Chapter 21 ATHALIA’S DISCOVERY
A rustling at her door made her stiff.
“Your Majesty?” came a voice that was soft, old, and familiar.
It was Meera, a new maid, a thin woman with silver hair pulled into a tight knot.
“Come in,” the queen said.
Maera entered slowly. She carried a tray with warm tea and a small bowl of honeyed figs.
But she did not smile. Instead, she paused.
“Another sleepless night?” Meera asked gently.
Queen Elizabeth forced a steady breath. “Too much depends on clarity.”
Maera set the tray down. “The king is recovering. Prince Adrian is preparing for tomorrow’s hearing. The guards are triple posted around Eric and Emelia’s confinement hall.”
The queen’s expression darkened slightly. “And yet none of that helps me.”
Maera studied her. “You look troubled.”
“No, I am calculating,” the queen corrected sharply. “And I cannot find the answer.”
“Regarding…?” Maera asked quietly.
“The second conspirator.”
Maera’s brows pinched. “You still believe there was one?”
“I do not believe,” the queen replied. “I know.”
She paced slowly around the room.
“Rylan was under my instruction, yet paralysis potion was harmless. Eric would have grown tired, perhaps collapsed gently. Nothing more or dangerous.” she thought.
Maera nodded as if in the queen’s thought. “But then who attacked the king.”
“It might have been someone else who intervened,” the queen said. “A guard sprayed that… strange fragrance and placed a blade in Eric’s hand. Someone tried stopping him. He would never have done so if he were colluding.”
“Or… perhaps he betrayed who sent him!.” Meera said.
“No,” the queen said immediately. Her tone carried certainty. “He probably acted out of confusion, fear or perhaps even guilt. But not betrayal.”
“But then, who was it?” The Queen thought.
Her eyes drifted to the balcony again.
Her voice grew quieter.
“Someone manipulated both Eric and Talen. Someone used my plan as cover. Someone silenced Lena. Someone whose motive benefits from the prince’s downfall.”
Maera swallowed. “Your Majesty… do you suspect Prince Adrian?”
The queen stopped pacing.
For a long moment, there was silence.
Then she shook her head.
“No. Adrian is ambitious but impulsive. He lacks subtlety. He could never orchestrate something so layered.”
“Then who…?” Meera breathed.
“I do not know,” the queen admitted.
And the admission tasted like bitterness.
She moved to her writing desk, pulling open a drawer filled with sealed documents. But she didn’t remove any. She simply stared at them, lost in thought.
“Rylan knew something before he fled,” the queen said. “Something he did not have time or did not dare to tell me.”
She remembered the slight panic in his eyes after the chaos. The blood on his side. The wound he tried to hide. He had come to her through the chambers once… explaining how he had completed his task … but then he disappeared.
Rylan’s fear meant someone had targeted him.
“It means the second conspirator may know about him,” the queen thought. “Which means they may know about me.”
She turned back to her mirror, staring into her own dark eyes.
“Whoever seized control of my plan…” she whispered, “they intend to undo more than a prince. They intend to take the kingdom.”
Maera stepped forward with caution. “Should we tighten your guards?”
The queen nodded slowly. “Yes. But quietly. If we move too obviously, we alert the enemy.”
She walked toward the balcony, pushing the curtains aside.
The wind brushed through her hair as she looked out over the palace. Torches flickered. Guards walked their posts and silence loomed.
But danger whispered from every shadow.
She whispered into the night air:
“Rylan… What did you see? What do you know?”
Her eyes drifted to the empty wooden perch where her dove usually rested.
If Rylan had received her letter… why had he not returned a message?
Was he really frightened? Wounded? On the run? Or…
The queen’s heart tightened, though she kept her expression still.
“Or,” she murmured, “someone intercepted my message.”
That possibility chilled her.
Someone had to know she used doves for secret correspondence. Someone had to anticipate the path. Someone could have lured the bird down… read the message… and understood her involvement in the plot.
Someone could now use that knowledge against her.
She returned to her chair with slow, measured steps and sat again with hands clasped tightly.
Her voice shook only slightly in thought:
“I must find the conspirator before they find me.”
Maera bowed and backed toward the door. “Your majesty, you must rest.”
“No,” the queen said. “Not yet.”
She looked toward the heavens through the balcony opening.
“First,” she whispered, “I must figure out who sent someone to kill Lena.”
Her fingers tapped the armrest again as the beat grew faster.
“Because whoever sent someone to kill the woman… is the same person who turned a plan into a violent disaster.”
For the next hour, she sat completely still with eyes open yet distant, mind racing through possibilities, names, motives and alliances. She sifted through memories, conversations, expressions and past conflicts… but every conclusion dissolved like smoke.
She whispered to herself:
“I cannot guess right. Every time I believe I have found the answer… it slips away.”
The moon rose higher, the palace slept deeper but the queen did not rest.
And somewhere far outside her chambers hidden in the palace walls, in the towers and in the shadows, someone else watched her movements with cold, calculated interest.
Someone who knew exactly what she had done. Someone who knew exactly what Rylan had seen.
It was Princess Athalia.
She had observed signs during the interrogation. But seeing a message from the queen to the unknown man was enough to convince her the Queen had something to do with it.
Athalia didn't need to intercept it, because she wanted the same man gone. If he stood by and watched Eric try hurting the king, then he must have seen the shadow guard disguised as Princess Emelia.
However, she wasn't sure of the full details of the Queens plot and the reason for the Queen's action.
The Shadow guard had come to Princess Athalia's chamber that night after the Prince left her room.
“I have completed the task” he said. “No one can stand in the way of Prince Adrain succeeding the throne. Congratulations, your highness.”
“You shall be rewarded.”
“Thank you, your highness.” he said. “However, it seemed someone had plans for the Prince and tried intercepting.”
Then they heard a noise outside the door.
“Who’s there?” The princess shouted.
It was Lena. She had passed by to hand over some medicine from the queen to princess Athalia who has earlier complained she was unable to sleep. Lena ran away in fear.
Athalia caught a glimpse of her as she ran and instructed the guard to kill her before she spills anything. When he got close enough to prince Adrain, he retreated back and hypnotized the guard on the tower to shoot her.