“Dinner is ssserved!”

Lola circled the table leaving ornate plates in front of every seat. Tayn followed soon after with containers that held all sorts of luxurious delicacies.

An unfamiliar, colorful striped fish occupied Auric’s plate, prepared like something he would’ve seen on a cooking show. He felt bad knowing the amount of effort that was put into it.

“Lola. . . .Tayn. . . .I would’ve been fine with a Toaster-Pop or something. You guys didn’t have to go this far.”

The two servants looked rather surprised. Lola carefully poured Galavaine a glass of water and spoke.

“It’s ok! It really is! Trust me! We don’t really have anything else to do, but cooking is super fun!”

Tayn’s emerald green eyes rolled in their sockets.

“Speak for yourself. . . and can we get permission to wear something else? These maid outfits aren’t really good for the whole self-esteem thing.”

Jumping at the chance to outwit her fellow coworker, Amie cut in.

“That’s a butler outfit, not a maid outfit.”

“It’s the same thi—”

Auric laughed and cut Tayn off.

“You guys think I care what you wear? What, did Preston make you wear these?”

Lola quickly made her way to the kitchen, her hazel hair dancing behind her petite figure.

“Yeah. . . .he did. When Lola gets back give us something to do please. I’m bored.”, said Tayn

The group of them ate and merrily conversed. The chandelier above twinkled brightly, refracting the gold of the walls in all directions, which reminded Auric of something.

“Oh, you guys should totally repaint the walls. I swear, I’ve had a headache since I got here.”

“You want us to repaint every single wall? Ugh. Should keep me occupied for long enough I guess”, Tayn muttered

“Sure! We’d be glad to! What color?”

“Honestly, anything’s fine. Just make sure it’s not something that destroys my eyes.”

Once the group of them were finished with their plates, Lola and Tayn once again went around clearing out the table.

“Say, the castle feels kind of empty. Where did Roggus go?

Galavaine took a sip of his water and looked at Auric.

“He’s attending a meeting in Cygnus. More importantly, how is your speech coming along?”

“It’s uh . . coming.”

He wasn’t sure if he believed him, but Galavaine didn’t pry any further.

“Just make sure you at least have something. Please.”

And with that, he walked off into the corridor and eventually faded out of view.

Amie put her glasses back on and got out of her seat.

“Tomorrow morning you’re helping me fix that paper mess upstairs.”

“Are you actually going to do something this time?”, said Auric

“Probably.”

With everyone out of sight, Auric figured it’d be best to retire for the night as well.

The weak light of the morning sun brightened the messy room. A vast arrangement of birds chirped on and off in song, to Auric’s annoyance. No amount of coffee could’ve prepared him for the day that was to come.

“Knight Applications. . . . Complaints From Citizens. . . . City Affairs.. . .Amie are you fucking serious?”

“Oops”

“There’s like eight hundred applications in this folder! And the complaints one has far too much go through right now. When was the last time you checked these?!”

“A while ago.”

“This folder dates back to Decanthe!”

“Hey, that was only a few months ago.”

“It would do you good to go through those Knight Applications.”

Auric turned his head to find Galavaine sitting on Amie’s desk.

“I’m currently the only knight left from Preston’s rule.” Galavaine smiled proudly.

“What happened to the others?” Auric was puzzled at how his Kingdom was operating on only one knight.

“When someone is permitted to serve under the kingdom, they must sign somewhat of a king’s Contract that prevents

them from leaving their position. This contract shares it length with the reign of the respective King”

“Oh so. . .”

“Precisely. The moment we determined that your brother was dead, nearly every last soul in the kingdom fled.”

Auric smiled.

“We can hold a tournament to select the applicants when we get this other stuff sorted out. That sounds like it'd be fun t to watch. Heh, was my brother that bad of a ruler?”

“The last few weeks of his rule were . . . interesting to say the least. He was an astounding King however and I have no regrets serving him. Not only was he my king, he was also my most cherished friend."

Auric pondered that statement for second. Now that Galavaine mentioned it, in the few times he’d seen his brother back then, the two were usually together. It was only natural that Galavaine became a knight alongside his best friend, the prince.

Galavaine’s eyes rested on the framed picture of Preston that hung from the wall. He examined the cocky smile, cobalt eyes, and wispy blonde hair before letting out a sigh. Curious to see what could be such a great distraction to the knight, Amie averted her attention to the wall as well.

“Damn, he looks exactly like Preston.”

“Indeed, but perhaps that is a good sign.” Galavaine laughed.

The more papers he flipped through, the more Auric understood the relevance of his presence.

“Some of these issues seem kind of major. . . .did these all just pop up in Preston’s absence?”, he said.

“Remember, this is Amie that was supposed to be looking over these matters. I’m under the impression that some of these existed in Preston’s reign and he just wasn’t aware.”, Galavaine said.

Auric didn’t even know where he should start with this. What issues had priority? What was tainting his city the most?

“Thirty-two of these reports mention women being found dead in their homes dating back to late Novanthe. I think this may be what the G.R.N was talking about a few weeks ago.”

Amie began to roll with laughter

“You watch G.R.N? What the hell?”

“What? A shut-in needs to stay informed sometimes.”

“Anyways, those are probably related to the break-ins I skimmed over earlier.”

Amie tossed a group of papers towards Auric.

Upon reading them, he decided that this would be the case the Kingdom dealt with first.

“A lot of these break-ins were reported by stores and homes. Sounds about right. In these cases, doors were never opened so alarms didn’t go off. The only reason they noticed was because of things going missing or murder.”, said Auric.

Galavaine extended his arm to Auric, handing him a folder.

“These mention missing persons, almost all of them were teenage girls and some of these were filed nearly a year ago.”

The two shot a fierce glance at Amie. She felt as if her face would melt right off.

******************************************************************

The sun merely hovered over the horizon, blanketing the city of Halford in a pale, orange light. Hundreds of citizens paced the streets, scattered about, anticipating the Kingdom’s return to the public eye. The news had been hyping it all week, sticking fliers anywhere there was room, broadcasting that there was to be a “special announcement” regarding the Kingdom this coming weekend. Auric sat in the middle of the largest park in the city: Trysa Park. Among that dozens of streetlights that were littered about, towering statues of angelic figures glowed in the evening light. Auric noticed that citizens were beginning to occupy the multiple stone paths that curved throughout the area. He could only imagine the thoughts going through their heads. Were they here because they were angry? Were they here because they were curious? Were they here because they had nothing better to spend their night doing?

“Heyyyyy! You’re up in about thirty minutes!? Do you have everything ready?”

Auric turned around, and wasn’t surprised to see that the horrid voice was coming from Sara. The redhead that was hosting tonight’s segment.

“Yeah . . . I guess.”

He felt a warm hand land on his shoulder. He looked up to find Galavaine smiling down on him.

“Excited?”

Auric laughed. He dreaded the thought of making a public appearance, but assumed it would be something he’d have to get used to.

“Not remotely.”

He could see a group of people, maybe in their mid-twenties setting up an arrangement of wires and projectors, among lighting and other things. Amie seemed to be bossing them around. There really was no getting out of this.

“Alright. It’s time”

Sara handed Auric a microphone and guided him up a short staircase, leading to an spacious stage. Beneath him stood an immeasurable sea of people. The first obvious thing he noticed was that the audience didn’t exactly consist entirely of humans as he would’ve expected . Among them he spotted quite a few skeletons, fully clothed, with eye sockets that led to nowhere. He noticed a short girl, with pale blue skin and gills on her cheeks. She wore a blue hoodie with text that read “Water you looking at?”

He considered approaching her after he was finished, to ask her where she bought it so he could shut the store down. To her far left he noticed a group of green haired teenagers, wrapped head to toe in light brown robes, with miniature images of trees and other plants patched all over, huddled around a blanket that spanned quite the distance. Atop it sat baskets, filled with sandwiches and drinks of all kind. He shook his head.

“Are they having a fucking picnic?” he thought.

“It’s the night you’ve all been waiting for! All your questions, your fears, addressed right here, right now! This is Grandolis Region News Tonight, and I’m your host Sara!”

In a sudden rain of extravagant lights, the stage glowed brightly beneath the evening sky. The crowd began to cheer and the sound of upbeat electronic music began to sweep through the park.

“I thought this was a speech, not a fucking rave”.

Auric could already feel the headache starting to set in.

“Relax, It’s just an introduction” Galavaine reassured.

“Brace yourselves! For the introduction of your new king!”

Sara passed the microphone onto Auric, the music came to an abrupt stop, and within seconds the crowd went silent.