The Lord of the castle had yet to return.

  As the days passed without sign of the departed hunting party, dark whispers took hold of the keep, flowing through its walls and halls like rich wine at a summer’s banquet. In hushed tones and whispered words, many wondered if the storm had waylaid the Lord or if bandits and highwaymen had caught him in their snares.

  They wondered if he was dead.

  While the bark of gruff guards and stern admonishments of older servants quickly squashed many of these rumors, they couldn’t be stopped in their entirety. One look at the storm raging outside birthed a slew of new fictions about the fate of the castle’s master. Even the most steadfast and loyal couldn’t help but feel dread at the sight.

  Howling winds tore across the countryside. The unrelenting fury of the storm bowed the vast forest down before it. It tore clay tiles, cobblestones, and thatched roofs free of their moorings, scattering them across the rolling hills before the castle. Streams and rivers roiled across the land as the flood of rain poured into them, filling them to the brim and over. The tide of mud and broken branches washed all away downstream.

  Confronted by the storm’s ire, most of the low-lying villages had fled to the castle. They took shelter in the keep, watching on in despair as their homes vanished, their livestock drowned, and their autumn harvest was utterly ruined. Lakes of mud now stood where fields of grain or vegetables once did. Verdant green replaced by bleak browns.

  Some, foolish or stubborn, had remained in their homes.

  Of their fate, nobody knew, but there was little hope that they’d survive in the storm’s wake.

  Dour was the mood.

  Outside, the orchestra of damnation continued to toll its hymns.

  Matilda’s mood wasn’t any better than those huddling within the keep. Despite what she’d hoped and prayed, and been treated for, her headaches hadn’t abated. In fact, they’d only grown worse. They pulsed within her skull, battering her mind under wave after wave of pain. Her nightgown clung to her body tightly, soaked in sweat as she lay abed.

  Her stormy days were spent bedridden.

  In her brief moments of clarity between head-splitting pain, she felt like she was living in a dream. Not a fantasy, but curiously enough, it didn’t feel like a nightmare either. Everything just felt strange. Cloudy. Foreign. Sometimes it felt like her thoughts were not her own. Like someone else was in her head, whispering things in her ear.

  She swore that sometimes, out of the corner of her eye, the walls would dance, their shadows coming alive.

  Incomprehensible patterns cast in the gloom.

  It was on the third day of her feverish convalescence that Matilda gained enough clarity of mind to awaken. Through the haze of her foggy mind, she heard the sound of her friend’s voice, Hetty, urging her awake.

  “Matilda? Wake up. I’ve brought you something to eat.”

  Opening her tired eyes, Matilda let out a groan befit of a newly risen dead. The candlelight beside her made her wince.

  “Oh, good,” Hetty said with a sigh of relief at seeing Matilda waken. “You made me worried. Are you up to eating today? I brought you a bowl of warm gruel with a dash of honey to settle your stomach, but keep that between us. The old crone has been double-checking the stores lately, what with all the new people in the castle. She doesn’t trust anyone.”

  As sick and tired as she felt, Matilda couldn’t deny how hungry she was. Honey and gruel sounded wonderful right now to her. Hetty helped her sit up before handing the bowl of hot food to her. Matilda barely managed to get out a shaky “thanks” before she set about devouring the offering.

  Her stomach rolled uncomfortably for a moment before thankfully settling without issue.

  Matilda felt marginally better once she’d eaten. As soon as she placed the empty bowl aside, a cup of herbal tea was pressed into her hands.

  “Here, drink up. It’ll help with the headaches,” Hetty said.

  “I don’t know about that. Nothing seems to help.”

  Hetty shrugged at Matilda’s grumbling. “Maybe. Maybe not. But it’s better than nothing. Now drink up.”

  Unable to argue much with her friend, Matilda instead focused on drinking up the slightly bitter tea. The steam warmed her face as she took a few hesitant sips. As she slowly drank the tea, the pain in her brow blessingly faded.

  When Matilda was done, Hetty plucked the empty cup from her hands. “Better?” she asked.

  “A little,” Matilda nodded, rubbing her temples. “It’s not all gone, but it’s not as bad as before. What did you give me?”

  “Just a little herbal recipe of my grandmother’s make. It’s a family secret,” Hetty winked, to which Matilda rolled her eyes. The action only provoked a slight wince from her. “Now get up! I’m sick of doing your work for you!”

  “You’re a real saint, aren’t you?” Matilda snarked. “Making the infirm work.”

  Hetty snorted. She helped Matilda get shakily to her feet before placing her hands on her hips. “I am a saint! I’d need to be to deal with you all the time!” The scowl on the other girl’s face lasted only a few moments before cracking into a grin. “Go on! Get dressed already, you layabout. I wasn’t joking about all the work we need to do.”

  “Did you wash my clothes?” Matilda asked as she picked up her working clothes, eyes roaming over the freshly laundered fabrics.

  “Who else was going to? You?”

  “Thanks, Hetty.”

  Hetty turned away, ears turning pink. “Eh, whatever. What are friends for but to foist your burdens upon? Don’t think I won’t do the same if I fall ill! Now get dressed!” With that, Hetty stormed away, shutting the door loudly behind her as she went.

  Matilda chuckled, a warm smile gracing her face.

  Making her way over to the bucket of icy water in the corner, Matilda quickly peeled off her soaked nightclothes and hurriedly set to wiping herself down with a provided rag. The frigid water made her shiver something fierce, but it was better than being coated in a sticky sweat all day. Once she felt she was clean enough, she redressed in her cleaner clothes before leaving the room.

  As swift as she was to find her friend, work found them even swifter.

  With all the villagers taking shelter in the castle, mud and grime rapidly built up in the well-trodden hallways and chambers. For most of the morning, the pair were tasked with sweeping, cleaning, and keeping those inside plied with hot food and cold drinks. Thankfully, most of the villagers were content to occupy the main dining hall and gamble away their time with dice or cards.

  Just as Matilda was wiping down a table someone had spilled ale upon, Hetty spoke up from beside her. “You know,” she said, her voice low in a gossiping tone, “Sir Liam was asking after you these last few days.”

  Matilda started. She whirled on her friend, eyes wide. “He did?! What- what did he say?!”

  “Oh, nothing much,” Hetty teased.

  “Hetty!” Grabbing her friend’s shoulders, Matilda shook her as if to shake loose the answers. “Tell me!”

  Hetty shoved Matilda off with an annoyed huff before throwing her own ale-soaked rag at her face. As Matilda spluttered and gagged, she straightened her rumbled dress with a growl. “I told you to stop doing that, you menace! You can be so embarrassing sometimes.” Hetty glanced over at her friend and took in the pouty look she was giving the other girl. She sighed. “Fine! Fine. He was just asking after your health, is all. He was wondering where you’d disappeared to the last few days.”

  “And? What did you tell him?”

  “I told him that you were abed. That you’d been struck down with headaches.”

  “What!!!” Matilda screeched. Several heads turned their way in annoyance, much to Hetty’s embarrassment. “Why did you tell him that?!”

  Looking at Matilda as if she was a particularly slow child, Hetty spoke slowly. “Because, Matilda, you were laying in bed with headaches. Hence why I told him such. Which part are you having trouble understanding? Did your headaches turn you stupid? Or in this case, even more so?”

  This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

  “Hardy ha-ha. Now he’ll think I’m a sickly girl!”

  “You are a sickly girl,” Hetty deadpanned.

  “But I didn’t want him to know that!” Matilda cried.

  A cough and a pointed glare from an older maid had the pair scurrying off to clean another table.

  As soon as it was clean, Hetty sat against it and glanced Matilda’s way. Taking in the despondent girl’s posture, she sighed once more. “Why do I have to be the mature one?” she muttered to herself. “Look, Matilda, he asked after you, didn’t he? That means he’s interested in you. Why? I’ve no clue.”

  Matilda ignored her friend’s snark to focus on the parts that she wanted to. “You think so?” she asked hopefully. “You think he likes me?”

  “Sure. Why not? Stranger things have happened.”

  “He likes me~” Matilda hummed to herself as she spun around.

  Hetty just rolled her eyes.

  “I’ve been meaning to ask, but what was up with you venturing into the cellars a few days ago? You weren’t stealing wine again, were you?”

  Hetty’s sudden question shocked Matilda from her daydreams. Spinning around, she faced her friend before darting her eyes around to spot any eavesdroppers. Seeing as they were still in the main hall that was filled villagers devoid of gossip, many ears were surreptitiously trained their way. Snatching up her friend’s wrist, Matilda dragged her out into an empty hallway to spin her tale.

  “You’ll never guess what I saw! I don’t even know how to describe him!”

  “Him?”

  Matilda floundered for a moment, trying to find the words to describe what she saw down in that cell beneath the castle. “I should start at the beginning.”

  “Sounds reasonable.”

  “SO! There I was, minding my own business, not avoiding work, no matter what the others say, when the chamberlain interrupts my very important work and tasks me with dealing with a problem that’d arisen. You see, the Lord’s new horseshoes hadn’t turned up! Horseshoes for the horse, not the Lord. The farrier had complained to the chamberlain about it and so, naturally, I was tasked with solving this very complex issue!”

  “Naturally,” Hetty drawled. “But could you get to the point already?”

  Matilda huffed. “You have no appreciation for a good story. Anyway, to solve this very complex issue, I needed to borrow a jug of wine from the cellars for the blacksmith.”

  “So you were stealing wine again!” Hetty growled as she massaged her brow. “Matilda! What have I told you about that?!”

  “Not to?” Matilda offered sheepishly. “But it was for a very important cause!”

  “Such as?”

  “Such as not getting into trouble for failing to acquire the horseshoes, Hetty! Which I did, by the way,” Matilda said, puffing her chest up with pride. “But that wasn’t the most interesting thing that happened! When I was down in the cellars, I heard voices talking down near the dungeons. Now at first I was confused as I hadn’t heard of there being any prisoners being kept in the dungeons, but when I went to check it out, there was a pair of guards guarding it!”

  Hetty quirked an eyebrow up at Matilda’s wild gesticulations. “That is strange. I haven’t heard anything about that either. You say this was days ago?”

  “Right!” Matilda nodded. “And that’s not even the wildest part! I saw who they had in the dungeons and they were... strange, to say the least,” she said, glancing around the hallway nervously.

  Hetty swatted her over the head, making the other girl squawk. “Don’t leave it at that, moron! What was so strange about this prisoner?”

  “Alright! Alright! I’ll tell you, just don’t hit me! I’m fragile!” Clearing her throat, she continued her tale in a dramatic whisper. “The figure that I spied, huddled within a dirty cell, was taller than any man I’ve seen before but skinny like a maid. They had skin whiter than moonlight, eyes bluer than a clear sky, and hair the color of gold. Stranger still, their ears were pointed, sharp like knives.”

  Despite herself, Hetty leaned in closer, enthralled by the tale.

  “The guards spoke of them like they were a demon! A thief of infernal origins who’d snuck into the castle unseen. Or perhaps they’d risen from the underworld within our midst!”

  Hetty rolled her eyes before slapping Matilda harshly on her shoulder. “What are you trying to be? A bard?”

  “Hey! Just adding a bit of drama! But you have to admit it is interesting, right?” Matilda asked.

  “Sure. I’m just surprised that you’re the first person I’ve heard about this from. The guards gossip more than old housewives. In your eavesdropping, did you happen to catch the names of the guards?”

  “I think it was Peter and Matthias,” Matilda hummed. “But don’t mention that you heard it from me! They’ll think I was stealing or something!”

  “You were stealing,” Hetty deadpanned.

  Matilda huffed. “Requisitioning, Hetty! I was requisitioning supplies.”

  “Sure, sure.”

  The pair continued on down the hallway in a companionable silence, each absorbed in their own thoughts as they ventured deeper into the castle. They tried their best to look busy whenever they passed by another maid or servant of the castle. A few gave them suspicious looks as they passed by, but otherwise left the pair to their business. Or lack thereof.

  Outside the safety of the castle, the dark winds continued to roar. Their battering fingers searched for ways inside, prying at locked doors and shuttered windows.

  They found no purchase.

  Later that day, Matilda found herself sitting within a window-nook near the highest reaches of the castle. Her fingers drummed idly on the shutter beside her that kept the downpour out while her other hand massaged her brow. Another headache had come on suddenly without warning, slamming into her temples like a pickaxe.

  Across from her sat Hetty, idly munching away on an apple she’d swiped from the kitchen earlier. The other girl wiped the juice from her lips as Matilda sighed. Glancing up, she asked. “What’s got you all up in a funk? More headaches?”

  “No. Well, yes, but I was just thinking about that prisoner again,” Matilda said. “I mean, who are they even? Where did they come from? Are they actually a demon?” she let out a wince as another spike of pain shoved itself rudely into her mind.

  “You’re still thinking about that?” Hetty said with a sigh.

  “I just-,” Matilda paused as the words escaped her. “I just want to know!”

  Hetty rolled her eyes. “So nosy! But I get it. The gossip potential is so juicy I can almost taste it.” She punctuated her statement by taking a bite of her apple and loudly slurping up the escaping juices.

  Matilda wrinkled her nose at her friend’s antics. As she watched, a wild thought flashed through her mind.

  “I should talk to them.”

  The suddenness of her statement caused Hetty to choke on her apple. The girl spluttered, pounding on her chest to dislodge the wayward fruit from her windpipe. When she finally regained her breath, she leveled a teary-eyed glare Matilda’s way. “You did that on purpose!” she rasped accusingly.

  A look of pure innocence answered her. “What? Me?” Matilda said. “Never.”

  Hetty’s glare only deepened. “Pest!” she scowled. “And that’s such a profoundly bad idea!”

  “What? How so?”

  “How so?! Oh, I don’t know, how about that if you get caught sneaking into the dungeons to talk to a thief, they’ll hang you as a spy?” Hetty snarked. “How about that, huh?”

  In the wake of Hetty’s rant, Matilda beamed. “Simple. I just won’t get caught then!”

  Hetty buried her face in her hands. “An idiot,” she said despairingly. “My best friend is an idiot. And how, pray tell, were you planning to get past the guards?”

  “Well~” Matilda drawled. “I was thinking about using some kind of distraction to lure away the guards.”

  Suspicion colored Hetty’s face. “What kind of distraction?” she asked. When all Matilda did in reply was blink her eyes coltishly at her, she blanched. “Oh, hell no! You can forget it!”

  “Hetty please!”

  “Absolutely not!”

  Suddenly, a sharp voice broke into their conversation. “What’s all this noise about?!” it barked.

  Both Hetty and Matilda jumped at the sound. They shared a look of dread between themselves before hurriedly trying to hide any evidence of their slacking. Matilda smoothed out the seats they’d been sitting upon while Hetty rapidly ate the rest of her pilfered apple, stuffing it into her cheeks like a chipmunk. The core she tossed behind her into the corner and hopefully out of view. She did so just in time too, as just as she was turning back around, the owner of the voice rounded the corner to their little hideaway and spotted them.

  As they took the pair in, Matilda took in the figure before her.

  While she’d never interacted much with the Lady of the castle’s handmaidens, she still knew them by sight, and the figure standing before her was one such handmaiden.

  Typically, only a girl of noble birth could serve as a handmaiden, often as a means of advancing their social status amidst the circles of nobility. Lady Stephanie was no exception. Born to a local household that provided troops to the Lord of the castle, she had the great privilege and opportunity to serve the Lady of the castle. While only a year older than Matilda, she possessed finer features to Matilda’s sun-kissed skin and calloused hands.

  As Matilda eyed the older girl’s nicer dress with envy, Lady Stephanie sniffed haughtily upon recognizing them. “Ah, I thought it might be the two of you. Skipping work again, Hetty?”

  “Mhhm, mmh, mmh!” Hetty mumbled through her mouthful of fruit. Matilda barely resisted the urge to face-palm. After swallowing, Hetty spoke again, this time more coherently. “No, Lady Stephine! Not us! We were just, um, checking the shutters! Wouldn’t want to let any rain in, would we?! Ha ha... ha.”

  Lady Stephine cocked an eyebrow at Hetty’s nervous laughter. “Quite,” she said before turning her attention towards Matilda. “I have been looking for you.”

  “Me?” Matilda squeaked. From her side, Hetty looked at her as if to ask, “what the heck did you do?!”

  “Yes,” Lady Stephine continued. From the tone of her voice, Matilda could tell she loathed every second of speaking with them. “Our Lady requires her chambers to be swept, cleaned, and her linens and bath to be changed. Normally, this task would befall her other handmaidens and I, but they’ve taken ill with the chill winds of late. As such, I require aid from yourself to handle her affairs. I trust this shan’t be an issue?” she asked-told archly.

  “Why me?” Matilda asked.

  The handmaiden was too refined to sigh in annoyance, but Matilda could tell she really wanted to. “The Head cook informed me that you were available. Is that not the case?”

  Matilda cursed the old crone in her mind. Out loud, she replied reluctantly, as if marching to the hangman’s noose. “I’m available at this moment.”

  “Excellent. Now, if you’ll follow me, we have much work to do and little time to do it in.”

  As Lady Stephanie turned and elegantly marched away towards the Lady’s chambers in the higher reaches of the castle, Matilda looked at Hetty with a sorrowful gaze. “If I don’t return, you can have my things.”

  Hetty rolled her eyes. “What things? Your broken comb and a half-handful of silver? Yay, what an inheritance.”

  Before Matilda could reply to her friend’s dry snark, Lady Stephine’s voice boomed down the hall. “Get a move on!”

  Jumping, Matilda scurried off to her impending doom-slash-work to the sound of barked laughter and howling wind.