novelThe Sleep Over
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Translated by XianPiete
Madeline started to regret having agreed to the sharing of her room with Lady Harcourt as Lady Harcourt's butler, Norris, slavishly cleaned every inch of her room. After he was done with the cleaning, he brought in a new table and two chairs, a frilly pink table cloth, new frilly pink curtains for the window, transformed the two twin beds in the room into frilly pink canopy beds with frilly pink bedding and finally a tray of tea and snacks. He gave a gentlemanly bow to Lady Harcourt and apologized, "I'm sorry young miss, there won't be enough time for paint to dry so I will not be able to change the color of the walls to suit your taste this evening."
Lady Harcourt moved to the table and Norris pulled out the chair for her, she took a seat and said, "Lady d'Aumont, would care for some chamomile tea before bed? I find that it helps me relax in the brutally poor conditions of the Academy dorm rooms."
Madeline blinked her eyes and watched as Norris stood just behind Lady Harcourt she said, "Does he stay with you all night long?"
Lady Harcourt gave a soft laugh and then said, "Goodness no, I am an unmarried lady, it would be improper to share my room with a man, even a servant. No, servants merely come when needed, dear, they are here to make life easier, not to impose themselves on your life when not needed."
Madeline shook her head and took out her sword to clean it as Sir Vergy had instructed her years ago, paying close attention to the blade to make sure she didn't have any uneven spots or cracks in the blade that could lead to its failure. Lady Harcourt stared at her in horror asking, "Why would you do that yourself, that is clearly work that should be given to a servant. Is House Aumont so poor?"
Madeline frowned and then explained, "My first teacher, Sir Vergy, taught that your sword is your life. You must take special care of the blade in order to have absolute assurance that it will be able to serve you when danger comes. Leaving the care of my blade to a servant, would of course spare me a little time, but I could never be assured that it would be to my standards when I need it most."
Lady Harcourt softly laughed once again, "Dear Lady d'Aumont, if you have a proper servant, not only could you be assured of your blade, you could trust that he could wield it for you when danger was near."
*****
Guy de Montfort, Claude de Rouvroy, Sir Charles de évreux, the Chairman of the Academy, Olivier de la Marche and the Royal investigator were sitting in the Chairman's office having a discussion when the head of the Royal guard entered the office and spoke, "We've caught an intruder entering the campus, a local man who claimed to be coming to see his girlfriend, we checked with the girl and found that it was indeed a planned meeting."
Everyone frowned and then returned to discussing possibilities. An hour later another man burst through the door, a royal guard quickly grabbed him from behind as he cried out, "Chief, I have important information!"
The Royal investigator called out, "Let him go, he's one of my men!"
The investigator brushed himself off and stepped into the office, he began to speak, "Chief, I looked into the two new students, Lady Eloise Bette Harcourt and Sir Charles de évreux. The knight checked out, but Lady Harcourt... When I visited the Harcourt estate, I found that Lady Harcourt was still in residence, she has been ill for a few months. The doctors found that she had been poisoned, only she had a very high tolerance to the poison and didn't die from it."
"Harcourt is the assassin..." Sir évreux stated the obvious.
Guy frowned and said, "We should check on Madeline and Alicia. Then carefully approach this fake Lady Harcourt's room."
The captain of the Royal Guard said, "Leave it to my men, we can handle both at the same time."
Guy nodded and said, "If you don't mind, I'd like to check on Madeline myself."
Olivier said, "I'll come with you."
Claude nodded as did Sir évreux, ""I'll come as well."" They said in unison.
*****
Madeline took a sip of the tea and suddenly felt extremely tired even with the anxiety of the danger surrounding the Academy. Lady Harcourt smiled at her and sipped her own tea. Lady Harcourt then asked, "You were engage to Prince Andre, once before, wasn't it?"
Madeline nodded and with slightly slurred speech answered, "Yes, when I was a child. He broke off the engagement before my sixteenth birthday."
Lady Harcourt smiled and then said, "I understood the situation to be that you chose the Villain, Guy the Molester, over Prince Andre. Which of course, is a horrible mistake. You know Prince Andre is a good friend of my family. He even gave us a lot of money to make sure that you were properly taken care of, along with that vile criminal, Guy the Molester."
Madeline said in slurred speech, "It's Montfort."
*****
Guy started to get a sense of dread as the approached Alicia's room. They knocked on the door and Lady Leon greeted them with sword in hand, "Yes?"
The Royal guardsman asked, "We are just doing a check of the rooms m'Lady, you are together with Lady d'Aumont and Lady Foix tonight?"
Lady Leon shook her head and said, "No, just Lady Foix, Lady d'Aumont is staying with Lady Harcourt."
Guy, Olivier, Claude and Sir évreux all looked at each other with faces full of fear and anger. The Royal Guardsman thanked her and said, "Rest easy m'lady, the Royal Guard have secured the building tonight."
After the door was closed they sprinted toward the fake Lady Harcourt's room. Once there they would the Royal Investigator and his man along with the Royal guard searching the empty room. The Royal investigator said, "Completely empty. Cleaned out as if no one was ever here. Not so much as a hair or finger nail."
Guy started to sprint towards Madeline's room with Olivier, Claude and Sir évreux not far behind.
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