Queen's Favor

Chapter 4

"GYAA–!"

She couldn't tell if slamming into the ground knocked the wind out of him and ended the shout early, or if the crash of two bodies hitting the ground drowned out the end of it, but at least it stopped.

He flailed on the ground underneath her, one hand reaching out toward where the white cat peered out from the safety of the bedroom. For all his flailing, though, he didn't move anywhere. He seemed much too scrawny to overcome her full body weight, though, so it wasn't a surprise.

"Elly~! Save me~!" The way he drew out the words, there was no way any cat would come to him. Indeed, the cat immediately disappeared and he dropped his head to the ground in disappointment.

…It was hard to tell if he'd seriously expected it to work, or if he was simply being dramatic. But it was probably the latter? Surely.

Well, it would be if he were a reasonable person, but as far as she knew he was a strange weirdo who found a way to break into a rich man's house just to attack his cat. (He did know the cat's name, though…)

While it wasn't something loudly broadcasted, as a personal maid it was important to be adept at self defense. When working alone, anything might happen. Random intruders included. So, while he hadn't managed to squirm his way out of her knee pinning him down yet, she didn't leave it at that.

She wrested his outstretched arm behind his back and then pulled the other one to join it.

"H-hey! Ow! Ow, ow, ow!"

"If you stop struggling it won't hurt." Well, it might be uncomfortable. She wasn't exactly making an attempt for it to be a comfortable hold, but his flailing about and jerking his shoulders around would have caused him the most pain. For as much as it would have hurt.

…But she couldn't just keep him stuck there until someone came looking for her. She'd get tired, and more importantly she had an actual job to do which wasn't pinning an intruder to the ground with her hands for hours.

Briefly, she glanced about her surroundings for something to secure his hands together with, before her gaze fell on one of the bracelets around his arms. It looked flexible and long. She shifted slightly to pin his arms with her leg and uncoiled the yellow elastic from his arm.

It looked flimsy, but it felt tougher than that, like some kind of metallic paracord. Which served her purposes just fine.

"Wah–wait you'll break it!"

Noisy. This guy was so noisy, and she couldn't help noticing just how much, when the penthouse was always so calm and quiet when she cleaned it. Even when there were others in the place, it never got all that loud. He just kept whining and complaining as she used the bracelet to tie his hands together, but once it was secured, his struggling showed no real effect on the knots.

Good. She hadn't been completely confident in those. It wasn't like the life of a maid was so harrowing that she regularly had to tie people up. Or ever.

Never.

She'd never done it before. Because people didn't generally try to actually break in and mess around with a place when a maid was right there.

"Don't try to get up or I'll tackle you to the ground again and tie up your legs this time." If she could find rope. Maybe his shoelaces would work? Well, actually she just wanted her threat to work long enough for security to arrive and deal with him instead.

"Not necessary! Not necessary!" He looked over his shoulder at her - or at least he made a good attempt at trying to turn his head like an owl. "I won't invoke any more violent ire, but I told you! I'm Jumin Han's friend! This isn't necessary!"

She didn't know much about the man who owned the penthouse other than that he seemed very strict and very quiet, but 'friend' seemed very unlikely. If only because no cat owner would stand for that kind of manhandling. Let alone one so protective of his cat.

"You were trying to kill his cat."

"I WOULD NEVER!"

He said that, but she couldn't imagine any other coherent reason for treating a cat so bizarrely and roughly.

She brushed her hands off as she stood, and walked over to call the security desk. To his credit, as weird as he was, he really didn't try to move. He whined and complained, but he didn't immediately start wriggling toward the room with the cat in it or something. She'd really have had to tie him up more than that if he had.

The security officer she spoke to over the phone was…surprisingly calm about the matter. Whoever he was, he must have been somewhat familiar to the house and the workers there, as the guard merely seemed exasperated with the red haired man when the guard appeared.

Rather than pull the man out of the room, the bespectacled youth ended up planted on a chair, watched by one of the bodyguards while original security man spoke to someone on the phone. Contextually, it would have to be the cat's owner.

She observed the process for a little while, but once it was evident they waited for the man to return, she turned her attention back to her work. They wouldn't need her help keeping him subdued and it still wasn't her job to keep unwelcome intruders in line. She had dust bunnies to deal with and a few more challenging wars to wage in the rooms that managed to get mangled every day. Usually by the cat.

And she didn't want to be associated with the situation at all if Elizabeth looked distressed when he came back. It wasn't her fault, she wouldn't get lectured for it. No way.

It was only about a half hour before the front door opened to admit the man of the house. She happened to be standing in a hallway near to the living room when he did, and was close enough to watch his expression turn from pensive thoughtfulness to something that…might have been amusement.

They weren't actually friends, were they?

"Didn't I tell you not to come here anymore?" His tone was casual as he walked toward the sitting boy.

"A hero won't stand idly by while the princess is trapped in a gloomy tower!" She couldn't actually see the intruder's face from where she lingered, eavesdropping, but he sounded almost sincere in his bizarre delusion.

"…Heroes are usually arrested?"

An offended huff responded to his comment. "I couldn't have expected the evil overlord to have actually hired ninja maids to guard the castle. This dramatic set back only means I'll return to triumphantly rescue her next chapter!"

"No. You won't." She couldn't see either of them now, and she didn't want to get close enough for them to see her. Especially since the captive man referenced her. "Ninja maid?"

The security guard responded. "The one who called us was one of the maids."

It was brief and, from where she stood, quiet…but his laughter sounded surprisingly nice. For being so cold and blank most of the time, the amusement that echoed in his short laugh felt warm.

…She had to finish her work, not eavesdrop on a conversation between two people who clearly knew each other better than she knew either of them, but she still couldn't help a bit of a smile when she ducked into the nearest bathroom to work.

He really did have a nice laugh.

–

Initially, it hadn't really hurt. The excitement of the moment and how busy she'd been the rest of the day playing catch-up to all the time the weird cat assaulter wasted, but once she got home she realized her whole body ached.

Crashing into the ground with a bony human underneath her probably left her with more bruises than it did to him. Maybe she should have been a bit more rough with him. Especially since it sounded a bit like she'd just been dragged into some kind of weird inside joke between two…maybe…not friends?

They hadn't really sounded like friends, but nothing about their conversation seemed serious enough to actually call them enemies, either.

She flopped down into her bed and suppressed a wince at the way her soreness seemed to reverberate with the vibrations in the mattress.

Wouldn't be nice if she got a bonus for protecting the cat?

She probably should just be happy he didn't check the CCTV records and see the part where she technically let him do it first. Even though it wasn't like she had the authority to tell people who could or couldn't go into a penthouse suite that wasn't even hers. She was literally the hired help. Unless people did something illegal or dangerous in front of her, she basically didn't exist.

She might have liked not existing right then.

It would mean she'd be less sore, probably.

"…Guh."

If he showed up again tomorrow and tried to mess up her day again, when she'd just gotten used to how easy and relaxed the job was, she couldn't promise herself she wouldn't just break his glasses and kick him bodily out the door.

He'd proven to be pretty weak today, so she could probably succeed in violently ejecting him if she tried. And she'd spread information about him through the rest of the maids and other coworkers in the building. See if he ever got a decent maid for himself then.

…She couldn't help but worry a little bit that the fiasco spooked the cat away from her just by being involved in it.

–

Somewhat surprisingly, it did not. Even though Elizabeth stayed in the bedroom hidden under the bed the rest of the day of the commotion, the very next morning she behaved as if nothing happened at all, trotting up to greet her as soon as she arrived, and then lazily playing with toys wherever she felt like.

Almost more importantly, the red haired man did not reappear.

Maybe he took the threat Jumin Han made about police seriously.

Fur seemed to be everywhere. Moreso than usual. Which meant the cat must have been shedding excessively. Was it the time of the year, or despite the cat's apparent nonchalance, was it still stressed from the previous day's incident?

During her lunch, after eating she sat down on the soft rug in the living room. Rather than approach and attempt to pounce or draw her into some sort of play, the white cat simply laid down next to her leg and dropped her fluffy white head on a knee.

…Maybe the cat really was a bit worn out still?

"I don't think he's coming back any time soon." She reached down and ran her fingers lightly through the unnaturally soft fur. "You should be okay now."

The cat lazily swatted at a dust mote that floated near its face.

Where did all the dust in the suite even come from?

She flopped back on the rug herself, hands and arms splayed out on either side of her, and admired the ceiling. It should have been regular stucco, but from where she lay…it looked like someone might have actually put purposeful patterns in it instead. Who would waste the time or the money on something so trivial?

It did kind of look nice, though, if that's what it was.

White fur moved from her leg to curl up between her arm and chest, purring lightly. "Don't you step on my face next just because I'm relaxing. I defended you yesterday, you know."

The cat gave no sign it heard her.

Before she could continue her lecture, the front door opened to admit the one who owned the penthouse suite. Considerably early. She couldn't help but wonder if he only did that while she was lying on the floor looking like a child who'd just played herself out running all over the penthouse and back with the cat.

It seemed like it so far.

"You're here."

The cat lifted her head and then wandered leisurely to where he stood. It seemed like it would be disrespectful to hold a conversation while staring out at the upside down world beyond his large windows…so she, too, sat up to speak to him. "I'm afraid I'm only halfway done."

"That's to be expected, given the time." He made a small gesture with one hand, a minuscule dismissive wave. As if the concern was much too small to be bothered with anything grander than that. "It's why I returned home early."

…hold on.

Why did he do what?