It wasn't a question. "I have," Thomas admitted. There was no point in lying. The truth was a tangible thing between them in that small room.
"I know what you did to the men at the Peton estate, to Samuel, to Ruth." She moved to the simple cot and sat, a profound weariness in her posture. When she spoke, her voice was stripped of all its mystery, leaving only the raw sound of a grief that had never healed. "My daughter's name was Sarah," she began.
And for the first time, Thomas saw tears shimmering in her eyes. She was 17. She loved the color yellow and the taste of wild honey. Dr. Vance, the man who killed her, smelled of whiskey and arrogance.
He ordered her bled. I begged him not to. I told him her body needed to keep its strength to fight the fever. He said my superstitions were of no consequence.
He had me whipped for daring to question a white man of science. Her hands clenched into fists in her lap, the knuckles white. They tied me to a post in the barn. I could hear her calling for me for three days.
I heard her die, and all I could do was listen. The story, told so simply, was more devastating than anything Krenshaw had said. "I'm sorry," Thomas whispered, and the words were utterly inadequate. "Sorry doesn't balance the scales," she replied, her voice hardening again.
So, I did what my mother taught me to do. I made the scales balance. Dr. Vance died of a heart weakened by small daily doses of foxglove in his tea. Marcus, who helped hold me, died because he couldn't see the spooked horse in the dark stable.
Kelly, who held the whip, died from the madness brought on by a fungus I cultivated on his bread. And Peton died because he was the master of it all. Because his world allowed my daughter to die while I listened. She stood and faced him, her sorrow replaced by a fearsome, righteous anger.
"I am not sorry for any of it. They were debts, and I am a faithful collector. I have also saved 21 lives on this plantation," she continued, her voice ringing with an authority that defied her station. "I have delivered 17 healthy babies since my arrival.
I ease the suffering of the old and comfort the dying. Am I a murderer? Or am I a healer? Or is it possible, master, that in a world as broken as this one, you cannot be one without being the other?
Thomas felt trapped in a vortex of her logic. She was both a monster and a savior, and he, by his inaction, was becoming her accomplice. "And what about Hutchkins's wife?" he pressed, needing to understand the present danger. "Is she on your ledger, too?"
Celia's face was a blank canvas. "Everyone's time comes. Master Hutchkins was the overseer at the Peton estate before he came here. He was the man who tied the knot that held me to that post."
Thomas felt his blood run cold. Hutchkins, his loyal, efficient overseer, was a dead man walking, and his wife's slow, agonizing death was part of the punishment. A way to make Hutchkins suffer just as Celia had suffered. "This is not justice," Thomas said, his voice shaking.
"This is... this is a plague." "Justice is a plague to those who are guilty," she countered. "To the innocent, it is a cool drink of water." The cabin felt like a courtroom, and he was being judged.
He realized with a sickening lurch that he stood at a precipice. He could expose her. But how? Her journal was her word against his.
There was no proof. And if he tried and failed, what would happen to him? What would happen to his plantation without its healer? "What happens now?" He asked the question as a plea.
"That," she said, moving toward the door, "depends entirely on you." You can fight me or you can accept that my justice is the only justice this place will ever know. Your profits will be higher, your workers healthier. All it costs is your silence.
All it costs is the lives of men who, if you were truly honest with yourself, you would admit deserve to die. "And what if I am one of those men?" Thomas asked, the question escaping his lips before he could stop it. "What if I end up on your ledger?"
Celia paused in the doorway, her silhouette framed against the dying light. She turned her head slightly, considering him. "Are you a guilty man, master? Have you killed a child through your pride?
Have you taken pleasure in the suffering of others? I do not punish the innocent. I only balance the scales. The assurance was anything but reassuring.
By the standards of his society, he was a decent master. But in her moral universe did his very ownership of other human beings make him guilty beyond redemption. As if reading his thoughts, she added one last chilling detail. "The previous owner of Waverly, the man whose convenient death allowed you to buy this place so cheaply.
Did you ever wonder about him?" "Natural causes," Thomas said, his mouth suddenly dry. "That's what the deed said." "It was," she affirmed. "His heart simply gave up."
I was not here. I had nothing to do with it, but I knew he was dying. Word travels. I knew this plantation would be sold to a young, ambitious man from Charleston who didn't know the whispers of this county.
I knew you would need a healer. He stared at her, the full terrifying scope of her plan revealing itself. The auction, the low price. "I made myself a curse," she said, a flicker of pride in her voice.
I let the stories of the Peton estate spread. I made sure every planter in that room was too afraid to bid on me. Except for you, the outsider. I needed to come to Waverly.