"Who was Lilly?"
Merra had said the name like it slipped out. Like it belonged somewhere. But Bella had never heard it before. Not in stories. Not in whispers. Not from anyone.
"Why would she say that while looking at me?"
There was no reason for it. No connection she could name. But Merra's eyes had stayed on her too long. Not with suspicion. Not with anger. Just... something else.
"Did she think I was someone else?"
The name had wrapped itself around her thoughts ever since. No one else had looked at her like that before. Like they almost recognized her.
Bella pressed harder into the tile. Her knees were burning through the fabric of her dress. She didn't care.
"Maybe it was just a mistake. Just a name. But what if it wasn't?"
She dipped the rag again. The water was gray and cold, and it stung the scrapes across her knuckles.
"She knows something. I'm sure of it."
She looked up. Merra was on the far side of the kitchen, inspecting the fermentation barrels. She dipped her fingers into one of the pots, sniffed once, then walked away without saying anything. A worker nearby adjusted the stove a moment later, without being told.
"How does she do that?" Confused how others adjusted around Merra - shifting trays, stirring faster, clearing space before she even asked. No one needed to be told.
She looked at Eli. Eli was still crouched by the hearth, wiping down the stone lip in sharp, circular strokes. Her face was flushed. She hadn't spoken since they started.
Bella turned back to the wall and scrubbed faster.
"Could Lilly have been my mother?"
The thought made her chest tighten. She didn't even know what her mother looked like. No one had ever said anything. No one had ever slipped.
Not until now.
She stood, slowly. The ache in her knees throbbed as she straightened her back. Her hands were damp and sore, the rag imprint still pressed into her fingers.
And she was done waiting.
Merra was stacking ladles on the prep table when Bella stepped in beside her. She didn't speak right away. Just moved one ladle, then another, each slotting into place like it had been rehearsed.
"I need to ask you something," Bella said quietly.
Merra didn't look up.
"You said a name earlier. Lilly."
Still nothing.
"You looked at me when you said it."
Merra reached for another spoon and set it flat. "You talk more than you work."
"I just want to know who she was!"
"Want more tasks?"
She stood there for a second, but Merra had already turned away - whatever chance she'd had to be heard was already gone.
Bella stepped away from the table and made her way to the basin, rinsing her rag in silence. She wiped her hands on her apron and turned back, eyes still locked on Merra.
When Merra moved to the herb shelf, Bella shifted toward the counter beside her and began aligning a row of jars. Nothing urgent. Just small movements. She slid a tray closer. Picked up a cloth Merra had dropped. Stacked bowls that didn't need stacking.
Merra didn't look at her. Didn't speak. Just kept moving, already anticipating what Bella was up to.
She kept going, circling Merra's tasks in silence, trying to be useful or at least be visible.
From across the kitchen, Eli watched her. She wrung out a rag, leaned slightly, and called softly, "What are you doing?"
Bella kept folding. "She definitely knows something."
She adjusted a spoon rack and shifted back toward the prep table. Merra reached for a towel, but paused when Bella's hand moved the same way. Not a touch. Just too close.
That pause, that breath between motions... said everything.
Bella stepped back, but it was too late. Merra's patience had worn thin, and someone else had been watching all these nuisance since beginning.
Near the kitchen entrance, Silas had been standing for a while.
He leaned against the archway, arms folded behind his back, uniform crisp, boots polished. His expression was unreadable as always.
"Even after being warned," he said softly to himself.
He watched her a moment longer testing Merra's patience, then shook his head.
"No survival instinct. Or worse - the kind you'd see in a newborn rat. Loud. Blind. And crawling right into teeth."
Then he stepped forward.
"You following her," he called out, his voice cutting across the noise, "or waiting for her to tuck you in?"
Bella didn't turn.
"She following you," he asked Merra, "or just orbiting till she gets herself smacked?"
"She's hovering," Merra replied, still not looking up.
"She's choking your air," Silas said. "Not the same thing."
He turned to Bella. "You ask a question, she says no, and you think the next step is shadowing her like a ghost?"
Bella's jaw tightened. She met his eyes for half a second, then looked past him like he wasn't worth the breath. She knew she was pushing too close, maybe even annoying her - but Merra was ignoring her, and that wasn't her fault.
Silas tilted his head. "You think hovering makes her forget you're a nuisance? Or you just hoping if you linger long enough, she'll start talking?"
"She wants something to do," Merra said, calm as ever.
Silas nodded. "Let's give her something. Something heavy. Something long."
Merra pointed toward the back of the kitchen. "Grain sacks. Six of them. Sort properly."
"Good grain, husk, and rot," Silas added. "You know the difference, right?"
Eli sighed. "We'll handle it."
"Make sure she doesn't confuse the good for the trash," Silas said. "Or the other way around."
"Get moving," Merra said, without looking up. Not angry, just final.
The girls didn't argue. Bella decided to step back, at least for now, before she ended up too far under Merra's skin. They crossed the kitchen without a word. No one helped. No one watched.
The sacks waited near the wall, hunched and gray. Bella crouched, grabbed the top one, and began dragging it toward the sorting table. It dragged hard against the stone. Dust burst up in clouds and clung to her sleeves.
Eli opened the next sack beside her.
The grain inside was uneven. Some dry and clean. Some soft and damp. Some already sour.
They worked in silence.
Bella didn't mind it. Her hands moved, but her thoughts didn't.
They were still stuck on that name.
Lilly