Phony Potions

Chapter 37

I watched Winsor snore for several moments as I waited for Rorona to be gone, and then I slinked from the bedroom into the hallway. There didn't seem to be anyone. I didn't check the rooms I'd already been in, but instead made a beeline for the far hallway I hadn't been able to get to before. Instead of creeping, I walked tall and purposefully. As if I were supposed to be there.

Directly across from Winsor's room, I heard activity in Charmster Toles's room. Odd. She was supposed to be outside. There was angry muttering and drawers slamming before the sounds of someone else shushing the disgruntled occupant. I continued; it wasn't Mallow.

At the end of the hall, crying slipped beneath the door like a secret note. Azeria. Someone must have brought her in here to warm up as well, perhaps one of the servants of the household.

I slowed my pace. I felt exposed in the dim light of the hallway lanterns with nothing to hide behind. I pressed my hand to the door, fighting back a smirk as I remembered how the last time me listening at doors had ended. I listened, and her stricken voice was muffled by the thick wood.

"What if he doesn't recover?" Azeria hiccupped between crying, her words as sincere and melodramatic as Winsor's. "I got sick before I could see. What if he doesn't—"

"Forget Winsor. What if you don't recover, Enchanted One? Your Proving is only a month away. You took a terrible risk," Tyas said. Her words had a high tone to them, like she had something caught on her throat and was wheezing around it. "Really, it's quite thoughtless how he's always expecting you to save him. I mean, I know he's only a human and that we elves are all terribly brave compared to them, even a lowly servant such as I, but—"

"Terribly brave?" Azeria's outrage, like when she asked who I was, how dare I speak to her, except magnified by a hundred. "Were we at different garden parties? I must be mistaken because as far I can recall there wasn't a single brave elf there, just a bunch of trembling, excuse-conjuring cretins—"

"Enchanted One! Those are your peers, some of them your betters."

"Nobody helped!"

"Winsor is scary. There's something wrong with him, and we can all sense it. Isn't that why you've been turning him away? You'd do well to follow your instincts once more and ignore him, Enchanted One."

"Follow my instincts?" Azeria barked a laugh. I no longer leaned against the door, I was standing outside of it, hearing the shouted words. "I suppose your instincts are fine with free meals and parties and dances and performances performed in Winsor's honor. Your instincts support staying in his manor and kissing up to his father and mother. Your instincts are spot on when they tell you to spend hours exploiting this party for all the fun you can wring from it. But those instincts, they stop short of helping Winsor when he's lying at your feet about to freeze to death?"

"It sounds terrible when you put it like that Azeria. Don't be upset at me. I'm your Assistant; I was terrified I would lose you when you caught his curse. I am trying to tend you. You do not need the anguish of concerning yourself with him."

"I wouldn't have had to be tended to if somebody else would have been willing to help." Then, quieter. "I don't know how you all sleep at night."

"I have a Cosmostic-sized down filled mattress with Zanthachaun imported silk sheets and a bug-proof enchanted canopy net. You know that. It's in your room; you bought it for me... Oh Azeria!" The high pitched voice went even higher, until it was shrill. "The curse is eating away at your memories as well as your body. This is terrible! I should have held you back; I shouldn't have let you touch him."