A Lady of the morning

Being the Lady of the Night had its perks, but it also had its drawbacks.

Victoria woke up, but kept her eyes closed. She reached out, expecting to find a body to hug, but found only an empty spot on the bed. She opened her eyes. Rosemary was already gone, having left nothing but tangled bedsheets and her warmth behind.

Victoria rose up and noticed a couple of the girls were already missing from the communal bed. She had to admit, being Lady of the Night definitely had its upsides, but going to bed late and extremely tired could only lead to one outcome: waking up later than one’s normal schedule. Which, as much as she had loved her previous night with Master, the Lady had to admit was a tad vexing.

She quickly got out of bed, fetched her uniform from her designated hanger, her glasses from her designated drawer, and began quickly getting ready for her day. Once she was appropriately dressed, Victoria bolted out the door and in the direction of her quarters, the library.

It was only when she was halfway there that her stomach grumbled, reminding her that she was, in fact, starving. So, taking that into consideration, she took a quick detour into the dining hall.

Arriving at such an immense room with almost no one in it was a completely different experience. The warm morning rays of sunlight descended into mostly empty chairs, and the grand architecture amplified the sound of the single person eating, turning it into a noticeable echo.

“Good morning, Lady.” Freya got up from her chair and made a curtsy. Victoria did the same. “Is there anything I can do to assist you today?”

“Good morning. And no, not really, I’m actually in a hurry to get to my…” the raven haired Lady of the Night did a facepalm. “I didn’t wake up anyone! I completely forgot to wake up the rest of the girls as I left the room! Could you please go wake them up after you finish eating?”

“Of course, my Lady,” the blonde beastmaster responded. She sat back down and began eating her fruit salad with noticeable speed.

Victoria considered telling her to eat slower, but she knew that once Freya got an idea into her head, it was pretty hard to dissuade her of it. And waking up before or alongside the Lady of the Night was a big part of the culture of this castle, so she knew her sister wouldn’t want her fellow servants to be dishonored in this way even longer.

Recognising a losing battle and deciding not to fight it, Victoria curtsied her friend goodbye and resumed her dash to order her food. She didn’t really care what she got, so she just scribbled “toast, eggs, and some tea”, alongside a request to deliver it to the library. And with that, she was off!

Arriving in the library was always one of her favorite parts of the day. The smell of old and new books alike, the gentle crackling of the fireplace, the soft velvet carpet beneath her feet, and the majestic oak bookshelves all greeted their owner. This was her domain.

Her library was actually one of the biggest individual rooms in the castle, which was no small feat in a place where the master of the house pampered and doted on every one of his servants’ quarters. Victoria accomplished this by actually combining two rooms into one, smashing a wall to create two separate environments for her precious library. The first one was where she kept most of the books, the thick oak shelves covering every inch of the walls, except for the doors and windows. It also contained her desk and whatever projects she was working on at the moment. The second room she turned into a reading room, with a crackling fireplace, darker wallpaper, and windows with a beautiful view to the courtyard and Iris’s garden, it provided the perfect environment to sit on one of the comfortable chairs and lose oneself on an afternoon of reading. This reading room didn’t have many bookshelves, but it did have a couple of small desks beside each of the chairs so Victoria, or whoever was here, could set down a pile of books to read for the day.

After saying a silent “good morning” to her favorite room in the castle, the Lady of the Night was quick at work. Victoria could admit, the quantity of books was lacking, she tried her best to sparse them out and mitigate the empty space on the shelves. Nevertheless, like any good librarian, she knew exactly where each and every book of her choosing would be located.

Unfortunately, there weren’t that many for her desired subject of the day. Books about magic weren’t the easiest to come by, and they certainly weren’t cheap. However, books about the history of magic were a lot easier to procure. On her quick search, she managed to find half a dozen tomes about the history and use of divination magic throughout the ages. Victoria, of course, intended to find as much information about the new girl as possible, but, given the fact that the books on her modest library wouldn’t have anything on the life story of this unknown wizard, the librarian settled for finding information about the newcomer’s biggest source of power: her divination.

The Lady of the Night didn’t trust Rosemary, she also sensed the girl carried a secret. Of course, secrets were nothing new in this castle. All of the girls had lived previous lives that they abandoned to follow their new true purpose of serving their Master. Victoria knew for a fact that some of them had secrets they were more than glad to leave behind, and she felt pretty safe in betting that all of the others did too, she just hadn’t learned of their secrets.

No, she didn’t care about Rosemary’s secret per se. Victoria was scared said secret was that she planned to escape! Or even worse, harm her Master in some form, either physically, in vengeance for keeping her charmed (unlikely, though not impossible), or metaphorically, by revealing his actions to the outside world, or even taking some of the girls with her. Victoria simply could not allow that. And so, the archivist and librarian of the castle, the Lady of the Night, eagerly began her work.