The conversation with Chiro left Sam feeling the same as every conversation with Chiro did. Confused and uneasy. Too much of what he said didn't make sense, but the stuff that did made him wonder. And he didn't want to wonder. He wanted to enjoy his new life.

Sam liked his new job. Helping the cook was not hard. He mostly just washed dishes and cleaned the kitchen, but sometimes, the cook would let him have a little extra bread left over from making the Lord's meals. That stuff was better than anything Sam had ever tasted before. He just wished that cook didn't look at him with those sad, pitying eyes all the time. He was the same with the girl who helped serve the dishes to the staff every meal, so Sam didn't feel like he was a particularly pitiful person. Maybe he would treat every worker the same if they passed through the kitchen enough.

The thing was, and he had decided to tell Chiro the next day, Sam had not applied to any job. Not in his town, or anywhere else. Certainly not on some moon far away where most people didn't believe his home existed. He was starting to suspect that someone had applied, though. Snatches of memory were coming back to him, memories of his last day in his hometown. Nothing concrete, but he remembered that he had snuck out to meet Petra Douglas after his parents went to bed. Petra, with her sweet smile and long, shiny hair. Sam hadn't thought she even knew he existed. He remembered getting the note asking him to come see her at midnight. He just couldn't remember anything after climbing out his window.

Sam finished scrubbing the last of the pots and hung up the scrub brush so that it would drip into the big sink and not all over the counter. The butler stood in the doorway, impatiently tapping his foot as he waited for Sam to finish so he could be escorted upstairs. Butler never spoke one more word than necessary. If an impatient glare and a tap of a foot could get someone to move faster, then that was all he did. Sam fought the urge to slow down. Maybe that was why he was always getting in trouble back home. He hated being told to hurry up or do things he didn't want to do.

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Butler walked with Sam to his door, making sure he was inside the room before shutting the door behind him. A few moments later, there was a loud click as the door locked, and Sam was trapped in his room for the night. He walked to the window and pulled back his curtains. The view was the same as it was every time he looked, darker at night, of course. The same trees swaying in the light wind, the same fog twisting and winding around the trunks and moving across the grass like something alive. He shuddered and pulled the curtains close.

Without that little bit of light, he couldn't see where the lamp was to turn it on,so he stripped out of his uniform and crawled under the sheets in just his underwear. It wasn't like Papan was there to yell at him for not putting his pajamas on properly or for not folding his uniform nicely over the footboard of the bed. And Butler never came in to check his room. As soon as Sam was inside and the door was shut, his footsteps quickly retreated as he headed to his own room. Or at least that was what Sam assumed he was doing. He didn't know much about anybody besides Chiro.

Shortly after midnight, Sam sat up in bed with a start. His eyes darted around, making out the now familiar shapes of his little side table and dresser in the dark. He laid back down and closed his eyes, but a scream from somewhere outside the door had him upright again, his heart racing. His door shook in its frame as someone pounded on it from outside, and a voice called out to him in a language he did not understand.

The light under the door brightened again, showing that whomever it was had left. He could hear the same thing happening to the door across the hall, but then she screamed again, and there were loud footsteps moving away toward the staircase. Sam stared at the door, terrified. He finally made himself get up to see if she needed help. The door did not budge, still locked for the night, and he lowered himself to the ground to look underneath. There was no other sound, and after laying on the cold ground for some time, Sam got up and crawled back under his sheets. He sat, clutching his sheet in his hand, until the room began to lighten with the morning.