18
The day crawled by like a living creature, bleating and breathing, where every pulsating breath was like an odor that slipped through the fissures of the tents and infected everyone. The sadness, the hopelessness, the sudden and terrifying loss was everywhere. If Sarah’s dearest wish had been to have a few more people support her in her desire to return to the convent she was shocked to realize that the support hurt nearly as bad as the rejection.
Is there anything worse than the loss of faith? What before had been a comforting blanket of group belief was now a terrifying realization that they were all in danger—they were all vulnerable—and that people really could start dying any time now.
Nuala and Fiona were slammed the hardest by Maeve’s death. Both had sworn to love and protect the child after her mother was murdered in the rape camp the spring before. But it was the loss of faith in Mike that really hurt. That and the sudden—up to now not believable idea—that they were safe as long as they believed they were.
It may take a village but not if that village is sound asleep and the child is determined enough, Sarah thought.
It was the first time for the group that the death was a child and the first time it had been an easily avoidable accident.
Because clearly even our best precautions aren’t enough.
The compound women were divided into two groups for the day—the group that was attempting to give comfort to Nuala and Fiona and the group watching the rest of the children. Twelve now.
Belonging to neither group Sarah sat with Declan in his tent for most of the afternoon and watched him as he flickered in and out of consciousness.
Kevin and Terry dug the grave. Tommy and Gavin were moving the horses to better pasture and laying traps in the woods. And Mike was walking around like a stunned ghost.
Scratch that. Like a detested stunned ghost.
Fiona had turned on Mike in the immediate aftermath and laid the blame for Maeve’s death at his feet. Sarah couldn’t defend him but she couldn’t witness it either and was relieved to sit by Declan’s bedside tucked away from the now rampant fear and anger.
“Is the fear worse than the reality now?” Sarah said under her breath as she watched the activity of the camp though the door of the tent. The day had turned cold and grey. Rain wasn’t far off. It never was.
Worry wouldn’t have prevented it. Mother Angelina’s voice spoke clearly in Sarah’s head.
That is flat bullshit, Sarah thought. Worry would have kept Maeve away from the water. It would have tied her to her bed and kept her from leaving the tent.
You can’t keep them safe by holding them in your arms, Mother Angelina’s voice came again. It doesn’t work that way.
Tell that to Fiona, Sarah thought as she glimpsed her sister in law through the gap in the tent flap, her shoulders heaving with sobs, as one of the compound women embraced her and tried to comfort her.
Tell that to anyone who’s feared the worst and then experienced it.
Mike had never felt more ostracized from his own people in his life. Right when they needed his leadership the most, they were shutting him out.
He didn’t blame them.
He stood by the cold campfire beside his tent and stared up at the castle walls.
What was I thinking? In the whole obsessed, maniacal trek here from the convent—two nearly deadly attacks and one broken axel ago—what was my plan for taking this fecking castle?
He felt a wave of dejection wash over him. How is it that he, of all people, had no real vision of how he’d do that? Had he assumed it would be empty? Or that they’d be reasonable people eager to add to their population? Maybe he was just pushing against Sarah? If she hadn’t been so against the idea would he have been more moderate about doing it?
Whatever his reasoning had been, the fact was the group was falling apart and it was his fault. The temperatures were dropping and they were sitting on a barren piece of land with no protection beyond the flimsy tents they’d brought with them. As if on cue he heard a sudden whooshing sound as a violent blast of wind tore down a tent and pulled it across the campground. He made a step toward it before he saw Kevin and Terry running toward it.
In the mood everyone was in at the moment he wasn’t entirely sure they wouldn’t rather sleep out in the open with no shelter at all than accept help from him.
He glanced at Fiona and Declan’s tent and felt his heart plunge. Sarah was in there keeping an eye on Declan, who was weakening by the hour according to Fiona.
Everything about this campaign had turned to shite in a hurry.
“Mike?”
He turned to see Sophia standing by his tent. She held little Maggie—not four weeks old with cheeks chapped and red—wrapped tightly in a blanket.
“Aye, lass,” he said wearily. It occurred to him that she was possibly the only person here who didn’t outright hate him at the moment, although he wasn’t entirely sure about that.
“They sent me to ask you when we’ll get inside,” she said, her eyes moving to the looming structure of the castle. She shivered.
That was another thing. He’d stupidly set up camp at the castle’s base so even at the height of any day with full sunshine, they were all plunged in perennial shade and cold.
“Only we’re all freezing out here,” she said, “and I wouldn’t ask except for the children.”
He felt a harbinger of disaster tingling over his shoulders.
“I know, lass,” he said helplessly and then turned around with a start as he saw her eyes widen as she looked at the castle. The man was back at the window. At the same moment Mike felt the first drops of rain on his face.
Please God, have him let us in. Please for the love of these people who trusted me and for the children…
Mike hurried to stand beneath the window. The man was alone this time.
“Hello to you,” Mike called. “Can you help us then?”
Even from this distance Mike could see the answer in the man’s face. Mike’s heart plummeted before he even heard the words.
“I’m very sorry but you’ll need to keep moving. You have nothing we need.”