Feeling like a well-wrung rag, I flopped down on my bed. My roommate, Ainsel, had already returned and was seated at her desk, reading by candlelight.
“You look exhausted, Cathy.”
She was the only one who called me by my proper nickname.
“I am, Ainsel!”
Too exhausted to stand up again, I began undressing where I lay. Ainsel glanced up from her book, laughing at the sight.
She was a parlor maid and the first friend I’d made after coming here. She was just past twenty and had gorgeous blonde curls that framed her face.
The day I’d first come here, after completing my assigned tasks (without even a moment to recover from my journey), she’d welcomed me with her Scottish brogue, and we’d talked late into the night. Ainsel had warned me that Mrs. Banks patrolled the halls at night like a prison guard, so whenever we heard Mrs. Banks’s footsteps, we fell silent, staring at each other in the darkness, grinning like mischievous children. There was a knock, then Mrs. Banks came in, lamp in hand, to check that we were already asleep. Satisfied, Mrs. Banks shut the door and walked away, keys jangling. I enjoyed this so much I couldn’t hold in the giggles. My laughter proved contagious, and Ainsel soon joined in.
“We really should sleep. You came all the way from London, and you must be exhausted,” she’d said.
Sandwiched between the hard bed and the thin blanket, I’d been bone-weary, but unable to fall asleep. At last even the moonlight had faded, and Ainsel had stopped replying. A wave of loneliness swept over me. This was all so different, like I was in a foreign land. My parents’ graves and the church I’d attended were so far away. Surrounded by forest, this place was isolated, and all the memories contained in the stones of Wald Abbey made it a gloomy place. I was seized by the sudden notion that I would die alone here in this quiet manor. I’d never considered anything like that. Before I knew it, the tears were flowing. I desperately choked back my sobs, trying not to wake Ainsel with my sniffling.
I soaked my flat pillow with tears the first night I ever used it.
“Don’t worry.”
Warm fingers brushed against my cheek. Surprised, I’d turned my face to find Ainsel on her knees, smiling gently down at me.
“Don’t worry. You’ll grow to love it here soon enough.”
Those words had comforted me, like I was praying in church.
“Thank you, Ainsel,” I’d whispered and drifted off, sleeping like a baby.
I’d never had a coworker speak like that to me. I was sure our similar ages partly emboldened her. We both loved to read, which helped. I only read Sweethearts and other romance novels, books that made the mistress and housekeepers wrinkle their noses, but Ainsel was a real bookworm: Shakespeare, Browning, Dickens, and all sorts of books I’d never even heard of.
Tonight she was dressed for bed, and her hair was already down. While I struggled to get undressed, she said, “Cathy, your hands aren’t moving,” sounding just like Mrs. Banks. Then, laughing, she helped me loosen my corset. Ainsel was very good at imitations.
“They really worked you today, huh?” she said, undoing the knots. “You’re extra worn out.”
“The rain left mud everywhere. I’ve got to show Miss Maven where everything is, too. I’m exhausted!”
“There’s a fox hunt tomorrow, so at least there won’t be any bells ringing in the middle of the day,” she said.
“Oh, good.” Letting my hair down, I gave a sigh of relief. “But what of the ladies that don’t join in?”
“They’re going to wander the garden and then eat on the rotunda. Nobody told you?”
“Miranda may have said something.” It was always the same: When Wald Abbey had visitors, so many instructions floated around downstairs that it became impossible to keep track of them all. “But the rotunda? You mean the thing that looks like an old shrine, with the round roof? There’s a cave nearby—old places like that might really have a faerie living there.”
I realized Ainsel was sitting on her bed, laughing at me.
“What’s so funny?” I asked.
“That’s a fake,” Ainsel said. “A folly. The second earl built the thing to make the manor seem more impressive. The rotunda and that cave—the grotto—are both fakes designed to make this place seem like the ruins of an ancient abbey. I’m sure it has no faeries.”
This was a shocking piece of information. All those structures were fake? How much money and time had he sunk into making these vanity projects?
“Then there’re no faeries anywhere.”
“Disappointed?”
“Not like I believe in them anyway,” I said, staring up at the gray ceiling. “But this manor has a strange air about it. Like I’m always being watched by something… And I find myself having unusual thoughts. People hereabouts say that’s the faeries whispering to you, don’t they?”
“They do. Bad thoughts, ill tidings, even an artist’s stroke of keen inspiration. People around here attribute all manner of things to the faeries.”
Ainsel seemed to be done reading for the night. She turned back to her desk and closed her book. Actually, it looked more like a magazine, and she didn’t often read those. I thought I saw the word Strand on the cover, but it was too dark to tell for sure. She blew out her candle, and the room grew darker.
Only a pale glimmer of moonlight shone through the window’s grime.
Hearing her sheets rustle, I drew my blanket up to my neck and whispered, “I wonder if faeries actually exist.”
“Just because you can’t see them, doesn’t mean they don’t,” she replied.
“If it’s just a matter of not seeing, then why can’t we?”
“Hmm.” She thought for a moment. “Perhaps because our hearts are so removed.”
Pressing my cheek into my pillow, I searched for her face in the darkness.
“This is just my theory,” Ainsel said. “I’m sure a long time ago, humans and faeries interacted frequently. But as the times changed, human beliefs changed, too. We no longer needed the faeries, and they certainly had no use for humans and their fickle minds either. So our hearts drifted apart, we no longer needed each other, and we could no longer be together. These days, only mages still need the both of us.”
“Mages?” I giggled. “Like in Shakespeare?”
As I got used to the darkness, I could make out the blue of her eyes looking fondly back. Ainsel’s cheek pressed into her pillow as she watched over me—a thought that made my heart dance. I was sure that last remark about mages had just been her little joke.
“So then that explains the stories about Diana,” I said, trying to show I’d been paying attention. “We can’t remember her face and name because we no longer need each other, and our hearts have drifted apart? Because she doesn’t really matter, our memories of her fade away.”
Ainsel dropped her gaze. In the darkness, I thought she looked faintly sad.
“Perhaps that’s true. She lives according to different rules. It was always impossible for us to live together.”
“If that’s true, then that’s very sad.”
Ainsel closed her eyes, undoubtedly to sleep.
I rolled over, staring at the ceiling and thinking about Diana, the faerie who’d lived here for so many centuries. In my mind, she was a woman. She wore a maid’s uniform, wandering like a ghost through the gloomy interior of Wald Abbey. She must be lonely.
Perhaps Diana was searching the Abbey for someone who could see her, I thought. Searching for a way to prove she was actually here. Just as I was, deep down…