Chapter 1
It was a perfect day for a funeral.
The clouds hung low over the churchyard, cloaking the battered stone in a misty grey. The air was cool and crisp with the threat of snow, just the way the spirits liked it.
Heat was death’s enemy. It bloated the body, rotted the flesh, and caused a stench that scared the souls away before Ivy could say hello. She’d never learned why they hated the heat so much, but she’d always figured it had something to do with the eternal fire of damnation Father Cenric was always on about. No one wanted to spend their afterlife roasting to death, so it made sense that the souls skipped town on the hot days.
But it was chilly today, and Ivy could feel the spirits lurking nearby, waiting to show their wispy faces. She drew her fingers through the lacy frost on the window, watching as Father Cenric crossed the yard and entered the a side door into the tiny narthex of the church. Ivy knew from experience that he would be preparing the pall and holy water and the altar itself.
She didn’t know old man Thomas, but she would attend anyway. She’d seen him about town as the rest of them had, but mostly on his way to the tavern. He’d been a permanent fixture at the Iron Door, so entrenched in his cups that the place had almost grown around him, absorbing him like a carcass decomposing in the soil.
Still, Ivy felt he was due some respect. After all, the dead were hers, and it was her duty to protect them.
“Tell me you’re not going to that funeral today,” Mother said as she threw a fresh ball of dough on the wooden table. “I don’t want you in that church.”
The table creaked with each stretch and fold, push and turn of the dough, Mother’s midsection nudging it into a gentle sway. It was a rhythmic sound and image, one that punctuated Ivy’s childhood.
That and the crackle of the fire behind her mother, logs snapping and popping and too hot to bake bread. In an hour or two, the fire would burn to coals, and the dough would be proofed, both ready to bake the perfect loaf.
Ivy turned from the window and drew a deep breath, pulling in the sweet smell of yeasty dough. She steeled herself for a fight.
“I am going, Mother,” Ivy said. “You know I am.”
“I don’t have a good feeling about this one. I think you should stay home.”
“You say that about every funeral. It’ll be fine.”
Mother scowled as she flung the dough onto the table and cut it into smaller lumps with a knife. She rolled each of those into a perfect round flatbread and tossed it to the side for baking.
Ivy waited for another comment, holding her shoulders tight in anticipation. At 19, Ivy was well old enough to make her own decisions, and she would go whether Mother liked it or not. But that didn’t mean they wouldn’t argue first.
Granted, Mother was losing some of her conviction as Ivy got older; her protests eked out in half-hearted indignation. It wasn’t that her beliefs had changed; Mother still despised the Church and any of its dealings. It was that she knew the days of control were past.
Ivy’d been going to Father Cenric’s church since she could walk, but not because she was a Christian. There was something about the place that drew her, called to her in her sleep. No matter how hard Ivy tried, she couldn’t get away from it, and Mother had once tried hard to keep her away.
“I don’t know why you go to that horrid place,” Mother had said after a long day of searching for Ivy in the cold. “It reeks of hypocrisy and misery.”
Ivy had gone there to sit in the oak grove between the church and the graves, watching as the clouds shifted and the light dimmed to darkness. But the day had other plans, and she’d ended up sitting in a pile of fresh grave dirt, playing with the spirits. Mother had found her and hauled her from the yard by the ear, muttering prayers to the goddess and begging the trees for forgiveness.
She’d dumped Ivy straight into the washbasin of ice water without bothering to heat it and scrubbed Ivy’s hair and face as if she could rid her of the stench. “I don’t want you back in that building, you hear me, girl?”
But it wasn’t the building that drew Ivy. It was as plain as the rest: a stone square with a steep roof, a tower for its bell, and a slimy green sheen of damp moss that coated the roof and walls in patches. It wasn’t its inhabitants either, though she’d grown to love Father Cenric over the years and many of his young monks that filtered in and out of the church.
Instead, it was the graveyard that called to her. She wanted only to sit and watch the graves, whispering to the spirits as they moved. They were her friends, her confidants, and sometimes, as she got older, they felt like her children.
Ivy turned back to the window. She let the sound of her mother’s kitchen work fill the silence, praying that it was the end of the discussion.
But her Mother was right. There was something strange about the day. There were fewer spirits lingering than usual, and those that Ivy could sense were agitated. It wasn’t that they spoke to her exactly, but that she could feel them. And today they felt like they were pacing, back and forth like an anxious child waiting for its mother.
It was unsettling and made her want to snap at them to sit down. But Ivy would never admit something was wrong. That would be relinquishing the battle to her mother, and she couldn’t dare give an inch.
Instead, she stood, grabbed her black cape, and moved to the door.
“I’m going to see if Father Cenric needs help.”
“Already?” Mother said.
Ivy opened the door and stepped out into the cold. Sometimes it was easier not to say anything.
Shadow greeted her, pressing his wet nose against her thigh as she slipped across the tiny front yard. Ivy stopped and knelt to grab his neck, rubbing her hands through his thick, black fur. She rustled his ears and threw her head back to dodge a sloppy kiss.
“Hi, boy,” she said in a sing-song voice. “What are you doing out here by yourself?”
Technically, Shadow belonged to the Church. Father Cenric decided the yard needed a dog after the village saw a few odd but gruesome deaths. Odd as in Cenric woke up to torn-up and eviscerated bodies in the yard, and nobody had seen or heard anything.
He thought Shadow, aptly named for his black fur, would help. In reality, the dog was scared of his own shadow and more of a lap dog than any kind of church guard. Father Cenric raised him from a pup and trained him, but really, he was Ivy’s.
Shadow responded more to her than anyone else and spent most of his time in her house. When Mother got tired of him, Ivy sent him back to the church for the night. Given Mother’s mood today, it was a good thing he’d had an overnight stay.
Ivy stood and gathered her cape around her neck. “C’mon, boy. Let’s go see Cenric.”
Shadow whined and danced toward the house door and back.
She glanced through the window at Mother. “Sorry, not today.”
Shadow whined again.
“No, sir. You don’t want to be around her today. Come on, let’s go.”
Ivy walked briskly across the wagon path into the church yard, not leaving any room for negotiation. Shadow dropped his tail but bounded after her with a huff as if relenting.
The frenzy amongst the spirits swelled as she grew closer to the church. There was something with the yard that kept them and their noise contained. As soon as she stepped across the yard line, the noise and energy picked up. It was a subtle change most days, but today it was like stepping into the busy King’s City on market day. The clamour was a million voices at once, while none of them spoke.
She drew a deep breath and scanned the graveyard at the side of the church. No one was visible, but she could feel them all.
“Settle down!” Ivy cried suddenly.
Shadow started beside her and pinned his ears back.
“I don’t know why you’re hiding, but I can’t help you if you’re all screeching at once.”
Her voice carried in the cold air, echoed against the church stones and trailed off, falling dead. Shadow looked at the graveyard and then back at her, wondering who she was talking to.
“Sorry, boy.” Ivy patted his head. “It’s just too early for the noise.”
He chuffed in agreement, though it sounded more like a scoff to Ivy.
Father Cenric opened the side door and walked out to meet her. He wore a dark, rough-spun wool robe, cinched at the waist with a rope, the cowl pulled over his head. The robe was so thin it didn’t do much to conceal his nethers, let alone brace him against the cold. He’d yet to change into his formal robes for the funeral.
“Everything okay, Ivy?” he said.
Cenric spoke softly, but his voice was a deep timber that could easily reach the rafters of the church. His face was pale against the dark hair receding into a half circle around the back of his head. His crown was bald and open to the heavens, and Ivy wondered if it gave him better access to his god.
“Good morning, Father,” Ivy said.
Shadow bolted past Cenric and into the church, happy to find some warmth. Ivy followed behind, pausing in front of the Father. He stood in front of the wooden door and straightened his spine, spreading himself wide to block her entry.
“Good morning. I heard you talking out there,” he said.
Ivy paused. He never blocked the door.
Should she tell him about the spirits? He knew she talked to them. When she was little, he called her the church protector. Now, he called her the church grim. She didn’t fully know what that meant, but she’d never once worried about what he might think.
Today, though, something was different.
There was an edge to him, and he wouldn’t let her in. Since when did a priest not want a visitor inside the church?
