Once upon a time there was a little girl named Esnipella who belonged to a very wealthy family. Her mother, a widow, raised her very strictly because she knew that little girls are prone to wickedness, and she wanted Esnipella to grow up to be a fine and upstanding lady. Because of this, Esnipella saw very little of the world outside her home with her mother’s precise schedules, or outside of her many studies and books.

In the little time that her mother did not watch her, Esnipella read other books that were not part of her studies— books about danger and adventure and far away places, all the things that her mother kept from her.

One day, when Esnipella’s mother was brushing her daughter’s hair, Esnipella asked her “Why do other children go outside and run errands and play and get dirty and have adventures, and I must stay inside all day and study and have my hair brushed three times a day?”

Her mother first swatted her hand with the brush, and told her it was an impertinent question. Then she answered, “because those children are poor and they are naughty and they will grow up to be wicked and unwanted. You will grow up into a fine lady and a charming hostess and an attractive wife.”

Esnipella thought that she did not want to be a fine lady and a charming hostess and an attractive wife, but she also did not want to get swatted again, and so she held her tongue.

The next day she overheard her mother scolding a servant for a delivery that did not arrive. The servant blamed thieves— a family of demons who had come to live in the dark underbelly of the docks at the edge of town.

When her mother was done whipping the servant, Esnipella dared to approach her and ask her about the demons, who seemed like the kind of people in one of her secret adventure books.

“Those demons are wicked creatures, bandits who steal and gamble and cheat and kill without a thought. They kidnap naughty children and they turn them into things like themselves, and they are never seen by good people again.”

Esnipella was still thinking about that later in the evening when she hid in her room, with her secret books. Perhaps her mother could sense her wicked thoughts, for that night, faster than Esnipella could hide what she was doing, her mother came in, and threw down the covers, and found her secret books.

“These books will not help you with your studies,” her mother declared. “They will not help you to be a fine lady, or a charming host, or an attractive wife. So I shall take them and be rid of them, so that you are not so distracted.”

It was more than Esnipella could bear. She stood and she stamped her foot, and she declared, “I do not want to be a lady or a host or a wife. I want to have adventures, and to sail on the sea, and to fight for my life!”

Esnipella’s mother, horrified, struck her across the face. “See what a wicked child you are!”

Her mother locked her in her room, and she took all of her secret books, and Esnipella wept.

-part one-