SERAVEL ROVODIA, the son of the tyrant Fire Potentate, is a model citizen of all sorts. Obedient, punctual, and most of all, silent. When his friend and long-time confidante gets arrested for alleged sacrilege against the administration, Seravel sta...
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2407 Crescin 01, Reshpe
A loud pounding on his door snapped Sera from his boredom. After sending in his last article and waiting for the prints to come out, he had been reduced into a sitting fowl inside his room. Would the Potentate get him to chop him to pieces?
The door opened and spilled forth Harsen. Judging from how she huffed and braced her knees to catch her breath, she must have run all the way here. Sera raised an eyebrow as he slipped out of his chair to meet the maid halfway.
"What's going on?" Sera asked.
The maid gulped a few more breaths before straightening, wiping the sweat on her forehead with her long sleeves. "The Potentate has summoned you to the throne hall," she said.
Sera blinked. The throne hall and not the court hall? That's new. This wasn't the response he had counted on but to get the full picture of the Potentate's response, he'd have to see for himself. Did the summon mean his house arrest was over?
"Thank you for telling me, Harsen," he said, startling the maid into gaping at him. Yeah, they always act like that whenever he lets the fact that he knew them by name slip. "I'll get ready and head there shortly."
Harsen clasped her hand by her bodice and bowed. She retreated out the door, the soldier guarding it shutting it behind her. Sera waited for the lock to click but it never came. He strode towards his closet and yanked out the only vest he had left. After Darmer had tinkered with all the listening devices in his vests, he couldn't bring himself to keep looking at them on a daily basis knowing what they carried.So, he stuffed all of them into a spare crate he used as a storage bin for so long, keeping just one for the rare occasions of him going out.
That's what house arrest would do to a person.
Sera donned his vest, hoping with all his might Darmer had truly stopped the device's listening functions. Because if not, the workers in charge of listening in would have heard everything that happened in the press. He gave his vest one last tuck, to make sure he didn't gain weight from doing nothing but eat nalda inside his room, before trudging to the door and giving it a light tap. The soldier from the other side opened it.
Like a free man on his first day out of prison. Sera stepped out with an inexplicable awe ripping from his system and bleeding into his lips. The corridors felt too big now that Sera walked into them after getting used to the limiting corners of his room. The tapestries had never looked so colorful.
When he got to the throne hall, there were a lot more servants crowding at the door than he remembered. He had to squeeze in, muttering his excuse-mes just to get to the hall's twin doors. As soon as the doors opened, the Potentate's voice rang through the space and bled into the corridor.
"Don't tell me to bend to them!" his father yelled. Sera turned to the source of the voice to find the Potentate standing from his throne, red in the face, staring daggers at the poor Adviser who suggested something last. "I don't take orders from peasants! What's the update on their operations?"
