'Don't look, Lillian. Never look into the eyes of a Sin-Eater, you will be as cursed as he is and will forever languish in darkness.'
Lillian Elmes remembers the warning her mother gave her about the town's Sin-Eater only too well.
How could she n...
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It is not your place.
How those words feel as if they are burned onto my skin. I have thought of nothing else since I left Mr. Carver at the edge of Rectory Wood, when he turned and walked away, not affording me one more glance.
It is not your place.
I am furious and ashamed and so very exhausted of knowing this to be the cold truth. It is not my place to say one word out of turn. It is not my place to speak my mind. It is not my place to have just one lock of hair not perfectly coiffured into position. It is not my place to do anything other than what is expected of me.
I have barely said a word to Marie all the way home and although her eyes had widened at the mere sight of me – for without one of my combs, which is now lost forever in Rectory Wood, fixing my hair proved to be an incredibly difficult endeavour, and I could do very little to make myself presentable again – she pursed her lips and said nothing. Whatever she had seen in my face was enough to hold her silence.
The heat of the day wanes since my pursuit of Ebba Cole through the town. Why does it feel as if months have passed since that moment, when it is just mere hours? Why do I feel so different to the person I was just this morning? The one who couldn't help but be thrilled by the adventure she was about to undertake?
I do not feel thrilled now. I feel exhausted to the bone. And empty of the answers I sought to find.
The idea that Mama may have lied to me about the curse bothers me greatly. It sits as an uncomfortable knot in my stomach. I might not always agree with everything Mama says and does, but I love her immensely and I have always known that she only ever has my better interests at the root of everything. She desires for me to have a good life, a comfortable life, with a respectable husband of good standing. I know she desires for me to have the love that exists between herself and Papa. I know all these things, and I know her to be a good person at heart, which is why I cannot fathom why she would speak so falsely of the Sin-Eater and why she would speak of him as if he were the Devil himself.
I know Mr. Carver is not the Devil. Of course, I don't claim to understand his work and it truly does seem a thing of darkness to consume souls, yet I saw no presence of evil in him. He seems a man seeking to do naught but provide for himself and in return, we have shunned him and exiled him to that dreadful place.
It is not your place.
Mayhap, he is right about that. His place is not my place. We live but a few miles from each other and yet we might as well live whole oceans apart. He looks upon the likes of me with disdain and repulsion and I did nothing to encourage him otherwise. I am utterly bereft that not only did I come away with more questions than answers, but I came away knowing that my presence did nothing but irritate him. Lizzie would tell me to not allow it to bother me so, for she believes a man's opinion of a woman is worth no more than a grain of salt, but I just cannot help myself. I am not used to people wanting rid of me and whilst I am aware how arrogant that must sound, I am also aware that it is but a tiny seashell in an ocean compared to what Mr. Carver must feel every single day of his existence.
