8. The Stallion

"Repeat again!" Miss Rowena ordered the umpteenth time.

"All plates and glasses must be clean from dirt as well as fingerprints when presented to Alpha."

"Fine, miss," said Bella before finally returning to her job.

Since becoming a servant at the Tomas Black family house, Bella has been tasked with cleaning dishes. It might seem like a trivial task, but in fact being the plate maid at the Tomas Black family home is a very tough task. Dinner and lunch have become very difficult times, because they are used to eating together. There might be more than twenty people.

There are hundreds of plates and divided into several different sets categorized according to the country of origin of manufacture. Elegant cutlery from France and Italy, classic-style porcelain from East Asia, simpler craftsmanship in Switzerland and the Netherlands, and fine gold and silver fixtures handed down from previous presidencies. Bella sometimes thinks, is she in a kingdom of this country?

Bella's job is to memorize all types and functions of the tableware without exception. Which cups are used for morning tea, which plates are suitable for breakfast, which ceramics are suitable for formal dinners, and which can be used for a casual dinner.

The craziest thing, according to Bella, is that everything must be mastered in just one week. Luckily there is Hida, a senior servant who has worked for the Tomas Black family for seven years.

The friendly woman helps Bella a lot. And, as friends, they used to talk about anything including gossiping about Thomas Black's family. From Hida, Bella knows that Alpha actually had many wives ... But they are all dead ... Every time he gets married, there is an extraordinarily grand celebration party ... But soon the wife is declared dead. Only the first wife who lived the longest had children ... that is ... Sir. Remus Black.

"He's heartbroken," Hida said as they chatted with each other while cleaning the silver tray with a special sponge imported from France.

"Who?"

"Prince Remus, who else," explained Hida enthusiastically. “Everyone knows that Prince Remus doesn't like living here… And he is rumored to love someone from another country. Based on the rumors circulating among the maids, this year they should have gotten married, but the girls ended their relationship and married another man.

"What a pity then," Bella muttered softly. "What does His Majesty Prince Remus look like, that?" She asked curiously.

Hida smiled, "Well, you're curious, huh?"

"I just want to know."

“He is still very young, also very handsome when compared to most other men, he looks more… Smart. Oh! I wish you could see for yourself, Bella. " Hida sighed softly. “It's just that to become a servant who immediately serves him you have to wait until it is recommended by Miss Rowena. I only got to see him after working here for three years. "

"What a long time!"

"Only senior servants have the right to serve Tomas Black's core family," explained Hida. "But, if we work for other families, we are only allowed to live near their maids."

"Why is that?"

“Because the laws in this place… the laws of the pack. Some men can only gather and be served by servants of a high level of gender. Why don't you know about this?"

"I mean, why in this house...why they allow us to work for this family?"

“It's because our master is a free-minded and open-minded person. He did not force the strict pack law to fully apply, although you must remain polite."

Bella heard Hida's explanation without stopping to clean the silver plates.

“But, believe me, the greatest luck here is if we can serve Prince Remus. Unfortunately somehow it will happen to you. "

Bella chuckled. "What is clear is that I did not expect it," she said, stacking several plates to be brought to the service room.

Bella had just finished arranging the dishes in the storage cupboard when someone called her from behind the kitchen door. Bella peeked into the private kitchen in the core room.

There Bella saw several servants in different uniforms, they were busy chopping vegetables and putting them in a large enamel pot. Looks like they are making large pasta.

Another waiter stirred the egg and cheese mixture, then poured it over the pile of vegetables in a saucepan. Seeing Bella's arrival, one of them smiled with relief.

“Sweetheart, will you take this to the grooms at the stable? Panther should be fed before noon. " The request came from the servant she knew as Madam Egg.

"Yes, madam," Bella replied as she hugged the heavy pot, then walked away to the stable. Do horses eat pasta in this place?

Passing through the backyard of the house which consists of a road covered with trees, Bella finally arrives in front of the stable belonging to the Tomas Black family which in fact is much bigger, luxurious, and cleaner, than her home.

At the door of the stable Bella runs into Rick, the groom.

"Sir, I brought food to Panther," she said timidly. Even though she has come to the stable three times, every time she sees Rick's face, Bella is always scared. Rick's big crooked nose and the hole in his skin were nothing to look at. Has he been to a war? She heards men at this place are accostumed going to a war.

“Just take it to its cage, and be careful not to disturb it. Panther's a bit mean." Rick warns Bella. His husky and heavy voice made the girl shudder for a moment.

Bella nodded, then hurried into the cage. In every part of the stable that she passed, Bella noticed the horse nameplate hanging in front of the wooden door. She still had not memorized the location of the horse stable which was said to be the employer's favorite.

Bella smiled with relief when she found the name Panther in the third cage in the right row. Cautiously, Bella opened the door and paused for a moment when she saw the big dark horse disturbed and neighing softly.

"Calm down, friend!" exclaimed Bella softly. "I brought lunch for you," she said as she spilled the contents of the pot she was carrying into the large copper basin which was the food container for the horse. Without prompting twice, the horse immediately enjoyed its food greedily.

"You're so big," Bella muttered in awe of the purebred stallion horse. Bella's hand reached out to touch the mane, but it turned out that her movement startled the horse so that it immediately neighed loudly while suddenly lifting its front legs. Bella was too shocked to move away. All the girl could do was close her eyes.

"Watch Out !!!" The sound of a muffled scream accompanied by a pounding made Bella's body pushed onto the haystack in the corner of the room.