"I am supposed to choose for you, but what would you like?" Annie said, frowning at the menu and then glancing up at Bella and me. She had collected us both from our respective houses and walked us into the village to eat in the café. It was a regular haunt for us, before my transformation, and I could tell that she was trying to be nice. She might have teased me before and then paddled me, but we were all friends, her only friends in Meadvale. Annie was dressed in civvies, because it was her afternoon off, a simple skirt and sweater, whilst Bella and I were wearing full gowns, obviously.

"Anything you think appropriate for us, Miss Stewart." Bella replied demurely. It was exactly the right thing to say, of course. Annie was certainly in charge. But I could tell that Annie was not inclined to impose her authority for once. She scowled at Bella and then turned to me.

"You like the lasagna, don't you, Daphne?"

"Yes, Miss Stewart...thank you, Miss Stewart."

"You don't have to be so...docile...I am off duty and I wanted to take you out as a friend...I am not going to tell anyone if you speak out of turn, I promise." Annie hissed, leaning forwards so that none of the other customers could hear. "It is probably best that you still call me Miss Stewart, but I mean it...lighten up, please?"

"Yes, Miss Stewart...thank you, Miss Stewart," I repeated, raising my eyebrows to show her that I understood.

"Ok...so, one lasagna...what would you like, Bella?"

"May I have the chicken and pasta, Miss Stewart?"

"Yes, you may...honestly, I do think this is all going a bit far," Annie murmured, glancing at the waitress. "I know I have had to do my job...and Bella, I know this is your community and your home...but Daphne, you can't be happy about this?"

"Daphne and I are both maidens, Miss Stewart," Bella responded, her eyes turning to me as she spoke. "Of our own free will...it is not easy being under discipline, but our families know what is best for us...don't they, Daphne?"

"I...I think so...and I was warned that it would be hard, Miss Stewart." I replied, uncertainly but honestly. I knew what Annie was thinking and I guessed that she wanted to help, but Bella was right, I had chosen my own path and I had promised to behave. Dear Annie clearly thought I was mad, and considering my first few days of maidenhood, I could see her point, but she did not understand how I felt about my Reformist family, or how much I wanted to be a part of the Meadvale community. I had tried to explain it to her before I took my vows, and although my first four days had not gone according to my plans, I knew that was my fault, because I was not giving myself completely to the doctrine.

"This is all about what that stupid American bitch said about you, isn't it? Honestly, you do not have to do this, Daphne...you have your own money, and your parents...we could leave with Bella, and you could go back to normal...because this is too much, isn't it?" Annie insisted as she looked at both of us, almost begging us to see sense. I glanced at Bella, wondering what she thought, whilst imagining doing what Annie was suggesting. She was probably right; I did have my parents and they would support any decision I made. But they would be disappointed in me. They liked Mr and Mrs Hughes, and I had told them how happy I was to be joining the church and the community. If I turned up on their doorstep after four days, they were not going to be pleased, because they had spent a lot of time learning about what I was doing and getting to know my new family. I did have money, which was something Bella had not had, when she was forced to choose between her family and her independence. But I did not know what use money would be to me without my sisters, and I was not sure I wanted to live in the modern world anymore. "You can't tell me that you really want to live like this?"

"It is very kind of you to worry about me...us...Miss Stewart," I said, glancing at Bella again as I burned the last of my bridges with my old life. "But I must honour my vows...I never want to leave my family, Miss Stewart."

"Can I take your order?" The waitress said, appearing at Annie's side, because she did not expect two maidens to be ordering the food, of course. Annie took a deep breath.

"Yes...I think we are ready," Annie responded, giving me one last glare. "I think I will have the fish and chips, and the girls will both have the plain salmon, with spinach, broccoli and cabbage, please. And I will have a glass of prosecco, and the girls can have apple juice."

"Coming right up." The waitress grinned, writing on her pad, and I hung my head, well aware of what I had just done. Annie closed her eyes for a moment, probably counting to ten, and then sat back in her chair, staring at me.

"So...Daphne dear, how are you getting along with your new nanny?"

"Miss Davenport is very nice, Miss Stewart."

"She told me that she had messed you before I arrived?"

"Yes, Miss Stewart."

"Good for her...you are far too inexperienced to reliably last from breakfast until bath time of course...and you are sleeping in the nursery now, I hear?"

"Yes, Miss Stewart." I admitted, realising that Annie was really furious with me. But there was nothing that I could do about it, of course. It had only been four days. I had a lot of settling to do, and a lot of thinking. And she was speaking as if I was in prison and needed help breaking out, which was not true. Bella and I were both with people who loved us and wanted us to find peace and happiness in the community, safe from the perversions of the modern world around us. And that was what I wanted, after a tumultuous six months. Annie was right, Miss Candy Wellman had upset me, more that I had ever admitted, but it was more than that. I did not much like the world I saw around me. Outside of Meadvale, the world was nasty, and dirty, and really rather cruel, and I did not feel at home there. I had gone from school, and my family home, to Norland, which was a unique, protected environment in its own way, and then to Charlesfield and Meadvale without getting too much experience of the adult world, and it scared me. Candy and her vicious accusations, and some of the comments I had read under the girl's social media posts, simply reinforced the growing feeling that Meadvale was the place for me. And I could not just jump into the community and be accepted as one of them, obviously. I was still young and clearly inexperienced, and I had to learn, and really earn, my place, just like Bella, just like any other nursling stepping up into the adult world as a maiden had to do. Normally, as Bella had mentioned, we would have been eighteen at that stage, but Bella and I were both different to most maidens, but that did not make us special cases. No allowances would be made for us at all, because if the community ever did that, they would end up weakening the whole. It might have been different, before Nicola and her silly friends provided the catalyst for a renaissance of the Reformist movement. Exceptions might well have been made for someone like me, and Bella might have been allowed to teach for a few more years and marry in her own time. But that was not to be.

"And you are happy with that, Daphne?" Annie asked, no longer speaking to me as a friend or offering any sympathy.

"Yes, Miss Stewart...I am happy to do as my guardians say, Miss Stewart."

After that, our lunch was a formal affair. Annie had spitefully ordered several of my pet hates in boiled salmon and cabbage, but I ate it and thanked her for her kindness. Bella and I answered all her questions politely and properly, practicing our conversation skills, as our family and guardians would expect, until Miss Stewart ordered coffee for herself and calmly handed us our pacifiers. It was supposed to humiliate us, I suppose, to punish us for rejecting her kind offer of help, but I was stronger than that, I told myself. I had promised myself that I would make a fresh start that morning and I had, dealing with everything calmly, apart perhaps, from Miss Davenport's assertion that she was taking over the daily management of the social media accounts. That had been a wobble. But I had done the right thing by not panicking or arguing and getting myself into trouble. I would talk to Helen, to Mama, when I got the chance, and she would tell me what was going on. That was the right way to behave.

"Good afternoon, Miss Stewart...how are you?" A familiar voice called out, just after we had left the café. Annie had put us back in our cloaks and bonnets to walk us home, still strictly silenced, of course. She was holding our hands too and turned when she heard her name.

"Mrs Blackstone...how nice to see you?" Annie exclaimed, as Bella and I both performed a slight curtsey, showing our respect. My friend Sheila, the woman who had set me on the path to conversion by lending me a gown at Charlesfield, smiled, and nodded at us. "Are you back for Christmas?"

"Yes...staying with my eldest son...but I am back up to Charlesfield before New Year, as I have a lot to do before the new term starts." Sheila replied, embracing Annie, her skirts crushing up against her. It was the way she would have greeted me, before my transformation, and I felt a pang of jealousy.

"I am sure you do, Ma'am...you know Miss Deacon and Miss Scott, of course?"

"Yes...very well...I would have liked to have attended Miss Scott's pledging, but we did not break up until the Sunday...she is under discipline, I see?" Sheila commented, her eyes looking me up and down as I bowed my head, courteously.

"She had some problems settling down, I believe..."

"Only to be expected...she is obviously inexperienced, and she will need help to give herself entirely to God and the holy doctrine." Sheila suggested, apparently entirely unconcerned by my predicament, which rather dismayed me. "She is a very talented girl, but she does need to learn her place after taking the vows of obedience. It is good of you to take the maidens out on your day off, Miss Stewart."

"I enjoy it, Mrs Blackstone...I realise that we cannot be friends for the time being...but I am fond of the girls...and I want to help them just as much as I can," Annie said, whilst giving my hand a sharp squeeze.

"You are a good friend to this community, Miss Stewart...and just a little older and wiser than these two...but they have time...I am sure that with a little hard work and dedication, they will both be fine ladies in due course...just what Meadvale needs." Sheila said, just a little mysteriously, but I did not get to hear anymore. Annie said that she needed to get us home and we were led off, after offering another curtsey. My head was spinning again, going back over my day and everything that had been said to me. But I had behaved, and Mama did not send me up to the nursery when Annie delivered me back to her, which gave me a chance to talk to her about things. As she helped me out of my bonnet and cloak, I vowed not to lose my temper or get upset, because I knew that would not get me anywhere. But there were things that I really needed to discuss.