"Your Majesty!"
Daphne had only taken the first couple of bites of her food when a guard burst into the infirmary, his shoulders rising and falling rapidly as he panted for air. His face was as pale as a sheet, his fingers trembling as he held the door open.
"What?" Atticus snapped, glaring at the man. "Didn’t I ntion that we are not to be disturbed?"
"This is an ergency!" The guard quailed at the angry look in Atticus’s eyes, but he continued, "It’s the Duchess. She... She..."
"Co on, spit it out," Atticus barked in annoyance. "What’s got you in such a panic?"
"Duchess Hazelle is dead!"
A stunned silence t his pronouncent. Sirona, Jonah, and Nathaniel imdiately stopped bickering among themselves, their mouths falling open when they registered the words.
"What did you an by that? How would you even know this?" Atticus asked suspiciously.
After all, that treasonous couple had all but vanished. Jonah and Atticus searched the estate thoroughly after they left the tunnels and they were most definitely gone. How could an ordinary guard possibly get news of their fate before he did?
The guard took a cautious step back, but there was no saving him from Atticus’s wrath. Sweat beaded down his temple as he stamred an explanation.
"Prince Alistair and his wife... returned a few days ago. They are back in their old rooms," the guard squeaked out.
"What?!" Atticus exclaid as he stood up suddenly, nearly upending the food on his plate. "Why didn’t anyone inform of this?"
Atticus had expected them to squirrel away to so dingy hideout, or perhaps flee to another one of Alistair’s estates, but never in his wildest dreams did Atticus expect this couple to be so brazen to return to the castle!
Daphne’s eyes widened in surprise, and she instinctively clutched her dinner knife more tightly as she looked around warily, half-expecting Alistair to burst through the windows for a second fight. Atticus snarled, grabbing the guard by his lapels.
"And no one seed fit to tell about this news? No one at all?! What are all of you good for?!"
To say Atticus was furious was a massive understatent. How could the two of them sneak right under his nose? And back into their old rooms, nonetheless! The utter audacity of them all!
Before Atticus could do sothing drastic like skin the man in front of him, Daphne reached out and cald him down with a gentle touch of her hand. Atticus growled, but Daphne gave him a warning look. Slowly but surely, he uncurled his fingers, allowing the poor guard to breathe at last.
"Don’t shoot the ssenger," Daphne said, shaking her head. It was true that soone had to know that her brother had returned, but those people most likely were not on her side. "Atticus, my family probably knew about it and kept it hidden on purpose. It’s not as though they have any great love for us."
In fact, with Daphne’s health in jeopardy, so of her family mbers might even be hoping that Alistair would make a coback. Or they might simply be waiting to see which way the scales fell and support the winner.
Her family was opportunistic like that. Daphne carefully stood up and tried not to wince at the pain. Her muscles ached even at such a simple movent.
God. If Alistair wanted to kill her, she’d be a sitting duck. She had to find out where he was.
"Since Duchess Hazelle is dead, then where is my brother? Is he... dead as well? Or injured?"
The guard paused and then bowed low in apology. "I’m sorry, Your Highnesses. He’s nowhere to be found. We only saw a set of bloody footprints in the room, but they vanished in the yard. But that’s not the most important thing."
Atticus let out a disbelieving scoff, "What could possibly be more important than my wife’s attempted murderer on the loose?"
"It’s the state of Duchess Hazelle’s body, Your Majesty." That poor man was close to fainting, but he managed to whisper out the last part. "The body... it was as though a wild animal mauled her to death!"
"Take to her, I need to see her with my own eyes," to everyone’s surprise, it was Prince Nathaniel who spoke. His face was pale, and Daphne couldn’t help noticing the way his hands trembled.
Beside him, understanding dawned in Sirona and Jonah’s eyes.
It seed like they were about to find out what Alistair could do under a potent cinnabar concoction.
"We have no ti to waste."
***
The stench that greeted them when they arrived at Alistair’s old quarters nearly caused Daphne to pass out again. The sll of blood and rotting at was pungent to say the least, and she could already spot so flies buzzing around Hazelle’s body.
Hazelle’s lifeless, unmoving, bloodied body.
Daphne sighed; Hazelle had always been an annoyance, a threat, and Daphne should have been nothing but pleased to see Hazelle dead, but she realized she couldn’t muster up the barest hint of joy.
She hated Hazelle, but even she would not wish such a painful, ugly death for her. Hazelle had prided herself on her appearances, but now she looked nothing more like a ghoul, with grayish pale wrinkled skin and sunken eyes staring unblinkingly at the ceiling, a mouth frozen in an eternal scream.
Her body was in no better shape, there were a number of huge jagged tears all over her body, as though an over-enthusiastic dragon had mauled her from head to toe. Her gown was tattered and torn in places, soaked red with blood, but that was all the blood that was on her.
Alistair had drained most of the blood from Hazelle. Daphne could imagine Hazelle trying to struggle and escape, only to grow increasingly weakened and desperate the more Alistair took from her.
Daphne said a ntal prayer for Hazelle’s spirit. What a terrible way to die. She always knew Alistair was a heartless man, but to think he would inflict such brutality on his own wife!
Unbidden, Daphne recalled Nathaniel’s story about his pet mice.
Clearly, the concoction had done incredible damage to Alistair’s already fragile psyche.
"Everyone," Jonah said with a grimace, "I think I know why Alistair went insane."
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