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Chapter 14 - Time for a J-O-B

Archie had been in Ambrosia City for a matter of days and already, a debt of a hundred gold loomed over his head. His parents had kept him away from Petrichor’s finances—likely to spare him the stress of watching the numbers dwindle—so he had no real anchor point for one hundred gold. He just knew that it was a lot and that he needed to get it, otherwise Nori would get the boot.

…which wouldn’t have been the worst thing, would it?

For a brief moment, Archie considered not doing it. But as much as Nori got on his nerves, he had given his word to Rowan. And no one deserved Prince Waldorf.

He had spent the night considering his options in the job market. As a Chef of the magical variety, Archie’s resume included preventing a noodle from breaking. But as a regular cook, Archie spent years living in a restaurant and working on his culinary skills. He figured a job as a cook would suit him well. He donned his orange jacket, figuring it would make getting a job easy, and set out in the morning.

He strolled down the street, thinking back to all of the restaurants and diners he had passed on his way in. Perhaps he’d go see if—

A gloved hand yanked him back. Archie fell over onto the ground, an unpleasantly familiar face glaring down at him, spear lowered.

“Ow!” Archie yelped. “Good morning to you too, Stop Him.”

Stop Him accentuated his words by jutting the butt of his spear into Archie’s side. “Now I know you ain’t coming down to MY”—jut—“post and just walking past ME”—jut—“without giving ME”—jut—“the food YOU promised.”

“I was busy!”

“Oh, you were busy?! Probably standing on your feet all day in the sun like me? Having to look out for threats? Having to look out for—” he shoved the butt of the spear into Archie again. “—brats!”

“Alright, I forgot, I’m sorry, I’m sorry! I’ll bring you something some other time.”

“Next week. Twice as much.”

“Yes, yes. Next week. Twice as much.”

“You best not forget. Now get out of here before I lose my cool.” Stop Him straightened up, breathing in deep. He looked dutifully down the road.

Archie scratched his head and looked up at Stop Him. “Hey, I have a question for you.”

Stop Him grunted, keeping his eyes fixed and focused.

“You know where I could get a job as a cook?”

Stop Him lost his composure, jumping at Archie. “What makes you think I’d know? And why would I tell you?! You gonna cook something for someone else but forget about ME?!”

He shoved the butt of his spear forward. Archie grabbed it and pulled it down, nearly bringing Stop Him with it.

Stop Him was about to continue the scuffle when a woman’s cough caused him to snap to attention. “M’lady!” he nearly shouted at a middle-aged woman that stood before them.

Archie spun around on the ground to face her. She looked down at him. Maybe it was just her red Chef’s jacket, but somehow, Archie thought she would find a way to look down on him even if he were five feet taller.

“Guard. You there,” she said to Archie with the unmistakable air of superiority. “Did I hear you correctly? You’re looking for work?”

“Yea—yes. M’lady. Yes I am. I’m a first-year student at the Academy,” Archie stood up, brushing off his prized jacket. The kalypo fibers had the wonderful ability to clean themselves over time—saving Chefs innumerable time after a day of cooking and spills—but Archie couldn’t stand the thought of his jacket being dirty for even a second. “I suppose you could tell from the jacket.”

“Perfect. Come with me.” She walked through the gate without looking back. Archie followed. He wasn’t sure if it would be legal not to. The woman looked up at a large clock built into the side of the keep.

“Nearly eleven o’clock,” she noted. “How late can you work?”

“I—uh. I don’t have any plans.”

“Perfect. You’ll work until eight. Any longer than that and your skin will come off.”

“My—uh, sorry. My skin?”

“You’ll be provided with two meals and given a break for each. Since you’re a new student of the Academy, you won’t be making a bad name for yourself. You won’t be slacking off.”

Archie hardly heard her as he marveled at the keep. The pale cerulean bricks seemed to glow in the morning light. The perfect brickwork, towering walls, and elaborate buttresses were like nothing Archie had ever experienced. Countless windows and balconies stuck out of the castle from the ground floor all the way up to the pointed tops of the towers. If he had to guess how many rooms were in the castle, Archie wouldn’t know how many zeroes to add.

“Your work will match a certain standard. As such, you will be paid five silvers for the day.”

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Half a gold!

Archie started doing the math in his head, blindly following the woman as they entered a side section of the castle and went through a large foyer.

Five silver a day…that’s a hundred days for fifty gold. Two hundred days for the hundred. If I work Saturdays and Sundays, that means I’ll be able to pay back Nori’s first year by…her third year.

His shoulders sank. The woman continued, leaving no chance for negotiations. It wouldn’t be enough, but for now, it’d have to do.

“We have quite the backlog of work right now, so try not to be overwhelmed.”

She opened a door to a narrow room with three massive basins of water and zero windows. Twenty stacks of plates, a mountain of bowls and serving trays, and a bucket of cutlery were stacked up on the counter.

“Our usual dishwasher fell ill last night, so dinner and breakfast remain…unwashed.” She spoke like just saying the word would dirty her. “An initial rinse in this basin, then wash with soap in this one. Finally, dip it into this one to get the soap off and then set it on this counter. When the water is no longer warm or you can’t see your hand in the first basin, empty all three and refill them.”

For the first time, she let Archie speak. “Any questions?”

“Um—I thought I’d be cooking.”

The woman looked at Archie with an expressionless face. She held her hands together in silence. “Our kitchen is at capacity. Besides, cooking? As a new student at the Academy? You’d make half as much coin. No, this will do well for you.”

She walked back through the doorway.

“There are always dishes, so there is always work. A servant will be by later with your lunch.”

Before Archie could protest—or even accept the job—the woman swung the door closed, leaving just him and the dishes.

And so Archie began a war of attrition.

He followed the woman’s instructions dutifully. He figured she would know if he didn’t. A dip into the first basin, wiping with a wiry sponge. A dip into the second, this time with the soap. A dip into the third, then set to dry.

One down. One or two or three hundred to go.

Fortunately, the plates came from a hungry bunch. With the exception of some of the serving trays, hardly a scrap remained. Some grease or oil or the occasional sauce, sure. But nothing solid to identify what royal food had graced these plates.

By the end of the first hour, Archie understood the woman’s comment about losing his skin. The hot water pruned his fingers, and the sponge seemed to become sharper and sharper with each wipe. He slowed down—but just a bit. The fear of the woman coming through the door spurred him on. Even when he stopped to take a breather every few minutes, he still held a plate over the sink just in case he needed to look busy.

After over an hour, Archie took a moment to admire his work. Nearly a third of the dishes had been washed.

And then the door opened.

Archie panicked and grabbed a plate, not wanting to be caught not working. But instead of the harsh woman, the one standing in the doorway wore the well-pressed clothes of a servant and didn’t seem likely to bite his head off.

“Was told to get you for lunch,” she squeaked. She took Archie down the hallway and into the servant’s break room. Through another door, he could hear what sounded like a dozen Chefs running around the kitchen. He thought he spotted Hyssop and Juniper, two Chefs from his class, but he was still working to pair faces to names.

The servant went into the kitchen and came back with two plates of food. A roast chicken, complete with adorning vegetables. Good eating for a servant. They ate in relative silence—the air in the room seemed too thick to penetrate with idle chatter.

After lunch, Archie walked back down the hall. He figured that some grand dining room sat between the kitchen, servant room, and dishwashing room. He started to imagine its luxurious cushioned chairs and the artwork on the walls, but the daydream was cut short by the nightmare of the dishwashing room.

Two servants had just finished setting down a new stack of dirty plates and left through the other door in a rush. Archie frowned and got back to work. A minute later, the servants came again with another stack each.

“What—” Archie began.

“Lunch time,” a servant explained before rushing out again.

Archie got to work. Fifteen minutes later, the servants returned with even more plates. Archie’s mouth dropped.

“Second course,” they explained.

“Second? Of how many?”

Archie received no answer. Instead, he received two more heaps of plates over the next thirty minutes. When a third stack came with the finality of “that’s dessert” from one of the servants, Archie stopped scrubbing and looked at the counter of dirty dishes. He felt like crying. The stack had grown since he had started.

He thought about how he ended up scrubbing dishes. He thought of the Induction Ceremony. Nori, still a stranger, looking at him with desperation in her eyes. However thorny and unagreeable that girl had turned out to be, she didn’t deserve whatever fate her father had cornered her with.

As Archie worked for the next few hours, he tried to figure out what had been on each plate, but the lack of crumbs left him stumped. Instead, he imagined the scene in the dining hall. The royal family, a half dozen advisors, maybe a dozen more lords and ladies that were passing through the capitol, all laughing and chatting and eating their fill.

As he ate his dinner, he tried to peek through the kitchen and into the dining room. No luck. Instead of seeing some grand setup, he only saw a large group of overworked Chefs of all ranks clawing at each other’s throats as they struggled to get their meals out on time. Archie was glad the kitchen was too full for him. He hated the rushing, angry culture that had infested so many kitchens. Maybe it was just Petrichor’s pitiful turnout, but he liked being able to chop vegetables a little slowly and letting sauces simmer a little longer.

Archie scrubbed and scrubbed and his mind went blank as he scrubbed some more. Each hour of manual labor dulled his mind and sharpened the pains in his joints.

Finally, the harsh woman returned. “Alright, that’s eight o’clock,” she announced as she entered the room.

Archie was elbow-deep in the sink. She smiled at that. Then she looked at the pile of dirty plates. Dinner had come and gone, and the plates came in as quickly as Archie could put them out.

She nodded in approval.

“There seems to have been no increase in our backlog. Good job.” She dropped five silver coins into Archie’s pruny hand.

“Thank you. Um, ma’am?”

“Yes?”

“Is this amount of plates normal? I mean, do they really eat this much?”

“Prince Waldorf? Well, he had a couple of friends over,” she said in a matter-of-fact voice.

“Prince…Waldorf?”

“Yes. This is his section of the keep.”

“And there were just three of them?”

She turned to leave. “You may go now. Thank you for your work.”

“Yeah…” Archie looked back at the mound of plates in disbelief.

“There’s always dishes, so there’s always work,” she added.