While most of the men were still asleep, Marc was the only one who got up that morning, along with the women who were getting ready to go to the soup kitchen to make breakfast.
Marc was quite surprised to see women, ranging from small children to the elderly, wearing clothes commonly used by women in the Middle Ages, an era when he lived side by side with palace servants whom he recognized and often talked to when looking for his mother.
Almost all women wear loose, bone-white colored dresses and brown calfskin sashes around their waists. For a moment, Marc felt like that era when he was only 20 years old. But all that nostalgia disappeared as quickly as it had arrived when he remembered having to see Thea and check on her.
When he entered the room, he did not find Thea in any room. Even on the floors in the palace, that girl wasn't around. Immediately, he came to the people asking if they had seen Thea go or leave the castle in the morning.
