On Her Knees

a sly search

POV: Alruna

Finally, I feel better. Not completely recovered, but enough to act as though I'm fine and no longer ill. I haven't brought it up to Cam yet since I have something else I need to do without her interference or her accidentally letting something slip.

She managed to find out that there is something more sketchy going on in the palace, whether she saw it as sketchy or not. Apparently many servants have been catching a mystery illness and have been dropping like flies. Some die within days of catching it, while others are supposedly sent home to die there in the comfort of their family.

While she told me that they're sent home, and she definitely believes that, I don't. My nosing around secretly has dug up something that proves that wrong.

Many of the other servants I've eavesdropped on have brought up that the sick just disappeared overnight when they were clearly dying. It doesn't matter if they're dead or not yet, they just go missing overnight and apparently some have even caught soldiers coming in during the middle of the night and taking the sick from their beds and then they're never seen again.

I don't know any of the other servants beyond simple acquaintances but I'm glad I haven't got attached. They're disappearing so quickly and this apparently started almost in the first day. All it says to me is that there was a darker reason for getting all these new servants into the palace and its horrible to think about.

I can't even sleep at night thinking about it, which is usually beneficial since that's the only time I can snoop around the palace without Cam noticing or some soldiers.

My father taught me to be stealthy all the time when I was a child. We'd always play hide-and-seek in the forest when I was learning. We'd play at night and during the day but I was always best at night. He'd always catch me in the daylight and then I'd get a long lecture about how to hide better, not that I ever really listened. I wish I had now since he can no longer teach me those lessons that I used to hate. I would let him ramble on with whatever he wanted to teach me - stealth, swordsman ship, defense, survival - any of it. I'd let him talk forever just so I could hear his voice again.

For now I can just use his lessons to my advantage to sneak around the palace, though I don't think he ever expected me to use his lessons for this.

I made sure Cam was completely passed out and in a deep sleep before slipping out of bed and changing as smoothly and slyly as humanly possible before scurrying out, leaving the door open just a little bit so I can get back in without risking waking her up. The door is loud and heavy so it is impossible to close quietly.

After double checking that she's completely and utterly asleep, I slip out of her bedroom and into the silent corridor of the palace.

As lively and bright and extravagant as this place is during the day, its eery at night. There's no one around and there's hardly an soldiers ever patrolling the halls so sneaking around isn't as difficult as I'd predicted on my first night of nosing around. Sure some people stay up late but since I dress like a servant no one pays me any mind when I pass by them late at night.

I keep my footsteps light as I walk around the halls, checking around every corner since, even though its quiet, I'd prefer no one notices me slinking around. There's contracts I place to stop me getting fired because of Camille, but that doesn't protect me from any one else of authority that finds me too shifty late at night.

There's carpets on most of the halls I've already searched and snooped around, but the ones I've recently been checking have no carpets and are just stone halls, which are very echoey. I've done most of those though and only have one left to go through which was oddly tucked away and unused. I have no clue where it goes but it shouldn't take me long. I'll be back in bed in an hour, which is much less risky than my recent outings at night that led Cam to get a little suspicious.