A Just Farewell by Brian S. Wheeler Page A

moment felt as confusing to Abraham as
it felt momentous. Strangely, he recalled how one of those twins
had waved at him on the day the clerics’ great horn had summoned
the tribes’ men to witness the butcher’s execution. He didn’t
intend to hesitate before answering the cleric, but he felt so
foolish, and so young. He felt lost, and he prayed that the Maker,
and not the great devil, moved within him when he answered.
     
    “I will open to the Maker, and I will accept
the girls.”
     
    The high cleric smiled. “Then you must mark
them both as yours.”
     
    Josef clapped his hands. “This way, Abraham.
Alexis and Cassandra wait for you in another room.”
     
    The high cleric and Rahbin followed Abraham
as Josef guided the boy through the dim hall that lead to his
daughters’ chamber. Inside, Alexis and Cassandra lay on a pair of
cots spread upon the floor. Abraham hesitated in the threshold to
that chamber, for the sight of those girls surprised him. He had
expected the girls to welcome him, to smile at the boy the Maker
sent to be their husband. He thought they might have a moment to
laugh and to play together, to perhaps even sing a song. Yet he
found the girls’ arms and legs bound together so that they could
not move, and he saw that gags covered their mouths. He thought
they would be pleased to accept his mark upon their face and so
start the story of a family. Yet those girls called no image of
celebration into Abraham’s mind. Instead, the way those girls were
bound, and the way their eyes widened at the sight of him standing
in the door, recalled the image of that lamb tied next to the
butcher shop’s drain. He remembered the panic and the cry of that
creature after he failed to deliver it a merciful death, and he
worried that his hands lacked the skill, strength and resolve that
would be needed when Josef put the ink needle in his hand and asked
him to mark his daughters.
     
    Rahbin, likely mistaking Abraham’s hesitance
for shyness, gently pushed his son into the room. “Do you know what
shape you’re going to mark on each girl’s cheek?”
     
    “The harder I think about it, the less I
know what to mark. I’ve never learned anything of the language
husbands employ to record their family’s history upon the faces of
the Maker’s wives.”
     
    “There’s no language to teach,” commented
the high cleric. “The Maker guides the marking of those tattoos.
That’s all that matters.”
     
    Abraham winced as his father punched his
shoulder. “Enjoy this moment, son, because you can never travel
backwards through the years. I still cherish the memory of the
first mark I sketched onto your mother’s face.”
     
    Josef withdrew a long, hallow needle and a
vile of black ink from a mahogany box set between his daughters’
cots. “Here you are, Abraham. Forgive Alexis and Cassandra for
their fear. They’re still young.”
     
    “That fear will pass soon enough after you
finish,” commented the high cleric.
     
    Abraham didn’t need the high cleric to
elaborate. His experience the last several mornings killing the
livestock the old man with the long beard brought to the butcher
shop educated him in the kindness of swift and confident hands. His
father helped him fill the hallow needle with ink, and Josef
mimicked moving the needle in the air to show Abraham the proper
way to manipulate the tool. Alexis and Cassandra squirmed against
their bonds and moaned against their gags as Abraham gripped the
needle and turned towards them. Abraham looked at the girls and
tried to decide which girl to first mark. They looked identical to
him. Green eyes sparkled in both of their faces. Autumn hair tinged
with a sheen of red fell to the shoulders of both. Abraham took a
moment to consider the shapes of their lips, the contours of their
chins, the arch of their noses as his imagination stretched for
something to etch upon their faces. Alexis and Cassandra appeared
the same, and Abraham knew it would not