I can’t stop my brain from circling that night. The thought that I—that maybe we all—have underestimated the King keeps me awake long after the man himself has fallen asleep. Not that that’s saying much—in addition to being a heavy sleeper, the King is an early sleeper, as well. I need to sneak away if I'm going to turn back into a human like I'm hoping. It’s one thing for the King’s pet to wander out of his bedroom at night, quite another for a missing servant girl to do the same. It takes a few attempts to get ahold of the doorknob and even more to swing the heavy door open. I have no idea how I’ll close it behind me, but perhaps the King will assume it was a strong breeze that opened it. A breeze inside his bedroom. With the window shut tight.

I can’t think about that right now.

Right now, I’m focused on making my way out of the King’s wing without running into Otis or Otto while they make their rounds. Kind as they are, I won’t be able to explain transforming in front of them. But the coast is clear, and cats are fast.

Where can I go? The kitchens? The servants’ quarters? I fear that will raise more questions if anyone recognizes me. But the King’s library will be empty—hardly anyone goes there even during the daytime, since the main library is enough to suit most needs.

I sneak inside just as the clock strikes eleven, and I feel it happening again. Concentrate, Lurina! Wasn’t that the time last night when I changed back? I approach the grandfather clock curiously, and sure enough, I’m looking back at myself in the glass. The real me. I mean, the human me. After all, I’m no less real when I’m a cat.

This is so confusing. I’m exhausted already, but I can’t risk falling asleep. The last time I did that, I woke back up a cat. Maybe if I stay awake, I can extend my human time. It’s not sustainable—I’ll fall asleep whether I want to or not—but just long enough so that I can ask someone for help. Dinah, maybe.

How I wish Dinah were here! That I could somehow send a silent, invisible message that she needs to sneak into the King’s private library immediately, somehow. If magic is real, after all, why can’t it manifest in more useful ways than turning unsuspecting maids into cats?

I can at least wait a while until more people are asleep. I feel bad about the idea of waking Dinah up when she has so much work to do every day, but surely she’ll forgive me once she understands the circumstances. Midnight, perhaps. That’s a reasonable hour to expect most to have retired, but not so late that she’ll be sleeping too deeply, or have a hard time falling back asleep.

I peruse the shelves, looking for something to occupy me for the hour. As expected, I can’t read much of the King’s private collection, painstakingly amassed from all over the world and written in every known language. I doubt even the King himself can read them all. Rich people just like to own nice things.

Still, there’s a collection of Carbonelian fairy tales tucked near the bottom of one shelf. It makes me smile to picture the King as a small child, tucking all his favorites there for easy access. I settle on the floor and begin to read.

Despite my fondness for them both, I have no idea how both Dinah and the King can devote so much of their time and mental facilities to the absorption of these storybooks. They’re all the same, in a fashion: an impossibly beautiful girl, an evil queen’s jealousy, a valiant young knight, and true love’s kiss. Some of the impossibly beautiful girls are lucky enough to have a fairy godmother to help make all their wishes come true. How nice, I note wryly, when I don’t even have a regular mother.

But as soon as the thought crosses my mind, I feel a pang of guilt. I’ve always had people taking care of me, from the farmers who raised me to their kind neighbors who helped look after me. The entire village took me in as their own, when I was nothing but an orphaned infant who could give them nothing in return.

Even now, out here in the capital by myself, I have Dinah by my side. A family friend from before I was around to remember, she’s the one who brought me out here, secured a job for me at the palace, and helps me feel at home no matter how hopelessly outclassed I know I still am. Is that anything short of a miracle? She may not be able to turn my maid’s uniform into a ballgown, but she’s real and she loves me. Surely that means much more.

I should write a letter home, to my adopted parents. But how will I manage that? I miss you, I love you, please don’t write back inquiring how I am because it will confuse everyone at the castle who thinks I’ve run away.

I sigh and look at the clock, which has barely moved. Another book, then, though the stories aren’t long. I’ll have finished all the books that I can read in here before midnight strikes. Even the thicker volume I grab next turns out to be a disappointment, since most of its pages are merely illustrations. The first is a story I’m unfamiliar with, about a prince who turns into a...wait.

People are always into monsters or frogs or rocking chairs in fairy tales, aren’t they? There are poisoned apples and prophecies and cursed forests. What if I can find a story like mine? I had thought before that these kinds of things only happened to princesses in fairy tales, but, well, here I am, a maid who’s sometimes a cat. I’m a woman in a castle—perhaps the curse got confused.

The pictures make it easier to flip through the book, looking for instances of transformation. But many seem to depict punishment, a vain princess obsessed with her looks or a cruel prince who takes love for granted. I’m not beautiful enough to be vain, and I’d like to believe I'm not cruel at all. I haven’t eaten any suspicious fruit or visited any cabins in the woods. Was it the whiskey after all? What if someone was trying to turn the King into a cat so they could catnap and assassinate him? What if they accidentally catnap and assassinate me instead? I’m meant to consider it an honor to sacrifice my life for King and country, I know, but that doesn’t mean I have to look forward to it.

This isn’t helping. It doesn’t matter how it happened, only how to make it stop. But aside from true love’s kiss, there seems to be no mention of a cure in any of these stories. Doesn’t the King have anything useful in this great big library of his? I recall him once excitedly discussing a new acquisition, which he swore was retrieved in a raid on a purported witches’ coven. Potions and spells and things. At the time, I didn’t think they were any more real than these storybooks. But as long as magic and curses and cat maids are real after all, who’s to say one of those potions or spells wouldn’t work for me?

I stand up, newly energized, scanning the stacks for anything that looks witchy, mystical, or has Spells and Solutions on the spine. But suddenly I feel dizzy. I grope for the shelves but they fall away from me, or perhaps I am falling from them, or perhaps the room itself is spinning as midnight strikes and I—

I turn back into a cat.

Great. Now what?