The Night Sister

“Fenton? Why?”


“She believed she was in love with him. She confessed the whole thing to me, when I confronted her about her nighttime wanderings, thinking she was the mare. She told me she’d been meeting Fenton in the tower at night for years now. They’d even discovered the secret room, but had no idea what it was for. She asked me about it during our talk yesterday, and I denied knowing it even existed. Anyway, in the beginning, Sylvie and Fenton would hide out down there and just talk late into the night. But as time went on and their feelings grew, they became…romantic. They were planning to run away together. To California.”

“But Sylvie—”

“Sylvie is gone, Rose. I took care of her body. Gave her a proper burial where no one will ever find her. The last thing we want is an investigation. If our secret was uncovered, I would never be able to protect you.”

Rose dropped her chin to her chest and began to sob. Mama moved forward and stroked Rose’s tangled hair with tentative fingers.

“I know it doesn’t seem like it, but it’s going to be all right. Like I told you, my mother discovered she was able to keep herself from transforming by using sedatives at night. We can start trying them on you. We’ll find a way, Rose.”

Everything Rose thought she knew fell away from her then.

“You can have a life. A normal life. I’ve lost one daughter. I won’t lose both.”

Rose looked up at her mother, who looked at her with eyes that simmered with fear, regret, and something else—loathing. She knew, knew that, try as she might, her mother would never forgive her. Sylvie would always be the good daughter: the beautiful moth with pale-green iridescent wings. Rose, even locked in a dungeon or cured by medicine, would always be the monster.





2013





Piper


Piper sat in shock as the nurse came bustling into Rose’s room, pushing the med cart. “Rose,” the nurse said, “time for your evening pills.”

Rose nodded, and dutifully took the tiny paper cup of pills and the cup of water with a flexible plastic straw from the nurse. She tipped the cup of pills into her mouth, took a sip of water, and swallowed.

“Good girl,” the nurse said. “You ring if you need anything.”

She nodded politely at Piper and said, “The pills can make our Rose a little groggy.”

“I understand,” Piper said.

And she did. They kept Rose medicated to keep her from disappearing. But what they didn’t know was that it wasn’t Rose in human form they were looking for when they found her bed empty at night—it was Rose in mare form, Rose as a black dog, or even an insect. She’d told Piper that it really wasn’t that hard for her to change into whatever she wished. It was a skill, like any other, something a mare develops over time. She’d also learned to transform at will when wide awake, and was able to keep a good part of her human consciousness—and conscience—once she’d changed. Mostly, however, she’d learned, over the years, to control it—to take just the right amount of muscle relaxants every evening to keep her from changing in her sleep, unaware.

The nurse wheeled the cart out of the room and turned left, making her way down the hall.

Rose stared at the jar on the bedside table with the luna moth inside.

“Charlotte showed us that jar that summer,” Piper said. “She told us you always believed it was Sylvie.”

Rose shook her head. “For about twenty-four hours I did, yes. But then I learned the truth: my sister died in that fall, and my mother covered it up; she hid the body so there wouldn’t be any investigation that might reveal our family secret.”

“So why did you keep the moth?”

Rose smiled bitterly. “I suppose as a reminder of how we all trick ourselves into believing what we need to believe.”