The next few days were incredibly frustrating for Alice. She was surprised to find, though, that this frustration was primarily with her injury and not the princess.

She was almost entirely immobilized, the princess insisting she stay as still as possible while she healed. Mornings and evenings, the princess would check her injury and use her magic to assist in the healing, but it was slow going.  And so, Alice found herself laid up most of the time, either in the bed – which the princess insisted on returning to her – or in the armchair. When it was time to work on the garden, the princess would help her outside and set her up sitting against a wall on a blanket. Because Alice needed to stay still and let her back recover, the princess had to take over all the chores. And to Alice’s shock, she did excellently. Alice found she needed to remind herself that this was actually what was supposed to happen: The princess was meant to find comfort and healing in living with the cottage, and this strength was what would allow her to go forth to defeat the witch later.

The princess also proved to be as confident and effective a caregiver as she was an emergency healer. She did not exactly fuss over Alice, but Alice found that there was always a mug with tea or water available to her. Whenever Alice moved to get up to do a task, she was blocked by the princess and laid back down before the royal went off to do the task herself. This even extended to the garden. The princess also proved to be quite patient with Alice directing her, learning quickly. She seemed to suddenly have gained competence overnight; where before she had been a distracted disaster of a gardener, now she was an efficient worker. Alice would call out reminders and instructions, but after the third day, just as Alice was starting to recover, the princess barely needed much guidance at all, only really needing to be given a quick list of tasks before going out to do them.

At first, sitting outside unable to help or work herself was infuriating. But as Alice grew to trust the princess more with her precious sanctuary, she found she could let herself be distracted and instead focus on her connection with the plants around her. The experience was peaceful, and the results were exciting. She was more and more hopeful that she might have some sort of magic in this world. The plants never spoke to her, but they could communicate, sending Alice impressions and feelings. This helped Alice know what they needed, and it also seemed as though Alice could send feelings back, feelings of encouragement and peace that were meant to help them grow. It felt like friendship. Her back still ached, but she was incredibly happy as she sat among the plants.

“It’s all done. Is there anything else?” The princess had come back, crouching in front of Alice at the wall. Alice blinked.

“Yes, the crushed eggshells need to be spread through the roses and the tomatoes. That’s all.” The princess grinned. She seemed to really enjoy Alice’s helplessness and was bizarrely eager to do whatever tasks Alice assigned her.

“Sure thing.”

This time, instead of ‘talking’ to the blackberry bushes around her, Alice watched the princess. She was working diligently, face completely focused. Alice still noticed her looking melancholic occasionally, but the busier she was, the happier and more at peace she seemed to be.

“What are you smirking at?” the princess called over from across the carrot and potato patches. Alice immediately scowled. “I wasn’t!”

This earned her a laugh, and she found herself smiling in earnest at how it sounded before she remembered to wipe away the smile and look properly severe. She didn’t think she managed it from how the princess kept on laughing. It really was astonishing to Alice how easily she could talk to Aurum. In her old life, she had to worry constantly about offending others, and despite all her effort and worry she was somehow never enough for them. Here, she was whole, and it felt like being honest was enough.

Honest is the wrong word, Alice thought, stomach lurching. She doesn’t know I stole this house from her. Or that I’m from another world. She shook off the thought, her mind immediately blocking her from the train of thought that inevitably led to her deepest fear: that this wasn’t real. That she was in a coma, and would either wake up or die without warning, leaving this haven behind.

With effort, she focused back on instructing the princess, guiding her in how best to spread the eggshell fertilizer to encourage the tomatoes to grow well.

When they went back inside, the princess helping her to walk despite Alice insisting that she could make it on her own, she sat back down in the armchair and started reading a book on the basics of magic. The princess looked at her reading choice curiously but asked nothing, which seemed a bit out of character. While Alice read, the princess bustled around the kitchen to make a salad and some bread that had been rising since morning, heating water to boil a few eggs as well. They were almost out, Alice realized, thinking with dread that they would soon run out of all their luxuries and be left with no choice but to return to the village sooner or later, lest they eat nothing but porridge until winter. Not that the princess would be staying that long.

Shaking off a feeling that might have been regret or sadness, Alice glanced back up to see the princess staring blankly into an empty bowl. Suddenly, a cabinet door that had been left open slammed shut, startling her into knocking the bowl over. She yelled in shock. “Stupid house!”

The fire next to Alice flared angrily, and a faint wind blew through the kitchen, ruffling the princess’s hair.

“I know! I know, I know, I know. I’m sorry.” As she spoke, her voice grew quieter and quieter. “I’m sorry.” The princess knelt and started to pick up the pieces of clay from the shattered bowl, still murmuring an apology. The joy from earlier was gone, and her face looked completely empty.

She must be very lonely, Alice thought to herself, the realization hitting her all at once. And for some reason, the cottage wasn’t supporting her, as it had in the novel. Instead, it was fighting her. Alice had noticed them bicker occasionally before, but she had never seen the house spirit so angry.

“Are you alright?”

Up to this point, Alice had avoided asking anything about the princess’ past for fear of learning too much. Her role was to guide the princess along the path the story had laid out. She knew she wasn’t smart or brave enough to engineer a different ending to the story, or find a new way to a happy ending, so the safest option was to ensure things went according to the original plot. It was cliched of her to worry about this, she knew, having read plenty of transmigration stories in the past. But she didn’t have any major trump cards or big aspirations. All she wanted was the princess to go along her royal, heroic way, and to be allowed to stay in the cottage for as long as she was in this world. Becoming the princess’s confidant or companion was not in the plan. Viewing this world outside the lens of the novel was not in the plan. Neither was thinking of Princess Aurum as someone other than, as someone more than the main character of the novel.

And yet, at this moment, she knew the princess really, really needed someone to care if she was okay or not.

The princess – Aurum – was looking at her with wide eyes. Something flickered in her gaze, and she answered. “No. No, I’m not.”

Alice waited, realizing that she needed to give Aurum space to decide if she wanted to continue or not. After a long moment, the princess sighed.

“I don’t know if you really care. I mean, you were so kind and you let me stay here, and you never – you never asked. Maybe you don’t care where I came from because you are kind.” Aurum looked at Alice searchingly. “You really should have – you should ask more questions.”

Alice, at a loss, shrugged – and then she immediately winced as her back complained. Aurum laughed, a bit shakily, sounding like she was on the verge of tears.

 “You don’t know anything. About me, or what I’m… why I’m here. And, and you should.”

Taking a deep breath, she stopped talking and turned away. She finished picking up the pieces of the bowl, slow and methodical. Minutes passed, the tiny slivers scattered far across the ground, Aurum moving slowly as she carefully gathered them. Alice waited. If the princess – if Aurum wanted to speak more, she would. Interrupting her would not help. Eventually, she looked up, gaze and voice steady.

“We need to talk, Aliss. Let me make some tea.”