Chapter 69 THE LOOSE MOUTH
Elizabeth turned away before her temper betrayed her further. “This conversation is over.”
She left the solar with her spine straight and her pulse racing. Servants scattered as she passed and doors closed softly behind her, sealing the exchange away like a sin.
But the words she had spoken would not stay sealed.
That night, sleep refused Elizabeth. The fire in her chamber burned low, casting long shadows that climbed the walls like reaching hands. She sat upright in bed, replaying the moment again and again.
She never wanted Celine as Queen consort and felt pain King Adrian went against her.
Meanwhile, Celine swung her legs to the floor and her feet found cold stone. She wrapped a robe around herself and crossed the chamber, pulling a small bell cord. A servant arrived, eyes downcast.
“Send for Mara,” Celine said. “Quietly.”
Mara came before dawn, gray-haired and sharp-eyed, smelling faintly of crushed leaves and smoke. She had served three nobles in her family and buried more secrets than husbands.
“l’m here, Your Majesty,” Mara said, tilting her head.
Celine studied her face, the deep lines etched by years of discretion. “Tell me,” she said slowly, “what do you know of medicines that stills the body or kills it slowly."
Mara did not flinch.
“There are such preparations,” Mara said. “They are dangerous.”
Celine’s fingers tightened in her robe. “They are used to paralyzed!.”
“Yes.”
“Without killing, it subjects the person to be incapable.”
Silence stretched between them.
“Who do you think would use such a thing?” Celine asked.
Mara’s gaze was steady. “Someone who cannot afford a death.”
Celine closed her eyes. A face rose unbidden in her mind of the Sick King who was once loud with laughter and lay motionless for weeks. The official reports said illness or wasting sickness.
Queen Elizabeth had accepted it.
“What does it look like?” Celine asked.
Mara hesitated. “At first, weakness, then stiffness, the voice goes and then slow death.”
Celine swallowed. “How long?”
“Days to weeks if administered carefully.”
“And if not?”
Mara’s mouth thinned. “Then death comes quickly.”
"Is it possible the Queen mother..."
"Did the Queen actually try harming someone?" She thought to herself.
Celine turned to the window. Dawn bled faintly into the sky. “Could it be mistaken for illness?”
“Yes,” Mara said. “Often it is.”
Celine felt something shift inside her, not certainty, but suspicion sharp enough to draw blood.
“Bring me texts,” she said. “Old ones. Not court-approved.”
Mara bowed. “As you wish, my lady.”
When Mara left, Celine sank into a chair. Her anger from the previous day had cooled into something more dangerous called calculation.
Queen Elizabeth had spoken in rage and Celine had listened in silence. And in that silence, something had cracked.
Later that morning, Queen Elizabeth walked the palace gardens alone. Dew clung to roses, their stems vicious with thorns. She passed statues of former kings, their stone eyes blind to what their flesh counterparts had endured.
At the far end of the garden stood the aviary which was unused now, with its iron door rusted. Queen Elizabeth paused there, memories stirring. The dethroned king had once stood beside her here, laughing as birds shrieked and flapped.
“You cannot cage everything,” he had said.
She smiled then. Now she wondered who had caged him. She stood there a while.
Meanwhile Celine returned to her chambers and dismissed her attendants after returning from a council meeting with Adrian. When Mara returned, she carried a bundle wrapped in cloth.
“These are not meant for royal eyes,” Mara said quietly.
Celine unfolded the cloth. It was filled with books with cracked spines, pages darkened by age and touch. Diagrams of plants, notes in cramped script,and warnings written in red ink.
She flipped through them, stopping at a sketch of a root twisted like a clenched fist.
“What is this?” Mara said. “When prepared properly, it stills the muscles. Taken slowly, it spares the heart.”
Elizabeth traced the drawing. “Where does it grow?”
“Near rivers and shaded ground. It is difficult to cultivate.”
“Who would have access to such things?”
Mara hesitated. “All court physicians and apothecaries loyal to the crown.”
Elizabeth’s laugh was humorless. “Loyalty,” she said. “A flexible word.”
She closed the book. “Has this been used recently?”
Mara’s silence answered for her since she nodded twice.
That afternoon, Celine requested records and medical notes from the months before the dethroned king’s collapse. The clerks looked puzzled but complied.
Celine worked quickly. She had learned long ago that hesitation invited interference. And always, threading through it all, the same seal.
Not the king’s but the Queen’s.
Celine’s chest tightened. Anger flared again, but this time it was cold, and precise.
She remembered Queen Elizabeth’s smile and the way she had said mercy unsettles.
Celine folded the papers and hid them beneath her writing desk just as footsteps approached and the door opened without announcement.
Adrain entered.
“You wanted to see me?” Adrian asked, his tone pleasant, his eyes alert.
Celine studied him.
“No,” Celine said. “But since you’re here.”
Adrian waited.
Celine rose slowly. “Tell me, your Majesty,” she said, “do you believe some men are too dangerous to be allowed their voices?”
Adrain did not answer immediately. He walked to the window, looking out at the gardens.
“I do not understand but I believe men can be stilled, like my brother ,” he said at last, “And that chaos often wears a familiar face.”
Celine felt a chill. The word hung between them, heavy.
Celine smiled. “Be careful, your majesty,” she said. “Fear is often mistaken for cruelty by those who survive it.”
Adrian returned the smile. “And cruelty,” he said, “is often justified by those who wield it.”
They stood there circling an unspoken truth.
Celine broke the silence first. “You look tired, Your Majesty. I wish to continue my investigation.”
Adrain’s eyes sharpened. “Investigation?”
Celine did not deny it.
Adrian leaned in, his voice low. “I wonder why.”
Celine’s gaze did not waver. “Perhaps,” she said softly, “because I recognized something someone may not know.”
Celine curtsied perfectly. As Adrian turned to go, he paused at the door.
“You should be careful what you dig up,” he said without looking back.
The door closed.
Celine crossed to her desk and retrieved the hidden papers and her fingers brushed the seal again.
Celine looked at the books Mara had brought, but found nothing.
“If I want to get anything substantial, it will be in her room.” She thought.
“Mara, find a way to search the Queen mother’s room for something.” She said.
Mara nodded.
Immediately, Mara started work.