Alice found herself in the ducal house of Nikodemus and couldn’t hide the joy in her step as she opened the door to the parlor. She had been promoted from being a normal maid to a personal maid!

No more cleaning rickety old furniture, no more climbing shaky ladders, and best of all, no more doing laundry! Oh, the joys of life, she rubbed her chapped hands together praying to the Goddess. Thank you!

Who would she be serving? The Duchess? Nay, she was in a coma. What about that pretty lady that moved in recently? Yes, that was more of her type. Alice shuddered at the thought of the old duchess. The Goddess must be watching over this household for her to survive such a nasty fall.

Knock, knock. A pretty bird-like voice answered for her to come in. This was it, she would befriend this noble lady and escape this monotonous life.

Her friend in a neighboring noble house would always brag on and on about her jewelry and dresses and desserts and— just thinking about it made her fume. Oh, to be poor.

Sitting on a chair, kicking her short legs all the while, was a pretty blond person. Her expensive looking dress fluttered for a moment before stopping still. The aura of a noble could be seen as not a single emotion could be read from her still face. But it was a child. This wasn’t lady Victoria, not at all, it was her kid. There must have been a mistake.

One by one, Alice felt her bubbles of dreams pop in order. Shopping trips where she would get free clothes? Pop. Tea parties where beautiful ladies gathered and gossiped? Pop. Balls and banquets where handsome rich men would all gather and perhaps ask for her hand in marriage? Pop.

Promotion? She didn’t slave away all this time to finally end up acting like some child’s babysitter. A weird one too, mind you.

The child had been an interesting sight at first as there were none in this place. Sneaking glances whenever she had the chance, Alice observed her.

She walked around without reason, turning this way before turning that way, crumpling the carpet in the process. And she would stare at everything that was in front of her, be it trees, bushes, plain walls, you name it. She even stared at that horrid painting in front of the Duke’s office.

Alice would always try to avoid that hallway, and even more so at night. She had a nightmare once and woke up with a start when that grotesque hunched over figure invaded her dreams. Yet there the child was, gawking at it as if she enjoyed it. Although who knew what that little thing thought, standing still like a statue.

Another thing that irked Alice was the amount of sweets that little girl ate, in fact, she even munched on some candy while appreciating the painting.

She felt her stomach turn in jealously. It was an unwritten rule to not finish one’s plate as the leftovers would be shared among the staff. But each time, without fail, she would send all the plates of desserts empty, polishing every single one.

Alice hadn’t eaten a single piece of cake ever since that child started living here. Yes, that child that sat there quiet as a mouse. Alice’s pupils trembled when she remembered another memory.

On the morning that sir Alden announced that important guests would be coming, she had taken a lot of time, like an extra hour or two, to prepare the rooms, making sure everything was spotless and straight. She even asked the chatty gardener for some pretty flowers to decorate the rooms with.

“Please remove them,” the child said immediately.

Agh! She wanted to tear her own hair after hearing that. She didn’t even comment on them, hell, she didn’t even change her face. The same face that had been plastered on her as if it was a mask for the past few days.

Now in the parlor her purple eyes were staring at something again. At what? Alice was about to turn her head when she suddenly moved.

“Good morning, my name is Esther and I am fourteen.”

What’s with that greeting? She already knew her name and age, all the staff knew.

As expected from her outer appearance, her voice carried an angelic air about it. A high pitch, yet not that high to be grating on the ears. However it sounded bored, or dead for that matter. Alice had to suppress the groan that tried to escape while observing the girl.

“Greetings my lady, my name is Alice and I will be your personal maid from this day forward. Please speak comfortably to me.” She clicked her imaginary tongue.

“I see.”

“...”

That was it?

‘I see’, it was impressive, really. Hadn’t this girl actually been living as some common commoner until just recently? Even Alice wanted to have a personal maid of her own that would do all of her tedious tasks, so why was she so disinterested?

Imagine to wake up with someone preparing a basin of water to wash your face, to have someone help with putting on the dresses and corsets, and to have someone to mold into the perfect helper. The child was still staring, at Alice’s face this time.

Then she opened her mouth. “Alice, do you know what a shopping center is?”

“A shopping center? Do you mean the center of the shopping district?”

“Never mind, forget what I just said.” Not a single other word was uttered before she was dismissed.

Standing outside the closed parlor door, she let out the sigh that had grown into a full exhale. Oh, Goddess. Is this the punishment for my sins? Wasn’t praying to you for seven straight days enough? Doing laundry would be less tiring than being in the same room as her. Alice cheered up by thinking about the salary increase. Yes the money should be enough.

She spotted two of her colleagues busily cleaning the hallway.

“Hey, why do you think that pair is getting such good treatment? I understand that the woman is pretty and that the man is handsome with that chiseled face… But aren’t they just some commoners?”

The other maid puffed out her arms. “Are you silly? That’s the duke’s youngest son you are talking about!”

“Gasp! What? The Duke’s youngest? But he looks older than me. A hidden child?”

“What thing are you insinuating of the Duchess? You must be one of the newer ones.” The maid leaned forward and whispered. “From what I’ve heard, they got banished or something from the Duchy a couple years back.”

She whispered back. “What did he do?”

“Not him, that woman he has with him. What do you think?”

“Gosh, you can't mean?”

The other maid puffed out her chest and pointed at the new girl. “You are not fit to be with my son. Get out!” She mimicked the tone of the Duke, her employer.

She giggled. “That can’t be, that sounds just like the books!”

“You didn’t hear it from me.”

Alice’s steps made a sound as she walked towards them.

“Oh, Alice.” The two of them turned to her with inquisitive eyes. “How was the young lady?”

“Could you tell me more about that story? It was interesting,” said Alice.

Huh. So the only noble among them was the handsome man? So she had been tricked either way, whether it was the mother or daughter she was serving? It did sound too unbelievable when she, of all the maids working in the estate, had been promoted.

Making sure the two maids couldn’t see her, she clenched her teeth and cursed at sir Alden. Ugly. Someone seeing her face right now would think that.

***

The warm water enveloping my body felt nice. Was this how potatoes felt when they were being cooked? Bubble bubble, simmer simmer. Imagining the steaming potatoes somehow made me feel even sleepier.

It had honestly been a long week. I got some new pretty clothes, met some of my father's old friends, held a sword for the first time, and even got my own personal maid.

“My lady, you shouldn’t fall asleep in the tub.”

“Ah, sorry…”

“You don’t need to apologize to someone like me.”

Having her help me bathe didn’t bother me as much as I thought. I must have been accustomed with the amount of times mom would help me.

Alice was a real professional about it too, didn’t even comment once about my disfigured hand. A big round of applause to her.

Still, her face was familiar, but at the same time not. Searching through my memories yielded nothing, but each time I peered into her eyes, my heart felt nostalgic. Maybe even bitter. This had only happened once before, it was when I saw Karrie for the first time in this life.

The first time it happened, I attributed it to pure coincidence. Karrie must have been a special case, one in a million perhaps. Some people just have similar faces. But now that it happened twice?

Another person from my previous life had potentially found themselves involved in my life again with no rhyme nor reason. I would understand if this maid was someone I had killed.

‘Look, these are the ones that lost their life because of you,’ would be the subtle message from the Goddess. But alas, I did not kill this woman. I never forget their faces.

Thinking about it, who would I like to see again? An imaginary catalogue of people I knew popped into my head. Maybe her? Flip. Him? Flip. Ah, I reached the end already. Had I known people would pop up randomly, I would have strived to meet more people— blub, blub.

“Ah, my lady!”

A day later, I was set to meet with my grandmother for the first time. The duchess’ room was even larger than my own. Like twice the size.

Her sleeping figure looked peaceful laying there surrounded by her family. I blinked a few times as some imaginary flower crests invaded my vision.

Old, wrinkly. Those descriptors didn’t suit my grandmother at all. She still looked youthful even with gray strands in her otherwise black hair. Her hair was flowing freely right now, straight but with some bends across her neckline. Likely from having her hair done up for a great deal of her life.

She wore a pendant of the Goddess’ symbol, a ship’s wheel. This one was different from the usual wooden ones, made from silver and dotted with tiny blue sapphires.

My father looked more like her than the duke, as they both had long eyelashes that sent soft shadows across her closed eyelids.

“When will she be able to wake up?” My father asked the attending physician.

“We truly do not know, my lord.”

“I’m not a lord.” He crossed his arms. “What about the priests? Don’t tell me it won’t work this time either.”

“That’s why I have been called here isn’t it?”

“Hah, I wonder what those priests can even do.”

Mom rebuked him. “Gale, you know their magic isn’t all powerful.”

“I expect it to have a little effect, not totally useless.”

“Who knows what the Goddess thinks.” The physician agreed with my father. “A sinner can get their arm reattached but a noble person like the Duchess has no other cure besides to wait. But what to do, time is not something we have much of. The Goddess keeps testing our faith all the same.”

He took her pulse and jotted something down in his journal. No one answered him as we left the room, leaving my grandmother in the company of the physician sitting on the edge of blasphemy.

“How are you finding the estate?” My father asked me.

“It’s fun, Alice helps me with a bunch of things.”

“She does look like a lovely girl,” said mom.

I thought the same. Yet, something minor happened this morning making me unable to voice my agreement. It was a subtle thing really, like a white stain on a white shirt you wouldn’t notice until someone pointed out where it was. What did she do? She didn’t look me in the eyes. It ticked me off somehow.

And on the next day, she stopped looking at my face altogether, stealing glances at my hand instead. When I asked her a question, she would subtly avert her eyes to my right. When she fixed my hair, her reflection in the mirror would be directed at my face for a second before returning back to her bowed position.

On the sixth day she was assigned to me, I found her sneaking into my room. Walking backwards in through the door, she didn’t notice that I was already in here and sitting in the corner.

I found her behavior amusing and wanted to see what she would do. She picked her nose. With her long, bony and thin finger, she dug into her nose with an eagerness I hadn’t seen her use while working.

Always a beat slow to move when I asked her to do something. Always a beat slow to give me an answer. Always a beat slow to hide her own expression.

Having had enough of digging in her own nose, she found a suitable spot to hide her treasure. She wiped it under my table and then went out of the room, humming to herself. I closed the book I was reading and went after her.

I found her admiring some flowers by the stairwell.

“My lady, is something the matter?” She smiled brightly.

“Say, Alice, what do you think of me?”

She bowed her head. “I’m afraid I don’t understand the question?”

“Do you dislike me.”

She lifted her head before pulling it down again. “Of, course I don’t, you’re the one I serve.”

I didn’t even need the glowing golden circle to see that she was lying through her teeth.