"How did you sleep last night?" Mrs. Thurston asked at breakfast. I pushed my oatmeal around its bowl with my spoon while my parents raved about how wonderful their room was. "And you, Cassie?"

I looked up briefly and shrugged. "Fine." I'd tossed and turned all night, half-waking several times from strange, vivid dreams. I'd only read part of the storybook, but what I had read must have crept into my subconscious. The stories were as strange as what had haunted me all night—witches and fairies and kings and queens just like any other book of fairytales, but they didn't make sense. Most fairytales had morals and predictable plots, but these didn't seem to at all. They seemed to stop too soon or go on for too long without saying anything meaningful. And yet Aunt Julia had said that I could learn something from them?

Mom gave me a look. "Aren't you hungry?"

That was code for eat it now, I knew. I shoved a spoonful into my mouth obediently. "So how come we haven't come to visit Aunt Julia before?" I asked after I swallowed. She'd hardly even been mentioned before my parents announced the trip. I'd vaguely known I had an aunt, a younger sister of my mother who lived far away and who I'd never met, but beyond that they'd told me nothing. Even when she'd first gotten sick they'd kept quiet. Until it got worse.

Dad stopped with his spoon halfway to his mouth and Mom pursed her lips. Mrs. Thurston looked down, studying her oatmeal with an intensity no breakfast food deserved. "Julia and I have never been very close," Mom answered carefully.

"But she's still your sister."

"Yes, she is. Let's say we have our differences."

"What does that mean?"

"It means that we don't get along well." She said it in the hard tone that meant I needed to drop the subject immediately.

I chewed on my lip for a moment. "Why didn't you tell me about her sooner, at least?"

Mom sighed heavily. "Because she's very sick, Cassie."

"Well I know that."

She gave Dad a pleading look and he took over. "Cass, Julia has had...mental problems since she was young. Delusions that sometimes turn dangerous. We didn't tell you about her because we didn't want to risk you being affected by them. You're a very imaginative girl."

"You think I'd believe someone's delusions?" If I was still five maybe that excuse would fly, but I wasn't so sure about it now.

"We thought it was best. But it doesn't matter anymore. We're here now, aren't we?"

"Yeah, I guess." Everybody continued eating silently. "So is that why she was acting so weird yesterday?"

"What do you mean?" Mom asked.

"When I went to take the flowers up to her she was awake and she seemed really confused and kind of spacey. She gave me a book and told me I could learn something from it."

"What book?"

"It's just a book of fairytales. It's up in my room."

"Go get it, let me see."

My room was down the other hall from Aunt Julia's, a light and open guest room with a window seat and bookshelves lining the walls. I had left the storybook on my bed and I retrieved it and returned to the dining room reluctantly. I didn't see what the big deal was about a kids' book.

Mom jumped up and grabbed the book from me as soon as she saw it. "Julia gave you this?"

"Yeah. What's wrong with it?"

Mrs. Thurston stood and placed a hand on her arm. "It's alright, Sandra, she does the same to everybody. She tells them to read those little stories and then they'll understand. It's just an ill woman's confusion. There's no harm in it."

"Julia made this when we were girls," Mom murmured, almost to herself. "She made up these stories and insisted that fairies gave her the book. I always thought she was just playing a game, the way kids do, but she could never let it go."

It seemed like a lot of work for a little girl, but that did make more sense than fairies. But for some reason disappointment flooded my chest. So there was nothing special about the book; Julia was just crazy. Somehow that took the fun out of having it, made it seem darker. "So there's no T, either, then."

"T?" Mom echoed, brow furrowed.

"The note in the book." I took it from her and flipped to the page the note was kept it, where I had left it since Julia had placed it there. "It says the book is from T."

She scanned the short note and waved a dismissive hand, closing the book again. "It's all a part of her game, Cassie, don't worry about it. If you're done eating why don't you help Mrs. Thurston clean up?" That meant we were done with the subject and any further questions on my part would not be received well. I nodded and headed towards the kitchen, giving in for now. "And I don't want you going to see Julia by yourself, alright?"

"Okay," I murmured.

"Don't look so gloomy, Cassie," Mrs. Thurston told me as she filled the sink with water to wash dishes. "Julia needs her rest and your father wasn't exaggerating when he said her delusions could get dangerous. Once, when she was maybe eight, she ran off in the rain and spent the night out in the garden without telling anybody. Your grandparents were worried sick. She was soaked and freezing by the time she got home. She's lucky she didn't get pneumonia."

That sounded more like a kid thing than a delusional thing, but I didn't tell her that. "She doesn't seem that crazy. Maybe she's just a little weird and has a big imagination. Or she's eccentric or whatever."

"Your aunt isn't crazy. She's sick."

I stared into the plate she'd handed me to dry. My dull, warped reflection stared back. "How sick?"

"Very." Her voice was infinitely sad and I remembered Mom telling me that Mrs. Thurston had been her and Julia's nanny when they were young. She must have had a real attachment to them, and seeing Julia sick must have been upsetting. I wanted to be more upset, but the fact that I'd never met Julia before made it hard. I felt bad that she was sick, of course, but I couldn't bring myself to summon up the worry and grief that I should have felt for a relative. I was more curious than anything.

"Why hasn't she gotten any help? Why isn't she in the hospital or something?"

"It's past that. She's more comfortable here." We both remained quiet for a long time, until Mrs. Thurston ran out of dishes to wash. "I'm going to get the breakfast dishes from Julia's room," she told me, dropping her wet sponge on the edge of the sink.

"Can I come?"

She looked between me and the door a few times, sighed, and motioned for me to follow. "You won't be going by yourself, I suppose, so your mother has no reason to complain."

I grinned and followed. Upstairs was slightly less creepy with another person with you, as I had discovered before going to bed last night, but it was still strange. Julia's bedroom door was open halfway and I could hear voices drifting from it down the hall.

"I like the flowers." That was Aunt Julia; her voice was recognizable anywhere, rough and strong, for a woman's voice, but pleasant.

The second voice was softer but slightly deeper, masculine, strange and musical. I couldn't make out the words well but I thought it said, "I'm glad."

"It's been a long time, hasn't it?"

"Yes, it has been. Years." There was some more murmuring I couldn't understand, and then in the second voice, "I'm sorry, Juliaesa. Sleep now."

Juliaesa. The note had been addressed to Juliaesa, not Julia. An odd nickname.

"Who's in there with her?" I asked as we reached the door.

Mrs. Thurston just shook her head. "Nobody. She's been having those conversations with herself a lot more often lately."

"She makes that voice, too?"

"See for yourself; there's nobody else there."

I hesitantly stepped into the room to see Julia lying in bed, one hand stroking the glass vase beside her. She gazed at it lovingly, looking only half aware of her surroundings. A couple books were scattered across the bedspread in front of her and she moved them closer to her as we entered, almost protectively. She was alone.

"You ate well this morning," Mrs. Thurston said with an approving smile, gathering up the dishes on the table. "That's good. Cassie, would you close that window, please? It's too chilly for it to be left open."

I pulled it shut, pushing the curtains out of the way so she would still have a view of the garden outside. "Who were you talking to, Aunt Julia?" I asked, unable to help myself.

Her voice was breathy and soft when she answered, as if she were speaking from a dream, different than before. "The fae."

"The fae?" I echoed, turning to face her.

"Faeries. Not like Tinkerbell—real faeries."

Mrs. Thurston smiled dryly and patted her arm. "Why don't you rest now, Julia?"

She sat up straighter, shaking her head, eyes brighter. "No," she said more clearly. "She needs to know about the fae, Margaret. The fae know about her."

A chill ran down my spine. "They do?"

"Yes," she said, nodding. "The fae I was speaking with just now, he does. He'd like to know your name, but I told him he'd have to ask you himself. He'll call you Cassiesa, he will. Just like he calls me Juliaesa."

"Why does he call you that?"

"It means 'dear Julia'. Esa is the fae tongue. He calls all his friends that. He'll teach you the fae tongue, if you ask."

"Alright, Julia, it's time to rest. Cassie and I have work to do." She gave me a stern look and I followed her out into the hallway. "You don't need to be encouraging her like that," she hissed once the door was closed.

I looked away. "Sorry. I just wanted to know what she was thinking. What's wrong with her, anyway?"

She sighed and began walking. "I told you, she's very sick."

I couldn't help myself. "What kind of sick?"

'Cancer, Cassie. When no other treatments were working she chose to spend her final weeks here and not at a hospital. She's comfortable here, and happy, and we've been assured that her...confusion is to be expected. But you don't need to make it any worse." As she spoke I saw her mask crack, blue eyes shining with unshed tears, and a pang of guilt hit me for asking so many questions. Julia may have been hardly more than a stranger to me but Mrs. Thurston had watched her grow up.

"I'm sorry."

"It's alright, Cassie. That's enough sad talk for now. Go on and find something happier to do; you're too young to spend all your time around illness."

Without a word I nodded and made my way back to my room, trying to think of what happy things there were to do in a house that sat waiting for death.