She hums, a flat, shapeless sound that offers no indication of her thoughts. “That’s interesting, because when we questioned Maria about your absence, she claimed not to have spoken to you in days.”
And I have officially said too much.
“Did anyone else know where you were going?” she demands.
“Fiona.” It is the first name that comes to mind. “I informed her I might be late for morning chores, but I grew disoriented in the darkness. I must have lost the trail.”
Her eyebrows climb high. “You, lose the trail? But you have been exploring those footpaths for a decade.” A moment of silence passes. “Look at me.”
My throat contracts with the force of my swallow, and I lift my head. Mother Mabel’s facial muscles have frozen in an expression of polite interest.
“What are the Seven Decrees?” she demands.
I have not had to state the Decrees since I was a child. It is the worst form of humiliation, that the abbess believes I need reminding of the Decrees when I carry them in my heart all days of the week. “Please, Mother Mabel.”
“The Decrees, Brielle.”
I take a shaky breath as the flush climbs my throat and singes red across my face. “Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not covet. Thou shalt not disrespect thy mother or thy father. Thou shalt not forsake thy God.” My voice grows hoarse the longer I speak without pause, each rule a dead weight I must cast aside. I swallow and finish with, “Thou shalt remember the Holy Day.”
“You missed one.”
I had hoped she wouldn’t notice.
Once I complete the set, it will become real. The last vestiges of this dream-like state will peel away. I am not ready.
“What is the Seventh Decree?” she snaps.
“Thou shalt not lie.”
Mother Mabel links her fingers together, studying me. Cold radiates through my dress, and my knees begin to ache from pressing into the hard stone. “You vanished for a week. Where did you go? What was so important that you thought it necessary to leave without informing anyone where you were going? And I want the truth.”
Sweat slithers down the column of my spine. Once this information comes to light, I might be dismissed from Thornbrook. I do not think I could survive the world untethered. “As I said, I was seeking pearl blossom.”
“Then why did your trail lead northwest as opposed to southwest, where the plant grows?”
The lies spin webs, but I cannot keep track of their sticky threads. Whatever the consequence, I will accept it, however sharp the barbs. Do I deserve to bleed, then?
“Mother Mabel—”
“Enough. I have heard enough.” Presenting her back, she shrugs off the impressive chasuble, hangs it on a wall hook. Beneath, she wears her alb, the gold stole, the cincture with its trio of knots.
She unties each knot deliberately. Her long nails pick at the rope and slide it free. Setting aside the cord, she then removes the stole, hanging it with the chasuble. Lastly, her alb.
Mother Mabel now wears only a flimsy white tunic. I stare at the pasty skin of her exposed calves.
She crosses the room to remove something from a box that sits on a low shelf. After a moment, she returns to my side. “Knowing the Decrees that guide us, is there anything you would like to add? Anything at all?” She regards me with much knowing. I think I have fallen far in her eyes.
Nothing I say would change my fate, so I do what I have been taught to do since I was eleven years old, hunched on the abbey stoopbeneath the pouring rain, watching a dark figure descend the mountain out of sight.
I keep my mouth shut.
Mother Mabel strides for the door. Its lock thunks into place. “Please remove your dress.”
My eyes drop, fingers twitching into loose fists. A wave of cold drags at me. “I do not understand.”
“I will not repeat myself.”
The punishing edge of that statement sends me to my feet. Presenting her my back, I remove my dress so I’m left in only my chemise and breastband. I shiver in the cool air.
