'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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SEVEN YEARS LATER
The road to Lutwyche Hall is a cruel and arduous route, marred by potholes that make the trap judder all the way, until I think my bones might never stop shaking.
We are afforded little in the way of blissful coverage from overhanging trees. Today, the sun is merciless, having plagued the county with three weeks of a blistering heat that has left the fields arid and has shrunk the stream that runs close to our house to nothing but a pathetic trickle of water that crawls sluggishly over rocks and hardy weeds.
I swallow, running a finger along the inside of the high-necked collar of my black dress, although there is little room in which to try and free my strangled throat. I might as well have been wearing a noose about my neck. The thick skirts feel heavy and restrictive about my legs. My arm is already growing tired from holding the parasol above my head – for what little good it is doing - and sweats dampens my back and sticks my dress to my skin.
'Papa, can you really not go any faster?' I call out.
Papa, who is upfront with the horses' reins gripped tightly in his hand, waves me off with the other, barely glancing in my direction. Not that I can blame him. I think I have implored him three times already to pick up the pace, but I know my father and slow and steady is just as much his motto, as is a place for everything and everything in its place. He is as sure and steadfast as he is organised and meticulous, and that, unfortunately, means snail's pace all the way to Lutwyche Hall.
'Careful, Lily,' my brother says, pressing the back of his hand against his damp forehead, 'any faster and we will end up in a ditch and we all know how much you despise getting your clothes dirty.'
William is joking, of course, for I am well-known for all the scrapes and adventures of my childhood which had invariably resulted in me splattering mud over my finest outfits and often tearing holes in skirts that Mama then had to spend hours mending. That was until she forced me to mend them myself, and after that, I tried my best to take better care of my clothes, although it did not stop me from yearning to be back running through the fields as if the Devil were at my back and I were laughing in spite of it.
'Perhaps I should have spent my life clutching onto Papa's coattails for fear of getting dirt on my finery, much like yourself,' I reply, poking out my tongue at him.
Mama tuts and shakes her head, moving to adjust the angle of her parasol. 'Honestly, anyone would think you are both still children the way you carry on, and today of all days. I hope there'll be no such shenanigans when we arrive. Mrs. Hawkstone is apparently besides herself with grief. We must all act with respect and dignity at this most terrible of times.'
'I'm surprised Mrs. Hawkstone isn't swinging from the rafters, now that her beastly husband has done the decent thing and passed away,' I say, rolling my eyes and earning a snort from William in the process. 'Besides herself with grief indeed! I wager it was all she could do not to scream her thanks to the Heavens when he fell down those stairs. He must have landed with such an awful bump too.'
