Bekija’s decision to become a sworn virgin devastates her mother, who fears it will provoke a blood feud with Nemanja’s family. Murash insists that the Kanun gives her the right to refuse the marriage. 

As predicted, Nemanja’s family is dishonored and, by the laws of the Kanun, is now entitled to kill a man from Bekija’s family to restore their honor. Murash presents Bekija with a black armband, which is usually worn by a man marked for death in a blood feud. He forces her to choose who will wear it: himself or her brother, Sále. With her mother sobbing, Bekija ties the black armband around Sále’s arm. Murash then tells his son to either keep his manhood or stain it, leaving the choice to him.

Matija reflects that her father, Murash, valued the Kanun above his own family. 

To escape being murdered in the blood feud, Sále runs away from home. When Murash announces his son’s departure, he transfers the black armband to his own arm. Murash reacts with pride at being entered into the blood feud and declares his intention to build the biggest dovecote in Albania. 

Matija recalls how Murash constantly berated Sále, insulting him over interests he considered effeminate, like dancing. The remaining family members, Bekija, Murash, and their mother, sit for meals at the table, setting a place for Sále in the hope he might return. Though Sále’s chair remains empty, Murash starts propping a shotgun against it. Bekija looks down and sees two shoe-shaped hollows worn into the floorboards where someone has stood for a long time.

After Nemanja’s family declares their intent to seek revenge, Bekija’s family is granted a besa, a temporary truce that prohibits any violence against them. They first receive a short 24-hour besa; the next day, the village separately grants a long, month-long besa  because no one from Nemanja’s family had been killed and therefore no funeral had taken place to aggrieve their family. 

During this period of reprieve, Murash becomes singularly focused on building a massive new dovecote, the biggest in Albania. He works on it from morning until night, forgoing meals. His life converges into this single matter. As he accepts his fate, he becomes isolated from his former friends, who now shun him.

During the final days of the besa, Bekija listens to her mother sleep-talking. Sleeping alone, her mother speaks in a delirious state, calling out the individual names of their pigeons. She specifically asks one named Archangel to rescue them. After addressing the pigeons, she speaks Murash’s name and then falls completely silent.

Matija recalls a memory of hunting with her father, Murash. She shot a stag, and he slapped her, angrily telling her that stags are noble animals and killing them is a crime. 

This memory intertwines with a vision of her father’s impending murder. Matija imagines Nemanja’s brother, the designated avenger, ambushing Murash at dusk. In accordance with the Kanun, the killer must speak to his victim before the act. Nemanja’s brother accomplishes this by relaying Nemanja’s regards to Murash. Matija imagines her own words of declaration to her father, starting her intention to become a sworn virgin, as a possible final utterance spoken before the killing, blurring her guilt with the act of Murash’s murder.

Sále sends a second letter from Sofia, Bulgaria, frustrated that Bekija has not replied to his first. He recounts a painful childhood memory when their father, Murash, brought home a wild bunny. The bunny died, and Bekija falsely blamed Sále. As a result, Murash beat Sále so severely he couldn’t lie on his back for two nights. 

Sále questions why Bekija lied, speculating that she was desperate to be “daddy’s boy.” He dismisses the Kanun as a fable and asserts that Bekija’s transformation into a man will never bring her freedom. He again pleads with her to tell him what truly happened at the dairy, insisting that truth is necessary for forgiveness.

Speaking to the journalist recording her story, Matija dismisses Sále’s claim as a lie and tries to clarify what really happened during the incident with the rabbit. 

She remembers holding the rabbit in a sock too close to a hot stove, accidentally killing it. When their father, Murash, discovered the dead animal and demanded to know who was responsible, she panicked and blamed Sále, believing that a show of brutality would finally make Murash respect Sále. Instead, Murash beat Sále for it. In the aftermath of the beating, Sále never brought up Bekija’s lie to her, making Bekija wonder if it all really happened. While out hunting, Murash later told Bekija that the wild rabbit was destined to die anyway. Bekija observed that it was moot for Murash to bring the rabbit home in the first place then. Murash chose not to answer this observation.

In a third letter, Sále worries about Bekija and describes how he came to settle in his new life. After fleeing home, he was beaten and robbed at the Serbian border. He arrived in Sofia penniless and began dancing on the street. A professor of modern dance discovered him, recognized his talent, and became his mentor. 

The professor helped Sále with securing his legal documents, housing, and lessons. In return, Sále became a member of his dance troupe. Sále also recalls a dream in which Bekija and Dhana swam in a sea of milk before Murash drank it dry; Bekija turned into a white she-wolf and ran into the woods, while Dhana turned into a fish that grew wings and flew away. He remembers one night hiding at the water mill and listening to Dhana read aloud to Bekija, calling her voice the most beautiful he had ever heard. He ends the letter by once again begging Bekija to tell him the truth about the night at the dairy.

After the journalist finishes reading the letter, Matija asks the journalist to stop recording for the day.

The name “Bekija” is written out in Cyrillic. Matija forcefully insists that the name reads “Matija,” rather than “Bekija.”

Matija reflects on her past relationship with Dhana. Dhana would read to Bekija at the water mill, and her presence was the only thing that could soothe Bekija’s chronic stomachaches. 

Bekija and Dhana both had small birthmarks over their hearts, which Matija interprets as a sign of their deep connection. One year, Dhana abruptly stopped visiting, and Bekija never saw her again. Matija reflects that in her village, choosing love could mean choosing death.

At the end of the month-long besa, Nemanja’s brother murders Murash near the wild pomegranate trees, finally avenging his family’s honor. Men from the village carry Murash’s body back on a makeshift stretcher and lay it at Bekija’s feet. Following tradition, Bekija formally asks if they have brought “a wound or death” (88). They confirm it is death. Bekija’s mother, who had gone to pick pomegranates for Murash as a final gift, sees the body and collapses in grief as the fruit scatters on the ground.

Murash’s funeral procession winds through the village. As dictated by the Kanun, the killer must attend the funeral feast of the man he killed. Nemanja and his brother come to Bekija’s home and eat rabbit stew at her table. Bekija observes them, noting that one of them must now die from the bullet in Murash’s pocket. However, because sworn virgins cannot kill, the blood feud is effectively dead.

Using her father’s razor, Bekija shaves in a peeling mirror, cementing her transformation into Matija. 

Matija reflects on the physical transformation she experienced since taking the oath to become a sworn virgin: Her period stopped, and dark hair grew on her chest and neck. The act of shaving is a daily ritual that reinforces her masculine identity as “daddy’s boy.” As Matija holds the razor to her throat, she thinks of Dhana and feels a wave of regret.

Matija tells the journalist to read Sále’s final letters. Tucked inside Sále’s letter is another, unopened envelope from Dhana. 

As the journalist reads the letters, Matija is overwhelmed by a surreal vision. The walls of the house appear to collapse, and the room is flooded with an unbearable, piercing light. Matija feels dissolved into it and projects shame onto the journalist, saying she is uncomfortable and cannot look. She tells the journalist to leave, as the letters contain a destructive truth that has been unknown to Matija for years. Matija feels as though the source of all the decay around has been within all along.

In a brief, poetic reflection, Matija sees an embodiment of all the pain and loss in the family’s story. The images include a red rock in Sále’s hands, the blood on Murash’s leg, Matija’s bleeding mother, the impression of Murash’s shoes on the floor, the bloodied shirt from the feud, a sacrificed lamb, and the memory of Dhana’s cheeks.

Matija declares that having “killed” Bekija 16 years ago, she must now kill her current identity, Matija, too. She builds a fire in the middle of her ruined house, burning remaining possessions including old photos and letters. 

After arranging for a neighbor to care for the cow, Nura, Matija goes to every pigeonhole door and turns each latch, freeing the birds in what feels like a triumph and a final ritual. The pigeons will not leave, though, because their wings were clipped when they were young. This causes Matija to reflect: “home is where they clip your wings” (100). 

Draped in Murash’s fur coat with the bullet in its inside pocket, Matija takes her passport, dress, and patent leather shoes, and walks up a rocky path, determined not to look back.