Chapter 23
A year had passed in the old fort. Perhaps more. It had been the mothers’ unofficial responsibility to keep track of time, whispering endlessly about the many weeks and months that had passed since they’d arrived. But as a windy autumn came to the old fort, Ilya and the other children were separated from the mothers. From then on, time felt both endless and like nothing at all without the mothers to mark its passage.
There was no reason given for the relocation of the children. At least not to the children themselves. On the rainy day the families were separated, Ilya looked back over her shoulder, hoping for her mother to nod her on with a stern but reassuring look, but her mother’s face had lost all its light. Izaak had been that light. It was not to say that Ilya’s mother l
