Chapter 118: Stone and Rose
"You are the Queen now. You should draw clear boundaries between you and your servants. It is necessary to avoid misunderstanding," said Alec before walking out of the room with Matthias on his tail.
Lauren huffed out a breath. She shook her head with her lips half-open. Necessary to avoid misunderstanding? But he was the only one who misunderstood it!
She never acted inappropriately around Julian or any of her people. Julian may be playful but he always respected the boundaries between them. After all, she was still a royal and his master. Alec only heard Julian chuckle. She couldn’t believe he was making a fuss just because of a trivial matter.
Inside the carriage, Lauren sat across from Alec. She couldn’t help but roll her eyes at his frowning face.
"Did the ministers annoy you that’s why you are so grumpy?" She sighed and crossed her arms. "I appreciate your concern but I know my people the best so you don’t have to worry about it."
"Do what you want," he said with a bleak tone.
"My pleasure," she replied, annoyed by his prickly attitude.
They were silent the whole ride to Abalone village. When they arrived, officers were guarding the vicinity and a group of counciln was checking the houses. None of the villagers were allowed to leave the village while the investigation was going on. It was to make sure that a black mage wasn’t hiding among them.
"Your Majesties," the counciln greeted.
Lauren’s gaze went to Lord Simon who offered her a polite smile.
"You shouldn’t have bothered coming here, King Alec, Queen Lauren. We have enough n to investigate the case and we know you are busy with court affairs," as the senior mber leading the team, it was Simon who spoke.
"I want to check the situation myself. As the new King, I believe it’s only right for
to sympathize with my people. Three families were massacred. The villagers must be terrified," said Alec like a righteous king true to his duty.
Simon led them to the bodies of the massacred families. They had beco nothing less than dry woods with how their souls were sucked out of them. Their eyes were wide open and their skin had shrunk and darkened like an old man’s. Their hair had turned gray and their cheeks had beco hollow. Not an ounce of life could be seen from the corpses as if they had been dead for days.
"Queen Lauren, this is quite a grueso sight. Are you sure you want to continue looking at the corpses?" Simon asked out of concern even though Lauren didn’t show the slightest hint of being fazed by the sight she was seeing.
"It is alright," answered Lauren.
Although the other counciln weren’t in favor of a woman ddling with their work, none of them dared express their contempt. Lauren was no longer the least favored princess but now the Queen.
"None of the black mages were killed?" Alec asked.
"None, Your Majesty. When the news reached us, we heard the black mages had fled the village. We left the town the mont we knew what happened," Simon replied.
"There were officers stationed in the village, right? What happened to them?" Lauren asked.
"There were only seven of them and they all died."
With the rise of the covens of black mages, the council thought that having so officers guard the small villages to ensure the villagers’ safety could help, but it seed like even the mage and vampire officers had no match to the black mages. Lauren thought about it and wondered how the black mages beca more powerful recently. Rembering the mysterious woman, she assud that she must be connected to all of these.
While Alec and the counciln were talking in front of the house with the most number of corpses, Lauren walked to the next house where another human family was massacred.
She didn’t go inside though and stopped on the east side of the wall where she caught sight of a blooming red rose on the dry ground. Which was odd because apart from the single rose, there was no other plant anywhere near it. The soil also seed too dry.
As she stepped closer to the flower, her gaze dropped to the small shiny stone near its thorny stem.
She crouched to pick it up and her eyes narrowed. It was an odd stone with the size of a cent. It had two sides, one was ruby and the other was erald. It didn’t take her a second to co up with the assumption that it was purposely left there.
Abalone village was a small and poor village so it was impossible that one of the villagers owned such an expensive stone unless it was stolen by a thief. But if it was the case, the thief would have kept the stone in a secured place. So, Lauren believed that it was a trace the perpetrator wanted to be found by the investigators, or perhaps by her. And one person ca into her mind when she saw the color of the stone.
"Co back here, Ericka!" A woman shouted and Lauren saw a little girl running towards her with a big smile on her face. Pure admiration could be seen in the girl’s big brown eyes.
"The Queen is here, mother! She is so beautiful!"
One of the counciln was about to stop the girl from getting close to Lauren but she gave him a signal that it was alright. Alec turned to see what it was all about. He found Lauren smiling sweetly to a child who seed to be not older than five.
"You know ?" Lauren asked. She had slid the small stone into her pocket before looking down at the small girl in front of her with thick brown curls.
The girl giddily nodded, her eyes glimring in delight. "Yes! You are the new Queen! Our land’s Queen Lauren!"
She must have saw illustrated posters of her, thought Lauren. Sending out posters of the new rulers was a way of letting the far villagers know who were leading the state.
"Please forgive us, Your Majesty!" A woman in her thirties pulled her daughter away from Lauren, panicking. "My daughter is still four years old and she doesn’t know much. Forgive us!"
"It’s fine. She didn’t do anything," Lauren said calmly. She looked at the young girl and spoke warmly, "You have a pretty na, dear Ericka. And you look pretty too. It’s alright to play around but for the anti listen to your mum and stay in the house, okay?"
"But... will I see you again?" The girl looked hopeful. For a child who only heard about the royals from the elders and never had the chance to leave the small village, seeing the Queen was new to Ericka. She only heard about princesses from stories, and to see Lauren clad in a high-quality dress and accessories, she was overwheld to see a true royal in front of her.
Lauren who didn’t want to spoil the young girl’s bubble said, "Of course, sweetie. I will co to visit you soday. I hope you will keep being a good girl."
"I will! I will!"
The kid’s mother smiled awkwardly, intimidated by the Queen’s presence.
"Thank you for your kindness, Your Majesty. We shall go ahead."
Just when the woman was about to pull her daughter back to their house, the little girl tugged her mother’s skirt.
"Mama, wait! Look, there is a pretty rose!" The girl pointed at the lone rose where Lauren found the stone.
"Ericka, we should go-"
"I want to give it to the Queen! Please let
get it!" The young girl pleaded.
Lauren was about to tell the kid that she shouldn’t bother but Ericka had escaped her mother’s grip and ran to pluck the rose mindlessly, which got her finger pricked by a thorn.
The woman worriedly went to her daughter. "Look what happened! I told you we should go ho!"
"Let
see," Lauren held the girl’s hand to see if her wound was deep. She was relieved to see it was only a prick. Ordinary mages could heal small wounds through a healing spell, however, when she tried to heal Ericka’s finger, it didn’t work.
Instead, the small wound on the girl’s finger slowly darkened which made Lauren’s eyes widen in horror.
The rose was poisonous!
"What is it, Lauren?" Alec asked when he saw the dread on her face.
"A healer mage.... we need a healer mage!"
With Alec’s long strides, he was next to Lauren the next mont. When he saw the discoloration of the young girl’s finger, he imdiately understood Lauren’s dilemma. The girl’s mother panicked, worried about what might happen to her child.
"Simon, where is the village magistrate? Ask him if there is a healer mage living in the village. The child is poisoned and the poison is moving through her body too fast," said Alec.
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