The world was still dark when Amara slipped out the back door.
No lantern. No escort. Just the kitchen knife tucked into her sleeve and the sound of her own breathing, too loud in the predawn silence.
The air was cold—colder than she'd expected for late May. Mist hung low over the ground, turning familiar shapes into ghosts. Somewhere far off, a dog barked. Then another. The sounds echoed across the fields like warnings.
This is insane. I'm walking into slave quarters alone, in the dark, with no one knowing where I am.
But that was the point. If anyone saw her—if Grimes found out—the entire visit would be worthless. He'd have the cabins cleaned up, the worst cases hidden away, the truth buried under a fresh layer of lies.
She needed to see reality. Not the performance.
The path from the main house led through the formal gardens, past the kitchen outbuildings, toward the working heart of the plantation. Amara avoided the main route, cutting instead through the vegetable plots and along the edge of the tobacco fields. Her shoes sank into soft earth. The hem of her dress dragged through wet grass.
Martha Custis would never do this. Martha Custis would send a servant, review a report, maybe visit once a year with plenty of warning.
But I'm not Martha Custis.
The thought was both terrifying and liberating.
She reached the crossroads where the path split—one way toward the overseer's cottage, the other toward the slave quarters. The mist was thicker here, pooling in the low ground like something alive.
A figure emerged from the gray.
Amara's hand went to her knife.
"It's me."
Elias. His voice was low, almost a whisper. He materialized from the fog like he'd been part of it, his dark skin nearly invisible in the predawn gloom.
"You actually came," he said. There was something in his tone—surprise, maybe. Or grudging respect. "Alone."
"You told me to."
"I told you a lot of things. Didn't expect you to listen." He studied her face, his expression unreadable. "You know what you're doing? If something happens out here—if you trip, if someone sees you, if anything goes wrong—"
"No one will believe you tried to help me. I know."
"More than that." He stepped closer, lowering his voice even further. "If something happens to you, Grimes will blame us. Doesn't matter what the truth is. A white woman, alone, in the quarters at night? They'll say we attacked you. They'll say we—" He stopped. "You understand what I'm saying?"
They'll say you raped me. Or tried to. And they'll hang you for it, whether it's true or not.
"I understand the risk."
Elias looked at her for a long moment. Whatever he was searching for, he seemed to find it.
"All right. Come on. And stay close."
He didn't take her down the main path.
Instead, he led her around the back of the quarters—through a drainage ditch half-filled with stagnant water, past a collapsed fence that no one had bothered to repair, along a narrow track that was more mud than road.
"Grimes never comes this way," Elias said quietly. "Too dirty for his boots."
The smell hit her before she saw the cabins.
Rot. Mold. Human waste. The thick, sour stink of too many bodies in too little space with no proper sanitation. Amara had smelled poverty before—she'd done fieldwork in Appalachia, visited inner-city shelters, toured historical sites that tried to recreate the conditions of slavery. None of it had prepared her for this.
This is real. This is now. These are people living like this right now, while I sleep in a feather bed.
The first cabin they reached was barely standing. The roof sagged in the middle, patched with scraps of canvas that did nothing to keep out the rain. The walls were rough-hewn logs with gaps between them wide enough to fit a hand through. No windows—just a single door hanging crooked on leather hinges.
"This is where they keep the field hands who aren't worth much," Elias said. His voice was flat, matter-of-fact. "The old ones. The sick ones. The ones Grimes figures will die soon anyway."
He pushed open the door.
The smell inside was worse—concentrated, inescapable. Amara forced herself to breathe through her mouth as her eyes adjusted to the darkness.
Bodies. At least eight of them, crammed into a space meant for four at most. They were sleeping on a raised platform of rough boards that served as a communal bed—men and women together, packed so tightly they couldn't turn over without disturbing their neighbors. Two children were curled on the dirt floor beneath the platform, sharing a single thin blanket that looked like it might have been a flour sack in a previous life.
One of the children stirred. A girl, maybe six years old. Her eyes opened, caught the faint light from the doorway, and went wide with fear.
"Shh." Elias crouched down, his voice dropping to a murmur. "It's all right, Dinah. Go back to sleep."
The girl looked past him to Amara—to the white woman standing in the doorway like a ghost. Her fear didn't fade. If anything, it deepened.
She's terrified of me. Of what I represent. Of what white women in doorways have meant in her short life.
Amara stepped back, giving the child space.
On the platform, an old man shifted. His leg was visible beneath the threadbare blanket—swollen, discolored, with an open wound near the ankle that glistened wetly in the dim light.
"How long has that been like that?" Amara whispered.
"Weeks. Maybe longer." Elias's jaw tightened. "He asked Grimes for medicine. Grimes said if he couldn't work, he wasn't worth the cost."
An infection. Left untreated. In my time, a round of antibiotics would fix it in days. Here, it'll probably kill him.
"Is there—can we do anything?"
"Not tonight. Not without waking everyone and starting a panic." Elias touched her arm—a brief pressure, almost a warning. "You wanted to see. So see. But don't make promises you can't keep."
They moved on.
The second cabin was slightly better—the roof leaked in only two places instead of everywhere, and there were actual blankets on the sleeping platform. But the smell was the same, and the faces that turned toward Amara as she entered held the same mixture of fear and exhaustion.
A woman sat in the corner, apart from the others. Young—maybe twenty, maybe less. She was wrapped in a shawl, her knees drawn up to her chest, her eyes fixed on nothing.
"That's Pearl," Elias said quietly. "Don't speak to her."
"Why?"
"She was called to the big house last night. To serve one of Grimes's friends." His voice was carefully neutral, but Amara heard the rage beneath it. "She hasn't slept. Hasn't spoken. Just sits there."
Called to serve. A polite way of saying rape. A polite way of describing something that happens so often they don't even call it what it is.
Amara's hands clenched at her sides.
"Who?"
"Does it matter?"
"Yes."
Elias looked at her. "A man named Garrett. Owns a place west of here. He visits Grimes sometimes. They drink. They play cards." A pause. "They share."
They share. Like she's a bottle of wine.
The woman—Pearl—still hadn't moved. Her eyes were open but empty, like she'd gone somewhere far away and left her body behind.
I know that look. I've seen it in photographs, in testimonies, in the faces of survivors a hundred years from now. Dissociation. The mind protecting itself from what the body had to endure.
"Pearl." Amara's voice came out rough. She cleared her throat. "Pearl, I'm—"
"Don't." Elias's hand closed on her wrist. "Not now. Not like this."
"I want to help her."
"You can't. Not tonight. Tonight all you can do is witness." His grip tightened. "Come on. There's more."
The third cabin held children.
Most of them were under ten—too young for heavy field work, old enough to be assigned small tasks. Gathering kindling. Carrying water. Chasing birds from the crops. They slept in a jumble of limbs and thin blankets, their bodies curled together for warmth.
One boy sat apart from the others, awake. His eyes were red and swollen—infection, probably, the same thing Amara had seen in impoverished communities her whole life. Lack of nutrition. Lack of hygiene. Lack of care.
"That's Marcus," Elias said. "Nine years old. Smart as a whip. Grimes hates him."
"Why?"
"Because he asks questions. Because he doesn't look down when white men talk to him." Elias's voice was bitter. "Because he hasn't learned to be afraid yet."
Give him time. This place will teach him.
The thought made Amara sick.
She looked around the cabin—at the children sleeping on dirt floors, at the rags they wore, at the thin walls that wouldn't keep out winter cold. She thought about Jacky and Patsy in the main house, with their feather beds and warm meals and tutors.
Same plantation. Same family. Two completely different worlds, separated by nothing but the color of skin.
Something inside her cracked.
"I'm going to fix this," she said. The words came out before she could stop them. "All of it. The roofs, the blankets, the food. I'll get medicine. I'll make sure no one else is—"
"Stop."
Elias's voice cut through her rising emotion like a blade.
"Stop right there."
Amara turned to face him. His expression was hard, almost angry.
"You want to help? Fine. I believe you. But you come here one night, and the next day everything changes—new blankets, new food, repairs starting—what do you think Grimes is going to think?"
"I don't care what Grimes thinks."
"You should. Because he's going to know exactly where you went and who you talked to. And then he's going to make someone pay for it." Elias stepped closer. "Not you. Never you. Someone like Pearl. Someone like Marcus. Someone who doesn't have a big house and a legal name to hide behind."
The anger in his voice was real. And it was directed at her.
He's right. God damn it, he's right.
"We need a plan," Elias continued. "Not emotions. You want to make changes? Make them slowly. Make them look like something else—economic decisions, maintenance, whatever white people call it when they're pretending to be practical. Don't come down here crying about how terrible everything is and then announce a bunch of reforms. That's how people get hurt."
Amara forced herself to breathe.
"Okay."
"Okay what?"
"Okay, you're right. I'll be careful. I'll make a plan." She met his eyes. "But Elias—I'm not going to pretend I didn't see this. I'm not going to go back to the big house and forget."
"I'm not asking you to forget." His voice softened slightly. "I'm asking you to be smart. You're no good to anyone if Grimes figures out what you're doing and gets you committed to an asylum. Or worse."
Worse. There are so many ways this could be worse.
"All right. Smart. I can do smart."
"We'll see."
They made their way back toward the main path as the first gray light of dawn began to seep into the sky. The mist was thinning, shapes becoming clearer. Soon the overseers would be up, the work bells ringing, another day of labor beginning.
Amara's mind was churning. Plans, priorities, logistics. The old man with the leg wound—he needs attention first. The children's cabin needs new roofing before the summer rains. Pearl needs—
Pearl needs justice. But I can't give her that. Not in this century.
She was so lost in thought that she almost didn't notice.
A flicker of movement. At the edge of her vision, near the tree line.
She turned.
Someone was standing there. Watching.
A man. White, from the paleness of his face. Too far away to see clearly, half-hidden by the morning shadows. He wasn't moving—just standing, perfectly still, his eyes fixed on her.
Then he stepped back, and the shadows swallowed him.
"Elias." Amara grabbed his arm. "Did you see that?"
"See what?"
"Someone was watching us. Near the trees."
Elias scanned the tree line. His body had gone tense, ready.
"I don't see anyone."
"He was there. A white man. Just standing there."
Elias was quiet for a moment. When he spoke, his voice was careful.
"Could have been anyone. A neighbor's overseer. Someone from the main house."
"Or Josiah."
"Maybe." He started walking again, faster now. "Get back inside. Don't talk about this. If someone was watching—"
"They already know."
"Then we deal with it later. Go."
Amara hesitated. The tree line was still and silent, the watcher—if there had been a watcher—gone.
Was he real? Or am I seeing threats everywhere now?
She didn't know. She wasn't sure she wanted to.
She turned and walked back toward the main house, feeling eyes on her back the whole way.
[End of Chapter 16]