Chapter 22: In the Ashes

Clara's POV

The water was so cold it burned.

I stood in the middle of the ford with the river around my knees, and I looked at the woman who had raised me.

"I'm not your ward," I said again. "You don't have a paper that says what I am."

"I have a paper that says who fed you."

"You do."

Maureen's smile tightened. "Then come home."

"Tell me where you found me."

The smile stopped.

"Dear, you know the story."

"I know the story you told me. I was left alone, and you took me in out of pity." I raised my voice so both banks could hear. "Say where."

"This is not the place."

"It's exactly the place."

She glanced at the Cedar Hollow line. Not one of them would meet her eyes.

"I remember my mother's hands," I said. "She taught me to cut lavender soap into squares. She sang when she did it."

Maureen's face did not move.

"You burned her recipe box. Pia found the ash behind your stove."

"That was old rubbish."

"It was the only thing of hers I had."

I reached up and pulled aside the collar of Torin's flannel.

The silver crescent lay on my shoulder, bright in the noon light.

A sound went along the Redfern bank, and then a second sound went along the Cedar Hollow one.

Maureen's eyes fixed on the mark, and the color drained out of her skin.

"Where did you find me, Maureen?"

She said nothing.

"The Redfern elders have a book," I said. "It says a den burned twenty-five years ago, with seven beds and six bodies. Where was I?"

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