Kingdom of Scourge and Shadow (The Sightstone Series #1)

Chapter Thirty-Eight: Judith

"The Church always claims that Saints are God's true voice, yet they seem to have misinterpreted the deeds of so many, ignored the word of others, and have forgotten so many more. In the end, it seems to me that most of their stories have been forgotten or overwritten with the ones the Church wants to tell."

-from the Codices of Saint Caroline the Heretic

***

But... but... She can't be Saint Elaine, Judith thought frantically. That's not possible. The Allmother died centuries ago.

But logic didn't seem to want to apply as Judith's thoughts jumbled and whirled. General Stark–Saint Elaine?–stayed quiet as Judith just stood there, dumbstruck and numb. As Judith watched, the general pulled on a black shirt over her camisole and finally turned to face her properly.

A memory of her most recent dream surfaced, and Judith could picture the sight of the Allmother's hands reaching for the wooden chest. She remembered the Allmother's long, graceful fingers, her calloused palms, the little crescent scar on the webbing between the thumb and first finger on her right hand.

Judith peered at General Stark's hand and, sure enough, there, on the skin between thumb and forefinger, was a dark scar in the shape of a half-moon. Judith's thoughts seemed to crystallize as realization and disbelief finally turned to certainty.

She supposed it was possible that General Stark could have, for whatever reason, been having the same strange dreams as her, but some instinct or memory that wasn't her own told her, with absolute certainty, that she was right. General Stark was the Allmother. She hadn't even denied it.

"It's true, isn't it?" Judith choked out, her voice hoarse and quiet. "You're the Allmother."

General Stark didn't bother to refute it. "Yes," she said simply.

"How?" Judith breathed, then realized something else. "Your work isn't even the same. The Allmother was a Lightbringer. You... you're an Elemental. How could your work have changed?"

"Surprisingly easily," General Stark said, her lips curving in a mirthless smile. "When I fought the one you called the Unnamed Saint, I died. I stopped breathing; my heart stopped beating. It was Adelaide–Saint Adelaide, to you, I suppose–who brought me back. She was a Healer, and an exceptionally gifted one, and, somehow, she saved me. But, when I awoke, my work had changed. I'd left some part of me behind. But I was still a witch; that part, I couldn't leave behind, I guess."

Judith shook her head, uncomprehending. "That's not possible," she said numbly. "Work doesn't just... leave."

"I was what they call a Lightbringer," General Stark said. "That's no ordinary work. Maybe it wasn't a part of me in the way our work usually is, and maybe, when I died, it couldn't come back with me. I don't know."

"Alright, fine," Judith said, scrubbing a hand across her face. "Your work changed. You died. But it's been centuries. How are you still alive?"

"Adelaide," General Stark said, and, this time, her smile was affectionate. "The witches needed a leader, and there was no one else. I'd never been able to have a child to leave a legacy to, and Adelaide was convinced that the witches wouldn't follow anyone but me–or my descendants. And she was right. I tried to get them to rally around her and Josephine–my other lieutenants, Maeve, Nemain and Caroline had all died already–but they didn't answer the call.

"And then the pogroms started, and the Burnings, and the massacres," General Stark went on. She turned away from Judith and strode over to the window, staring out at the dawn beyond the glass, her gaze unseeing and haunted. "Someone had to do something. Adelaide... she found some way to extend my life. I still don't understand how, and I've spent hundreds of years trying to figure it out. I don't age anymore; I only seem like I do thanks to a handful of Alterers that I've let in on the secret over the years. Adelaide was the first. Right now, it's Commander Fray. Every generation or so, I fake my own death, then come back with a changed face, looking like I'm about twenty or so."