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Etty doesn't get used to it - not exactly. Not in any sense that would leave her comfortable. She learns the routines, learns to reliably keep her dinner down, learns how limp she can go and how helpful she has to be to get it over with as fast as possible while remaining dissociated as she can manage from the experience.
She waits in the room, after, for a while, and - Nona doesn't come.
They might only get one chance. And Nona wants out too, and Etty shouldn't fault her for waiting, but she writes those thoughts on her scroll in terrible handwriting and cries and wishes that things would go faster.
She doesn't want to be one of the swans.
She's tried talking to them some more - tried imitating them, and when she does that they'll act like she's one of the flock and stop being afraid of her, but she can't get any glimmer of human memory out of them whatever prompts she tries.
She does not want to be one of the swans.
And the next girl won't even have the hope of Nona, the comfort of maybe soon.
She holds Nona, when Nona meets her in the orchard, and she thinks maybe soon, and one night she says:
"Do you - have any idea when you'll be able to say it?"
mute_pen
growcrooked
"I don't know," she sighs. "I keep trying to - think about it, and I keep not knowing."
growcrooked
"I love you," she says. "But I don't know how I did it, and I don't know how to make sure I never stop."
mute_pen
"When you did it," murmurs Etty, "what happened, what did it feel like, what were you thinking?"
growcrooked
"I don't know! I didn't really do it at all," she says. "It just happened. And not all at once or anything."
growcrooked
"I don't know," she sighs. "If you weren't the person I think you are, that might do it. But you are, aren't you?"
mute_pen
"I imagine if I turn into one of those - swans - there won't be any of me left to love."
growcrooked
"I'll still love who you were," she says, hugging her some more. "Who you are now."
mute_pen
"I love you too," weeps Etty; she wasn't sure if she did until just this moment, but now she is.
Time continues to pass. There is no summons the following night, but the night after that, it comes just after dusk.
The Baron brings her into the castle, and eats dinner with her, and carries her up to his rooms. As usual.
The Baron goes to sleep.
growcrooked
Nona comes very close to Etty, and she whispers in her ear, "I promise to love you forever."
The curse approves. The curse approves itself to death.
The curse approves. The curse approves itself to death.