Sure, if she pledged, they’d put her baby on the very short, very elite Church registry—a list of elderly Church officials who were ready to give up their souls to support the next generation of life. But then they’d take the baby, not as a ward, like the orphans, but as an ecclesiastic dedication. A human tithe. In another town. She would never see him again, and at eighteen, he would be ordained without choice, his soul to be paid for with lifelong service to the Church by both mother and child.

“You don’t want to pledge, Mellie,” I said, though I couldn’t make myself voice the reasons.

She wiped her eyes again and looked at me with more determination than I’d ever seen from her. “What I don’t want is to let this baby die.”

I stared at her. I wasn’t sure I recognized my own sister in that moment. Melanie had changed in the hour since we’d walked to school. She was still young and impulsive, and still wasn’t quite thinking things through, but at some point she’d come to value her unborn child’s life more than her own, and that made her a better mother than ours had ever been.

“I can do this, Nina,” she said, and that determination I’d seen in her eyes echoed in her voice. “I know you think I never take anything seriously, and I mess everything up, but I can do this, and if you’ll help me, I may not have to join the Church. I’ll do whatever you say.” She took my hand in both of hers. “I’ll do all the laundry, and the dishes, and anything else you need me to do, if you’ll just help me keep my baby. Please, Nina!”

She was too young. We couldn’t guarantee her baby a soul. Even if it lived and the Church let her keep it, we couldn’t afford to feed and clothe a baby. And I wouldn’t be able to pledge and become a teacher, because Melanie couldn’t do this on her own. To give her baby even a chance at life, I would have to spend the rest of mine in a factory.

I knew I should say no. But I couldn’t.

“Okay. I’ll help you. But you have to understand that there are no guarantees. If the Church decides to prosecute”—and they would if Deacon Bennett saw her as an embarrassment to the town—“you could serve serious time.” Unpaid prison workers were the nation’s largest source of factory labor, producing everything from paper cups and clothing to car parts and traffic signals, in every plant that had survived the war. “And even if you don’t go to jail, you’ll have at least two convictions on your record.” One for fornication, one for conceiving a child without a license. “Those’ll keep you out of college.” Which was a real shame, because Melanie was smart. She had a head for numbers and a memory for facts and dates. “And they may still take the baby. But I’ll do the best I can.”