick. He would have died in moments anyway, I knew that, but with him gone, at my hand, only minutes before nature would have taken him . . . was that really murder? Was the blade of the merciful still murder? The garrote of the priest to the one on the stake to burn? By today’s standards, yes. But it hadn’t always been so. And if it was now, should I care? Was my claim and Paka’s agreement about me having the right to rule on my land correct? Or had my deliberate actions changed the nature of Soulwood, and me as well, me reaping the death I had sown? I wasn’t sure about the questions, and I had no certain answers. I also had no guilt or shame in what I had done, and maybe that made me as evil as the churchmen, and as dangerous as they claimed free women were.

I closed my eyes, feeling the sun rise, lifting over the horizon, the first pale rays turning golden, warming the earth. I settled into a partial lotus position, hands on my knees. The churchmen, if they passed this way, would ignore me, thinking me a modern-day hippie. Others might think me a new-age sun worshiper, or a Jesus freak out to pray, or a Hindu, or a yoga practitioner. I was none of those, but if I ever prayed anymore, it was like this, my face to the sun, in contact with the woods and the ground.

Traffic was already busy this morning, the vibrations of passing vehicles subtle under my feet. A cop on foot patrol paused by me, and I smiled without opening my eyes. “It’s a beautiful morning, Officer.”

I felt him start, the emotion passing through the ground and into my body. “Ma’am,” he said as he moved away. I felt it the moment his attention went elsewhere. Interesting. I wondered again if this awareness would fade as Ephraim’s energies were absorbed and commingled with the other man I’d fed to the forest. The sensation I was getting was . . . overly alert, agitated, hyper-reflexive. If I was presented with a child like this, by a concerned parent, I’d suggest he or she be given chamomile tea with lavender or lemon balm. For an adult, I’d suggest blending in valerian. But this was wasn’t a human, it was the woods themselves. I couldn’t see a way to feed my woods a soothing dose of herbs big enough to do it any good unless I bought out an herbal supply store and dropped the chamomile from an airplane. The image made me smile.

A voice said, “I almost didn’t recognize you.”

Rick. So much for being hyperalert. I hadn’t known he was there. Was that because I had claimed Paka, and through her also placed a claim on Rick? That was a scary thought. I opened my eyes to find him standing on the sidewalk nearby, facing Paka, as if he was speaking to her and not me. I interlaced my fingers and stretched my arms up over my head, hiding my mouth from view as I said, “That was the idea, me in churchwoman attire, or close to it.” I leaned out, stretching to look at the booth. “They’re here, setting up. If I’m a clock, then the church booth is at two o’clock. The women are my sisters Priscilla and Esther, and the Cohen sisters.”

It was an odd grouping of churchwomen to say the least, as the Cohens had been taken from the punishment house during the law enforcement raid and into protective legal custody, last I’d heard. I was surprised to find them living back among the church folk, walking free, and out in public, unless the menfolk wanted the world to see them and assume that they were okay. Or maybe they were here so that Priscilla and Esther could watch and then tattle on them. Anything was possible in the twisted minds of the churchmen.

“Go away,” I said to Rick and Paka. I felt them drift to the far right, away from the churchwomen’s booth and into the market.

Hours had passed as I sat on the land. It was ten a.m. and most booth spaces were open, so I stood, put on my hat, took up my baskets and blanket, and walked across to the nearest booth. Like the others, it had a tentlike tarp overhead, a long table in front, and unopened boxes at the rear. The vendor sold unusual varieties of seeds and late-planted beans that were still in the pods for canning or eating now. Since my garden had been shot up, I traded some of my winter squash—three heirloom varieties—for some purple-podded pole bean seeds, a packet of rare Kentucky Wonder bean seeds, as my own stash was smaller than I wanted, and a packet of rattlesnake beans for spring planting. One can never have too many beans. I canned and dried mine, and sold them fresh, in season, by the peck basket at another market on the roadside. While I dickered with the vendor, offering my veggies for their seeds, I also traded for three varieties of heirloom lettuce seeds and one variety of melon—Rocky Ford, which looked good on the package.

While I dawdled over the seeds, I managed to make eye contact with Priscilla from beneath my wide-brimmed hat. I shot a glance to the outdoor latrines, and held up a hand, flashing five fingers two times, suggesting a meet in ten minutes. I got a slight nod and a tense line of lips in return, and went on to the local pickle producer. She took my largest basket full of small, firm cukes and exchanged them for five small jars of her secret recipe of bread-and-butter pickles. There were enough cukes to can more than ten large jars, but I didn’t want to do the canning, so the trade was good enough for me. I didn’t eat much in the way of cukes and pickles, and the face creams I made only lasted for so long in the fridge.

Out of the corner of my eye, I watched as Priscilla made an excuse and headed for the standing, portable toilet booths. Without picking up my speed, I made a line to intersect her, and caught up.

When we were out of sight of the sales booths, Priscilla rounded on me, her face pinched and drawn, made worse by the hair, bunned-up tight atop her head. “Are you trying to get me in trouble or did you’un just get stupid alla sudden?”

“Neither.”

“Then talk fast. People are mighty jumpy roun’ the church today.”

“Jumpy how? Who’s jumpy?” I pulled off my hat to see her better.

She looked back toward the booth, out of sight but not out of mind, and gripped her brown skirts in both fists. “Brother Ephraim done went missing last night. There’s those that say you’un are behind it, what with your witchy ways.”

“I’m not a witch,” I said, the words by rote. The assertion was the truth and not words I used to say to make me feel better.

I wasn’t a witch. I was something else. Something worse.

“Are you in danger?” I asked her softly.

“Because a you? Prob’ly,” Priscilla grumbled, but her expression softened as she took in my bruised face. “What happened? You okay?”

“I’m good enough,” I said. “So Brother Ephraim’s missing? What are they saying?”

“Him and Jackie and Joshua Purdy went hunting over close to your place, and Brother Ephraim walked away and never came back. And Joshua’s saying as how you called up a demon to attack him.”

“Mmmm,” I said, trying to be encouraging, trying to decide if I should tell her more. I decided not. “That’s it?”

“That’s enough, ain’t it?”

“I heard . . . I heard there were some outsiders around. Any new people in the compound?” Priss looked confused, and I tried to find another way to ask this, knowing how my matchmaker sister would take it, my sister who thought every woman needed a man and a dozen children in order to be happy. But I couldn’t think of anything except to blurt out, “Any new men?”

Priss’ face went from sour to happy and hopeful in an instant. “You thinking about taking a husband again? Coming home?”

“No, Priss. I’m not coming back to the church. It isn’t my home. Hasn’t been in a decade.”

Her face fell and she crushed her skirts again, a gesture that looked nervous as her hands smoothed out the wrinkles, gripped the cloth, smoothed out the wrinkles, over and over. “You’re helping outsiders again, ain’t you?” When I didn’t reply, she made an expression I had seen on Mama’s face, a pinched, fearful look, but it slid into resolute and stayed there. “Fine. Ain’t no new people. No new men. I heard that some a the younger boys was hunting and come upon a nonchurch boy and they’re playing in the woods together. Jackie seemed to know his people, and approved it, so long as they don’t act up or get into hooliganism and put graffiti on the houses.”

That was a surprise. While it wasn’t uncommon for boys or men to see or encounter nonchurchmen in the woods at hunting season, they weren’t allowed to interact with them, only speak and move on. Church people didn’t associate with outsiders. Even outsiders like me, who had once been insiders, hence Priss’ nervousness. “Anything else new?” Gossip. I was asking for gossip, which I had never listened to when I lived there. But Rick wanted news, and I hadn’t talked to Priss in a long time. I didn’t know what might be important.

“Some stuff you wouldn’t know ’cause a you not coming round no more,” she said. “After the social services raid, Preacher Jackson took everything outta the punishment house. This month he installed a guest quarters there, with a tiny kitchen and bath and two little bedrooms. It looks nice. But then he put the winter supply cave off-limits for a bit, and we’re worried about having enough foodstuffs to last the winter.”

The punishment house had been a narrow structure with a bath facility and four beds, each bed equipped with straps to hold a woman down. The cave was one of three, the winter supply one used only for storage. “So where do the women go when they get punished now?”

“You’re always looking for the bad stuff. The dark side.” Her face went pinched again. “But this time you got a point. Jackie done built him a room on the back a his house. He’s in charge of the punishing now, both the women and the men. And he’s got him what Caleb’s calling a cadre of cronies who hang out with him and take part in the punishing. It’s got Caleb and Daddy and his friends all riled up. Caleb’s afraid him and his own bunch might have to fight for the church leadership.”

“Oh.” That meant the Nicholson cadre—my family—and their hunting buddies disagreed with church policy. I had no idea how to respond to that. It was beyond any expectation or understanding of the church and how it worked. In my recollection, no one got riled up about anything. They followed along like sheep to a shearing. Except that John and Leah had backed away from the church, and then John and I had left it. So maybe I hadn’t understood the politics of the church as well as I’d thought. I had only been twelve when I left it, all filled with righteous anger and—

Priss interrupted my thoughts with, “Who hit you?”

I touched my face. It wasn’t hurting much, but it was a lovely shade of purple and green today. I had a black eye, which did hurt, and more bruises on my throat and shoulders. “Joshua Purdy. And then a black cat jumped him and I got away. Not a demon.”

Priss’ eyes tightened more, but she didn’t say anything, so I had no idea what the reaction meant. I asked, “Why does Caleb think Jackson Jr. took over administering punishments? Something new going on?”

“Since the Social Services raid, Jackie’s been a mite unpredictable. He blames you for the police interference. He’s increased his wives to four and his concubines to ten or so. He even come sniffing around Esther and Judith, till Daddy told him none of the Nicholson girls was ever going to him, not as wife nor concubine. Caleb was there in the wood shop, and the way he tells it, Jackie was a mite riled, but he backed down. The number the preacher keeps is always changing, but he holds the power right now and not enough of the menfolk can find the guts to stop him and take back the church leadership. Yet.”

Yet meant the alliances weren’t strong enough to make changes. Esther and Judith were of age according to church law, and Esther was a beauty, having taken her cornflower blue eyes and blond hair from Mama’s side of the family. “How do the elders feel about Jackie’s wives and women?”

“Don’tchu tell I told this,” she warned, her tone stern. “They been rumbling about deposing him, but my Caleb and some a his bunch got an audit in secret. All the church property and buildings belong to Jr. in the absence of the colonel. Kinda made ’em all mad and they hadda back off from kicking him out, ’cause if they do that, then they’re the ones who havta leave the compound. The law would be on Jackie’s side.” Priss had a peculiar smile on her face, and I wondered if she had urged Caleb to call for CPA services, not that I’d ask such a loaded question.

“So who’s in charge of the compound?”

“Until last night, Brother Ephraim. Now he’s disappeared, and no one knows what’s gonna happen.”

Most of Rick’s questions had been answered: no new men, lots of leadership problems and power struggles, and new tensions had occurred, all answered by inference and all partly my fault, not the fault of some new group joining the church. I bent around the portable toilet pod to make sure that Esther and the Cohen sisters were occupied. They were helping what looked like a happy couple examine dough bowls and rolling pins and hand-stitched quilts. The romantic couple were Rick and Paka, and they looked blissful together. My little custom-tailored catnip aromatherapy must be helping them, but either way, we were safe for the moment. “Any new weapons on church land? Different things from the usual?”

“More ’n the menfolk know what to do with. How many hunting rifles can one man need, I ask you, when some a the young’uns need new shoes, and the men are off buying useless stuff?” She sounded exasperated. “They brung in fifteen automatic rifles. Them things shoot thirty rounds per magazine. There wouldn’t be nothing left of the deer to eat.” She glared at me. “Why you asking that?”

“I’m asking because Jackie’s men shot up my house,” I said hotly. Priscilla’s face went through a series of emotions that were too fast to follow, but she ended up looking thoughtful. “Priss, if you want to get free, I can keep you safe, you and all the sisters, as many as want to come. I promise I can.”

“You always say that, but I gotta ask how, in light of the fact that you’rn sportin’ some mighty spectacular bruises. ’Sides, Nell”—her expression softened with something akin to joy—“I got young’uns and another on the way.” She put a hand to her belly, and something inside me clenched. I hadn’t known she was pregnant. “And I got a husband I love. I don’t want to leave. I’m happy, Nell.” Her expression proved that, all full of tenderness and joy, the way a woman must look when she’s fulfilled and satisfied. Things I didn’t understand and probably never would.

“If you get in trouble,” I said, hearing my own stubborn tone, “go to the Vaughns’ and pay them to bring you to me. I can get you somewhere safe, to someone who can protect you.”

She made a sound of disbelief in the back of her throat. “They come back last night from huntin’ all cocky and talking about how you’rn a lot more subservient to your betters now.” Her brow crinkled as she stared my jaw, her hazel eyes darkening. “Damn Joshua Purdy to the depths of perdition.”

My eyebrows went up when Priss cussed. She leaned around the toilets, staring at the booth, and said, “I been gone too long. I gotta go.”

“If you learn something more about the factions or troubles sometime in the next week to ten days, and you can find an excuse to get away, come through the woods to tell me.”

“I can’t do that,” Priss said, her voice wavering. “I can’t. I can’t be taken to punishment. Jackie, he’d . . .” Her words stopped, her voice holding real fear now.

“Find a way to get word to me if you need me. If Jackie tries to punish you.”

“Fine. Iffen that happens, I’ll try. I’ll do most anything to keep outta Jackie’s hands.” Priscilla paused and added, “Our brother picked hisself out a girl and is getting married in a week. Just so’s you know.” She took off back to the booths and I went the other way, but my stomach was sour and a knot had formed just below my breastbone. My bruises ached, and they hadn’t really bothered me until now. I shoulda shot Jackie and Joshua when I had the chance. I shoulda fed their souls to the woods and good riddance. How could I protect my family against Jackie and his “cadre of cronies”? I couldn’t kill them all.

“You the one they said was differ’nt.”

I whirled, startled, my heart leaping into my throat. The ground hadn’t told me anyone was near; I hadn’t realized how quickly I had adapted to depending on the earth to warn me of things.

She was dressed in churchwoman attire—olive green skirt, brown shoes, tall socks to hide her legs, olive shirt, and brown sweater. Her hair was still down, not up in a bun, making the girl less than twelve years old, her height marking her as probably eight or ten. Her hair was the exact shade of reddish brown that Priscilla’s had been when she was this age, before the red had dulled down to brown. And her eyes were the hazel gray of my own eyes. Her jaw was like mine, a bit pugnacious, her brows arched . . . like mine.

She was a Nicholson. I was sure I had seen her the last time I went to services with John, but that had been a long time ago. She was too young to be Judith.

I took in a slow breath and whispered, “Mindy?”

“Yup. But I like Mud, because I can grow things so good. Is you her? The one that could grow most anything? The one who left?”

“Yes,” I whispered.

She was my sister. I hadn’t seen her since she was a toddler. I realized that my sisters knew more about me than I knew about them.

“They say you done got married in the eyes of the law. That you took land that shoulda gone to the Purdys. That you’un’s independent and read books and live alone instead of in a big house with a bunch of women and young’uns.”

I had no idea at all how to reply to that, so I just nodded my head and realized how much she looked like Mama, all long-limbed and skinny. And how much she looked like me.

“You like it? Living all lonesome? I think I’d like it. I like the quiet. I like planting things too, making ’em grow.” Her eyes went bright and intense. “If Mama says I can, can I come visit?”

Something unknown moved deep inside me, something I had no name for. So much was new and uncertain since Rick LaFleur and his mate came to my door—so much of the strangeness within me. “Yes,” I whispered again.

“You don’t talk much, do you?”

A chuckle burst from my lips, quickly stifled. “No. Not much.” She grabbed my hand, squeezed, and held on. Something slow but powerful passed between us, like the growth of roots in the soil, like the slow process of rock or glaciers beginning to cleave. Like nothing I had ever felt before. And then she let go and the feeling was gone. I shook my head.

“You’un’ll talk if I come visit. Mama says I can make a turnip talk when I’m of a mind to. Daddy tells me I’m to be seen and not heard. I think that’s stupid. I gotta go.” She whirled, her skirts flying, and in an instant, she was gone.

“I think it’s stupid too,” I whispered to the empty place where she had stood.

My sisters had been talking about me. Remembering me. I stared at the place where Mindy had slipped between the portable toilets and disappeared. Priss, Esther, Judith, and Mindy had kept my memory alive. I wondered if my brother, Samuel, remembered me. And if my half brother, the one born from Mama, listened to the chatter about the one that left the church. Thinking about family, all the young’uns growing up, I shook my head in wonder. Sam was getting married. Amazing. The wedding would be huge, with all my full and half sibs. I had several half brothers, and I had no idea how many half sisters. I hadn’t kept up with that part of the family after I left.

The thought of my sisters—of Mindy—was warm and bright in my dazed mind as I carried my seeds and pickles and empty baskets to the truck. Without looking around, I stored everything away, dropped my hat into the passenger seat, and drove off, finding my wits only after I maneuvered away from the market.

My sisters remembered me. Talked about me. A small smile played at my lips.

Like usual, I stopped at the library and left off the books I had finished, but the night without reading and watching films had put me behind, so I renewed two of the nonfiction books and both films, and visited Kristy. Today I brought her some African Blue Basil seeds, a variety that had dark bluish purple leaves and a robust flavor. I found it too strong, but she liked her basils licorice-y. Once I got past an explanation about bruises—blamed on a lie about an ax head that came lose mid swing—I leaned across the book counter, and we had a nice chat about fall plantings. I made a suggestion about an herbal tea recipe for her grandfather, who was having trouble sleeping. He was a Vietnam War vet, and his PTSD symptoms always got worse in the fall and winter, as the days got shorter and his seasonal affective disorder kicked in to exacerbate it.

Kristy was studious and dark-haired and, like most librarians I had met, she read a lot. Before I left, she handed me a new book and said, “I know how you feel about romances, but, girl, this one is a must read. It’s about a woman from the Victorian era who carries a sword like a man, goes into business like a man, and still gets her man, if you know what I mean.” Her eyebrows waggled.

“I know what you mean,” I said, amused. “I just never thought about that being too terribly important.”

“Girl, when you meet the right man, your head will spin. Happened to me when I met Harvey. We’ll do coffee and I’ll dish.”

Which sounded fun. The visit was short, but it left me feeling more lively and positive. I took home a newspaper with a splashy story on the front page about a townie girl who had been kidnapped. The paper showed a grainy photograph of a white van with a dented back panel. Police were investigating it as a possible sex trade abduction. Sad that the police had never been called into investigate when church girls were taken that way.

*   *   *

Rick and Paka and the thing called Pea were parked next to the truck when I came out of the library, sitting as if enjoying the warm weather; I walked over to their car, leaned in the window, and told them not to come back to the house, that I once again had three men in the deer stand that overlooked my property. A single visit I could explain away. Two would create too many questions.

Rick’s response was, “It’s empty at night?” I nodded once, my hair loose now, and swinging. “Good thing. I hear we’re going to have some localized straight-line winds and downbursts tonight. I hear they can do some awful damage.” Beside him in the car, Paka laughed. The sound was nowhere near humorous. Or human.

I had a feeling that there was a lot more going on than the PsyLED cop and his cat-woman had told me. And that feeling suggested that I was going to get stuck in the middle of it before all was said and done. It was a mite curious that I didn’t care. “Did you get the insurance handled and the repair people lined up?” I asked.

“The insurance adjuster will be there this afternoon. The Rankins will start today, and will be back at dawn to finish,” Rick said. “The receptionist said she knew you rose early, so I didn’t argue.” I dipped my head in a small nod and Rick went on. “What did you learn?”

I told him, as succinctly as possible, but leaving out my sister Mud, what I had learned. Then, figuring we were done, I got in the cab, shut the door, and drove off in John’s—no, not John’s, my—truck.

*   *   *

I was home early enough to harvest some root herbs, which was hard work, requiring using a very sharp shovel, a gardening fork, a sturdy spade, and a pair of thick leather gloves to protect my hands, while keeping a shotgun close and the .32 in my overalls’ bib. I thought about my day as I worked up a sweat. I needed my bare feet in the soil and the dirt in my hands and up under my nails. The feel of the soil leached the tension and worry out of me and left me feeling more peaceful, the way it always did. Before I turned to more difficult projects, I pruned back some overgrown plants and placed bricks over some rosemary limbs to root them for selling.

On the back porch, I washed and laid out the first of the burdock root, calamus, ginseng, goldenseal, yellow dock, soapwort, and snakeroot to dry, then spent the warm heart of the day working in the garden with the tiller. The engine was loud, but I had my awareness of the land to tell me if anyone was heading this way, but no one did, not even my watchers. And just like I needed to have my hands in the soil, the soil needed my attention, turned under with natural supplements. Twice a year I turned over the garden dirt, this time in the half an acre where the spring and early summer plants were dying, adding compost from the fifty-gallon drum on the south side of the house, readying the ground for winter, mulching deep, trying to make up for the time spent away from the plants. It was grueling work, but the ground liked the feel of the tiller in it, churning and aerating and adding new nutrients. It was like exercise and a good meal for the garden. Had my land been a house cat, it would have been purring by the time I finished.

The three men in the tree stand watched, but didn’t come close.

The insurance lady came by and stayed for half an hour, taking pictures of the vandalism, as she called it. She assured me that the insurance would cover the damage, but got kinda pruney around the mouth when she did. I got kinda pruney when I heard the deductible.

The Rankin truck must have passed her on the road down, because the dust was still settling when it pulled in. Thad Rankin of Rankin Replacements and Repairs showed up himself to inspect the damage and give me an estimate. We had done business together ever since John and I married, and he had a set of windows in the back of his truck when he parked. I counted and the number matched the ones that needed replacement. Rick could follow orders. That was a good trait in a man. I met Mr. Thad at the front door, noting that he had another man with him, toting a ladder and other equipment. “Hear you had some problems yesterday, Miz Ingram,” he said by way of greeting, his eyes on my jaw and eye, with their blossoming bruises.

“Bunch a hooligans out hunting,” I said. “I reckon they thought my house was edible.”

“Them hunting hooligans manage to sock you too?” he asked gently.

I touched my jaw and sighed. “Actually, in a way, yes. But forewarned is forearmed. I have a gun, and next time it won’t be so easy for the vandals.”

Mr. Thad chuckled, though it sounded mostly polite, not like real amusement. Over Thad’s shoulder the young man with him lifted a hand, nodded, and headed to the back of the house with the batch of equipment, the ladder over one shoulder. Thad’s son, Thaddeus Jr., who went by the name Deus, had grown a foot since I’d last seen him. He was the fifth generation to be working for the family business, which had been started back after the Civil War, by a family of freed slaves. The young man looked to be about eighteen, and was fit and trim in his company T-shirt and jeans, his dark skin shining in the sun.

“That cult you got away from,” Mr. Thad said, jerking my attention back to him. “Was it involved in this ‘hunting vandalism’?”

I glared at Mr. Thad and he backed away fast, down the top two steps, lifting his hands as if holding off an attack. “I didn’t mean no nosiness or disrespect, ma’am. But people talk.” When I didn’t say anything, he went on. “We pray for the women and children at your cult all the time.”

“Not my cult. Not now. Not ever,” I said stiffly.

“I understand that, Miz Ingram. But if you ever need help or a new place to worship, you are welcome to come to church with us at First Tabernacle A.M.E. Zion. We accept everybody, whites and blacks, brown-skinned and Asian folk, men and women, worshiping together under one roof, like the good Lord intended. We even got a sign language speaker to interpret the sermon and prayers and such for the deaf.”

I relaxed my shoulders and shook my head at Thad, not in negation, but in embarrassment. “Sorry,” I whispered. “It’s been a tough couple of days.”

“I understand. I’ll get your house secure for the night and put in the windows. We’ll come back tomorrow to redo the siding over the old logs, and check again to make sure you got no rot or termites. I’ll send a crew to patch the wallboard and paint inside, someone you can trust to let in your house. And you remember: You need help, you call on me. I’ll come. The men from my church, we’ll come. We’ll help you fight the evil of that place and them people. You understand? We’ll come.”

I blinked back hot tears and didn’t remind him that I had no phone and couldn’t call for help. I said, “Thank you, Mr. Thad. I’ll remember. And my name is Nell. You understand?”

“I do, Sister Nell. I surely do.”

*   *   *

The Rankins were parked in the drive for an hour and twenty minutes, and during that time, Brother Thad and his son changed out four windows and marked several dozen shot holes in the siding outside and in the wallboard inside, coming and going like family, while bread dough finished rising and I put four loaves in to bake, picked vegetables, and thawed meat for the evening meal. It was unexpected to discover that the Rankins thought of me as a sister, an equal in their church, and not chattel. The entire idea of church had left a bad taste in my mouth for years, but . . . maybe that was just the one church, the God’s Cloud of Glory Church, or a few churches, not all churches. I had to wonder.

I accepted a tract from Brother Thad before they left, and told him I would consider attending a service at his church. A service. One. I made sure he understood that part. And he left beaming and satisfied, telling me he’d wait until he heard from the insurance company to send me a bill for the deductible.

I didn’t really know what to make of people like Mr. Thaddeus Rankin. Good people, but foreign to my upbringing and life experience so far.

*   *   *

No one bothered me that night, but I woke with a perplexing sensation at about two a.m on Wednesday, a feeling that ants were crawling all over me—biting, itchy, feathery, and burning. I sat up in my small bed in the dark, disturbing the cats. More than one nonhuman, and one human, had crossed into the woods on the Vaughn farm property. Their life signatures were incomprehensible, remarkable enough that I couldn’t separate them into individual markers, but I knew in my blood that they were no threat to me, feeling playful rather than malicious. I felt them tramp along the property line to the deer stand, and later felt it as the stand’s supports were ripped from the trees and it started to fall. I felt it in my bones when the biggest part of it hit the ground about twenty feet from where it had started, as if the air had swept up underneath and tossed it. Heard it in the nerves of my hands when the nonhumans shouted with victory.

It wasn’t Paka. I’d have recognized her.

Nonhumans. On my land or near enough. Strangers.

In the ground beneath my home, I felt something stirring, something new and angry. I raced to the front windows, listening, waiting. But the flash of rage died away, gone so totally that I had to wonder if I had imagined or misinterpreted it.

In the distance, on the Vaughn farm, I felt the uninvited visitors withdraw. Relief shushed through me like water through a pipe, but it didn’t last long, and worry flushed right back. I spent the rest of the night on the sofa, where I could see anyone coming down the drive, protecting my home from any direction. I slept uneasily, with John’s old Colt .45 six-shooter and the Winchester .30-30 on the rug at my feet. Neither had the spread pattern of the double-barreled shotgun, but without being able to stabilize it against a flagpole or a handy wall, the shotgun was mostly a threat without teeth. Useless. I needed something that was point-and-shoot and wouldn’t dislocate my shoulder. I needed a new gun.

*   *   *

The land quivered when humans walked onto my land just before dawn. They entered along the northwest side of the property, from the Stubbins farm. The churchmen had never come that way before, the land being steep and requiring a demanding climb, but perhaps Jackson Jr.’s anger was changing things. Or perhaps the group he’d found to help were the Stubbins’ kin. I had figured it would take time, maybe even weeks, to organize the menfolk. I’d been wrong.

I sat up, feet on the floor, and rubbed my tired eyes, concentrating. Fear spiked through me. They had sent eight men. I felt their combined life force flowing through the woods, along the ground, and up through the foundation of the house, into my bare feet, and some of the life force carried a faint taint of wrongness, similar to what I had sensed from Jackie. They carried weapons, and though I couldn’t tell what kind, I knew that with eight participants, they didn’t intend to use distance weapons. They intended this to be up close and personal.

I’d thought I had longer. I was a fool.

The battle I had been expecting and fearing for years—the battle to take me back to the church for punishment and rehabilitation, churchman style, or burn me at the stake—was heading my way. I’d choose my own way of dying if I had to go today.

The intruders had to come through the woods, however, and there was no path, just ridges and small creeks and rock outcroppings and trees big as redwoods. They’d be working by dead reckoning, in the dark of predawn, giving me time to get prepared. The trees were so tall on the steep hill that the leafy canopies cut the line of sight to nothing. I wished again I could do magic like a witch in one of the silly movies I watched, making roots rise up and trap them, thorns rise up and form an impenetrable wall. I remembered Pea and the earth that had stopped her in her tracks. In some form of trepidation, I reached out to the woods and thought, Stop them. Thinking that maybe the roots and the soil would indeed reach up and trap their feet as they had trapped Pea. But nothing happened.

So . . . I was gonna have to deal with this. With the men.

Real life was always a lot more bloody and had a lot fewer happy endings than movies.

Working in the dark, I double-checked the loads in all the weapons and laid out ammunition at each window. I washed up with the last of the night’s warm water, bathing the sleepless exhaustion from my eyes, before slathering on my homemade emollient cream. A cold wind was blowing, tossing multicolored leaves, and even stripping green leaves from their stems, flinging them through the air, so I braided my hair back out of the way, dressed in long-john underwear, layered on T-shirts, overalls, and work boots. For an extra bit of safety, I strapped John’s old hunting knife around my waist while extra rounds went into my pockets—preparations that settled me. I was gonna die. But I’d take a few of them with me. I took a moment to wonder what life would be like if I were able to pick up a phone and call the police for help. But the woods made that impossible. Cell signals just didn’t reach in here. Even satellite signals were iffy once one entered the edge of the property.

Soulwood ate the energy.

Though my heart was stuffed up high in my throat and my guts did little pirouettes, I ate leftovers from the fridge and stoked the stove before putting the drip percolator on the hottest section of the stovetop for coffee, making a full pot in case I got to be hospitable instead of a good shot. Or in case someone made it inside and I needed an unexpected weapon. Scalding coffee was a good one.

I shooed the cats out of the house. It was safer outside this morning than inside, despite the owls and coyotes and foxes that thought house cats were tasty. And the churchmen would likely kill the cats like they’d killed the dogs.

My heart rose up in my throat at the thought of the dogs, and I suddenly could feel the cold, hair-covered flesh of their ankles as I dragged them across the lawn to bury them. Tears threatened and I blinked, closing my lids over hot, painful eyes. I would not mourn. Not now. Grief was paralyzing. Grief slowed reflexes. Grief was an emotion I didn’t have time for.

I sat on the back porch with John’s hunting rifle, the sun rising at my back on the front of the house, the screening hiding me in shadows, and I felt one of the churchmen trip and fall, barking his arm on the root he landed on. His skin ripped and his blood dropped, two tiny splatters. But it was enough. His life was mine the moment I needed it. Another tripped and bit his tongue when he landed, jaw-first, in the loam. He spit bloody spittle. Two were mine now. Six to go.

The churchmen walked closer, tramping over my land.

Maybe I could convince them to go away.

My laugh was humorless. Maybe pigs would fly and I’d find gold nuggets in the water that my windmill pumped up from the ground. Best bet was I’d die fighting and take a few with me.

The sky was bright in the east, climbing above the mountain ridge, the sun’s rays shining through clouds like a deceitful promise of survival, when dark forms appeared at the edge of the woods, stopping just outside the cleared area of grassy land. I lifted John’s binoculars to my face and tracked down until I focused on one of the men.

Only it wasn’t a man. It was a kid. A boy. Maybe ten or twelve years old. He was wearing a plaid shirt like the older churchmen wore on weekdays. Jeans. Boots. He had dark red hair and freckles. He carried a hunting rifle almost as big as he was. And he wore an expression too callous and too determined for his years. And yet . . . he was afraid.

Oh . . . No . . .

I moved my binoculars right, slowly, then left, until I had seen all eight of them. Not one was older than fifteen. None of them even needed to shave yet. And they all wore faces that said they had come to do something they already regretted. Ernest Jackson Jr. had sent children to murder me. And I owned the lives of two if I set my hands into the soil and dragged them under.

“No,” I whispered. “No.”

They are not going to make me kill children.