‘Thank you, sire,’ the filthy man in front of me said with a toothless grin, bowing and scraping his way out of the enormous room, backwards. I smiled thinly at him, wondering how he was going to manage to make it all the way to the oaken doors without his thighs giving out. By some miracle, he did make it, and I nodded to myself, suitably impressed.
A page burst through the door after the peasant, his voice cutting off in a squawk as I held up a hand.
‘No more, for the moment,’ I sighed, my kingly tones still reverberating around the room. Some of my advisors and subjects thought it was a royal skill, being able to speak quietly for all to hear – in reality, it was a trick of acoustics, designed into the throne room hundreds of years before I was even born.
‘There’s quite a line today,’ noted my chief advisor, a squirrely man named Barret.
‘And none of them with an interesting problem,’ I bemoaned. ‘I half expect the next one to ask me for a recommendation for the best plasterer to hire around Melbourne.’
In the distance, I heard the page frantically scratching a name off of the parchment.
‘Your subjects appreciate your royal time, at least,’ Barret smiled. He had a disturbing smile, I noted, not for the first time. It was all teeth and no eyes – quite unsettling, truth be told.
‘Right, right,’ I murmured, taking my eyes off the man. ‘Well, see to it that I have a few interesting ones for the next hour. I’m liable to fall asleep.’
Barret clicked his fingers at the page, and yet more furious scratching echoed towards us.
‘I’m thinking of having a divider installed,’ I mused out loud.
‘Sire?’
‘A room divider,’ I said. ‘How much does a plaster room divider cost? This damned room is too big.’
‘But,’ Barret stammered, ‘it’s imposing! A physical manifestation of your kingly will!’
‘I also can’t hear a damned thing anybody else says!’ I rolled my eyes. ‘You!’ I called down to the page. ‘Find me that plasterer we talked about. I have a question…’