"I can't," I answered.
Noctis shot his head up to stare at my tired face, tears blinding him.
"I can't save you," I continued. "But I can try to save her. Try."
I was met with silence.
"Yes, I understand," Noctis spoke as he pulled himself back up, patting his clothes clean and wiping his face with a tissue that seemingly appeared out of nowhere.
"Let's call it a night, shall we?" he spoke with a weak grin.
"Uh, yeah. I think that would be best," I replied. "But how exactly do I get back to the castle?"
"You're not gonna like this..." he said.
I was soon pushed back into the living lake, bioluminescence marking out an outline of my slender body. My body kept sinking deeper and deeper. This time, I was unable to propel myself back up like I had done before—was I going to die?
My frantic thoughts ended abruptly when my consciousness faded and my body went limp.
Acco
'Ugh, why the hell has Arthur sent me to that kid's room at this hour? The game's gonna start in a few minutes, and I haven't even started cleaning that brat's room. Screw you, Arthur! Old-headed tramp.'
I gritted my teeth in anger as I continued to conjure up insults I could hurl at the ancient damnation when I next saw him.
I threw open the door in an attempt to vent my frustration and hastily began cleaning the boy's room. I left no corner undusted, no crevice unchecked, and not a single sheet unfolded. I was proud of my work before I went in to start cleaning the toilet.
'At least that boy knows how to keep a room clean. He hadn't done anything; all I had to do was waft away some dust. Quite the well-put-together man. It's kind of attra—'
My compliments dragged themselves from out of my mouth back down into the throat they had come out of as I stood motionless in front of the bathroom door.
In front of me sat hundreds of tiny little shards of glass—the whole bathroom had been defiled by these fragments. The mirror had been completely shattered—destroyed. The room felt like some sort of death trap, a game where if you misstepped even slightly, you'd be impaled by these minuscule traps.
'What the fu—'
My curses were interrupted by a loud thud to my left, followed by the sounds of gushing water.
That can't be right.
I twisted my already agitated neck to my nine o'clock and almost fainted at the stupid sight that lay before me.
"Bad time?" Taiga asked.
In front of me stood a slender, black-haired boy with tired eyes, drenched from head to toe and dripping with salty water. Where could he have come from? How could he have brought so much water with him? Why did this have to happen now?!
By the time I returned to my senses, almost the whole bedroom floor had been soaked.
"Listen, I know you have a bunch of questions, but unfortunately, I am not allowed to explain any of this. Sorry, but I don't make the rules; I just enforce them," he spoke with such a carefree attitude that my blood began to boil.
"I'd appreciate it if I could get this all cleaned up within an hour. I'm feeling sleepy. I'm guessing you've fixed the mirror already? Nice job." He gave me a thumbs up. "Anyway, I'm gonna go tell one of your maid sisters to make me some dinner now. I am staaarving! See ya!"
With that, he calmly grabbed the doorknob of the room, twisted it, and made his way out, dripping oceans of water where he walked.
Before he could take another step outside, I grabbed him by the collar of his soaking-wet shirt and threw him back into the room.
I then proceeded to beat the shit out of him.
Once my divine punishment had ceased, I demanded an apology from him. The boy was kneeling on the floor already, so I thought it was the least he could do.
"I-I'm sowwy, Mrs Acco," he muttered. It was difficult for him to speak with the swollen and bruised face I had given him.
"Don't just apologise to me. Make sure to apologise to every other maid you see, too. We're not pieces of furniture, designed for your comfort."
"What if I only apologise to every other one? There's way too many maids for me to apologise to all of them."
"Nope. It has to be all of them."
"What if I only apologise to the hot ones? Can you at least give me that?"
My forehead ached with anger, but I was able to talk myself down from murder to a light kick to the skull. Taiga was subsequently punted from one end of the room to the other, seemingly knocked out.
'Oh well, he can clean this room up himself in the morning. I, for one, am late to the weekly game of cards in the basement. I hope they haven't started without me.'
I then hurried out of the room and made my way down to the top-secret castle basement.
Arriving at the door of the basement, I knocked four times and shouted the magic password.
"Noctis drools, Maids rule!"
The door, having heard the truth, slowly began to open itself. The opening mechanism was completely automatic; all you needed to do was say the password. Us maids are getting advanced, right?
I made my way in and was greeted by an all-too-familiar wine cellar. Barrels of wine filled the room. If our weekly games were held in this room, I can assure you a lot fewer people would be willing to come, and the games are already only played between a small group of people. Even I feel a bit cramped in here, and I used to sleep under my bed as a child instead of atop it. I know, it's a bit weird, but how else does one survive the monsters?
Before I could scare myself with thoughts of monsters, I reached my hand into a very specific barrel in the far-left corner—the one under the abstract painting of a square—and began fishing for a lever. Having found it, I pulled with all my might and opened a passage in the wall opposite me, right next to the door I had come in from.
The shelves of old, distinguished wine rotated inward alongside the wall they rested on, not dissimilar to a revolving door, and revealed a long set of stairs leading down.
After around a minute of walking, I had finally made it into our secret lair. This was where us evil maids worked day and night in an effort to finally overthrow the tyranny of the Don.
Just kidding.
This is where we play Old Maid and other card games from time to time—nothing serious.
"Hey! You're here, Acco!" a young butler with slicked-back maroon hair called out to me. His emerald eyes made him quite popular at the castle, but he only reminded me of a frog for some reason. I'm not saying he's an uggo or anything; he's just not my type, that's all.
"Don't take it to heart, most men aren't," I accidentally blurted aloud.
"Huh?" he replied.
"Uh, sorry! I was thinking out loud. Forget I said anything. It's nice to see you again, too. Not like we saw each other this morning, but still! Fun nonetheless."
"Ugh, not this again. You've got to stop calling me ugly, ya know? It really, really, really gets to me."
"Like hell it does, Marco! You practically talk to a new girl every day. If only they knew even half of what you're actually like. Perv."
"Please, Acco. You must refrain from believing such crude headlines. The news can be very misleading."
"The news?! I'm talking about what I've see—"
"Shhh. This isn't you, Acco. This is just the alcohol talking," he teased me, his childlike joy seeping through his smile.
"That's enough teasing, Marco," a booming voice shouted from behind him. "God knows where you get this confidence from." The voice continued before slapping the young man on the back of the head.
"Tsk. You're no fun, Aunt Hilda. It's just a bit of playful banter," Marco retorted.
"Get lost, you little gremlin. When you win, I'll let you do and say whatever the hell you want, but until that day, shut up," his aunt replied as Marco took his seat at the table.
Hilda was a tall brunette. Her size and stature had always reminded me of a Viking for some reason. I mean, she wasn't burly or anything, but the way she braided her hair never failed to pop that image into my mind. I could totally imagine her carrying an axe on her back and shooting arrows from afar—she's really cool, if you hadn't gathered.
"Hurry up and sit down, Acco," she greeted me with a smile as she sat down in her seat. "We're already quite late."
"Oh yeah, sorry about that. Arthur gave me another room to clean at the last minute, and let's just say it wasn't a small one."
"Yeah, yeah, we've heard it all before. Take a seat." She waved for me to sit next to her.
There were six seats at the poker table, ironic as poker was the game we played the least. Two of them were taken by Marco and Hilda, both sitting opposite each other. There were two on each side of the table and one at each end. I sat next to Hilda on the right-hand side, while Marco sat next to our fourth player, Cindy.
Cindy is best described as a tomboy. She has short, black hair, wears a baseball cap, jeans, and all the other stereotypes you can think of. However, her voice couldn't be further from the persona she was attempting to portray. She was very soft-spoken; even her shouts sounded like faint, somewhat erotic (if I'm honest) whispers. Not to mention she had a very cute and squishy face that I dreamt of rubbing nonstop.
At the head of the table, on my right, sat the best player out of all of us—Sydell. Sydell has been gambling for as long as he can remember. In fact, the only reason he was even brought here was because he beat Noctis in a game of poker at some rich guy's party. He's quite the character, if I do say so myself.
He is very skinny, like absurdly thin. A slow breeze could probably send him all the way to Emberstan, or even to the holy country of Zina, all the way in the far east. He's also an avid smoker. I don't think I've ever seen him not huffing and puffing on a cigarette. As per usual, his long, silver hair was covering his dry, ashy face.
And on the seat opposite him sat no one. I don't know why, but that sixth seat had been here when we started playing, and no one bothered to get rid of it.
"Isn't this place amazing?" Cindy proclaimed. "I doubt even the Don himself knows about this."
At that very instant, a piece of tissue paper gently cascaded its way down from a shelf and onto the table, right in front of Cindy. On the paper was written something.
'Don't kid yourself. —Noctis Vale, 33rd Don of Aria.'
"Fair enough," said Marco. "Now let's start. I can feel it; this is the time I beat you guys!"
Before the round of Old Maid could even begin, however, the sounds of footsteps echoed throughout the room.
"Is that Noctis?" Hilda asked.
"Close, but not quite," the familiar voice answered. "Aim a bit younger."
Finally, Taiga appeared before the group. He was completely dry.
"Bad time?"