The thing about our academy is that nobles can bring their own maids.
Polished boots. Bloodlines thicker than soup. Rings on their pinkies and egos puffed up like soufflés.
It wasn't great for the commoners. Not for kids who cleaned their own laundry and ate bread that bent in half. But it was perfect for the high-and-mighty types, the ones with carriages, with fathers in courtrooms, and cousins on coin stamps.
Perfect for people like me.
I didn't bring Anne. Couldn't.
I couldn't bring her with me for the suspicion of her being Count'spy.
Also I blackmailed her and ofcourse Count pays her salary, not me.
I told Amelia the plan the morning before we left the camp.
I handed her some plain clothes I had . Pressed linen apron. Plain sleeves. No lace. No frills.
She squinted at it.
"No," she said, voice flat. "Not possible. Not in a million years."
"I get it, it's hard, but—"
"Do you get it?" Her voice snapped. Loud enough to echo in the tent walls. "Have you spent centuries in a cave? Have you been hunted like an animal? Singled out? Mocked for being wrong?"
I swallowed.
"No," I said. "No. Yes. Yes. Yes."
She flinched. Like she hadn't meant to go that far. Guilt flashed across her face, then she looked away and stared at the floor.
I sighed. Tried to soften. Failed.
"If you have a better plan, tell me now. Otherwise, it's this. Or it's the church. Choice is yours."
She went quiet. Lips sealed so tight they lost color. I left the uniform on the chair and walked out of the tent.
I lied to the professor.
Said she helped me on the expedition.
Saved my life, even ; on the rough terrains. Loyal. Kind. A bit strange, sure, but brilliant.
He bought it.
I had that kind of face. The noble one.
People didn't ask much when you said things with certainty and perfect posture.
Everyone left for the carriage. Each had a carriage of their own. A carriage had enough space for four people.
I waited in the carriage.
Waited until the footman tapped twice, until the driver cleared his throat, until the horses began to shift impatiently.
She wasn't coming.
I'd lost her.
Then—
A blur of shadow. Bare feet. Tangled hair.
She ran.
Scrambled over a hedge like a thief and slammed the door shut behind her with a puff of breathless air.
I didn't scold her. I was too busy breathing again.
Inside the academy gates, students spilled like birds.
Swishing skirts. Shining boots.
Books held to their chests like armor.
I was already here. Already used to the bells and the halls and the velvet-laced routine.
But she—
Amelia shrank beside me.
She'd stolen a plain bonnet from someone's basket and tugged it too low on her head if she could.
But her eyes—
Those hadn't dulled.
They darted everywhere. Windows. Trees. Stone lions. The fountain shaped like an angel, frozen mid-fall.
She flinched at bells. Froze at a horse's whinny. Laughed at the echo when she clapped inside the gatehouse tunnel.
A child.
A stray one.
But she never showed it to me. Not directly.
I had a suite. My own washroom. Writing desk. Wardrobe with lavender sachets tucked between gowns.
And one couch.
i informed a staff on her being my maid. He carried the info to resignated people.
Maid quarters would take time. A day, they said. Maybe two.
So for now—
She stood at the threshold of my chambers.Bare feet on the marble floor.
She didn't step in.
"Is this… yours?" she asked.
"Yes."
"And… I stay here?"
"For tonight."
She hesitated.
Then stepped in like the floor might bite her.
She sniffed the couch.
"You sure this isn't made of cotton?"
"It's made of velvet."
"Vel-wut?"
"Just sleep."
She crawled onto the bed without asking.
Rolled face-first into the blankets. Kicked the sheets like a child.
Just made herself a nest out of pillows and sighed like a queen returned to her throne.
I watched her for a moment.
She didn't even look at me.
So I took the couch. Quietly.
She didn't say thank you.
Of course she didn't.
In her last life, they probably built temples when she sneezed.
Why would she thank someone for giving her what she already thinks she deserves?
The next few days—
She explored the campus more than I had in all my years here.
Quiet as a leaf. Vanishing into shadows.
Once I found her halfway up the bell tower.
Another time, she was crouched by the koi pond, poking the water with a stick like it might bite.
I told her not to touch the koi.
She touched them anyway.
The maid quarters still weren't ready.
So I stayed on the couch.
She stayed in my bed.
By the third night, she had claimed all the blankets and snored with her mouth open.
It was Caelum who spotted her first.
We were sitting on the sun-warmed steps behind the east dorms.
Amelia hovered in the distance, half-hidden behind a marble column. Watching.
Caelum cupped his hands like a trumpet.
"That your ghost, Isha?"
"She's not a ghost," I muttered. "She's… complicated."
He stood, dusted off his coat.
"Bring her over, then. Let us meet your mystery."
I sighed. "She's not a puppy."
Sera raised one brow. "If she bites, I like her already."
Dian didn't say anything. He was sketching her from across the courtyard.
Of course he was.
I called her. She didn't budge.
"Come," I said again. "They don't bite."
"Why should I listen to you." she said, eyes fixed on Sera's boots. "That one looks like she eats hearts."
"She does," I said. "But only the mean ones."
Eventually, she came.
Shoulders set like stone. Eyes wary, but alert.
Caelum bowed with a flourish.
"Caelum Novar. Collector of paper birds, scholar of average standing, and proud speaker to ghosts."
Amelia blinked.
Sera offered a nod.
"Sera Vexlin. Swords, spoons, and sarcasm. You?"
Amelia glanced at me.
I said nothing.
Dian looked up. "She has sharp eyes," he murmured, then went back to sketching.
They didn't press.
Just made space for her on the steps.
She didn't sit.
She stood. Watched. Silent.
Then turned and walked away.
That night—
She perched on my windowsill like a cat. Feet bare, hair damp from washing.
"They're strange," she said softly.
"They're human."
"Are they… yours?"
I turned a page in my book. "They're mine in the way anyone is. Which is to say—not really. But I know how they break. That's enough."
She said nothing.
Just hugged her knees to her chest.
In the quiet, I told her more.
How Caelum sold poems under three different names.
How Sera lost her family's estate in a fire and never once cried.
How Dian didn't speak for a whole year, until he dreamed of a star falling into his hands.
She didn't respond.
But she listened.
She always listened.
Still as a frozen lake, just before it cracks.
By the fifth day, she started disappearing on her own.
She found the old castle wing—unused, filled with dust and moonlight.
She didn't tell me.
But I followed once.
She moved through the hall like it belonged to her.
Touched the stained glass with reverence.
Stepped over dead moths like they were sacred.
She paused before the faded paintings of dead kings.
She didn't bow. She just stared. Long. Hard.
Until they flinched in their frames.
High ceilings. Air that smelled like stone and silver.
The stars painted above still shimmered after all this time.
She tilted her head up.
And breathed.
She stayed there until the moon rose.
I didn't ask what she was thinking.
And she didn't tell me.