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The rocks bite into her knees as she falls and oddly the thing Hannah Miller thinks of as her teeth click together is her mother and how the woman had struck her earlier that day, how it had elicited the same startling shock, the same sting of childish betrayal. Wait, this isn’t supposed to happen. All her life, Hannah has tried to be the most dutiful daughter and still it gets her nothing: scorn, disappointment, a hand across the face if she’s lucky, the lash if not. 

She’d thought at least she could count on the ground being steady underneath her feet. 

Hannah lifts her head and even through the sting of tears, she can see Sarah’s face so clearly, can see the fear there. A trapped, wild animal growing more desperate as the hunter approaches. And Hannah can hear them, the footsteps behind her, too close for her to ever get away.

Sarah takes a step toward her and Hannah presses her palm to the rocks to keep her traitorous hand from reaching. “Go! Go!” 

Even as the words leave her mouth, her mind screams stay, don’t leave me! with a desperation that feels more and more familiar with each passing day. Still, Sarah seems to take her words as truth, whirling and running into the darkness and Hannah has only seconds to be relieved before she feels the heat of the bodies as they encircle her, can smell the unwashed, sweaty anger of them. Their thrill, too. 

A foot drives the air from her lungs and that betrayal is back, the confusion that makes her feel like a little girl again, learning all the ways the world can hurt, sting, let her down. Her mother’s anger, the burns left behind by an iron pot, the bite of a cold wind and an empty stomach. But this is much, much worse. Those things before, they had never meant to hurt her, not like this. 

Hannah gasps and any hopes of escape are dashed completely at the command, “Check her for marks!” and the realization of what that means. Hands, rough and excited, grab her, roll her over, reach and grope and pull and she’s the animal now, trapped and helpless and that feeling coats her tongue with horror, with a fear so thick and palpable that she thinks she might choke on it. 

Caleb grins down at her, lecherous and pleased, seeming to love each time she claws and pushes at his face, struggling in vain. Someone grabs at her knees, rough, dirty fingers on her thighs and it occurs to her, suddenly, how much worse this could get, how when she looks at the faces of these men she sees the devils they’re supposedly hunting for. She keens, wild and desperate, as Caleb tears at her clothing and that only makes him laugh and his fingers pinch at the skin that only a night before had been brought to life by the brush of Sarah’s touch. 

The weight of him disappears suddenly, so quickly that it makes Hannah’s head spin, that she wonders, somehow, if she has gone to a different place, a different moment, somewhere gentle and quiet where she doesn’t have to witness what happens next to that poor, unlucky girl they have cornered in the grass.

But, no. Hannah can still hear the buzzing of voices, can feel the ache in her side, the feeling of fingers pressed to skin. She’s here, still, but Caleb is gone and it takes her a second to realize that the cursing, groaning lump in the grass beside her is the boy who had been holding her down only seconds before.

It takes her a second, too, to realize that the shouting has changed pitch, that the feeling of hands on her is only in her memory now, that the focus of the mob has changed. Someone shouts, a variation of the words Hannah knows will be swirling in her dreams for days if she were to make it out of this night: whore, witch, devil and when she looks, she can see a figure of fire and shadow, a demon after all. 

The figure is driving the men back with flame and the steel Hannah can see glinting in the firelight and it seems impossible that the devil is truly here in Union and that the devil would care anything about Hannah Miller.

“Back!” The voice snarls and the fire makes another sweeping pass in the darkness, driving back the men who are clearly afraid and all the more angry for it. “Do not touch her!” 

“Sarah,” Hannah whispers, the understanding coming from the center of her chest rather than her mind, warped and rattled with fear, and it seems so obvious now, seems completely ridiculous that she ever could have mistaken her for the devil. 

The torch is gripped tightly in Sarah’s hand, her knife in the other, and Hannah knows it’s only a matter of time before the men realize there are more of them, that they truly don’t have anything to fear from Sarah Fier, and it seems that Sarah realizes this too because she steps back, sliding the knife back into her waistband and reaching her hand out to Hannah instead. “Come. Quickly.” 

Hannah takes her hand without thinking, allowing Sarah to pull her to her feet, to tug her forward, away from the place that had once been home and toward the woods instead. Her hand stays in Sarah’s, holding so tightly Hannah can only imagine how painful it must be but still Sarah doesn’t pull away. “You were supposed to run,” she says, even as they do that now.

“And leave you?” Sarah glances over her shoulder, back toward the men Hannah can hear giving chase. “I would never.” 

It’s startling, how quickly the tears prick her eyes again, how badly Hannah wants to drop to her knees and sob. But if ever there was a time to hold back her tears, to press through the swirl of emotions threatening to choke her, it’s now. 

The darkness closes around them, tight and unforgiving, as they rush into the woods and Hannah knows it won’t deter the men after them. She knows because she saw it in their eyes, that it wasn’t fear driving them at all but something more, something worse. An excitement, a desire, a hunger. “They won’t stop,” Hannah pants, unaware that she’s even spoken at all until Sarah answers her.

“Neither will we. We just need to…we will find somewhere to hide. Somewhere they won’t look.”

“They will look everywhere.”

Sarah’s hand tightens around hers, pulling her forward. “Come on, Hannah.” Her tone is gentle and sharp all at once. “Just a little farther.” 

The brush behind them cracks and snaps with the weight of footsteps, the rush of bodies, proof of their pursuers and Hannah draws in a gasp, eyes widening. “Sarah,” she whispers, “the torch.” 

“Damn,” Sarah mumbles, looking at the fire that is all too like a beacon. She drops it, wasting precious seconds to stomp on the flames, to smother them with dirt and damp undergrowth and it’s not perfect but Hannah is less worried about burning the forest down than the men following after them.

The darkness is complete now but Hannah doesn’t falter, letting herself be pulled along behind Sarah, trusting the feeling of their palms pressed together. Behind them, the voices of the men swirl in the darkness like the baying of hounds after a fox, loud and persistent and bloodthirsty. It’s impossible to tell exactly where they are, the words and threats echoing off the trees, sometimes sounding as close as breath against the back of her neck while other times the voices seem to be barely more than a whisper. 

A branch grabs for the torn sleeve of her dress, scratching at the skin Caleb had laid bare, and Hannah pulls herself free, pressing her fingers to the spot and feeling a dampness. “Sarah…where…” Her voice is hoarse, as though she has been the one screaming though she’s trying so desperately to whisper. 

“I think…not much further…” Sarah lets out a grunt and then something that might even be a laugh. “Careful,” she says, “there’s a branch here.” 

She holds it away from Hannah, letting it go only once she’s stepped safely out of range. “There are branches everywhere,” Hannah points out wryly. 

“True,” Sarah concedes. “I should stop trying to count them with my face, then.” 

“Sarah…how…” But Hannah isn’t sure how to finish the sentence. How can you be joking at a time like this? How do you make me want to laugh even now? How did you find the courage to come back for me when you could’ve gotten away? 

She’s saved having to decide on her words by Sarah, who whispers, “Here…quiet…” 

Hannah pulls in a breath, holding it in her already burning lungs, listening. The voices of the men from Union have fallen away, the darkness punctuated only by the occasional shout or crack of a branch that feels impossibly far away. Here…she hears nothing. 

But she sees…yes. A shelter, roughly constructed in a roughly hewn clearing. As Hannah’s eyes continue to adjust, she realizes she’s been here before. “The Widow?” 

“I think…” Sarah swallows. “Perhaps she will hide us. Perhaps the men will be too scared to come look for us here.” 

“But how will the Widow feel when we show up uninvited in the middle of the night?” Hannah hesitates in spite of herself, fear churning in her belly despite everything else that has already happened tonight. “Sarah…” 

Sarah turns toward her, swallowing, and Hannah can see how rounded her eyes are, how they shine with fear even in the darkness. Her chin trembles as she opens her mouth, struggling to find the breath to speak. “Hannah…I…” She shakes her head, and it isn’t until Sarah squeezes that Hannah realizes they’ve been holding hands all this time. “Trust me.” 

Hannah nods and she can see a bit of the fear leave Sarah’s face and Hannah is grateful she could at least be brave enough to do that much. 

Unsurprisingly, the Widow’s homestead is quiet, any fire that she might have had for light and company long sense put to bed. Sarah pushes aside the deer skin doorway and it whispers as it falls closed behind them again and in the changing darkness, Hannah finds herself blind again. She tries to slow her breathing, hoping to hear something other than her own panicked heartbeat, as she waits for her eyes to adjust. The place smells entirely unfamiliar, like woodsmoke and wildness, something bitter and sharp mixed with a sweet, coppery tang. Something rustles in the shadows, a clicking in the dark, and it’s so unlike it had been the other day, when she was with Lizzie and Sarah and everything had felt dangerous and exciting but safe because it hadn’t occurred to her that she had anything to worry about. 

Sarah’s hand slips from her own and at least now Hannah can attribute some of the sounds she hears to the other girl, can pretend that they aren’t dropping in unannounced on one of the most feared and untouchable women in the surrounding area.

But she’s had enough of witches and stories to last her a lifetime. Hannah swallows. “Widow Mary? It’s Sarah Fier and Hannah Miller. Widow?” 

Perfect silence follows, the kind that makes Hannah, suddenly, uneasy. It strikes her as strange how quickly she’s gone from fearing that the Widow was home to feeling far more terrified at the silence. 

More movement, the sound of it sharp as a musket crack, and then a burst of light, the pungent tang of the whale oil that her mother considers a necessity and her father calls an extravagance. 

Called. 

Hannah is grateful for it now, for the smell that used to cling to her clothing and make her wrinkle up her nose in disgust. The light brightens Sarah’s face, flickering across her features and making her look more beautiful than Hannah thinks anyone ever has and relief makes her knees weak. It had been so dark and even back in Union everything had felt like such a panicked blur that to actually see Sarah’s face, to have this undeniable proof of her here now, leaves her feeling trembly with relief. 

“I don’t think…” Sarah lifts the oil lamp, trying to further illuminate the corners of the space. “Where else would she be?” 

The room they’re in now seems to be a bedroom of sorts, at least the pile of animal pelts in one corner, beside a roughly hewn shelf full of books and writings seems to suggest it. There’s a desk near where Sarah is standing, and another room beyond and Hannah realizes this is where she had stood only the night before with Lizzie, the impish girl laughing as she’s gone through the items on the desk where Sarah had found the lamp, looking for her magical berries. The other room then, Hannah assumes, is the larger space, where she had found Sarah standing with the Widow. 

Sarah pushes aside the buckskin door, holding the lamp out in front of her as she steps into the space beyond. “Widow Mary? Widow…we don’t mean to intrude but-”

Her words are cut off by the sound of a crow’s caw, so jarring and unexpected that Hannah nearly jumps out of her skin, and then, worse, a strangled cry from Sarah. Quickly, Hannah rushes toward her, only to collide with Sarah in the doorway. “Sarah, what-”

Quickly, Sarah shakes her head, giving her a push back, the fear returned to her face. “Don’t…” 

“What is it?” Hannah hisses, making as though to reach for the lamp so she can see for herself. “Sarah, what-”

“Widow Mary,” Sarah whispers, swallowing. “She’s dead.”

Hannah’s eyes widen. “Dead? How can that be…” 

Sarah shakes her head. “Maybe they’ve already…maybe someone has been here tonight and…” 

“We have to leave,” Hannah says, reaching for Sarah’s hand once more. “Quickly. We have to…” She stops when it seems obvious that Sarah is not about to spring into action. “Sarah…” 

“Hannah, wait,” Sarah says softly. “If someone has already been here…it’s likely they will not come back.”

“You want to…stay here all night with a dead body just on the other side of us?” 

Sarah shakes her head. “No. I want to avoid running back into the woods in the middle of the night and getting horribly lost. Or, worse, doubling back to Union on accident. If we stay here tonight…we can rest, hide…and then tomorrow we can take what we need and get as far from here as we can.” 

Hannah isn’t even aware of her own hands shaking until Sarah reaches for them, twining their fingers together. “Tomorrow they will still be looking for us,” she whispers. “If they already killed the Widow…you know what they will do to us.”

“I won’t let them,” Sarah says fiercely and something licks through Hannah’s chest stronger and sharper than the fear that has been there all night. “I will keep you safe, Hannah Miller.” 

Hannah musters a smile, small but still there. “And who will keep you safe, Sarah Fier?” 

In the flickering light from the oil lamp, Sarah, too, smiles. “Well, I thought you might.” 

Carefully, as cautious as if it were the first time, Hannah leans forward, kissing Sarah softly. It makes her want to cry all over again, the feeling of Sarah’s lips against hers, and it’s embarrassing how often the impulse seizes her when Sarah seems so utterly fearless. 

It’s a surprise to pull away and see a shine in Sarah’s eyes, a flicker of relief. “If you want to go, we can,” Sarah says softly and Hannah knows she means the words.

Going means setting foot in the dark, impassable woods. It could mean running into Caleb or Thomas or anyone else from Union or going back to Union itself. Staying means trying to fall asleep with a dead body mere feet away. A murdered body.

Still. The choice seems easy enough. “We should stay,” Hannah says with a nod. “And tomorrow, we will flee.” 

Sarah kisses her again, delicate and questioning, a whisper of her lips against Hannah’s. When Sarah moves away, her brow furrows, eyes darkening. “Hannah…what did they do to you?” Her fingers brush against the bloody scratch left behind by the branch, the bruising that Hannah can feel now that she’s staring at it against her skin.

“Nothing,” Hannah swallows, shaking her head. She reaches for the torn part of her chemise, trying to hold it together, though she knows its a hopeless cause. “Nothing.” 

The hands on her thighs had been hot and rough. Caleb’s face hungry with anticipation. She can feel, again and again, the anger that had driven the boot into her ribs. She swallows, certain now that if she were to try and say anything more, she truly will start to cry. Instead, she turns away, as though to study the pile of parchment by the Widow’s bedside. 

“Here,” Sarah says softly, setting the lamp down on the desk. “I’ll try and find something to…perhaps there’s water we can use to clean.” 

Hannah suddenly feels so, so very tired. It feels impossible, the idea that she could be feeling anything but fear and the desire to run, run, run like the rabbits her father used to bring home for stew, trying to hide them when she was a little girl so she wouldn’t start crying. Hannah has a new found sympathy for the rabbits now, even though they kept her fed for many a winter night. Any minute now, she expects the wire to tighten around her neck.

Or, worse still. Around Sarah’s. 

The thought instills her with a burst of energy, enough that she follows after Sarah rather than let her out of her sight, even if it means stepping into the larger space of the Widow’s home where the Widow currently lays in the dirt, sightless eyes staring upward. Hannah pulls in a sharp breath, pressing her dirty fingers to her mouth, unable to pull her gaze from the unfortunate woman. The ground around her is dark with blood, the gash in her throat deep and ragged, so bright in contrast to her pale skin.

“Hannah.” Her eyes jump toward Sarah’s face. “Do not look.”

“Too late,” Hannah mumbles but she steps around the woman, and around the crow still perched nearby, trying not to take it’s cantankerous croaking personally. 

Sarah starts rummaging through the wooden bowls and boxes on the various surfaces in the space, brow furrowed in concentration, the light from the lamp making her look entirely too serious. Hannah gives the contents a cursory glance as she crosses behind her. “What are you doing? Are you a terrifying witch after all?”

The joke falls a little flat, all things considered. 

“If I was, I would certainly not be hiding here like a rabbit,” Sarah mutters. “I would do all the things they’ve been accusing us of.”

Hannah lifts an eyebrow. “Laying with a demon in the full moonlight?” 

“Well…” Sarah smirks. “Not that part.” 

Hannah pulls one of the animal skins down from where the Widow has it folded across a support beam, shaking it out. “Good. I’m not sure I could compete with the devil.” 

“Jealous, Hannah Miller?” 

“If you were the devil’s bride, I would have to concede,” Hannah says, gently draping the animal skin across the Widow’s sightless face. “I could hardly pursue a married woman.” 

“Holy as always,” Sarah says, holding out her hand. “Come here. I think this might help with the cuts.” 

Hannah wrinkles her nose as the sharp, bitter smell of the herbs in Sarah’s hands. “What is that?” 

“I’ve gathered this before,” Sarah says. “My mother…before she died…she would take me with her into the woods sometimes. Henry was always getting hurt, so we always needed to have plenty of this on hand.” She smiles, faraway, wistful. “It should help, take some of the sting away.” 

Gently, Sarah uses her fingers to spread the paste across the gash below her collarbone and Hannah shivers, mouth suddenly dry. Sarah lifts her gaze, concerned. “Does it hurt?”

“No,” Hannah says, shaking her head. “No…I…” She can feel herself blush, can feel the heat spreading through her cheeks and to the tips of her ears. “It feels…nice.” 

Now Sarah’s expression shifts to one of confusion. “It does? I think it would-”

“No, I mean…” The blushing is certainly not subsiding any time soon. “You…” She gently closes her fingers around Sarah’s wrist. “It feels nice when you touch me.” 

“Imagine how it will feel when I’m touching you without the smelly poultice.”

Hannah shivers again and Sarah laughs, tipping her head back as the sound passes her lips and Hannah narrows her eyes, giving her shoulder a push. “Enough out of you,” she mumbles. “Devil.” 

Smiling, Sarah takes her face between her hands, pulling Hannah to her. “Demon,” she whispers before kissing her gently and the words certainly feel like they have lost their sting when spoken like this, the press of Sarah’s lips gentling any sharpness they might have had. 

The feeling of Sarah’s hands on her, gentle against the curve of her neck or against her side, is almost enough to erase the feeling of the other hands and fingers pulling, pinching, groping, grabbing. She moves closer to Sarah, pressing their bodies together, purely for the selfish purpose of trying to push those feelings aside, of reminding herself of the gentleness that she’s felt before. 

“We should try to rest,” Sarah says, once they’re both breathless and the space is filled with the sounds of their quick inhales and beating hearts. “We need to be…we should be rested for tomorrow.” 

Hannah nods, even though the idea of closing her eyes seems impossible. Not just because of the idea that Caleb and Elijah and the others still out there in the woods, but because of the dead woman they’ve already likely disrespected enough, and the fluttering worry that maybe all this talk about witches and demons might have actually brought about the real thing. Still, standing around in the dark hardly seems like a better alternative, so they go back into the sleeping area and Hannah can’t help but cast a skeptical look at the pile of pelts laid out on the ground. 

“You go ahead,” Sarah says, nodding toward what passes as a bed. “I’ll keep watch.”

“You aren’t…” 

Two things occur to Hannah at once. 

The first being that Sarah apparently does not intend to follow her own advice and get some rest.

The second, and perhaps more important, being that there are limited options as far as sleeping spaces are concerned which would mean that she and Sarah…that they…the idea of it freezes the question in her throat even while it sends a rush of heat through her unlike anything Hannah has ever felt before. 

Or, perhaps that’s not true. She’s felt scalded like this once before, nearly a year ago when her father’s sermon was about all the unholy thoughts the devil might fill one’s mind with, including thoughts of a man laying with another man. He hadn’t brought up the rest of it, as though the idea that a woman thinking about another woman in that way was simply too ridiculous to contemplate. But she’d been thinking of Sarah Fier in the way she knew she shouldn’t, in the way that would most certainly be considered a sin, and no matter how fervently she prayed each night on her knees, the thoughts wouldn’t leave her mind. 

It hadn’t occurred to Hannah until later that maybe that meant they weren’t sinful at all, that God wasn’t riding her of them because there was nothing wrong with her. 

But that feeling she’d had that morning, the heat that Hannah had feared would turn her to ash in front of the whole of Union, was shame. 

This…this is nothing like that. 

How long has she had a thought just like this one? How long has she lain alone in her own bed and imagined how it would feel to have the weight and heat of another body beside hers? How long has she closed her eyes and imagined that body to be Sarah’s? 

She could let Sarah stick to her rather ridiculous idea of staying up all night to keep watch -which does not fill Hannah with the relief she wishes it would.

Or.

Or. 

“Sarah,” Hannah says softly, reaching for her hand. “Rest.”

The way Sarah avoids looking at her, dots of color in her own cheeks, lets Hannah know that this realization has not escaped her either. “We shouldn’t…”

“Please.” 

The space is surprisingly comfortable, especially when they do a bit of their own arranging, moving some of the pelts around and widening the space enough for two. She’s never lain on anything other than a straw mattress with sheets that she knows had once been a soft white. Grace Miller would’ve never allowed such crude or Native practices to make it into her home. There’s a musty, wild smell that fills her nose as she tries to get comfortable but the softness of the pelts is surprising, as is the warmth.

Or maybe the warmth is coming from Sarah’s body, only inches from her own. 

“Sarah…” Hannah swallows, letting her fingers lightly brush against the crook of her elbow, this previously hidden section of skin that now manages to make her heart race. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?” Sarah turns her head, eyebrows knitting together. “For what?” 

Hannah hesitates, willing herself to stop. To just savor this moment and the feeling of Sarah beside her before she does something that might push Sarah away. “I think…all of this is my fault. And you’re suffering because of it.”

Sarah pushes herself up on her elbow, looking at Hannah as though she’s just started reciting one of her father’s sermons in perfect Latin. “Your fault? How could that possibly be true?” 

“My mother is right…my heart is…wicked. I think my weakness must have tempted the devil here to Union, and he punished my father and now-”

“Hannah, stop,” Sarah says gently. She reaches out a hand, laying it over Hannah’s thundering heart with the same gentleness she had used earlier. “Your heart is many things, but wicked is not one of them. It could never be. You are…too good, Hannah Miller.” 

Again, the prick of tears, but they feel less embarrassing now, here in the middle of the forest with Sarah beside her. Hannah covers Sarah’s hand with her own, lifting her eyes to meet the other woman’s. “Will you kiss me, Sarah Fier?” 

Sarah leans closer and does exactly that.

The sensation of movement beside her wakes Hannah suddenly and she has only a moment of confusion before it all comes flooding back. Her father’s death, the betrayal of the town that has known her for her entire life, the hands on her body.

The Widow.

Sarah. 

Hannah turns her head and none of it has been a dream, not the worst parts of it. But, not the best parts either. Like Sarah, beside her after all, still asleep amidst a tumble of wild curls.

And dreaming, if the frantic movement behind her eyelids is any indication. The movement that had woken her…Sarah, caught in the throes of what she sees in her mind, face pinched in worry, body shifting and uncertain.

“Sarah,” Hannah says softly, reaching her hand out across the distance between them, resting it gently on Sarah’s shoulder. “Sarah. Wake up.” 

As though on command, Sarah’s eyes snap open and she gasps, body stiffening as she comes awake. “It’s okay,” Hannah says softly. “You were dreaming.” 

Immediately, Hannah can feel the tension leave her, can see the relief settle across Sarah’s face as she turns her head. “Oh, Hannah,” she says softly, reaching for her hand. “I…” She swallows, nodding. “Just a dream.”

Nodding, Hannah repeats, “Just a dream.”

Given the recent hours, she can only imagine what Sarah might have been seeing in her mind. She’s surprised she was able to fall asleep at all, given the fear of being found, the knowledge that there was nothing, really, that separated her from the men looking. But she’s surprised even more that her sleep was dreamless, deep and heavy, that she feels almost rejuvenated now. 

Before she can talk herself out of it, Hannah moves, curling her body closer to Sarah’s, closing the distance that they had managed to keep all night. It’s terrifying, the realization that washes over her, that, for now, she and Sarah are truly alone. No one to see, to stop them, to interrupt, to talk. Just her and Sarah and a distinct lack of space between them. The last thing Hannah remembers before falling asleep is wishing she was brave enough to move closer, to pull Sarah to her, to tell Sarah of all the things she’d imagined them being able to do if there was no one else in the world. 

Now…for this stolen moment at least…there is no one else. 

Sarah takes her in her arms, holding Hannah to her, and Hannah can hear the beating of her heart beneath her ear, can feel the steady rise and fall of her chest with every breath. Sarah’s body is warm and solid against her own, but soft and familiar, more comforting than anywhere else Hannah can ever remember being. Home. 

It makes her want to laugh, makes her well and truly doubt her father for the first time in her life. For so long, she’d believed that the man knew everything, that he understood all the mysteries in this unforgiving life. But clearly, he had been wrong about so many things. 

“Hannah…” Sarah pauses, though the movement of her fingers through Hannah’s hair does not, and tangled together like this, Hannah fears she could easily fall back asleep. It’s still early, the light still watery and gray. How badly she wants to sleep just like this, safe and protected. “Are you sure?” 

At first, Hannah thinks Sarah might have somehow read her mind, is asking if she’s sure about slipping off into sleep again, but then Sarah adds, “We could try and go back to Union. Maybe things have calmed now…maybe they would be willing to…I could just explain what they think-”

“No,” Hannah says softly, tightening her jaw. “No, there is no explaining.” 

She stops her mind before it can carry her away, before it can show her what Thomas and Elijah and the others would do to Sarah if she were to walk into Union again. The thought of it, of losing her, nearly steals the breath from her as swiftly as the kick to her ribs had done. 

“No, Sarah,” Hannah says again, more firmly. She lifts her head, reaching to brush a curl from Sarah’s face. “I want to go. With you.” 

She’s dreamt of leaving Union, of leaving with Sarah, had known all along that such a thing would never happen. Except…perhaps…now it is. Maybe now is the chance she’s longed for so badly. A new life, a different one, better. A life with Sarah. 

Sarah kisses her and it feels different, kissing like this with their bodies flush together and warmed from sleep, limbs still lazy and heavy. A decadence Hannah had never imagined she would actually get to experience. 

“It will be dangerous,” Sarah says, as though it hasn’t been dangerous already. Her hand is soft against Hannah’s cheek, thumb tracing the apple of her cheek. “We have no supplies. No…no bloody idea what we’re even doing.”

Hannah smiles for just a moment, though the truth of Sarah’s words makes the smile falter quickly. “If we go back to Union, we will die,” she says simply and Sarah doesn’t argue. “If we leave, maybe we can live.” 

Sarah nods, kissing her forehead. “Yes. We shall.” 

They leave the bed behind and Hannah shivers in the early morning chill, wrapping her arms around herself. Her shift is in tatters, far worse than she’d thought before, now that she can see it in the morning light. The parts that hadn’t been torn by human hands have been ripped and snared by branches and roots, leaving it likely beyond the help of the sewing needle. Still, which choice is there but to sigh and follow Sarah into the main part of the Widow’s house.

Even knowing that the Widow would there, dead and pathetically covered in an animal skin, does little to brace Hannah for the sight of the body once more. It all seems worse in the light: the blood in the dirt, the overturned items scattered around, the pale hand laying palm up. “Who could have done this?” She whispers, as though she doesn’t have first hand proof of the evil the men she’s known her whole life are capable of. 

“We should not dally to find out,” Sarah says, once more poking through the Widow’s things, her back to Hannah.

It takes Hannah a moment to notice the expression of determination on Sarah’s face, in her movements. “What are you looking for?” 

“Oh…” Sarah frowns, shaking her head. “A book…”

“A book?” Hannah lifts her eyebrows. “In the mood for some reading?” 

Sarah’s smile is self-conscious, sheepish, and she shakes her head. “No. I…just something I noticed the other day. It’s gone now, anyway.” Confusion flickers across her face and she glances toward the Widow’s body. “Odd.” 

“Sarah, I think we have more important things to worry about than a book,” Hannah says gently. “We can’t be sure that they won’t come by here again, that someone won’t find us.” 

“Right.” Sarah nods, abandoning her search. “We should see what things the Widow has that we can take with us.” Off Hannah’s uncertain look, Sarah adds, “She has no use for them anymore. And we do.” 

Hannah can’t argue with this logic. Hopefully Widow Mary would understand. 

Any qualms that her mind might’ve had about going through the Widow’s food stores are not shared by her stomach, which growls impatiently at the idea of food, her sudden hunger making the hard bread and dried meat taste like the best thing she’s ever eaten. The crow hops over to where she and Sarah are standing, fluttering around impatiently, soothed only when Hannah finally gives it a piece of the dried meat, though it still doesn’t seem pleased with their presence. Sarah tries to pet the top of its head, only for the bird to squawk and nip at her finger and as Hannah stands there laughing at the startled look on Sarah’s face, it occurs to her that this is her life now. Unrecognizable and strange, where she can apparently ignore the presence of a dead body while she has breakfast and laughs in spite of the past day that feels too much like a nightmare to be true. 

“We need to find something we can use to carry some things,” Sarah says. “I’m going to see if I can find a bucket, get us some water. Perhaps there’s a spring or…” 

“Outside?” Hannah presses her lips together. “Is that a good idea?” 

Sarah shrugs, sliding the sheath with her knife into the band of her skirt. The leather sheath is new and Hannah wonders, briefly, where she’d gotten it, the leather supple and expensive. “We’ll have to leave eventually.” 

It seems almost ridiculous that they’ve been here for as long as they have, like they’re tempting fate being so close to Union. Right under the noses of the men who have been searching for them. 

Sarah disappears on silent feet and Hannah turns away, trying to busy herself with seeing what else they can use. Sarah will return. She’s just right outside. It’s not hard to think about the alternative, what fate had been promised by the angry voices of angry men: death by hanging at the start of morning. They’ll likely only be angerier now that she and Sarah have slipped their chains and made a fool of them all. The torn state of her clothing is enough of a suggestion as to what they might do with that anger, that embarrassment. 

Thankfully, Hannah is able to find a leather sachet and an old, threadbare sugar sack, both things that she figures will be suited for an escape effort. But, more importantly, she finds a few carefully folded chemises, well-worn and with proof of repeated repairs, but still in better state than what she’s wearing now. Hesitantly, Hannah looks over her shoulder toward the Widow before letting her fingers close around one of the dun colored shifts. Sarah is right. Widow Mary doesn’t need these things anymore. 

As Hannah is pulling the shift over her head, the sound of footsteps precedes Sarah’s voice by mere seconds. “I’ve found some…oh.” 

When Hannah looks back at her, pulling her hair from the collar of the shift, she’s vindicated to see that she’s finally rendered Sarah speechless, a blush in her cheeks. “Found what?” She prompts innocently, as though she has no idea what Sarah could possibly have been gawking at. It’s tantalizing, the idea of Sarah seeing her skin and, all the more thrilling is the idea of wanting her to. 

Some wicked part of her wants to pull the shift off again, wants to pull Sarah closer and put the woman’s rough and warm hands against her bare skin. There’s a heat low in her stomach, a desperate pressure between her thighs, conjured up the memory of Sarah’s kiss, her touch, the press of their bodies together just that morning. Of those stolen moments in the woods, where Sarah had pushed up her skirts and pressed wet, open-mouthed kisses to her thighs, promising something more Hannah could only begin to guess at, the promise of something she’d been told her whole life she should never want or welcome but that, with Sarah, she wanted so badly. 

Maybe this is the life she’s opening herself up to now, the promise of what she and Sarah might do when they are far enough away from Union to stop running. Where they might be able to make a life for themselves, just the two of them, always. She wants to know what comes next, after the feeling of Sarah’s lips on her skin, wants to know what the hooded, desirous look in Sarah’s eyes had promised. 

But not now. Not when they’ve been lucky thus far. Hannah feels like their time is running short, the brightening sky only making it more and more likely that they’ll be found. And Hannah won’t allow this life to be snatched away from her before it’s even truly begun. 

“Water,” Sarah says, clearing her throat. “There’s a stream close. I think it’s the same one that leads toward Solomon’s…it’s…cold. Good water.” 

Hannah smiles, pleased. Clearly there is something to make the impressive Sarah Fier lose her composure after all. 

Quickly, they pack away the few things the Widow has that might prove useful: as much of her food stores as possible, flint and the striker, and Sarah’s cloak, too valuable to leave behind but unnecessary in the warming day. It feels like nothing at all. Hardly enough to step into the forest with the intention of never returning to anything she knows. They don’t even have tools to forage for more food or to create and shape a home for just the two of them. 

What she has now can fit in the pack on her back. 

That, and Sarah Fier. 

Sarah leads the way toward the stream, the woods quiet and still around them. Hannah can’t resist the urge to glance around, head seemingly on swivel, as they put the Widow’s place behind them. Even in the quiet, everything feels like a threat. “I wish we could…do something for Widow Mary,” she whispers, as though raising her voice might give them away. “Bury her or…” 

“You have a good heart, Hannah Miller,” Sarah says, as they kneel beside the stream. “I am grateful to her, though. She might’ve saved our lives last night.”

Hannah shakes her head. “ You saved my life last night,” she says softly. “You…you shouldn’t have come back for me. If they had caught you-”

“Enough,” Sarah says gently. “I will always come back for you. Always.” 

“Hopefully we won’t have to worry anymore. We can get away and…just be us. Away from anyone who might know where we came from, or what we are.” 

“And what is that?” Sarah lifts an eyebrow as she asks the question. 

Sinners, Hannah is half-tempted to respond, women who love one another. But that doesn’t feel right. It doesn’t feel like the truth she knows. Instead, she smiles. “Witches, of course.”

“Oh, of course.” 

They drink from the stream with cupped hands and the water is shockingly cold, numbing Hannah’s fingers almost immediately, but it’s a relief to feel the cool water move down her throat and into her stomach. Since they’d found Sarah’s dog in the well, no water back in Union had felt safe, and it hadn’t been much longer until stopping for a swallow of water was the last thing on her mind. Now Hannah drinks until her belly feels rounded and she’s prickled with goosebumps and she feels sturdy, ready for what might come next. Despite the chill, they try to wash some of the sweat and grime from their arms and faces, clothes dampening with their efforts, and Hannah tries to study her reflection in the water, which offers very little to go on. What she’s learned about her appearance has come from the comments of other people, with glass far too expensive to be shipped and delivered to their small colony, let alone used for something her mother would consider the sinful pleasure of vanity. She likes herself best through Sarah’s eyes, through the feeling of her hands tracing the shape of her face, through her whispered voice calling her beautiful. 

Sarah frowns as she studies their surroundings, eyes moving down one side of the stream and then the other, and Hannah watches in silence, feeling completely useless beside Sarah’s obvious capability. “I think Solomon’s is back that way,” Sarah says finally, pointing toward the left side of the stream. “So we need to go in the opposite direction.” 

It’s all the same to Hannah. As in most things, she’s content just to follow Sarah. 

As they walk, the day grows brighter, the chill starting to slip away as the sun falls through the trees, the only proof of passing time considering everything around them looks so similar that they might as well be standing still for all Hannah knows. For the most part, they move in silence, either to avoid giving themselves away or because the moment seems too heavy for idle chatter, Hannah isn’t sure. What she is sure of is the feeling of her hand in Sarah’s, of the burn in the backs of her legs as they continue to press forward, of everything she’s known falling farther and farther behind her. 

The further they go, the easier it is for Hannah to let herself believe that they will actually make it. Away from Union. Somewhere the world might be a little kinder to her and to Sarah. She stops tensing at every snapping twig, stops bracing herself to hear the pitch of angry voices, stops expecting to feel Caleb’s hands on her again. Instead, she walks taller, shoulders looser, stops feeling like holding Sarah’s hand in her own is some sort of crime rather than a reassurance. 

“Are there others in these woods?” Hannah asks as she scans the dabbled light with a casual interest rather than a panicky desperation. “The Native people?” 

“Surely,” Sarah says and her forehead is beaded with sweat, skin already smudged again with dirt despite their best efforts in the stream. Hannah wishes they were back there now, wishes she could drink the cool water, could soak her aching feet. “They know the area better than we do.”

“Maybe they could help us,” Hannah suggests, even though the words sound childish the second she says them.

The feeling only grows when Sarah gives her a skeptical look. “Why would they want to? We’ve already taken their land. Driven out their people.” She shakes her head, a hint of scowl on her features. “Maybe now they’re burn Union to the ground. Put an end to all their troubles.” 

Hannah nods, even as her brow furrows. “My…my father said it was God that brought us to Union. To take care of the land in the proper way.” 

“Well,” Sarah scoffs, “I’m not sure your father was as in tune with God as he might’ve believed.” 

When she’d heard her father had locked himself in the Meeting House, Hannah had believed it, had had no doubts that a man as pious as he would surely turn to God in his darkest moments, would rely on prayer to heal whatever was wrong with him. But when she’d heard that he’d taken the children too…that part hadn’t seemed possible, hadn’t made any sense at all. Her father was one of the more gentle men that she knew, which is why it always fell to her mother to have a quick hand and her father to be there with a quick smile. 

But the sound of her mother wailing…the anguish in it…Hannah had known even before she’d gotten to the Meeting House what had happened. She’d never known a human to be capable of a sound like that, and then she’d heard those sounds all around her, the cries of pain and heartbreak as families found their children dead. Murdered. By her father. 

No one had paid her much notice as she’d stepped into the church, as she’d stared down at the man who always had a kind word, a kind touch, a kind smile. All of that was gone, suddenly, because there was no denying what he had done.

Hannah lets her hand fall from Sarah’s, though the sudden loss of contact feels foreign and wrong. When Sarah looks back at her, Hannah drops her gaze, brushing her hair behind her shoulder as though such an absent gesture is the only reason she’d pulled her hand free.

“Perhaps we should stop,” Sarah suggests. “Rest for a bit.” 

Wordlessly, Hannah moves the brush aside with a sweep of her foot and while there’s no way to avoid getting dirty, at least she can ensure that she won’t be sitting directly on a twisted root or a rock. Sarah sits across from her, reaching into the sack they’d taken from the Widow’s, pulling out one of the hanks of bread and tearing it into pieces. Hannah doesn’t miss how Sarah hands her the larger of the two and before Hannah can move her hand away, Sarah touches her wrist, silent until Hannah lifts her eyes once more.

“I’m sorry about your father,” Sarah says softly and there’s a tightness in her throat despite the sincerity that Hannah can see in her eyes, as though she’s trying to force the words out, steady and even. “I know he…” She pauses, as though to consider her words. “I know you loved him.” 

Hannah nods, about to assure Sarah that she did, indeed, that Cyrus Miller was a good man, a gentle one, who showed her how to shape a snowball when she was still young enough to find winter enchanting rather than troublesome, and who told bedtime stories about woodland creatures rather than Biblical plagues. But she stops abruptly, the words suddenly thick on her tongue. “Sarah,” she says softly, eyes widening. “Oh. Henry. I’m so sorry about…for…” 

She’d known the boy since he was born, knew all of the children in Union, of course. But Henry it seemed she knew almost as well as Abigail’s little sister Constance, thanks to Hannah’s efforts to find any and every excuse to talk to Sarah or wander by the Fier’s home. And her father had murdered him.

And she had expected Sarah to feel pity for the man. 

Sarah exhales and now she’s the one who seems to be unable to meet Hannah’s gaze, her eyes settling on everything and nothing and her chin trembles and Hannah feels her heart break, an ache spreading through her chest. “I just…” Sarah swallows and when she looks at Hannah, there are tears collected in her eyes, shining and unshed. “I wish I had been able to stop what happened…to help him…”

Hannah moves closer, wrapping her arms around Sarah and pulling her close and there’s no second thoughts about how others might see this closeness or whether someone might be watching. There’s only her and Sarah and her desperate wish to take away the hurt she feels. All she can do is hold Sarah tightly, to kiss the top of her head, to close her eyes and let her own tears fall into her curls. “It’s not your fault,” Hannah whispers. “What happened isn’t your fault.” 

Sarah nods but she doesn’t move away, doesn’t untangle herself from Hannah and Hannah just holds her tighter, closer. This, too, is something Union would’ve taken from them, this simple act of being able to hold onto Sarah and be there for this person she loves. The morning before, her mother had grabbed her by the hair to ensure that Hannah’s attention wouldn’t wander as she’d laid down the decree that she was never to see Sarah Fier again. Or so help me, girl, you will be Alderman Goode’s second wife before the new moon. And this…this is what her mother was so afraid of? 

“I’m sorry,” Hannah says, running her fingers through Sarah’s curls, damp from her own tears. “I’m sorry my father…I’m sorry for what he did.” 

“It’s not your fault, either.” Sarah lifts her head and to Hannah’s surprise, she presses a soft kiss to her lips, a swift forgiveness for her selfishness that Hannah isn’t sure she deserves. “Someone will pay for what happened back in Union, but it will not be us.”

Hannah smiles, shaking her head. “No.” She wipes away the tears still dampening her cheeks. “It will not.” 

Eventually, they come to another stream, following along its banks after stopping to drink once more from cupped hands and chilled fingers. The sun is high overhead, the middle of the day approaching, and once more, Hannah lets her fingers find Sarah’s, wondering if the excitement of this simple gesture will ever wear off. 

She can reach for Sarah whenever she wants. She could kiss her, if she wanted. Right now, right here. The thought is like sugar dissolving on her tongue, rare and precious. 

“What would you be doing right now?” Hannah asks. “If you were back in Union.” 

“Assuming I wasn’t being accused to witchcraft, you mean?” 

Hannah laughs and somehow she feels closer to Sarah than she ever has before, the love she feels settling inside her differently now. Perhaps it’s the only natural thing, after running for your life with someone, after depending so solely on someone else for safety, for survival. But it feels like more than that, too, like the sight of Sarah’s tears, of being able to hold her while she cried, had loosened something inside of Hannah, changing the very shape of her body in order to more securely fit Sarah inside. 

“Yes, that’s what I mean.” She bumps Sarah’s shoulder with her own.

“Well, I suppose…” Sarah squints, considering. “Likely whatever farm work my father had left unfinished. Weeding the garden? Chopping wood? All the days feel the same, honestly.”

Hannah nods. “I know what you mean.” The chores that had just felt endless, mostly because she was doing them constantly, day after day, the sweeping and cleaning and cooking punctuated only by prayers lead by her father, the wooden floor biting into her knees while she knelt for what felt like hours, or needlepoint lessons from her mother, who insisted that Hannah needed to work on a sampler like ‘the gentry.’ Hannah had never been able to figure out exactly who her mother was expecting her to impress with her admittedly impressive embroidery skills, though she’d stitched a nice bonnet for herself, and then an apron for Abigail when she’d fawned endlessly over the vibrancy of the bonnet Hannah had made.

The bonnet, along with everything else -her skirts, her unfinished sampler, the brush she’d run so carefully through her hair each morning- left behind in the echoes of an empty house. 

“You were the only thing that ever seemed to make the days any different,” Hannah adds, rather than think of her mother alone with a dead husband and missing daughter. How long before her mother gives her up for dead, too? 

How might things have been different if her mother had tried to intervene on her daughter’s behalf? 

“I used to fabricate any reason I could to see you,” Sarah says, like this is an admission of sorts. Like this hadn’t been obvious enough, even in the moment. “I think I could walk the path between your house and mine with my eyes closed.” 

Hannah smiles, feeling heat collect in her cheeks. “I would watch for you, hoping I would see you coming.” 

“I always wondered why your walk always needed sweeping,” Sarah teases. 

Hannah gives her a playful nudge with her elbow. “You tempted me. I was helpless to resist.” 

Sarah lifts an eyebrow. “Oh, is that so? I seem to remember it the other way around…” She tilts her head, studying Hannah. “Yes, you seem to be the tempting one…” 

This time, the nudge Hannah attempts only brings her close enough to Sarah to allow their lips to meet, however briefly, in the dappled light that comes through the trees. 

By night fall, they’ve grown mostly silent, lost to their separate thoughts, though if Hannah had to make a guess based on the expression on Sarah’s face, they’re sharing all the same worries. Night falls so suddenly that it’s like snuffing out a candle and the idea of pushing forward is pointless, and Hannah can’t think of a good reason to chance it anyway. Everything seems to look the same, and she simply has to trust in the logic that would say that progress is being made.

They’ve put Union squarely behind them and have seen no signs of any of the men, no signs that they might still be giving chase or tailing them through the forest. But they’ve seen no signs of anyone at all, no signs that the forest might have been tamed and felled in some way to make room for another settlement, another town. Or even another homestead, alone in the midst of all this wildness. 

Aside from the forest animals, Hannah would have no problem believing that she and Sarah were the only living things for miles. 

“Should we try and light a fire?” Hannah asks, willing her eyes to adjust to the falling darkness so that she can see something more than the shadowy hint of Sarah’s figure in the watery moonlight that seems no match from the branches overhead. 

“Maybe not yet,” Sarah says, after a pause that was nearly long enough to convince Hannah that she was alone in this darkness, that Sarah wasn’t there at all. “Just to be safe.”

Hannah nods, though she knows the gesture is meaningless, and she can’t resist the urge to reach out, to put her hand against Sarah’s knee, her elbow, her shoulder. A touchstone to tether her back to this moment. They eat what feels like only a few mouthfuls and with each swallow, Hannah can feel the food weighing heavy and traitorous in her stomach, heavy with the reminder that there is no general store, no pantry, no freshly harvested vegetables she can turn into a watery stew that will at least fill her stomach. Until they find somewhere else, there is only what they have in their packs. 

Still, that does little to help with the hunger. 

They shelter against the trunk of a massive tree, Sarah’s back to the bark and Hannah curled against her, the cloak draped across the both of them. It seems impossible that sleep will follow, given her current circumstances, but somehow it does and Hannah sleeps with her head against Sarah’s chest and Sarah’s fingers in her hair. 

When Hannah opens her eyes, the first thing she sees is a rabbit, round eyes fixed directly on her face. The rabbit seems unconcerned, chewing at the clover in its mouth, nose twitching. Hannah shifts, wincing at the ache in her muscles, the throbbing in her back. Her skin is slick with morning dew and she shudders to imagine what the rest of her might look like, after traveling through the woods all day and sleeping on the ground. 

Or, not entirely on the ground. Sarah had been unsurprisingly comfortable, the only thing, Hannah imagines, that had helped her get any sleep at all. Sarah’s body is still curled around hers, cheek resting against the crown of Hannah’s head, and she’s glad to know that she wasn’t the only one who had gotten at least some sleep last night. 

Rather than risk waking Sarah, Hannah stays as still as possible, staring at the rabbit in front of her. Where are we? she wants to ask, as though the rabbit might possibly be able to answer. Where should we go? 

Hannah knows there’s one simple truth, buried beneath all the aches in her body, the rabbity beat of fear in her heart, the press of hunger in her belly: she would rather be here, right now, with Sarah’s body pressed to hers, than waking up to the sounds of her mother in the kitchen, to the promise of another day exactly like the ones before.

And maybe it’s foolish. Actually, Hannah knows it’s foolish because who in their right mind would think such a thing. But it doesn’t change the truth that she feels.

Sarah seems to jerk awake suddenly and Hannah misses the heavy, loose weight of her, the knowledge that her presence had been enough to help lull Sarah off to sleep. “What…” Sarah grumbles, stifling a yawn, and Hannah sees the moment she comes fully awake, when the reminder of their current situation settles across her features. “Oh.” But she smiles slightly as she looks back toward Hannah. “Morning.” 

“Good morning.” Hannah watches as the rabbit’s ears twitch, as the creature turns and hops off into the forest. So much for getting any sort of directions from him. 

Instead, she turns back toward Sarah, with her dirt-smudged cheeks and her wild curls and a heat rushes through her, nearly splintering her heart in two. Hannah can’t resist the urge to press her lips to Sarah’s, to hold her once more, maybe a bit too tightly, just for a moment, the tangled wave of love she feels suddenly making the idea of letting her go seem impossible. 

“Well.” Sarah laughs, heat flushing her cheeks. “Good morning indeed. What was that for?” She uses her thumb to gently wipe what Hannah can only assume is dirt from her cheek before tucking a twist of hair behind her ear. 

“For?” Hannah asks, tilting her head. “Don’t you know, Sarah Fier, out here I can kiss you all the time for no reason at all.” 

Sarah smiles, the blush creeping across the nape of her neck and down her chest. “Well. Then I suppose we’ve found one good thing about being out here.”

Sarah’s words are, unfortunately, very true.

And they only grow more true as the day progresses and nothing about their situation changes. 

Hannah feels like her body moves on instinct, her footsteps following dutifully behind Sarah’s because where there is Sarah, there she is. The panicked frenzy is gone, so is the desperate fear of being chased, of being caught. It seems impossible now that anyone from Union will find them, drag them back, snatch this life from Hannah’s hands. But she hadn’t anticipated that with the loss of that fear, that pressing, desperate, primal instinct, it would become slightly more difficult to press forward, to walk even when she was exhausted, hungry, worn down. They go forward now because going back is not an option, no longer running from something, or moving toward it either. 

“There will be somewhere,” Sarah says, as they stop with the midday sun high above them, eating a few mouthfuls of the bread from Widow Mary’s. “My father said there were other settlements, others out here trying to make a living off the land. We will find…something.” 

Hannah nods, swallowing the dry bread and the impulse to ask and then what? What will we do after that? She’d rather not know, rather not force either of them to confront the knowledge that, even if they were to find another settlement, they still have nothing. “I trust you, Sarah,” Hannah says softly, letting her fingers brush lightly against Sarah’s cheek. “I trust you.”

Sarah swallows, nodding, and Hannah can’t help but notice that her smile does not meet her eyes. 

A crack of thunder pulls Hannah from an already light sleep and she gasps, jerking awake completely. A flash of lightning illuminates her surroundings for no longer than a blink, but it’s long enough for Hannah to see that Sarah is already awake, that she has one edge of the cloak wrapped tightly in her fist. 

Thunder follows almost immediately, the sound rumbling loud enough and close enough that Hannah feels it across her ribs, her spine, all the way down to her toes. She flinches and even though it’s been a long time since she’s been small enough or naive enough to have a fear of storms, she feels her heart start to race, her body tighten. 

Then again, she’s always had at least a passable roof over her head to keep the worst of the storm at bay. 

“It’s all right, Hannah,” Sarah says softly, pressing a hand to the spot between Hannah’s shoulder blades. “It’s all right.”

“Is it?” Hannah tightens her jaw as the lightning flashes again, bracing herself for another crash of thunder. She’s not disappointed. “The storm is nearly on top of us.” 

“It will pass quickly.” 

Hannah is not so sure about that. The thunder is loud, angry, the lightning sharp and decisive, and quicker than Hannah can draw breath, the sky opens up and the deluge begins. Somehow, this had escaped her worries, the idea that with storms also came rain, and come it does. Sarah draws the cloak around them as best as she can, though in order to canopy it over their heads, they have to leave their legs exposed to the weather. Not that Hannah thinks it matters. There will be no staying dry, not really.

At least like this, she can pretend. Pretend that she’s safe and warm and dry. That she’s cocooned and protected. Sarah’s face is pressed close to hers, her breath feathery soft against Hannah’s cheek, the only assurance she has that she is still protected and held after all. 

The rain beats against the fabric of the cloak, soaking it through quickly enough and Hannah tries to draw herself closer to Sarah, to silence the chattering of her teeth. Though she isn’t sure she does a very good job. The wind lashes them, driving the rain against them with even more force, as though things weren’t bad enough. Even through the cloak, Hannah can see the flashes of lightning, always trailed immediately by cracking thunder.

“Tell me a secret,” Sarah says, her voice soft and close. 

Hannah presses her chin into the top of her knees, holding herself closer. “I have no secrets from you,” she manages around her chattering teeth.

Sarah is shivering, fiercely enough that it nearly breaks Hannah’s heart, makes her feel useless and completely lost. She wants to pull Sarah to her, to warm her skin, to light a fire that will bring color back to her cheeks and tuck her gently into sheets that still smell like sunshine. But all she can do is sit here with her back to the rain and the storm raging overhead. 

“Surely that is not true,” Sarah says, the shaking fingers from the hand not holding the cloak around them finding Hannah’s and holding tightly. “Something.” 

The desperate edge in Sarah’s voice doesn’t escape Hannah’s notice, that final word a plea for something: something other than the rain, the thunder, the reality of where they are. A distraction.

“I think…” Hannah pauses, surprised by how, even now, she feels foolish for the words she’s about to say. “I would like to be a baker.”

“A baker?” Sarah sounds surprised, though not in a way that makes Hannah feel ridiculous for saying the words, or in a way that makes her regret them. 

But in a way that makes her want to tell Sarah more, to tell her these things she’s let herself think in the nighttime hours, twined together among her thoughts of a life she might have with the woman pressed close to her side. “Yes. I…I know it’s ridiculous. My mother and father…my having a trade or a skill, it was never important to them. It was always inevitable that I would simply become a wife and a mother, that I would run a household.” 

The idea makes her feel suddenly so impossibly lonely. Maybe it’s the rain lashing her back, or the thunder rattling her teeth, but Hannah suddenly feels like she could cry, drowned by the weight of it all. A life that her mother had laid out for her and delivered without option, and then the life that Hannah had wanted for herself. The older she’d gotten, the more she realized that what she wanted was different, impossible. That what she wanted would never be hers.

But now…now…

“But I thought sometimes, about baking different things. Breads and sweets even, if I could. Using them to trade for what I needed, spending my days baking the things for the settlement.” Hannah shakes her head, closing her eyes even though it’s nearly too dark to see anything anyway. “It’s foolish. But-”

“It’s not foolish,” Sarah says softly. “You would be an excellent baker. You always…I used to savor the bread you would bring over, and not just because I knew it made your mother angry to know that you were giving some of it to me.” Even in the darkness, Hannah can imagine the smile on Sarah’s face. “It was always still warm. I used to hold it in my hands and think of you.” 

The idea causes a flicker of warmth in the center of Hannah’s chest, that, without her knowing, Sarah had held onto the loaves she’d made and thought of her, just like Sarah had been on Hannah’s mind as she’d kneaded the dough, waited for it to rise, as she’d pulled it from the oven. 

“And what of the rest of this dream,” Sarah prods. “Are you running this bakery alone?” 

Hannah feels herself smile. “Oh, is there someone I should be imagining there with me?” 

“No,” Sarah says indifferently. “Just curious.” 

They couldn’t possibly be any closer than they are now, not without twining their limbs together, pressing their bodies flush. But still, that’s exactly what Hannah longs for. 

“I will bake all the bread you want,” Hannah promises. “So much bread you’ll get sick of it.”

“Impossible,” Sarah assures her, drawing the cloak closer as the thunder rumbles around them. “Though this is making me hungry now.”

Hannah scoffs, trying to ignore the press in her stomach. “Well, my mother always told me that dreaming wouldn’t keep my stomach full. I guess she was right.” 

Sarah lets out a dry laugh, shaking her head. “That is my secret,” she says after the silence has settled between them for a few moments.

“That you agree with my mother?” 

“No,” Sarah says and Hannah can imagine the roll of her eyes that goes along with the words. “That I want to be the one there with you. In whatever you’re doing.”

“Oh, Sarah,” Hannah says softly. “That is no secret.”

The storm passes as promised but it forgets to take the rain with it. And Hannah forgets what it feels like to be dry. 

They eat the last of the bread mostly because it’s damp and what parts aren’t stale have turned to mush and they can either eat it or watch it dissolve back into its most basic ingredients and while it does little to actually fill Hannah’s stomach, she can almost trick herself into thinking she’ll feel full as she chews, trying to make the motion last as long as possible. 

“We will find something soon,” Sarah says, her face fixed in an expression of determination even as the rain water drips from her curls, her cheeks, her eyelashes. “There are other settlements, other places around Union.” 

Hannah nods, blinking away the rain as she tries to offer Sarah a reassuring smile. “I know.” 

She doesn’t, but what good would it be to point that out? She’s never left Union and all she knows of the world beyond comes from her parents, though usually their stories were full of talks of corruption, about what happens when people stray too far from God. Which is why they had decided to leave one of the larger villages, had decided to move out further into the wilderness, to join other like-minded settlers in founding their own colony, a place they could all be in union with God. But Sarah’s father used to be a trader, used to ride out with some of the other men in hopes of trading and bargaining for the things they needed but could not make themselves, had exploded the surrounding areas before the death of his wife. It’s been years since the man has left Union but Hannah doesn’t bother to point this out either. If they aren’t walking toward something, then why bother? 

As the rain continues, they don’t talk much, focusing instead on moving forward, always forward, and Hannah’s skin is numb, her muscles protesting each tiny movement and she’s stopped trying to brush her hair from her face and eyes, allowing it instead to plaster itself to her cheeks, her skull, the nape of her neck. She focuses instead on Sarah, on the angry determination on her face, on the way each of her steps leads to the next one. 

The heavy, dark clouds steal the light earlier than usual, halting their progress sooner, if it can even be called progress. “It will stop soon,” Hannah says once they’ve taken shelter as best as they can beneath the bows of a low growing tree. “It will stop and the sun will come up.” 

Sarah nods, running her thumb along the ridges of Hannah’s knuckles, her touch the first thing Hannah is certain she’s felt all day. “Yes. It will stop.”

It doesn’t. 

The rain continues, a steady downpour, throughout the night and into the morning and Hannah just sits with her head on Sarah’s shoulder, waiting for it become bright enough for them to see enough to continue forward, through the woods that she is certain will never end. Staying or returning to Union was never an option. And it seems as though leaving might produce the same outcome, though her death is far less predictable under these circumstances than it would’ve been back home, when someone would have looped a noose around her neck and looked her in the eyes as they decided that she, Hannah Miller, deserved death. It seems cruel, entirely unfair, that this is all she gets with Sarah, these few stolen days where she had been able to reach for her hand, to kiss her, to imagine how things might have been different for them. 

But Hannah Miller isn’t dead yet. And so she walks.

“It can’t be much farther,” Sarah says, the words mumbled more to herself than for Hannah’s benefit, a whispered refrain that is often the only thing that passes between them. Neither have the energy for sharing secrets, for planning a future that seems as dubious now as it had been before. “There’s something, not much further.” 

They stop to eat some of the dried strips of meat they’d taken from the Widow’s, though without the sun Hannah has no way of knowing if they’ve been walking for hours or just moments. It all feels the same, anyway. 

Sarah presses her back to a tree that seems to be doing little by dripping more water on them from its leaves and draws her knees up to her chest, letting her forehead rest on them. “I’m sorry, Hannah,” she says softly, curls plastered to her shift. “I’m sorry.”

“There’s nothing to be sorry for,” Hannah tells her, fingers shaking as she rests them against the curve of Sarah’s shoulder. “We’re nearly there.” 

Sarah shakes her head. “Where? There is nothing. Nothing.” She lets her forehead rest against her knees once more, hiding her face from view. 

For the first time since leaving the Widow’s, Hannah feels a shiver of fear skitter down the base of her spine. She looks at Sarah, curled in on herself, and the forest around them, gray and drenched. “We should rest,” she says softly because she’s afraid of what might happen if she suggests Sarah get up, afraid of what she will do if she doesn’t. “Take a break for a while.” 

Sarah doesn’t protest, doesn’t suggest they should keep going. They just sit in silence, the only noise coming from the rain against the leaves, the forest floor, against their bodies. 

Hannah is so bloody sick of the sound of rain. 

“Sarah,” she says softly, once she can’t stand it anymore and sitting here feels worse than the idea of continuing on, “we need to keep going.”

“I’m sorry, Hannah,” Sarah says softly and when she lifts her head, Hannah has the feeling that Sarah isn’t seeing her at all. That she isn’t seeing any of this. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t…I’m sorry I couldn’t…” 

Hannah shakes her head, taking Sarah’s hand and holding it between hers. “We can’t stay here, Sarah.” 

“This is my fault…” Sarah murmurs. “You…Henry…I couldn’t…” 

“Stop,” Hannah says, though the word comes out as more of a plea than a command, fear thickening her tongue and tightening her throat. If Sarah gives up, if she refuses to keep going…then this really is all they have. All they’ll ever have. “Nothing is your fault. We just need to keep going, a little bit farther.” 

Hannah stands and Sarah lets her hand slip free rather than follow her. Hannah forces herself to take a few steps forward, only to pause, to swallow, to turn back around. Sarah is still where she had been, motionless, expressionless. She turns back, kneeling in front of Sarah once more. “Are you really going to let me keep going all by myself?” She asks, taking Sarah’s face in her hands and forcing their eyes to meet. “Alone?” 

Sarah blinks and her eyes seem to focus, seem to truly meet Hannah’s, and she can feel a prickle of hope return. “Please,” she says softly, and, for the briefest of moments, she longs for those two girls back in Union, filled with childish excitement at the thought of slipping off into the woods at night with their friends, unaware of what would soon happen because of it. I’ll only go if you go. 

Hannah feels so much older than the person she was only days before. 

Sarah reaches for her hand, holding it tightly, and she stands and Hannah exhales, her body prickling with relief. “Just a little further,” Hannah says, relieved when Sarah doesn’t let go of her hand. “I can tell.” 

“Oh, is that so?” The attempted lightness in Sarah’s voice doesn’t entirely succeed but it’s there, an effort, and that’s really enough for Hannah. “Where has this navigational prowess been before?” 

“Just getting warmed up,” Hannah assures her. “But I’ve got my bearings now.” She even manages to force a smile onto her colorless lips, which grows when Sarah makes the effort to return it. 

Sarah nods, though the slope of her shoulders doesn’t straighten, nor does the sparkle return her to eyes. “Not much farther,” she agrees.

Hannah gives her hand a squeeze, cold palm to cold palm. “Right.” 

The past few days have given her more than a few reasons to doubt the lessons her father has tried to place in her mind since infancy, but as the trees finally start to thin out and the land starts to flatten, Hannah wonders if maybe there is a God out there who is intent on helping her words to Sarah become truth. Or maybe her father is up there in some unknown Heaven, staring down at his wicked daughter with a little bit of fondness after all, delivering them out of the forest and to a sort of promised land.

A promised land that looks a great deal like a swampy, overgrown field, but Hannah can hardly afford to be picky. It seems almost too good to be true to step into the cleared, flat land and leave the tangled undergrowth behind. Her feet sink into the muddy ground, the furrows that have seen a plow at least once upon a time but seem to be untended now, left to go mostly to seed. 

“I’ll be damned,” Sarah mutters, letting her fingers brush against a tangle of what seems to be little more than weeds. “I thought the forest was going to go on forever.” 

Hannah looks behind her, toward the trees they’ve left behind, the woods looking all the more foreboding in the rain and weak light. “If we had gone a different direction, we might still be-”

“But we didn’t,” Sarah interrupts, her smile stronger, more sincere, than it was before. They still look like a pair of drowned kittens, the rain still falling steadily overhead and with more insistence without the canopy to protect them, but everything about the moment suddenly feels beautiful to Hannah. “I think this is…could be a farm of some sort.” 

“Not a very well taken care of farm.” Hannah squints through the rain, trying to see what might be beyond the fields. “I think there’s…a roof, maybe?” When Sarah looks up, Hannah points. “There.” 

Among the weeds and overgrown rows, they find a handful of tomatoes, rounded and ripe and a splash of color so vibrant that it almost hurts Hannah’s eyes after the days of grays and browns and the skin breaks beneath her teeth, the juice running onto her fingers as she holds the tomato in her palms like it’s the finest silk or the sweetest pat of butter. It might be better than any of those things, especially in this moment. They both eat without bothering to consider saving anything for later, until Hannah feels like the hunger in her belly is not only ignorable but gone completely. 

“Maybe there’s more out here,” Sarah muses, as they walk through the fields close to ruin. “Something more we can use.”

“Do you think…does someone live there?” The closer they get, the more obvious it is that there is a building just a head, a barn set off a little farther back, drab in the rest of the drabness around them. 

Sarah frowns. “I can’t imagine someone would just…let all this go to ruin. Maybe…” She shrugs, considering. “Maybe something happened.” 

They move toward the barn first, the house too still and foreboding to start with, and as soon as Sarah pulls the door open, the warm smell of animals envelops them and Hannah nearly falls to her knees with relief. Warmth…somewhere dry…things she’d been starting to suspect were just a fairy tale after all this time.

“Someone must be here, then,” Sarah says, walking toward one of the cows tied in a stall. “These look taken care of. Better than the fields, at least.” 

As Hannah’s eyes adjust to the dim light, she tries to take in their surroundings, to make sense of this oasis that has presented itself. There are three cows, milk cows by the looks them, and a hayloft overhead, the ladder leaned crookedly against the lip of the loft. Few farming implements are scattered around, rusting or otherwise showing signs of disuse, the only things that seem clean being the buckets used for milking. Hannah can’t resist the urge to go to one of the cows, to rest her damp body against the warmth of its side, closing her eyes against the soft fur, the earthy smell. As a child, she’d loved to go to the Bermans to help Abigail with her chores, the animals seeming like an indulgence to a child who didn’t have to wake up before sunrise each morning to tend to them. Abigail had been more than willing to let Hannah help her and even though Hannah had been aware that all her suggestions of “games” were really just efforts to get Hannah to do her chores, she never minded. The cow lows, shifting a hoof or two, but not enough to bump Hannah from her side, seeming to accept this pathetically wet creature clinging to her. 

“Hannah,” Sarah says softly and she lifts her head, which feels like it takes a great deal of effort even after only a few moments of allowing the cow to shoulder most of her weight. “Come look at this.” 

With a bit of reluctance, Hannah leaves the cow behind, giving her velvety ears a brief stroke before going to find Sarah. She’s pulled the ladder closer toward the loft and lifts her chin. “We could go up there. Rest. If anyone comes in…we should be hidden from view.”

Of course. Hannah had somehow managed to forget that part, the rest of it, how there’s someone else in the picture. Someone in the house that had seemed completely abandoned and empty as they’d passed by. She’s too exhausted to even consider being afraid, too weary to spend too much time worrying about what might happen if someone does find them here. Sarah’s plan seems good enough for her: climb, rest, hide. It’s hard to care much about what might happen next, at least right now, with her clothes clinging icy to her body, her skin prickling as it warms in the barn, teeth chattering. 

Instead, Hannah follows Sarah up the ladder, listening to the whispered warnings Sarah calls over her shoulder: a loose rung, a weak spot in the wood, and then she pulls herself into the hay loft, trying not to let her eyes linger on the ground. “I’ve never been so high before,” she mumbles, pulling her gaze away from the cows watching them impassively from below. 

“It’ll be fine,” Sarah says, poking around the edges of the loft. “It’s sturdy enough.” 

Most of the space is occupied by hay, either spread loose across the ground or twined together in limp, loose clusters, but there’s a blanket folded in one corner, leather gloves tossed on top of it, and it’s this blanket that Sarah goes for, picking it up and shaking it out. The cloud of dust that plumes out makes her sneeze and Hannah feels that tightness in her chest, the warmth that catches like a flame to the wick of an oil lamp. Oh, Sarah, she wants to sigh into her shoulder, her hair, the shell of her ear, how I love you. 

“I think…” When Sarah turns back to look at her, Hannah is shocked to find that her face is as red as the tomatoes that they’d found outside. She swallows, throat bobbing with the effort. “We should…” She gestures with a hand toward Hannah, as though that might somehow convey what she’s struggling to say. “Our clothes. We should take them off. Try to let them dry.”

Hannah understands now the sudden rush of color to Sarah’s face. “Oh.” 

“I…they’ll never dry if we keep wearing them. And I think…” Sarah presses her teeth to her lips before forcing her gaze to lift. “I do not want to spend another night trying to sleep in wet clothes, especially now that we’re out of the rain.” 

The idea of it is almost impossible to consider and it makes Hannah’s skin crawl, makes her desperate to rip off the shift and skirts now and eager to never put them on again. Still, her heart is racing, her fingers shaking for an entirely different reason, and the prospect of taking off her clothing in front of Sarah is not what terrifies her. It’s seeing Sarah do the same.

Terrifies, Hannah knows, is not the right word. But any other word feels almost too wicked, too wanton. 

Still, she nods, tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth, making speech seemingly impossible. Blushing like school girls, they turn their backs on one another, something that makes Hannah want to start laughing until she doubles over, tears in her eyes. What are they going to do? Keep their eyes closed for the next several hours? Stay huddled on opposite ends of the hay loft? 

Not bloody likely. 

Hannah steps out of her damp skirts, pulls her shift over her head with a sigh of relief. The air is warm against her bare skin but still she prickles with goosebumps and she wonders if Sarah can feel it too, the anticipation that seems to have settled between them, the thrill that she could turn around right now and see Sarah as no one else has. As she’s thought about seeing her, in the most secret of all the dreams she’s clung to in the middle of the night. 

She spreads her clothing out as best as she can, already dreading the moment that she has to put them back on again, certain that it will be even worse when they’re half-dried and cold. Slowly, Hannah turns back around, certain that the sound of her pounding heart is going to alert the person whose barn they’ve snuck into, that she’s going to give them away before they even have a chance. 

Sarah has already settled herself in the hay scattered across the floor, the blanket draped over her shoulders, her eyes downcast as though to afford Hannah a modicum of privacy. Privacy that Hannah, suddenly, doesn’t want. She wants to see Sarah see her, wants to take Sarah’s hands and place them on her body, wants Sarah to feel how she’s made her heart race, how she’s made her breath quicken. 

Without looking at her, Sarah holds the blanket open to her and Hannah curls her shaking fingers into her palms in an effort to hide them. Not that she thinks that’ll conceal her trembling, her rabbity heart, her quickening breaths. Especially not when she kneels down in front of Sarah, when Sarah wraps them both in the blanket, when there is almost no space between them. 

“Hannah…” Sarah swallows, lifting her eyes. “Thank you.” 

Hannah blinks, surprised. Whatever she had been expecting, it wasn’t that. “For what?” 

Sarah’s eyes are beautiful, a brown that Hannah thinks exists nowhere else but right here, for her to study and lose herself in. Her cheeks are dusted with pink, all the way to the tips of her ears, but the mad rush of color, the timid blushing, seems to have subsided. Hannah can feel it too in her own body, in her chest. A sturdiness, a surety. 

“I’m not sure…what came over me earlier. I just couldn’t…” Sarah shakes her head. “I couldn’t go forward and I…I don’t know what I would’ve done without you. If you had…given up on me.” 

Hannah shakes her head, letting her forehead rest against Sarah’s. “Never,” she whispers. “I will always come back for you. Remember?”

Sarah’s lips twitch into a smile and she nods, just enough to keep their foreheads resting together. Her words, back at Widow Mary’s. “Yes.” 

Hannah takes her face between her hands, kissing Sarah softly and for the first time in days, she’s no longer cold. She’s no longer shivering, or lost, or trying to ignore the hopelessness that clings to her like her wet clothes. Instead, she’s just here, in this moment, with Sarah, her beautiful Sarah, and everything else seems to slide away. 

It seems ridiculous that, in this moment, the overwhelming feeling is exhaustion, the desire to just close her eyes and sleep like she hasn’t been able to in days. Still, Sarah seems to know, seems to understand, because she just pulls Hannah closer as they lay back, the blanket still wrapped around them, and Hannah stops trying to fight her heavy eyelids, resting her head on Sarah’s chest and falling asleep to the sound of her beating heart.

With the barn roof overhead, the rain sounds almost nice. Comforting. The way it used to be back in Union, when Hannah could lay beneath the covers for a few stolen minutes before her mother came to pull her out of bed, when she could just close her eyes and listen to the drops like tiny fingers tapping the window, or a drumming to echo throughout the house. Now that she’s not subject to the icy water running down her back or the sound of it endlessly in her ears, Hannah doesn’t mind so much. 

But it could be any number of things that are making her feel that way. The cozy quiet created by the swish of animal tails, the occasional shuffle of hooves on wood, the warm exhales of breath. The hay that reminds her almost of her mattress back in Union, how there really isn’t much difference between what’s underneath her now and what she’d slept on for years, as though if she closed her eyes she might be able to trick herself to imagining she was back there once more.

Except for one, far more important difference. Her feet twined with Sarah’s. The feeling of Sarah’s fingers on her hip. Sarah’s collarbone beneath her fingertips. The brush of their noses, the occasional touch of lips. A heavy contentedness that Hannah had never thought possible. 

Sarah’s skin is hot, bare and flush against hers, and all the things Hannah had allowed herself to imagine she might do if she was ever lucky enough to be in this position seem to have fallen to the wayside for the moment, lost to the exhaustion that had plunged her into a dreamless sleep that had seemed to go on for days rather than just hours. Lost, too, to the quiet peace of the moment, of just being able to be here with Sarah, in a moment that doesn’t feel rushed or stolen or secret at all. For now, it feels like enough to just be, to look at Sarah’s smile and trace it with her fingers, to feel it in the steady beating of her heart. 

“That tickles,” Hannah says softly, as Sarah’s fingers tip-toe across her hip. “It feels good, though.”

This she adds shyly, as an after thought, emboldened each time she gets to say the words out loud. When this is wrong gets to be replaced by something else, something that feels far more true. 

“Does it?” Sarah asks, trailing her fingers up Hannah’s side, leaving goosebumps in her wake and Hannah shivers, moving closer to Sarah. “You are ticklish, Hannah Miller.” She sounds far too pleased with herself. 

“I never knew, until now,” Hannah admits, because who would have ever had cause to touch her this way? Who would she have ever wanted to, if not Sarah? “You don’t have to stop.” 

Sarah’s fingers continue their path, up and down the curve of her side, eliciting the same reaction each time and Hannah hums, low in her throat as the very tips of her toes tingle at Sarah’s touch. Maybe her parents were right about one thing: this certainly does feel sinful. 

Sarah presses a featherlight kiss to her neck, the underside of her jaw, and finally, to the corner of her mouth, her nose brushing lightly against Hannah’s cheek. Hannah’s eyes flutter open, her gaze meeting Sarah’s, and she can’t resist the urge to reach out, to touch her cheek in a way she never would’ve been able to do before. Now it feels effortless, right. “Sarah Fier,” she whispers and there’s no fear even though she knows her heart should be racing. “I love you.” 

Of all the time Hannah has spent studying Sarah’s smiles, she’s never seen one like this. So boldly open and wide, not an ounce of hesitation or doubt on her face. The sparkle is back in her eyes, the glow on her cheeks making her look beautiful, radiant enough to make Hannah’s teeth ache. “Holy Hannah Miller,” Sarah teases, bringing their lips together, her fingers resting lightly on Hannah’s chin. “You-”

The rest of her words fall off quickly at the sound of the barn door opening and the swiftness of the change makes Hannah feel like something has been stolen from her once again, snatched from her fingers just as she was about to understand something she’d so desperately been trying to make sense of for so long. Sarah presses a finger to her lips, as though Hannah might somehow need the cue for silence given the situation, but the sudden prickle of fear she feels, the tightness in her chest, keeps her from rolling her eyes at Sarah. Instead, they both tense, silent and still, listening to the sound of footsteps below them. 

The footsteps are shuffling, uneven, and it doesn’t take long for the acrid smell of unwashed body to reach Hannah’s nose, underlined by something else, something sharp and bitter. The man is mumbling to himself, irritable, and something clatters to the ground. Hannah rolls over, praying the wood beneath them doesn’t creak and give her away, trying to peer over the side of the loft to see below. The view from up so high is still disconcerting and her head spins just a little, the world strange from this vantage point. She watches as the man does his best to milk the cows, though he seems to struggle with nearly every aspect of the process, from situating the stool to getting the cows to calm down and stay still.

Hannah can feel Sarah moving behind her, the gentle brush of curls against her bare shoulder as Sarah leans against her to study the man below them. Eventually, he seems to grow tired of the task, stumbling to his feet and taking with him the half-filled pail of milk, cursing as he leaves the barn, the door half open.

They wait a moment, two, before Sarah finally says, “Drunk. I would recognize that smell anywhere.” 

“That explains the fields, I suppose,” Hannah says. “He doesn’t seem to be all that…capable.” 

Sarah sighs, laying back down and pulling the blanket with her, leaving Hannah hurrying to follow after her, to allow herself to be wrapped up in fabric and arms once more. “Maybe we can use this to our advantage,” Sarah muses, letting her fingers thread through Hannah’s still damp hair. 

“Oh?” Hannah rests her head against the crook of Sarah’s shoulder, savoring the lack of space between them. “How?” 

“We could offer to help. Tend the fields. Help with the animals. In exchange for being able to stay. For food.”

Hannah turns the idea over in her mind, unsurprised that the first feeling that settles over her is fear. Will there ever come a moment when being around other people doesn’t make her feel that way? When she won’t be waiting for them to turn on her, to see her as suddenly evil and untrustworthy rather than the apple-cheeked, smiling preacher’s daughter they’ve known for so long. “You mean let him know we’re here?” 

“Better than letting him find us up here like this,” Sarah teases. “Who knows what else is around us, Hannah. It might be…it might be worth staying for a bit, trying to make a plan. A better plan.” 

Hannah makes a noncommittal sound without moving from her position tucked against Sarah. It’s pointless, these protests. She already knows that she will go along with Sarah’s idea, because she would agree with anything Sarah thought was worth trying. Especially considering that she neither has another idea nor the inclination to go wandering off again, trudging along on aching feet and an empty stomach. 

“All right,” Hannah agrees softly. “But not yet. Let’s stay like this for a little while longer.”

Sarah kisses the crown of her head and seems to have no complaints about waiting. 

Hannah wrinkles her nose as she pulls her still damp shift over her head, doing her best to smooth it down across her stomach and thighs. It could definitely be worse. At least she’s no longer dripping rain, shivering uncontrollably and wondering if she’ll ever be dry again, but it’s certainly not the same as pulling a fresh chemise from the wardrobe and putting it on without a second thought. One of the things she’d never thought she would long for or regret taking for granted. 

Climbing down the ladder is slightly more terrifying than going up at been and she forces herself to trust her feet, her hands, the wood to hold her, and Sarah below her. Still, there are no complaints when her feet are back on solid ground. 

The rain has stopped, though the sun is still hidden behind a mass of gray, the ground soft and pliant under Hannah’s feet as she follows Sarah up the path toward the cabin where, presumably, the farmer spends the majority of his time. There’s an impulse to reach for Sarah’s hand, to take reassurance in the feeling of their fingers twined together, but even more prevalent is the familiar feeling of having to stuff the urge down deep inside her. The worry about what someone might think, or say, or do if they were to see her holding onto Sarah. If they were to suspect for a moment the thoughts running through Hannah’s mind. 

She’d been naive to think there was anywhere they could go where she didn’t have to hide her shy smiles and fluttering heart. 

Sarah knocks and after several moments pass with no signs of life, she rolls her eyes in Hannah’s direction and then knocks again, louder this time and with her fist, making her presence known and felt in a way that leaves Hannah slightly envious. 

The man who opens the door does not look at all happy to see them. He blinks, eyes bleary, his cheeks a ruddy color, hair a wild tangle. The smell of him quickly follows, the one that hadn’t escaped Hannah’s notice in the barn, sharp and sweaty. The glare he gives Sarah softens only when his gaze shifts toward Hannah instead, a curiosity peeking through the annoyance on his bearded face. “What?” 

While Sarah explains herself, her words and tone even and steady, Hannah stands there, feeling mute, useless. Small. Even still, it’s her who seems to have captured most of the interest of this man, who is keeping himself braced against the door frame with a thick hand. “A farm is rough work,” he says finally, his words more growl than anything, his disdain obvious. “How much help could you be anyway.”

“We know about rough work,” Sarah assures him, lifting her chin slightly to meet his gaze. “And we can see you might need some extra hands, given the state of your fields.”

Hannah recognizes her mistake, even if Sarah doesn’t. She knows men just like this, knows Sarah does too, but their ways of navigating around them back in Union had been different, had come to different ends. Sarah, with her steady words and fingers in a fist. Hannah, with the same soft smile she uses now to try and temper some of the anger she can see in the man’s eyes at what she’s sure he imagines to be Sarah’s impertinence. 

“Sir, it wouldn’t be charity,” Hannah points out and she’s sure to look at the both of them such a statement seems doubtful. She doubts there have ever been a sorrier pair more in need of a little charity. “We would be helping you. And in return, you would help us.”

The man grunts, scratching at his cheek, studying them. Or, rather, studying her. “Don’t expect much,” he says finally. “Not much to give.” 

Sarah tightens her jaw but says nothing, letting Hannah smile, nod. “‘Anyone who has been stealing must steal no longer, but must work,’” she quotes dutifully, grateful for the years of hearing the words that slip from her tongue easily,  “‘doing something useful with their own hands, that they may have something to share with those in need.’”

Not that she’s certain this man is the church-going type. 

Still, something about the two bedraggled women on his doorstep must convince him, because he just grunts again, nodding. “Start in the field there,” he gestures absently in the direction they’d come, “needs weeding.” 

Without further commitment or direction, he shuts the door firmly, not that Hannah is sorry to bring this conversation an end. 

Sarah looks at her, eyebrows lifted, and the surprised look Hannah sees on her face makes her bubbly and warm inside, pleased with herself. “I suppose I should be calling you Pastor Miller,” she says as they cross in the direction the man had gestured. “I’m impressed.”

“I’m sure my father never expected these were the circumstances in which I would be quoting passages,” Hannah admits, shrugging her shoulders. “Still. Hopefully he would be pleased to know I was listening after all.”

“I’m pleased you were listening,” Sarah assures her. “And pleased you were here. But…” She shrugs, her own smile shy and sheepish. “I’m sure that is no secret.” 

Hannah smiles, the gesture easy and sincere, impossible to stifle when she has Sarah’s eyes on her.

If not for the stale smell of the air and the collection of glass bottles winking in the sunlight, Hannah would almost believe that she was back in Union, sweeping out the kitchen while her mother found something to disapprove of. Holding a broom in her hands once more, moving the scraggly bristles back and forth across the floor of an empty pantry, the sense of deja vu is unmistakable. 

How has she come so far, only to end up here again? 

Though her circumstances are not entirely the same, as evidenced by the dirty shift that hangs loose from her shoulders, or the unfamiliar, bare walls of the pantry in which she stands now. Or the particularly pungent smell that always seems to give the farmer, Jacob, away before he’s in eye shot, though Hannah has come to understand over the past day or so that he is always lurking, whether she can see him or not. 

Like her mother before, Jacob watches her work, whether it be sweeping out the unevenly placed floorboards of his small home, or preparing the meal that he will eat and likely not share with either her or Sarah. Jacob had decided not long after agreeing to employ -though Hannah uses the term loosely, of course- them that Sarah, with her brusque mannerisms and unflinching stare, was better suited to handle the hard labor of the farm on her own. Hannah, he’d declared gruffly, was to assist him in the house. 

House is another term Hannah uses loosely, of course. 

But it’s no wonder that both she and Sarah have plenty to do, cleaning up after a man who undoubtedly spends the majority of his days drinking himself from one bottle to the next, thinking only to tend the cows in his barn every so often. Though watching her seems to have an addition to the way Jacob now spends his time, though Hannah pretends not to notice. 

Instead, she finishes in the pantry, leaning the broom against the kitchen wall and turning back to the rest of the house. The air is stifling, something Hannah tries to appreciate after days of wandering through the forest with her clothing plastered to her body and her teeth chattering, but it’s difficult when her forehead is beaded with sweat and it seems dubious that her chemise and skirt could possibly get any grimier. But the fire is crackling in the small hearth, the iron pot slowly cooking the stew that she’d made with the vegetables that Sarah had managed to rescue from the overgrown fields, and Hannah tries to ignore the rumbling in her stomach. 

“You do good work, girl,” Jacob tells her from his place at the kitchen table, glass bottle of rye in front of him. “A man would be foolish not to want to make a wife out of you.”

Hannah says nothing, setting her teeth and trying to ignore the feeling of Jacob’s eyes on her. They feel as solid and rough as the hands she remembers back in Union, the memory of their angry, hungry touches startling her awake more often than not, the only relief coming when she realizes she’s asleep beside Sarah and not back in Union. Last night, she hadn’t woken Sarah when she’d jolted awake, allowing Hannah the opportunity to just study her features in the dim light of the barn’s loft, mesmerized by this woman in front of her. Close enough for her to touch if she’d wanted and, all the more amazing had been the reminder that she could, that she could let her fingers brush against Sarah’s cheeks, her shoulders, her hips. 

“I’m going to get some more water from the well,” Hannah says, though the bucket is still mostly full from this morning. Not that Jacob is aware of that, seeing as it would require him to take an interest in something other than rye or Hannah herself. She picks up the bucket before Jacob can say anything, yanking the door closed behind her. 

Hannah ignores the well toward the right side of the property, heading, instead, in the direction where she can see Sarah, kneeled in the fields yanking at the seemingly endless supply of weeds. The sun is bright overhead, finally returned after its days hidden behind the clouds, and Sarah’s shoulders and cheeks are already reddening from its rays. The sight of her tugs at Hannah’s heart, like it always does, but for a different reason now, too, a twinge of sadness at seeing her like this, exhausting herself for the benefit of someone else. 

There had been a time, a moment after they’d left the Widow’s and continued to move farther and farther from Union, where Hannah had let herself imagine that things would be different. Better. Naive Hannah Miller, the pastor’s daughter, who had been coddled and spoiled and so sheltered from hardships. But maybe this is what freedom feels like. Maybe there will always be someone who is more free than they. 

“Here,” Hannah says, setting the bucket down beside Sarah and joining her in the poorly tilled field. “Take a break. Drink.” 

Sarah smiles, grateful and weary, cupping her hands to drink from the bucket. Hannah swallows, that twinge in her heart only growing stronger, making her ache, and once again she has to stop herself from reaching for Sarah, from tucking an arrant curl behind her ear, just in case Jacob might be watching them. Instead, she settles for gathering the corner of her skirt and wetting it, using it to wipe the sweat and dirt from Sarah’s face. Sarah exhales, closing her eyes, and Hannah lets this moment be enough, lets the feeling of Sarah’s face through the fabric of her skirt be enough. 

“Are you sure this is where we should be?” Hannah asks, searching Sarah’s tired eyes. “This is hardly a partnership.” She casts her gaze back toward Jacob’s house, wrinkling her nose.

Sarah sighs, glancing toward the house as well. She seems satisfied with the idea that Jacob is nowhere to be seen because she reaches for Hannah’s hand, letting her fingers brush lightly against her palm. “I’m…” She shakes her head, studying instead Hannah’s palms. “I’m not sure what else to do.” 

Her whole life, until this point, her parents had been there to take care of her. And, had she stayed in Union, been forced to marry whichever man had proposed the best deal to her parents, she would’ve become the responsibility of her husband. Someone else to take care of her. 

And, it seems, she’s been falling into old habits again, depending on Sarah to shoulder the responsibility, to make the decisions. She can see the same curve in Sarah’s shoulders, can sense the same exhaustion that had seemed to radiate from her when they were in the forest, when each step seemed to be getting them nowhere. I’m sorry that I couldn’t… Sarah, again, taking on the responsibility. 

Hannah lifts her hands, guiding Sarah’s face upright and meeting her gaze. “We will make do. We have shelter, some food. That will do for now.” 

Sarah nods, her fingers settling briefly against the inside of Hannah’s arm. “It will do,” she agrees, though she seems almost reluctant to do so. 

If they were alone, well and truly, Hannah would pull Sarah to her, would kiss her right here and now with the sun brilliant overhead and the wind trying to shake free the remaining leaves of autumn. She would will Sarah’s body to relax, to try and help her slow her racing mind. She would help shoulder the weight she knows Sarah has been carrying for so long. 

But all she can do now is let their eyes meet and hope that Sarah can read all these things in her gaze. “Where you are,” Hannah whispers, “that is where I want to be.” 

It is the truest thing she knows. 

“I don’t like the way he looks at you.”

“Who?” The question is pointless, of course. Hannah knows exactly who Sarah is referring to. 

Sarah sets her jaw, eyes flicking back toward the house. Jacob is there now, no doubt drinking himself into a stupor as evening settles across the farm. Hannah is hardly surprised that Jacob’s attention has been noticed by Sarah, especially considering he does little to hide it. And why would he? It is only her and Sarah would have to worry about letting their truest selves be seen. 

“Hannah…” Sarah frowns, studying her. “If he has ever-”

But Hannah shakes her head. “He’s too useless to do anything but stare,” she assures Sarah quickly, in hopes of smoothing the worry from her face. “It is fine.” 

Sarah rolls her eyes. “It’s not fine,” she grumbles as they head into the barn and toward the loft, the spot that has felt more like home than anything else has lately. “I just…don’t like it.” 

Hannah smirks, tucking her legs underneath herself as she settles against the wooden floor. “Are you jealous, Sarah Fier?” It’s more forced than she would like, especially considering that Jacob does make her uncomfortable and she isn’t sure how long he will content himself just with looking. Not that she would ever confess those worries to Sarah. 

“Of that pig?” Sarah scoffs, giving Hannah a look. “I didn’t think he was your type.” 

“Oh, he’s not,” Hannah assures her, tapping the tip of Sarah’s nose with her finger. “You have nothing to worry about there.” 

Sarah takes her hand, gently pressing her lips to Hannah’s wrist. “I do worry,” she admits softly. “I don’t trust him.” 

“It will do for now,” Hannah says again and Sarah rolls her eyes gamely. “Don’t worry about me,” she adds softly.

Sarah gives her a look that suggests it might be difficult to do anything else. Or perhaps that just how Hannah feels as far as Sarah is concerned. 

“Still.” Sarah reaches into the waistband of her skirts, withdrawing the leather sheath, pressing the knife into Hannah’s hand. “Take this.” When Hannah starts to protest, Sarah just shakes her head. “Take it. Keep it with you. It will make me feel better, knowing you have it to use if you need to.” 

Swallowing, Hannah looks down at the knife, innocuous in its sheathing. It’s hard to remember a time where she hasn’t seen it somewhere on Sarah’s person, knows Sarah would’ve always been ready, confident and willing, to use it if she’d had to. The knife feels treacherous in Hannah’s hands, as though sensing she would never be capable or confident even to draw it when necessary. Even the idea of brandishing it to ward off Jacob and his wandering hands seems ridiculous.

Still, Hannah knows a losing argument when she sees one. “Where did you get the casing?” 

“Solomon Goode,” Sarah says, a flicker of a smile on her face. “He gave it to me before…well…” 

Hannah presses her lips together. “Solomon. Of course.”

Sarah tilts her head, smiling. “Oh. Now who’s jealous?” 

Hannah’s eyes widen and she gives Sarah a gentle shove. “Of course not. Of Solomon Goode?” She rolls her eyes at the idea.

Though…still. There is a flicker of worry in her chest. And the leather sheath is quite the gift. Hannah glances toward Sarah. “Should I be?”

Sarah laughs, the sound echoing against the wooden walls around them, and Sarah reaches for her, laying down on her back and pulling Hannah with her. “Hannah Miller,” Sarah says with a shake of her head, thumb brushing lightly against her cheek. “I do not love Solomon Goode. I love you. Or do you forget so easily?”  

“Perhaps I might need some reminding.” 

Sarah pulls her in for a kiss and Hannah can hardly remember what they were talking about before. 

“I hear someone coming.”

“Who?” Sarah stands, stroking the dun colored cow along the curve of her backbone. “Jacob?” 

Hannah frowns, returning her focus to the view through the cracked barn door. “No. Someone on a horse.” She can hear the hooves approaching quickly, the rider clearly in a hurry, and for a reason she can’t put her finger on, the thundering approach conjures up an equal sound in her chest. 

She doesn’t turn away, even when she hears Sarah put the milking pail aside and come to stand behind her. Sarah’s hand fits against the small of her back, a small, steady comfort that does little to assuage the sudden worry that Hannah feels. In the three days they’ve been at the farm, they’ve not seen a single person even pass by this way, let alone someone approaching with such a determination. 

The horse appears on the passable road that crosses the front of the farm and Hannah gasps, unable to stop the sound from passing her lips. She knows the horse, knows him by the white blaze on his chest, the patches of white against otherwise coal black legs. She was still a girl last time she’d been close enough to run her hands across the withers, the velvety muzzle, coaxed into the barn under the pretense of seeing the stallion, though it had quickly turned into her trying to push aside the older boy, who’d grabbed her wrists and tried to kiss her. “Caleb.” The word passes her lips like an exhale, fear shoving aside any thoughts of doubt. “It’s Caleb.”

“What?” Sarah presses closer, expression darkening. “How can you be sure?”

The horse and rider are still far enough away that Hannah doesn’t fault Sarah for her desperate deniability. “I know,” she says. “The horse. And I know how he rides.” 

Poorly, Hannah means to say, but it’s pointless now. Because the horse is close enough now to make out the features of the man in the saddle. Caleb looks dirty, exhausted, and annoyed, none of which is all that surprising if he’s been traveling from Union since she and Sarah left. It seems impossible for him to be here now, that out of all the directions he could go and paths he could take, he took the one that brought him here. 

“How is this possible,” Sarah whispers, fingers tightening around the fabric of Hannah’s shift. “I did not think they would care that much to send someone after us. Not after all this time.” 

“Maybe it isn’t Union,” Hannah says. “Maybe that was just Caleb.” 

Don’t tease me, girl. Words he’d said to her before, not just on that night in the woods, as though he took every smile, every moment of eye contact, as an invitation of sorts. 

“We need to hide,” Sarah says but she doesn’t move, doesn’t do anything but stare as Caleb slips off his horse and starts toward Jacob’s door. “Perhaps we can…avoid him somehow.” 

Hannah tries to steady her breathing, to calm the panic in her heart, but it’s no use. All she can do is stare at Caleb as he raises his hand to knock, arms crossed over his chest. It’s not possible. It’s not fair. Him here, now. They were supposed to be free. She was supposed to have this life with Sarah. She deserves this life with Sarah. She’s fought for it enough, hasn’t she? 

She’d thought she was done fighting. 

“Hannah…” But Sarah doesn’t finish, doesn’t tell her what they’re supposed to do next. They just stand there, watching. Maybe they’re both done fighting. Maybe this is where it ends after all. 

The door swings open and though they can’t make out Caleb’s exact words, Hannah understands them well enough. Two women, witches, whores, devils. Who wouldn’t turn them over after that.

Still, she can’t help but hope. “Perhaps…perhaps Jacob will lie.” Hannah can taste her own lie on the tip of her tongue, dressed up like a final, desperate hail Mary. “Perhaps he will tell Caleb he hasn’t seen us.”

Sarah scoffs, shaking her head. “Not bloody likely,” she mutters. “I doubt he appreciates the free labor that much.” 

The hopes are for nothing anyway, dashed the second Caleb reaches into a pocket on his vest, holding up two pieces of coin. “They want us dead that badly,” Hannah whispers. “They’ve put a bounty on our heads.” 

What a waste, just to see them hang. 

But there’s no hope now, not when money is involved. Having people to do his dirty work is one thing, but it certainly can’t buy more spirits. 

Jacob nods, pointing toward the bar and Sarah mutters a curse, finally stepping backward and pulling Hannah with her. She shuts the door, moving toward the center of the barn, her hands firmly on Hannah’s forearms, holding tightly. “You need to go. Run.” Sarah lifts her hands, taking Hannah’s face between them. “I will buy you time.”

“No,” Hannah whispers and then it seems like everything catches up with her, yanking her out of the panicked haze in her mind and pulling her back to the present. Sarah’s words. She narrows her eyes, shaking her head. “No.” This time, the word is more firm, determined, decided.

Not that it seems to sway Sarah. Or that she even seems to notice. She’s too busy looking around, frantic, eyes wild. “Hannah, you must. Hide…or…run. Just…please…” She steps away, considering their rather limited options. “The loft, or-”

“No, Sarah, stop,” Hannah says, feeling the useless press of tears, the equally unhelpful pounding of her heart. “Just, please-” 

“I will go,” Sarah says with a nod and some of the panic seems to leave her face. “I will explain to them that it was me. That it was only me and that I was the one who-”

“Enough,” Hannah says firmly. “I’m not leaving you. And we are not giving up. All of this…we’re just wasting time. This is pointless, Sarah, we need-”

“Aye. It is a waste.” 

Hannah turns toward the voice, toward Caleb in the doorway, a pleased smile on his face. 

“But it wouldn’t have done you much good, anyway.” Caleb smiles, his eyes taking in Sarah before settling on Hannah. “I’ve been looking for you, girl. Time to come on home now.” 

Sarah explodes into movement before Hannah can even exhale, which means she also manages to catch Caleb completely by surprise and he can do nothing to stop her when she throws the weight of her body into his, sending them both crashing to the ground. Sarah is up first, on her knees, her eyes finding Hannah. “Run. Hannah, quickly, go-” 

Caleb grabs onto her curls, yanking her backward roughly and forcing her down into the dirt. “Bitch,” he snarls, his hand closing around her neck. “No one will ask questions if you don’t make it back to Union.” 

“No,” Hannah whispers and all of this is happening much too quickly while she seems to be moving much too slowly, useless, always useless. Small, quiet, docile Hannah Miller. Who can’t do anything but watch as Sarah gasps, eyes widening as Caleb’s hand tightens around her throat. “No. No.” 

She cannot.

She will not.

Hannah lunges toward Caleb, throwing herself onto his back, howling like the demon he seems to think she is, pulling at his hair, his shirt, scratching at his face. Anything to get him to release Sarah. 

He does, only because it frees him up to whirl onto her instead, and his elbow cracks against the side of her head, sending her falling backward, dazed. Hannah blinks, trying to stop the world from spinning around her, trying to think around the ache in her head. She rolls onto her stomach, gasping, but it does little to stop the clanging in her head, and regardless of how many times she blinks, nothing seems to come into focus.

Hannah lifts her head, watching as Caleb presses a knee into Sarah’s stomach, keeping her pinned to the ground as he starts to bind her hands together. His efforts seem completely unnecessary, as she doesn’t seem to be fighting back anymore, her eyes solely on Hannah and everything she’s saying feels muted, as though she’s experiencing the world now from a dream. 

Slowly, Hannah shakes her head, trying to clear her mind, trying to stop the ringing between her ears, and pushes herself up to her knees, fingers digging into the dirt. She can taste blood inside her mouth, can feel a tenderness in her cheek, but she does not let that stop her. Instead, Hannah forces herself to stand, to reach for the knife still pressed firmly in the waistband of her skirt. A gift from Sarah. To protect herself. 

The leather sheath falls to the ground as Hannah pulls the blade free, holding it in her shaking hands. Perhaps she is a devil after all. Perhaps she is all the things that everyone has decided to take as truth. Because as Hannah lifts the knife and brings it down, burying it between Caleb’s shoulder blades, she does not hesitate. She waits for the remorse to come, the guilt, the panic. But it doesn’t. Not even as Caleb screams and tries to twist away. Not even as Hannah pulls the knife free, blade and fingers crimson, and watches as Caleb falls, face ashen, eyes wide with surprise and confusion and fear. 

The fear only grows, becomes all the more apparent, as he looks at her, standing there above him. “Hannah, wait. Hannah…you…you know me.”

“Do I?” Hannah frowns, brow furrowing. Her head is still ringing, her mouth coppery sweet, and all Hannah can see in her mind is how he’d looked as he’d held her down, torn at her shift, hands on her skin. And how he’d wrapped those same hands around Sarah’s throat, ready to choke the life out of her, would have done it gladly. “Yes. I suppose I do.” 

The knife comes down again, and Hannah watches, somehow outside of herself, as it buries itself into his chest, her fingers still wrapped tightly around the hilt. Caleb gasps, and though he opens his mouth, no words slip free. 

Hannah exhales a shuddery breath, a sob, as she falls backward, into the dirt and away, desperate, suddenly to be as far from Caleb as possible. She turns toward Sarah instead, always Sarah, and she crawls toward her, trying to force away the tears so that she can see well enough to work at the binds, to untie the ropes holding Sarah’s hands together. The ties fall away and Sarah reaches for her, desperate and fervent, holding Hannah against her in a way that is more crushing than comforting but still Hannah crumples, folds herself into Sarah’s body, clinging tightly. 

“Hannah,” Sarah whispers, brushing her hair back from her face, using her thumbs to wipe the tears from Hannah’s cheeks. “Oh, my sweet Hannah.” She pulls Hannah to her once more and Hannah closes her eyes, pressing her face to the crook of Sarah’s neck, pulling in a desperate, heaving breath. 

Sarah kisses the crown of her head, her temple, featherlight and desperate touches that slow Hannah’s breathing, that steady the ringing in her ears, the stifle the tremors in her hands. Slowly, Hannah lifts her head again, letting her fingers travel gently across the plains of Sarah’s face, assuring herself that she is real. Safe. Whole. That Caleb did not succeed in taking Sarah from her. 

Caleb, it seems, will not be getting any second chances to come after them, to put his hands around Sarah’s neck again and squeeze. His eyes are sightless, glassy, as they stare up at the roof of the barn, and the knife in his chest does not move with any quivering breaths, any desperate inhales. Hannah studies her hands, tacky red with blood, until Sarah takes them in her own, covering them from view. “Hannah…”

She shakes her head. “I would do it again.” Hannah is surprised, not by the words as much as the sound of her voice as she says them. The distant quality, the bitterness. As though she regrets only that she can’t lift the knife and plunge it down once more. 

Sarah nods, tucking a wisp of hair behind Hannah’s ear. She lets her hand linger against Hannah’s cheek, the soft brown of her eyes making Hannah feel like she might crack open at the sight of them, at the idea of how close she was to never being able to see those eyes again. It makes her want to yell and never stop, makes her want to pull the knife from Caleb’s chest and take it with her back to Union, to use it on anyone else there who might try to take Sarah from her. 

“We need to go,” Sarah says softly. “We need to leave. Once Jacob discovers what’s happened…we should be far from here.” 

Hannah nods, getting to her feet when Sarah stands, watching as Sarah moves dispassionately toward Caleb, pulling the knife from his chest. She wipes it on the folds of her skirt before retrieving the sheath from the dirt and returning the knife to its proper place. “I’m glad you held onto this.” There’s just the barest hint of a wry smile on her face. 

“Thanks to you,” Hannah says softly, trying to ignore the aching in her head, trying to think past the part of her that still seems to be somewhere else. “As always.” 

Sarah hesitates for a moment before kneeling down in front of Caleb, beginning to go through his pockets and Hannah watches for a breath, considering, before she turns, walking on unsteady feet toward the entrance of the barn. Jacob is nowhere in sight, thankfully, no doubt counting his new coin and thinking about the bottles he’ll be able to buy with it. Eating the food Hannah had made for him from the crops Sarah had tended for him, thinking nothing of having turned them both over without a second thought. 

“We should take the horse,” Hannah says, turning back to look at Sarah as she gets to her feet, pocketing whatever she’d found useful. “It’s still there. It would be better than walking. Faster.”

“Yes.” The flash of relief that crosses Sarah’s is short-lived, flickering away as soon as her eyes settle on Caleb once more. “What should we do with…” 

Hannah shakes her head. “Leave him,” she says shortly, surprised by the cool sharpness in her voice. It matches how she feels in the rest of her body: cold and sharp, but also strangely apart from herself, like the world hasn’t quite stopped spinning beneath her feet. “Let Jacob deal with him. Or not.” 

Sarah steps around Caleb, coming to stand in front of Hannah, studying her closely. Once more, she rests her palms against Hannah’s cheeks, searching her eyes. “It will be all right, Hannah.” 

The feeling of Sarah’s touch manages to lessen the aching in her head, manages to pull her in tighter, like the brush of skin on skin is the needle pulling the threads of her together. “Yes.” 

Sarah takes her hand, holding tightly as they slip from the barn and across the yard. There is no need for secrecy now, no time to worry about that when there are so many other things that deserve their concern. Sarah boosts Hannah onto the back of the stallion and follows, taking the reins and pressing her heels into the horse’s side. He jerks his head up, nickering with annoyance at having been pulled from tearing up the grass, but when Sarah kicks him again, the horse surges forward, hooves churning at the still soft ground.

Hannah’s hands fit around Sarah’s waist, solid and warm and real. Here. Still here. She wills herself to focus on that fact alone and leave everything else behind. 

Hannah is grateful when the horse finally comes to a stop, head aching not only from the pounding of the horse’s hooves but from the constant movement, all of it making her feel like she’d been stuffed into a sack and swing around, aching and disoriented. The evening is approaching, painting the sky with the most brilliant colors that Hannah has ever seen. “I don’t remember sunsets like this back in Union,” she says, tipping her aching head back to study the blushing pinks, the bold oranges, the velvety purples. 

They’re the words she’s spoken in what feels like hours, conversation impossible with the driving pace Sarah had set and the pounding in Hannah’s head. Her throat is dry, exhaustion making her body impossibly heavy.

Sarah drops from the saddle, reaching out a hand to steady herself before turning her face back toward Hannah. “Not surprised,” she remarks. “Why waste such beauty on a place like Union.” 

It’s a relief to be off the horse, to have Sarah’s hands gently steadying her and Hannah exhales, letting her gaze travel beyond Sarah to the place they’ve stopped. “There was still some coin left in Caleb’s pockets,” Sarah explains as Hannah looks at the building in front of them in surprise. “I thought it might be nice to stop somewhere…hopefully the inn has room.” 

Hannah feels like she’s taking everything around them in in stages, her mind still catching up with the rest of her. The road is far more traveled here, the path beaten and obvious, hooves and cart wheels pressed into the dirt from dozens and dozens of travelers. The inn looks sturdy and well built, larger than any other building Hannah has ever seen, even the Meeting House back in Union. This building puts that one to shame, towering over them, the sign out front advertising the rooms creaking in the gently blowing wind. There’s a barn situated toward the corner of the property and Hannah can hear the murmur of voices from inside, the laughter and casual tones that suggest people going about their business without any of the cares that she feels are currently threatening to drag her down. On the opposite side of the road is another building, one without an easily discernible purpose, though judging by the hitching posts out front, it’s used to getting a fair number of travelers. 

“Hannah?” When she looks at Sarah, she can tell that this isn’t the first time Sarah has spoken her name. “Does it…suit?” She looks nervous, oddly enough, though it takes Hannah a moment to realize that it might not be nerves at all but something else. Something like worry, as though she can’t entirely recognize this person standing in front of her. 

Nodding, Hannah steps away from the horse, who has gone back to pulling up hanks of grass, surely relieved to no longer be forced into the pace that Sarah had set. “Yes.” 

Inside, the inn is warm and smells of fresh bread and the wood smoking in the fireplace and it does little to alleviate the exhaustion making her feel heavy and disconnected. Hannah feels capable of only listening with half an ear as Sarah explains their hope for a room, sliding the coin to the woman on the other side of the counter with slightly shaking fingers. There’s space enough for them, the woman assures them, though Hannah doesn’t miss the way that her gaze keeps leaving Sarah’s face and settling on her instead, a slightly concerned expression flickering across her features despite her efforts to school her reaction. Hannah just glances toward the floor, unwilling or perhaps unable to parcel out the woman’s response. 

“Meals come with the room,” the woman continues, her words only making Hannah’s mouth water, especially with the smell of bread still tickling her nose. She would give anything to be back in a kitchen, letting her fingers and wrists work through the dough, kneading it into shape effortlessly while her thoughts carried her away. Now her fingers have held a knife, her wrist has moved to drive that knife into someone’s chest. It seems impossible to be capable of both things. “Supper and breakfast, at least.”

Sarah nods, eagerness apparent. “That is perfect. Thank you.” 

Thankfully, it seems that supper is not far off and comes in the form of a bowl of stew and a heel of bread for each of them and the main area of the inn is sparsely occupied, undoubtedly because that the woman had informed them that the road is primarily used for traders and trappers, that they are hardly ever full given the isolation of the area. Hannah glances toward the hearth they’re seated near, far from anyone else in the room, not that she would rather be sitting with the loud men with their bright eyes and wild beards, voices rough as they laugh and share stories. Instead, she watches the crackle of the flames, the embers that glow red among the ashes at the bottom of the hearth, reveling in the heat against her cheeks.

“Hannah.” Sarah’s voice is soft and quiet, as gentle as the press of her foot against Hannah’s that suddenly pulls her from her thoughts. “You must eat.” 

Nodding, Hannah returns her attention toward the food, desperate for it suddenly. “I’m sorry,” she says softly, once a few mouthfuls of the stew have warmed her, have eased some of the aching in her head. “I’m just…tired.”

Sarah nods, though it does little to ease the worry from her face. “It will be nice to rest,” she agrees and Hannah can tell there is more that she wants to say, can practically see the words lingering on the tip of her tongue, but they aren’t alone and it’s easy to fall back into old habits: the distance, the things left unspoken, the worry of what someone might see and think. 

When there is nothing left but crumbs, they finally move upstairs toward the room that is theirs, at least for the time being, and it’s strange for Hannah to think about the fact that she doesn’t have anything to call her own anymore, not really. Just the clothes she’s been wearing since they’d left the Widow’s -some of which weren’t even hers to start with. And Sarah. Always Sarah.

The room is small, with a bed and a small, stout dresser with an oil lamp sitting on top. Sarah lights the lamp, banishing the shadows from the corners of the room and Hannah sits on the edge of the bed, struck by the softness of the mattress beneath her. Now that she’s sitting, she can see the traces of blood on her shift and skirt, the crimson stains lingering on her fingers. No wonder the inn-keep had been staring at her strangely. She’s impressed the woman didn’t refuse them all together. 

Hannah startles at a sudden brush of movement, surprised to see Sarah kneeling down in front of her. There’s a ceramic basin on the floor beside her and Sarah uses the water inside to dampen a cloth. She takes one of Hannah’s hands and the water is cool against her skin, Sarah’s touch gentle as she starts to wash the blood clean. 

“Hannah…” Sarah presses her lips together, keeping her focus on Hannah’s palm, on cleaning the creases in her palms of blood and dirt and sweat. “I’m sorry. This is not…this is not what I ever would’ve wanted. Not for you. Not when we left.”

“What are you talking about?” Hannah’s brow furrows and she lets her other hand linger briefly on the crown of Sarah’s head, brushing against her curls. “Sarah?”

Sarah finally lifts her gaze and Hannah is surprised to see tears shining in her eyes, her chin trembling. “My gentle Hannah,” she says softly, the words an apology as much as a prayer. “I’m sorry it had to be you. With Caleb…I’m sorry…” She swallows, voice thick. “I wanted you to…to leave…to hide…to…”

“Is that what you wanted?” Hannah asks softly. “Me to leave you? Truly?” 

Hannah knows the truth, even before she asks the question. “No,” Sarah says softly. “I know I should but I…don’t. I can’t.” 

Hannah lets her hand fall to the nape of Sarah’s neck, wishing more than anything to be able to pull her close, to kiss the tears from her cheeks and eyelashes. But it seems unfair, after what she’s done. “Perhaps I should have…” She says softly, a bitter taste on her tongue. “I’ve only made things worse for you now. With Caleb and…”

“What are you talking about?” Sarah’s confusion looks genuine, so sincere that it almost takes Hannah by surprise. How can she not have spent these past hours hating Hannah for what she’s done? 

“I killed him,” Hannah says softly. “And now I’ve brought all of Union back down on us. They will never let us go now. Because…because of what I’ve done.”

“No.” There’s an intensity to Sarah’s tone that makes Hannah lift her gaze, startled. “No.” Sarah joins her on the bed, grasping her hand tightly. “You saved us. You saved us both.” She presses her lips to Hannah’s fingers, her grip tight and aching but Hannah doesn’t dream of pulling away. “Perhaps now they will…understand. They will leave us alone. They will not find us.” 

Hannah so badly wants to believe this. To trust what Sarah has said. 

And maybe she can. Maybe she has to. Otherwise, how will she ever truly be free of where they’ve been? 

Hannah leans forward, kissing Sarah, pulling her close. “What I feel for you,” she whispers against her lips, “it is not wicked. It is not wrong. And yet they make it so.” 

Sarah shakes her head, letting her forehead rest against Hannah’s. “No, it is not wrong.” Her voice is quiet, breath warm against Hannah’s cheeks. “We will not let them decide for us anymore.” 

Hannah kisses her again and she finally feels the aching in her head disappear, falling away from her easily, along with the rest of the weight she’s been carrying in her chest, in her shoulders. Sarah’s touch, her kiss, her presence banishes it all easily and Hannah exhales, feeling, finally, like she can breathe again. 

“With you…” Hannah whispers, slipping her fingers through Sarah’s hair, wishing it were possible to touch her everywhere, all at once. “With you, I feel like myself. Truly. For the first time.” 

Sarah smiles, nodding. “Yes.” She kisses Hannah again, taking her chin between her fingers. “I see you, Hannah Miller.” 

Hannah smiles and it feels like a miracle, like one of those rare and magical occurrences that her father always assured her were possible, if only she were good and truth and faithful in her belief. Surely he’d never anticipated, never imagined, that a miracle had already been there, all along, right there in Union. In the form of this woman, with sparkling eyes and a soft smile, with gentle hands and a good, steady heart. 

A miracle for them to be together, now, like this. And Hannah is certain, with every kiss, that Sarah can feel it too.

For a moment, it all feels like a dream. It’s so like the dreams Hannah had allowed herself to indulge in in the past, the moments of a life she wanted so badly but had always known would never be hers. The impossibility of it always slipping away in those moments when she’d imagined waking up in a bed that she had shared with Sarah, their bodies twined together, inseparable and right. She’s been grateful for the past few days, how they have allowed her, in spite of everything, to see just a snippet of that life, where she could wake up beside Sarah and have her close enough to touch.

But it was not the same, not entirely.

Not like this. 

Not with her body warm and comfortable and completely at ease, feeling new and somehow different thanks to all the things Hannah understands about herself now thanks to Sarah’s hands and lips and tongue, thanks to the gentle and insistent touches and weight of Sarah’s body. The room is quiet around them, the blankets warm and soft against her bare skin. 

None it compares to the feeling of Sarah’s fingers trailing gently up and down her back, or the memory of Sarah’s mouth against hers, the memory of Sarah whispering her own name back to her the night before, a desperate plea, a prayer, that had made Hannah come alive well and truly for the first time. 

“I’ve been thinking,” Sarah says softly, her lips brushing against the top of Hannah’s head. “About what we should do next.”

“Oh?” Hannah doesn’t bother to move, keeping her body against Sarah’s, head pillowed on her shoulder. She figures it goes without saying that she will go along with anything that Sarah says they should do, and not just because of how Sarah had made her feel the night before. But because of how Sarah always makes her feel, how she has since that very first moment where they had met eyes and everything between them had felt different, suddenly, sharp and crackling. 

Sarah nods, her fingers not stilling in their travels. “I think… ‘it will do’ is not good enough. Not anymore. Not for me. I don’t want to just make do, Hannah. I want us to be able to be together, truly. To be like this with you, always.” 

Hannah nods, letting the words, the idea of them, wash over her. “Yes,” she agrees softly, closing her eyes as she imagines it. A life where she can wake up like this every morning, where she can fall asleep each night with her body tangled in Sarah’s. Where they can kiss and reach for one another’s hand without having to worry about who might see them. “But how…where…” Such a place sounds as intangible as the Eden her father had always described. 

“There is land out here. So much space. The inn-keeper, she said the only people who often pass through are trappers and traders. We could find somewhere just for us. Alone. Our own home, our own land…just for us.” 

Now Hannah does lift her head, studying Sarah as she spins this tale, this idea that seems too impossible to be true. And so impossibly perfect. Hannah longs for it as sharply and as real as she’s longed for food and shelter. “But…how? How will we ever…”

“We can use the horse to trade for what we need,” Sarah says. “And I know a thing or two about how to build a home, how to shape the logs and fit them together…there is no place where we can go and be just us, as we are. But perhaps we can make our own.” Sarah smiles, tracing the curve of Hannah’s cheek with her fingers. “You can bake all the bread you want. And I will sit around and eat it.” 

Hannah smiles, lifting an eyebrow. “Oh, is that all you will do?” 

“Of course not,” Sarah assures her. She lowers her head, kissing Hannah softly. “I will do that, too.” 

Hannah longs for the brush of her lips even after Sarah has pulled away. “Do you think we really…that it is possible?” 

Sarah nods and the sparkle in her eyes is all it takes to convince Hannah, well and truly, that they can. That they should. “Why not?” Sarah says softly. “Why not try?” 

Hannah shifts, rolling onto her back and pulling Sarah along with her, their bodies fitting together once more. There’s a heat low in her belly and a fire lighting in her chest from where her heart is thrumming with excitement, full to the bursting with joy. Sarah smiles, leaning closer as though to kiss her, letting their noses brush together. “What do you think?” 

Gently, Hannah takes Sarah’s face in her hands, gazes meeting. There is no need to answer, not really. There is no doubt in her mind that Sarah already knows exactly what she is thinking. And as daylight blooms outside, Hannah brings Sarah’s face closer to hers, and they kiss.