This was all outlined again and again inThe Book of Rodwin.
“They roam this land, you see,” Starling said, as if he was only speaking to our father now. “They have more freedom outside the blessed lands of Perpatane. They are not curtailed by our saint. Hence, why I seek to bring the settlement of Sheridan to its knees. On the border of the most heathen country of law, the land of Tintar, a name I can barely say without spitting—are not these people the most vulnerable?”
My father gave another nod.
“And the most vulnerable of them are actually the strongest men. A demon’s spirit, ever present, will tempt a strong man with women or drink.”
“I have seen it,” my father agreed.
“And if those don’t work…” the priest trailed off and removed his hand from my father’s shoulder. “Little things, small sins, will be used against him. A single book on his shelf of pagan ideas. Gluttony of the belly.” He waited a beat and then finished by saying, “A game of cards.”
Both of my parents went very still.
Rowena and I were confused. At that age we did not know our father played cards at The Pale Horse, that he bet large sums of coin on games and lost more than he won, that he had debts. We did not know then that Torm Sheridan knew of these debts and kept offering my father to pay them off in exchange for ownership of the mill. We did not understand yet the brilliance of the priest’s campaign. By starting with the lesser residents of Sheridan, he had obviously built up fear by openly shaming them more easily than he could do to the close friends of Torm. But this had also allowed him to gather information on those men. His manipulation and mastery of the elders and businessmen in Sheridan were formulated of secrets and lies.
“I pity you, my son,” said the priest, his smile nearly convivial. “To be such a cornerstone in the edifice of this place, to be so well regarded and so strong, you are hounded by evil. I pray for your soul.”
My father, his face pale, thanked the priest. He had been shamed somehow, that much I could tell. And so when Starling turned his attentions to me, my father’s pride was bruised, and it was with almost relief that he agreed with the priest’s proclamation that I had a spirit of rebellion in me.
“Lord Torm tells me she was the first boxed in many winters, your darker-haired daughter.” The priest had drawn nearer to my mother and us and was peering down at me. “A rebellious girl. Full of questions.”
“She has been good of late,” my mother burst out. “Very docile and obedient. Reliable in her chores. I swear it, Father.”
“But she has a history of mutinous behaviors,” said my other parent. “Our lord speaks true. Roberta has unrest in her.”
Starling made ahmmnoise, those blue eyes memorizing my face. “Unrest is a common sin in girls. Your other daughter? Her twin?”
“She is a sweet girl,” my mother said.
“Ah,” differed the priest, a finger in the air. “As our saint warned us, we must be wary of a woman who entices with sweetness but strikes like an adder. We are warned of sweetness. It veils a poison.”
“She is a good girl,” my mother insisted. “And close with her sister.”
“Which makes it easy for Roberta to lead Rowena astray,” my father countered.
I looked past the priest at him pleadingly. I had tried so hard recently to be good. I had even tried to pray to the saint for guidance. Why did he turn on me now? Could he not see my bowed head and my valiant attempts?
“We must keep an eye on Roberta then,” said Starling. “Do you know what your name means, girl?”
I shook my head.
“It means legendary fame, and it means a blaze of glory. Those are things meant for men. You must cut out your pride, daughter. Your name is a curse and a reminder to you that you are but a worm in the ground compared to our saint.”
And though I had not opened my mouth, had not said one word, had remained demure and respectful, something in me had sparked his interest. The priest saw me like anXon a map, as if the key said, “This is where the fire should burn.”
From the ages of eleven to thirteen, I was boxed with regularity. Fortunately for me, but unfortunately for others, there was only one box to be used. So my stints in the box were never longer than a day as someone else had to turn themselves in on second days. I would climb out and return home, and the new wrongdoer would take myplace. This went on all week. I would try my hardest not to anger my father, and whole seasons would pass without punishment, but eventually, I opened my mouth and found myself back in the box. In the scriptures of Rodwin, it said,There shall be one box in a village, in the church. Therein each sinner will lie. That singularity of that box will serve to show that the one boxed is the most shameful of the village.
I had the idea that if the scriptures did not have such explicit instruction about the number of boxes, Starling would have filled his church with them.
Though he reigned with a radical devotion to the literal translations ofThe Book of Rodwin, boxing every woman and child who was turned in by their husband or parent, he did save the boxing on tenth-day services for the worst sinner of that week. And more often than not, it was me. So while I suffered no more and no less than my fellow sinners, I was the most public of them.
To avoid this, my mother constantly sent us on errands as we aged. When my father would ask after us, coming into the house for his midday meals, she would say that she had us delivering a basket of something or visiting a friend of hers to see after their being ill. In truth, she would suggest we pick wild windflowers in a field as she liked to dry them for decoration. They grew on the border of Nyossa, and soon we spent whole days exploring the edge of the pagan woods.
By our fourteenth winter, I was better at biting my tongue but worse for having more and more rebellious thoughts. Once, after a shouting match with my father that had ended with him stalking out of the house and making for the keep to report me to Starling, my mother had sat me down in a chair in the kitchen and begged me to be quieter and more conciliatory.
Chastened, I tried my hardest to explain that my tongue never could sit in my mouth, that it had to be free, that my thoughts flew from me like fledglings from a nest, that I could not contain my mind.
“You are a wildfire,” she said. “I need you to bea hearth fire. I need you to burn in place. Just a little meeker. Burn if you must burn, but if you do not contain that mind of yours... Roberta, I don’t know what to do with you.”
