Help your Sisters

I sat down on the ground at the foot of my bed. Helina stood nearby as I placed my hands on my knees. This wasn’t something that we did very often at the charmed castle. It was a practice almost all but lost by the time Rosemary arrived. But for me, for the first, it was ingrained into who I was.

“What are you doing?” Helina asked.

I opened one eye to look at her. I didn’t like my focus being broken, but I suppose this wasn’t bad. “You understand, I was mind controlled, a lot of patterns of mine are put into me against me will. I was basically rapped over a thousand times, if not ten thousand or more. Does that scare you?”

She shook her head. “I see a few possibilities. Either you are stronger than anyone ever, my understanding of hte trauma of **** is incorrect, or what you expierenced isn’t what I picture with ****.”

I like her. My new little attendant.

I turned my head. Master? No one was there though. I pressed my hand to my chest. Yes. I quite like her too.

“Lady Celeste? Are you okay?” she asked.

I took a deep breath and looked at her. “I was a bit… rude last night, yet you yielded to me. Explain your position. Tell me about yourself as well. Help me understand who you are.”

She nodded. I closed my eyes as she began to speak.

“I was born to a rich merchant, we actually met just onces. It was before the event. You were like an angel. It may sound silly but I wanted to work for you. And when I made it to the estate a few years ago. I came to learn the story of your ****. I was… well you can imagine.”

Could I? In my case, he was my life for so long. Yet she had barely seen me more than once. Was I lucky or was she? It is better to have a heart to be crushed then to know only the void? That is what the scholars say don’t they?

“But last month when word was announced you were still alive. My excitement was rather high, as you can imagine. They didn’t tell us the entire story, but we were warned that you had been hurt. And yet, to think the angel I remembered had returned exactly as I remembered her. You may have spoke a little different, but that mattered not.”

I grabbed her hand and held it to my face. “It was a gift, by one of my sisters. To help restore my beauty for Master. And yet, now I have no Master to be beautiful for.” I could feel a tear streaming down to her hand.

“He ment that much to you? Genuinely?” she asked.

I let out a scoff. “What does genuinely mean? Am I a beaten dog? Is this how beaten dogs feel? I miss him. I miss him greatly. I wonder what he would want me to do. How can I honor his memory?”

She touched her chin. “I love you Lady Celeste. And I think, I want you to be happy. So, if this guy loved you. Then, he would want you happy, right? Well, what does that mean?”

I asked Helina to take a position on the floor like me, knees spread, our palms up. “When you feel you have a good idea, turn your hand down and if my palms are down, then we can talk again.”

Master. I knew you so long. I know it wasn’t too often you tried to teach us. The things you did teach us were rather simple. Help our sisters. Be amazing. Be sexy. Focus on our strengths, but for the collective. Be yours. You were more important than us. We…. did matter though. The latest tme I think of is Sister Victoria. She let her glasses nearly break.

RIght, Sister Rosemary and Sister Victoria mentioned that. How she made her new glasses and he reminded her to take care of them and to talk to him. Because we belong to him. And if he comes back, we should be ready to receive him. To retain our value. To allow our value to diminish. Never.

Hmm, how though. Helina made a good point. Obviously I loved Master and my sisters. Katherine, Lydia, and Samantha, yes I suppose even them. Not that any of them were happy. Not with Mother’s strings around them. Oh. A smile crept over my face.

Would you like that Master? For me to set things right for you, for this home? My sisters were the one thing I knew I loved before and I still loved now. Protecting them, that could be a good thing to do. Making sure they are happy. What else should a little maid do, then to clean up messes that are stinking up my air. Yes, I thought. Stinking up his air, intolerable!. I turned my hands over and opened my eyes.

Her eyes were already open, with her palms facing downward. She blushed looking at me.

“What are you thinking?” I asked.

“Just that, I don’t want last night to be the only time,” she said.

I smiled as I moved my hand to her cheek. “It is different for you, you are not charmed. That means different rules. Are you okay with that?” I asked.

“I am okay with anything you demand,” she said as she reached for my hand.

“No, I don’t know how things will go. But not me, I am not Master, and I cannot be his replacement. You will give your loyalty to him.”

“But isn’t he dead?” she asked.

“So you won’t?” I asked.

She moved her hands to gesture for me to slow down. “I don’t know what it means. I can’t agree to something that confuses me.”

I sighed. “I don’t know either. But I shall walk with Master, if alone, or together. We will decide what that means, but will you stay with me regardless of what I find?”

She nodded softly. “I am not as strong as you. I may need you to help me, but I vow to try, with all my heart, Lady Celeste.”

“No,” I said. That was just the wrong way to say it.

She looked nervous. “Sister Celeste. We are both under Master of course. Or perhaps headmaid. You can only call me these in private, but we are in private now, are we not?”

She nodded. “I vow it, Lady Celeste.”