From the corner of the palace, the only evident sight of a small child hidden in the shadows of the palace was the sunlight glistening off his dirty blonde hair. Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of people had walked past the hiding spot this boy took, without so much as a glance in his direction. Perhaps this spoke badly of the people of Ilvance that they did not grant charity to a dirty boy clothed in rags, or it proved his skills to hide.

His green eyes darted around and upon every passer-by. A few days ago, his eyes would have been searching for anyone dressed in the flowing silks of rich merchants, women browsing through expensive textiles from foreign lands, or anyone who smelled of money. His employer told him otherwise, however. Street urchins did not normally have employers, and certainly none that would pick him out of a line-up of all the other children of the street.

He was looking for something. His eyes lingered on everyone that held a weapon openly, or anyone clad in armour that bore no signs of loyalty to Ilvance. He looked down at his palm for a moment, imagining the sheet of paper his employer showed him for a second. The boy could remember every single detail of that paper, even the small yellow stains caused by age at the top left corner of the sheet. There were pictures of people he could recognise that he had not met, and descriptions that made it seem like he had enjoyed a personal conversation with them for a few minutes. The employer was looking for people. Warriors, knights, mercenaries, wizards and such.

The only woman on the list dwelt on his mind, however. His employer spoke too little of her, but a woman standing at 5 feet and 11 inches, clad in armour that could crush this young boy and wielding a mace left him in awe. She was the first person picked out by him, it seemed like just about everyone noticed the 'Archangel' as well.

With a cheeky little smile, the boy ran out of the shadows, brushing past a soldier standing guard. If he had paid attention to his belongings instead of staring agape the Archangel, he would have realised that the pouch of coins hanging by his belt was gone. The boy had a little bit more spending coin tonight, especially after his employer's payment. 

The boy continued darting through and past the crowd, before taking a leap off a flight of stairs and onto the second-floor balcony of a stone building that stood 5 storeys high. Second floor was where his employer's office was, and walking in by the front door was for those not eagerly anticipating more coin.

Mustering a childish, happy grin, he leapt for the door and shoved it aside, before tripping onto a pile of leather-bound books and toppling onto the floor. His coins spilled out onto the floor with a few loud clangs, and he let out a pathetic whimper as he watched them roll around the floor.

His employer, seated at a wooden desk, looked up from his book with a disapproving glance that didn't even seem worth the young man's effort. He had to crane his neck just so that his eyes could poke out from behind the wall of books that were stacked up on his table. His name was Prince Francis Machiavelli Enrico Dandolo, the Lord High Admiral of the Republic of Amalfi and the Governor-General of the Southern Amalfi Trading Company, a small young man that was a head shorter than any grown male. His face was softly built with peach skin untouched by sunlight, and brown eyes that fitted a maiden waiting for a husband rather than a merchant prince. His long white hair raced past his shoulders, resting onto the red nape he wore. His reputation did not precede him in Ilvance, and he looked like a girly fop to outsiders. 

"You saw one of the targets?" asked Prince Fran. He sounded a little bored, and with good reason. Doing 4 years worth of accounting in a week left little time for other activities. His brother, Giovanni, had fiddled with the numbers to account for slave-trading. It spoke something bad about his brother that even when he was involved in the slave trade, the falsification of account ledgers was ultimately meant to cover up losses rather than illicit gains. Fran had to fix all that before he could truly get involved in the company.

The boy said nothing, though he grunted a few times as he picked up every coin of his on the floor. He froze right after he picked up the last coin. Fran was a rich man, and even though he was just a few inches taller than the urchin, the boy felt the tension in every single muscle of his, just like the first time he spoke to Prince Fran.

It didn't help that the first time he met his employer, he was trying to steal the merchant prince's coin pouch. 

That incident happened 3 days ago. When the urchin cased the crowd around the marketplace districts of Ilvance, Prince Fran did stick out in the boy's mind. The red silks he wore as his outfit, along with the scarlet wide-brimmed hat with an embedded white feather made the boy think that the young man was a dandy. He did carry a rapier by his side, but the boy thought he could move fast enough. What the boy did not spot were the 5 bodyguards Fran had around him, dressed casually and carrying weapons of their own.

Fran wasn't sure why he forgave the boy, but the boy had an eye for detail that could be trained, and a memory that surpassed God. And nerves that gave way rather quickly.

"I—I'm—"

Fran raised his head even higher to show a gentle smile. 

"Speak calmly, Jack."

The young man spoke with such a comforting tones that Jack first thought of the memories of the mother. The sweet memories made him a little warm inside, just enough to push through the boundaries of nervousness.

"I saw Cirindel Valehold. She was heading to the palace."

Fran shot up, though standing up was only enough for the boy to see the prince's chin and part of his neck above the wall of ledgers. A wry grin made its way across his face, and trailed across his eyes as well.

"Archangel! That's perfect!" Fran cheered.

The history of the Valeholds were not hidden in dusty tomes stashed away in libraries buried beneath time, but not many knew about them outside of Alcea or about how they fell. If a single word could summarised how they were ultimately made irrelevant, it was slavery. The same word that caused his brother's suicide.

Fran hated that word, and everything associated with it. The list of people he showed Jack were of notable men or women, most of them 'hedge knights' or wizards with great magical power, and all of them with a history regarding slavery that most likely left them disgusted. People that could be worked with to deal with slavers at little to no cost.

Something Jack said made Fran think a little bit, and then gasp. Cirindel Valehold was heading to the palace. A warrior who served a crown, by common sense, had less free time to deal with their common interests.

"Jack! Ask Frederick for your pay!" yelled Fran. He tried not to sound like he was scolding anyone, but Jack cowered all the same. The prince would have noticed, if he wasn't in such a hurry. He leapt out of his seat and grabbed his signature wide-brimmed hat at the corner hatstand, hastily placing it on his head. The rapier that hung by the hatstand as well was ignored, considering that he was rushing headlong into a palace.

"And tell him I'm going to the palace!"

Fran rushed past the piles of ledgers, out of the same door Jack entered, and jumped off the balcony. He took the same route Jack did, racing past the crowd and then towards the palace gates. The lone soldier standing guard wavered slightly in his post, the pole-axe he held as a weapon served more like a form of support to the exhausted man.

The guard did tighten his face and his posture when Fran approached.

"Halt! State your business!" he barked out, shoving an open palm in front of Fran in a gesture to stop.

The last time he had entered the palace at Ilvance, even the noble grace of being the Lord High Admiral of the Republic of Amalfi, Governor-General of the Southern Amalfi Trading Company and the 3rd son of the current Doge of the Republic of Amalfi, was not enough for him to avoid the rude accosting by guards and a demand to know his reasons for entering the palace. A merchant prince was probably richer than just about all the nobles in Ilvance, but 'nobility' meant so much more than wealth. 

Fran looked up, catching no sights of anyone atop the castle walls. The last time he was here, there was an armed sentry on the walls, but wherever he went to was of no interest to the prince.

The fact that he wasn't there, however, allowed Fran a little indulgence. His hands slipped into his shirt, removed a medium-sized coin pouch, and held it out to the guard.

"I want to meet Cirindel Valehold," stated Fran, matter-of-factly.

The guard's eyes widened, and his own firm gaze now darted around the palace walls. Soldiers were taught to have their loyalties to the throne in their minds before all else, but in practice, that was much harder to implement. With clenched teeth, as if cursing his own greed even as he gave in to it, the guard took the coin pouch and slid it into his pocket.

"Go in," he said with a defeated sigh.

With the sort of smile Fran would give to a defeated foe flashed at the guard, he rushed into the palace. The prince made it into the throne room just as the Archangel finished her vow of loyalty. He heard none of it, but when he saw the knight upon her knees, he could already guess what she was saying to the Queen of Alcea.

"No!" he yelled out. "Don't do this! Not yet!" 

Fran regretted those words, or at least his tone, a second after they left his lips and resonated in the throne room. The ever-present Royal Guard, the last of defence to the protection of the queen first had their eyes on Valehold, but shifted to the short young white-haired man who so rudely interrupted them. A few of them whispered amongst themselves, but to the merchant's prince slight relief, none of them actually drew their weapons.

"Lady Cirindel Valehold, I need your assistance. You must not swear allegiance before you at least hear me out. I am Prince Francis Machiavelli Enrico Dandolo of the Republic of Amalfi."