The next morning Valerie woke up and got out of bed, careful not to wake Malphus up. As she put on her clothes, she remembered what happened last night. She can't believe that she acted so much like a teenager 'I wasn't ready, not this time, but I wanted to too' what was she thinking?
That was never gonna happen again and she said she wasn't ready that time.
"That guys' charm!" Valerie muttered as she silently left the King's room. They were really about to have sex last night and Valerie wanted it.
Well, she didn't want to, but it felt nice so- so- she was tricked! She was bewitched into liking it, and that's what she went with to make herself feel better about last night's events.
She saw maids rushing around, sweating, and yelling at each other.
"Is there gonna be some really important party that I was never asked to help prepare?" Valerie asked out loud to no one in particular but she received an answer anyway.
"Even worse! The grand King and Queen are coming over for a visit!" A maid screamed frailing past Valerie trying to get things done.
"What do you mean they're coming over for a visit!" Valerie started panicking along with the other maids when she heard a deep chuckle behind her. She turned around and saw Malphus in his robe leaning against his doorway.
"Don't tell me your gonna freak-clean like the other maids. They're always so frantic when mother and father come over." Malphus rolled his eye and huffed.
"Yea!" Valerie exclaimed, "Because the grand King and Queen are coming over! And this place is a mess! I'll see you later, there's so much to do!" Valerie waved Malphus off and speed-walked down to her room to change.
Alan wasn't there but Alice was.
"Hello, Alice, did you know the King and Queen are coming back? This place needs to be spotless." Valerie claimed as Alice licked her paw and fluffed out her tail.
"Even you want to look nice for them." Valerie patted Alice's head and dashed out the door, unaware that Alice slid out to follow her in the nick of time.
Valerie went straight to Malphus' study and she dusted it and reorganized it, replenished the ink in his ink holder, and put out a fresh new quill for him. She stacked up all his paperwork, hoping he wouldn't be angry with her for doing so, and she mopped the floor. At some point when she was cleaning, Alice got away, but she wasn't worried. Cat's tend to make their way back home.
Afterward, she went to the library to dust the older books no one really reads although no one reads most of the books anyway.
She spent 2 hours dusting any book that looked like it needed dusting and then she went to Malphus' room to make up his bed, dust his shelves and sweep and mop his floors.
Now that she was in Malphus' room she wondered where he was. She hadn't seen too much of him that day and she wondered what he was doing if he wasn't in his study.
He liked the observatory but it was daytime and the only thing he could be doing there was tanning himself. Valerie imagined him laying on a sun chair with nothing but swimwear on. She laughed at how silly it would look and continued her work.
When she finished mopping she was summoned to the main hall. When she got there she saw Edwin, Dorthy, and Oscar, and Margret and Robert all with their bags looking stunned.
"Dorthy! What are you doing here?" Valerie wrapped her best friend in a tight squeeze.
"You invited us here, remember? It turns out that you also invited Oscar and his mom and dad." Dorthy laughed. It had been forever since Valerie saw her, the last time they planned to hang out, Malphus dismissed it and told Valerie to go to sleep instead.
"No, no I don't, but if you say you received an invitation then your welcome here. Come on, I'll show you to the guest rooms, and then I have something to do, but after that, I'm all yours!" Valerie said and asked a few of her friends to help carry their things.
"Who's that hot mess of a man," Dorthy whispered in Valerie's ear as they walked through the halls.
"Oh that, that's Rave. He was kind of the first person to accept me after something big went down. We'll talk about it later." Valerie winked at Rave and he winked back. Oscar noticed it and pursed his lips. He figured it was nothing to worry about so he ignored it.
Valerie dropped her family off at the guest rooms and fled before anyone asked her anything, she needed to ask Malphus something first.
She checked the garden, the main hall, the grand hall, the study, and his room but he was nowhere to be found. She decided that he actually was in the observatory, she walked to the far end of the castle, past the guest rooms. She had to sneak past to avoid any questions.