Chapter 1415: With a little spark(1)

He leaned his weight into the straw broom and drove it across the flagstones, kicking up a thin, dancing haze of grey dust. In his drab, ill-dyed tunic of rough hemp, Marcus moved from one side of the corridor to the other, sweeping, dragging, and pretending he had the mind of a simpleton.

It was mind-numbing work. For an operative who had desecrated the corpse of an Emperor and laid the groundwork for the fall of the Fingers, sweeping corridors felt like a particularly spiteful practical joke played by his King.

Still, a master of the craft did not pout. He kept his spine slightly bent and his eyes fixed on the grime, maintaining the slow, vacant rhythm of an obedient drone. This is an honor, he recited to himself, burying every scrap of his true nature deep down where no sharp-eyed bailiff could find it. They feed you hard crusts, they grant you a pallet of straw in the cellar, this is an honor. You’ll starve and sleep in stable, this is an honor

He cast a quick, calculated glance upward at a gilded chandelier suspended over a carved mahogany credenza. He had seen its twin in Alpheo’s own halls. Not that Marcus spent much time idling in palaces; usually, the moment his boots dried from one butcher’s chore, the King had a fresh nightmare waiting for him.

You would think Yarzat possessed only him and Lucius, the way the Crown worked them down to the bone. He has scores of black bird in his pay, Marcus grumbled inwardly. Could he truly spare no other bastard to sweep pig shit?

He had been on the verge of a comfortable assignment, too. He was slated to be tucked neatly into the stables of a Herculean petty lord, a quiet, gentle task where his only duty was to count oats , brush the horses and of course record and send back which knight rode which destrier on which morning. Soft work, safe work, and entirely free of executioners’ blocks. He did not know why he was to record such thing, perhaps they simply wished to see which man was given which task and plan a hit on him when he was still in some tavern.

Instead, he had been pulled from the road and shoved into the viper’s nest to plot the murder of a prince.

Killing a crowned head was far messier business than slitting the throat of an outlaw in a ditch. And while Marcus had already buried his iron into highborn flesh before, that target had been a half-ruined usurper that was in his grave.

This prince was alive, suspicious, and wrapped in three layers of plate, surrounded by heavy guards and thick masonry.

How was he to manage the stroke? Poison? If Alpheo wanted venom, he would have bought a kitchen skivvy; the royal kitchens were a walled fortress unto themselves, with half a dozen tasters between the kettle and the high table. No, it would have to be steel, close and quiet, executed in a manner that wouldn’t leave Marcus dangling by his neck from the battlements.

Unless the King views me as a spent coin, he thought dryly. But no, Alpheo was too shrewd a miser to throw away an asset of his caliber on an amateur’s suicide strike.And besides if he were taken alive nad tortured he would sing like a canary.

There was no way the king would allow his name be assosciated with kingslaying, that was after all a big no. A king could only be killed in battle, and even then it was a touchy subject for all.

He cleared his mind and let the bristles scrape the slate. Rhythm. Patience. He had already committed the palace layout to memory, cross-referencing every hidden stair and privy shaft with the sketches Sevar had smuggled to him. The real obstacle was the inner sanctum: the private royal apartments were strictly sequestered, watched night and day by a hand-picked cohort of guards. A common scullion had no business within three corridors of those oak doors.

He would need a pretext, a key, or a body. Perhaps Sevar could arrange a gap in the watch?

Until then, his grand mission consisted of scraping mud, emptying chamber pots, and swallowing the stench of the palace guard’s leavings.

From desecrating emperors to clean after shit. Now wasn’t that a let down?

Rinse and repeat, he thought, shoving the broom forward. Rinse and rep-

The straw bristles swept squarely across the toes of a soft leather shoe.

Marcus caught himself instantly, straightening with the sluggish, apologetic haste expected of a frightened drudge. He kept his head tilted, his gaze dropping to the hem of her skirts: plain grey wool, edged in cheap white linen. A scullery maid.

He did not need to be so humble then.

He let out a mumbled apology. He recognized her from the back stairs, one of the girls under Madam Maria’s lash. That bloated, sour-faced harpy of a head housekeeper that he encountered on his first day, proving that petty tyrants in linen hoods were often far nastier than lords in velvet mantles.

Luckily, Marcus’s false papers tied him directly to Master Sevar’s steward rolls, allowing him to largely ignore the old sow’s screeching.

"It’s all right," she murmured, her voice barely a breath. She kept her chin tucked close to her chest.

Marcus took in the splash of rust-red hair spilling from her linen coif and the skin speckled with fresh, sun-kissed freckles. A Sharjaani look, clear as spring water. A rare sight in Yarzat, where the blood ran dark and black-haired, though farther east toward the river vales, the colors always turned paler.Sharjaan was between the two instead, and they had the colour of fire.

Then he noticed the bundle of twigs in her hands. She was holding a broom of her own.

Seeing his gaze linger on the wood, she lifted her face just enough to offer a strained, nervous explanation. "Madam Maria sent me to sweep the western gallery."

"Did she now?" Marcus leaned lightly on his broom handle, dropping the servant’s hollow stammer for an easy, conspiratorial drawl. She had a pleasant face, and playing the bored scullion beat counting floorboards in silence. "First time in this corridor, is it? The trick is the molding behind the armoires, filth cakes in the corners like dried porridge."

She blinked at him. "She sends me here every morning."

"Does she?" Marcus chuckled softly, resting his chin on his crossed hands atop the broomstick. "I sweep this identical hall at first cockcrow, every single day." He arched an eyebrow, his grin turning sharp. "Ah. The old cow’s running us against each other, isn’t she?The cunt don’t trust me"

The girl visibly flinched, leaping backward half a step like a cat that had stepped on a hot hearthstone.

"Hush!" she hissed, her eyes darting frantically down the long, empty corridor before locking onto his with genuine terror. "Are you mad? You cannot say such things out loud! Someone will hear you and run straight to her!"

Marcus gave a quiet, raspy chuckle. "What, so this whole roost is full of squealing rats?"

She stared at him, her brows shooting up beneath her coif with weary exasperation. "I am sorry, are you new to this?"

"Kind of," Marcus shrugged.

"Well, learn fast," she warned in a tight whisper, clutching her broom like a shield. "There isn’t a servant in this palace who wouldn’t sell their own mother for an extra copper or a pat on the head from the steward. They’ll play the rat, the hound, or the pig,whatever keeps the whip off their own backs."

"A charming hearth we serve," Marcus murmured, his eyes glittering with amused interest. "And here I thought we were all one happy family under the prince generous roof."

He gave him a strange gaze. She was younger than him and yet she looked at him as if he were a child that needed a lesson. "Well the roof leaks, and Madam Maria bites," she retorted, though a faint, reluctant twitch at the corner of her mouth gave away her amusement. "So if you want to keep your skin whole, simpleton,’’ She muttered on a small tone, that Marcus would have hardly heard if he did not sharpen his ears ’’ you’d best look busy. She’ll be making her rounds from the linen rooms before the bells strike noon."

"I am the very picture of work and I am not under the bitch" Marcus grinned, planting his broom back on the stone and making a grand, theatrical show of sweeping the exact same patch of dust he had cleared five minutes prior. "I’m M-Lucius, by the way. Master of the straw and sworn enemy of cobwebs."

She watched him strangely, taking up her own broom on the far side of the runner.

"Fia," she murmured softly, keeping her eyes on the floor as the straw began to scrape the slate.Turning away from him.

Marcus , well now Lucius looked at her, and realised that perhpaps he would have something to pass the time as he made dust here.

Still for now he would end the sweeping and then off for Sevar it was, if the gods were good he would finally hear word from the king. He wanted out of this, as soon as he could.

He had been rotting here for a month already and he had yet to hear anything regarding the plan, he needed after all to make his own preparations to that.

As much as he liked the king, there was no way he would be dying for him.

His life above all...