Few people welcome the sight of a snake at any time, but to wake up to a snake is especially unpleasant for all but the most fervently ophidiophilic. There are two ways a scared person tends to react to a snake, either by screaming and jumping around in a panic or by freezing in abject terror. This woman took the latter option.

The woman's eyes widened, half because she was being addressed by a talking cat and half because she believed what the talking cat was telling her. Happy, however, was quick to defend his honor as a good, decent, respectable serpent.

Prissy grinned again, this time more slyly and directed at Happy.

Confused, Happy cocked his head and asked, "Is that wrong? Kamellia never said anything."

Happy prided himself in being a polite sort of snake, so the revelation of his inadvertent rudeness cut him to the quick. Desperate to make amends, he turned back to the woman and began to bob his head apologetically.

The woman did not quite know how to take the snake's apology, but few would. There was also the matter of said snake still lying on top of her. Pythons, even the magical variety, are not the lightest of creatures, which certainly did not help anything.

Prissy snickered at the exchange, drawing Happy's attention, and his ire.

Prissy rolled her eyes.

Happy turned to the venerable old raven and asked him, "Is she really an Ancient, Ramstein?"

Before Happy could finish what he was about to say, Giger came into the room.

The woman did not say anything in reply. She only looked at him blankly. After all, a green-haired man in gaudy robes is not what you typically expect to wake up to.

The woman touched her earlobes and then her neck, taking notice of the items in question for the first time. The earrings were simple jeweled studs and the choker a plain black ribbon with a jewel in the center.

Ramstein finally intervened. "For God's sake, get her some water. The poor child has not used her own voice in over three hundred years."

Returning after a minute, Giger presented the woman with a cup of water.

The woman sat up with some difficulty, accepting the cup nervously. She took an experimental sip before downing the contents in a single, slow draught.

She had barely finished when Giger asked her, "Is that better?" and then quickly demanded, "Now say something."

First, the woman could only mouth the sound silently, and then slowly began to stammer, "Wh, wha..."

And then the floodgates opened.

Prissy rolled her eyes. "We get her to talk and now she won't shut up."

Giger held up a hand and told the woman, "Stop. You're giving me a headache."

Though breathing heavily from getting so worked up, the woman went quiet and after a moment, Giger started talking again.

The woman just sat there, her mouth hanging open. It took quite a while—and considerable struggle on the woman's part—to even make the first sound.

This was hardly the answer Giger was expecting, or hoping for.

Giger bit on his finger again while he brought his thoughts into order.

Giger shot Prissy a mean glare, which was enough to silence her for the time being.

Awkwardly, the woman accepted his hand and asked him, "Why are they talking?"

This caught Giger's interest.

Like a schoolgirl in the classroom, the woman raised her hand to get their attention.

Giger looked at the woman a moment, then adjusted his glasses, crossed his arms and said, "I'll tell you what my theory is. The only one who can confirm it is you, when, if you ever get your memory back. There was a great disaster that nearly destroyed the world. We call it the Cataclysm. There weren't many survivors. The stories say one in ten, but we have no way of knowing the actual numbers. Scattered throughout the world are these bronze statues as old as anyone can remember. Here in Vigau alone I've counted four hundred thirty-seven complete specimens, counting you."

Giger went over to the dresser, picked up a photograph and handed it to the woman.

It was the selfsame statue on Rue Meredy that Giger chose for his experiment.

Looking at the film plate, disbelieving was she saw, the woman said, "This statue... is me?"

The film plate fell from the woman's hands as the realization sunk in.

Giger shrugged.

Whatever his plans, nothing much would be accomplished standing around in the bedroom. Giger's rather limited patience had lasted about as long as it could.

With that, Giger left the room and so the woman was back to having only the three familiars for company. Prissy stood up, arching her back to stretch as cats will do when they first get up. After stretching her arms and legs as well, she looked to the woman and said in annoyance, "Well? Don't just lie there. Let's go."

The woman pulled the cover off her and took her first clumsy step out of bed. She was unsteady on her feet, dressed only in a simple shift that was little more than a bag with three holes for her arms and head. The shift only extended to about mid-thigh. She could not help but feel a bit of a draft.

A chill ran up her spine as she felt Happy brush past her foot. He looked up at her. She did not fail to notice that he was slithering between her legs and was overcome with a sudden flush of self-consciousness. She clutched at the hem of the shift for whatever good it would do her, turning bright red in the process.

Prissy swatted Happy's head.

This did nothing make the woman any less flustered.

Happy looked at the woman and said, "I don't think she's going to try anything, Prissy."

Prissy then led the woman downstairs. The woman had some trouble maintaining her balance on the narrow stairs and held fast to the rail with both hands like some arthritic grandmother.

Prissy hopped up on the counter and said, "Here's the kitchen. Back through there is the toilet and the bath." She then hopped down and led the woman through the house. "Over here is the dining room. Entryway right here. And here's the living room. That's it."

The woman looked around to take in her surroundings. Seeing the the unremarked door at the far end of the living room, she pointed to it and asked, "Where does that door lead?"

Though the cottage was small, it was still a lot for the woman to take in. She started to get unsteady on her feet again and nearly fell when she was caught by none other than Giger himself, who appeared quite unexpectedly.

Giger took the glasses off his own nose and put them on the woman.

The woman squinted and said, "It helps. A little."

Giger gave his feline companion an annoyed look. "Will you give it a rest, Prissy?" He then turned his attention to the young woman. "You, have you gotten a feel for the place."

The woman's annoyance quickly faded when she realized she had no rejoinder.

The woman cocked her head.

For the first time, a wry grin appeared on the woman's face as she asked him, "Does that mean I can call you Piggy? Ow!"

Her comment earned her swift judgment by Prissy, who latched into the meat of her calf.

A sudden transformation came over Giger. He took hold of the woman's shoulders and beamed, "This is great! You're human after all! An Ancient!"

Giger was so overcome that he actually hugged the woman, causing a fresh blush to rise to her cheeks. She might have demanded an answer for his forwardness, but that was only a secondary concern at the time. Right now her actual nature was far more important.

The initial wave of euphoria passed and Giger released the woman—who we will now call 'Gally'—and cleared his throat as he regained his composure.

Gally could not find it in herself to share his elation.

With that thought in mind, Giger made a beeline to the door to his study.

And with that, Giger slammed the door behind him and was gone. Gally, Prissy and Happy were left looking blankly at each other.

Before Prissy could come up with some task for Gally, it was perhaps a mercy that they were interrupted by a knocking at the door. Or it would have been a mercy were it not for the potential threat it represented. Gally stood there uncertain of what to do, but Prissy was already on her guard, the fur on her back bristling at the possible danger waiting on the other side of the door.

Prissy and Happy withdrew to the kitchen. From there they could peek at the living room with less chance of being seen themselves and if there was any actual danger, they would have multiple options for escape. Though Gally did not understand the sort of threats they faced, fear is primal sort of emotion and it does not take much get it working.

The knocking at the door repeated a second time. A pause. Then a third time.

And then the door cracked open. Perhaps it was their imagination, but it seemed like the hinges were screaming.

However, it was no monster, burglar or any other such thing that stepped in but rather a well-groomed, well-dressed young man who called out in a soft voice, "Master? Are you in?"

The danger having passed, the wary Prissy immediately changed her attitude. She sprang forward, happily crying, "Yugo!"

She leapt into the young man's arms, who handily caught her, cradled her like a baby and scratched under her chin.

Purring loudly, he eyes closed in contentment, she nevertheless chided him, saying, "Don't you know it's rude to barge into people's houses? I thought you were a Witch-hunter."

The young man—Yugo—worked his way from Prissy's chin to behind her ears as he said, "Master Taus is always in his laboratory. If I don't invite myself in, I'll never get my lessons."

It was then that Yugo took his first notice of Gally. Whether it was because he was taken by the sight of her or because he was embarrassed for not noticing her sooner or a little of both, his cheeks flushed a little as he gave her a slight bow.

It was Giger, who yet again made a convenient appearance out of nowhere. This ability's connection to his wizardry remains uncertain.

Yugo let Prissy down to deliver a more formal bow to Giger.

Ignoring Prissy's objection, Yugo looked uncertainly at Gally and then back to Giger.

That reassurance was enough for Yugo. He turned his attention to Gally and extended his hand to her.

Gally took Yugo's hand, but rather than shake her hand, Yugo brought it to his lips and gave it a kiss in a demonstration of old-fashioned chivalry.

He was blushing and Gally was blushing as well. The display did little to impress Prissy.

If she had been more in sorts, Gally may have objected to the insult, but for the time being, she simply took the abuse.

Yugo looked at Gally a moment longer before asking Giger, "Master Taus, forgive me for asking, but where are Miss Gally's clothes?"

Gally found herself blushing more hotly, but Giger was quick with an answer.

Annoyed by his apprentice's excessive display of concern but eager to mollify him to put an end to the conversation, Giger said, "I intend to give her an advance on her first month's pay to get some clothes. If you're so worried about her, why don't you go buy her something, rich boy?"

Giger could only roll his eyes at Yugo's clumsiness and quipped, "Good luck getting her size right."

Prissy got in on the action and said, "She's barely got a curve one to her, so it shouldn't be too hard."

Prissy sighed, "Ah, I wish I had a white knight come to my rescue."

By now Giger had his fill of all the back-and-forth.

Gally followed Prissy and Happy to the kitchen, where they took a seat on the stairs, out of sight but not quite out of earshot.

Giger cut him off.

Yugo did not give up, though.

Gally was hanging on every word, but Giger was having none of it.

Defeated, Yugo simply replied, "Yes, Master."

Over Prissy's objections, Gally was granted access to Giger's bedroom to try on all the new clothes Yugo gave her. That alone took most of the time remaining until supper. The meal was a fillet of pan-fried fish and some chopped turnips that were fried with it. Giger told her that he expected her to come up with a better menu once she started cooking. Though she could not remember anything from her previous life, for some reason cooking seemed to be a weak point of hers. She imagined a woman's voice telling her she was never going to get a husband. Her mother, perhaps? Or was it just her imagination?

At the moment, she was going over everything that had happened in the bath. It took over an hour just to draw the bath, filling the buckets and heating them on the stove. She did not go into the bath right away, though. Instinct told her to wash first before getting into the tub. She prepared two extra buckets, one to get herself wet and another to rinse off. She was on the latter step when she felt a breeze.

She turned to see three sets of eyes peeking in at her. Her reaction was perfectly natural. She screamed.

Her scream was followed by hasty footfalls scrambling to the door. Giger then burst in, scattering the three familiars.

Gally screamed again.

Covering herself with one arm, she reached out with the other to grab a bucket and threw it. Young David himself could not have struck truer when he felled Goliath.

Gally stood with her arms crossed, no less angry than him but without half as good a reason by his reckoning.

Gally recalled the film plate of the statue on the street corner. It was a nude and if it was indeed her, then Giger was right that everyone in town had been looking at her stark naked for the past three centuries.

Overcome with mortification, with that same woman's nagging voice ringing in her head, she muttered, "I'll never get married..."

That left Ramstein, who should have had the least reason of the three of them.

Ramstein puffed up his feathers in offense and said, "I do not know why you have all this hostility toward Master Grummond, but the accusations could not be farther from the truth. At any rate, I am under no obligation to answer."

Prissy's objection to the double standard was swiftly overruled.

Giger turned his attention back to Gally and asked her, "Anyway, why did you take off your choker?"

Setting that aside, Gally then asked, "Am I really supposed to work as your housekeeper?"