35 Where Burdett Lies

Upon realizing what he said, Kanaru waved his hands as if erasing something in the air. "Please forget what I said! Nothing worth staring at happened, I swear!"

However, Melaka frowned at those words. "The king's curse is soul-deep, and Rodnir didn't contract it. There's no way the same thing is happening to him. Hmm, what a curious matter…"

"Hello? Sierra, are you here? I can hear Kanaru…" Rosamund's voice came from the door, and she entered the library as well. She then gestured at the two, her finger across her lips. "Shhh, this is a library, Kanaru. Don't get too loud."

"Sorry…" Kanaru pursed his lips, but he could only look down in shame. Rosamund just reached out to pet his head, ignoring Kanaru's flinch that came with it.

The flower girl just walked to the seat next to Kanaru, watching how Melaka used her whiteboard. "Shouldn't Sierra be the one watching over him, Melaka? Why does he have you instead? Are you drawing a map for him?"

Melaka finished the perimeter, but the lines were so straight that it looked like she used tools in drawing them. "He has to know. After all, Sierra would normally walk around with His Majesty. As Sierra's assistant, he needs to be familiar with the palace's layout. I'm only drawing the important ones, however. He needs more clearance for the rest."

Rosamund then turned to Kanaru, who rubbed the phantom feeling of her hand on his head. "Kanaru, I don't know if you caught my name, but I'm Rosamund. I am in charge of organizing audiences with His Majesty. I prepare meal plans for his guests and how the rooms are decorated if they are staying over. Even the meeting places are kept by me. I normally check His Majesty's schedule with Sierra."

She then pointed at Melaka. "Melaka is in charge of the queen's political duties. You can say that she helps run Middlemist. A lot of people think Sierra has the most power in the inner court, but it's actually Melaka. If you want someone gone, you might have to reason with her."

"I learned the trade of law from my father. Since the laws of Gonoma were drafted from the ones used in Middlemist, it was easy for me to understand them." Melaka chuckled as she was called the most powerful. "Don't listen to Rosamund. I don't hold that much power. His Majesty just finds it convenient that he doesn't have to deal with the legalities on his own."

"Wow, I didn't think you needed to be so exemplary to be in the inner court," Kanaru whispered as he stared at the map on the board. "I wonder what those temperance tests were like."

"They are most likely done to evaluate someone's aptitude. However, the tests had been around for so long now that some countries cracked the answers. That is why some concubines passed the tests even if they were only acting." Melaka sighed, sitting down on a chair she took from the table. "This year's recruitment was solely based on Rodnir's evaluation, so a lot failed."

She then smiled at Kanaru. "Tell me about your little exam with Rodnir. I heard that he spoke to the candidates behind closed doors. What kinds of questions did he ask?"

Kanaru only stared at her. Even Rosamund looked excited to listen to his story. It was just that Kanaru rubbed his neck. "I didn't sit down with him before he agreed to let me in the harem court. Wait, it looked like he just saw me once and agreed, but we actually met outside Burdett before I found out he was with the ambassadors. We walked a caravan from my country to their outpost.

"It was just one day, but he had a lot of stories to share. I could only talk about my little adventures around the country and a little into the forbidden lands." Kanaru twitched as he remembered his breaking country. "Sometimes, the storms will make the temperature negligible, and the clouds will block the sun. I would join expedition parties to look for the ruins of other countries up north.

"However, it's never as cold as before anymore. Ten years ago, my brothers could still search this big country buried under the sand dunes. There were so many artifacts, but the palace was razed to the ground. Only a few things survived." Kanaru pulled up his jacket's sleeve and showed a gold bangle bracelet. "We got some gold from it, but most were melted and turned into coins for trade."

Melaka stared at the gold bangle. "You destroyed golden artifacts to turn them into currency? Not that it's atrocious to the needy, but… the lost history…"

Kanaru shook his head. "Not really. What we melted down were also gold coins, but they had another face on them. We couldn't use it to pay traders, so we kept some and melted most. Artifacts were either brought back or left inside the ruins. The ones we turned into accessories were from the gold plating melted by the sun. There were tons of them, but mining them took up manpower and resources."

Leaning against her seat, Melaka hummed. She then searched the books on the table before getting up to search the library instead. When she returned, she asked Rosamund and Kanaru to clear the table. A gigantic map soon showed up as Melaka unrolled it.

"Kanaru, you said that, sometimes, you took advantage of storms to raid the forbidden lands. You also mentioned walking with Rodnir to an outpost of Middlemist." Melaka flattened the top part of the map. "Rodnir traveled back to Middlemist from this area. Can you tell me where Burdett is?"

"Uhm, sure, it's around…" Kanaru spoke with a smile, but he froze at the blankness of the spot. He then hunted for Krillman's spot on the map, seeing it almost by the edge. The outpost closest to it was not even noted down. "It's not here…"

Rosamund took out a Polaroid camera from between her full breasts and shot a photo of the board. She waited for the film to come out before smiling at Kanaru. "Can you draw what you remember? I'll give you a photo of the palace map, but you need to point out where Burdett is, okay?"

Kanaru nodded and got up to draw what he remembered on the board Melaka erased for him. The board marker glided smoothly as Kanaru drew the rivers and the terrain he had seen from the windows of their fast-moving carriages. When he was done, he only stared at the map of his world from before.

"…I wonder how they found Burdett if their maps stop at Krillman, which is five days away…" the bird prince whispered. He continued to add details, soon lost to the visualization of the region where he lived. However, he didn't realize he drew the communications tower until he was done.

Kanaru only stared at his hope before everything happened. It was just that Melaka stood next to him and patted the space next to the tower. "Do you know what this is? Middlemist has one just like it."