“Come on, be a smart fellow and swing a bit,” Jo cried. “You’re acting like a girl, you are!”

William couldn’t help himself this time and his exasperation escaped in a low groan, which Jo, very nicely, ignored. Gritting his teeth, William examined her face again. Her golden cheeks were smudged with dirt and her emerald eyes glittered. Strength lined every feature. Maybe that’s how she was able to masquerade as a boy. Her height and large build only added to the facade. As she circled her opponent, William caught a glimpse of dingy red hair beneath her brown cowl. He remembered the first time he had seen her. She was...amazing. Her mass of fiery curls cascading down her back, brilliant green eyes sparkling in merriment, golden limbs sticking majestically out of a tattered brown dress. William’s thoughts were broken by the other man’s retaliation.

“Girl am I? You know nothing boy,” Voteir sneered. With a long look at Jo, he sucked in his cheeks and pursing his lips, he spat in her face.

William’s hand tightened on his sheathed sword. Jo merely laughed as she wiped her face with the back of her hand.

“No, it is you who know nothing,” she replied with a wink in William’s direction.

Stepping back a pace, Jo paused, appearing to hear something from behind. Her brows drew together in confusion and she innocently turned her back. Voteir swung his sword towards her right arm, a saucy smile filling his confident face. Steel met steel. His jarred expression humored her immensely....

Pip was a gatherer. At least that is how he would respond when asked what he did to help out. He worked every morning sweeping the bookshop for Demmy and he decided that if he could gather waste, then he could also gather information. So, once his duties were done, he would flit from tavern to tavern, pausing on street corners, concealing himself in alley shadows. Being quite small for a boy almost thirteen, Pip found his lack of size to be an advantage in his newfound business because no one seemed to notice his presence or react if they did.

One problem with gathering information was that he couldn’t always find a place for it. Even the simplest of statements could be of great importance, but they didn’t always connect to other statements. And how is one to keep track of all this information? Pip lived by order; he once told his sister, Sarah, that order revealed the beauty of God. In the house he shared with his parents, three sisters, and two brothers, he had only a tiny corner of which to call his own, and that only because he was the oldest. Yet, there he kept his meager treasures—a pencil stub, a hawk’s feather, a piece of broken glass, a ragged end of rope—in stately array. Daily he would clean them and lay them each in their place. For his own appearance, even if he couldn’t bathe, he would make sure that at least his hair was in place.

On his forages for news, he had learned of the rebels. He loved the heated talks he heard behind their closed doors. He loved their beautiful orange flag and the snatch of orange ribbon sometimes visible from within the folds of their dirty coats. But he didn’t realize until the swarming in the streets how disordered they were. All had been confusion from the very beginning of the night. It started in the street near his home though he could not bring himself to word what had happened, even to himself. From then on, everything had been tangled and chaotic.

Then, in the midst of the disorder, came Crow. He had been there from the beginning, but it had taken him a while to begin his work. Before long, however, the rebels had moved to a more defendable street and started building their walls of freedom. Crow had spoken, order had taken control, and the rebels were once again beloved by Pip and none more so than Crow....

My tea tastes best when it has already rained and I always let a few leaves slip into my cup, though I’m a bit more careful when others come for my tea. Beside the stove, my Bible rests—worn and faded as my face. My mother always said, “Your Bible should look worse for wear to remind you and others how much you’ve read it.” My father always followed with, “And your face should look the same so everyone knows you’ve lived.”

I sit and sip. The warmth is as familiar as the words beneath my fingers. I touch the pages, heavily marking Paul’s words. I have not hesitated to preach anything that would be helpful…I consider my life worth nothing to me…I never stopped warning you night and day with tears…I am ready not only to be bound, but also to die for the name of the Lord Jesus…I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for salvation. And I wonder how someone grows old with that kind of passion.

With an empty cup comes the O’Casey girl, interrupting my view of green with her flash of red-blonde hair.

“Bettina, it’s a tea day!” Bridget calls.

“Aye, and I guess you’re thinking I’ll be giving you some.”

“You know you always make an extra bit for me,” she remarks, reaching my red door.

“Ah Bridget, get your tea and let us walk awhile.”

Having her beside me, my view is once again just green. Our bare feet walk on the hill I’ve known, feeling the grasses and the soil we pretend is green, too. Our breath is cool in our warm throats. And the air, though freshly washed, is ancient and always leads to Bridget’s prompting for my stories....

Fisher cupped the strip of paper he’d been faxed, in his palms. Sitting at an otherwise empty booth in a semi-crowded breakfast restaurant, he read it quickly. Then carefully folding it, he inserted it into the inside pocket of his dark grey suit jacket. Nancy plopped his pancakes down in front of him and after commenting on the sticky weather outside, she refilled his coffee mug and returned to the kitchen through the swinging brown doors. He noticed her black hair was secured in a long braid and so didn’t look too hard on his plate for loose waitress hairs. Cutting his pancakes into small squares, he dipped a bite in his poured circle of syrup and forked it into his mouth while taking a pen from the pocket of his grey-striped dress shirt. Shifting the pile of paper napkins to the left of his plate, he uncapped the pen and pondered the first blank napkin.