really believed it would go like that. I thought for sure the boldness of what I done would bring some good. It was like I had put everything I was and everything I had into this one business, and the world had got to match that wager or it wasn’t no world at all.
I was young, which maybe isn’t no excuse for being so stupid. Also, the way it come out, I was right. But I don’t see as how that makes it any better. Good success in a bad labour sets you down a dangerous path, so the dead god said one time before they killed him.
That lock-tide when I come back to my room I picked up the boxes one by one. The sun had gone down a good hour before, but they was still warm to the touch like as if they was alive.
22
Salt Feast was coming up. Haijon and Spinner was fasting for their wedding, which was set to be on the day of the feast.
I think I told you that Ursala give answer on three pair-pledges that year. Them other two couples was in the Fasting House, for they decided they would say their promises on the same day the new Rampart did. They thought it a good omen, like as not.
But Haijon and Spinner was not in the Fasting House. The Count and Seal said it would be too cramped in there for six people, the women’s room in particular being very small and narrow. So they give a licence this one time for Spinner to fast in Rampart Hold, and since she was doing that, Haijon had got to fast there too.
Meanwhile, there was the salt lodge to be put up in the middle of the gather-ground, and the tabernac for the wedding right next to it, and the bonfire over on the setting side. Three new share-works, and six souls less to advance them. That meant some busy days coming, right when I needed to be free.
It worked out well enough though. My sisters was dead set on decorating the tabernac, and since they couldn’t do till it was builded they went all out to build it. Ma and me was left alone at the mill the next three days. There was lots of work to do, but we was often doing it in different places, Ma going out with the catchers while I took care of what they catched. So I had no one watching over me, and could do as I liked as long as I didn’t slack.
Late in the morning of that next day, I went into my room and sit down on the bed with all the boxes laid out in front of me. I tried the one with the horse on it first, pressing the switches each in turn, then going back and holding each one for a couple of breaths before I let it go again.
That didn’t do nothing. I went along the line, trying the same things each time. It seemed a good idea to keep some order in it so I knowed where I was got to.
But it didn’t help none. There wasn’t a single one of the boxes did anything at all. They didn’t feel warm now, the way they did the night before. They was as cold in my hand as when I brung them out of Rampart Hold.
So then I tried to bespeak them, the way we was told to do when we was preparing to be tested. I said confirm and accept and acknowledge to each and every one of them, sometimes with my thumb on one of the switches and sometimes without. That didn’t make no difference, neither.
I was at this for an hour or more. Then I looked out of the window and seen the catchers coming back with a cartload of fresh wood. Ma was looking around for me, no doubt so I could help with getting the wood tied down on the drying frame, so I had got to leave off what I was doing and hide the boxes back under the bed again.
The next time I took them out was that same night, after everyone was gone off to sleep. I was tired to death myself, but my restless thoughts wouldn’t let me settle, so in the end I give in to them and tried again. I done the same as before, except that I was whispering the words instead of saying them out loud.