There are many things one could say about nobles, few of them were good and a considerable fraction of those were earned. Chief among them was that they were snotty, petulant man-children with too much power and not enough common sense.

However, one could say, despite the nobles’ own claims to the contrary, that they weren’t beyond being manipulated. Sure, they were harder to manipulate, but like anyone else ,they had things they desired and things they hated and any good manipulator needed to be able to find what those were and act accordingly.

The Lord hated the color blue but loved green? Then remove anything blue from your person, compliment anything green that he owns and definitely start wearing some green accessories so that he begins to associate you with what he likes. Do that and slowly he will consider your words with more weight and might even start seeing you as a living being rather than just a walking piece of furniture.

Manipulating someone was a slow grind however, not a marathon, especially when working on paranoid lords. The groundwork had to be painfully set into motion across weeks, if not months before you could even begin twisting them around your finger. Needless to say I, maid extraordinaire, have done just that for the month I’ve been here in the Royal Palace.

Sure most of that time was spent familiarizing myself with the different players and factions of palace politics, and getting used to my new job. Regardless, it wasn’t hard to find out how to go about manipulating my target once I found out about his existence.

Kar Goldstar also known as 'The Dark Failure' and the sixth prince of the Goldstar kingdom was my target and by all metrics, he was an easy one. He was the unknown twin of the Golden Princess Issa Goldstar, the little pride of the royal family and Blessed by the gods with immense beauty, golden hair and enormous magical potential, as befitting for a royal chosen by the gods and loved by all the people under the Sun.

On the other hand, poor little Kar who has just recently turned 12 with his dark hair and poor magic aptitude was so unknown and disliked that I’d seen him listed on yesterday’s birthday party’s list of attendance as ‘distant relative’ despite the party being thrown for his twin sister.

‘Talk about being disliked by family.’ I thought with a grimace as I continued cleaning.

I thankfully escaped the rug cleanings of yesterday’s party as well as several of today’s less savory cleaning duties of the guest rooms but now I’m forced to pull triple shifts to compensate. All in all, a small price to pay when the alternative was cleaning after a bunch of decadent nobles with a reason to party.

“C’mon Petra! We need to clean this and fast!” I tried to address my sleepy companion.

“I’ve been awake since yesterday morning, Illyria, have mercy on me!” Was my blonde friend's whining reply.

I might not have been looking at her but I could just hear her sleep-walking, somehow managing to acquire the legendary sleep-cleaning skill that all maids secretly wished they had. She snores, loudly despite her claims to the contrary.

I just shook my head in disappointment, my pretty brown hair swishing along. Petra is my only friend in this castle as we both applied and got accepted at the same time. I pointed my small tuft at her as I replied.

“Petra, it’s either this, or that bitch, Glynda ,will get the easy job ,and it’s your turn to clean ‘that’.”

“Cleaning now!” My partner replied with renewed vigor, banishing the last vestiges of sleep and a slight echo of terror crossed her face, evident to anyone who's spent more than a week with her.

I did not envy the girls who were forced to clean up after the nobles, nor the girls who had to actually keep these same nobles company for both the night and the morning, as they prepared for the second night of partying.

'I'll be damned if I do anything to share their fate without a fight!' I tried to psyche myself up.

The attempt was as successful as always, thankfully, and I felt energy returning to my limbs.

Back to cleaning duty, now that I remembered just why I needed to finish this, I couldn't help but appreciate how the white and gold corridors I had been assigned to clean were far away from where most nobles frequented during the day, so we were safe from displeasing them and being put on carpet duty.

‘Carpet duty’ , as it’s innocuously called, is more than just cleaning some carpets, it’s cleaning several dozen square meters of highly expensive carpets from the ballroom, the halls and hallways by hand. The carpets needed to be cleaned to perfection until no smell, splotch of color or any other imperfections remained, oh and it also needed to be dry by sunset. It’s...doable, if time-intensive with magic, but again the ‘special’ carpets could not be washed by magic due to how fragile they were to it, not unless you had arch-mage level control over magic - which none of us did except maybe the Head Maid but the damn monstrous she-bitch was usually too busy to bother.

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This left around thirty maids desperately trying to clean those carpets by hand and then dry them in less than 12 hours while the rest had to pull triple shifts doing the work of two maids to make sure the palace was clean for the second night of festivities.

So yes, parties are not an enjoyable experience for us poor maids, even if the nobles seemed to enjoy them for some arcane reason.

‘Probably because they didn’t need to actually clean after themselves.’ I thought bitterly, as I continued cleaning the dust from the paintings on the walls and the ornaments on the small tables in the hallway, while my rock-headed, lazy bum of a partner used her broom to clean the floor and another maid further back tried to catch up to us with a mop.

Being a maid is not easy. Sure it pays more than enough for what it puts you through, 7000 frak is no small sum after all, but cleaning after nobles whose weekly meals and drinks were probably worth ten times as much, does get tiring after a while, especially when you usually need to pick a tenth of that from the floor and walls. Despite, or better said because of, all of the nobles acting like nobles it paid well and gave plenty of opportunities for such a great maid as I, even if it was annoying.

“I’ll never understand royals and their parties. I mean, if you want to party and eat fine foods and drink the best alcohol, the least you could do is actually not spill it!” My friend started raving once again.

No, now that I’m paying attention to her, it seems this little ravign session has been going on for some time, but I’ve been ignoring it.

I just sighed at her. It was much better to let her vent, because if I didn’t, it would turn into an argument that would send both of us to carpet duty, if we were caught.

I let her words wash over me as she spoke of the nobles being fat and lazy slobs with no concept of responsibility and the like. I continued cleaning the hallway at top speed , ignoring my friend’s ramblings until I heard the clacking of heels on marble.

I immediately snapped my fingers and my energetic companion immediately turned meek and stopped wasting energy that could be used cleaning.

That was the signal for someone approaching, and both my companions heard and obeyed it. Weeks of shit-duty had taught us to keep a keen ear to any and all sounds lest someone come near us while we were resting or talking. We didn’t look up at the approaching figure, but placed ourselves near the wall, our cleaning utensils behind us, safely hidden.

If whoever was coming was a maid then she wouldn’t say a word and just step a bit harder on the floor once she reached us, if it was any of the other servants, like the knight guards or butlers, the result would depend on the individual, but most of the time they would just ignore our presence and go along their business. Those were the good options. The bad options would be a noble who wanted something and needed to be greeted with a bow, a smile, and no cleaning utensils in sight, lest his or her ego be somehow offended by seeing how the palace was kept clean. Thankfully those were usually accompanied by maids who knew to give a signal to inform us that a noble was nearby and how we needed to act.

'One sound for a fellow maid, two for a noble's silence and three for a peaceful night.' Were the words I had to learn by heart lest I deal with an angry noble.

The way the signal worked was that a maid would alter her way of walking so that once every few steps her one, or several of her steps, would be slightly more forceful depending on who she was with or what was happening. One such step every few seconds meant that another maid was approaching so everything was good and two such steps every few seconds meant a noble was coming and we needed to look meek, meekly bow our heads, and hide our cleaning utensils. On the other hand, three such steps meant that we needed to run or hide because something was happening and we needed to not be seen lest we somehow make it worse or put ourselves in danger.

Another bad result would be the she-bitch coming around for a visit, since she rarely brought good news.

It took seconds until I recognized the clicking sounds of the the she-devil’s heels. She never gave us a signal on just who was coming but we've learned to recognize the sound her heels made.

‘Well, talk of the Dark God and he, or in this case she, shall appear.’

We bowed to the she-bitch as she passed, not daring to look her in the eyes. Our Head Maid, whose name I still didn’t know, wasn’t exactly loved, her strictness being the cause of many fair maidens like myself quitting in tears or disgrace.

“Head Maid.” We greeted her in twin voices, subservient tones with a drop of fear mixed in our voice.

Just how she liked it.

“Illyria Claret, His Highness the sixth prince has requested your presence.” The red-head spoke, her tone as bland as the porridge they fed the soldiers.

“I do not know where his Highness’ quarters are, miss.” I replied, as I tried to make sense of what I just heard.

This is… fast, too fast in fact. I planned for him to want to see me several days, if not weeks ,from now as I slowly got myself closer to him. I even planned to burn through some favors to learn his schedule and get myself near where his lessons were held and get to know him. The prince calling me, quite literally hours after I even made contact, was NOT part of the plan.

I hid my concern behind a subservient mask and waited for the Head Maid to speak. I don’t know what hid beyond her blue eyes, and beneath that red hair and slightly wrinkled face, though I doubt it was favorable to my continued employment prospects, but I honestly didn’t know where his quarters are. I’ve been here for barely a month after all.

“I shall lead you there.” The older maid said after a small pause, her distaste hitting me with the physical force of a punch to the gut.

She didn’t even wait a second after she finished speaking before she turned and left, leaving both of us there as Petra started silently praying for my soul, her hands held in prayer now that the Head Maid wasn’t looking anymore. I followed shortly after a whispered ‘Sorry,’ but my mind wasn’t in it. My mind was churning from the words I heard as I began remaking my plan. If someone had been looking at me in this moment they would have seen me smiling

‘If the prince wants to rush, then who am I to refuse him? Nothing ventured, nothing gained or so the saying goes.’