Two days now since the army left.

Naira and I sleep together in a tiny room in the eaves. We don’t fit into the life of the other servants of the palace—except that we take our meals with them. Otherwise, we are apart from that peculiar life the upper servants, the decorative servants, share in any big institution, a life subservient to, but Otherwise just as idle and pleasant as, the life their owners lead.

I have passed Yle several times. She looked inscrutable at me, and I wondered if there was surprise and triumph, at my presence here after the going of the Northern army, behind the features.

The strange animals I saw my second night here, which live usually jabbering about the tree and the fountain, are a small tribe of hybrids or half-human freaks. They must have been captured, perhaps generations ago, from somewhere in the surrounding mountains and have been tamed as pets or servants. I suppose they are mainly pets, but they are used to prune the lawns and trees, as grass and leaves and all that stuff is their diet, so they are allowed to feed on it on condition they take only what should be taken. They are called not by names but by numbers. In their own way they each have a limited kind of individual personality. 3 is a perky little thing, male I think, with a cock’s comb on its head. 7 is definitely female. She is taller and strangely beautiful and almost humanly attractive. She is the especial pet of the governor, in fact her status and mine are about equal, and she is luckier because presumably she dislikes it less. They call her too by a number. She doesn’t know she is a number, she knows the sound is hers and presumably thinks she has a name just as all humans and dogs do. She comes to it blithely, unaware she is considered only as a brute. Of course it wouldn’t mean anything to her even if she could be told, but it doesn’t seem fair.

It has now dawned on me that Yle does not feel gloating triumph about my captivity, but envy and respect for the honour I have been shown.

Yet I am not, except in the one sense, at all a mistress.

The tiny room Narra and I share is nothing. I am not allowed to speak to him, it makes him impatient and he only grunts. I am allowed no privileges.

Twice I have begged him to excuse me when he called for me, because it was my monthly period. He replied that that made no difference to him. So, of course, twice my subterfuge was revealed. But in that case I’m not looking forward to the time when it will be true.