Page 3 of Tangled Sails

I could not fathom what that would mean for my life. She’d called my dream of marriage and a family mundane. Was that what she believed motherhood to be? Something completely unextraordinary? I’d spent years setting my own desires aside, doing all I could to help anyone who came to me. I knew the value of helping others and I had no wish for people to suffer needlessly. But it wasn’t all I wanted to do. Yet I’d done it, day after day, year after year. I’d kept myself in this tower. I’d protected my hair and my gift, all in the hopes that one day my wants and wishes would matter.

But that day would never come, not if Aunt Ethel had her way. And I knew in that moment, more than I’d known anything in my whole life, that I could not let Auntie have her way. I would waste away, die, go insane if I stayed in this place much longer without hope, without the promise of anything other than this. And if Auntie would offer me no hope, then I would have to make my own.

I had to find a way out of this tower. I had to leave—soon. As soon as I was able.

I started climbing the walls.

I’d been over it a thousand times in my head. Aunt Ethel was very careful to safeguard anything that could be used as a rope or ladder, and since my escape would necessarily have to happen in silence while she slept, I knew I had few options.

So I practiced climbing the inside walls of the tower every afternoon while she was gone. I’d spent a lot of time leaning over the banister, studying the structure of the tower, and I knew that the way the stone and mortar fit together on the outside of the tower was the same on the inside.

I had to make up excuses for why my fingers were scraped and raw when Auntie noticed, telling her it had happened while I’d scrubbed the floors or that I’d been tending the roses that climbed the tower. Despite the difficulty of getting dressed while managing my hair, I started dressing myself without her help so she wouldn’t notice the inevitable scrapes and bruises on my shins and backside that resulted from my desperate endeavor.

After nearly two months, my strength and climbing abilities were improving. I was able to climb up and down the walls of our rooms, clinging to the rocks and maneuvering along them for longer and longer periods each week. Yet, the prospect of climbing over the balcony and down the entire height of the tower left me nauseous.

I started to doubt my conviction. Maybe I was being impulsive and foolhardy. Maybe Aunt Ethel hadn’t truly meant it when she said what she did.

So before I took my life in my hands and left this tower, I broached the subject with her one more time.

“I know you believe that my place is here, Aunt,” I said as we sat across from one another, eating our evening stew.

She paused her eating and fixed her eyes on me. “It is your place.”

“I know how important my gift is. I know the good I’ve done, and I want to do more. But I’m grown now. I must have the freedom to live my own life.”

Her nostrils flared and her eyes narrowed. “Freedom?” The whispered word felt dangerous. “Is that what you want?”

I swallowed and felt myself start to tremble. “Yes, Aunt.”

“Freedom has a price,” she said with a cold stare. “And believe me, my dear, you are not willing to pay it.”

I shrank a little in my seat, unnerved by her hard eyes and sneering mouth. What price was she talking about? Did she think I couldn’t handle the freedom to move about in the world of my own accord? Was she just trying to scare me?

“I’m not a child anymore, Auntie,” I said, managing to keep the quiver out of my voice. “You can’t ask me to stay in this tower for my entire life. I deserve to—”

She slammed her hand down on the table with such force that I jumped. “If you continue to bring up this ridiculous notion, then you might need to spend some time in solitude.”

My lungs felt like they collapsed inside my chest at that single word—solitude. When I’d first come to live with Aunt Ethel at nine, I hadn’t understood her rules, and I’d fought her on them. I wanted to be allowed outside, so I’d pestered and whined endlessly—until she’d given me solitude. The rooms we currently occupied were not at the very top of the tower. No, there was another room farther up at the end of the long, winding stairwell. We used it for storage. I was never allowed to leave these rooms and go into that stairwell unless she was punishing me by giving me solitude in that upper room.

The room had no windows.

Sometimes she had left me there only for a few hours. Other times, she’d given me a “calming potion” and left me there for days with water but no food, too weak to stand and in a mental haze. I was only ever allowed one candle, and it never lasted long. The last time she’d used that punishment was after she’d taken away my precious dolls when I was thirteen, but just the mention of it left me in a cold sweat. “No,” I whispered, twisting the fabric of my skirt in my hands. “I don’t need that.”

“You say that now, and yet I worry that in a week we will be having this same inane conversation. You know what happened to my sister. You know the tragedy that could befall countless families if you are not willing to help. Yet you insist on bringing it up time after time.”

“I won’t bring it up again, I promise.”

“Good. But just to be sure…” She stood and crossed to my bed, tossing my pillow aside and snatching up one of Gregor’s books I had hidden there. “I will be taking this.” She stalked over to the fireplace and tossed the book in without hesitation. “And each time you act in an ungrateful manner, I’ll burn another.” She came back, grabbed both of our half-eaten bowls of stew, and threw them in the wash tub. Stew splattered the walls and ground, but she ignored it and left the kitchen.

My breathing was pained and shallow, my eyes stinging with unshed tears, but I forced myself to breathe past the horrific panic that consumed my chest, then stood and cleaned up the mess she’d just made.

Aunt Ethel was asleep—and had been for some time—yet I waited a few moments more, gathering my courage before slipping from my bed. I didn’t have time to delay. I had to dress, gather the few things I would take with me, and then…go.

Climb down the tower. Leave my entire life behind.

Gain some semblance of freedom—I hoped.

I quickly dressed, taking the time to grab the back hem of my skirt and pull it forward through my legs, stuffing as much as I could into the sash at my waist so it wouldn’t be in the way as I climbed. I grabbed the necklace my mother had gifted me from my bedside table and secured it around my neck. Then I pulled out one of the long scarves that I used to bind my hair and placed a change of clothes, my aunt’s shoes, some food, and a water pouch in the middle. I tied it in a bundle, then crossed to the balcony, grabbing Auntie’s cloak as I went. I held the cloak as far out over the railing as I could and then let it go, watching as it plummeted and then slumped onto the ground. My heart leapt to my throat. I was used to being up high; it was all I’d known for the past ten years, but watching that cloak fall made me realize just how high it was. If I lost my grip and fell…