The news of the attack on Inaymi had reached the Castle at daybreak, unleashing a busy day in its wake.
Eli was busy, flooded with reports from different villages and speaking to the General on the next dispatch.
Many villages had been attacked recently.
The news put him on edge.
This White Aura attacker was the only suspect he had in mind, Kestra had aided his belief in that suspicion too, and it was scary to know that the Witch moved so powerfully... and quickly.
How could he not have known about the attackers until now, after a lot of damage had already been done?
From the reports, this wasn't the first time something like this was happening.
The Village Heads must have thought it was something they could deal with until they realized their attacker was going around fast, causing massive damage, and finally decided that the matter was something the King had to be involved with.
If only they had told him about this earlier, he would have done something about it immediately, many lives would have been saved!
Anok had been dispatched to Tikivah and Belladonna had made use of the opportunity to send him on a different assignment, she wanted him to look for a baby around a specific part of the village and save the child if he found him. She gave no further explanations and Anok asked questions.
Although he had been surprised when Kenji had joined him on his journey back to Tikivah.
Kenji had not been the happiest about the fact that he would be leaving the Capital, but he had been left with no choice, Belladonna have given him no choice.
She had threatened him with the knowledge that she knew he was in the King's study on the night of the "mystery appearance" in the Castle. At first, he had wanted to deny it but she brought up his missing black book.
Why she had wanted him to leave the Capital, by all means, was something he didn't understand.
He believed she must have read the book, and like the most stupid bride he knew her to be, she didn't want to be confronted with the truth that something was amiss, she also wanted any remembrance of logicality to be far away from her as far as possible.
By Ignas, she was the most stupid one yet.
"And my book?" He had asked in defeat.
He would rather leave Ignas than have her tell the King about his presence in that study. He had gone there to find out more about the triskelion, only finding out there was a book on it there through his crocked means that had cost him a lot of coins.
He had told her what he wanted to find out, even about the presence of someone else in the study, in hopes that she would see reason and let him stay, or even join him on his mystery hunt and save herself and others that might end up falling into the "bride" trap in the future, but she was stupid and remained adamant.
Belladonna has been adamant about his need to leave, just as she had been adamant about hoarding his book, to keep her entertained "during boring afternoons".
All the years he had spent on that book and he would just have to part with it like that?!
He hated her but his hands were tied.
So, along with his brother and the rest of the dispatched soldiers, he had to leave for Tikivah.
News reached back to Belladonna that there was no child at the given location, and no one in the village knew anything about the said child.
In fact, there was nothing there to suggest that anything had happened.
Belladonna had taken the news with a pained heart, although the news had been expected, it still hurt to have it confirmed that the baby was dead.
She had avoided Kestra like a plague after, fearing that she might attempt to strangle her from rage and hatred, if they were to be in the same space at the same time.
Instead, she occupied herself with finding reading more on Kenji's black book and finding out more about the Soul Witch, if there was any information that could help.
There was none.
So she had started trying to find out libraries or places she could go to find out more information.
Kenji had listed down a couple of places he planned to go, in the hierarchy of how much information he believed they could provide.
This had just made everything easier.
The only thing standing in her way now was Alaris.
She had dreamt about him last night but he wouldn't take her anyway, claiming that her body was too weak for her soul to be traveling.
He told her to give it two more days before she came back.
Two days!
That was too much to be making no progress on. She knew her enemy already, she just needed a way to kill her, why did she have to wait two days for that?!
The two days had given her time to clear her head and come up with a decision she could follow through.
Belladonna had decided not to look for the Nahiri.
Besides the fact that her search might be fruitless and be an entire waste of time, the Nahiri might want to choose the easier way out of everything.
What if the witch decided to kill her just to ensure that her prepared soul, (that was if Kestra was already doing something to her that she didn't know about to prepare her soul) would not be used for the sacrifice?
This would break down Kestra's chances and lead to a sure victory of killing her easily before the Blood Moon or even on the Blood Moon, since there would be no sacrifice for her to rely on.
She had to do this alone.
She had to put an end to this madness alone.
The door screeched open and Belladonna almost jumped in her skin, startled by the sound.
Eli had been really busy these days, he was always leaving their chambers first thing in the morning and coming back when she was already asleep.
He had been that busy and she had been way too busy to realize that until now, when his presence in the room felt like something she was suddenly not used to any longer.
She missed him, but she was busy and time was ticking by fast for what she had to do.
They were already well into the middle of the seventh, in a couple of days, the seventh month would come to an end.
They were getting closer and closer to the Blood Moon.
Running out of time.
Her hands clapped the Black Book she had open on the drawing table, shut as he turned the key in the lock.
His shoulders were tense and after a moment of thinking, he turned to her, his mask still on his face, with him making no attempt of taking it off.
A different kind of tension settled inbetween them, it pinched against her skin and she felt a strange feeling descend upon her when she realized that this would be the first time they would be seeing each other, alone and in the room after what he had told her three days ago.
She hoped he wouldn't ask them to talk about it. She had to leave to her study and dream of Alaris.
She had to continue her battle tonight.
But when he pulled off his mask and started unbuttoning the sleeves of his robe, she knew he had other time-consuming plans in mind.
No, by Ignas, not tonight.