The next morning, people barge into Mare’s house, and she takes this in stride because she assumes it’s a routine security search. Only there’s a servant from the royal palace there, and instead o f the guards tearing through her house they summon her to Summerton.

Mare worries that all this is because of her thievery, or possibly because of her association with Farley (although she met the chick ones for like five minutes, wouldn’t her brother be the more damning association?) but has to go anyway because trying to fight the guard would be pointless. So she says goodbye to her family, and the words are “I’ll see you later” but the tone is “whelp, I guess this is it forever.”

Only, you know, sad.

With a silent laugh I remember that Farley will be expecting me today, with a fortune in payment. She’ll be disappointed.

Actually, I’m willing to bet she doesn’t expect much from you.

They get into a car and head towards Summerton, “racing down the road at speeds I had never even imagined.”

Two options here: Mare is used to walking everywhere and 10 mph technically qualifies as “unimaginable.” Or, it’s a hovercar. Because no way in hell is any wheeled vehicle speeding down an unkempt foot road, and no way is a road to a backwater village and traveled mostly by pedestrians going to be well maintained enough for speeding.

Once they’re in the town and on foot again, the servant woman introduces herself as Ann Walsh and says everyone mostly goes by last names. She starts talking about working at the palace as if Mare already knows she’s been hired for something, talking about long hours and tenuous status and how it’s all very stressful.

Mare says wait, back up, what job?

Mare figures out that Cal must have pulled some strings to get her hired after her sob story about conscription and is just weak with relief over having work instead of needing to go into the army.

And, while I like Walsh’s lines up above about how servants are treated more like Flintstone appliances than actual people, when you put it next to Mare’s expectations, it seems kind of…harsh? Out of context, maybe? Yes, it sucks, and I’m not asking the book to say it doesn’t just because it could be worse. But on the other hand…for these specific characters, it was worse, and there’s no acknowledgement of that? Not everything sucks uniformly, and while “one step above dirt” is not and should not be anyone’s end game, it seems really odd that the people actually in this are so…uniform in their attitudes. There’s not even a hint of “hey, we get three square meals and laundry service, so there’s that.”

I could see Walsh’s comments being appropriate if Mare had been talking up her new post as the bees knees, but coming right on the heels of literally pulling her out of a hovel, it just seems weird?

They get Mare into a uniform and all set to start working. It’s very busy, and Walsh says it’s because all the marriageable daughters are around to be presented to the crown prince so that someone (prince? King? Committee?) can pick one to be the next queen. They’re calling it a Queenstrial.

Then her eyes glitter. “You’re on serving duty, so you’ll get to see for yourself.”

…you put the brand new girl who’s only been in the palace for an hour on serving duty at the most important social event of the decade?

Who is the personnel manager in this place and why aren’t they fired yet?

She gets saddled with a tray of cups and hussled out to the Spiral Garden, which sounds pretty cool. It’s like a big ampetheater, with tiered levels all leading down to a grassy center at the bottom, but instead of steps and level tiers it’s all a slight downward spiral. With decadence and flowers.

Mare freaks out because it seems like a more plush version of the arena from the first chapter, but she can’t figure out what they’d need an arena for. After she and the other servants get everything set up, the retreat behind a screen to watch. All the nobles show up (where they all gathered somewhere before this, waiting? Did they line up like a kindergarten class to show up at the same time? Was there some other event going on that held them and then released them all at the same time?) to mingle and socialize and then take their seats. Mare notices that most of the families don’t seem very hopeful, more like they’re on vacation, but at least two are very intense. Also none of the young ladies are with their families.

She gets called up to serve one of these ‘very intense’ families, specifically the patriarch who is described as having a “ pointed beard and black eyes” and “the wretched black-eyed patriarch.” Gee, I wonder if he’s a villain? Obvious Villain Man complains to someone named Ptolemus about how the royal family is making them wait. Then said royal family arrives while Mare is still out refilling drinks, and they all get exacting descriptions. We go through the king, the queen, the younger prince, and then…dun dun dun! The crown prince is actually Cal!

Yeah, who didn’t see that coming? (Or at least realize that he was a Silver.)