When I arrived home with Riel by my side, I had braced myself for a dramatic scene.
I had imagined several versions of Sain's reaction during our walk back—some tragic, some comedic. In one, she'd gasp so loudly the neighbors would peek through the window. In another, she'd drop a teacup in slow motion and dramatically declare I was too soft-hearted for this cruel world. My favorite version involved her flopping onto the floor like a betrayed wife from a countryside melodrama, wailing, "Not another stray!"
But Sain, as always, rewrote the script entirely.
She took one look at us and smiled like she was welcoming a daughter and her long-lost spouse home from war. Then she pulled us both into a hug that smelled faintly of lemongrass and woodsmoke.
"Finally," she said with mock exasperation. "I won't be the only one cleaning up your mess anymore."
I blinked, stunned. Riel blinked too. Her body was stiff, like she wasn't used to being pulled into warmth.
Sain's easy acceptance undid something inside me. Maybe because she always went beyond what I hoped for. And that—somehow—always made me feel safe.
And Riel? The fact that she had chosen to follow me home at all felt nothing short of miraculous. For someone who had never been allowed to choose anything freely, stepping out of the Mollota residence felt like defying gravity.
But she did it. I saw it in her eyes—uncertainty, yes, but laced with something fragile and new. Hope.
Sain wasted no time.
"We should dye her hair," she announced as she stirred soup with one hand and tapped her chin with a spoon. "Silver locks like that? Someone's bound to sniff trouble. Too noble. Too shiny. Too much."
Riel gave her a bewildered look, unsure whether to be insulted or complimented.
"It's… a compliment," I said, nudging her lightly. "Kind of."
And the next day, Sain easily helped Riel dye her hair. It turned a shiny brown in the sunlight. She still looked sweet and lovely with her new hair color.
Sain never pried into Riel's past. Not because she didn't care—but because she respected silence. She had this uncanny instinct for knowing when someone wasn't ready. She let Riel arrive on her own terms. And I loved her for that.
Within a month, we fell into a rhythm.
A home.
Riel was startlingly efficient at chores—almost too efficient. She and Sain became an unstoppable duo in the kitchen, moving like they'd rehearsed their choreography. Meanwhile, I stuck to my comfort zone: cleaning, organizing, tidying the ever-growing stack of books we borrowed from the library.
Riel adapted fast. Too fast. It made me wonder how long she had lived in survival mode—doing everything by herself, waiting for the next command or consequence. She even got a part-time job in the orchard alongside Sain. Her hands, once delicate, grew tougher by the day, but her smiles? They came easier too.
As for me… I somehow ended up juggling three jobs. The orchard needed someone to keep track of harvest ledgers, and that turned into a full-fledged admin position. Mr. Gerick Wright, the orchard supervisor, took every opportunity to brag about me to his two brothers—Samuel, who managed the Library, and Brown, who ran the Information Guild.
Apparently, I had become some kind of Wright family legend.
Next thing I knew, Samuel offered me part-time hours at the Library, and Brown swept me into the Guild soon after. Now I was juggling scrolls, records, and late-night tea like a circus performer with decent posture and a mild caffeine addiction.
In our spare time, I started teaching Sain and Riel how to read and write.
Sain had a particular flair for numbers, which didn't surprise me—she had a spreadsheet soul. "Knowledge is power," she'd declare while calculating our monthly expenses, "but financial literacy? That's freedom."
She also took her role as our "safety officer" very seriously. "No flaunting new words in the market," she warned us one morning. "Don't go shouting vocabulary like it's a magic spell. People notice. People talk."
On weekends, Riel joined to our a tradition.
Library days.
Sain would drift toward the romance shelves like a bashful teenager, cheeks pink as cherry petals. Riel gravitated to the herbal medicine archives, eyes gleaming as she absorbed information like roots drinking sunlight. I stayed near the staff room, working—watching them from behind a door left slightly ajar.
We dressed up on library days. No one said it aloud, but it became a ritual. A silent affirmation that we were allowed elegance, too. Dignity. Joy.
Even Sain wore perfume—though she claimed she was "just testing whether bourgeois nonsense still gave her allergies."
Despite how naturally Riel settled into our life, she remained guarded.
Sometimes, something would slip—a name, a memory—but the moment she realized, she'd withdraw behind a polite smile or abruptly change the subject. I never pushed. I just listened.
Sain never pushed either. She teased Riel constantly—called her the ghost chef for how quietly she moved, scolded her for chopping vegetables too symmetrically—but when it came to pain, Sain knew how to sit beside someone without demanding their wounds as proof.
I remember while in carriage on our way back from a neighboring village last month, Riel keep asking me.
"Is it… true?" she asked. "That you used to work at the Mollota Residence?"
I nodded. "Yes."
Her brows pinched together. "I… I feel bad. Accepting your offer. When I didn't even remember you."
I looked her in the eye.
"Riel, you don't have to apologize for not remembering someone like me. I was just a background blur in that house. A kitchen maid. Maybe you passed by me once or twice. It doesn't matter."
"But I was…" Her voice thinned to a whisper. "Nobody there. Just a burden. The illegitimate child no one wanted."
"No," I said, more sharply than I intended. "Don't say that to yourself."
Before she could recoil, I sit closer and wrapped my arms around her.
"You're not a nobody. And if they couldn't see your worth, that's on them—not you. Look at us. We're not there anymore. We get to choose our own stories."
She didn't respond right away. But her shoulders relaxed. Just a little.
"And anyway," I added with a grin, "I've got amnesia, remember? Clean slate. Let's be friends—not mistress and maid, but as a friends, best friends. Less drama, more cake."
Riel gave the smallest laugh—so soft I might've missed it.
But I didn't. And I held onto it like it was something precious.
Later that night, I reread some of the entries in Anna's—my—diary. The scribbled words told me what Riel never would: the cold hallways of the Mollota Residence, the cruel arguments between Lord Mollota and his calculating wife, the invisible bruises left by silence and neglect. She'd lost her mother and inherited a battlefield.
And yet… she had grown. Not into a sharp edge, but into something tempered. Quiet. Observant. Unyielding.
She was the heart of the story I once criticized from a screen. Now, she was the reason I stayed.
She didn't know it yet, but she was the reason I hadn't tried—again— to go back to my own world.
In her, I saw something I couldn't quite name—a pull, a possibility. Maybe it was fate. Or maybe it was what happens when two people who've survived different storms end up under the same roof, watching the rain pass together.