It's the sort of artless, heavy-handed irony he'd expect to see in one of Makepeace's plays: one moment John Mandrake, great magician and Information Minister, sits in the back of his own private car and very seriously debates his right — no, obligation — to take up Gladstone's Staff for the good of all of Britain. And now, not very many moments later (or weeks, literally, but that's lacking dramatic appeal), he stands, penniless, holding a broomstick and standing in...

Rat hearts? Those are really rat hearts. Anyway, it isn't the polished wood staff he was planning on holding, is the point.

Without his expensive suits and meticulous haircuts, he looks like what he is, which is a skinny teenage boy holding a broomstick and frowning thoughtfully at the broken cabinet's innards. John doesn't make a move to start cleaning. He considers digging the charcoal out of his pocket and drawing a pentacle on the floor instead. Not for the first time, which is why he knows it would be pointless. Still, maybe if he just changes the words of the summoning slightly—

"You." He's drawn out of his thoughts by a bypasser, whether they're skirting close or carefully avoiding the mess. He says you with polite authority, as if there's any way to make shouting you at someone not rude. He seems to think it isn't. "Do you know who usually tends to the grounds?"

He's not an idiot. The informal answer is clearly new recruits, or rifters, or specifically whoever's been handed a broom. But there must be some kind of hierarchy. And, more importantly: he can't possibly be at the bottom of it.

This is a task with some merit. There isn't much about this place that makes sense, but Marquis is a word he knows and nobleman holds the obvious weight, and that means this inane, humiliating task might be a blessing in disguise. A chance to rub shoulders with the elite, to get his name in with someone who really matters.

You know what also holds weight? The Marquis, who is currently dead drunk and teetering perilously at the top of a flight of stone steps.

John has his back against the Marquis', pushing against him with all the effectiveness you might expect from a boy who hasn't lifted anything heavier than his ego in all of his seventeen years. There's sweat on his brow and an uncomfortable focus on his face, gaze fixed on the tips of his toes at the edge of a step, desperately trying not to give ground or lose balance.

He can't even look up when he hears footsteps approach. And while normally he'd approach an alliance with more finesse and strategy, right now he doesn't have much choice. Instead, there's a strained, dubiously high-pitched: "Help, please."

In very tidy (some might even say pretentious) script, the kind that's so fancy that it's hard to say if that's an f or an s:

What do the words "spirit" and "demon" mean to you?

I have done all the pertinent reading, so I am not looking for pedantry and definitions. I know what these words mean in the context of this world. I am interested in your opinion and your subjective experience.

Does that even make sense? Wouldn't their opinion still include a definition? Can he erase this message?— no. That would look even worse than sending a foolish question in the first place. He'll stand by it.