I first realized I wasn’t like everyone else when I was six years old.

  My friend Alia suggested making a swing out of curtains and hanging it in the garden. I tore up the last curtain to make a sturdy rope. Then I threw the rope over the branch of an old apple tree, and Alia and I hung from the ends of the rope, laughing, swinging, and bumping into each other. I was having a wild time, laughing and giggling uncontrollably, even starting to hiccup. And then I noticed Grandma, who had appeared out of nowhere. She was looking at me with clear disapproval, so I straightened my dress and put on a humble expression.

  “A young lady should carry herself with dignity, not behave like a kholop,” her voice sounded cold.

  I lowered my head in feigned repentance.

  “We decided to make a swing, Grandma, and we borrowed the curtains from the corner bedroom — it’s empty anyway…”

  “We?” Grandma interrupted me sharply. “Who is ‘we’? Whom have you dragged into your mischief this time?”

  “Well, it’s Alia, I told you about her. don't be afraid, greet the Voivodess,” I waved to my friend, who was shyly clinging to the trunk of the apple tree.

  Grandma's eyes turned to stone, taking on that dreadful, icy hue that signaled her rage. I recognized it at once and knew punishment was inevitable. What I couldn't fathom was the reason. Surely it was not because of the curtains.

  “Chrysocolla Lanstikun!” The fact that Grandma used my full name was a very bad sign. “There is no one else here in the garden besides you and me.” She spoke each word separately, with pauses. “How dare you lie?!?”

  I felt hurt and scared. I ran over to the tree, grabbed Alia by the hand, and pulled her toward Grandma.

  "I'm not lying. Here's my friend Alia. I told you about her..."

  Without even a glance at the girl, Grandma slapped me sharply across the face. I burst into tears, wounded and bewildered.

  “You wretched child! Don’t you dare!” she shouted, her beautiful pale skin flushing with angry red splotches. “Never repeat your foolish stories—and never, ever believe them! I won’t let you turn out like your father!”

  I recoiled in horror, pressing my palm to the crimson cheek. It wasn't so much the sting that hurt, but the deep, searing humiliation. Just then, Nurden, our steward, appeared. He gave me a brief, acknowledging nod before informing my grandmother, in a voice that was both calm and weighty, that the local elders were waiting for her in the audience hall.

  For a moment, Grandma stood frozen, a statue carved of ice. Then she drew a long, steadying breath, smoothed back her thick copper hair with its single streak of silver, and swept out of the room without a word.

  I kept on wailing. My nose was running shamelessly, but I was past caring. The steward didn't leave. Instead, he silently offered me a handkerchief. I tried to blow my nose, but the sobs kept wrenching through me—great, heaving waves of misery. I felt wronged by the whole wide world: by my friend who hadn't defended me, by Grandma for striking and screaming at me, by my father for his endless indifference, by my mother who flinched away from me, by the steward for witnessing my tears… by everyone, in short. Hiccups seized me then, racking my body, stealing my breath and my voice. I gulped air in ragged, desperate gasps, but the storm of tears refused to subside.

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  "Come now, Chrys. You'll cry yourself to exhaustion. What could have upset Voivodess Talma, your grandmother?"

  "She called me a liar!"

  "And what was your lie?"

  "I didn't lie at all! Alia and I made a swing from the curtains and were playing right here, and then she came... and ruined everything!"

  "Forgive me, my lady, but who is Alia?"

  "You too!" The hurt vanished, replaced by blazing anger. I stamped my foot and scanned the room for my friend, but she was gone without a trace. "You saw her. Alia, my friend. Pale little braids, a blue dress."

  "But, my lady," the steward began cautiously, "there are no other children in the castle besides yourself."

  "So you think I'm lying too?" I glared at him furiously.

  "Perhaps not," he said thoughtfully. He twisted the handkerchief in his hands, folded it neatly, and without looking up, asked carefully, "Besides yourself, who else has seen or spoken with Alia?"

  At first, I was taken aback, then I fell into thought. Alia and I spent a lot of time together, but usually either in the garden or in my room. She never came to the dinner table, nor to the stables, nor to my lessons.

  "No one. But that doesn't mean—"

  "My lady," the steward interrupted gently, "do you know what happened to your father?"

  "What?" I grumbled.

  "Your father is unwell," the steward paused thoughtfully, then continued. "He sees and hears things the rest of us never will. And with each passing day, he retreats further from us into his own imagined world..."

  I was stunned. On my last birthday, I had secretly slipped into my father's room. He was sitting in his armchair, his vacant gaze fixed on the window. I tried to get his attention and stood right in front of the window, blocking the light. Father didn't even stir; his gaze was focused right through me. I spoke to him, told him about my childish affairs, showed him my birthday gift—a large porcelain doll almost as tall as I was—but I never got a response. I got frightened then, burst into tears, worked myself into a hysterical fit, and fell asleep right there on the floor... That's where they found me. They gave me such a whipping with the birch rods that I couldn't sit properly for a month. So that's what it was all about...

  “Your grandmother fears for you greatly. Please do not hold it against her and try not to upset her further.”

  I fell silent, thinking.

  “I see Alia. I play with her. She tells me about herself…”

  “She is nothing more than a child’s fancy, my lady,” the steward said sharply. “She does not exist. Let us speak no more of it.”

  “How can she not exist? I see her. I hear her. Therefore, she does exist!”

  “But no one else can see her…”

  “What do I care about others?” I shot back. “Why do you assume that if others cannot see her, she must not be real? Perhaps they themselves do not exist? If I pretend not to see someone, will they vanish? And if I—”

  “My lady!” The steward was genuinely alarmed now. He drew a sharp breath, then another, deeper one, and dabbed his forehead with his handkerchief, grimacing when he felt it was already damp. “Has anyone ever told you about your great-great-grandmother, Chrysolite the Accursed?”

  “Yes,” I said. “Brother Anatol from the monastery made me memorize the lineage and histories of all our kin.”

  “Well then, your great-great-grandmother was mad. She, too, saw and heard things… things that were not permissible. But she managed—do you hear me?—she managed to harness her own madness. She led armies into battle while demons whispered counsel in her ear; she tore her enemies apart with her teeth and drew strength from her insane visions. She knew her foes' moves before they made them and could pass through walls; she could read minds, or believed she could…”

  “Was she a witch?”

  “She may have been. But she never showed it and never tried to convince anyone of her delusions. Otherwise, they would surely have burned her at the stake, rank and title be damned. That is why, my lady, I advise you: drive these visions away. Speak of them to no one. And if you are ever in doubt, come to me and ask if what you see is real. And if it becomes truly unbearable… well, then at least try, like your great-great-grandmother, to bend the madness to your will. Make it work for you, against your enemies, and not against you.”

  It was profoundly wise counsel that would serve me well many times in the years to come, and for which I remain grateful to the steward to this day, despite everything. Unfortunately, I was then too young and foolish to follow it fully or to tell my enemies from my friends. Though, in truth, I had no friends to speak of…

  At lunch, I apologized to Grandma. I told her I had invented an imaginary friend because I was lonely and had no one to play with. Alia sat on the chair next to me, giggling. I tried not to look at her. Grandma sighed with palpable relief and even seemed pleased. I felt no shame at all; the game had begun to amuse me. The only problem was that Alia stubbornly refused to vanish. She took to following me to meals and lessons, pushing herself insistently into my line of sight, sometimes throwing fits. My tutors grew displeased with me; I became distractible and absent-minded beyond all measure. But then, Alia began to appear less and less frequently, until finally, she disappeared for good.

  I still miss her sometimes. Of all my maras, she was the most pleasant.