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Chapters (64)
  1. Front Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright
  4. Contents
  6. Pronunciation Guide
  7. Prologue
  8. Part One
  9. One
  10. Two
  11. Three
  12. Four
  13. Five
  14. Six
  15. Seven
  16. Eight
  17. Nine
  18. Ten
  19. Eleven
  20. Twelve
  21. Thirteen
  22. Part Two
  23. Fourteen
  24. Fifteen
  25. Sixteen
  26. Seventeen
  27. Eighteen
  28. Nineteen
  29. Twenty
  30. Twenty-One
  31. Twenty-Two
  32. Twenty-Three
  33. Part Three
  34. Twenty-Four
  35. Twenty-Five
  36. Twenty-Six
  37. Twenty-Seven
  38. Twenty-Eight
  39. Twenty-Nine
  40. Thirty
  41. Thirty-One
  42. Thirty-Two
  43. Thirty-Three
  44. Thirty-Four
  45. Thirty-Five
  46. Part Four
  47. Thirty-Six
  48. Thirty-Seven
  49. Thirty-Eight
  50. Thirty-Nine
  51. Forty
  52. Forty-One
  53. Forty-Two
  54. Forty-Three
  55. Forty-Four
  56. Forty-Five
  57. Forty-Six
  58. Forty-Seven
  59. Epilogue
  60. Excerpt from The Sun and Its Shade
  61. The Night and Its Moon Playlist
  62. Acknowledgments
  63. About the Author
  64. Back Cover

Time passed as it did. Lessons, shams of church processionals whenever the bishop visited, prayers to the All Mother, reading, cleaning, chores, and so forth filled their days. The girls found ways to ask the matrons questions outside of their lessons and spent their time cherry-picking knowledge of geography, terrain, and the sorts of animals that roamed the forest near Farleigh. Every day was a new opportunity for covert reconnaissance. If they kept their questions spread out between the matrons and dispersed over time, no one would think to ask why Nox and Amaris were collecting mental layouts of their surroundings, of foods that grew naturally in the forest, of poisons or animals or towns.

Gathering provisions was a different story. Theft required both patience and caution.

They held their breath, hoping no one would question when things went missing as long as it happened gradually, with the plausibility of time and the forgetfulness of others. A spare sock here, a clean tunic there, a blanket, a wool hat, the odds and ends of their needs were slowly stashed in hiding places that could be easily retrieved in their moment of need.

Matron Mable proved to be the most conversational when they caught her in a good mood, though they’d expected as much from the friendly matron. They learned Mable was from a village two days’ ride from Farleigh called Stone. While the children had been led to believe that Farleigh was on the northeastern-most edge of the kingdom, it seemed Stone was so named as it was backed up against a sheer cliff, drawing a firm, unquestionable barrier between the kingdoms. Mable missed Stone, she’d said, but she was happy to be of use to the All Mother.

Amidst the tales she told was the story of how, when Mable was sixteen, her deeply religious parents had dedicated her to servitude at Farleigh. Her life was to be spent in service of both the goddess and disenfranchised children. Mable had left it unsaid that Farleigh was neither a religious sanctuary nor a place that helped children, though her love for the goddess hadn’t permitted her to leave. Nox wondered if it was the mill’s very immorality that pressed her to stay. The All Mother needed Mable’s small light of goodness in the shadowed depravity of a mill more than any pious institution.