Pen and Paper Translations

When Lev opened his eyes again, the first thing he saw was an unfamiliar ceiling lavishly finished with gold leaf.

“Where am I?”

Mumbling blankly to himself, Lev belatedly remembered that this was the room the attendant had shown him to.

Once he came to his senses, his mouth felt parched, and he wanted water. Lev turned his head slightly and looked around the bed, but there was neither a pitcher nor a water bottle. There was no shelf-like furniture at all.

Lev sat up. Only then did he notice, under the window, an armless sofa and a shelf, yet there too he saw no jug or bottle that might hold water.

Now that he looked, the room was all showy appearance but bleak to the core. Nothing in it suggested anyone actually lived here. Apparently, it had not been used for quite some time.

“What is this place…?”

There seemed little point in looking further. To quench his thirst, he would have to leave.

But the moment Lev climbed off the bed he halted again. There were two doors.

One lay opposite the bed; the other in the wall at a diagonal. Same size, same design. There was no way to tell which was the exit.

“So… which one did I come in through?”

Try as he might, he could not remember. He had been half-asleep at the time.

After studying the twin doors, Lev approached the one nearer the side wall and turned the knob.

Only a dull clunk. It was locked.

“What? Locked?”

Letting go, he circled the bed to the other door. This one opened easily.

Outside stretched a broad corridor. Dazzled by surroundings as ornate as the room, he paused and looked about.

No one in sight. Should he give up and go back?

But he really was thirsty. If only there were a bath, he could wet his lips but there was nothing of the sort.

First, he carefully inspected the doorway he had come from. He might get lost in this unfamiliar place.

When he closed the door, he saw a nameplate showing a gold lion climbing an inverted-triangle shield.

If I just remember that…

Reassured, Lev glanced left and right along the seemingly endless corridor, then chose a direction. After walking quite a while, even the languid afternoon sunlight had begun to fade.

He had not had a drop of water. Now he was downright hungry, and his legs ached. Stopping, he braced his hands on his waist and sighed long.

“Coming this far, shouldn’t there at least be something?”

Grumbling changed nothing. No sign of life answered. Worse, dusk was settling, and worry crept in. Someone might already have discovered the empty room.

“This won’t do. I’ll just go back.”

He made up his mind and started to turn…

“Where is it…? Where did it go…?”

An anxious voice came from beyond the corridor corner. One foot half-raised, Lev twisted toward the sound.

A darkening hall with sunset gone. 

A hidden corner with no one visible. 

Muttering words carried on the air.

Perfect conditions for something to happen or for something other than a person to appear.

In such cases, it’s best to ignore it. Who knew what might pop out.

Yet Lev’s steps moved of their own accord toward the voice.

“I have to find it quickly. Where are you?”

Unable to suppress curiosity, Lev rounded the corner and at the same instant something whipped out from the opposite side.

“Gah!”

“Eeeek!”

Shouts burst from both sides. Lev was the first to recover. Ahat met his eyes was a black head roughly level with his chest.

“Who are you?” he asked cautiously.

The head lifted, revealing the face of a boy about fourteen or fifteen, eyes wide with undisguised shock.

“I’m Marco, the page in charge of the second floor… and you are?”

So it was merely a pale-faced boy, not the ghost Lev had half expected. The trembling pupils showed the lad was as startled as Lev.

“I was just thirsty, looking for some water. But what were you searching for?”

Unsure how to introduce himself, Lev deflected the question.

“Uh—uh, I… lost a gold button. I think I dropped it here somewhere, but I can’t see it at all.”

Luckily the boy, more pressed by his own trouble, darted glances everywhere as he answered.

A gold button was an expensive item indeed, worthy of desperate searching.

“I see. If it’s that serious, shall I help you look?”

The child seemed pitiful, so Lev offered a hand.

“R-really?”

Lev had a reason of his own: it would be more efficient to ask a palace page than to wander cluelessly in search of water.

“Yes but in return, please let me have a cup of water.”

Lev winked. The boy brightened and nodded eagerly.

Saying, “Just a moment,” he slipped through a small door Lev hadn’t noticed.

“Alice in Wonderland? How odd.”

When was that there? Lev stared at the closed door in amazement until, a few minutes later, the boy re-emerged.

In his hand sloshed a glass cup of clear water. At the sight, Lev’s forgotten thirst rushed back.

“Here!”

The boy thrust the cup toward him.

“Thank you.”

Without hesitation Lev drained it in one draught.

“Ah, you’re a life saver.”

Water he had sought so desperately tasted doubly sweet. 

Handing back the cup with a grin, he asked, “So, what does the gold button look like?”

Cup in hand, the boy’s eyes shone as he described it.

“There’s a gold lion drawn beside a shield. It’s about this big.”

He held up his thumb and measured half its length with his forefinger. A lion on a shield?

I feel like I’ve seen that somewhere…

Nothing came clearly to mind. Tilting his head, Lev turned his attention to the search.

Evening light had failed. Finding a button half a thumb long would not be easy.

They checked wall corners, stair edges, beneath curtains and their knots, shelves, under and inside flowerpots even window frames but the button was nowhere. It seemed unlikely they would find it at all.

“What do I do! We have to light the lamps and if I’m late I’ll be scolded…!”

The boy’s face darkened by the minute.

“If you’re busy, go ahead. If I find it, I’ll pass it on.”

Lev, with nothing better to do, spoke kindly. But the boy, anxious, hesitated to leave.

Understandable. This was a gold button, surely valuable. He couldn’t entrust it to a stranger.

“No… it’s fine. If we searched this much and still didn’t find it, I guess it isn’t here.”

He answered dispiritedly. Indeed, Lev also saw nowhere else to look.

“It must be important?”

“Yes. It’s from His Majesty’s jacket sleeve.”

At those words Lev jerked his head up so fast it made a whoosh.

“Whose?”

“His Majesty’s…”

A shield and gold lion. So that’s why it seemed familiar. It was identical to the crest on the doorplate which was clearly a royal emblem.

No wonder the lad was frantic in a dark hall. Understanding the situation, Lev’s face softened.

“Then you have to find it. Won’t you be in terrible trouble if you don’t?”

More than getting scolded, he might be branded a thief and expelled from the palace. Just when he was learning the place… Worried, the boy’s complexion grew gloomier.

“Right. But I really must get back now…”

“You’re sure you dropped it near here?”

“Yes. This passage is the quickest to the laundry, so I always use it. If it fell, it has to be around here.”

“All right. I’ll keep looking. If I find it, I’ll bring it to you. Marco from the second floor, right?”

Lev confirmed his name to reassure him. After a moment’s hesitation, the boy nodded.

Evening was fast approaching. He couldn’t stand here wavering when lamps had to be lit and his senior attendant was already on edge. He would answer for the loss eventually, but first he had to return to post.

“Well, then… if you happen to find it, please look for Marco Dupont. And if you don’t, that’s all right too. Thank you!”

With a deep bow, he vanished through the door. Left alone, Lev tried the door, but it wouldn’t open. Apparently, it was a passage only palace staff used, with a different mechanism.

Guess I’ll keep searching.

He combed gaps between steps and walls, then shook each curtain hanging from the windows.

Something clinked and fell from the folded drapery—a tiny object half a thumb long, exactly as described.

Eyes gleaming, Lev bent and picked it up: the very button, its face stamped with an inverted-triangle shield and a lion.

“Here it is.”

A triumphant grin spread across Lev’s lips just as two men rounded the corridor corner. The shorter one spotted him and shouted,

“Ah! There he is!”

Lev recognized the finger pointed at him: the attendant who had shown him to his room before he slept.

“Who’s that? You know him?”

The larger companion jerked his chin at Lev in puzzlement.

“That’s him. The man that was put in the room beside the office!”

“Oh!”

Realization dawned. The fellow’s clothes were rumpled sleeper’s garb, cheap in look, hair standing on end.

“Are you saying His Majesty brought him?”

Hard to believe he was any sort of noble. The big man raked Lev up and down with open contempt.

“I said so, didn’t I.”

Throwing the words, the first attendant strode toward Lev, chin lifted as if to start a fight.

“You there! What exactly are you doing here? Do you know how much chaos you’ve caused in the palace?”

Though his words were polite, his eyes and expression dripped insolence. It showed outright disdain saying ‘scum like you, of course’.

Lev found it absurd. After all, he had met this attendant only when shown to his room.

But Lev knew well that sometimes people showed hostility for no reason. Clearly this man was one of those.

“I wanted water, but no one was around. I wandered hoping to find someone and ended up here. I’m sorry.”

He explained calmly and apologized. The attendant snorted as if it were a lame excuse.

“Hmph.”

He actually scoffed aloud. From the start he had disliked this man.

That fellow, His Majesty’s consort?

All palace servants feared, respected, and supported their Emperor. Seeing him bring in a man whose status seemed dubious, they naturally took offense.

How dare… a wretch like him…

After returning, the Emperor had gone straight to the third floor to rest for the day. Knowing this, the attendant had left the rustic stranger alone on the empty second floor, hoping he would be at a loss. He had even spied secretly when Lev left the room.

He hadn’t followed because it would be fine if the man simply disappeared. It was better, even. He could just report him missing. He had waited quite a while before telling the chamberlain that the man was gone.

And now here he was in this remote spot. That was suspicious in itself. Perhaps he was a spy? Someone who came to snoop?

Just then the attendant’s gaze caught the gold button in Lev’s hand.

“Why, that’s—!”

Lev noticed him staring at the button and felt relieved. Though the man disliked him, it was his fellow attendant’s lost item, so surely he would see it returned.

“This is…”

But the attendant’s face twisted, and a bad feeling struck Lev.

“How dare you steal His Majesty’s property and try to run off!”

As expected, the attendant yelled. His eyes gleamed viciously, sensing a perfect chance.

“Guards! Guards!”

He bellowed so the corridor rang. Quickly understanding, the larger companion dashed back the way they had come to fetch the palace guards.

“Hand it over!”

The attendant seized Lev’s wrist, trying to snatch the button.

“Ah, no, this is, listen—!”

Caught off-guard, Lev tried to protest, but it was no use.