I see this man in my mind embracing my mother. It’s not a memory, just a notion turning over. He could be my father. Pieces slide into place. The recorder made me, his brother’s bastard, a sin eater the same way he did his barren wife. Clearing the family of its stained women. Choler burns a hot, white star in my chest, getting larger and larger. It wants to fight. It wants my arms to be strong enough to run across the field and dig my nails into the recorder’s flesh. I grab at my arms and squeeze them. Why can’t I be Black Fingers, who can press folk beneath stones, or the Queen, who can command armies?!

I’m so enraged I almost don’t see Fair Hair come out of the tent and give a coin to a linkboy to lead her to the jakes with his lantern. The recorder and his brother must wait. I may not be strong enough to hurt them, but, Maker help me, I’ll give Fair Hair what she deserves.

I slip off my stone and walk silent through the grass. Fair Hair pauses to greet the recorder and the other ladies, so I have a moment to trot ahead through the dark and get into place around the side of the jakes.

Fair Hair leaves the linkboy by the back of the tent, takes his lantern, and walks the last twenty paces to the jakes alone, most like because ladies don’t like boys listening to them piss. He’s just as happy. The moment she leaves him, he’s peering in the tent to see the play.

When I hear Fair Hair open the door to the jakes, I dart around and catch the door before it shuts. In I go, dropping the bar in the lock behind me.

Fair Hair startles, then raises the lantern to see better. ‘I need no aid, miss, and haven’t a coin for you anyhow. Take your leave.’ She waves me away and waits.

I stand my ground and unwrap my shawl to reveal my collar. And this is where my plan begins. It’s not a fancy plan, like my uncles’ complicated games of confidence. It’s not an educated plan like the Willow Tree’s midnight ritual. It’s a simple plan for a cursed girl, and I pray it will work.