Perchance to Dream by Lisa Mantchev

“Who are you?”
    Bertie took a deep breath and stepped into her proper role. “I am the Mistress of Revels, Rhymer, Singer, and Teller of Tales, on my way to a distant castle to perform for the Royal Family.”
    As though on cue, the Incoming Storm arrived. Bertie’s free hand covered the scrimshaw medallion just before a droplet splashed down her nose, immediately followed by a dozen of its brethren. Squinting up, she marveled that the real experience felt exactly the same as the rain machines.
    “You’re wet enough already, and it wouldn’t be right for me to leave you out here to drown.” Rushing back to the laundry line, the woman pulled the remaining clothes from their pegs and tossed them atop a wicker basket. “Follow me.”
    “Er,” Bertie said, forgetting to be the Mistress of Revels, the Teller of Tales. “That is most kind of you.”
    “Come along, I haven’t all day to stand about the yard.”
    Keeping a wary eye upon the dog, Bertie followed the woman to the thatched-roof cottage and hesitated in the doorway. A merry fire burned in the hearth, string-tied bundles of dried herbs hung upside down from the rafters, and small pots of wildflowers dotted the table, the windowsills, and the mantelpiece with the sort of haphazard charm that indicated they’d been gathered by chubby fingers. “You’ve a lovely home.”
    “My thanks.” The woman’s voice dropped to a whisper as she jabbed at the cradle set in the corner. “It takes a lot of work to make it so, especially with the other children, thanks be they’re yet at school.”
    Bertie lowered her voice to match, sitting on a bench at the nearby table and setting the journal before her. “How many do you have? Children, I mean?”
    “Six, plus the wee one.” Passing the hearth, the farmwife dropped the basket on the swept-clean stone floor, removed lids from pots, and set the contents a-swish with a long-handled wooden spoon. Though she moved with the silent efficiency of one of the stagehands, a strange noise nevertheless turned into the hiccup-cry of a startled newborn. The woman sighed, and her voice returned to a normal volume. “This one’s hardly let me get a moment’s rest since she arrived.”
    Lifting the tiny thing from its cradle, she afforded Bertie her first glimpse of a real baby. There were no infants at the Théâtre; for performances, swaddled dolls took their place, and Bertie had never been a child who played with dolls. Mr. Hastings had offered a parade of teddy bears and dainty porcelain-faced beauties, but why would Bertie want an inanimate sawdust-stuffed thing when she could frolic with the fairies?
    Thus she was completely unprepared for the farmwife to ask, “Hold her a moment for me?” Without waiting for an answer, she deposited the baby in Bertie’s arms.
    Startled by the soft, heavy weight of it, Bertie stared down into the child’s tiny face. Surely not every baby had hair like golden peach fuzz, milky blue eyes, or brilliant flakes of pink on such fat cheeks. “She’s beautiful.”
    “Thank you.” The woman opened a cupboard door to sort through a selection of medicinal liniments and powders. “Where did I put that ginger? You ought to have something hot to drink.” The ingredients the farmwife culled reeked of heat and spice, and she muttered to herself as she pulled a gently steaming kettle off the hearth.
    Cautiously shifting the child, Bertie realized everything about the creature was as damp as her own skirts, from the spit bubbles the baby blew on berry-colored lips to her suspiciously soggy posterior. “I think she needs a change.”
    Tsk ing under her breath, the woman moved to take her progeny. “Oh, Beatrix, again?”
    All roads lead to Bertie.
    Bertie-the-elder got chills down her arms from something other than the cold outside. “Such a pretty name.”
    “After my mother.” The farmwife whisked the child away, removing the soiled cloth diaper and replacing it with lightning