Page 3 of Harvest of Sighs (Thornchapel 3)
Estamond walked around the altar with the lantern raised high, even though the moon on its own illuminated the door well enough. The first time she’d seen it two years ago, it had been merely a glimpse, a flash of wood and old iron out of the corner of her eye. And then it became more—it stabilized or solidified or pushed its way through whatever thick magic normally kept it hidden—and every feast night, she saw it plain as anything, as if it had been built there yesterday.
Or as if it had always been there.
And then every feast night turned into every new moon, and then every new moon turned into every night. Until it stood there even in the broad daylight. Until even Randolph could see it.
She hadn’t told her mother, of course she hadn’t.
Because while, yes, her mother was the only one who approved of Estamond marrying Randolph—who had in fact foretold it using copper spoons and blood cut from the tender inside of one of Estamond’s thighs—it was also her mother who’d warned Estamond not to fall in love with Randolph Guest.
It will be that much harder if the door opens and the Thorn King must do his duty by the land, her mother had said. It will be that much harder for you to do your part.
She knew what part her mother meant. She meant Estamond should kill him if he would not go willingly.
At the memory, Estamond’s hand went to her pocket. She could no more kill Randolph than she could kill her own children, than she could kill her own parents, or her twin brother. It was simply impossible. She hadn’t known it was impossible then, when she married a Guest, but she knew it now.
So she hadn’t told her mother about the door. But her mother knew anyway.
If you don’t do it at Lammastide, then it will be done at Samhain.
It will be one of us.
I’ll do it in the hills.
That’s what her mother’s note said—and nothing more. Not that it needed to say more, Estamond could read the meaning loud and clear. If she did not kill the Thorn King on Lammas, then her mother would kill Estamond’s father or her brother—or maybe even herself—on Samhain night. And that was the best possible scenario, because there was one other at the Kernstow farmstead her mother could kill, and if she did that, then Estamond would set the moors afire with her despair.
And her mother wouldn’t do it in the thorn chapel, where Estamond could try to stop her. No, she’d do it up in the hills, where there’d be no way to find her. No way to predict her movements or protect her family.
No, if Estamond didn’t close the door, her mother would. And her mother would close it at such a cost that they might as well already be dead.
The day after she’d received the note, Esta
mond had dragged her tender postpartum body to the farm to beg her mother to change her mind, but she was gone on one of her mysterious errands and her father was up with a flock near Reavy Hill. Only her twin brother had been there, which was dangerous for a number of reasons.
“Esau,” she’d said in surprise as he ducked out of the farmhouse door to welcome her. The house looked as it always looked—damp stone and dark windows—fuchsia foxgloves peeking around the low stone walls surrounding the house, and the hills blushing purple with blooming heather.
And Esau looked as he always looked: tall and lean and broad-shouldered, his hair the same dark brown as hers, his eyes the same glittering emerald. As children, they roamed and romped all over the moors, hiding and darting far away from the drudgery of the farm, pretending to gather herbs and plants for their mother. They matched in more than looks—they matched in wildness, in anger and in thrill—and so perhaps it wasn’t a surprise what happened between them later, on the same moors where they used to play so innocently.
At least, their mother hadn’t been surprised. After she’d midwifed the child, she’d used the birth blood in the spoons and smiled to herself at what she saw. The boy—Esra, they named him—grew up utterly doted on and pampered by his Nanna and Poppa, as well as by his mother and father. And if his mother and father had the same parents, if they looked alike, if he must not tell certain people who his mother was—well, that all seemed normal enough to Esra. Every farmstead tucked into the moors had its own strangenesses and peculiarities, after all, and anyway, people already expected the Kernstows to be strange.
“Is he here?” Estamond had asked, her heart twisting. Esau and Esra had been the sacrifice she’d had to make in order to marry a Guest—a necessary sacrifice in her mother’s eyes, but a sin in Esau’s. It was a sin he would never forgive her for, she knew, and yet, she couldn’t quite bring herself to regret it. Esra was safe and happy, and she’d never begrudge Esau finding another woman to vent all his feral passions at, and so he could also be happy if he chose. She’d gained the thorn chapel in return for leaving her brother and her son behind, she’d gained the stones and the altar and the door and the place that belonged to her family by ancient right. She’d gained five more children for the one she left to her parents, she’d gained a sweet, devoted husband in place of her twin brother. A brother whose love was like the moors themselves—howling and desolate.
And yet, she still missed them, missed them like she missed the rain on her face or the mist in her hair.
“He’s started at the village school,” Esau had told her, stepping close enough to seize her in his arms, which he did. “Now, why are you here?”
“Mother,” she’d gasped. “Mother sent me a note. She wants me to kill the Thorn King at Lammastide.”
“Or it will be one of us,” Esau said. “I know.”
“Not Esra,” she begged. “Please.”
Esau had growled then, hauling her even tighter to his chest. “If you would do your duty, then no one would have to die at all.”
“No one here, you mean,” she hissed, struggling. “You want me to choose between my husband and you.”
“I want you to choose between the Guests and the Kernstows,” Esau said, scowling. “They stole the thorn chapel from us. Why should you cry over a dead Guest now?”
“They stole it thirteen hundred years ago,” Estamond said, still struggling in his arms. “When will we forgive them for it? Does a man really deserve to die for what his forefathers did that long ago?”
