Page 54 of A Resistance of Witches

ba’agala uvizman kariv, v’im’ru. Amen…

Y’hei sh’mei raba m’varach l’alam ul’almei almaya.

Yitbarach v’yishtabach, v’yitpa’ar v’yitromam v’yitnaseh,

v’yithadar v’yit’aleh v’yit’halal

sh’mei d’kud’sha, b’rich hu,

l’eila min-kol-birchata v’shirata,

tushb’chata v’nechemata da’amiran b’alma

v’im’ru. Amen.

Y’hei shlama raba min-sh’maya v’chayim aleinu v’al-kol-yisrael,

v’im’ru. Amen.

Oseh shalom bimromav, hu ya’aseh shalom aleinu v’al kol-yisrael,

v’imru. Amen.

Rebecca carried on until the syllables seemed to run out, and then there was quiet once again. The book lay at Lydia’s feet, silent as a stone.

“Amen,” Henry said. His face was streaked with tears. Lydia looked at Rebecca and saw that she was crying as well.

They drove back without speaking.

•••

It was nightby the time they reached the château. The morning’s fog had dissipated, replaced by a sharp-toothed wind that bit into Lydia’s skin through her thin coat. A delicate frost blanketed the ground, and moonlight illuminated the icy crystals, making the grass glitter in the dark.

Henry collected some pillows and blankets for Rebecca, then disappeared without a word.

Lydia studied Rebecca’s face as she eased herself into a kitchen chair.Her skin was streaked with dirt. Yellow bruises still mottled the skin around her eye and mouth, and there were black crescents of dirt under her nails. Two days ago, Lydia had thought of Rebecca as thin, perhaps a little too thin. Now she looked gaunt.

“You’re leaving us?”

Rebecca nodded. “Tomorrow.”

Lydia considered her bloody, blistered palms, but couldn’t seem to gather the energy needed to heal them. TheGrimorium Bellumsat heavy in her lap.

“Those words you spoke. At the grave. It was a prayer?”

Rebecca stared at the table. “The Mourner’s Kaddish. It shouldn’t have been me. There should have been a minyan, but…” She shook her head.

“You’re Jewish.” Lydia watched Rebecca’s face for some reaction. “I didn’t know.”

“I didn’t want you to.”

She wondered why she’d never considered it before. “Is your family…” Lydia didn’t know how to finish the question.

Rebecca exhaled. “My father was taken away by the police two years ago. Then, last July, they came back and took my mother, and my little sister, Noémie. They took them to the Vélodrome d’Hiver, along with everyone else they could round up. Then to Drancy. Then…” She didn’t need to say it. Lydia knew.Deportation. Poland.Rebecca glanced at Lydia, then away again. “I wasn’t home when it happened.”

The pitch of the grimoire’s incessant humming seemed to heighten. Lydia looked down and saw that her palms had left streaks of reddish-brown blood on the cracked leather of the book, and now it was practically vibrating. She wiped her palms on her skirt, trying to make it stop, but it only seemed to become more agitated.

“Have you decided what you’re going to do with that?” Rebecca glanced at the grimoire.

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