Page 12 of The House of Quiet

Chapter Eight

A Bird at Work

As soon as Birdie enters another beautiful bedroom with another spoiled rich kid inside, she’s overcome with rage again.

All the pain and the injustice and the loss, all the anger she’s never been able to feel: It’s everywhere .

It’s boiling inside her, screaming that she needs to do something.

Anything. Someone needs to hurt because of how badly she hurts, and the red-faced, shouting girl in front of her is the perfect encapsulation of everything that has ever been taken from Birdie.

Her childhood, her sister, her future. She’s the reason Birdie has nothing.

Minnow balls her hands into fists and steps forward. It’s enough to jar Birdie out of her own mindless rage. Minnow’s about to do something terrible.

“Enough of that,” Birdie snaps. Minnow whirls, ready to turn her anger on Birdie, but Birdie’s looking only at Dawn, the final resident and the source of the feelings roiling in Birdie and Minnow.

Dawn is a short, pleasantly rounded girl wearing a frilly pink dress with a matching hair bow, awkwardly placed on a sloppy brown braid. “I know you were all talking about me!” she shouts. “Everyone talks about me! The only person who ever loved me was my nurse, and she made me like this, so—”

Birdie holds up a hand and cuts her off. “Stop acting like a baby.”

The girl gasps. “You can’t talk to me like that!”

“I can talk to you any way I wish when you’re making us feel like this for no reason.”

Minnow staggers backward, trying to physically distance herself from the feelings. At least she’s finally clued in to what’s happening and Birdie can focus on improving the situation rather than preventing disaster.

Dawn stomps a foot. “I have plenty of reasons! I’m trapped here, and my family abandoned me, and no one likes me, and—”

Birdie takes Dawn’s hands. Her voice is quiet, but her words are direct and unflinching.

She’s never spoken to anyone from the upper classes this way, but it has to be done, and her anger—Dawn’s anger—makes her bold.

“You’ve every right to be upset with your circumstances.

But you have a bed, and food, and a roof.

Which is more than many where I grew up.

And even those without would have used what they had to help those around them.

Because that’s what we do. When we feel trapped and miserable, we don’t let it poison us.

We help . You’ve been given an amazing gift to do just that, if you decide to use it. ”

It’s like someone pulled a plug. Birdie can feel all the outside anger draining away. But now that she knows the border between her own anger and Dawn’s, Birdie realizes just how much is left behind.

Birdie dips a light curtsy, at last able to respond how a maid ought to. “I’m Birdie, and this is Minnow.”

“I’m Dawn.” The girl is a little sheepish. Birdie feels embarrassment rising and refuses to indulge it.

Birdie smiles. “It’s lovely to meet you, Dawn. I’m sorry for how I spoke, but I was angry. I think you understand?” She definitely crossed a line. Cook doesn’t seem to care about the kids or how they’re treated, but Birdie won’t risk losing this position until she knows where Magpie is.

Dawn nods eagerly. “I do understand. It’s fine. Thank you for being so nice.”

“If it’s all right with you, I’m going to clean while Minnow starts your fire. You’ll feel better once your room isn’t so cold.”

Unlike River, Dawn just stands around awkwardly, watching them work instead of learning to do things herself. But it’s hard to be annoyed because Birdie’s feeling better. Hopeful, even.

Once the fire is crackling in the fireplace, Minnow slips out into the hall without a word. At least the atmosphere is pleasant now. Birdie leaves with a spring in her step that quickly tamps itself down when she sees Minnow waiting with a bored expression in the hallway.

Minnow follows Birdie into the next bedroom.

It’s empty at the moment, but inhabited.

Birdie assumes it’s Lake’s room, given the absolute chaos of the space.

There are random pieces of clothing abandoned in odd places and a washbasin turned upside down in the middle of the floor as though trapping something.

After picking up, Birdie sweeps out the fireplace while Minnow makes the bed.

“You’re doing it wrong,” Birdie says.

The glare that flickers across Minnow’s face makes Birdie glad the other maid doesn’t have the same ability as Dawn. “No, I’mnot.”

“You have to tuck the corners, like so.” Birdie pulls back all the bedding and redoes it in a fraction of the time it took Minnow.

“Why?”

Birdie glances at her from the side. “Why?”

“Yes. Why? Why do we have to tuck the corners like so ?”

“Because we do.” Further confirmation. Every maid knows how to properly make a bed and can do it in ruthlessly efficient fashion. Minnow isn’t incompetent, but she isn’t practiced. She’s never been a maid before. And without an ability like Rabbit’s, why would she have gotten this position?

“So,” Minnow says, “we can’t skip tucking the corners, but we’re allowed to yell at the residents? That will make working here a lot more pleasant.”

Birdie snorts a laugh. “We probably shouldn’t make a habit of it.” She leans back on her heels and shakes her head. “I couldn’t stand how selfish it was. Dawn in there, moping about how terrible she has it. When she can see that Nimbus is—” Her voice cracks.

“You know him,” Minnow says. She’s too perceptive for Birdie’s comfort.

“I used to work in his house.” Birdie sniffs to get her emotions back under control and continues.

“And with the wages for that specific ability, Dawn would be able to support an entire family. Anyone from my quarter would be overjoyed if the procedure resulted in that. I might have taken it a little too personally, though. It’s the ability I hoped for with—well, it’s a good one. ”

Birdie shakes her head, trying to clear it. Some of Dawn’s eagerness for approval is lingering. She shouldn’t say anything to Minnow that isn’t strictly necessary.

Minnow shrugs. “Probably would have gotten her shipped north immediately.”

Birdie stops mid–pillow fluff. “What?”

“With her ability. You know, they send people who can project emotions to the north for crowd control and interrogation.”

Birdie frowns. “ What? No, they end up working in hospitals. Or with children. That’s what all the pamphlets say. Where did you hear that?”

“Just a rumor,” Minnow murmurs.

“Who told you that, though? Do a lot of people say it?” If more young people are sent north than Birdie thought, maybe that’s where Magpie ended up, after she left the house.

“You’re doing that wrong,” Minnow says, pointing to the fireplace. She seems happy to be the one correcting Birdie now.

Birdie’s stacking the peat briquettes the same way she always has with wood. Minnow clearly relishes the correction as she crouches next to Birdie and edges her out of the way, efficiently arranging the peat and then lighting it.

“I don’t understand why Dawn’s here,” Birdie says, drifting to the window and staring out at the blank white mist softening the deadly landscape around them. “It’s not such a terrible ability.”

Minnow stands, wiping her hands on her apron. “Because her family thinks it’s shameful, so she does, too. Can’t have a daughter with the same ability as the help .”

“No wonder she’s so sad and angry.”

“Not anymore. You felt how much she likes you now, right? All it took was that nonsense about everyone helping each other.”

Birdie frowns, hurt. “That wasn’t nonsense. That’s what we do in my quarter. Why, what’s it like where you’re from?”

“It’s not like that on the coast,” Minnow says, voice flat. “We’re too spread apart.”

Minnow grabs the remaining scattered clothing, but pauses in the middle of the room, turning in a circle. “What do I do with these? Rabbit should know whether they go in the laundry, but I haven’t seen her all day.”

Minnow isn’t in a position to complain about another maid not pulling her weight, but Birdie decides not to comment.

“Just hang them for now. But…there’s no closet.

” Birdie glances around the room, puzzled.

“No drawers, either. Almost nothing for storing clothes or possessions. These rooms weren’t meant for long-term occupation. ”

Minnow lets out a noncommittal hum. “That’s odd, isn’t it?”

Birdie sighs. “Everything about this place is odd.”

All morning and into the afternoon, Minnow shadows Birdie, watching and imitating her. She might not be a maid, but she’s a quick study. Each room is tidied, each fireplace tended to. They avoid the rooms when they’re occupied, darting in as soon as the residents leave.

The work is simple enough, but there’s so much of it that Birdie barely has time to think. A sickly yellow glow suffuses the house as afternoon lengthens to evening and the sun at last pierces the ever-present fog.

“I’ll pop upstairs and make sure everything’s good there,” Minnow says, darting off before Birdie can tell her upstairs isn’t a priority.

It’s nearly suppertime, so Birdie heads toward the kitchen to offer to help Cook.

She freezes and ducks back behind the hall corner, though.

Cook is standing outside the kitchen, grasping Lake by both her arms. Birdie carefully peers around.

Cook’s back is to her, and Lake isn’t tall enough to see over Cook’s shoulders.

“What did you mean?”

Lake says nothing. Cook shakes her. Birdie watches in alarm, unsure what, if anything, she should do.

“Tell me what you meant when you said they were going to take the House Wife away soon! Who? When? This is where she belongs, where she’s safe.”

Lake speaks at last. “Do you still see their faces?”

“Whose faces?” Cook demands, practically shouting.

“The children in the bog.”

With an animal moan of despair, Cook shoves Lake aside and slams into the kitchen. Birdie stays where she is, heart racing. Why does everyone in this house have secrets, and why can’t any of them be the secrets that Birdie needs revealed?