Jinneth's shadow passed through the internal hallways of the upper floor like a blur exhaled by the wind. The girl walked with giant strides, mentally counting on her fingers while muttering to herself in a trance of pure strategic planning:
"Eggs, a few loaves of bread, bacon, butter, and tea... That's fifteen minutes for him to finish eating, and about twenty more for his food to digest. But no, I can't risk it with those twenty minutes... He's an elf! Fast!"
She flew around the corner of the second-floor hallway and burst into her room. The space was ample and cozy, decorated with light wood furniture, plush couches, a tall dresser, and a full-length mirror reflecting the light from a bay window. The shelves on the walls were packed with adventure novels and chronicles of dungeon explorers. The bed, piled high with colorful cushions, looked impeccably neat—or at least it did until Hurricane Jinneth assaulted the drawers.
Clothes of different textures and colors began flying through the air. Jinneth was already laying out dress number six on the bedspread when she stopped dead in her tracks, looking at her hands.
"A bath..." she said to herself, her eyes widening in horror. "I can't smell like kitchen grease!"
Shifting targets in a blink, the girl descended back toward the ground floor via the service stairs. Marly, who was organizing some pots near the kitchen entrance, saw her daughter run past toward the back room—a rest area used by employees and family during down-time. What caught the mother's attention wasn't the speed, but the fact that Jinneth was carrying a massive, unnatural pile of firewood in her arms.
Marly stood dumbfounded, watching the young woman hurl the pile of logs into the room without even looking where they landed, causing a brutal crash of wood hitting wood that made the walls vibrate.
"What are you doing, girl?" Marly asked, arching an eyebrow.
Jinneth spun around. Her large, light gray eyes were wide, and her forehead was beaded with fine drops of sweat from the physical exertion. With a movement that looked almost like teleportation to her mother, the girl closed the distance and planted herself right in front of her, startling her.
"Mom! I need the key to the storeroom. I need the expensive soap."
The older woman narrowed her eyes suspiciously, crossing her arms over her apron.
"What are you plotting now?"
Despite the question, Marly reached into her pocket, pulled out a small bronze key, and held it out. Jinneth stretched her fingers to take it, but her mother didn't let go immediately.
"Whatever you use from there comes directly out of your allowance this month," Marly warned in a bored, monotonous voice.
Jinneth stopped dead, as if her boots had been nailed to the floor, and snapped her head around with lightning speed.
"But Mom!"
"No buts. You're an adult now, nineteen years old, and you have a job here. It's only normal you pay for your whims."
Jinneth puffed out her cheeks, planted her hands on her hips, and brought out the heavy artillery with a tragic pout:
"But Mom! What I'm doing is for your future grandchildren!"
Marly blinked once, unbothered.
"I don't know what you're talking about, and frankly, I don't want to know."
Jinneth took a deep breath and squeezed the bronze key against her palm, feeling the cold metal. This is an investment... Yes! A mandatory investment for my own happiness! she cheered herself on mentally to dull the pain in her wallet.
She reached the basement storeroom in a heartbeat. She pushed open the heavy door and began checking the shelves with an eagle eye, grabbing all the refined beauty products her employee budget allowed and returning, with a broken heart, those whose price in silver coins was prohibitive.
This month I definitely won't be able to go with the girls to try the new sweets in Sibar... she thought with a rueful grimace, but the image of Alaster's violet eyes flashed in her mind and banished any doubt.
She reviewed her haul on the workbench: winter flower extract soap, a small vial of wild lavender perfume, and a magical eyelash corrector that promised a perfect hold against sweat and heat.
"I have to look perfect," she repeated to herself, closing the storeroom drawer.
She turned to leave in a hurry, but after taking two long strides, her pretty legs braked gracefully on the smooth wooden floor. She slid a few inches from the momentum, making her skirt and worn apron flutter in the air. A sudden, violent blush painted her cheeks red.
She slowly walked back to the rear of the drawer she had just closed. Her gray eyes locked onto a rather peculiar-looking device kept in a velvet box. The girl picked it up with a trembling hand, feeling her pulse race.
"I... I'm a decent girl," she whispered to the empty walls of the storeroom, trying to convince herself. "I wouldn't do anything so fast, of course not... but... that elf..."
A new, more intense blush climbed up her neck until it tinted the tips of her ears. She pressed the object against her chest.
"Nobody in all of Sibar would blame me. I'm not made of stone," she justified aloud, finally tucking the subtle pink, razor-shaped magical device into her apron.