A voice came fast. A woman—her dress modest compared to the glittering guests—came running across the path, her face pale, eyes wide like she was about to deliver news of death.
"Lady!" she cried. "Where did you run off to?! I've been looking everywhere—!"
Then the woman froze, horror widening her eyes.
Mae followed the line of her stare down—at her own legs. Her knees were still showing, bare and scratched, the heavy dress bunched up in her fists.
"What are you doing?!" the woman gasped, rushing forward without asking permission and yanking the fabric down to cover her legs again.
Mae staggered back.
"What do you mean 'what am I doing'?! Get off me!" she snapped, jerking away. "Who the hell are you?!"
But the woman didn't answer. She just stood there like she'd been hit.
Mae's brow tightened. "Why are you acting like you know me?"
"Lady," the woman whispered, hurt flooding her voice. "I'm Mellisa. Your maid."
Mae blinked.
"What?" she said flatly.
"Have… have you forgotten me?" Mellisa's voice cracked as she reached forward again, more hesitant this time. "Are you—did something happen to you?"
"My maid?" Mae laughed bitterly, shaking her head. "Since when did I get that rich? Don't joke around. I don't know you. I've never seen you in my life. Go."
The maid's face crumpled.
"No, wait—Lady—!"
Her voice cut off with a shriek and before Mae could process it, Mellisa dropped like a lifeless doll onto the stone path.
Mae's eyes widened.
"Hey!" she shouted, keeping distance. Her fists clenched by her sides. "Hey, you—get up!"
No answer.
A tight knot formed in her throat. Her eyes flicked toward the palace again, toward the strange figures now gathering, murmuring, staring. She looked back down at the woman on the floor.
"…Is she dead?" she asked herself, breath turning cold.
Then a colder thought crept in.
Can someone die… in the afterlife?
She stepped forward, one foot at a time, slow, heavy, cautious. When she got close enough, she reached her bare foot out and nudged Mellisa's side—just once, just slightly.
The woman didn't move.
Not even a twitch.
Mae let out a slow, dragging sigh. Her breath shook a little at the end, like her lungs were trying to hold something back. She leaned down, this time calmer, and reached out her hand to gently pat the woman's shoulder.
"Wake up," she muttered, her hand tapping lightly. "Come on, you're not dead…"
After a few seconds, the woman finally stirred—her breath caught, her eyes fluttered open, blinking up at Mae's face. A single second passed—and then her whole face crumpled.
"Lady!!" she cried out, her voice cracking as she sat up too fast and grabbed Mae's hand with both of hers, clutching like she had just been pulled out of a nightmare. "You're okay! Thank God, you're okay! I just—I just had the worst dream that you forgot me! That you didn't even remember me, my lady!"
Her words fell in gasps, messy and fast, and tears rolled down her cheeks as she held on tighter.
Mae pulled her hand away quickly, her whole face creased in exhaustion and disbelief.
"Why do you keep calling me that?" she said, annoyed, not even trying to hide the bite in her voice. "I don't know you, okay? So just—" she flicked her hand at the woman like she was shooing off a bug—"just go away."
Her tone dropped flat after that, and her face hardened.
The woman—Mellisa—froze again. Her face just stayed in that same horrified expression, as if Mae's words had hit her harder than anything else could.
But she didn't stop.
She couldn't stop.
"Lady… You are my mistress," Mellisa whispered, like she was trying to remind Mae of something real. "You went missing from the ball just now. Everyone's been looking for you. I've been looking for you—I found you—" Her voice started to shake again, her hand reaching up as if to touch Mae's shoulder but stopping halfway. "And now you're speaking like I'm a stranger and—"
She stopped mid-sentence.
Her eyes dropped lower, landing on Mae's dress—the pale pink one with gold threads, the foreign one she hadn't stopped staring at since she woke up here.
"…You're wearing something else," Mellisa murmured, her voice faint and trembling. "That's not the dress you came in. That's not the one I helped you put on for the ball."
She looked up again, and the horror in her face wasn't fading—it was growing.
"What happened to you?" she asked. Her voice wasn't angry. It was afraid. Afraid for Mae.
"This has to be a joke…"
Mae's laugh came out dry, choked, broken. "A very elaborate one at that," she added, barely above a whisper, before smacking Melissa's hand away and shaking her head hard enough to hurt.
"It's a prank. A sick, twisted one," she hissed, her throat closing in, she repeated that sentence as if that could solve anything.
Her vision started to blur. Not from the light. From her own eyes. They were watering before she even knew it. Her fingers were trembling now, slow at first—then all at once. The cold climbed her spine like hands clawing up her bones. Her anxiety, the kind she thought she'd already burned out of herself, came crawling back like it had been waiting.
Melissa reached for her again, gently this time. "Lady, please calm down. Everything is going to be okay. We'll go home, alright? We'll call for the best doctors in the country. You just need rest, and soon you'll start remembering everything." She was trying to soothe, voice high and too soft. "For now, just stand up and come with me."
Mae's eyes snapped.
"Are you stupid?!" she yelled, stepping back. "I remember everything! It's you who doesn't know what the hell's going on! I'm not your lady or mistress or whatever she was! Just—just go away!"
She shoved her hair back, chest heaving, her breath ragged like she'd just climbed out of a pit.
The palace behind her felt like it was watching. Its walls didn't look the same anymore. Its golden windows looked too tall, too sharp, alien.
Melissa flinched, clearly shaken. "Lady, please," she said again, quietly now. "Just stay right here. I'll come back in a moment. Please—don't go anywhere."
And then she turned and ran, her shoes clicking off the stone path, her soft skirts fluttering behind her.
Mae didn't care. She was barely hearing anything. Her ears rang too loud. Her thoughts were a blur of static.
She was alone now.
Alone, kneeling in the dirt, in some ridiculous dress, with her feet bleeding and her head pounding like a war drum.
Then came laughter.
Not friendly.
That sharp, high-pitched kind. The kind that made your skin crawl. The kind you knew before you turned your head.
"Hah! What do we have here, Miss Scarlette?"
A snide voice full of fake sweetness rang behind her, followed by snickering. "Isn't that Lady Marianne? Crawling in the mud like a piglet, as always."
Mae's eyes rolled before they even fully lifted. She looked up—and there they were.
Three women standing, dressed in gowns that looked like someone bled fabric bolts onto their bodies. Organza, tulle, lace—and colors that looked like vomit. Hair dyed every color that shouldn't exist especially on hair, something blond but mixed with an ugly green and brown-in short hateful. Fans covering their mouths, but not their venom.
She blinked slowly. Her expression blank. Maybe they weren't even talking to her.
Until one stepped closer.
"I thought Lady Marianne said she'd never attend the Crown Prince's birthday again," she purred. "But here you are. Still embarrassing yourself."
Mae's lips parted. "Are you… talking to me?"
The girl blinked, then smirked. "Well of course I am, Lady Marianne."
A twitch sparked in Mae's jaw.
She stood up slowly, brushing the dirt from her knees, holding her dress up so she could move properly. "You've got the wrong person," she muttered. "I'm not Marianne or whoever the hell that is."
She turned to walk away—but the girl stepped in again.
"Marianne seems to be—"
Mae turned on her heels so fast the girl didn't get to finish.
"One more time," she growled. "You call me that name one more fucking time and I'll make sure you forget your own damn name."
The one who'd spoken—her name was Lillith, apparently—froze mid-step, her mouth half-open, choking on her own sentence. Her painted face went pale under the thick powder, and her hand trembled slightly as she lowered her fan.
The other two behind her stopped laughing.
"Now get lost!" Mae hissed through gritted teeth, every cell in her body on fire. Her head throbbed. Her throat burned. There was a feverish pulse crawling up her neck, bitter like rot. Her eyes swam, and the world around her twisted with a heat that didn't belong in this strange place.
That's when Melissa returned—rushing into the scene with a frantic energy that collapsed the moment she spotted Lilith and her snickering entourage. She paled instantly.
"Greetings to Lady Lilith," she murmured with a quick, stiff bow, not daring to meet her eyes. "Lady Scarlette. Lady Rune."
Her glance flicked sideways toward Mae, worried, clearly hoping she hadn't seen or heard too much. But it was too late.
Lilith's nose lifted haughtily. Without a word, she spun on her heel and stormed off, her silk fan flung dramatically onto the grass. The other two followed.
Melissa blinked in confusion—why had they left so easily? But her thoughts were quickly swallowed by the arrival of another figure. No, two.
Hurried footsteps approached, and Mae turned to look—and froze. Everything inside her shut down.
A woman—elegant, mid-forties, wearing deep velvet the color of crushed wine—was walking straight toward her. Her eyes glistened. Her hair was swept back in familiar waves. Her arms were open.
"Darling! Where have you been?!" the woman exclaimed, reaching for her. Mae turned, her expression hardening, preparing another tantrum—but the second her eyes met the woman's face, her lungs stopped working.
Her throat seized like she'd swallowed a fist of glass.
"…Mother?"
(continued)