Fox in a Henhouse: Chapter One

        I would have to come up with a plan, I realized, if I wanted to seize control of the kingdom in one fell swoop. It wouldn't happen overnight. There was no possible way that a mere servant boy (of my ranking, furthermore: I was looked down upon by the older working boys of the court) would be able to claw his way up through the ranks in such a short time. Reluctantly, I decided that I would have to bide my time until the opportune moment, though I was impatient to do so. But I forced myself to calm, and to think everything through. In order to rise to the top, I would have to become someone that held a ranking, someone that others turned to for counsel and someone that they could depend on. To do that, however, I would have to start from the bottom and find someone I could overtake. I worked for a while more in the court, quietly observing, gathering information, and plotting. I set my targets.

        First would have to be relatively easy; someone that could overtaken without causing too much suspicion. I lurked around the castle kitchen more and more often, and finally, one day, I found my perfect patsy.

        His name was Toma: the head kitchen boy. He was fat, pale, and extremely unattractive with his shock of greasy blond hair and pimpled countenance. Nevertheless, he was loud, so people tended to listen when he was speaking. He exercised some control over the distribution of pastries and sweet things, for this brother was the head baker. He was counted on to oversee the flow of sweets at parties and royal dinners, and was largely depended on to whip the serving lads into shape (though I believe he had a hard enough time with himself, I'm sure). 
 
        I had finally found a handhold, and I was impatient to begin my master plan.
One afternoon, Toma was taking a break by the kitchen oven, sitting on some flour sacks and stuffing himself with pastries. I slipped into the room and sidled over to where he was munching, then casually leaned against the brick wall across from him. After a while, he noticed me staring at him and glared at me with beady eyes.

        "I'm not sharin', so bug off." He inhaled another pastry as he said this, his fat hand grabbing more from his seemingly bottomless apron pocket. The fire crackled happily behind him.

        "Don't worry, Toma, I don't want any." I replied pleasantly. Toma continued to stare at me suspiciously. I held out my arms in a defenseless gesture. "I just want to talk."

        "About what?" He sprayed bread crumbs in my direction.  I tried my best not to recoil.

        "I was just wondering: what do you think of Albert?" I jerked my head in the direction of a baker-boy, a little behind us. He was pounding floured dough vigorously with his fists, sweat beading on his forehead. Toma glanced at him, and then waved his jiggling arm.

        "He's alright," Toma mumbled, licking his fingers. "A little dim, but alright." He paused, screwing up his face in sudden concentration. "What's it to you anyways? You're new here. You cause trouble and you'll get kicked out."

        I waved my hand, as if it were unimportant, but inside my heart fluttered for just a second. The thought of sleeping out in the gutters in the pouring rain did not thrill me. I continued on the best I could.

        "I know, I know," I replied genially. "But just look at him. Shifty guy if I ever saw one."

        Toma snorted at this. "You would know," he retorted. But I saw with satisfaction that Toma was looking suspiciously at Albert, watching him carefully. I turned my head to look as well and watched him as he picked his nose and then continued pounding away at the dough. I snorted in disgust.

        "Don't you agree?" I asked Toma.

        "Huh," he replied. I continued to pry.

        "You don't know then, do you?" I dropped my voice to a dramatic whisper and leaned in closer. Toma unconsciously leaned forward as well to hear me speak.  "Just the other night, Albert was caught filching muffins from the king's own plate!"

        Toma's eyes grew very wide with fear, for only days earlier, I had seen him do the exact same thing.

        "What did they do to him?" He whispered, anxious.

        I licked my lips nervously. "I'd better not say," I pretended to shudder. "It was pretty horrible."

        I made to turn away, but Toma's pudgy fingers grabbed hold of my arm and dug in painfully.

        "What happened?" He demanded. I sighed and turned back around.

        "They took him outside the castle, far out into the fen. It was all dark-like, and no one could barely see. Then," I paused dramatically. Toma, still clutching my arm, tightened his grip. "When no one was around, they chained him to a post and left him there to starve for days."

        "No!" He gasped, his pimpled face suddenly turning whiter than the flour he was sitting on.

        "Yes!" I cried.  "And you know what they said to him?"

        "What?" Toma stared into my eyes with a deep, horrified fascination.

        "They said, The next time we catch you stealing food, we'll feed you your own fingertips!"

        Toma covered his eyes with his fat hands and began to tremble.

        "Oh the Maker," he sobbed. "Horrible, horrible!"

        "Yes," I said sagely. "And look at him. Poor kid's never been the same since." Toma uncovered his eyes and the both of us looked at Albert. Just at that moment, a pan clanged noisily on the stove, and Albert leapt a foot into the air, thinking someone had come up behind him and had seen him snacking on the dough filched when he thought no one was looking.

        I shook my head in mock disappointment. "Kid has no talent," I remarked. Toma snapped his head around to stare at me.

        "What do you mean?" He exclaimed. "You sound like you can do better!"

        I winked conspiratorially. "Much, much better." Toma's mouth hung agape in apparent disbelief. "Don't believe me? Then watch."

        Just as a serving boy, carrying a platter of pastries, was striding by, I turned from him, my open hands behind my back, and swiftly caught a pastry on the edge without the serving boy noticing. I brought it forward and presented it to Toma, who was gaping like a hooked fish.

        "How did you-?" He spluttered.

        I tossed him the pastry, which he caught extremely nervously. "I've been on the streets long enough to know how to catch a thing or two. I used to filch food all the time. I've never been caught once in my life."

        Toma was silent for a moment, and I could almost see his piggy little brain trying to figure out how he could use this to his advantage. Finally, after a good solid ten minutes, he rose to his full height (much higher than mine, I might add) to stand menacingly over me.

        "Listen, kid," he growled, poking me in the chest. I gazed calmly up at him. 'Don't you tell anyone about this skill of yours, you hear?" He nearly squashed the pastry in his fat fist. "It'll just be our secret."

        "Sure it will," I agreed. Toma stared at me, surprised, his slow little brain trying to understand why I had agreed so readily. I chuckled inwardly to myself. Pigs will be pigs. "As a matter of fact, I'll filch as much food you want me to. We can eat like kings!"

        Stunned at this new development, Toma could only shake my proffered hand stupidly and wander off to do his kitchen duties. I hung back for a little, catching myself a piece of bread, and then exited the kitchen with a sense of accomplishment.

        For a whole month I stole pastries and sweet cakes right under the bakers' noses without even a suspicious glare from anyone in the whole kitchen. Then one day, the head baker received an anonymous tip that Toma, his own little brother, had been stealing pastries and sweet things from the King's own platter itself. Of course Toma denied all accusations against him, pleading that he was innocent, and that it was all a big mistake. They almost believed him, too, until the moment they searched his pockets; in his apron pocket was sitting three delicious looking King Pastries, baked only for the King. Toma was just a surprised as the rest of them when the sweets were discovered. He could be heard shouting something about a cleaning boy being with him, but they never did find who he was talking about exactly. So Toma was fired and thrown out, and his position was empty. Unexplainably, I was offered the job, seeing that I was Toma's only friend and all (to the observance of a very embarrassed older brother of Toma). I worked there quite happily for some time. Being a head kitchen boy wasn't much, but it was a start to my climb to the throne.

        A new entry in my little black book reads: The stomach- one of the easiest ways to the mind.