The Flight of Princess Mary

the game is afoot

One week later

"Sir, you have a visitor." Austen's maid said from the doorway of his room, jolting him awake. His eyes squint in the bright morning light streaming through the windows of his faded wooden room. He had it better than anybody in the slums. A house that wasn't falling apart, clean water, fresh bedding, an attractive maid. He was lucky, among all things.

"Who is it?"

"The king." The maid responded, awkwardly fidgeting from foot to foot. Austen almost smiled. His maid, Lucy or Lily, whatever her name was, had harbored a massive crush on him for years now. She was good at hiding her emotions, as serene and composed as any other maid, but the blush that blossomed on the nape of her neck whenever he walked by told him otherwise.

"What does he want?" Austen asked, trying to hide his curiosity. It had been a week since he had captured Charles Black, and the newspapers had stopped praising him two days after. The king didn't make regular visits out to the slums, and he especially didn't do so to congratulate street rats for cleaning up his messes.

He must need something from Austen. Something that nobody else can give him.

"I don't know sir, but it's best to go meet him now." She blankly remarked, staring at the wall opposite her.

"You can go. Tell him I'll be down in a minute," Austen stands, stretching his sore limbs and making sure his maid gets a good look at his bare chest. Sure enough, she blinks, staring blankly, but Austen can tell that the signature blush is creeping up her neck.

"Are you going or not?" Austen says, pulling a plain white button-up out of his closet and putting it on.

"Y-yes, sir." The maid bows anxiously and runs out of the room. Austen grabs a pair of black pants and a tie and pulls them on, looking at himself in the tall, ornate mirror next to his bed.

The mirror was cleaned and polished, but that wasn't how it was before. He had come to England on that mirror, a shivering boy, who didn't remember anything. He was only fourteen years old and he was bleeding down the side of his face. The blood had dripped onto the glass, staining them, and making it almost impossible to remove. Almost.

The mirror showed no signs of his arrival now.

Austen touches his cheek, running his hand upon his scar. That was the only thing he couldn't cover up about his past. The scar was a part of him, as a part of him as anything else was.

"Austen!" The maid calls up, doing a good job of hiding the worry in her voice. Austen turns on his heel, taking one last look at his small room, where his bed was hardly big enough for him, and the floorboards creaked in all sorts of places.

He had a feeling that he wouldn't be seeing it again.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Mr. Knight," The King says, arranged elegantly on Austen's sofa as if it were a throne, "Thank you for agreeing to meet with me."

"What do you want?" Austen was never much for pleasantries.

"Congratulations on your capture of Charles Black, by the way. From what the newspaper told me, he never stood a chance. You've done England a great service."