Chapter 2 - Summoned

(Alicia)

Safely back home, I strip and almost run into a scalding hot shower. The shower is a small baptism. Hot water hammers the night off my skin and out of my hair until the water runs clear and I can tell myself the world has been washed off it. I pull on soft tights, an oversized hoodie, Uggs and the armour of indifference. I plan on binge-watching something. But first, breakfast.

I’m too hungry to cook and too impatient for delivery, so cereal it is, with a mental note to order that pizza later.

Halfway through my bowl of cereal there is a loud knock on the door. Sighing, I put the bowl down and go to open it. My mood sours as soon as I see who is waiting outside.

“Princess Alicia. You have been summoned,” the dour-faced man in the three-piece suit says before I can close the door in his face. He is flanked by two heavies. They are clearly not going to take no for an answer. Maybe I should have answered those phone calls, or at least listened to the messages without deleting them.

For a moment I contemplate closing that door regardless, but from experience I know it won’t work. I could take them, all three of them, but he’ll only send more and where would I hide the bodies? This is a respectable apartment building, and I try to keep a low profile. The humans don’t know what I am, and I’d like to keep it that way.

I stare longingly at the bowl of cereal.

“I’m going to finish my breakfast first,” I tell mister dour-face. “You can wait here.”

“Our orders are to bring you immediately…” he starts, but I hold a finger up and slowly move my hand towards his mouth. Then I use my thumb and forefinger to pinch his lips shut. The shock of my action reverberates through his body and I see his eyes slowly turn murderous. I smirk inwardly.

Without a word, I turn towards the kitchen and pick up my bowl again. I take a seat at the counter and start eating while old dour-face slowly pops an artery in his brain. To his credit, and the heavies surrounding him, he doesn’t move or squeak. Good boy. I notice that at least one of the heavies is trying very hard to keep a straight face. I better not catch his eye or we’ll both be in big trouble.

When I’ve finished eating, I make a point of rinsing my bowl and spoon, then drying them and meticulously putting them away. A small domestic rebellion. On any other day they’ll be left in the sink until I’ve built up enough dirty dishes to warrant a proper wash. But nope, not today. Today, I’m deliberately stalling.

After I place the spoon in its spot in the drawer, I open the pantry and grab a muesli bar, slipping it into my hoodie pocket. Who knows when I’ll get to eat again today. In my mind I’m already saying goodbye to that pizza.

I turn towards the three men and grab my keys.

“Right, now where were we?” I say as I walk towards them. Dour-face doesn’t say a word, he just turns and starts walking, clearly expecting me to follow the trail of steam coming out of his ears. I do so obediently, patting myself on the back mentally for playing nice. One of the heavies falls in next to me, the other one takes the rear.

Right.

I don’t have to ask who sent them or where we’re off to. I know. I also know not to even try asking them what this is all about. They either wouldn’t know or wouldn’t tell me.

The car ride to the palace happens in a tense four-hour silence, during which I play candy crush on my phone and occasionally stare out of the window.

We drive through several villages on the way there. Maybe it’s just because I haven’t been here in nearly two years that I notice how tired everything looks. Echoes of the kingdom’s former prosperity are still there in the distinctly tall yet quaintly elegant buildings, but there’s a stench of lingering neglect clinging to the landscape.

Here and there I spot weeds growing through a crack in the pavement. Public buildings and private houses all show the signs of time’s gentle erosion. Peeling paint here, a rusty, skewed fence there.

The lawn of a once pristinely manicured playpark near the library of one of the bigger villages is now overgrown, the grass stretching tall in defiance of the absent mower. It’s not that the place has fallen into ruin. It’s more as if it’s grown tired, no longer cared for with the same fervour that once infused every brick and stone with pride.

It has taken him 12 years to get his people to no longer care.

We drive through the gilded palace gates, and I can’t help but make the glaringly obvious comparison. The place is immaculate. Is that a new fountain? Holy hell, the 15-foot-high monstrosity is oddly elegant despite looking like it is made from solid gold… Not a sag or a speck of rust or a wayward weed anywhere in sight.