Obviously, I took him up on his kind offer and made my way back to the herb garden the very next day. As I meandered, the researcher spotted me and once again joined me on my walk, telling me about the uses of the herbs growing in the immediate vicinity, as well as the effects of the potions that could be made from them.
The third day I visited, we once more toured the herb garden, but on the fourth day, he took me into the research institute itself, and I got to meet the other researchers. I enjoyed hearing everything they had to say as well. We mainly discussed medicinal plants and potions, but soon enough they started telling me about the latest trends in the capital and about the people working in the palace.
It wasn’t long before I found myself hanging around the institute every day, and it got to the point that traveling there and back to the palace was starting to become a real hassle. I mean, it took a half hour each way on foot to reach it. The palace’s gardens were truly vast. According to my maid, everything in sight was part of the palace grounds.
If only I didn’t have to spend that whole hour traveling back and forth every day, I’d have even more time to spend with the researchers.
“I’m starting to think I’d rather just live here,” I said one day.
“I think that’s a great idea,” said Jude. He was the researcher I had first met in the herb garden. We had grown quite friendly since my discovery of him and his research institute. He readily agreed with me when I admitted my thoughts. “Actually, a bunch of the other researchers live here at the institute—as do I.”
“Really?”
“Yup. Though some of us have estates in the capital as well. Even so, our institute is on one side of the palace, and the capital is on the other. Not to mention, we’re so far away from the palace itself. Given all that distance, since the first person decided to just up and live here, more and more people have followed suit.”
Jude’s family also resided in the capital, so for a while he commuted from his residence, just like everyone else. However, once he realized a few of the researchers already lived in the institute, he promptly decided to move there as well.
I really sympathized. I guess everyone felt the same about traveling all that way—commuting is such a pain.
“What are you two talking about today?” I heard someone ask behind me.
Jude and I turned to find Johan Valdec, the head researcher at the institute.
“We were just chatting about what a slog it is for me to come here from the palace every day and how nice it would be if I could just live here,” I said.
“Here at the institute?”
“Well, yes. I heard some of the researchers already do… Is that right?”
“They do indeed. Wait, does that mean you want to work here now, too?” Johan grinned.
His words took me by surprise. Work at the institute? I supposed it was true that the people living there were all researchers. It might be weird for someone not similarly employed to take up residence among them.
Not to mention, it was clear to me that if I were to move out of the palace and into the capital, it would be far better to have a job than to remain unemployed. Also, working at the institute would be way more exciting than wasting day after day, bored to tears in the palace. Plus, it would mean working with herbs, which I already had a fascination with. I could study potions, too, which I knew nothing about. I started to feel genuinely enthused by the prospect.
Yeah! Working at the research institute’s a great idea, I thought, and with that, I turned to the head researcher. “That’s right. I want to become a researcher.”
“Oh, really? Then we’ll need to proceed along the formal channels,” Johan said in a somewhat teasing manner. But he still made his way back to his office, albeit somewhat slowly.
Later, once I was formally employed, Jude told me with some surprise that, at the time, he was positive Johan was just joking.
But I had made up my mind. That very day, as soon as I got back to my chambers in the palace, I asked my maid to act as an intermediary. I needed to ask the blue-haired official about my prospective employment. By then it was already evening, so I had to wait until the next day to meet him.
The official stopped by after breakfast while I was taking a tea break. “I heard there was something you wished to discuss?”
“That’s correct. So, you see, I have an interest in herbs and would like to work at the Research Institute of Medicinal Flora.”
“Very well, then.”
“Huh? Just like that?”
I thought he was going to need way more convincing to give his consent, but it turned out Johan had already made my case. An agreement had been made that I would move to the institute from the palace.
Up to that point, I was half-convinced Johan’s suggestion was merely in jest, but it seemed like he’d really done the work to get the approval of the blue-haired official guy. Good going, Johan!
I immediately set out making preparations for my move. I didn’t have much—just the business suit, coat, shoes, and a purse I had brought home from work when I was summoned. However, it wasn’t like I could work in a research institute with a single suit. I needed more clothes and other daily necessities. The official said he would arrange for those, though, so I left it to him.
In the end, he prepared a few sets of plain shirts, skirts, and dresses that wouldn’t look out of place in a research institute, as well as a collection of personal items, such as towels and soaps. Included among my new belongings were the dresses and accessories I had taken a liking to during my brief time living in the palace, as well as several new ones with similar designs. The official must have taken my preferences into consideration.
I suspected the official had even prepared the furniture I found already furnishing my new chambers on the third floor of the institute. It all matched and had a bright, welcoming tone. It looked like my new home would be a pleasant place to spend time in; not at all how I’d imagined living in such a place would be.
“Thank you so much for all of your help,” I said to him on the day of my move. His final preparation for me was a carriage that I would ride to the institute.
“Don’t mention it. Please feel free to let me know if there is anything else you need,” he replied, wearing his usual tired, somewhat nervous smile.
“I will. Thank you.” I had absolutely zero intention of ever returning to the palace, so I thought it unlikely I’d be asking him for help ever again. Still, I thanked him again anyway before getting into the carriage.
And so, I was employed as a researcher at the Research Institute of Medicinal Flora, and I even had a room there to call my own.