Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Once upon a time, in a land a very long way away, there was a great lord who had three daughters. His wife had died bearing a stillborn son, and he had never remarried, but his daughters were known as the flowers of the court, and he had high hopes for them. The eldest daughter was named Marta, and she was as sharp and cold as the north wind. The middle daughter was named Marika, and she was as cool and brisk as a spring breeze. And the youngest daughter was named Milena, and she was as warm and gentle as a summer’s day. They were all very beautiful and very clever and very courteous, and their father had grand plans of marrying them to lords and princes, and becoming the most wealthy and powerful man in the whole country.

Yet as many great lords do, he had enemies, and one day it came to pass that his enemies persuaded the king that the lord had committed some grave offense, and the king in his anger banished the lord from court, and stripped his wealth and holdings from him, until all that remained was a single house many miles from the capital city, deep in the foothills of the trackless mountains. So the great lord and his daughters had to give up all their fine clothes and jewelry, their horses and hounds, all the trappings of the wealth and rank which once were theirs, and go to live in the hinterlands, without even any servants to aid them.

Now the eldest daughter, who had been promised to a prince, was very bitter at this change in her circumstances, and refused to do any labor about the house; and of course the great lord could not be expected to work with his hands, either, for he would have counted it a great shame hardly to be borne. So it was that the younger two daughters divided all the chores of the household up between them: Marika turned her soft hands to the cooking and the cleaning, and Milena her own tender fingers to the gardening and the care of the single carthorse and the goats and the chickens, and they split the mending between them, and would sit through the long evenings before the fire, sewing and talking and taking comfort in each other’s presence.

So it went for three long years. The great lord brooded over his lost wealth and power, and Marta simmered at her lost rank and prince, and Marika and Milena worked until their soft hands were callused and their slender arms grew strong; and if the younger daughters grieved their losses, they did not speak of it, save sometimes softly to each other in the long winter evenings when their father and sister had gone to bed. And though they, too, had lost much in their father’s fall from grace, still they found things to cherish in their new life. Marika became a very talented cook, by trial and error and asking the women of the nearby village most politely for their advice; and Milena became a very skilled gardener, and grew flowers in amongst the vegetables, and taught the carthorse to love her and the goats and chickens to mostly heed her, which is as much as one can ask of such creatures. And after a while, Milena began to notice that when it was Marika’s turn to venture into the little village for bread and cloth and the other things their household could not make for themselves, she would stay rather longer than might be expected. Finally Marika confided in her that the blacksmith’s apprentice, whose name was Griffin, had begun to court her, though he knew that their father would not willingly let her marry any man of such low rank and station. Still, both Marika and Milena dared to hope that perhaps, in time, their father’s heart would soften.

Then, after three years, a letter came from the capital city, saying that the king had reconsidered his actions, and if the great lord were to present himself again at court, all would be forgiven, and all the wealth and lands which were taken from him restored. The great lord at once prepared to go to the capital, and asked of his daughters what they desired him to bring them when he returned with his riches and rank returned to him.

“Bring me the prince, Father,” Marta said. “For he was meant to be mine, and I shall have him yet.”

“Bring me cinnamon and ginger and saffron,” Marika said. “For I have missed having such flavors in my meals.” But she looked at Milena, and they each thought that there was little chance their father would do so.

“Bring me a cutting from a rosebush, please,” Milena said. “For I have missed the smell of roses.”

And when he had left, she and Marika spoke together, and agreed that they did not think the letter rang true, for it came not from the king, but from a courtier who had been their father’s rival in times gone past; yet their father was so eager to regain what he had lost that they knew he would have heard no word against this chance, but only grown angry if they had dared to speak their worries.

So all three sisters waited anxiously for their father’s return, and the months rolled past, and the garden grew, and the blacksmith’s apprentice earned the rank of journeyman and went off to another village to learn as much as he could, promising Marika that when he returned as a full master of his craft, he would ask her father for her hand.

Yet the lord did not return, and did not return, and the sisters began to fear that he had been slain on the road, or imprisoned in the capital, or executed for daring to return without the king’s let and leave. Summer turned to autumn, and autumn to winter, and the snow began to cover the roads and the fields.

In the middle of the first true blizzard of the winter, there came a knocking on the door, and when the sisters opened it, they found their father outside, half frozen, with a rose cutting clutched in one hand so tightly that the thorns had drawn blood. They brought him in hastily, and set him by the fire, and gave him meat and drink, and at last he was recovered enough to tell them what had befallen him.

The letter had been a cruel trick, as Marika and Milena had suspected. When the great lord reached the city and presented himself at court, the king was exceedingly wroth, and had the lord not brought the letter with him, the king might well have had the lord executed for his temerity. As it was, he had been commanded to leave the city again, and never return on pain of death. So he had turned his steps again to the distant manor, but bad roads and bad luck had delayed him again and again, until at last he reached the foothills even as a snowstorm covered the road. He had gotten terribly lost, and thought that he would die in the wilderness, when suddenly he happened upon the gates to a great stone keep, ancient and imposing and seemingly abandoned. When he passed through the great doors, however, instead of darkness and a cold hearth he found a warm and well-lit hall, and a meal laid ready by unseen hands, and a bath and a bed prepared beside the fire. So of course the lord had availed himself of all these things, and when he woke he had begun to look through the keep to see if he could find the source of the magic which compelled the unseen servants, for if he had such a thing, it would bring him much wealth and power.

Yet alas, he did not find the source of the magic, but instead the master of the keep: a great shaggy monster like a wolf which walked upon its hind legs, with eyes like glowing coals and teeth as long as a man’s hand, which leapt upon him from concealment and nearly tore him limb from limb. (Marika and Milena, seeing that their father bore no great injuries, cast a glance at each other in doubt that this part of the tale was entirely accurate.) The monster took insult at the lord’s invasion of his keep, and threatened to slay him where he stood; but the lord pled with him, saying that if he died, his daughters would starve.

(This, too, Marika and Milena took leave to doubt, for they had been feeding themselves and their father and sister very well for the last two years, by selling their work of mending and embroidery to the people of the village, and by using the produce of their garden and the eggs and milk of their chickens and goats.)

So the lord had told the monster of his daughters, of their dutiful spirits and their beauty and their humble requests, and the monster had declared that as the lord had offended against his hospitality, he might choose: either the monster would slay him, or the lord might send one of his own daughters to the monster in his place.

The lord had, of course, agreed to send a daughter, and the monster had given him, in token of their agreement, the cutting of a rose which grew in some secret place within the keep. A rose, for the lord’s youngest daughter, who had asked for nothing more.

And so Milena’s fate was sealed.

*

Milena probably could have run away, she thinks as she looks up at the great iron gates which bar her way. Marika would have helped. But for all their father’s faults, she does not want him dead. And there is this, too: she won from him the concession that if she went, willingly and without complaint, to save his life, he would allow Marika the free choice of her husband, whoever that might be. Which might mean Marika, at least, can have her blacksmith, and her happy ending.

So here Milena is, wondering if the monster plans to eat her or not.

The gates swing open. Milena takes a deep breath and walks in.

Around her, the cobbled courtyard is swept clean of snow, though the road beyond the gates was thickly covered, and she has been trudging through the drifts for hours. The stark walls of the keep rise up around her, dark against the clear blue of the cloudless sky. The keep’s doors are tightly shut.

The gates swing closed behind her, silent as the grave.

Milena swallows hard, and climbs the steps to the great iron-bound doors, which whisper open in front of her. The hall revealed is far less intimidating than the outer courtyard: it is lit by many lanterns and a great roaring fire, and there is a table before the fire set with a feast fit for a dozen young women at least, but there is only one chair beside it.

A very large cat, at least as large as a spaniel, uncurls itself from the seat of the chair and leaps gracefully to the floor, coming over to Milena with its head and tail held high. It’s a handsome animal, with thick dark fur and brilliant green eyes and a tattered ear.

Mrow, it says as it gets closer, and twines around her legs, nudging her forward towards the table.

Milena laughs. “Yes,” she says, “alright, I’m coming,” and lets the cat herd her towards the table, setting her little pack down and sinking into the chair with a sigh. The cat hops up onto the table and sits down, curling its long tail neatly around its paws. There’s a leather collar about its throat, with a little silver pendant that just shows the carved outline of a cat’s face.

“Is your name just Cat, then?” Milena asks it.

Mrow, the cat says, sounding vaguely offended.

“I do beg your pardon,” Milena says, deeply amused, “but as I do not speak the feline tongue, I regret that I must call you Cat or come up with some other name which would doubtless also not be yours.”

Mrow, the cat allows reluctantly, and then reaches out and bats at a platter of roast venison, nudging it towards her. Mrow!

“I should eat?” Milena asks, and the cat nods.

Oh. It is a magic cat, then. Milena serves herself obediently, trying not to drip anything on the pristine white tablecloth, and then on a strange whim, uses her bread plate to make up a serving of the various meats for the cat.

“Here, Master Cat; I should rather not eat alone,” she says, putting it down in front of the cat, which gives her a very startled look and then a slow, pleased blink. They eat in an oddly companionable silence; the cat is a surprisingly tidy diner, taking small bites and not rushing through its meal.

When they have both finished, the cat licks its paws and grooms its whiskers, then hops gracefully down from the table and gives Milena an expectant look. Milena stands, gathers up her pack, and follows it - no, him, quite distinctly - out of the hall through a door that swings open in front of her, up a long flight of stairs, and down another short corridor to a wooden door. Milena has just time to notice the outline of a rose burned into the door’s wood before it, too, swings open, revealing a suite of rooms: a sitting room, thickly carpeted and furnished with heavy, comfortable-looking furniture in dark wood and extremely old-fashioned upholstery, and opening off the sitting room, doorways that lead to a bedroom entirely dominated by an enormous curtained bed, and a bathing room with its own privy. There’s a fire crackling in the hearth, and the wall sconces have been lit.

Mrow, the cat says, twining around her legs again. Around her calves, in fact - its head comes to her knee at least. It nudges her gently.

“Are these rooms for me?” Milena checks.

Mrow, the cat confirms, looking up to meet her eyes and nodding again.

“They are delightful,” Milena says, venturing in slowly. The words are perfect truth: the tapestries on the walls show wolves and roses, the carpet is thick and soft beneath her shoes, and the rooms smell like they’ve been aired out recently.

Mrow? the cat inquires, and Milena turns to smile at him. He’s waiting in the doorway, politely not intruding on what is now her space.

“Please, be welcome,” she says. She’s not going to turn away a friendly face, even if it is a cat’s.

The cat comes in, placing its paws delicately on the centers of the geometric designs in the thick carpet, and curls up into a loaf on the hearth, watching with half-shut green eyes as she explores. The bathing room has a sort of pipe leading into a deep tub, with handles on either side of it; when she ventures to turn one, hot water comes spilling out, smelling very slightly mineral. The other provides water so cold it might be snowmelt. The privy itself is screened off and has another handle to sluice water down through the appropriate parts. Such amenities were rare even in the capital - she has not had the luxury of plumbing in three years and more.

The bed in the bedroom is large enough for three or four people, with heavy dark curtains that should block out both light and cold most admirably, and there is a chest for Milena’s smallclothes and a wardrobe for her dresses. Honestly, Milena cannot find any fault with the hospitality of the enchanted keep.

The only worry she has is that she has not yet encountered the keep’s master.

She has barely finished the thought when there’s a loud thump of a door being thrown open somewhere below her, and then a bellow that reverberates from the walls. She cringes back against the nearest bedpost, hands pressed to her chest as her heart tries to beat its way out of her ribcage. Oh, gods.

Mrrrrow! says the cat, sounding very irritated indeed, and goes darting out of the sitting room through the half-open door.

“Cat!” Milena gasps, terrified all over again. What if the cat isn’t supposed to be here? What if the lord of the keep, enraged or maddened as that bellow suggests he is, does the cat harm? She follows the cat out into the corridor, looking around wildly for him -

The cat is standing at the top of the stairs, tail lashing back and forth, staring down into the stairway with his ears flat to his head.

“Master Cat,” Milena whispers. “Please, please, come away, do not put yourself in danger -”

The cat glances over his shoulder at her, and his ears perk forward for a moment. Mrow, he says reassuringly, and then turns and yowls down the staircase, an angry screech that echoes from the walls.

“Will you stop making that noise, you fuzzy motherfucker,” a deep rough growl answers, and Milena shrinks back against the door to her rooms as the master of the keep emerges from the stairway.

Her father, for once, was not exaggerating. The master of the keep is a monster, a creature like a wolf risen onto its hind legs; his fur is dark and shaggy and unkempt, uncovered by any sort of clothing whatsoever, and his eyes glow yellow and vicious in the dimness. His teeth gleam as he snarls down at the cat; his lupine ears are flat back against his skull.

Yow-ow-ow! the cat insists, and then springs improbably into the air, batting at the monster’s lupine muzzle, claws very definitely out, bounces off the monster’s face, and lands again neatly on the top step.

Milena claps a hand to her mouth, sure she is going to see the cat murdered before her very eyes.

“Ow, you bastard!” the monster says, recoiling and clapping a heavy, clawed paw to his nose. “What the fuck was that for?”

And then he looks up and sees Milena. His eyes widen, and his ears go straight up in surprise.

There’s a long, tense moment, broken only by Milena’s panting breaths.

“Oh,” the monster says at last, ears flattening again. “Well. Shit. Fuckin’ great first impression I’m making, isn’t it.”

Whatever Milena was expecting, it wasn’t that.

She gathers her courage and takes a little step away from the door, bending into her best court curtsey, though she dares not bend her head and look away, lest he move while she cannot see him. “Good evening, my lord.”

“Uh. Good evening,” the monster says awkwardly. His ears tilt slightly upward. “Shit. He actually sent you?”

Milena straightens, swallowing hard. “Yes, my lord. I am come at your command.”

“Damn,” the monster says, running the claws of one paw through his headfur much like a man might scratch his own head in confusion. “Well. Uh. That’s…never happened before.”

Mrow, the cat says, and prances over to Milena, twining around her legs with a distinctly proud air.

“Yeah, of course you’ve already made friends, you charming asshole,” the monster grumbles, and gestures at the cat. “He’s Aiden. I’m Lambert.”

For some reason, Milena didn’t think a two-legged wolf as large as a bear would be named Lambert.

“I am Milena,” Milena says, choosing not to include her family name. It hardly means anything anymore, after all.

“Uh. Welcome to Kaer Morhen, I guess,” Lambert the improbably named says. “You…uh…you had dinner?”

“Yes,” Milena says warily, wondering if she should have waited for him before she ate. The cat - Aiden - didn’t seem to think so, and he clearly has some sort of…of friendly relationship with Lambert, given how little he fears the monster, but -

“Good. That’s good. Uh. And - the rooms’re alright?”

“They are lovely, thank you.”

“Good.” Lambert looks…well, he looks awkward, like he’s not sure what to do now.

Mrow! Aiden says, and saunters over to Lambert expectantly. To Milena’s continuing surprise, Lambert hunkers down - his legs bend oddly - and runs one enormous paw very gently down the cat’s back. Aiden starts to purr, the sound as loud as thunder, and glances back at Milena as if to say, See? It’s safe.

It is harder to be scared of a monster who is carefully petting a cat.

Aiden rolls over onto his back and latches onto Lambert’s paw with all four limbs, gnawing at it happily. Lambert sighs.

“You have fucking sharp teeth, you little bastard,” he grumbles, but he doesn’t actually do anything, not even pull away.

It’s that which gives Milena the courage to say, “May I ask, my lord, for what reason you desire my company?”

Lambert glances up at her, uncanny yellow eyes catching the light from her rooms and gleaming like coals. Milena’s breath catches.

“You can ask,” he says slowly, “but I can’t tell you. It’s -” he looks down at Aiden, who has stopped attacking his paw and squirmed around to regard Milena gravely. “It’s a fuckin’ mess, but I can’t explain it, or it’ll get worse.”

“I see,” says Milena, who doesn’t, really. But he hasn’t grown angry at the question, at least; that is something.

Mrow, Aiden opines, and squirms out from under Lambert’s paw, going up on his hind legs to lick Lambert’s nose and then trotting over to Milena, nudging her towards her rooms.

“Heh,” Lambert snorts, ears tilting forward again. “Yeah. It’s late, and you fuckin’ walked up the damn mountain, didn’t you?”

“I did, my lord,” Milena agrees. She couldn’t have done that three years ago; it’s amazing what living as, if not a peasant, then at least a very disgraced noble will do for one’s physical fitness.

“Then you should get some sleep.” Lambert glances down at the cat. “Want Aiden to stay with you?”

“That would be a great comfort, my lord,” Milena admits.

“Great.” Lambert stands, and Milena can’t help shrinking back a step as he looms over her, dark as midnight, terrible as a nightmare. “I’ll…see you in the morning, then.”

“Goodnight, my lord,” Milena says, curtseying again, and lets the cat herd her back into her rooms.

The door swings soundlessly shut behind her.

Chapter Text

Milena falls asleep with Aiden draped over her legs atop the blanket, purring like thunder, his weight a comforting reminder that even if Marika is not here, still she is not alone.

She wakes up feeling surprisingly refreshed, and finds that Aiden is still there, fast asleep with his head pillowed on his paws. Feeling greatly daring, she sits up and strokes a hand down his back, the thick fur astonishingly soft under her fingers.

Aiden stretches and starts to purr again, blinking lazily at her as he wakes. Mrp, he says, and stands up to nudge his nose against her cheek, then bats the curtains apart and hops down out of the bed, looking over his shoulder to check if she’s following.

Milena does, finding her slippers where she left them, and Aiden precedes her out into the sitting room, where she discovers a little folding table has been set up with a tray of coddled eggs and toast and fried ham and everything else she could possibly want to break her fast.

“This is marvelous,” Milena says. “Is it permitted to ask who the cook is, do you think, Aiden?”

Aiden appears to consider this, tail twitching, and then turns and stares intently at thin air for a moment before leaping up -

And stopping, as something catches him.

Milena staggers back, eyes wide and breath catching in her throat. There’s someone there. There’s someone holding Aiden, she can see the imprints of fingers in the cat’s fur, there’s someone in her rooms and she can’t see them and -

Mrow! Aiden says, jumping down hastily and coming over to nudge at her skirts worriedly. Mrow, mrrp!

Something puts a piece of paper down onto the tray beside the plate, and then picks the tray up - which vanishes as soon as it rises into the air. Floating paper is extremely disconcerting.

The paper has a message written on it, in careful block letters: WE WILL DO YOU NO HARM.

Mrow! Aiden says.

“Can you talk?” Milena asks whatever is holding the tray.

The paper waggles back and forth. Mrowwww, Aiden says sadly. That’s probably a no, then. But they can write.

“How - how many of you are in the room right now?”

Aiden turns and twines around the invisible person’s legs, then sits down with his tail tucked over his paws. “Just one?” Milena checks.

Mrow! Aiden confirms.

“Were you watching me sleep?” Milena demands. “Ah - rap on the chair. One rap for yes, two for no.”

Tap, tap, the invisible person replies at once.

“You just came up to bring me breakfast,” Milena guesses.

Tap.

“Well.” Milena takes a deep breath, smooths down the skirt of her nightgown, and tries to get her breathing under control. “Thank you very much. It looks and smells delicious. Ah. Could you…could you or Aiden somehow let me know when you are around?”

Tap, the invisible person confirms. Mrow! Aiden agrees, and twines through the invisible person’s ankles again.

Milena stifles a rather hysterical giggle: at this rate, the only voice she’s going to be hearing will be Lambert’s.

“How many of you are there?” she asks the invisible person, wondering if the whole keep is infested with unseen servants.

She loses count of the taps somewhere after two dozen. Lots of invisible people. And one intelligent cat, and one wolf-monster.

What is this keep?

What is she doing here?

“I thank you for breakfast,” she says, hoping her voice is steady. “May I eat and dress in privacy, please?”

Tap, the invisible person replies, and the door opens, soundless as always, and swings shut again. Aiden glances from her to the door and cocks his head curiously.

“Oh - I - if you wish to eat with me, you would be welcome,” Milena says, feeling very awkward. “I just - it is very hard to be comfortable around someone I cannot see.”

Mrow, Aiden agrees, and hops up onto one of the chairs beside the little table. Milena sits down in the other chair, serves the cat some of the ham and eggs, and eats as much of the rest as she can. It’s delicious, but it’s also far too much food. It could have fed her and both of her sisters, easily.

Gods, Marika must be so worried.

Perhaps - perhaps Milena is only here for some brief task or other. Perhaps she will be home by spring. Certainly despite the monstrous nature of the keep’s lord and the disconcerting presence of the invisible people, no one has yet offered her any harm at all.

She takes advantage of the marvelous bath, dresses, combs and re-braids her hair, and then has to admit to herself that she’s putting off venturing out into the keep and encountering…well, anyone. More invisible people. Lambert. Whatever else this strange place might contain.

But hiding in these rooms will doubtless do her no good at all, so she squares her shoulders and crosses to the door, which for once doesn’t open before she gets there. Aiden hops down from the chair and trots after her as she carefully pulls the door open, deeply grateful that it isn’t locked.

Aiden slides past her feet and goes to twine around…well, around what she assumes is an invisible person. There’s a gentle rap on the wall a little ways away, and then, to Milena’s shock, the rasp of chalk against stone. Words appear on the wall; she can’t see the chalk, which is disconcerting, but at least they’ve found a method of communicating that is more precise than tapping.

NO HARM, the person writes. We will keep you safe. Speak what you need and we will provide.

“Thank you,” Milena says, rather baffled. “I don’t suppose you can tell me what’s going on?”

No, the person writes. But we promise you will not be harmed.

Which is actually very reassuring.

“Thank you very much,” Milena says, and glances from where she thinks the person is to where Aiden is sitting watching the whole tableau with his ears perked in interest. “Ah - what should I do today, then? Have I duties?”

Mrow! Aiden says cheerfully, and saunters off down the corridor, tail held high, glancing over his shoulder to check if she’s coming. Milena bobs a quick curtsey to where she hopes the invisible person is and follows the cat.

Aiden leads her down the corridor, around a corner, and up a short flight of stairs to a heavy door which does not open at their approach. MROW! the cat calls, a surprisingly loud sound even given his impressive size.

“Mother of fuck you bastard how do you even get that fucking loud?” Lambert’s unmistakable voice growls from the other side of the door, and then the door is yanked open and Milena takes a hasty step backwards as the master of the keep appears in the doorway, glowering down at the unfazed cat.

The movement catches Lambert’s eye, and he glances up, spots her, and sighs heavily, putting a paw over his eyes. His ears droop. So does his tail.

“Fucking hell,” he mutters. “Keeping up that great impression, aren’t I.” He looks back down at the cat. “Alright, now that I’ve scared her shitless again, you asshole, what am I supposed to do?”

Milena has never met anyone who is so casually profane before.

The cat winds around Lambert’s legs and nudges him towards Milena, then darts over to wind around her legs and coax her forward, too. Mrow! he insists. Mrrrow!

“Uh,” Lambert says, glancing from her to Aiden and back again. His ears tilt up at a hopeful angle. “I could…show you the keep?”

Mrrp! Aiden agrees enthusiastically.

“That would be very kind of you, my lord,” Milena says, since apparently Aiden is going to be insistent about Lambert spending time with her.

“Right. Uh. Well, that’s my room, if you need me,” Lambert says, waving one paw at the doorway behind him. “Rest of this floor’s bedrooms, mostly. Up or down first?”

“Up?” Milena says, rather at random.

“Sure,” Lambert says, and Aiden contributes an approving Mrp, so hopefully she hasn’t made a terrible error.

Up, it turns out, means the battlemented roof of the keep, from which she can see almost all the way to the capital in the crisp clear winter air. It’s beautiful, and very cold, and she didn’t bring a coat. She wraps her arms around herself, trying not to shiver too obviously.

“Ah, shit,” Lambert says. “C’mon, get you back inside before you fucking freeze to death, gods, well done me, forgetting most people don’t have fucking fur -” he ushers her down the stairs again hastily, never quite touching her, and Milena has no idea what to make of the - is it worry in his gruff voice? The angle of his ears suggests as much.

“Don’t you look at me like that, fuzzball, you’re furry too,” Lambert grumbles as Aiden trots past them. “Just - keep going down, all the way, the kitchens are always warm, yeah?”

Milena follows Aiden all the way down the long spiral staircase until it opens out into a long cavernous hall: a kitchen large enough to feed an army. It is, as promised, warmed by the roaring fire and the many ovens. It’s also clearly occupied by at least a few invisible people: Milena can see evidence of someone chopping vegetables, their knife invisible but the turnips falling into pieces with ruthless efficiency, someone else tying up a roast to put in the oven, someone else kneading bread.

It’s immensely disconcerting.

“Someone find her a coat?” Lambert asks the air. “I went and fuckin’ forgot she doesn’t have fur.”

Aiden mrrps in a way that sounds distinctly like he is mocking Lambert. Lambert sighs and rolls his eyes. “Look, asshole, it’s not like we get a lot of guests,” he grumbles.

Milena stands in a corner she hopes is out of the way and watches the invisible bustle, trying to figure out the rules of what stays visible and what doesn’t. The rule seems to be that anything the invisible people are holding also becomes invisible - knives, string, even trays of food, but not the food on the trays. Which means things appear and disappear at irregular, unpredictable intervals. Why Aiden didn’t disappear when the invisible person was holding him she’s not sure, except perhaps if the fact that the cat is magical means he isn’t affected by the invisibility.

“Thanks,” Lambert says gruffly, and she turns to see him accepting a heavy fur coat from thin air; it appears in his paw as if conjured there and then something ruffles the fur on his shoulder, like it’s been patted by an invisible hand. He turns and offers it to her.

To take it, she’ll have to get closer to him than she has as of yet. Close enough to touch - or for him to grab her. Not that Milena has any illusions about whether he could do anything he wanted to and with her, regardless; of course he could. But actually walking up to him is…terrifying.

Aiden chirps and winds around Lambert’s ankles, looking up at her with big green eyes as if to say, It’s safe.

Milena swallows hard and steps forward, reaching out to take the coat. It’s heavy and very soft, and after a moment she realizes it’s sable.

Even when her father was a great lord, she did not have a sable coat, though Marta did.

“Thank you,” she says quietly, marveling.

Lambert shrugs, but his ears prick forward. “Should’ve thought of it a lot fucking sooner,” he grumbles. “Want to see the gardens?”

“Oh! Yes!” Milena says, shrugging the coat on eagerly.

The gardens, it turns out, are both extensive and extremely practical. There are espaliered fruit trees along the walls, an herb garden built in an elegant spiral, plots of vegetables laid out in tidy rows with absolutely adorable stakes at the end of each row holding wooden carvings of whatever is planted there.

And, in a corner, the only impractical note: an untamed rosebush with brilliant crimson blooms covering it despite the season. Its scent wafts through the whole garden courtyard, rich and intoxicating.

Milena would bet her new and very expensive fur coat that the rosebush is magical.

She’s less certain about the vegetables. Surely no one enchants vegetables.

“How do you coax them to grow so late in the year?” she asks, not really expecting Lambert to know the answer.

“We’re right over the kitchen,” he says. “The soil stays warm year-round. Can’t grow berries here, though - they need the cold.”

For some reason, Milena wasn’t expecting a monster to know anything about gardening.

“Do you grow berries elsewhere, then?”

“Sure, yeah, c’mon.” He beckons her towards a gate near the rosebush; as she passes it, one of the long vines uncurls from the rough stone it has been anchored to and drops down in front of her, barring her path. Milena leaps backwards with a squeak of terror.

“Oi,” Lambert says, turning back, lupine ears going back with annoyance. “Let her through.” He reaches out for the branch, which dodges his paw, then slaps at the back of it with a thorny twig.

“Ow! What the hell?”

The rosevine uncurls further towards Milena, one enormous bloom held right in front of her. Milena glances from the rose to Lambert, who shrugs enormous furry shoulders.

“Guess he wants you to have a rose,” he says. He? Milena wonders, but she reaches out with shaking fingers to clasp the blossom’s stem. It falls off on her hand without any effort at all, and the vine curls back up to latch onto the wall, the bush stilling again as if it had never moved.

“Thank you,” Milena says to the rosebush, assuming that courtesy is never wasted, and follows Lambert out to see the berry patch.

*

Luncheon is held in the great hall, and Milena eats alone but for Aiden, who has his own bowl of meat scraps this time - evidently the invisible people have decided that if he’s going to be sharing meals with Milena, he should not be eating the food they’ve made for her. Then again, raw meat is probably better for a cat than cooked.

After luncheon, Milena goes up to her rooms to put the rose carefully in a little jar in the bedroom - the smell will perfume the whole suite, she is sure - and then follows Aiden as he leads her up a staircase to the second floor and through an enormous pair of double doors which do swing open at her approach, into -

Milena stops dead, staring. This must be the largest library she has ever seen, larger than the king’s, larger than the university’s. She isn’t as book-hungry as some people she knows, but she has missed reading in the years since they left the capital.

“This is marvelous,” she breathes. “May I read them?”

Aiden gives her a sardonic look, as if to ask why he would have led her there if she wasn’t allowed to touch.

“You can read anything you like,” Lambert’s deep voice rumbles from behind her, and Milena whirls and tries not to yelp with shock. “Shit, sorry,” Lambert adds, sounding distinctly rueful, ears drooping a little.

“How are you so quiet?” Milena blurts, regretting the words as soon as they leave her mouth.

“Got pads on my feet,” Lambert says, to her vast surprise. “Like that fuzzy bastard does. Means they don’t make much noise on stone.”

“Oh,” Milena says blankly. “And the - the invisible people? Have they pads on their feet, as well?” Is she surrounded by wolf-monsters?

Lambert’s shoulders hunch. “No. They’re just…quiet.”

“I see,” Milena says. Lambert shrugs.

“Anyhow, you can read anything you want, but use gloves for the ones with green covers. They’re poisonous.”

“Poisonous?” Milena asks incredulously.

“There was this really fucking stupid fad for using arsenic in green pigments,” Lambert explains, ears coming up and eyes lighting with enthusiasm. “Which gets you a really intense green but also it’s fucking poisonous and if you get it on your fingers and then you, oh, lick your fingers to turn a page, you give yourself fucking arsenic poisoning and then it takes people decades to figure out how.”

Which is actually fascinating, and also Milena is slightly disconcerted by how much her captor (or is it host? For she is not being treated like a prisoner) knows about historical poisons.

“I shall avoid the green-covered books, then,” she promises. “Have you any recommendations for what I should read?”

Lambert makes a thoughtful sort of grumbling sound deep in his throat. “I dunno what you like. Aiden? Thoughts?”

The cat can read? Well, he is a magical cat. Why should he not be literate as well as sapient?

Mrow, Aiden says, prowling into the library with his tail-tip twitching, and vanishes into the stacks. Lambert leans against the doorway, looking down at Milena but apparently trying not to loom.

“Is there…anything you need?” he asks. “Shit we’ve forgotten about, like a decent fucking coat? I dunno what ladies even need.”

“I am very well provided for, thank you,” Milena says carefully. “Your…assistants…have ensured my rooms are marvelously appointed, and the meals are quite delicious.”

“Yeah, but, d’you need more clothes or anything?”

Milena hesitates. “My current wardrobe is not meant for the mountain winter,” she admits. “But I find great pleasure in making and adorning my own clothing. Would it be permissible to ask for cloth and thread and needles?”

“You can ask for anything you want,” Lambert says quietly. “If we can get it for you, we will.”

“Oh,” Milena says, taken aback by the sheer expansiveness of that promise. “I - I cannot ask you why you are so solicitous, can I?”

Lambert makes a sort of growly noise deep in his throat. “No,” he says. “No. Don’t ask me that.”

Milena nods obediently. She is desperately curious, of course, but at least Lambert doesn’t seem to be angry with her for being so.

“Other than cloth and a sewing kit, what else?” Lambert says, shaking himself a bit.

Milena feels her cheeks flushing. There are some things she did not bring along, as she rather assumed she might be dead before the issue came up. But speaking of it with a - a male person, since she cannot exactly call Lambert a man - is deeply uncomfortable.

“Willowbark tea,” she says. “And clean bandages.”

“Shit, are you hurt?” Lambert asks, shoving away from the wall and leaning down to sniff at her in obvious worry.

“No! No, I am not hurt. But I will - will need them in a week or so.” Milena really doesn’t want to explain this aloud.

“You’re going to be hurt in a week?”

Aiden appears out of the shelves and says, Mrow! in a very insistent tone.

“Fuck,” Lambert sighs. “Alright, I don’t need to know why. Willowbark and bandages. Got it.”

“Thank you,” Milena says, and follows Aiden into the maze of shelving. It turns out he has found a corner full of the sort of tales Milena likes best: the ones with dashing heroes and clever damsels and true love conquering all.

“These are perfect,” Milena tells the cat. “Absolutely perfect; thank you.”

Mrrp, Aiden replies proudly, and twines around her legs while she selects a trio of books - one long poem-story that she’s read before and loved, the Lais, and two prose tales she’s never before encountered. Aiden leads her back to her rooms, going slowly enough that she thinks she might be able to remember the route.

There’s a heap of folded cloth waiting for her on a brand-new table in her sitting room, with a little chest beside it that proves to hold thread and needles in abundance. And in her bedroom, another new little chest is full of sachets of what certainly smells like willowbark, and neatly coiled clean bandages.

“Thank you,” Milena says to the air, hoping the invisible people aren’t actually close enough to hear. There is, of course, no response.

She spends the rest of the afternoon examining her new hoard of cloth, and making plans for many new dresses, in heavy enough fabrics to withstand the chilly mountain air.

Chapter Text

Supper that night is just her and Aiden again, and then Aiden goes off she’s not sure where, and she retreats to her rooms and discovers that a long day of cold and mild terror is actually rather exhausting, and changes for bed, taking the Lais with her.

She falls asleep before she gets more than a few pages in, surrounded by the rich sweet smell of the rose.

In her dreams, she wakes in the garden, beside the rosebush. It’s a beautiful summer’s day in her dream; the plants are every shade of brilliant green, and the sky is a perfect sapphire bowl. A warm wind blows, full of the scent of roses. The bush is still covered in brilliant crimson blooms.

There’s a man sitting on a little bench beside the rosebush, one she’s never met before. He’s a handsome fellow, tall and blond and snub-nosed, young enough that he hasn’t quite grown into the breadth of his shoulders or the width of his hands just yet. His eyes are an unusual light hazel that looks almost yellow in the sunlight. He grins at her cheerfully.

“Hello, milady.”

Milena discovers she’s wearing her old favorite dress, one of the many she had to leave behind when they left the capital, rich blue silk with her own embroidery adorning it. She curtsies. “Hello, good sir.”

“I’m Voltehre,” the young man says. “And, in another sense, I’m the rosebush.”

Milena blinks. “What?”

“Have a seat,” Voltehre invites, gesturing to another little bench. “Look. I can’t answer all your questions, and I can’t tell you why, but I can tell you more than Lambert can, because I’m dead, and the magic doesn’t bind me as tightly. And I want to help.”

Milena sits down carefully. “Help me, or him?” She’s not sure what to do with the revelation that this cheerful young man is dead, or that he is in some strange fashion the rosebush.

“Both,” Voltehre says. “Lambert is dear as a brother to me, and I want him to be happy. But I mean no harm to you.”

“I see,” Milena says. “Well. I should be grateful for your advice, then. And - oh, my apologies. My name is Milena.”

“A pretty name for a pretty lady,” Voltehre says, grinning more broadly. “Anyway, as I said, there are things I cannot tell you. But ask your questions, and if I can answer, I will.”

Milena considers this. The first question that comes to mind might have nothing to do with anything, but is pressing nonetheless. “How is it that you are a rosebush?”

“Oh!” Voltehre laughs. “I died when I was - well - young, as you can see. Lambert buried me and planted a rosebush on my grave, and my spirit decided not to leave, so I became the rosebush. I plan to stick around until Lambert is old and grey and we can go on to whatever comes next together.”

That’s oddly sweet, actually. “He is a lucky man, to have so dear a friend,” Milena says.

“Yeah, he is,” Voltehre replies, smirking. “But I don’t actually have much of anything to do with everything else that’s going on. I’m just a stubborn rosebush ghost.”

Milena nods. She has so many questions, and she is sure that most of them will not be answerable, but - “The invisible people,” she says. “Are they - is there a way to tell when they are around? It is very distressing to not know when I am not alone.”

“Oh!” Voltehre frowns in thought, leaning back against the wall and looking up at the clear blue sky. “Interesting question. I can see how that’d be uncomfortable, yeah. Specially as you’re a stranger here. Hm.” He thinks for a long moment, then claps his hands, sitting up straight again. “I have it!”

Milena leans forward eagerly.

“You can’t see ‘em because you’re not part of the whole…mess,” Voltehre explains, gesturing excitedly. “But I can - or can sense them, anyhow, rosebushes don’t exactly see - so here’s what you do. When you wake up, get that rose I gave you, and pluck a few of the petals, then mash them up into a paste with a little oil. Rub that on your eyelids, and you should be able to see at least the shapes of…well, everyone you can’t see right now.”

“Thank you,” Milena says fervently. Even shapes will be far better than thin air.

“You’re welcome,” Voltehre says cheerfully, and then wrinkles his nose as the scene seems to waver, as if it’s a reflection seen through water. “This is harder than I thought it would be. I’ve never tried to dreamwalk with someone from outside the keep before. I’ll talk to you again tomorrow night?”

“Until then,” Milena says, and the scene ripples again and fades into darkness. Milena wakes some hours later, feeling very well-rested indeed.

There is a large cat draped over her legs, pinning them down quite effectively. Milena laughs softly. “Aiden, let me up.”

Mrrp, Aiden protests, but he rolls off her legs and lets her get out of bed. She goes at once to the rose, plucking two of the outside petals and then hastening into the bathroom to find a bit of the unscented oil she saw there yesterday. The end of a hairbrush makes a decent makeshift grinding implement, and it takes very little time before she has a thin, sweet-smelling paste.

She puts a dot of it on each eyelid and then peeks out into the sitting room.

There’s a tall, wavery shape standing beside the table, gesturing with its hands at Aiden, who is sitting in a chair with his tail wrapped around his paws and watching closely, nodding or shaking his head at intervals.

It works. She can see the invisible people!

She ventures out, peering at the wavery shape. The person is tall and probably dark-haired, with broad shoulders; she can’t see much detail beyond that. Looking too hard at him makes her eyes hurt, like trying to concentrate on a bit of embroidery that just won’t come into focus. But she can see him, which is an immense relief. He turns to look at her as she enters, stepping carefully out of the way so she won’t brush against him.

Ah, he’s brought breakfast.

“Thank you,” she says, and the shape nods.

Aiden glances from her to the shape and says, Mrrp?

“I - was given some good advice,” Milena says. “I can see your outline, good…sir?”

The shape nods, and then takes something out of what might be a pocket - a little folding slate, Milena discovers, when he next produces a piece of chalk. He writes swiftly upon it, and then puts it down on the table, whereupon it comes into sharp focus - almost as if suddenly becoming more real before her eyes.

I am Eskel.

“It is a pleasure to meet you, Eskel,” Milena says, dipping a curtsey. Eskel bows slightly and gestures towards the food.

“It would be a pity to let it get cold, yes,” Milena agrees. “My compliments to the cooks; everything is exquisite.”

Eskel bows again.

Milena takes her seat and breaks her fast with a light heart. Being able to see even the outline of her invisible companions is much easier than just having to wonder where they might be lurking.

Eskel takes the tray away when she has finished her meal; they are getting better at judging how much food she needs, as there was only twice as much this morning, instead of three times. She dresses for the day, careful not to wipe the rose oil from her eyelids, and joins Aiden in the sitting room. “Where to, Master Cat?”

Mrow, Aiden says, and leads the way back to the door of Lambert’s rooms. Along the way, they pass two or three more wavery shapes, all of whom seem to pay close attention to Milena. It feels a little like being back at court, knowing anything she does will be seen and judged, but they don’t seem unfriendly. Only very focused.

Mrow! Aiden calls when they reach Lambert’s door, and Lambert opens it a moment later.

“Mrow, yourself,” he grumbles, and then sees Milena. “Uh. Good morning?”

“Good morning, my lord,” Milena says, curtseying.

“Not a lord, just Lambert,” Lambert says, waving a paw dismissively. “Right. Uh.” He hesitates. “Would you…like to see the rest of the keep?”

“That would be very nice,” Milena agrees, because if nothing else she’d enjoy knowing her way around a bit, and if Aiden isn’t going to act as her constant guide - if, in fact, everyone seems very invested in getting her to spend time with Lambert - then she may as well have the guidance of someone who can speak to her when she is awake. “If I am not taking you from your other pursuits?”

“What other fuckin’ pursuits,” Lambert sighs. “Can’t fuckin’ do anything with these damn paws.”

Milena blinks. That makes it sound as if he didn’t always have paws. “What would you do if you were not thus constrained?” she asks.

“Alchemy,” Lambert says immediately. “Brewing. Fuckin’ blacksmithing, I’d only just started learning, I’m gonna have to start over from scratch if -” he breaks off abruptly, ears flattening. “If I ever get the chance,” he finishes after a moment.

“I can see how blacksmithing might be dangerous when one has fur,” Milena agrees. “But -” she hesitates. “I…know something of basic distilling. Would you…find assistance useful?”

Lambert gives her a very startled look. “Uh. That. You’d…do that?”

Milena shrugs slightly. “I have very little to do, here. I have grown used to having duties to fill my days. And Aiden has made it quite clear that I should be in your company as much as possible.”

Mrow, Aiden agrees, looking as smug as only a cat can.

Lambert sighs, shoulders drooping, and if a giant wolf-monster can look dejected, he manages it. “Aiden’s a damn optimist,” he says quietly.

Mrow! Aiden objects, and leaps; Lambert catches him reflexively, and Aiden stands up in the cradle of Lambert’s enormous furry arms and bonks his head insistently against Lambert’s muzzle, purring as loudly as he can. It’s oddly adorable. Milena covers her mouth to hide a smile.

“Yeah, I know, but you’re fucking daft, kitty,” Lambert murmurs, quietly enough that Milena’s not sure she’s meant to hear it. “But fine. If you think this is a good idea -”

He raises his head and fixes Milena with those startling yellow eyes. “I’ll make you a deal,” he says gruffly. “We…spend time together til spring. Come the equinox, if you still want to leave, I let you go. Price paid.”

Milena’s eyes widen. It’s not quite midwinter - call it four months until the equinox. But given that she expected to die here, at the fangs and claws of a monster, or else be kept prisoner all her days -

“I will take that deal,” she says. Four months of keeping company with Lambert, who for all his terrifying aspect has not yet done her any harm, and then she can go home.

Lambert nods sharply. “And you, kitty, you don’t…get clever,” he says to the cat in his arms. “Alright, you fuzzy bastard?”

Mrowwww, Aiden whines.

“No, look, you are helping, but don’t get pushy, alright, asshole?”

Aiden’s ears flatten, but he nods. Mrr, he grumbles, and wraps all four legs around one of Lambert’s arms, settling in for a nap in the most inconvenient place possible. Lambert sighs and rolls his eyes.

“Cats,” he says, but he cradles Aiden to his chest, holding what must be thirty pounds of cat without complaint or obvious strain. “Right. Uh. Tell you what, this morning I’ll show you the rest of the keep, and this afternoon we can get the lab set up?”

Milena nods. “That sounds perfectly amenable to me, yes.”

Lambert nods and gestures for her to accompany him. The corridor is wide enough that they can walk side by side, even with Milena leaving some space between them.

“So like I said yesterday, this floor’s pretty much all bedrooms,” Lambert says. “We can go up first - not to the roof, I learned that lesson already, shut the fuck up, cat -”

Milena covers her mouth to hide her amusement at watching the enormous wolf-monster arguing with a sleeping cat in his arms, and follows her host - not captor, not with a promise of freedom awaiting her - up the stairs.

*

It turns out that Lambert knows every nook and cranny of the keep, which shouldn’t surprise Milena - he has obviously lived here for a while - but he talks about what she would have guessed were servants’ passages and storage rooms with as much familiarity as he does the library and the receiving hall and the surprisingly large ballroom. He has little stories about most of the main rooms, too. “Got stuck in the rafters with Voltehre,” he says of the ballroom, and of the main hall, “Had to scrub the whole damn floor after we had a mudfight, me an’ Eskel and Geralt,” and in the library, “There’s a good seat in the back corner where nobody’ll see you if you’re quiet.”

Milena is getting the impression that the keep used to be a much livelier place, somehow. That the invisible people weren’t always invisible, that Lambert wasn’t always a wolf-monster.

She’s also getting the impression that there’s something very important that she’s missing, because all of the invisible people turn to stare at her as she passes. It can’t be surprise at her presence; surely they all know she’s in the keep. Perhaps it is only that they do not expect her to be keeping company with Lambert so willingly?

Lambert leads her back down to the great hall at midday; two of the invisible people have just finished setting the table. Milena hesitates as Aiden hops down from Lambert’s arms and leaps into the chair that has a bowl of meat scraps in front of it. There are only two chairs.

“Will you not be joining me for luncheon?” she asks Lambert.

Lambert’s ears, which have been pricked forward with good humor for most of the morning, flatten again. “I’m not good company for meals,” he says gruffly.

“Why ever not?” Milena asks, and Lambert snarls.

“Because I’m a fucking monster,” he snaps, and stalks away, ruff bristling.

“Oh dear,” Milena says weakly as a door slams behind him. She hadn’t realized they could slam.

One of the invisible people - Eskel, she thinks, though it’s hard to tell with how wavery they are - puts a hand to his forehead and very clearly heaves a sigh, shoulders rising and falling heavily. Aiden sighs, too, an oddly dejected huff.

“...but why does being a - a wolf-person make him bad company at meals?” Milena asks, not really expecting a response. It’s not a yes or no question, which limits Aiden’s ability to answer, and it’s a little complicated for gestures, too.

Eskel holds up a hand as if to say, Wait, and goes darting out one of the doors that leads down to the kitchen. He returns a few minutes later, carrying an enormous haunch of venison on a platter, cooked just barely past rare.

“He eats those,” Milena guesses. Eskel nods. “And it’s…not a pleasant sight?” Eskel shakes his head. “Oh.”

She sits down as Eskel takes the venison away again. “I see,” she says softly. “Drat. I did not mean to offend him.”

Mrow, Aiden says consolingly, and leans over to bump his head against her elbow.

The other invisible person, who has been standing silently by, steps slowly forward and stretches out a hand to pat her shoulder gently, the touch cool like a spring breeze but oddly comforting. And then he retreats again, something awkward in his movements. He’s about as tall as Eskel, but much paler, skin and hair alike. Milena wonders what his name is - if it even is a man. The wavery shape isn’t clear enough for her to tell.

Mrow, Aiden says, and takes a tidy bite of his shredded meat. Milena sighs and takes his advice. Missing a meal won’t help make up for offending Lambert.

The food is, as ever, delicious. “My compliments to the cooks,” she says as she rises. “And - Eskel, might I know your companion’s name?”

Eskel fishes the folding slate out of his pocket again. He’s Geralt, he writes, setting the slate down on the table so she can read it once he’s done. Geralt gives Milena an awkward little wave. Milena curtsies.

Aiden mrrps, sounding very amused, and comes over to bump against Milena’s legs, urging her out of the hall and up the stairs - not to her rooms, but up another level, and down the hallway that she thinks remembers leads to the stillroom.

“Is this wise?” she asks Aiden. “I offended him terribly -”

The door to the stillroom swings open, and Lambert’s rough growl says, “I’m not offended. But you don’t gotta be here if you don’t want to. Don’t fucking push her, Aiden.”

“If I have not offended you, then I am glad to be here,” Milena says firmly. “How may I assist you?”

“Uh. Well. Come in, I guess,” Lambert says, sounding very confused, and Milena steps through the doorway to find a long, well-lit room with broad tables and a sink at one end. There’s assorted glassware on the shelves, alembics and coiled tubes and beakers that she recognizes from the stillroom they used to have in the capital, and on the other side of the room, jars and sealed pots with neat labels containing all the various oils and alcohols that a distiller could need.

“I can’t manage the finicky little connections,” Lambert says grumpily. “Not with these paws.”

“If you lift things down, I can set them up,” Milena says - she’s not sure she can reach the shelves.

“Works,” Lambert agrees, and does so, picking up each bit of glassware carefully in his big paws and setting them down so softly they don’t even clink against the stone tabletops. Aiden hops up to sit on the end of one of the tables, curling his tail around his paws and watching with great interest as Milena assembles things. It takes a while, since there’s a lot to put together and both Milena and Lambert are moving very carefully with the expensive glass, but it’s oddly pleasant all the same. Lambert doesn’t talk much. Just being in the same room with him is helping to calm Milena’s instinctive wariness of him, though: he’s so obviously careful with the glass and so wary of her, careful to leave her a wide berth, that it’s hard to stay terrified.

They get the room set up properly by midafternoon, and Lambert steps back, looking around with great satisfaction. “Thanks,” he says.

“Is there a reason the invisible people do not distil?” Milena asks.

“That’s a good term for ‘em,” Lambert says, sounding startled. “Specially as I can’t tell you who they actually are, gods fucking damn it anyhow. Uh. Mostly ‘cause we don’t need a lot of distilling done anymore, or brewing. It’d just be me drinking it, and -” he grimaces, baring all of his very sharp teeth - “I can’t fucking well get drunk anymore.”

“You have been made a wolf-person and even the solace of alcohol is denied you?” Milena frowns. “Well, that’s just rude.”

Lambert bursts into laughter, loud and startled, and slumps back against a counter, shaking with mirth. “Yeah, it fuckin’ is,” he replies once he’s gone from guffaws to chortling. “I used to make damn good booze, too!”

“And you shall again,” Milena says.

“Yeah?” Lambert asks, and gives her a thoughtful look as he pushes away from the counter. “What sorta booze d’you like?”

“I do not drink much,” Milena admits. “I have little tolerance for strong liquor. But I must admit I miss good red wine, and summer mead.”

Lambert’s ears perk up. “Wine I can’t make, though we should check the cellars; mead I might be able to do something about. We’ve got a shitload of honey.”

“You do not have to make mead just for me,” Milena protests.

“I mean, what the hell else am I gonna do?” Lambert asks. “No point making it for me, not when I can’t even get drunk. And I like having a project that’ll actually get used, you know?” He runs a paw through his headfur. “Been a while since I got to make something,” he adds quietly, almost sheepishly.

“Then I will accept with thanks,” Milena says.

Lambert gives her a rather terrifyingly toothy grin. “Great,” he says. “Then I’ll get the stuff together, and we can start a batch tomorrow afternoon. For now, d’you want to go raid the cellars for wine?”

“Is it raiding if they are your cellars?” Milena asks, smiling.

Lambert winks. “It is if we’re sneaky,” he says, and opens the door. Aiden is napping on a window ledge across the corridor; Lambert pads across and pokes the cat gently. “Oi, we’re raiding the cellars. Scout for us?”

Aiden hops to his feet with a cheerful, distinctly amused mrp, and slinks down the corridor, tail twitching like he’s stalking some poor mouse. Lambert puts a paw to his muzzle, winks again, and pads after Aiden, gesturing for Milena to follow him.

Milena muffles her giggles and obeys, drawing on all her memories of tiptoeing around her father’s manor in the city without drawing the attention of her governess or the servants. With Aiden’s scouting - and, Milena suspects, the cat’s aid in shooing invisible people away from their path - they make it all the way down to the cellars without being spotted.

The cellars are extensive, which does not surprise Milena; the fact that many of the bottles of wine are from very good vintages does startle her a bit. None of them are less than a hundred years old, either, which is…odd. Someone clearly comes down and dusts them regularly, but if Lambert and the invisible people have been in the castle for a hundred years, Milena would expect there to be more gaps on the racks, unless…

“Do the invisible people not get drunk, either?” she asks.

Lambert sighs, and his ears droop. “More’s the pity, yeah. Gods know they’d fucking deserve it if they could. But they’re worse off’n I am. No booze, no talking, food doesn’t taste right, just -” he cuts off with a furious snarl. “It’s fucking awful,” he finishes.

“I wish there was something I could do to help them, and you,” Milena says. Aiden mrps eagerly. Lambert’s ears come up a little.

“There might be,” he says. “But I can’t talk about it.”

“Then I shall not press,” Milena says. “But I will hope to learn it, all the same.”

“I hope you do, too,” Lambert sighs. “Anyway. See any wine you like?”

Milena discovers that the cellar is rather an embarrassment of riches, as there are any number of vintages she has only ever heard of before - wines expensive enough for an emperor’s table. She finally selects one that she thinks she has heard has a particularly mellow and fruity aftertaste, and carries it up from the cellar to the dining hall.

Dinner is waiting for her and Aiden. Lambert gives her a nod. “G’night, then,” he says, and turns to leave.

“Wait,” Milena says, because, oddly, she doesn’t want this day to end. Even with the mishaps, it has been strangely companionable, and she has enjoyed it far more than she expected to. “I will not ask you to dine with me, but - would it please you to meet in the library after dinner?”

Lambert’s ears come up, and his eyes go wide. “That’d be…pretty fucking nice, actually,” he says.

Aiden mrows happily, tail waving gleefully. Milena smiles at him. “You approve?”

Mrow! Aiden agrees enthusiastically.

“After dinner, then,” Lambert says, and gives her another nod before making his escape.

Milena turns to see Eskel standing by the table - at least, she thinks it’s Eskel. The rose oil must be wearing off; he’s little more than a faint outline. He bows to her, though, a deep obeisance as if to a queen.

Milena curtsies back, and takes her seat.

The food is as good as she has come to expect, and Eskel fills her wine glass with the century-old wine, which is just as good as she hoped it would be. Aiden comes over and sniffs at it and then flops down and sighs dramatically.

Milena blinks at him.

She’s been coming to the conclusion that Lambert and the invisible people have not always been as they are now. Certainly Voltehre bears that out - he looked quite human, in the dream, and he said he was Lambert’s childhood friend, which at least implies that Lambert was not a - a wolf-person puppy. Though that would be rather adorable, actually.

“Was Lambert ever a puppy?” she asks Aiden and Eskel, who both quite obviously laugh, delighted by the question. Eskel shakes his head.

Alas.

But to return to her original train of thought - is it possible that Aiden, too, was not always a cat?

“Were you a - a person once?” she ventures to Aiden. “Or rather, a person who was not shaped like a very large cat?”

Aiden blinks at her, and glances over at Eskel. They seem to have a conversation in ear-flicks and hand-gestures, Eskel clearly using some sort of hand-language Milena doesn’t know. Finally, slowly, Aiden nods, ears flat back against his head.

“I am going to guess I ought not ask more,” Milena says. Aiden nods again.

“Very well,” Milena says, and rises. “Will you lead me to the library? I am not sure I can find it again on my own.”

Aiden’s ears perk up again and he hops down off the table and leads the way, tail a tall question mark behind him.

Lambert is already in the library, sprawled out on his front in front of the fireplace, with an enormous book open in front of him. His tail is wagging slightly; as Aiden and Milena come in, Aiden stiffens, and then he hunkers down, the very tip of his tail twitching, and stalks forward one slow step at a time until he can pounce on the plume of Lambert’s tail.

Lambert just sighs and puts his head down on the book, one paw covering his eyes. Milena covers her mouth to muffle a giggle.

“I swear to fuck, kitty, one of these days you’re gonna actually startle me and I’m gonna punt you across the room,” Lambert grumbles, propping his head up on a paw again. Aiden, who has all four paws wrapped around Lambert’s tail and is wrestling it gleefully, just mrows unrepentantly.

Milena settles into a chair, unable to completely hide her smile. “You have been friends for a very long time, I think.”

“Yeah,” Lambert says, turning his head to look up at her. The yellow eyes are still a little startling, but becoming less so. His tail is fairly well pinned by Aiden’s weight, but he doesn’t seem distressed. “It’s been…a while. He’s an annoying ass, but he’s good company.”

Mrow! Aiden says proudly.

“Got far too fuckin’ many pointy bits, though,” Lambert adds. Aiden yowls in what Milena thinks is mock offense.

“That does seem to be the nature of cats,” she observes.

“Yeah, I guess so.” Lambert shrugs a bit. “Uh. Did you want to…talk, or read, or…?”

Milena eyes his sprawled position - it looks comfortable for resting, but not for reading. She can only imagine his tail interferes with sitting in a chair, though, which may explain why he hasn’t taken advantage of any of the armchairs. “Would you like me to read aloud?” she offers tentatively.

Lambert glances from her to the book and back again. “Uh. If you’re sure?”

“I am,” Milena says. Lambert gets up, dislodging Aiden, who yowls unhappily about it, and brings the book over to Milena, then settles back on the hearth-rug. Aiden hops onto Lambert’s back, paces up the length of his spine, and turns around atop his head before sitting down squarely over Lambert’s eyes.

“Really, you bastard?” Lambert mutters.

Aiden settles in more comfortably.

Lambert sighs deeply, and wags his tail until Aiden, clearly unable to resist, rises from his sprawl and pounces on it again.

Milena giggles and turns her attention to the book in her lap, which appears to be a history of the wild Northlands - something about which she knows absolutely nothing, so she’s rather intrigued - and written as an epic poem rather than prose.

“‘Beowulf spake, offspring of Ecgtheow:’,” she begins. “‘I purposed in spirit when I mounted the ocean, / When I boarded my boat with a band of my liegemen, / I would work to the fullest the will of your people / Or in foe’s-clutches fastened fall in the battle. / Deeds I shall do of daring and prowess, / Or the last of my life-days live in this mead-hall…’”

Aiden leaves off wrestling Lambert’s tail and moves to curl up in the crook of the wolf-man’s neck, and they both lie there watching Milena, Aiden purring like thunder, Lambert with his paws folded under his muzzle and a warm light in his yellow eyes.

It’s a very pleasant way to spend an evening.

Chapter Text

Milena is not terribly surprised, later that night, to fall asleep and wake immediately in a beautiful summer’s day, sitting on a bench beside a rosebush and a handsome young man.

“The rose oil worked!” she tells Voltehre, beaming. He grins back.

“Oh good! I thought it should, but I’m glad I was right. Come on back any time you run out of rose petals, and I’ll give you another bloom.”

“Thank you,” Milena says warmly.

“You’re very welcome,” Voltehre replies. “So! Questions?”

Milena slumps back against the sun-warmed wall, scrubbing her hands over her face. “So many. I am sure you cannot simply lay out everything that is going on for me, but I don’t even know where to start!” She sighs. “I suppose the question which underlies every other one is, is whatever is going on here some sort of curse?”

Curses are things from children’s tales and nursery rhymes, but - well, so are rosebush ghosts and wolf-people and invisible servants and human-smart cats. Milena is in a fairy tale, or at least that’s how it seems.

“Yes,” Voltehre says slowly. “It is. I cannot tell you how to break it.”

“I had rather assumed that,” Milena admits. Curses in tales are not so easily broken as all that. The ones that do have clear-cut solutions usually involve things like wearing out three pairs of iron shoes, or making seven shirts of nettle thread, or things like that; it seems that one must either be clever enough to deduce the cure, or dedicated enough to endure many hardships in pursuit of it. And given that Lambert has already said he can’t tell her what’s going on, this must be one of the clever kind. “Can you tell me what caused it?”

Voltehre hums, biting his bottom lip in thought. “Not the details,” he says. “I don’t dare - it might not hurt me too badly, since I’m already dead, but it might rebound onto Lambert, and that I won’t risk.”

Milena nods. “I understand,” she assures him, rather charmed by his obvious affection for his friend. Between him and Aiden, she is beginning to get the impression that those who do care for Lambert despite his foul mouth and rather prickly demeanor tend to love him quite dearly.

“Well then,” Voltehre says. “There was a mage - a sorceress. She wanted…something. And the clan wouldn’t give it to her. And Lambert was the last one to refuse, and the rudest.”

Milena giggles despite herself. Voltehre gives her a crooked smile. “Yeah, big surprise, Lambert being rude, right?”

“I am shocked,” Milena assures him. “Absolutely flabbergasted that Lambert might have been rude to anyone.”

Voltehre laughs. “Yeah. So anyway, he was rude to her, and she…cursed the clan. And Lambert’s the key to it. And she made it as…unlikely as possible that anyone could break it, the vicious bitch.”

Milena nods. “I see. And you cannot give me any hints beyond that.”

Voltehre shakes his head. “I do not dare.”

“Then I thank you most sincerely for what you have told me,” Milena says. “Oh! Is it too much to ask if Aiden is part of the curse, too?”

Voltehre wrinkles his nose. “It’s not too much, no. Just, the answer is yes and no. He showed up after the curse was cast, and tried to break it. It…didn’t work. We think we know why. But the backlash made him…” He shrugs.

“A cat,” Milena finishes for him.

“A cat,” Voltehre confirms.

Milena takes a deep breath. “If I try to break the curse and fail, will I become…something else?”

Voltehre blinks. “I…huh. I don’t think so. But I don’t think I can tell you why I think you’re safe. I’m so sorry. I can tell you no one here will hurt you.”

Milena sighs. That’s not as reassuring as she would like it to be, but for all that she knows everyone here is definitely on Lambert’s side, hoping desperately for him to finally break this curse - Voltehre most surely included - she doesn’t get the impression that he has lied to her about anything, and a girl raised at court learns very young to hear the lies in even very pretty words.

And in any case, being a cat wouldn’t be so terrible, perhaps. Though she would miss being able to sew, and read, and talk.

“Who were you all, before the curse? Your clan, I mean?” she asks, and Voltehre opens his mouth to answer, and the dream wavers and fades into the sort of pleasant nonsense Milena is used to seeing in her sleep.

She wakes with Aiden draped over her legs again, a heavy comforting weight, and lies still for a moment, turning over everything she’s learned so far. There is a curse. Lambert is its key. She’s probably safe from the curse, and definitely safe from the people of this castle.

And if she cannot figure it out by the spring equinox, then Lambert will let her go home.

She nods to herself and pulls her feet carefully out from under Aiden, who makes a grumbly noise but doesn’t get up, and goes into the bathing room to make up another batch of rose oil and brush her hair and wash her face. By the time she emerges in a clean gown - the last of the ones she brought with her, and she makes a note to ask where her laundry has been taken - Aiden is awake and has gone out into the sitting room, where he is begging Eskel for a bit of ham.

“Shameless,” Milena laughs, because Aiden is definitely using his big green eyes for evil. Aiden leaps up and grabs the scrap of ham out of Eskel’s translucent fingers and saunters away, tail and ears high, clearly very proud of himself. Eskel laughs soundlessly.

There is more ham on the table, with eggs and toast and jam, and Milena makes a fine meal of it, making sure to thank Eskel, who ducks his head in what she thinks is pleasure.

She’s not quite feeling up to exploring the castle again today; the last few days have been very overwhelming, and she would like a little time without any further revelations.

“Will you tell Lambert I will join him in the alchemy workroom after luncheon, please?” she asks Eskel. “I plan to spend the morning sewing.”

Eskel nods and takes the empty tray, the door closing silently behind him. Aiden glances from Milena to the door and back, tail twitching, then appears to make up his mind and flops down on the hearth, watching Milena with great interest.

Milena shrugs - she doesn’t mind being watched while she works - and starts sorting through the heap of cloth that has been brought up. Most of it is wool, heavy and soft against her hands, in deep rich shades of red and brown, grey and green. There’s a blue as deep as a midnight sky which she particularly likes, and the bolt, once unrolled, proves long enough that she ought to be able to get a full gown out of it if she is careful in the cutting.

“What I really need is a dressmaker’s dummy,” she says thoughtfully to herself. She has one at home, of course - she and Marika and Marta are close enough in proportion that one will do for all of them, and she knows the minor alterations required to make a dress fit any of the three of them.

Aiden’s ears perk up, and he leaps to his feet and trots over to the door, standing on his hind legs to turn the latch with his enormous forepaws and darting out into the corridor. Milena stares after him for a moment, baffled, then turns back to the pile of cloth; she could probably get a skirt out of the green, though definitely not a matching bodice; perhaps with the deepest brown, though…

Aiden comes back a few minutes later, trailed by an invisible person Milena doesn’t recognize. He’s tall - as tall as Eskel and Geralt are - and his hair is so vivid a red that it stands out even through the translucence of the curse. He bows to Milena, who curtsies back.

“I’m afraid I don’t know why Aiden brought you,” she says apologetically.

Aiden huffs and turns in a frustrated little circle. Milena is guessing he is annoyed at not being able to explain himself in mrows and tail-flicks. After a moment he goes over to the hearth and paws a bit of coal out, hissing softly to himself, and rubs a sooty paw over the stones.

Milena and the invisible person both go over to look at what he’s doing. In rather clumsy but quite legible letters, Aiden scrawls, Dummy.

The invisible person puts his hands on his hips and huffs visibly at the insult.

“Oh,” Milena says. “A dressmaker’s dummy - I said I wished I had one.”

The invisible person straightens up and pulls out a folding slate with obvious eagerness, holding it out towards her. When she blinks at him in confusion, he pulls it back just long enough to scribble Draw one! in a corner of the slate and holds it out again.

“Oh, are you a carpenter?” Milena asks, taking the slate and starting to sketch. The invisible person nods enthusiastically. It takes them a few minutes before Milena is reasonably sure he understands what she needs - only one of them being able to speak does make conversation more difficult - but at last he grins at her and goes off with the slate full of sketches. Milena smiles warmly down at Aiden.

“Thank you.”

Mrow! Aiden says proudly.

Milena leans down to stroke a hand down his back - his fur is very soft - and goes back to examining the cloth with a light heart and a cheerful smile.

By lunch-time, she has decided on what to make from each bolt, assuming she has time to do so, and spent a contented hour going through the little chest of sewing supplies that was provided along with the cloth: beautiful steel needles and pins, thread in every color she could possibly want, a pair of tiny gleaming scissors sharp enough to cut the wind. It’s nearly as fine a kit as she had in the city, though the thread is wool and linen rather than silk and cotton.

She goes down for lunch - successfully finding her way from her rooms to the dining hall without Aiden’s guidance, which is rather satisfying - and after yet another beautifully made meal, follows Aiden up to the alchemy workroom. Lambert is there already, paging through a big leather-bound tome.

His ears perk up when he sees her, and his tail wags once before he stills it. Which is…oddly flattering, actually. “Got a couple different mead recipes,” he says. “Want to tell me which ones look good? We can do half a dozen batches if you like.”

Milena grins. “That sounds delightful,” she says, and it’s far less difficult than she would have expected only a few days ago to cross the room and stand beside him, close enough to touch.

He does loom, rather, and he’s still a great hulking wolf-monster with claws and fangs and piercing yellow eyes, but it’s rather harder to be terrified of him when she’s seen him allowing a cat to attack his tail.

They spend a very companionable afternoon making up the promised half dozen batches of mead, one plain and the rest with flavorings that sound interesting, and then Milena goes down to have dinner and they meet up again in the library. Milena reads another chapter of the history book; Lambert lounges on the hearth and lets Aiden pounce on his tail and watches Milena with yellow eyes that are scaring her less and less with every passing hour.

She doesn’t dream of Voltehre that night; perhaps the moon is in the wrong phase, or he has exhausted his strength, or there is some other reason she cannot imagine. But she sleeps deeply all the same, and wakes to Aiden’s already-familiar weight across her legs and the smell of bacon and eggs from the sitting room.

She feels…startlingly good, actually, she realizes as she eases her feet from under Aiden and slips out of bed to dress and make a batch of rose oil. She’s still not entirely sure what is going on in this castle, or what her role is meant to be, but she doesn’t fear that she is going to be devoured, or imprisoned, or mistreated in any way. Lambert and Aiden and all the invisible people seem deeply invested in making sure she is comfortable and even happy, or as happy as it is possible for her to be, so far from her kin and so surrounded by strangeness.

She was prepared to die, or to suffer torments, and console herself with the knowledge that she has earned Marika’s happiness. That she must only spend time in the company of a being who is…imposing, yes, and more foul-mouthed than anyone else she has ever met, but not cruel in the slightest - that is a very light price indeed.

She goes out to the sitting room with a light heart, and gives Eskel a bright smile. He smiles back so broadly that even with the blurriness of his form, his joy is unmistakable.

*

The dressmaker’s dummy is not finished - Milena isn’t surprised; it’s a complicated bit of carpentry, especially if the woodworker hasn’t made one before - so she spends a pleasant few hours going through the various ribbons and colored threads that have been brought up, and making plans for embroidered trim. Aiden watches avidly from his perch on the back of a chair; his twitching tail suggests he would like to pounce on the thread, but he keeps himself under control admirably.

That afternoon she follows Aiden up not to the room where the mead is brewing, but to a tower room with windows on all four sides, letting the sunlight stream in. The windows are glassed, which is impressive.

Lambert is leaning on a windowsill, looking out over the forested foothills below the keep. He straightens up when she comes in, and Milena is quietly charmed by the way his tail wags briefly before he stills it with an obvious effort.

Aiden leaps up onto the windowsill and bonks his head against Lambert’s arm. Mrow! he says brightly.

“Mrow yourself, asshole,” Lambert replies, but his claws are very gentle as he scratches under the cat’s chin. Aiden purrs thunderously.

“This is a beautiful room,” Milena says, not letting herself hesitate as she crosses to stand beside Lambert at the window. “And a truly marvelous view.”

“Yeah,” Lambert agrees. “I spend a lot of time out in the forests. There’s good hunting.” He looks down at her and hums, a low growly noise. “You probably shouldn’t. Lots of things out there would think you make good eating.”

Mrow, Aiden says, sounding rather like he’s laughing, and licks his chops. Lambert looks at him in confusion for a moment before his ears go flat and he snarls at the cat. Milena takes a step back in startled apprehension.

Lambert and Aiden both wince. Aiden’s tail goes down and he makes a low whining noise, hunkering low and giving Milena a plaintive look. Lambert’s tail tucks between his legs and his ears go all the way flat.

“Sorry,” he says, stepping back to give her space and curling his shoulders in to look smaller. “Shit. Didn’t mean to scare you.”

Milena takes a deep breath and puts her shoulders back. “I was only startled. May I ask what elicited such ire on your part?”

Lambert glances at Aiden, who hunkers down even further and lets out a very quiet yowl. “A fuckin’ awful joke,” Lambert says.

“Oh,” Milena says, frowning. “Do you understand him, then?” She had been under the distinct impression that Aiden's vocalizations are mere noises to everyone, not just her. Certainly the invisible people do not seem to hear them as words.

“No,” Lambert says. “I just know the bastard too well.”

“I see,” Milena says, deeply curious as to what joke could have elicited such a reaction. Unfortunately, it is probably best not to ask.

“‘S fine,” Lambert says, waving a paw. “He’s just an ass. So’m I.” He reaches out to put his paw very gently on Aiden’s back, and Aiden sighs and leans into it, ears and tail slowly rising as Lambert pets him.

Milena dares to reach over and scratch Aiden gently behind the ears. He flops over to sprawl on the window-ledge, pushing his head against her hand, and starts to purr again.

“Tell me of the forest creatures?” she asks Lambert.

“Sure,” Lambert says. “Let me see. There’s a herd of deer that live in the eastern valley, past that hill there, you see? With the pines along the stream. They’ve got some sort of weird shit going on; about one in every ten’s a white deer. We useta get all sorts of noble idiots coming by bleating about catching the white deer an’ getting wishes, and we had to tell ‘em that the damn things aren’t magical, they’re just shiny.”

Milena giggles. “Oh dear.”

“Oh deer,” Lambert agrees, emphasizing the word to make the pun obvious, and Milena giggles harder.

“Pretty sure we’ve got a couple of white deer-hides somewhere in the storerooms,” Lambert adds. “If you want one for a coat or somethin’, let us know.”

A coat made of white deerskin would be very striking. “Perhaps I will,” Milena says.

“We’ve got some sable furs down there, too,” Lambert says thoughtfully. “Or mink.”

“You have already given me a very nice fur coat,” Milena points out.

“Guess that’s true,” Lambert allows. “Still. If you want it, it’s yours.” He shrugs and gestures out the window again. “So obviously given that we’ve got deer, we’ve got things what eat ‘em. There’s a bear that lives up in the mountains, biggest damn thing you ever did see. Looks like a hill come to life. Cranky, too. Somebody named him Arnaghad years ago, fuck if I know why. He’s been around longer’n I can remember - probably ate something magical when he was young, to get that big and live that long.”

“I am surprised you and your clan have allowed him to remain,” Milena admits.

“Well, mostly he eats deer and wild boar,” Lambert says, shrugging. “An’ he stays well up the mountain where most people don’t go. If he started eating people then we’d deal with it.”

“That seems fair,” Milena allows. If the bear is not bothering anyone, then killing him would seem to be unnecessary.

And it says something very interesting about Lambert and his clan that they have not slain the bear merely for bragging rights, as so many noblemen of Milena’s acquaintance would have done.

“Honestly as long as you don’t go and bother him, he’s no trouble,” Lambert says. “The wolverines, now, they’re fuckin’ bad news. They’re fast, they’re mean, and they eat just about anything.”

“They sound formidable,” Milena says, shuddering.

“Damn things kill elk,” Lambert agrees. “So don’t go out into the forest without me, alright? Down the trail’s safe enough, but under the trees…” He trails off, grimacing expressively.

“Do you and your clan hunt those, then?”

“Yeah. They don’t fear humans, is the thing. The big wildcats, they figure humans are too much trouble, and Arnaghad doesn’t come down the mountain hardly ever, but wolverines just figure humans are easy pickings.” Lambert shrugs. “They make good coats, though.”

“I see,” Milena says. “Are the wildcats larger than Aiden?”

“Yeah,” Lambert laughs. “Twice as big, maybe. Paws like dinner plates. Shy, though, you hardly ever see ‘em.” He grins down at the puddle of purring cat on the window-ledge, showing far too many teeth and a lolling red tongue. “They’d eat you for dinner, kitty.”

Yow, Aiden objects, not moving.

“Little kitty cutlets,” Lambert teases, and Aiden yowls again and squirms around to latch onto Lambert’s paw with all four of his paws and his teeth, gnawing on it viciously. Lambert yelps and flails - not, Milena notices, hard enough to dislodge Aiden, though he doubtless could; and Aiden’s teeth and claws do not dig in through Lambert’s thick fur.

Milena grins and reaches out to tweak Aiden’s tail. Aiden makes a sound like a squeak and detaches from Lambert’s paw, whirling around to stare at Milena for a moment and then flopping over on his side with a yowl of exaggerated betrayal.

Lambert guffaws, and Milena puts a hand over her mouth to muffle her laughter.

Mrow, Aiden says indignantly.

“Oh dear, I’m sorry,” Milena giggles, and reaches out to scratch him behind the ears again. He holds himself stiff and aloof for only a moment before he melts against her fingers and cranes his head to rasp a rough tongue against her wrist.

“Aww,” Lambert coos.

Aiden gives him a dirty look, as only a cat can, and then ignores him magnificently in favor of rolling about so Milena can scratch him under the chin exactly where he likes.

Milena grins up at Lambert. “He is dreadfully cute.”

“It’s how he’s stayed alive this long,” Lambert says dryly. “Tricks people into thinking he’s fuckin’ adorable instead of annoying as hell.” He gives her a rueful smile, ears perking forward. “An’ before you say it, yes, it works on me too, dammit.”

Milena laughs. “I wasn’t going to say it,” she teases. “But he does seem to have you wrapped around his little paw.”

Lambert shrugs. “He’s…he’s annoying, and he’s got a fucking awful sense of humor, and he’s loyal as the day is long and too fuckin’ sweet for his own good.” His ears flatten a little, and he looks away. “He’s like this because of me. I owe him more’n I’m ever gonna be able to repay.”

Aiden rolls to his feet and rears up on his hind paws, putting his forepaws on Lambert’s shoulder and lashing his tail. Mrow! he says angrily. Lambert turns his head to look at the cat, and Aiden baps him across the muzzle with a paw and then licks the tip of his nose. Mrow! he insists again, and hops up to drape himself over Lambert’s shoulders like a fur stole.

“I think perhaps he disagrees with your assessment,” Milena says.

“Yeah, well,” Lambert says, shuffling his feet and lifting a hand to stroke Aiden’s head gently. “He would. I said he was too fuckin’ loyal.”

There’s a brief pause, and then Lambert shakes himself, careful not to dislodge Aiden from his new perch, and leans on the window-ledge.

“Anyway,” he says, “most of what’s out there is deer an’ boars an’ occasional wildcats. But there’s…well, the idiot nobles were wrong about the white deer being magical. But that’s not to say there’s nothing magical back up in the mountains.”

“Oh,” Milena breathes, eyes wide, and follows Lambert across the room to the windows that look up towards the snow-covered mountain peaks stark against the sky.

“Magic’s rare,” Lambert says quietly. “Real damn rare. But rare’s not impossible. There’s a valley up there - way the hell up, it’s a hike on a good day and pretty near impossible to get to when it snows - that’s got some of the weirdest plants that you ever did see, and the things that eat those plants, well, they don’t stay rabbits or deer or what have you very long. And the things that eat those critters, they get changed too. And that’s why we’re here. The castle, I mean. My clan. Because sometimes something comes down out of the mountains that used to be a bear, or a boar, or an elk, and now it isn’t, and if it gets out into the flatlands, it’ll be real damn bad.”

“How bad?” Milena asks, edging a little closer to him and staring up at the mountains with her heart in her throat.

“Well, when I was - young,” and Milena’s pretty sure he was about to use another word and changed his mind, “there was a thing we think was a boar, before it got into that valley. By the time it got down here, it was about the size of Arnaghad, and it breathed fire. Oh, and its hide was growing iron scales - thank fuck we got to it before it was completely covered, because how the hell you kill an armor-plated boar I do not fucking know.”

Milena shudders and shifts even closer to him, taking refuge against his warm bulk at the very idea of such a monster. “A pit trap, perhaps?”

“Yeah, that’d probably be the best idea,” Lambert says, looking down at her with his ears pricked forward. “Wouldn’t be a lot of fun baiting it into the trap, though.”

“No,” Milena agrees, shivering again. “Is everything which eats those plants transformed so terribly?”

“Well, no,” Lambert admits. “The stuff that isn’t monstrous, we leave alone. There are white deer that grant wishes, sometimes, and I caught a rabbit with starlight in its ears once. Let it go again, too; these days there’s a whole warren with sparkly ears. Cute as hell.”

“They sound adorable,” Milena breathes, eyes wide.

“Could take you out to see ‘em,” Lambert offers a little awkwardly. “If we get a really nice day. It’s not that bad a hike.”

“I would enjoy that,” Milena says. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Lambert says, and Milena feels the swish of his tail wagging against her skirts.

She’s standing very close to him, she realizes suddenly. Probably she should move. Being so close to a…a male person is quite improper.

But he’s very warm, and he’s smiling down at her so very sweetly.

“Tell me about the other magical creatures you’ve seen?” she asks, and doesn’t step away.

Chapter Text

That night, a snowstorm blows in. Milena is asleep deeply enough that she doesn’t hear it arrive, but when she gets up in the morning, the silence has an odd heavy quality, and Aiden has actually squirmed under the quilt to stretch out along her side. She shivers as she pulls on her dressing gown and tucks her feet into the fur-lined slippers beside the bed, and pads over to the heavily-curtained window.

Outside, the world is utterly colorless: white snow, black leafless trees, stark grey mountains. The wind whips the snowdrifts into little flurries, whirling the flakes around too fast for the eye to follow. Milena bites her lip. If she had wanted to leave, this would very effectively prevent such a thing. As it is, she won’t be venturing outside the castle’s walls without a very good reason. Even her lovely new fur coat won’t protect her from wind like that.

Aiden hops up onto the window-ledge, looks out at the snow, and makes a sound very like he’s about to cough up a hairball.

Milena giggles. “I quite agree,” she admits. “Perhaps I will not suggest going on a walk to see the rabbits with starlit ears today.”

Aiden yowls what certainly sounds like agreement and hops off the window-ledge, rearing up on his hind legs to paw the curtains closed again.

As Milena is making up another batch of rose oil, she realizes there’s a decent chance Voltehre’s rosebush will stop blooming during the coldest months, no matter how magical it is. That’s - discomforting, actually. She vastly prefers being able to see the outlines of the invisible people.

She has at least another week of petals, but after that…

“Does Voltehre’s rosebush stop blooming during the winter at all?” she asks Eskel as she enters the sitting room.

Eskel shakes his head.

“Too magical?” Milena guesses.

Eskel nods.

“That is a great relief to me,” Milena says, beaming at him. “Thank you.”

Eskel bows slightly, as if to say, You’re welcome.

Breakfast this morning is oatmeal with milk and dried fruit and honey; Milena laughs softly at the sight. “Hearty enough to keep me warm?” she asks, laughing again when Eskel shrugs and nods.

There’s a quiet rap on the door just as she’s finishing her oatmeal, and Eskel opens it to reveal the carpenter, bright red hair almost glowing as he lugs in a slightly awkward wooden construct.

He sets it up beside the hearth, and as he steps away, it comes into proper focus. Milena hurries over to admire her new dressmaker’s dummy.

It’s startlingly good, especially given that the carpenter - whose name she has not yet gotten - has never made one before. Every piece is smoothed to a fine sheen, and it has exactly her dimensions.

“This is beautifully done, master - ah -” she trails off hopefully.

Eskel fishes his everpresent slate out. Gweld, he writes.

“Master Gweld,” Milena says, beaming at the redheaded carpenter. “This is perfect. Thank you so much.”

Gweld bows deeply and takes his leave with a jaunty stride that suggests he’s justifiably proud of himself.

Milena takes a deep, happy breath and beams at Eskel. “I think,” she says, “I am going to spend the morning making myself the first really nice new dress I have had in years.”

Eskel produces his slate again. May I watch?

Milena blinks. “I suppose you may,” she allows. “Though I cannot imagine it will be terribly entertaining.”

Eskel shrugs. I have never seen a dress made before, he writes.

So Milena spends her morning sketching and cutting and pinning fabric under the interested gaze of a very large cat and a blurrily not-quite-invisible man. It is definitely the strangest audience she’s ever had for dressmaking, but they’re quiet and polite and Eskel is willing to hold things if she needs an extra pair of hands, so she doesn’t mind.

She has the dress fully cut and pinned by lunchtime, and is rather glad to take a break.

After lunch she follows Aiden to yet another room she hasn’t seen before. This one is on the same level as Lambert’s suite of rooms, though apparently not attached to it, and is set up as…well, as a sitting room.

It’s full of invisible people.

Milena pauses in the doorway, feeling rather out of place as every head turns toward to her.

Lambert is sprawled on the hearth; Milena rather suspects that chairs are uncomfortable for him, given the tail. There are probably a dozen invisible people on chairs and sofas around the room; Milena spots Gweld’s brilliant red hair, and then has to shift hastily to one side so Eskel and Geralt can come in, as well, settling on either side of Gweld.

“Milena,” Lambert says, as Aiden bounces across the room to him. There’s a chair left open near the hearth. Lambert gestures to it. “Join us?”

“Am I not intruding?” Milena asks hesitantly.

“Nah. First big storm of winter means we can relax a bit. Monsters don’t come down out of the mountains in this weather. So we all get together and - well, it used to be we’d drink and tell stories.” Lambert’s ears flatten unhappily. “They can’t drink and I’m the only one as can talk, so it’s not like it was, but…you’re welcome to join us all the same.”

Milena crosses the room and takes the empty chair, still feeling deeply awkward. But - they have been so kind to her. Surely she can do something to return that kindness. “If it is the tradition to tell stories,” she says carefully, “perhaps it would please you all for me to tell the tale of the Duke of Montecalvo and the extremely slippery piglet?”

A story which causes said duke to go entirely puce and sputter magnificently, or did when Milena was last at court. Since the duke in question is rather an awful man, the story was very popular, if usually told in whispers rather than public performance.

“Oh, that sounds fuckin’ hilarious,” Lambert says, grinning as he sprawls out again. Aiden curls up on his back, green eyes fixed eagerly on Milena. Eskel moves enough to catch her eye and nods vigorously.

“Well,” Milena begins, sitting back a bit and getting comfortable. “Now the first thing you must know is that the Duke of Montecalvo is excessively fond of spirits-of-wine…”

The invisible people are all rocking with laughter by the time she finishes, which gives her a warm glow of pride. Lambert is nearly howling, and Aiden has slid off Lambert’s back and collapsed on the floor in a puddle of fur, making little helpless mewing noises of delight.

Once they’ve all caught their breaths, Lambert says, “Shit, that reminds me of the time that dipshit count came by to hunt a white deer. You remember that, Gardis? I think it was the two of us had to get him out of that mess.”

One of the invisible people nods and makes a gesture that’s clearly meant to encourage Lambert to tell the story. Lambert grins toothily at Milena and sits up so he can gesture as he talks.

“So this absolute idiot comes riding up with a dozen sycophants panting along behind him, and he says he’s here to hunt the white deer and win his heart’s desire - which, where do they even get this bullshit? Who is spreading these stories? I know it’s not us - and demands we take him to the right part of the forest.”

“How rude,” Milena observes.

“Exactly!” Lambert agrees. “So anyway, we figured we’d take him the least pleasant way, and wouldn’t you know it, we get maybe half a mile into the forest and an entire fuckin’ family of skunks comes sauntering onto the path…”

Milena plasters a hand over her mouth, muffling her laughter as Lambert recounts the absolute comedy of errors which befell the unfortunate count. By the time he’s done, one of the invisible people has slid out of his chair and is slapping the floor as he laughs - silently, as they do everything, but very obviously - and Milena’s sides hurt from trying to suppress her mirth. Aiden is flopped against her feet, yowling softly and flailing his paws in the air.

To her surprise, once everyone has recovered, Eskel and Geralt get up from a couch and usher Lambert away from the hearth, and proceed to put on a pantomime show. Milena is astonished by their skill: Geralt is clearly playing some sort of arrogant noble of some sort, his nose always in the air and his walk a haughty swagger; Eskel, to Milena’s delight, is playing a rabbit. He holds his hands up for the ears, and hops most adorably.

The rabbit runs absolute circles around the noble, ending with the noble actually bursting into furious tears and storming off - upon which he falls into the pit trap he dug for the rabbit earlier. Milena curls up in her chair and cries with laughter.

“I remember that,” Lambert says, through his guffaws. “I think Eskel and Geralt sat in a tree and watched the whole thing.”

Eskel and Geralt bow to their audience and sit down again, clearly very pleased with themselves.

Everyone takes a few minutes to recover, and then Aiden hops up onto a shelf and paws at a book until it falls off; Lambert catches it before it can hit the floor.

“You want me to read a story?” he asks Aiden.

Aiden mews, and trots over to prop his forefeet on Milena’s chair and give her a hopeful look. Lambert barks a laugh. “You want Milena to read a story? Oh, I see how it is, a pretty lady shows up and I’m chopped liver.”

Aiden flirts his tail at Lambert, looking as smug as a cat can, and several of the invisible people clearly guffaw. Milena takes the book when Lambert hands it to her, and opens it to the table of contents. Aiden hops up onto the arm of the chair and reaches out with one paw to tap at one of the entries.

“Puss in Boots?” Milena laughs. Aiden nods and hops down again to stand on the hearth. “Oh! Are you going to act it out?”

Aiden nods again. Lambert settles on the floor next to Milena’s chair, resting his head against the chair’s arm. Milena smiles and begins to read.

“Once upon a time, in a faraway land, there was a miller who had three sons…”

Aiden does a marvelous job of portraying the titular Puss, prancing about on his hind legs and looking cunning and then finally pouncing, and the fictional ogre is no more. The invisible people applaud, and Aiden curls up in Lambert’s lap looking very pleased with himself.

One of the invisible people Milena doesn’t know gets up and comes over, bowing slightly, and gestures at the book; she offers it to him, and he turns to the table of contents and taps another entry. “Shall I read that one?” she checks, to a hopeful nod.

So Milena reads The Frog Prince and The Brave Little Tailor and The Golden Goose, and various invisible people act them out on the hearth, and Lambert sits beside her with Aiden on his lap purring like thunder, and it’s…

It is an exceedingly pleasant afternoon.

*

It’s two weeks after the first big storm that Milena sits down in her usual chair in the library and looks over at Lambert on the hearth, with Aiden sprawled out beside him, and thinks how very cozy they look.

And - well - there is no one here who cares about propriety. Lambert would laugh at the very idea.

She picks up her book and stands. “May I join you?”

Lambert looks up, ears pricking forward in surprise. “Uh - sure, if you like. Bring a cushion over, I guess?”

Milena does, settling next to him on the warm stones of the hearth, and opens the book on her lap, and begins to read. Little by little as the evening wears on, Lambert curls around her, edging closer an inch at a time, until at last he’s made a sort of furry backrest of himself, with Aiden draped across him and purring happily. Milena reaches over to pet the cat’s soft back, and then, feeling greatly daring, strokes her hand over Lambert’s thick fur.

Lambert pricks an ear at her but doesn’t move. Milena does it again, and again, and then before she can think better of it she reaches up to scratch her fingers behind one of those mobile ears.

Lambert goes nearly limp, tail thumping frantically as he wags it. His fur is pleasantly coarse under her fingers, and his eyes are half-lidded in happiness, and his tongue is lolling slightly out of his mouth in bliss.

Milena smiles to herself and keeps scratching even as she turns back to the book.

She thinks she’s been settling into the keep quite well, all things considered.

She’s made herself three new dresses, heavy soft things that keep her warm against the winter’s chill. They’re not decorated yet; putting embroidery onto them ought to occupy her for the rest of the winter. Eskel has brought her up a white deerskin, and she’s contemplating how best to make it into a coat; she hasn’t worked with leather much, and it’s so pretty that she doesn’t wish to mar it by accident. Perhaps she’ll ask for a more normal deerskin so she can make a practice coat first.

She’s gotten used to eating with only Aiden as company. The food continues to be marvelous, and she’s actually ventured down into the kitchens a few times to ask if she can help at all. She’s been allowed to chop vegetables and knead bread dough and have opinions on a spice mix for a venison roast, all of which filled her with an odd sort of pride.

She’s dreamed of Voltehre every second night or so. He doesn’t seem to have much else he can tell her about the curse - “You’ve gotten all the clues I can give, I think; now it’s on you, but you’re a clever lass, never fear,” - but he tells stories about the antics he and Lambert got up to when they were young and Voltehre was alive. She wakes laughing often. They sound like they were proper rapscallions, the two of them. And Voltehre gives her new roses whenever she needs them, so she never runs out of the oil which lets her see who is nearby.

She has grown swiftly accustomed to Aiden’s near-constant presence. He’s a warm weight on her legs at night, an interested gargoyle as she sews, a third conversationalist while she is with Lambert (for all that he cannot actually talk). She thinks he may be one of her dearest friends by this point, despite the barrier of his feline shape. And Voltehre, too, she would count as a dear friend, despite his being both dead and a rosebush.

She wonders sometimes how she could explain this to Marika. Not the invisible people - they, at least, are purely magical, and Marika would only be confused by how unwary of them Milena has become. But how much joy she finds in the company of a rosebush-ghost who haunts her dreams, and a cat-shaped person who somehow manages to make terrible jokes without being able to say a word.

And a great wolf-monster person, hulking and terrible, who is swiftly become so dear to her that she cannot find the words to explain it even to herself.

He is fearsome. She cannot deny it. His fangs are long and sharp, his claws formidable. He looms over her when he stands. His temper is swift. He swears, and yells, and snarls.

But for all that, Milena has found that as the days go by, she is losing her fear of him, until now she can barely remember why she shrank from him when first they met. Because for all his snarls and snaps, he has never done any actual harm to anyone - not to the invisible people, not to Aiden even when Aiden is being a true nuisance, and most especially not to her. He treats her like she is made of porcelain, she rather thinks; like he is worried she will break at the slightest touch.

But he does not treat her as if she is useless. Far from it. He trusts her brewing expertise: they have made mead, and a dozen kinds of salves, and hand lotions and face creams and any number of other things, together in the stillroom, and he heeds her knowledge without any hesitation. He listens eagerly to her tales of the outside world, and asks her opinion on political matters, ears tilted intently as she describes the intricate web of obligations and feuds and alliances which make up the court. He marvels at her skill with a needle, and blatantly admires the dresses she has made; the little embroidery she has managed, he has examined with great curiosity and fervent, profane praise.

He talks to her as if he trusts that she can understand. As if she is - is a companion, not merely a decorative part of the courtly furniture. And he tells marvelous stories, and his fur is very pleasant to touch, and she -

She likes him. She genuinely enjoys his company. Aiden doesn’t have to herd her up to wherever Lambert is lurking anymore; she goes looking for him of her own volition, because she wants to spend the afternoon at his side. She hasn’t felt this purely happy in someone’s company except on the very rare occasions that she and Marika were left alone for an afternoon, and could talk without worrying that Marta would overhear.

Truly, the only things which still distress her about this arrangement are, first, that she misses her sister and knows that Marika will be terribly worried about her; and second, that there is a curse she is supposed to break.

She thinks she has deduced that when the curse is broken, the invisible people will be visible once again, and Lambert and Aiden will take on their proper human forms. Well and good; she is sure they will all be quite relieved. And she would rather like to be able to see the invisible people’s true shapes, not the wavery outlines the rose oil provides, and hear Aiden’s voice, and see what Lambert looks like when he is not eight feet tall and covered in fur.

And breaking the curse involves her, and Lambert, and will do her no harm. Voltehre has promised that, and so has Lambert, and even Aiden, inasmuch as he can promise anything in meows.

But what she is supposed to do…that, Milena hasn’t the faintest idea.

*

The invisible people put on a magnificent feast for midwinter: roast boar with apples, and venison with pears, and egg pie, and fish with preserved fruit, and -

Milena stands in the hall looking at the spread for a moment, eyes wide, and then says to Aiden, “Go and get Lambert, please.”

Aiden tilts his head curiously, but he goes trotting off. Milena smiles at Eskel, who is standing by her usual chair looking confused. “This is far too much food for one person,” she explains.

Eskel frowns, but before he can fish his slate out to answer, Aiden comes back in, fluffy tail held high, with Lambert right behind him.

“What’s the matter?” Lambert asks, ears tilted back in worry.

“This is too much food for only me,” Milena says, gesturing at the table. “Will you join me? I promise I will not be offended by your manners.”

Lambert’s ears flatten further. “They aren’t pretty,” he says gruffly.

“Nevertheless, I would like the company, if you would not be unduly distressed thereby,” Milena says steadily.

Lambert glances from her to Aiden to Eskel - Aiden flicks his tail and Eskel shrugs eloquently - and then, reluctantly, nods. “Fine. On your own head be it.” He drags over a chair with a wide enough gap between the slats of his back for his tail, and sits down across from her. Aiden hops up to sit neatly beside his own plate.

Eskel carves and serves, and Milena takes up her own utensils and pledges silently that she won’t flinch, no matter how terrible Lambert’s table manners may be.

It turns out they’re…honestly not horrible. Lambert eats with his paws, as Milena had expected - he is not dexterous enough to handle knife and fork and spoon - but he does not bury his face in his food like a hungry hound, and as it is all cooked to perfection, he does not end up with his muzzle smeared in blood. He simply picks up large pieces of boar or venison and uses his teeth to tear off bites, swallowing them down nearly without chewing. It is not couth, no, but it is hardly horrifying.

She smiles across the table at him when he gives her a defiant look. “Thank you.”

Lambert’s ears tip forward, just a little. “Weird thing to thank me for.”

“I enjoy company at meals, and, meaning no offense, Aiden, I do like company which can speak.”

Aiden snorts and flicks his tail indignantly, but is mollified when Milena puts a particularly choice portion of boar on his plate.

And after that, Lambert eats with Milena, which is lovely; it means they do not have to pause their conversations awkwardly between afternoon and evening, but can continue chatting all through dinner and on up to the library afterwards, Milena with her hand resting lightly on Lambert’s thickly furred forearm and Aiden gamboling in front of them, delighted with the world.

A week or so after midwinter, there’s a break in the weather; the sky is a clear blue that seems to go on forever, and the snow gleams like diamonds on the mountainsides. Milena stands in the garden beside Voltehre’s rosebush and marvels, her breath puffing in clouds into the chilly air, hands tucked into the sleeves of her magnificent coat.

Lambert finds her there; Aiden, to her amusement, has chosen to stay safely indoors, sprawled by the fireplace in her room and clearly unwilling to move.

Lambert brushes a hand over the rosebush’s leaves and huffs in amusement when the rosebush responds by tapping his snout with a blossom. “It’s going to be nice all day,” he says to Milena. “Do you want to go see the rabbits?”

“Oh! Most assuredly,” Milena says, delighted, and follows him out of the keep’s high walls.

It is, indeed, not a bad walk up to the meadow where the rabbits live, especially with Lambert breaking the trail so Milena need not wade through the snow. He stops at the edge of the meadow and gestures for her to come closer. “They heard us coming, but if we stand still a while, they should come back out.”

Milena nods. It’s rather chilly, standing still in the shade, her boots ankle-deep in snow; after a few minutes she shifts closer to Lambert, who looks down at her in surprise. His ears flatten slightly, then perk forward.

“If you’re cold,” he says slowly, “I could - uh -” He raises an arm and drapes it carefully around her shoulders, drawing her closer. Milena tucks herself against his side; he radiates heat, quite as well as any furnace, and the weight of his arm is oddly comforting.

They stand in silence until the rabbits begin to emerge from their burrows. They’re perfectly normal little things, winter-white and plump, like living snowballs, but whenever they are in shadow, their ears gleam like distant stars.

Milena watches in awe and delight until a hawk glides by overhead and the rabbits dart back into their burrows, upon which she realizes her toes are very cold.

She shivers, and Lambert, to her astonishment, picks her up and turns to hasten back to the keep. She squeaks and grabs at his shoulders, then slowly relaxes; he won’t drop her, she is sure of that.

“Don’t want you getting frostbite,” Lambert grumbles. “Should’ve gotten you better boots. Or thicker socks. Or something.”

Milena giggles. “I don’t think I am in danger of frostbite quite yet,” she assures him. “But I thank you all the same, for looking out for me.”

Lambert’s ears prick forward, and he ducks his head to give her an almost shy look, odd yellow eyes full of something like hope. “My pleasure,” he rumbles.

Milena rests her head on his shoulder and lets him carry her back to her rooms, feeling much warmer than even his furry bulk can explain.

“Would you like to stay?” she asks Lambert when he puts her down on the hearth. “I was going to change my stockings and perhaps do some sewing, but I would enjoy your company.”

“If you’re sure,” Lambert says, and curls up on the hearth as she darts into the bedroom to shuck her boots and chilly stockings, trading them for thick warm socks. When she comes back out and takes a seat, to her amusement, Aiden abandons his assault on Lambert’s tail and trots over to lie down on her feet, purring like a distant avalanche and radiating warmth.

“Why thank you,” Milena laughs. Aiden gives her a very smug look.

Lambert watches with interest as Milena picks up the ribbon she is currently embroidering, and asks a great many questions about the technique, which somehow turns into talking about thread-sourcing and the difficulty of finding certain colors of dyed thread, and the dyes Milena does know how to make. Lambert is absolutely fascinated by the concept of dyeworks. Milena probably should have expected that.

And somehow that pleasant morning leads to Lambert dropping by her rooms the next morning, and the next, and after a few weeks Milena realizes that she is spending very nearly all day, every day, in Lambert’s company.

By rights, she thinks, she should grow weary of his presence. Certainly even Marika’s company grows overwhelming after too long; they have both found that spending some hours apart, doing separate chores, makes their time together all the sweeter. But Lambert’s company does not grow wearisome, nor irksome. He is always a font of interesting conversation, but he is capable of sitting quietly, too, sharing space without interaction. It is easy to be around him, easy as no one else’s presence has ever been.

It’s easy, too, to forget that he is…well…a terrifying wolf-creature. Milena finds herself resting a hand on his arm, or tucking herself against his side as they walk, or leaning against him as she sits on the hearth to read. He’s not terrifying anymore. He’s just Lambert: big and gruff and furry and kind, with mobile ears and a tail Aiden loves to pounce on and a penchant for swearing in more languages than Milena knew existed.

Lambert, who has become unfathomably dear to her.

Chapter Text

Lambert and Aiden are wrestling playfully on the floor of the library early one afternoon, Milena safely out of the way in an armchair with her feet drawn up, giggling at their antics, when the sound of a great bell rings through the air.

Lambert shoots to his feet at once, ears pricked, head cocked. “Fuck.” Aiden’s tail bushes out and his ears flatten back, and he hisses.

“What is it?” Milena asks worriedly.

“That’s the alarm bell,” Lambert says. “Means something’s coming down the mountain.”

“As in, some dangerous magical animal?” Milena says.

Lambert nods. “Fuck, fuck, fuck. Alright. I - hell. I’m the only one who can go, so…”

“So you must do so,” Milena says, nodding her understanding. She rises and reaches up to put a hand on his furry cheek. “Be careful, please.”

Lambert nods jerkily. “I will. Promise.” He glances over at Aiden, who is making a low unhappy noise deep in his chest. “Stay with Milena, yeah?”

Aiden yowls miserably.

Lambert crouches down and bumps the back of one finger against Aiden’s cheek. “Yeah, I know. You’re as fierce as any lion. But if you got hurt, kitty…”

Aiden yowls again, but he bumps his head against Lambert’s paw and then comes over to sit beside Milena. Milena leans down to stroke his fur.

“Alright,” Lambert says. “I’ll - I’ll be back. And if I’m not, then…you’re free to go.”

He leaves at a trot before Milena can find the words to object to the idea that he might not return.

“Does this happen often?” she asks Aiden softly.

Aiden shrugs surprisingly eloquently, given that he is a cat. Milena sighs and scoops him up into her arms - he’s astonishingly heavy, solid beneath his thick coat.

“He’ll be alright,” she says firmly. “He must be. He’ll be back by dinnertime, I’m sure.”

Aiden bonks his head against her cheek, purring loudly, but she thinks she sees a worry that matches her own in his brilliant green eyes.

Milena carries Aiden back to her rooms, but she can’t muster the concentration to attempt any embroidery; she ends up sitting in an armchair with Aiden on her lap, stroking his fur and staring sightlessly into the fire as he makes biscuits against her leg and purrs and purrs and purrs.

Lambert is not back by dinnertime. Milena and Aiden eat in tense silence; Eskel and Geralt are much more attentive than usual, and Milena suspects they are worried, too. It must be even harder for them and Aiden: they used to be able to help, she is sure, back before the curse, and now they are confined to the keep, or to a body which would be a liability in a fight. Not that she thinks Aiden’s cat-form would be easy to subdue, but he is still only a cat.

She and Aiden go back to her rooms after dinner, and she manages to read aloud for a while, to occupy herself, but she glances up every few lines and is surprised and dismayed, every time, that Lambert is not lying on the hearth, watching her with contented yellow eyes. Aiden paces, tail flicking, and jumps up to the windowsill and back down again, and chases his own tail with a sort of miserable desperation.

Finally, for lack of anything better to do, Milena heads for bed, Aiden trotting at her heels.

Sleep doesn’t come easily, even with Aiden’s warm weight atop her feet. When she does finally doze off, she tosses and turns, dozing and waking in an irregular, unrestful rhythm.

Finally, sometime after midnight, she falls into a deeper sleep.

She opens her eyes almost immediately on Voltehre’s sunlit dreamscape.

“Oh thank fuck,” Voltehre gasps, startling up from a slumped seat on the bench. “Milena - Lambert’s hurt, bad hurt. Please, say you’ll help him.”

Milena seizes Voltehre’s hands. “Where? What does he need? Tell me, quickly!”

“He’s in our old cave - Aiden knows where - bring a suture kit, and salves, Eskel can get you the right stuff - hurry, please hurry, he can see me.”

Milena assumes that means Lambert is on the very cusp of death, and forces herself into wakefulness with a hoarse shout. Aiden springs upright, fur standing on end. Milena scrambles out of bed.

“Voltehre said Lambert is hurt - he’s in the old cave, he said you’d know where -”

Aiden yowls and sprints for the door, then visibly restrains himself, dancing in place as Milena hastily throws on her heaviest dress and undergarments and thickest stockings, shoving her feet into her boots and grabbing her coat as swiftly as she can.

Aiden skitters ahead of her, yowling at the top of his lungs as he races down the stairs; Milena realizes belatedly that her rose oil has worn off when Aiden leaps from the third-to-last step and lands on something she cannot see. “Eskel?” she ventures. “I cannot see you -” There’s a rap against the wall. “Voltehre told me Lambert was hurt; he said you would know what salves are needed, and a suture kit -”

Another rap, and Aiden is placed hastily on the floor. Milena follows Aiden towards the main doors at a trot; as she reaches them, a large haversack and a lantern appear just beside them, and someone scrawls in chalk on the wall, in a messy hasty hand, Green jars for open wounds, red jars to drink, then let him sleep. Salve first, then sew.

Milena scans the words half a dozen times as she settles the haversack on her back and picks up the lantern. Then she nods to where she thinks Eskel must be. “I’ll bring him back,” she pledges.

Be careful, Eskel scrawls, and pushes the door open.

Milena follows Aiden out into the snowy darkness.

It’s a windy night, and the moon is barely a sliver; the lantern casts a shaky light, making the hollows and hummocks of the snowdrifts look distinctly eerie. Aiden can run atop the snow, or leap from branch to branch in the leafless trees; Milena has to trudge, and Aiden dances with impatience. Milena mutters curses she’s learned from Lambert under her breath as she makes as much haste as she can. Gods, would that she were an enormous wolf-creature; she could forge through the snow without any trouble at all!

Finally she rounds the base of a great pine tree, its trunk as wide as the doors to the keep, and sees a hill looming ahead of her, with a dark hole in its base - and leading to the hole, from off to one side, a broad streak of something which looks black in the lantern’s light, but which Milena is almost certain must be blood.

Aiden makes a low, miserable sound deep in his throat, looking down at Milena from his perch on a tree branch with big glowing eyes full of misery. And then he looks up, and screams, a sound Milena has never heard from him before, and leaps.

Milena stumbles forward and whirls to see that Aiden has collided with a great shaggy dark shape, almost twice his size, which seems to have far too many claws and teeth; they fall together into the snow, a whirling ball of fur and fury.

And then the ball separates again, into Aiden and a thing like a cross between a bear and a weasel, which hunkers down eyeing Aiden with clear murderous intent.

Aiden looks over at Milena and jerks his head at the hole in the hill. Mrooow! he orders - it almost sounds like Go!

And then he whirls and takes off into the snowy forest, the awful creature hard upon his heels.

Nearly weeping with fear - for herself, for Aiden, for Lambert - Milena struggles through the knee-deep snow and into the mouth of the cave.

The blood-trail is clear against the stone in the lantern’s light. She follows it as fast as she can, moving more easily now, the lantern’s light reflecting off of grey stone walls and ceiling and floor. She rounds a turn, and then another, and then the light glances off of dark fur instead of stone. Dark fur, and far, far too much blood.

“Oh gods, Lambert,” Milena blurts, hurrying forward and falling to her knees beside the fallen wolf-creature, setting the lantern down with a clunk and shrugging out of the haversack.

Lambert makes a low whining sort of noise and doesn’t move.

Milena whispers curses as she pulls jars out of the sack. Thank the gods, the green is a pale shade and the red is dark, so even in the lantern-light it’s easy to tell the difference. She yanks one of the green jars open and just pours the salve - salve she made, to Lambert’s directions - over the nearest bleeding wound.

Lambert roars.

Milena plants a hand on his shoulder and shoves, and gods, it’s a clear sign of how badly hurt he is that she can pin him down. “Hold still!” she orders. “Let me help you, Lambert, please.”

Hazy yellow eyes blink at her. “...’Lena?” Lambert rasps.

“Yes, it’s Milena. Let me help you.” Milena uncorks one of the red jars. “Eskel gave me this - drink, please, it will help -”

Lambert lolls his mouth open, fangs stained red in places, tongue lolling out, and Milena pours the contents of the red jar into the very back of his throat. Lambert swallows and then grimaces eloquently. But he lies still as she pours the salve from the green jars onto his injuries, whining softly but not protesting.

When she’s gotten the salve from the green jars on every injury she can find - and they’re all on his front, dear gods, it looks like he and whatever he went to hunt just tore into each other - she wipes her hands on her skirts and digs in the sack for the suture kit. The needles are worryingly large.

She’s sewn deerskin and fur before; surely this cannot be too terribly different. Except for all the blood.

She grits her teeth and sets to work.

Lambert lies still, panting, as she stitches the horrible gashes back together. Milena murmurs apologies under her breath with every stitch.

“Don’...’pologize,” Lambert rasps.

Milena looks up to see his eyes are a little clearer. “Do you need another of the red jars?”

“Would…prolly help,” Lambert admits. Milena pauses between stitches to uncork another and pour it carefully down his throat.

“Eskel said you should sleep after you drank those.”

“Yeah.” Lambert takes a deep, raspy breath. “Fuck. If. If I don’ wake up.”

“You’re going to wake up,” Milena tells him fiercely.

Lambert huffs a painful-sounding laugh and moves one paw, weakly, to touch her knee. “If I don’ wake up,” he repeats. “Can…go home. Keep…all th’ dresses. An’ - maybe - take Aid’n? Kitty likes you…”

He sounds weaker by the word. Milena rises up on her knees and puts her hands on his shoulders and shakes him - not much, since he’s very heavy, but enough to jostle him a little.

“You are not allowed to die,” she orders him through tears she hadn’t even realized she was shedding. “I forbid it! You have to wake up. Please, please, you can’t die. I - I love you.”

Lambert’s jaw drops open, and he makes a very strange noise - a sort of strangled gasp - and then he starts to glow. Milena lets go of him and scrambles backwards, staring in shock and terror, as each individual strand of his fur seems to turn to a filament of light, filling the whole cave with a white-gold radiance.

Milena stares in baffled wonder. Is this something the liquid in the red jars does? But surely Eskel would have warned her if it was. Is it something she did? But if so, what?

Inside the glow, Lambert’s shape begins to change - to shrink, and shift, even as the glow begins to die away.

And then, finally, the only light left in the cave is the lantern, its flickering flame illuminating not Lambert’s familiar furred bulk but a man, dark-haired and broad-shouldered, wearing battered leather armor and a gleaming silver pendant. He doesn’t seem to have any injuries at all - certainly not the terrible gashes that the wolf-creature bore.

Milena blinks, rubs her arm across her eyes, and blinks again. “...Lambert?”

The man groans softly and sits up, scrubbing a hand across his face, and turns to face her. His eyes are the same yellow as the wolf-creature’s were. “Milena,” he says softly, and oh, it’s the same voice - less resonant, now, from a smaller chest, but the same.

“Oh,” Milena says, and flings herself into his arms, clinging to him desperately. Lambert grunts in shock and then his arms close around her and he presses his face against her hair and rocks them back and forth as Milena sobs.

She finally gets her weeping under control and sits back, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. “I - my apologies,” she starts, and Lambert snorts.

“Ain’t it just like you to apologize for breaking a curse,” he says softly. “Thank you.”

Milena smiles up at him. “You’re welcome. It - that was the condition? That someone should love you? But then why - why not Aiden?” Because Aiden does love Lambert, that is clear as daylight.

“Had to be a woman,” Lambert says. “I guess that absolute bitch of a sorceress figured there was no way in hell any woman’d ever put up with me.”

Milena giggles. “She was a fool, then.”

“I mean, not so’s you’d notice,” Lambert says, shrugging, and brushes his fingers gently against Milena’s cheek. “Just didn’t plan for you. Can’t really blame her. I’m pretty sure you’re fucking unique.”

Milena leans into his hand, beaming. “Uniquely fortunate, perhaps.”

“Nah, that’s me,” Lambert replies. “Luckiest son-of-a-bitch in the world.” And he cups his hand very gently around her cheek and bends his head and kisses her, a rosepetal-soft brush of lips on lips.

Milena sighs and leans into the kiss, eyes fluttering shut.

Lambert leans back again, and Milena blinks at him, feeling oddly fragile and very, very happy.

Lambert smiles at her. It’s a nice smile, for all that he looks a bit wicked in his human form. Shy, and sweet, despite the way his receding hairline and short-cropped beard give him a devilish appearance.

“Thank you,” he says again, quietly. “For breaking the curse and saving my ass.” He frowns a little. “Which, come to think of it - how the hell did you get here?”

“Voltehre told me you were grievously injured, and where to seek you, and then Aiden brought me to the cave,” Milena says, and bites her lip. “And then - there was this awful creature right outside, like a bear crossed with a weasel -”

“A wolverine,” a lilting tenor says from the cave entrance, and Milena whirls to see a lean, lanky man wearing lightweight leather armor and a silver medallion and far more knives than anyone could possibly need. He has curly dark hair worn long, and bright green eyes, and a crooked, rakish smile. He’s also got a long gash from his forehead down to his cheek, and is favoring one leg.

“Aiden!” Lambert says, rising to his feet with a stumble and a muffled curse and crossing the scant distance to pull the newcomer into his arms. Milena stands too, and hesitates, not sure of her welcome -

And the man who was the cat she’s come to adore as her dearest friend squeezes Lambert hard, kisses him firmly on the mouth, and then lets go of him and turns to scoop Milena up and whirl her around in a circle, grinning up at her, apparently not noticing the blood running down his neck.

“You marvelous girl,” he says warmly. “You brilliant sweetheart. You did it!”

“You’re hurt,” Milena says, dizzily, as he puts her down.

“Oh - yeah, the wolverine got a swipe in before I managed to kill it.” Aiden grins. “Me turnin’ back into a person startled the hell out of it, though. Never seen a wolverine look confused before.”

Lambert barks a very familiar laugh and crouches down to rummage in the haversack. “Hold still and let me patch you up, kitty.”

“Yes, dear,” Aiden lilts, and stands obediently still while Lambert smears some of the salve from a green jar over the gashes on his face and leg. Milena, watching curiously, can see the injuries start to heal. The salve is just as potent as Lambert had said it would be, though the ingredients are almost entirely poisonous.

“You aren’t hurt anymore,” Milena ventures. Lambert shoots her a grin over his shoulder from where he’s crouched at Aiden’s feet.

“Guess getting turned back fixed everything, not just bein’ furry,” he says cheerfully. “Which is a hell of a relief.”

“What the fuck was it?” Aiden asks.

“I think it started as a deer, actually,” Lambert says, rising and wiping his hands on his trouser legs. “By the time I got to it, it had fangs, though, and really fucking sharp antlers. And was about four times as big as it should have been. And was eating another deer, so, y’know.”

“Ew,” Aiden says, wrinkling his nose and then wincing as he jars his injury.

“That sounds horrifying,” Milena agrees.

“Kinda was,” Lambert says. “Right. Let’s get back to the keep - no point sitting out here in the fucking cold.”

“Better carry Milena,” Aiden says. “The snow’s pretty deep.”

“I would not want to put you to any trouble -” Milena starts, and is cut off when Lambert simply bends and scoops her up, with as little effort as he displayed in his wolf-creature form. “Oh!”

Lambert grins down at her. “You don’t weigh hardly anything. C’mon, Aiden, I want to see my brothers again.”

Aiden scoops up the lantern and leads the way out of the cave, already moving easier on his injured leg.

Milena nestles into Lambert’s arms, almost missing the fur. His armor is colder, and less comfortable. But the way he smiles every time he looks down to check on her makes up for that.

Chapter Text

The no-longer-invisible people meet them halfway back to the keep, surrounding their little party in a sudden commotion of whooping and armor, silver pendants and unsettlingly yellow eyes. A big man with remarkable scars on his face and a slightly leaner man with white hair come straight for Lambert and Milena, enveloping them in a hug without even letting Lambert put Milena down.

Milena makes an educated guess. “Eskel? Geralt?”

“That’s us,” the big man says, beaming at her. “Gods damn, you did it! It is so fucking good to be able to talk, my gods!”

“Hm,” the paler man agrees, with a broad smile.

“Hey, here’s the hero of the hour!” a lanky redhead cries, slinging his arms over Eskel and Geralt’s shoulders and grinning at Milena. “I’m Gweld. Hi!”

“Hello,” Milena says, smiling up at them all.

“Let me get her inside before she fucking freezes, you assholes,” Lambert says, though he’s smiling so wide it looks like it might hurt.

“Right, shit, yeah - we brought a sled,” Eskel says, and a few minutes later Lambert and Milena and Aiden have all been bundled onto a broad sledge and had blankets heaped atop them, and are being hauled back to the keep by half a dozen large men with yellow eyes. Lambert and Aiden are sort of curled around Milena, keeping her quite cozily warm. It’s not the same as having a giant wolf-creature and a cat tucked against her, but it’s…she thinks she could get used to it, perhaps.

If that’s…if they want to keep her around.

The curse was broken when she fell in love with Lambert. It doesn’t seem to have had anything to do with his feelings for her.

She’s not allowed to walk once they get to the keep, either; Lambert scoops her up again and carries her to her rooms to put her down in a chair, and Aiden kneels down at her feet to unlace her boots and pull them off, and Eskel comes hurrying in a few moments later with a tray holding mugs of hot mulled wine for all of them.

Milena feels very thoroughly fussed-over, and she’s so tired that the kindness makes her start to tear up again. Aiden, who has been rubbing her feet to try to warm them up, looks up with a worried noise, and Lambert, who has been arranging a blanket around her like a strange cape, echoes it.

“Hey,” Eskel says gently, putting the tray down and pressing a mug into Milena’s hands. “Deep breaths, lass. Drink a little. You broke the curse, and you saved Lambert’s life, and everything else can wait until you’ve gotten some sleep, hm?”

Milena giggles wetly. “You’re the sensible one, aren’t you?”

“Always have been, always will be,” Eskel replies, grinning down at her. “Someone’s gotta look out for these ridiculous madcap creatures. And for our sweet lass, who is neither ridiculous nor madcap.”

Milena giggles again. “You have done a marvelous job of it, and I thank you.”

“You are more than welcome, lass,” Eskel says warmly. “I’m going to let you get some rest; give these two reprobates your dress when you kick them out, and we can see about getting the bloodstains out of it for you. We’ve some experience with that.”

“I will do that, and thank you,” Milena says. Eskel nods, leans down to kiss the top of her head, and bustles out.

As the door closes, she hears him ordering, “Alright, clear out, you lot, no lurking in the corridor, shoo, shoo.” And then the sound of many footsteps.

Lambert snorts. “Good old Eskel. Reliable as sunrise.”

“Is that why he was tasked with my care?” Milena asks, taking a sip of the mulled wine and finding it unsurprisingly excellent.

“I dunno about tasked - he chose to look after you,” Lambert says, shrugging. “Prolly figured that way nobody else would fuck it up.” He takes a second mug and hands Aiden the third, then stands there looking slightly awkward. Aiden sits down cross-legged on the floor and sips at his drink, watching both of them thoughtfully.

Milena is tired - exhausted, in fact - but she suddenly realizes that when she goes to bed, there will be no warm cat stretched out across her legs. And that is the proverbial straw that breaks the camel’s back; she starts to weep, quietly and helplessly, into her mug.

“Oh shit,” Lambert blurts, and Aiden sets his mug aside so fast it splashes onto the floor and goes up on his knees beside her, patting at her frantically as if looking for an injury. Lambert crowds in on her other side, looking just as worried.

“What is it, sweetheart?” Aiden asks. “Are you hurt? Fuck, what’s the matter?”

“What’d we do?” Lambert adds. “What’s wrong?”

Milena covers her face with her hands - one of them takes her mug before it can fall out of her lap - and tries to muffle her sobs. It’s foolish to grieve the loss of a cat when the curse is broken. Foolish to be so overwrought when she has done what she was brought here to do and soon she will be able to - to leave, to leave behind these people who have become so dear to her, but who surely do not need an ex-noblewoman wandering about in their keep’s corridors without a reason to be there -

“Ah hell,” Lambert says, and gentle hands lift Milena out of the chair, and then she’s in someone’s lap - in Lambert’s lap - and he’s cradling her close, tucking her head beneath his chin and stroking her back soothingly.

“This has been a lot, hasn’t it, sweetheart,” Aiden murmurs. “Cry it out. You’re safe with us.”

Milena buries her face against Lambert’s throat and sobs until she runs out of tears.

When she sits up at last, feeling distinctly wobbly and rather ashamed, it’s to find Aiden is sitting on the arm of the chair. He offers her a handkerchief with a crooked little smile. She takes it and wipes her face clean, sniffling a bit. “My apologies,” she says weakly.

“None needed,” Lambert replies gruffly, and she looks up to find that he’s watching her with a worried frown line between his eyebrows. “You’re not hurt?”

“Not at all,” Milena assures him. “I just - well. I just realized I would not have a cat in my bed, tonight.”

“I mean, you could,” Aiden says, with a truly ridiculous wiggle of his eyebrows. Lambert huffs and shoves Aiden off the chair’s arm; Aiden lands rolling, cackling with laughter, and springs to his feet again. Milena discovers she is grinning.

“I thank you,” she tells Aiden gravely. Aiden smirks. “But - ah - I -” she covers her face with her hands again, takes a deep breath, and looks up at Lambert. “What happens now?” she asks bluntly.

“...Now, as in the next hour, or now, as in tomorrow - well, later today, I guess - and going on from there?” Lambert asks, looking oddly wary.

“As in tomorrow, and onward,” Milena says. “Because I - I love you,” the words are harder to say when she is not near-frantic with terror for his life, “and you kissed me, but you also kissed Aiden, and I - I was brought here as a means to an end, I know -”

“Braver than both of us put together, aren’t you, sweetheart?” Aiden murmurs, coming back to perch on the chair’s arm again and reaching over to run a hand over her hair, an oddly soothing touch. Lambert is looking somewhat poleaxed, and Milena has the odd feeling that if she were not sitting on his lap, he might well have fled the room. Aiden nudges Lambert’s shoulder. “Come on, you prickly bastard, don’t leave her hanging.”

Lambert shoots Aiden a brief glare, then takes a deep breath. “Right,” he says. “Uh. So. Aiden…was my lover, before I got cursed, and I sure as hell hope he’s still gonna be.” Aiden nods. “But I’d be lying through my damn teeth if I said I didn’t - well. Didn’t love you too,” Lambert continues slowly. Milena sucks in a sharp breath, eyes going wide, heart pounding in her chest. “So. Uh. You…did what we hoped you would. If it’s too damn weird to think about sticking around and…uh…I dunno, sharing me…then we’ll see you on home with a fucking packhorse and any sorta goods you want to take with you, and I won’t blame you a bit.”

Slowly, Milena nods.

Lambert bites his lip, sighs heavily, and adds, “But if you wanted to stay, I’d…hell. I’d like that. An’ hell, you could invite your sister. The good one. An’ her blacksmith, too. Fuck knows another blacksmith wouldn’t be a bad thing to have around. So. Uh.” He shrugs a little helplessly. “I love you. If you want to stay, I’ll be over the fucking moon. But if you don’t, I won’t…won’t hold it against you.”

Aiden nods solemnly. “No more will I,” he says. “But, well, if you do want to stay, I sure as hell wouldn’t mind sharing. Or -” he hesitates, which Milena suspects is rare; certainly as a cat he was always very sure of himself. “Well, I know it’s a little different because I was a cat, but you’re sweet and clever and awfully pretty and if I’m not in love with you I’m within spitting distance of it, so. If you do want a Cat in your bed, just say the word.”

“Oh,” Milena says weakly.

She’s not sure what she was expecting, but this…wasn’t it.

Well-brought-up young noblewomen don’t tend to take lovers, or at least not until they’re safely married and have produced the requisite heir and spare, and even then they don’t do so openly. But it doesn’t sound as though what Lambert and Aiden are offering is any sort of hidden relationship. Just…Lambert having two lovers, and possibly those lovers also being lovers, and the whole thing being common knowledge to the entire keep.

She genuinely has no idea what to do with that.

“I…need to think,” she says slowly.

“Yeah, sure,” Aiden says at once. “It’s been a hell of a day - and a hell of a night, for that matter.”

“Never make decisions while upset,” Lambert says, in the tone of someone reciting a very old lesson. “Which, for the record, I am shit at taking that particular advice, but that doesn’t mean it’s wrong.”

“Eskel’s advice is usually sound,” Aiden says ruefully. “So. How’s this. You should get some sleep. So should we - getting chased halfway across the mountain by a wolverine is surprisingly tiring, and I expect fighting a carnivorous magical deer-thing is also not exactly restful. Tomorrow we can reconvene over…let’s say lunch, because frankly I’m gonna sleep until midday, and talk this out when we’re not all absolutely exhausted.”

“That seems extremely sensible,” Milena says, because honestly it does.

“It’s a plan, then,” Lambert says, and rises, setting her gently on her feet. “D’you want to get changed and give us that dress so’s we can dump it in the laundry?”

“Yes, thank you,” Milena says, and ducks into her bedroom, closing the door gently and carefully not letting herself think about anything but unlacing her dress and changing into a nightgown. She opens the door again to find both men standing a little awkwardly on the hearth. Lambert comes over to take the dress when she holds it out, then, a little clumsily, catches her hand and bows over it, pressing his lips to the backs of her fingers.

Milena stands there blinking at him in shock as he steps away, and then Aiden is there, scooping up her hand to do the same thing, his touch a little softer than Lambert’s chapped lips. “Goodnight, sweetheart,” he says warmly.

“G’night, Milena,” Lambert adds.

“Goodnight,” Milena says, and retreats into her bedroom, drawing the curtains about her bed and curling up around a pillow - which is no sort of replacement for Aiden at all - and wondering if she’ll even be able to sleep despite her exhaustion.

She falls asleep between one breath and the next.

*

“You did it,” Voltehre cries, catching her up in his arms and whirling them both about until Milena is entirely dizzy. “You wonder!”

Milena clutches at his shoulders, laughing helplessly. “Put me down!”

Voltehre lowers her to her feet and guides her over to the bench. “Sorry. I just - he was so badly hurt, and then you got to him in time, and you broke the curse, and - I’m so happy I’ve gone and put out half a dozen new branches.”

Milena giggles - that’s not an expression of enthusiasm she’s ever thought of, but it’s adorable. Voltehre grins and flops down beside her, snuggling up against her like a particularly gangly puppy, all paws and wriggles. “You did so well,” he says happily. “You’re brilliant. Lambert’s lucky to have you.”

Milena must flinch, because Voltehre sits up and gives her a concerned look. “Tell me that idiot fucked it up already,” he sighs.

“No! No, I - I just don’t know what to do,” Milena says. Voltehre cocks his head, then slides down off the bench to sit cross-legged in front of her.

“Lay it all out,” he invites. “Sometimes that helps, just talking stuff through.”

Milena nods and takes a deep breath. “Alright. So. I - I love him, obviously.”

Voltehre nods. “Since he’s not currently furry, I think we can take that as a given, yes.”

“And he said he loves me,” Milena continues, laying out the facts like pieces on a game board.

Voltehre nods again. “As well he ought; you’re entirely marvelous, and really it’s just as well I haven’t a taste for women, or this could get very awkward. A rosebush-ghost pining for a living woman makes for a good winter’s tale but would be entirely unpleasant to…well, live isn’t the right word, but experience, at least.”

Milena can feel herself blushing at the compliment. “I suppose that is just as well. I do count you among my dearest friends.”

Voltehre’s ears go pink. “Thank you! And I you, as it happens; you’re really nice to have around, even if I do only really get to talk to you in dreams. Anyhow. So you love Lambert and he loves you.”

Milena takes a deep breath. “Lambert also loves Aiden.”

“Ah. Um. Well, yes.” Voltehre sighs. “And Aiden loves him - that’s how he ended up as a cat. He tried breaking the curse and the backlash cursed him instead.”

Milena nods. “I had guessed it was something of the sort. And I - they knew each other before the curse, I assume.”

“They did. They - well. Our clan and Aiden’s were sort of enemies, but Lambert isn’t great at following stupid rules -”

“You astound me,” Milena says dryly.

Voltehre snorts. “Yeah. So anyway he met Aiden and they hit it off and, well, I was the only one who knew about them for a while, because I’ve been Lambert’s best friend since we were knee-high and also it’s not like I was going to be able to do anything about it if I flew off the handle, on account of being a rosebush. Anyway. The short version is they knew each other and they loved each other and then Lambert got turned into a bipedal wolf and Aiden tried to break the curse and it didn’t work.”

Milena bites her lip. “So I am…well, the newcomer. And I - Aiden said he would share Lambert, or even take me as a lover as well, which would be entirely scandalous but I’m not sure why I care when I’m never going back to court anyway, but I - I don’t want to be a burden. To be someone they think they have to put up with because I broke the curse. And your clan has an important duty, and I know all your brothers will want to return to it, and I would surely only be a liability to them as well - I cannot fight monsters, I wouldn’t even know where to start - the sensible thing to do would be to go home and - and maybe move in with Marika when she and her Griffin set up a household, or perhaps simply take on the care of my father and Marta -” Which sounds so very lonely, so utterly bleak, to leave the people she’s come to love so dearly and the keep which has begun to feel like home, with its cold corridors and its beautiful vantages and its well-stocked library, but surely it’s the wise choice.

Voltehre frowns. “Right, well, first off: can you genuinely imagine Lambert, of all people, putting up with someone out of nothing but obligation?”

Milena pauses. “Well. No, actually.” Lambert certainly wouldn’t do so cheerfully. If he thought she was going to be a burden and a chore to keep around, he would have said as much.

Voltehre nods. “Just so. Second thing: yeah, you can’t hunt monsters. So fucking what?”

Milena blinks at him. “What?”

“That’s not the only thing my brothers do. Hell, it’s not even a weekly sort of thing! Whole months go by without anything unpleasant coming down out of the mountains. But you’ve got lots of other skills. You’re a seamstress, you can make medicines, you understand nobles, you can help in the kitchen and the garden. All sorts of stuff.”

“...Oh,” Milena says. Because, well, yes, all of that is useful. And the dealing-with-nobles part of it might even be a skill none of the keep’s inhabitants already have - or at least, they don’t know how to be very polite and still get exactly what they want, which is a skill Milena and her sisters had been forced to learn from a very young age indeed.

Voltehre grins. “Yeah. Oh. And finally - ignore propriety, ignore whether or not you’re going to be a burden, ignore all of that just for a moment - what would make you happy?”

Milena blurts, “I want to stay.” To stay with Lambert, who she loves, and Aiden who is unfathomably dear to her; with Voltehre, and Eskel, and Geralt, and Gweld. To stay in this place that is more a home than either her family’s manor or the little house in a backwater village has ever been.

Voltehre smiles. “Then stay, dear one.”

“It isn’t that simple,” Milena protests.

“No,” Voltehre agrees. “But you want to stay, and Lambert and Aiden want you to stay, and I daresay the rest of my brothers do as well, so whatever complications there are, we’ll figure them out. Alright?” He reaches up to clasp her hands. “You broke a hundred-year curse. You saved my brother’s life. You can do this, too.”

Milena giggles. “When you put it like that,” she says, “how can I argue?”

“You can’t, obviously,” Voltehre says, sticking his nose in the air with a grin. “I am a font of wisdom, after all.”

“You are,” Milena agrees, smiling warmly down at him. “You’re sure it’s a good idea?”

“Absolutely, positively, and without question,” Voltehre replies firmly. “I’m not going to say it’s going to be easy, necessarily, but I think it will make everyone happy who damn well deserves to be happy. Which most especially includes you.”

Milena takes a deep breath, filling her lungs with the scent of roses in sunshine. “Alright. I’ll talk to them tomorrow, but if that goes well, then…then I’ll stay.”

Voltehre beams and bounces to his feet, scooping her up to whirl her around again. Milena clutches at his shoulders, giggling giddily. Maybe it’s folly, but -

She’s going to stay.

*

She wakes late in the morning, and for a moment is baffled by the lack of cat on her ankles - and then the previous night’s events come flooding back to her, and she lies there taking deep breaths and trying to calm her racing heart.

She broke the curse. She saved Lambert’s life. She promised Voltehre she’d stay.

She hasn’t lived through so overwhelming a day since the day her family was banished from court. But yesterday was a good sort of overwhelming - the latter part, at least.

She gets up and bathes and dresses, and then pauses with her hand just touching this week’s rose and realizes she won’t need to put rose oil on her eyelids today. She’ll just be able to see everyone, because they’re not invisible anymore. She’ll be able to hear them, not just communicate by pantomime and slate. She’ll be able to talk to Aiden and have him respond with more than meows and body language. She’ll be able to look at Lambert and see a man, not a wolf-creature, even if he does still have topaz-yellow eyes.

(Milena is fairly sure that’s a mark of his clan, since all his brothers also have yellow eyes of one shade or another, including Voltehre.)

She tucks the rose behind her ear and goes downstairs in a distinctly cheerful frame of mind.

There are people in the great hall. The seats along the long, heavily laden table are full of burly men, all of whom turn to look at her as she pauses in the doorway. Milena is briefly taken aback at being the focus of so many yellow eyes - and two piercing green ones. Aiden and Lambert are seated at the foot of the table, with an empty chair between them.

There’s a brief silence and then a wave of cheering that fills the hall, whooping and hollering and applause loud enough that it rings from the walls and makes Milena take a step backwards in surprise.

“Milena,” Eskel says, rising from the head of the table and giving her a shallow bow as the noise dies down. “Good morning.”

“Good noonday,” Milena replies, to a wave of chuckles. Eskel grins and waves her towards the empty chair at the foot of the table. Lambert and Aiden are both staring at her with naked hope in their eyes; Aiden whacks Lambert on the arm, and Lambert scrambles to his feet to pull out her chair for her. Milena gives them both a warm smile as she sits down.

Eskel raises his tankard, and all the rest of the clan mimic him. “Brothers, I give you Milena, whose courage and kind heart have won our freedom.”

“Milena!” the rest of the men chorus, and drink deeply. Milena blushes so hotly she thinks her cheeks might catch fire.

“Aw, sweetheart,” Aiden murmurs, patting her shoulder gently. Lambert is glaring around at everyone else like he’s prepared to fight them for her honor.

To Milena’s immense relief, once Eskel sits back down, the attention turns from her; the men of the clan start to talk among themselves as they pass the platters of food around, the low rumble of conversation filling the hall.

“Sleep alright without a cat around?” Aiden asks quietly as Lambert starts to fill Milena’s plate and then his own.

“I did, thank you,” Milena says, smiling up at him. “Though I was rather confused this morning, I must admit.”

“Yeah, me too,” Aiden says ruefully. “Woke up and tried to hop off the bed without getting out from under the covers first. That didn’t go so well.”

“Kitty ended up swaddled,” Lambert smirks. “Like a babe.”

“Bastard,” Aiden sighs. Milena giggles.

Lambert gives her a crooked smile. “I spent the whole morning forgetting I didn’t have a tail anymore,” he admits.

“Oh no,” Milena says, pressing a hand over her mouth to hide her grin.

“Throws my whole balance off,” Lambert sighs, but there’s a smile hiding in the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes. “I’m gonna be spending months re-learning how to move without it. Also I put half a dozen things up where I could reach ‘em when I was cursed and now I’m too damn short.”

“He jumped,” Aiden informs her in a mock whisper.

Milena giggles so hard her ribs hurt.

The food is as delicious as usual, and she ate very little for dinner the previous night, out of worry, so she makes a fine meal of it. The rest of the clan disperses to whatever their usual duties are without any particular ceremony, several of them starting to clear the table as the rest of them wander out.

“I thought maybe the library?” Lambert says tentatively once they’ve all put their utensils down.

Milena nods. The library is a good choice: it is a neutral space, but one in which they all will feel comfortable, and is relatively out of the way, so Lambert’s brothers will not be obviously eavesdropping on the conversation.

It does feel odd to sit down in a chair across from Lambert, though, instead of joining him and Aiden in a heap on the hearth. Aiden doesn’t sit, but prowls about very like the cat he used to be; if he still had a tail, Milena suspects it would be lashing.

“So,” Lambert says. “I’m no good at tact, you know that, so I’m just gonna lay it out plain.” Milena nods. Lambert takes a deep breath and braces himself like he’s anticipating a blow. “I wouldn’t blame you if you decided to leave, but I’d sure as hell like it if you stayed. With me. With us. You’re the sweetest thing and you’re brave as a lion and I’d really fucking like to kiss you again.” He falls silent, biting his lip.

Aiden makes a soft, encouraging noise. “What he said,” he agrees. “Though I don’t think he’s said everything.”

Lambert gives Aiden a brief glare, then sighs, his shoulders slumping slightly. “I love you,” he tells Milena quietly. “I guess…do what you will with that.”

Milena has the distinct feeling that he expects her to fling the words back into his face.

She takes a deep breath. She broke a curse. She saved a life. She can do this.

“I talked to Voltehre last night,” she says quietly. Lambert’s head comes up and he blinks at her in surprise. “He…helped me figure out what I really wanted.”

Aiden pauses beside Lambert’s chair, resting a hand on Lambert’s shoulder, both of them watching her with wide, unblinking eyes. It looks like neither of them is breathing.

“I want to stay,” Milena says, and watches joy dawn in their faces like a perfect summer sunrise. “I love you, Lambert, and I am very close to being in love with you, Aiden, and I want to make a life here with you, whatever that ends up looking like.”

There is a single long moment where both men seem too stunned to move, and then she’s being scooped up out of her chair into Lambert’s arms, Aiden pressed up behind her so she’s entirely surrounded by their warm embrace, and Lambert is kissing her.

Milena throws her arms around his neck and kisses back.

*

Once upon a time, there was a great lord who had three daughters, and who brought them into exile with him when his fortunes changed. The eldest daughter remained with him all her days, and the two of them grew ever more bitter at their misfortune; and it is said that in time their bitterness overcame them, so that when they died, the lord became a spring of bitter water, and his eldest daughter a weeping willow beside it.

The middle daughter married a blacksmith, and with him moved to a town at the foot of the great mountains. She bore him many children, and they prospered and were happy for all their days.

And the youngest daughter - well. She went in her father’s place to a cursed castle, and by her courage and her kind heart she broke the foul enchantment, freeing the castle’s warriors from their long captivity. The castle’s fiercest warrior and his partner fell in love with her, and she with them; and when the curse was broken, she chose to remain with them for all her days.

So they lived for many years in the greatest happiness, and it may well be that they are living there still.