This entry is a part of my free Serialized Fiction Preview, which will run on this site and through my Free Fantasy Fiction email list through January, 2012. Starting in February, my Serialized Fiction will only be available to Patrons. Meanwhile, enjoy the preview!

More children were born in the following years. Suddenly the farm, which throughout Rachel’s entire childhood had been such a quiet, sleepy place, came alive with happy calls, crying, and the babble of the very young. Cousins and brothers of Baram’s came from next-door and helped to expand the farmhouse, raising two new rooms off the back behind the hearth, one for Carlen and one for Rachel and Baram.

The children were a special joy for Carlen. Their presence seemed to ease her loss. She guided them as they grew, teaching them how to do their chores, watching them during their play.

“They are another gift to me,” she said to Rachel one evening, as they sat by the fire. Little Gunter was asleep on the rug in front of the hearth, and his even littler sister Gerta was asleep in her grandmother’s arms. “I have lost much, but looking at these young ones, now, this is my life.”

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The thing that’s bothering me about this story so far is the build of pressure from edgeward that will soon provide the change in Rachel’s life. This is something she senses throughout her life but doesn’t understand, something that hangs over her all the time, but especially just before a festival. It’s a part of her from her earliest years. But as you will see next week, she’s always misinterpreted it. Let me know whether that menace or pressure or potentiality for change is even perceptible in this current draft (acodispo@gmail.com).

One evening a few years later, as she prepared the meal, Rachel heard Carlen and Gunter talking out in the garden.

“Well, it’s at least time to be thinking about it,” Carlen said in a louder tone. “We aren’t getting any younger. Sometime in the next few years.”

Rachel quietly pulled the window open, letting in a rush of cold fall air which made the steam from the soup pot twice as visible.

“The problem,” Gunter said, “is that she doesn’t spend enough time with anyone her age to get to know them. We’re a little far from town for that.”

“We could give her some time to herself, send her down to the town. She could stay with Gerta, learn the herbs.”

There was silence in the garden for a moment or two. Rachel moved to stand at the other end of the window, and she could see her parents, sitting across a garden row from each other on three-legged stools, bending down to weed. Carlen’s long white hair was wrapped up in a bun on her head to keep it out of the dirt. Gunter was looking at his wife. His back was to Rachel and she couldn’t see his face, but his form spoke of sadness.

“We couldn’t spare her, Gerta. There’s too much to be done. We could sell the pigs, and perhaps you and I could manage on our own for a while, but that money would only last so long.”

“I know, love,” said Carlen. They bent back to weeding, but in a moment Gunter straightened again. He looked out mornward, towards the town. Then he moved his stool closer to the garden bed and bent down to speak very quietly to his wife.

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