Tilly slowly unwound a tendril of Elenora’s golden hair from around the iron curling rod.  She had to carefully control the temperature of the wand as well as her temper so she would not burn the hair clean off.  It took almost all the willpower she possessed. 

Her own hair was a rich wavy auburn was pinned up and hidden under a frilly white cap like all other who were in service were subjected to.  But every day Tilly would grit her teeth and curl Elenora’s hair using her ability is a bi-linker, or blinker as it was commonly known, to heat the iron rod.  Blinkers with inlinks to different metals, woods, or fabrics were sought after by the highlinkers to use as servants.  Highlinkers considered themselves the zenith of modern society and their households resembled those of Victorian England, so they could rule their tiny little worlds.  Tilly angrily yanked a new piece of Elenora’s hair, which earned her a cool look in the mirror.  This particular highlinker ruled Tilly’s world.  Her ruler’s eyes continued to watch her as Tilly forced her face into the expression of calm contentment with a hint of deference that she knew Elenora liked to see. 

"Tilly, you seem stressed, perhaps you should go rest and call Lila to come finish this," Eleanora’s voice was full of concern, but Tilly knew it was a trap.  Elenora loved to pit the housemaids against each other.  Some of the girls would play along with it for their own entertainment, but Lila worshiped Elenora and had no ambitions to move up in the world.  Tilly did not think Elenora was aware that any of her maids were disloyal to her, but she did not want her to find out that Lila was more dedicated to the family than her.  Despite Tilly’s resentment of the class system, at least she had a link and had been selected to use it for Elenora, instead of in the kitchen where many of the fire-linked ended up.  Luckily, Tilly’s second, albeit weaker, an earth-link was silk.  It was a useless link before she entered service, but now it smoothed Elenora’s dresses and kept them from wrinkling.  She formed her links by simply touching the iron or cotton.

Elenora was a highlinker.  Beautiful, elegant, wealthy, and privileged.   Her wealth and privilege were due to her four links.  Her beauty and elegance, just made Tilly resent her even more, but she pretended to worship her “lady”.  Elenora had never used her links in front of Tilly – she rarely told Tilly anything of importance, but Tilly had a feeling that they were either incredibly rare links or incredibly useless, perhaps both.  She’d heard rumours that some highlinkers spent years trying to determine their linkages, as links were so closely tied to status.  She laughed inwardly at the thought of spending years testing links only to find you were linked to castor oil through taste or to porcupines through touch.  She knew Elenora’s father was a Snap – his access to his links were only possible through sound.  He always carried a pan flute with him and its whistle could be heard through the house.  She had no idea what his other three inlinks were – probably a cow’s moo or a glass breaking.  Tilly’s father had been linked to iron and dandelions, and her mother to silk and pumpkin seeds, both through touch, so the whole family were Powks.  The majority of the population of Sen Fynniskoh were Powks, as it was the most common inlink.  Occasionally people with different links would have children, but the children would only have access to their links through one inlet, as all people did.  Her younger brother was linked to dandelions and pumpkin seeds.  Most of her friends seemed to have links that had been passed on from their parents or grandparents, but occasionally a random link popped up.  Her mother said her pumpkin seed link was the first recorded in her family, although it may have been a missed link because pumpkins were so rare.  Or perhaps it was due to Tilly’s grandmother’s penchant for pumpkin pie during her pregnancy.  It was the outlink that was seemingly random.  Tilly’s mother could only sense pumpkin seeds, but her brother was earth-linked to pumpkin seeds and could make them grow only by holding them in his hand. 

The door to Elenora’s room burst open and Elenora’s posse arrived with shrieks and laughter.  Elizabetta, Gloriana, and Isabella were highlinkers, with the corresponding four-syllable names that all highlinkers bore.  They all had their hair done piled in intricate curling designs in the style of Marie-Antoinette and flawless make-up that Tilly had spent countless hours practising on the other maids learning to apply.  Elizabetta walked over to Elenora’s dressing table, which was by a large bay window that overlooked High Park.  She snatched the curling rod from Tilly, which Tilly loosened her grip on at the last second and flared her link, causing Elizabetta to pull the rod harder than she needed to, hitting herself in the chest with it.  The rod left a sizeable hole with brown burn marks around the edges in her light blue taffeta gown that Tilly thought looked like a giant birthday cake.  Elizabetta looked down at the burn and inspected the hole with a sigh, and then casually smacked Tilly across the mouth without any expression on her face, as if she was bored.  Tilly’s eyes watered, and she carefully explored her lip with her tongue to find where it was bleeding.

Elizabetta turned and announced, "Elenora, your maid is incompetent and I now need a new dress."

"Your dress was atrocious and you know that blue is my colour, you’d have had to change anyway.  Tilly has done us a favour."  Elenora gave a small smile to acknowledge the snickering of Gloriana and Isabella.  "And as for a dress, my darling, you’ve eaten everything in sight for the past 6 months.  There is no dress in my closet that would fit one of your thighs."

Elizabetta’s mouth dropped in outrage, "Elenora, you...I...am"

Elenora continued speaking over Elizabetta’s stuttering, "Either that, or you’re having Samuel’s little lunker baby."

Her friends gasped at her casual use of the word lunker.  It was slang for an unlinked person, but highlinkers used it as an insult to those who married a person from a lower class.  Highlinkers were completely unforgiving to those who dallied with those beneath them, even the trinks. 

"Samuel is a wonderful man.  His father is a surgeon who may become a honourary highlinker any day now," Elizabetta had become defiant at the mention of Samuel.

"Honourary links do not include family members. Your baby would still be a lunk.  But that is beside the point, you’re not pregnant, and even if you were, we could never let you keep it.  We’d take a grand tour to Asia," Elenora smirked and Gloriana and Isabella looked relieved as Elizabetta relaxed.  Elenora continued, "And then give the baby to Tilly to raise." 

Everyone looked over to Tilly who they had forgotten was still in the room.  She was making herself busy tidying the half dozen dresses that Elenora’ had discarded before choosing the light blue silk gown she now wore that matched her eyes, which were now dancing with amusement. 

"You.” Elizabetta had quickly recovered her highlink bearing and commanded Tilly, “Foster mother to my baby. Fix this," she said pointing to the gaping hole in the bodice of her dress.

Tilly looked at it thoughtfully.  At least the rod had not burned through her underclothes - Elizabetta probably would have hit her hard enough to lose teeth.  Tilly reached out to the silk fibers of the taffeta.  She was weak in her manipulation of silk, but she could change its colour slightly, mend small tears, and smooth it.  Cleaning the silk was beyond her ability – her outlink joined to the earth, not to water.  This hole she could probably manage.  First she took a pair of shearing scissors she kept in the pocket of her oversize apron.  They were useful for trimming Elenora’s hair, flowers for display in Elenora’s rooms, or to discourage the men in the house from being too bold. Tilly carefully cut a strip of fabric from the train of Elizabetta’s dress and smoothed the edge to hide the cut.  It was a neat job and no one said anything, so it must be okay.

Tilly moved around to Elizabetta’s front.  With her eyes cast down, she asked humbly, "Miss, would you care to remove your dress for its repair?"

Elizabetta raised an eyebrow at her friends and then audibly began to tap her foot.  Tilly shrugged off her irritation and cut the long strip of fabric into six piece that together were wide enough to cover the hole.  She cut them to length and the held her breath as she linked them together.  It worked.  She tucked the now whole piece of silk into the hole and attempted to change the colour of the singed edges.  She was able to darken the brown and make it the colour of oatmeal, but could not make it blue. 

"Why don’t you cut away the burned area," Isabella called out.  Isabella was the quietest of the four girls.  Tall and impossibly freckled, with light brown hair that never seemed to hold a curl.  She was, however, the nicest to people in service.  Tilly had heard even she volunteered to assist poor lunkers. 

"Be quiet.  Don’t help her," Elizabetta snarled.  It was as if she wanted Tilly to fail.  She probably wanted to hit her again. 

Tilly brought out her small pair of scissors that she used to shape Elenora’s nails.  The other girls in the house had nails in varying state of polish for weeks while Tilly learned this skill.  She carefully cut the burn mark away from the dress trying not to make contact with Elizabetta’s more than ample bosom. 

After a few tense moments the dress was whole again and Tilly let out a small sigh of relief now that she was safe.

Elenora idly twirled a curl, looking thoughtful and cruel.  She was starting a new trend of wearing her hair down.  Tilly turned to her and bowed her head waiting for instructions, "Tilly, you may pack your things.  I no longer require your services.  You are dismissed."

Next Chapter: Spy - 2191