Mighty and Strong (The Righteous) Read online

  The young couple looked nice enough. They gave Fear-Not a friendly greeting before going on their way down the sidewalk, the woman pushing a stroller with a toddler.

  He felt sorry for them. They didn't know better, and would only look on in terror and confusion as the apocalypse swept over them. He wanted to grab them and shake them by the shoulders and cry, “Wake up, don't you see? Your city will lie in dust. No two stones will sit one upon the other. Repent, before it's too late.”

  But they would only turn rude. The wicked never listened to warnings from the prophets.

  Chapter Fifteen:

  I'm secretly engaged.

  Emma Green must have repeated this fifty times during the day. It gave her a thrill every time she remembered what Jacob had told her. You won't be fifteen forever.

  She was working a foot-operated sewing machine and ran the stitches off the pocket of her father's pants. Another time, she lost track of the flour she was measuring for the daily bread and her mother snapped at her to stop daydreaming.

  Emma shared a room with two younger sisters. That night, after the three of them said their prayers and repeated their scriptures, then turned off the lamp, the other two girls took to gossiping about Caleb Hunter, a boy near their age.

  “Can you two shut up and go to sleep?”

  “I can't believe he smiled at you like that.” A sigh. “He's got the cutest dimples.”

  “I just want to pinch his cheeks.”

  Emma groaned. “You two are so immature.”

  “I want to do more than pinch his cheeks.”

  The other sister squealed. “Ooh, that's naughty.”

  It went on like this for about twenty minutes. Emma wrapped her pillow around her head and tried to block them.

  When her sisters finally stopped talking and their breathing turned slow, regular, Emma rolled to her side and tried to sleep.

  To get to Brother Timothy's compound—where Jacob was currently a guest—one would have to go down the stairs to the lowest level, go outside, and walk left through the arcade to the archway that passed beneath the library. From there, another left and around Brother Timothy's family courtyard to the guest rooms, where the prophet kept new members of the church until he found them permanent quarters.

  But Emma worked it out in her mind and realized that after all the stairs and arcades, she'd be on the other side of her bedroom wall and down a level. If only magically there would be a doorway here where her bed pushed against the wall, and then a stairway, her future husband would be lying in bed no more than twenty feet away. It was too much to stand, knowing that.

  An hour went by, maybe two. She could not get comfortable in this stupid bed. And it was too hot.

  Emma had her nightgown tucked between the mattress and the wall, in case she needed to go out to the bathroom. She fished it out and pulled it on. She slipped out of bed and made her way to the door. One of the other beds creaked and she froze.

  What are you doing?

  A tight feeling worked its way up into her body. A wrong feeling. Wasn't that the spirit telling her to turn around and go back to bed? But what would it hurt? She just wanted to walk past his room, then she'd come straight back.

  It was dark in the courtyard. They'd left the modern world behind when Dad decided they were moving to Zarahemla to join the Church of the Last Days. There were no phones, no television (yes, they'd been one of those families, even though Father hid the TV whenever family or friends came to visit), and no lights other than candles and lamps. They didn't even have indoor toilets, which had been a real treat during their first winter in the Manti Mountains.

  “The Lord will sweep away modern conveniences when He comes,” the prophet liked to say. “Better get used to living without useless technology now.”

  A sliver of moon left enough light to see by if she walked with her left hand extended to guide along the stone. It may have been warm inside, but the dry air outside had already bled off the daytime heat. A wind spilled over the edge of the building. Clothing flapped on lines; dark shapes against the sky. Goose flesh pricked her skin.

  Emma reached the far end of the arcade. A sound to her right, like boot leather scratched over stone. She stopped dead.

  She stared into the corner. It seemed to her eyes that there was a thicker, darker place back there, like the shadow of a man standing there, watching her.

  “Who is it?” she whispered. She meant to say it in a confident, ringing voice, but it wouldn't come out. Her heart pounded until it felt like it was trying to knock itself free.

  Nothing happened. Nobody responded, nobody came out of the shadows. As Emma stared and blinked and stared some more, she became convinced she'd imagined the sound. Hadn't it come just after the wind finished stirring the laundry?

  But as she passed under the archway, into the next courtyard, she heard it again. Behind her.

  Emma stopped, spun around. “Who is it?” she demanded, louder now.

  Again, nothing. And not even a shadow to focus on this time. Either he'd pressed himself against the wall or it was pure imagination.

  It was now safer to go forward than back, or at least that's what she told herself. The flagstones were warm beneath her feet, still holding the day's heat, and she stood still, let herself calm down. She continued. A moment later and she was outside Jacob's door.

  She'd never meant to go inside, just walk past. At most, she thought about resting her hand on the door, happy to know there were no locks in the Zarahemla compound, that if she were already married, she'd be able to slip inside and climb into bed with Jacob.

  And then what? She imagined some sort of tender kisses, and his hands would touch her. It was kind of blurry after that. Jacob would know what to do. She'd let him teach her.

  Somehow, thinking was doing. Before she knew it she was pushing down on the latch and opening the door wide enough to slip inside. The hinge didn't so much as creak and she pulled it shut behind her.

  Maybe there was someone out there, maybe not, but she felt safer inside. Nobody would dare enter Jacob Christianson's room. He was Brother Timothy's guest.

  The lamp by the bed was still lit, and Jacob sat propped against a pillow with a book on his chest. Emma froze, afraid he would be angry.

  But he was asleep, snoring softly. The blankets bunched around his waist and his upper body was bare, except for his white priesthood undergarments.

  Warmth flooded through Emma's body. She forgot her fears. She was only a few feet from Jacob.

  Emma walked step by silent step toward the sound of the breathing. A minute, two minutes passed, and then she was right above him. The book on his chest was the Book of Mormon.

  She took her right hand and lowered it every so slowly toward the bed. Her fingers curled around the Book of Mormon. She lifted it and set it on the nightstand, next to the lamp.

  Her hand lowered again, slowly, until it floated above his chest. She dropped it further when he exhaled, and when he breathed in again his chest rose and brushed her hand. Every muscle in her body tingled.

  If she lowered her hand just a fraction more he would feel it and wake up. And what would she say?

  Shh, it's just me, love. Yes, I know what you said. I'll wait until I'm seventeen, of course I will. But I must see you now. Nobody will know, I promise.

  She'd crawl into bed. Not to do anything. . .immoral. But just to lie next to him, feel his body against hers. Her nightgown felt light, airy, over her body. She should slip it off first, so she could feel him against her bare skin. Jacob wouldn't be angry at that, would he?

  Don't worry, my love. The spirit told me it was okay. Don't you feel that warm feeling too?

  Without thinking, her hand drifted lower on his chest. The lightest touch, but enough to feel the muscles of his stomach. And lower, there was a bulge below his waist and her hand naturally trailed toward it.

  Jacob stirred. “Fernie,” he murmured in his sleep. “I didn't want that. No, I don't want to.”
r />   Emma froze. Something dark and jealous stirred. Was he dreaming about someone else? Who was this Fernie? His first wife?

  She didn't like the dark feeling and told it to go away. Of course Jacob was already married, she knew that. She'd have to share him, little as she liked the idea. That was just the way things were. And wasn't half of a good man better than one hundred percent of anyone else?

  But thank goodness he'd muttered his first wife's name. It snapped her from her stupor, that almost sleep-walking feeling. She'd been about to rub her hand over his privates. That would have been a disaster.

  She looked around her. This was crazy. What was she thinking?

  Slowly, Emma backed away from the bed. She had to get home, she had to settle down. And worse, if she pushed any harder she might just push Jacob away.

  Emma reached the door, pulled the handle open and slipped into the night air. It was black and she waited for her eyes to adjust. The chill was bracing and whatever remained of her stupor fled. She made her way along the wall, using her hand to guide her through the darkest shadows.

  “Emma Green.” A low, angry voice that came from the darkness at her back.

  She whipped around, heart thudding. “Who's there!”

  It was too dark in the shadow of the arcade to see where the sound came from. For a long moment, there was no answer except for the moan of the wind.

  “What abominations hast thou committed tonight, girl?”

  She recognized the voice now. “No, I didn't do anything. I was out for a walk.”

  “Thou art a liar.”

  “No, I'm not. I. . .” She tried to say more, to explain, but her words choked in her mouth.

  “Woe be unto the liar, for she shall be thrust down to hell.”

  A dark shape emerged from the shadows. Emma turned to run.

  #

  It's supposed to be pleasant to dream about having sex. But Jacob woke with a guilty, sick feeling and an unwelcome tightness in his groin.

  For a second he could swear he smelled a woman in his room. Deep, musky, like Fernie when she was aroused. A voice from outside the building, and then something like a woman's moan of pleasure, or maybe a cry of pain. All of it hung in the air, the cobwebs of his dream.

  But then he looked around the room—he'd fallen asleep with the lamp on—and it was empty. He didn't remember setting his Book of Mormon aside, but there it was on the nightstand.

  He listened, smelled. And now that he was fully awake, it all faded. Just stone, the smell of burning lamp oil, the sound of wind outside the door, trying to find its way inside.

  What an awful dream. He'd been with Fernie in their bedroom. And she kept bringing in young women. Each one of them was naked, as was Jacob, even though Fernie wore a dress and long braids, like she used to when she was a teenager.

  Jacob found a reason to decline each of them. This one was too young, this one not very bright or too chatty. Too skinny, too fat. This one? Too homely.

  “She's not homely,” Fernie said. “Look at her teeth. Straight and healthy.”

  “Her teeth? What, is she a horse?”

  “You're making stuff up. There's nothing wrong with these girls.”

  “I don't want another wife.”

  “It's the way of the Lord, Jacob. Here, what about this one?”

  It was another girl, maybe twenty-one or twenty-two, and he looked but couldn't find anything wrong with her. Smart (in the way of dreams, he just knew it somehow), pretty, and a hard worker. He couldn't think of anything, and so she climbed naked into bed with him and she knew what she was doing.

  Is this a dream? How does she know how to do this? And that, who taught her that?

  And suddenly, he looked up and caught her face at a different angle. She wasn't a woman. How had he thought she was in her twenties? She was just a girl.

  Dear heavens, it was Emma Green. Only now he knew she'd been lying about her age. She wasn't almost sixteen, not even close.

  “How old are you, anyway?”

  “Almost fourteen, I thought you knew that.”

  “What?”

  He tried to get out from under her, repulsed, disgusted with himself. And then the sound of a door closing, and it was Fernie leaving them. Emma kept thrusting up and down and he tried to scream for her to get the hell off and couldn't.

  And then, mercifully, he was awake. Groin hard as a rock. Imagining he smelled Emma in the room, hearing things outside his window that turned out to be nothing at all. He sat back with a groan. What was wrong with him? Why would he have that kind of a dream?

  One more day in the compound, that was it. He would confront Agent Kite at the farmers market. Look, do you want out, or not? And if you're still undercover, what do you want me to tell Krantz and Fayer?

  And then he'd go back to his children, his one wife.

  He'd had enough of self-proclaimed prophets. If the Lord wanted him to do something, He could say it to his face.

  And that went doubly for Fernie. She had to drop this crap about getting another wife, and that meant keeping her away from Zarahemla, where religion oozed from every stone. Testimonies, blessings, prophetic counsel—he didn't want any of it. Thank goodness Fernie was safe and comfortable back in Salt Lake City.

  #

  Emma almost made it to her room. She gathered her nightgown and ran. Her bare feet pounded against the stone. She slammed a big toe where two stones met, unevenly, but she didn't feel it. She whipped around the dark corner, beneath the archway and into the arcade that led to her family's home.

  She had it fixed in her head that if she could just make it to her bedroom she'd be safe, like a game of tag. And if not, maybe she'd find her voice, now strangled in her throat, and scream for help. He wouldn't touch her then, not when everyone else would know.

  Emma made it to her house at the same moment the man reached her. She grabbed the door handle and pulled. It wouldn't open. Locked.

  No, that's impossible.

  There were no locks in Zarahemla. Locks were for the Lone and Dreary World, Brother Timothy taught. One laid up earthly treasures behind locks. No locks for the saints, where a girl could sleep safely in her own bed without fear of strangers entering.

  And it wasn't locked. Her pursuer had reached the door first. He pinned it shut with his shoulder and she wasn't strong enough to force it open. He grabbed her shoulder with his other hand and dragged her back into the square.

  “Emma Green,” the man said. “By the authority of the Holy Melchizedek Priesthood, I rebuke thee for thy sins.”

  His priesthood. Only instead of giving her a blessing, he was condemning her. A damnation.

  She found her voice. “Help!” And then, louder, “Somebody, help me!”

  “I command thee to silence.”

  And her throat closed. She turned limp, unable to fight back. Her legs collapsed, her arms flailed. Emma grabbed something—drying laundry—and it caught her fall momentarily before the clothes pins popped free. Her head smacked the ground. A sharp, stunning pain. Clothes pins pinged against her face.

  The man knelt next to her, laid his hands on her head. She couldn't move, couldn't fight his priesthood.

  “Thou hast violated thy sacred vows of chastity. Thou hast polluted thyself with the sins of this generation.”

  “No,” she whispered. “I didn't.”

  “Thy sins are grievous. Thou hast condemned thyself unto hell. Excepting thou atone.”

  He lifted his hands from her head. A wild thrill of hope. He was going to let her go. He'd only rebuked her. It was a warning, that's all. She wouldn't do it again, dear heavens, no. She'd learned her lesson, and she'd go back to her room and pray to the Lord for forgiveness. She'd sinned, she could see that now. Except what did he mean about atoning? How was that possible? Jesus had atoned on her behalf, in Gethsemane, when they nailed him to the cross.

  But hadn't the prophet said that there were sins too serious even for the atonement? Denying the Holy Ghost. Disobeyin
g the direct command of the Lord. So what did that mean? What did she have to do to atone? She'd do anything.

  His hands closed around her throat. They were strong. She pulled at his wrists. Too strong. She couldn't break his grip.

  “Thy life shall be forfeit as payment for thy sins, Emma Green. With my priesthood, I now seal thee unto death.”

  Chapter Sixteen:

  Jacob came up with a pretext to leave Zarahemla. The name of the pretext was Sister Grace Ellen, eighty-two years old. The woman who had born her testimony yesterday at breakfast, shared her hope and desire to live until the Second Coming of the Lord.

  He rose before dawn, took his list of medications and searched for Brother Timothy. Not even breakfast yet, but most of the compound was up and working: pulling laundry, stacking adobe bricks. A girl carted a basket of eggs. Smoke trickled from a chimney and he smelled baking bread. A hammer, voices, a baby crying. But not a machine or engine anywhere.

  Jacob looked in the raised vegetable gardens north of the compound. Women and children picked weeds by hand, plucked off beetles, caterpillars and other pests, and harvested tomatoes and bell peppers for the farmers market.

  Two men double dug one of the beds for a late summer planting, and another slaughtered chickens at the pens. A squawk, the thwack of an ax against wood. No sign of Brother Timothy or Brother Clarence. He could have asked, but it seemed like the perfect excuse to explore.

  Foothills sprawled above the compound to the east and north. These foothills grew until they became the Manti Mountains a few miles distant. They were brown this time of the year, covered with scrub and dry grass. Towering cumulonimbus clouds piled against the mountains.

  Jacob left the buildings behind. A chain link fence enclosed this edge of the property, encircling what had to be several thousand acres into the foothills. Some was green with alfalfa or corn. Ditches crisscrossed the fields and gardens. The whole system was gravity-fed irrigation, like the original pioneers would have used in the 1850s.

  Even here, in the dry heart of rural Utah, land wasn't cheap. Less so water shares, and how many acre feet did this system move? Where did the money come from? Zarahemla couldn't generate much cash.