If he noticed anything significant about the date, he wouldn't have admitted it. Indeed, for a moment or two as he settled down to breakfast, he allowed himself to contemplate its almost impressive lack of significance. Then, as he crossed it off his calendar, he reflected briefly that it was probably special for someone. Several someones, even. People would be born today, people would die, people would fall in love, hear bad news, make life-changing decisions. He wondered what it would be like to have that kind of excitement in one's life. He concluded that it probably wasn't for him. It all sounded good, of course, getting the blood racing, being able to exclaim things like "Ah yes, this is what life is all about!" In practice, though, Lawrence was pretty sure that that kind of exertion would only mean trouble in the long run. For him, this was what life was all about. Another day crossed off on the calendar just meant another day on board this rotten ship, swaying about all over the place and trying to persuade the prince not to commit another of his innumerable indiscretions. Unsuccessfully, of course, but then that was more or less the story of his life.

Twenty years ago

Lucinda had fixed him with a cold stare. Lawrence realised, not for the first time, that his little sister terrified him.

"You owe us, think you'd be manservant to the baby prince if it weren't for my Alphonse? Without us, you'd still be slaving in the kitchens and you know it."

"But—"

"I can't believe you'd 'but' me! What else are you going to spend it on, that money that you only have because of my husband? Something more important than helping your own flesh and blood? My Alphonse has lost his job because of a stupid misunderstanding and now I'm going to have another baby and I ask you for just a little help and you won't give it to me! Well, I call that ungrateful!"

Lawrence clasped the wad of notes in his pocket. He thought about all the things he could say, like how Alphonse's "little misunderstanding" with the king was more like a few decades of helping himself to royal jewellery, or how Lucinda's two youngest children looked a lot less like her husband than the others, or how he'd been planning to use the money to buy a ring to propose to Annabelle, a maid he'd had his eye on for two years. But what was the use? Lucinda got what she wanted and he didn't. That was the way it went. He gave her the money and, two weeks later, Annabelle was engaged to a butler. It didn't matter. By that time he had his hands well and truly full with supervising the young prince's care. He didn't have time for a wife.

Thirty-five years ago

It was a cold evening, a fact that had not gone unnoticed by his mother. He heard her shrill cry as though she were in the room with him, even as he tucked his six-year-old brother into bed upstairs. The child spat on his shoes as a thank-you.

"Lawrence!" his mother had yelled, her voice carrying all the strength she said her invalid body lacked. "Lawrence, you useless clot, light the fire! Do you want your poor mother to freeze to death?"

He had toyed briefly with the idea of answering in the affirmative, but it wouldn't have been worth it. Instead, he knelt in front of the fireplace and busied himself with arranging the logs, only half-listening to the tirade his mother had launched into. He gathered that it concerned his many and varied inadequacies, taking in his woefully menial job as a kitchen boy at the palace and ending up, as his mother's train of thought usually did, at the "cursed with the worst son in all of Maldonia" terminus.

Logs neatly stacked, he struck a match. A little flame roared into life, only to be snuffed out in its prime by a gust of icy wind that blew through the newly-opened front door.

"Lucinda darling!" his mother exclaimed. "Fancy coming home so late and leaving your poor old mother to worry! Come here and give me a kiss!"

Lawrence wondered, as he struck another match, where his mother found the time to worry about Lucinda darling when his own awe-inspiring uselessness consumed so much of her energies in that direction. The flame caught, spreading quickly over the dried wood and creating a satisfying fire. He stayed kneeling for a little while, enjoying its warmth. It was a few minutes before he caught the thread of the conversation carrying on behind him – or, more accurately, his sister's excited monologue. He was impressed: it wasn't often that his mother couldn't get a word in edgeways.

"...He says we'll have a big church wedding, all our friends, and he's going to buy us a lovely house near the castle and he even says he can get Lawrence moved a couple of rungs up the ladder, whatever that means and oh, Mama, it's so exciting!"

Lawrence mused on this for a moment or two. So, Lucinda had finally extracted a marriage proposal from the king's valet, that young man who was always at the house. Good news all round! He was happy for his sister, who'd never really wanted much more from life than to marry a handsome man and cook him dinner every night, and not a little happy for himself, since a good word from the king's valet would be exactly the sort of thing to get him a better job with better prospects. In fact, there was just one problem.

"Well now," said his mother, clasping Lucinda's left hand to get a good look at the ring, "isn't that lovely? If only your brother was doing as well. Lord knows I could use a nice girl around the place to keep him out of mischief. A good son, you know, would find himself a nice girl to take care of his poor old mother once his sister goes off to look after her new husband." She sighed, the pressures of her wearying life escaping from her lips like a hot air balloon deflating.

The expected jibe didn't sting like he'd thought it was going to. In fact, as he straightened up and left the room, he felt a rush of happiness wash over him. He was going places now, just like he'd always known he would. Nothing was going to stop him now – once Lucinda's husband got him out of the kitchen and serving the royal family he'd be in control of his own destiny. He'd have to work hard, of course, but it would be worth it once people in high places started being impressed with him. He thought of the money, of being privy to royal secrets as a trusted confidante, of the power he'd have over the lesser servants, and a huge smile spread across his lips. Things were really starting to happen for him.

Forty years ago

He was just eight years old on the day his father died. Later, at the funeral, sympathetic friends and relatives would put their hands on his shoulders and tell him that he must be strong, that he was the man of the house now, that it was up to him to look after Lucinda and the baby and his poor mother, who just hadn't been the same since his father had been taken ill. But all that wouldn't happen for a few days yet. For now, he was still a little boy standing by his father's bed.

"I won't be around for much longer," his father had said.

He didn't reply. All he could do was nod, holding back tears because he knew his father didn't like it when he cried.

"Lawrence, let me tell you something. All my life, I've been told what to do by people who are no better than me. I was pushed round by my father and my boss and, bless her, your mother." His face was pale but his eyes were bright, almost too bright. Later, when he remembered this moment, Lawrence would forget that, but at the time it scared him, the intensity of his father's words. "Lawrence, you mustn't let that happen to you. Seek out money, Lawrence, become as rich as you possibly can. Because money, son, that's where the power comes from. I don't want you to live like I have, always crushed under other people's feet."

And Lawrence had promised. He'd sworn to his father on his deathbed that he would seek out power, that he wouldn't let other people push him around.

To the Shadowman, it all seemed too good to be true.