Chapter 32 - Leavi

The town council reception at Lady Veradeaux's manor is more like my parents' stuffy work functions than last night's party at Marcí's was. Five council members parade through the space I spent all yesterday cleaning, spouses in tow and glasses of watered-down alcohol in hand. The men's tall, stiff collars force their necks into a perpetual stretch, a posture that reminds me of uncomfortable geese. With my back to the wall and uniform still too small, I'm not in much better shape. At least I'm not one of the active serving maids, though, winding their way through the crowd as guests snag food from trays while entirely ignoring the girls who hold them. In the center of the room, Lady Veradeaux laughs and flips her hair, the only one here seeming comfortable. Candlelight reflects off her golden brocade, making her appear to glow.

Beside her stands the mysterious 'visitor from the east.' Billowing black robes swallow him, sleeves long enough to conceal his hands. A deep hood hangs against his back, and a thick silver chain disappears under the cloth. I've never been a superstitious or religious person, but if he were to put the hood on, I swear he'd be what I met on the opposite side of death. He stands slightly too still, but his gaze flickers over everything like a bird of prey analyzing its victims. Lank, shoulder-length red hair gives his already pale skin a sickly pallor. Though he stands half a head shorter than Lady Veradeaux, his composure is just as confident.

Across the room, his dark eyes snap to mine. My stomach drops, hyper-aware he caught me staring. He holds my gaze for an unnerving amount of time.

Raising a single finger, he beckons me over. I freeze, hesitant to be any closer to him than I must. His eyes narrow, lips parting slightly. Despite being twenty feet away, his one-word command is as clear as if he'd spoken it directly in my ear, and chills crawl across my skin.

"Come."

Scared what will happen if I refuse, I force my leaden feet forward. He turns away from his group, toward me. I stop five feet from him, but that condemning finger rises again. Hesitantly, I close a few more feet.

He grabs my wrist, yanking me close, then tips my chin up, inspecting me. Before I can protest, he's released me. "You're not a Kadranian brat or you'd have better manners." His voice is as dark as a deep, vast cavern. "Where are you from?"

I lean back, heart hammering in my chest. For a second, my frazzled mind considers telling him the truth, but I doubt he'd believe it. Instead, I provide the lie Jacin seems to accept. "Draó."

A sardonic smile rises to his lips. "Specific. You do look like a mongrel, though, so I suppose it's fitting." He turns back to the group. "Lady Veradeaux, do you often make a habit of hiring insolent maids?"

Panic flickers briefly in her eyes, but she covers it, smoothing out nonexistent wrinkles in her dress. "Of course not. Why? Is that one giving you trouble?"

"Perhaps it is different in your land. However, in my country, lowly serving girls are taught to keep their eyes to their own affairs." His gaze rakes me down.

"If it's a problem," the lady offers, "she can always be dismissed."

He stares at me, and I hold his gaze. Looking in his eyes, though—there's something dark and cold there. Subtle but undeniably wrong. It unsettles me, and I glance down, breaking the connection.

"No," he concludes at length. "I believe she's learned her lesson."

He turns away, and I hurry back to my spot at the wall. Humiliation burns my chest, but a chilled disquiet tempers the flames. I keep my eyes down, only looking up if one of the guests summons me.

No matter what, my gaze stays off the Man from the East.

* * *

The morning after the reception, the manor halls echo.

"I haven't seen her in three days," a girl whispers, turning the corner onto my hall.

"I heard she got fired."

Thirty feet down from me, the maids' gossip is as clear as if we were sitting side by side. I try to focus on my work, but with nothing besides varying patterns of dirt to distract me, it's impossible not to listen.

I glance out of the corner of my eye. The first girl who spoke has blonde hair and bright eyes round in worry. The second girl is older, with a leanness to hear that speaks of long days and hard work well done.

"For what?" a lanky, carrot-topped girl asks. "I always thought she did good work."

The older girl scoffs. Her thick black plait slides over her shoulder with a casual toss of her head. "Maybe for that mouth on her."

The blonde maid shakes her head. "No. Kirsi was a good girl. She wouldn't have done anything stupid."

"Because she hasn't before?" the eldest retorts.

"I—" The younger girl gathers herself, then narrows her eyes. "I'm worried about her and all you can do is run your mouth off. You never did like her anyway, did you? You probably do hope something happened to her."

The dark-haired girl narrows her eyes. "I'm just looking at the facts, and the facts are that she never liked keeping her mouth shut or falling in line. Those are the kinds of things that get you fired in a job like this."

"If she got fired, she would have told me," the blonde protests.

The other crosses her arms. "Or maybe you two weren't quite the bosom buddies you thought you were."

"Something's wrong. I'm telling you, it is!"

The older girl rolls her eyes and goes back to dusting.

After a second, the carrot-top takes pity on the blonde. "When did you say you last saw her?"

"Three days ago. That morning. She told me she'd seen something weird in the north wing—"

The carrot-top recoils. "The north wing? What was she doing there?"

My scrubbing pauses. That was one of the first things my manager said when she gave me my assignment yesterday—don't speak unless spoken to, do what you're told, and keep out of the north wing. It's off-limits. Why, she didn't say.

The blonde shrugs. "I don't know. She wanted me to come look, but I made up some excuse. I didn't want to get caught, you know? But now I'm wondering if I should have gone with her."

The oldest maid, not even bothering to turn her head, snorts. "And then you'd be out of a job, too. You really can't put it together? She went where she wasn't supposed to, and she got fired for it. It's plain and simple, sweetheart."

The girl spins toward her. "That still doesn't explain why she hasn't talked to me!"

The woman shakes her head.

Seeing the mystery solved, the carrot-top pats her on the shoulder, making some consolation, and gets back to her work. As if irritated by the condescension, the first maid declares, "I'm going to find her!"

"Whatever you gotta do, sweetheart. It's your job. Just keep us out of it."

The girl huffs and stalks off.

The other two's conversation turns to who's dating who and the latest thing the manager has done to tick them off, and I tune them out, considering what I heard. The older girl sounds sensible, but after last night, I can't shake the feeling something strange is going on here. What is so bad that you would disappear from your workplace without telling a single person? My mind flicks back to the message I scratched on the door of Trifexer's Institute. I was running for my life, and I still left a note.

Maybe she didn't get a chance to.

A chill runs through me, and I try to shake it off. You're letting your imagination get the best of you again. Annoyed, I finish the spot I've been cleaning and move on.


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