"Where are we going, Mother?" Touko looked dubiously around the forest as the village faded further and further behind them.

"Opportunity," her mother replied. "You'll just have to trust me, dear."

The two of them had spent nearly a week traveling on foot. They had left the tiny peasant village Touko had grown up in and made their way to the larger village. Touko had thought that that had been their destination all along. However, that didn't quite explain why Touko had to bring all of her belongings, but her mother only brought a few weeks' worth of supplies. As a result, Touko was only partially surprised when the pair left the village after spending a night.

"Mother," Touko complained after awhile, "I'm hungry."

Her mother laughed. "Aren't you used to it? No matter." She passed Touko a small piece of bread and added, "You won't have to worry about that, I think, once we get to our destination." She looked at her map. "And we're almost there!"

Several hours later, a huge building like Touko had never seen before appeared before her. The four-story building, with its elegant, walls of pale-grey stone and tall windows with golden frames, seemed like a castle. A black gate at least twice Touko's height closed off the mansion and the surrounding garden, and she looked up at it nervously as she got closer.

"This is our destination?" Touko asked. Her small bag of clothing felt heavy as she gazed at the expansive estate. The sun reflected off the building and hurt her eyes.

Her mother silently pulled a string by the gate and a bell rang out through the garden. "Yes," her mother replied.

Touko looked at her mother. "Are you okay? What's wrong?"

"Nothing. I'm excited that we're finally here, but I'm a little nervous, too."

Touko felt frustrated that after all this time, she still didn't know what this was all about. "Well, now that we're here, could you please tell me what we're here for?"

Her mother started to respond but stopped as a lanky man in a neat suit approached the gate from the other side. "Are you Mrs. Fukawa?" He spoke with a cultured accent that Touko would later learn all the upper-class people spoke with.

"Yes, I am," her mother responded. "And this is Touko, my daughter."

"Excellent," the man responded. "I'll have the gate opened momentarily, and then I'd appreciate it if you two would follow me."

He left to unlock the gate, and Touko swiftly turned to her mother. "What's going on? Tell me, now," she demanded.

Her mother looked just above Touko's shoulder, not making eye contact. "The debt at home was getting to be too much," she began to explain. "You know, of course, that we haven't been making enough to, um, support the both of us. I need to stay at home to fulfill the contract… But I found a way for you to—"

Before she could finish, the sound of the gate creaking open interrupted her. The man returned, nodded to them, and proceeded towards the mansion's front door. Touko's mother didn't want to have a long conversation in front of the stranger but whispered to her daughter, "Opportunity."

Touko looked up at her mother in concern. Fear and anxiety were beginning to settle into a pit in her stomach in addition to the previous confusion. There must have been a reason that she hadn't been told the reason for the trip. She fiddled with her two long braids as they entered the majestic foyer.

The room was stunningly large. A marble spiral staircase led up to another floor. A crystal chandelier illuminated the room, which was adorned with not much except for a few bookshelves. Touko didn't have much time to examine the room before being led into an adjacent parlor.

She and her mother were seated on a plush red sofa. Looking at the grand piano in the corner, the stone fireplace, and the flower vase on the coffee table before them, Touko felt incredibly out of place in her shabby dress.

"I'll let my lord know of your arrival," the man said, leaving the room.

It was only a moment before Touko urged her mother to continue. Her mother said, "If everything goes according to plan, you can get a job here. I don't know what it will be, but I think it will be better than whatever I can offer you. I hope that maybe you can, um, live here, instead of spending your life supporting your mother."

Touko gaped blankly at her mother. "You mean you're leaving me here?" This can't be happening, she thought, growing frantic.

"It's for the best, honey, I promise. There are things you can get here that I could never offer you."

"But I can't just leave you! I don't care. I don't want to be separated from you. I'd rather support you than support whoever lives here. I don't care about being hungry, or anything like that."

Touko could have rambled on even more, but she was silenced by the look on her mother's face. She turned around to see a different man walk into the room. He was regally dressed and carried an obvious air of superiority.

He took one look at the two on the sofa and said, "I can't hire both of you. I only have one opening."

"Oh, that's fine, Mr. Togami," Mrs. Fukawa replied quickly. "I don't want a position. It's only my daughter."

"Hmph." Mr. Togami regarded Touko critically. "She's barely past childhood."

"Yes," Touko's mother confirmed, "but she's very capable. She helps me around the home all the time. And she's very intelligent, too. Perhaps she could serve as a tutor for—"

"My son would never need tutoring from a commoner."

"I-I'm sorry! I didn't mean to imply…"

"I'm sure you didn't." A heavy silence floated in the room as Mr. Togami seemed to consider his options. "I'll hire her as a basic maid. Cleaning, running errands as necessary, etcetera." He turned to face Touko. "Will you take the position?"

Touko's mother elbowed her gently. Touko desperately didn't want to accept, but she thought about what her mother would say…She really didn't have a choice. "I will," she said.

"Fine. We'll begin orientation immediately. I'll call your new manager." He turned to Touko's mother. "I'm going to have to ask you to leave the premises shortly. Kawaguchi will escort you out."

Mr. Togami left the room to summon the people he mentioned. Touko's mother faced her daughter. "I guess this is goodbye for now," she said.

Touko didn't have anything to say that expressed her feelings. She thought up so many phrases of anger, frustration, sorrow, loss, but none of them seemed appropriate to articulate. "I love you," she choked out.

"I love you, too." After saying this, Kawaguchi, the man who had escorted them in, came to escort Touko's mother out. They embraced tightly, Kawaguchi looking on understandingly, before the two of them left Touko alone in the parlor.

She wasn't alone for long, however. Very soon after, a short woman dressed in a plain, brown dress bustled into the room.

"You must be the new girl, right? What's your name?"

"Ah…My name is Touko Fukawa."

"Okay! I'm Mariko Miyaki, but you can refer to me as Mari. We're going to start off with a tour. It can be kind of overwhelming at first, so try to pay attention! The Togamis don't really account for the fact that it can take some people time to get adjusted to the layout of the house, but the rest of the workers here will help you out if you ask."

Mari talked enough for the both of them. Touko barely needed to say anything as she went from room to room. Her memory was decent enough, but she could definitely visualize herself getting lost often in the next few weeks. She would probably get lost partly due to not having perfect memory, but also partly to the fact that she wasn't completely paying attention. Throughout the tour, accompanied by Mari's amiable babbling, Touko imagined her mother making the weeklong journey home all by herself.