Chapter 38: Morning for the Staff

Thank you for following, AnimalBlossom36, and here, don't worry, now you won't go insane. I hope you, and all other followers, will be satisfied with this one. I say morning is going slow, but I can assure you it won't be boring. I have plans for this day, both for the royalties and for the staff; and for our darling dork of course.

As Karen walked out of the sick room and headed for the doors to the corridor, she let out a sigh, suddenly feeling a bit lighter. No, allot lighter. Actually she had forgotten all about how Varian failed to recall her name at first and let the pricing of her profession take it's place. His words were ringing in hear ears and she felt like they lifted her up.

The Majesties are completely depending on you.

She wasn't aware of it, but she was laughing out loud and made a swirl on the floor out of happiness when she heard voice behind her.

"Karen?"

She got startled again, and got rather embarrassed when she turned around and saw the physician, feeling how rapidly warm her cheeks got again. "Uhm... Yes, Sir?" she replied, her voice barely holding.

Phineas approached, smiling lightly, not showing any sign of reaction to her silly behavior. "I take it the Majesties are about to wake up soon?"

"Yeah, I... I suppose so." she said, fiddling with her apron again. "Is there anything I can do?"

Phineas shook his head slightly. "Oh, it's nothing important. The King wanted a word with me, but there is no rush. I can't leave the young man in there unattended anyway, so I will have to wait till His Majesty comes to me."

"Of course you can't." she said, giving a short laugh. "I... I better get this to the chef then." she said, holding up the bottle.

"Send him my good wishes of recovering." the Physician said and opened the door for her.

"I will, Phineas. Thanks!" she replied and walked through the door. But she had barely managed to get outside before the two new guards spotted her, and got pale.

"Karen? Where did you come from?"

"You weren't allowed in here. It's not safe with you near the prisoner!"

"Huh?" Karen were disturbed by their direct approach. "What prisoner?"

The two guards exchanged confused looks and then looked back at her,. "The prisoner in the sick room, of course!" one of them said.

Phineas stiffened and prepared himself to interfere, but Karen were ahead of him and placing her hands on her hips she looked at them with small eyes like her Grandmother would have done, indicating how dumb she thought they acted.

"What are you talking about? There's no prisoner in the sick room!"

"WHAT!?" the two guards cried out in unison and looked at eachother, each of them panicking more than the other.

"He has escaped again!"

"We have got to tell the Captain!"

"Hurry up, or else wee too will end up polishing boots..."

"Gentlemen, here really is no need to..." Phineas called out after them, but they had already passed the corner, and he lowered the arm he had stretched out after them. Then he lowered it, letting out a frustrated sigh that sounded most like a growl and pinched the bridge of his nose and begun mumbling something in his own tongue before spitting. "Those guards makes my hair grow whither by the minute!" he mumbled as he closed the door behind him.

Karen was left alone, blinking in confusion, still pondering over everyone's odd behavior and started walking back to the kitchen, looking at the bottle in her hand and then glancing back to the medic's doors a moment, wondering to herself if this too was gonna be one of those days in the Castle.

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In the servant's lodgings, Violet had just finished getting ready and walked out through the door. But before closing it, she had one last look at her daughter. Millicent were still sleeping, her head halfway buried into her pillow and her short brown hair a mess around her face.

Violet gave her a pitiful look before she closed the door behind her. "My poor dear. Sleep a while longer. I'll handle the rest." Then she stepped towards the next door where a couple of other maids lived, and knocked gently on it. She heard voices from inside, and soon another maid opened, a tall, slender maid with long, auburn hair, still in her night gown. She widened her eyes when seeing her. "Oh, Violet. Are we late?"

"What?" another maid appeared in the door, with short red hair and a round face.

"No Diane, not at all. But I have to be early off today. You see my poor daughter worked herself off her shoes for Princess Annabelle yesterday, and I thought I'd cover that for her so she can rest out. That means I won't be able to help out preparing breakfast for the royalties, and I... might not be able to help out with the laundry later on. SO Diane, I want you to handle the morning meeting in my place, can you do that?"

"Eh... Sure, I can do it..." Diane widened her eyes and looked at her companion, who got a little concerned.

"Oh my... I hope it won't be like this for the next couple of months."

"Don't worry yourself, Sarah." Violet said with a calming smile. "If she becomes too demanding, I am going to have a word with Her Majesty about it. Just tell Millicent that she'll go help you with the laundry when she wakes up. Now prepare yourself. Yesterday was a disaster, so today must be better."

She hoped herself she sounded convincing as she turned to leave, but behind her, Diane and Sarah exchanged concerned looks as they watched her go.

"I have heard about this Princess Annabelle, but I've never seen her before." Sarah said. "She wasn't at Princess Rapunzel's coronation, was she?"

"No, we would have remembered." Diane said and suddenly got a sneaky smile on her lips, turning to her roommate. "I did hear a rumor, though... about her and Cassandra."

Sarah's concerned expression turned to a wide eyed exiting smile by the chance of some gossip. "Tell me, please!" she said as Diane closed the door behind them.

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Nigel let out a long, loud yawn when he closed the door to his bedroom behind him. Streching out once more, he began walking, blinking rapidly and rubbing his eyes with a hand.

The royal advisor didn't look like his normal good looking self this morning. Neither did he feel so. His hair was tied in its normal ponytail, but today he felt like his hair was flat and dry, and it wasn't as tight as it used to. He had large circles around his eyes and he looked pale, and his face looked longer than usual. He had tried his best to straighten his mustache to make it look as it normally did, but today he simply failed to shape it he usual way. As he walked he tried to fasten the lace in his neckline properly, but when he failed for the third time he simply just stuffed it down the neckline of his shirt.

"That will do. That's not first priority right now." he mumbled to himself, sounding far from the usual perfectionist self. "Oh, my eyes feels like sand..."

He gave his eyes another rub before he began walking up towards the third floor, almost stumbling in the first step. As he approached the royal bedroom, he stopped and dropped his jaw, his eyes went round and he was at sudden wide awake. Normally he would approach the royal bedroom and awaken His Majesty and then wait for his arrival. He was practically stunned as he watched King as he carefully closed the door to his own bedroom, already dressed and ready.

"S-sire? Have... have I overslept?" he stumbled, barely able to keep his voice normal.

King Frederic quickly turned around and hurried to hush him down, looking back at the door as if he hoped nobody would hear them. Then he hurried over to him, struggling with his clothes on the way as if they didn't fit right.

"No, not at all, Nigel. You haven't overslept. I... I just woke up early. That's all."

"Sire, let me..." Nigel hurried in front of him and forced him to stop, and before Frederic could react, the advisor begun started to untie the King's waistcoat. First now Frederic discovered that he had managed to tie the leather strings into the golden medallion around his neck. But Nigel gently released them from eachother before he tied up the waistcoat again it and took his liberty to carefully straighten the medallion as well. "There, Your Majesty, much better!"

Frederic couldn't help but chuckle a little. "How odd. I couldn't understand why it felt so tight. Thank you, Nigel."

"My pleasure, Your Majesty." Nigel replied low, then looked at him."Look, Sire. Em... If it's necessary with an hour more sleep, I suggest..."

Nigel were interrupted as he felt the King's hand on his shoulder as he led him further down the hallway. "No no, that won't be needed. Besides, The Queen needs it more than I. She... didn't sleep very well, I'm afraid." Frederic sank when he thought of his wife the previous night and looked back at the door with a sad look.

"Well, that makes two of us." Nigel said, being reminded of how badly he had slept himself. "I'm not sure if I have slept at all for a moment during the whole night. But then again, it's no wonder, after such events yesterday."

"I am only glad my cousin didn't stay."Frederic's face became a frown, raising his voice a little more as they went further and further away from the royal bedroom. "Had Valponce discovered Varian, we would all have been toast. We wouldn't hear the end of it."

"Sire. I have been thinking, and this is what kept me awake..." Nigel said. "I understand it was... Well, the situation made it practically impossible during the circumstances to avoid Prince Lars and his brother to discover Varian before we did..."

"Actually it was young Daniel who discovered him first." Frederic couldn't help but chuckle. "Youth now at days tends to come before us in many ways."

"Well, I feel I must be honest, Sire." Nigel went on with his speach. "Was it wise to let them know as much as they did?"

"Well, like you just said, Nigel. During the circumstances, it was impossible to avoid. Besides... Prince Lars was most understanding. And his brother too. I really liked that young man... Jonas, was it?"

"Jonas, yes Sire. Remarkable young man if I must say." For a moment Nigel became a little lighter. "Such a friendly character. The perfect gentleman, indeed! Princess Annabelle has been fortunate. We know how difficult it has been for the Duke to marry her off. But..." Nigel got back into his serious mode. "Speaking of Princess Annabelle... I only fear that if she gets to hear about this, she might slip the word to the Duke."

"I doubt very well that would be. You recall it was Prince Lars who said it would be a good idea to keep Annabelle all out of this? According to what he said she seems to be... completely unable to keep secrets. We better not let her into this."

"No, that might be a good idea. And therefore we must be extremely careful. Especially now with her wedding coming up."

"Oh dear... I had completely forgotten about that." Frederic suddenly looked all worn out. "That... is definitely the last thing Arianna need now."

"As much as I agree, Sire, I don't like the thought of it. But on the other hand, it could be a major topic that, for the moment, would help us all keep the Princess away from the talk of Varian."

"As much as I hate to admit it... That is a fact, indeed." Frederic rolled his eyes and sighed. "What a fine stew we have managed to stumble into. But we simply have to stumble our way through it. Phineas said two weeks, and then..." he sighed. "Well, we're simply forced to wait and see."

"Two weeks..." Nigel sighed and rolled his eyes. "Very well."

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The Captain of the guards were stumping his way with the two guards behind him.

"This better not be true! We have never used so many guards before. It's impossible he could have escaped! And if he has, Phineas will have to answer for it."

"There should have been more of us, Captain." one of the guards said.

"I wanted to, but that hopeless physician wouldn't let me." He stopped outside the medic's quarters and banged the door. "Open this instant, Phineas! That's an order!"

The door went open, and the foreign physician squinted his small eyes at the two guards behind him as if he shot daggers at them. "Well there you two imbeciles are. How dare you just run off like that without even consulting with me if your assumption were true or not?"

"Huh?" the guards looked at eachother, and then back at him. "What do you..."

The Captain was about to put in a word, but the physician didn't let him in as he went on.

"First of all, I thought we all agreed that we were supposed to not mention Varian as a prisoner when young Karen was around to avoid scaring her."

"But..." the other guard stumbled. "She walked right in."

"Indeed. Right under your very noses, when you two were snoozing." Phineas said dryly with sarcasm in his voice. "A good thing I had given him a strong sleeping tonic and that I was there to prevent him from waking up and wander off by himself." He turned towards the Captain, glaring even sharper. "I assured you last night, Captain, that I had everything under control."

The Captain blinked, getting just as confused as his two guards. "Does this mean he's still in there?"

The physician's eyes grew even smaller. "I believe I just said that. You may come and see for yourself, but only if you remain absolute quiet, and you dare not show yourself to him. The slightest of unnecessary hint of fight might cause damage to his head, and His Majesty won't like it if that happens! But your guards remain outside, where they are supposed to be!"

The Captain of the guards blinked and signalized the two others to remain at the spot while he followed the Physichian into the reception room. There, the physician opened the door slightly and gave him harsh signals of remaining quiet. Then he stepped aside for the Captain to approach, and the Captian peeked through the thin opening, and his eyes got wide when he looked inside.

Cause Varian were indeed there, sitting in the bed with some kind of breakfast, the raccoon by his side, eyeing his every move.

The Captain blinked and rubbed his eyes before having another look, but there were the same view as just a second ago. But the sight didn't give him relief. On the other hand he didn't know what to feel. Because even though he saw Varian in here, it wasn't really Varian as he was used to. The goggles and the apron was gone, and all he saw was a young boy eating breakfast, looking all calm and... not frowning? He even chuckled with his mouth full of food when the raccoon climbed up his shoulders.

As soon as he realized that the Captain was convinced, the physician pushed the door till it closed. "Well, Captain?"

"I say..." he begun as he turned back. "He was actually eating for once!"

"It seems so." Phineas said, smirking in satisfaction.

But then he got serious and looked at him. "But Karen... How could you allow her to..."

"Like I said yesterday, he doesn't recall being a dangerous criminal. So therefore he had no reason to harm her. On the contrary, I think that young girl has a better hold on him than any of your guards has ever had. So why would it be that bad?"

The Captain got frustrated by his constant lack of concern and frowned at him. "Phineas, may I remind you whom we are talking about here?"

The physician didn't reply at first, only stared at him, remaining calm. "Captain, I believe it is I who must remind you of what kind of issue we are dealing with! We have been through such a matter once before, if you do not recall?"

"I have absolutely no idea of what you mean with that!" he replied, crossing his arms.

"Oh well... I believe it's important to refresh your memory then." he said and walked towards his lab, opening the door and gesticulated with his right hand that he were to enter. "After you, Captain!"

The Captain hesitated, but decided in the end it was better to follow. So he entered the medic's lab and the physician closed the door behind him.

DUMDUMDUM-DUUUUMM... What now?