40

"You can sew?" she demands.

"Yes, madam."

"You can…build?" She wobbles her hands towards each other in a cryptic gesture.

"I…to a degree, yes, madam," you offer, uncertain.

"Hmm."

After A Pause

She rolls up the scroll and reinserts it in her rack on the desk. "You are unfit for performance…but there is a need for a menial with some comprehension of stage matters to lurk about His Grace's resident company and render such aid as is desired."

Your heart starts to beat faster. She sees the question in your eyes and sighs heavily.

"You are to be that Lurker," she says. "The mending, the fashioning, the, the coordination—such things and more will fall to you."

"Madam Steward," you begin, standing—

"On a provisional basis, it goes without saying," she snaps. "If you neglect your duties or impair the company's ability to divert His Grace and his guests, you will be fortunate to be discharged from the service of this household with ten fingers and two eyes. Is that clear?"

You nod, lacing all ten fingers protectively behind your back.

There is silence for a moment. "Then leave," she says, jangling her rings at you.

Onward

She deigns to tell you where to go moments later to secure your lodgings for the day—and the future, you realize suddenly, stopping short in the rose-stone halls.

Here is where you will live…in the service of a Duke! A far cry from going blind over cauldrons of foxglove back home, and also an honor your talented peers in the Bardbrood found eluded them, much to their frustration. How edifying to have succeeded where they did not, at least to this degree.

You shake yourself and continue down the hallway to look for the vice steward's quarters. A Lurker, you think…serving the company, though not a participant in it.

A humble acorn grows into a mighty oak over time. Your modest foothold here in the Duke's Court hardly precludes you from great gains in public prominence as time wears on.

You can't keep yourself from grinning as you trot down the hall. You took the gamble of your life, and by God! It paid off. [+Blood]

You let out a quick sigh as you arrive at the vice steward's door. A spectacled man with a wide, waxy mustache looks up at you.

"I am sent by Malodoro," you begin, putting on a smile.

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