27 | ACT I, SCENE XXVII

P R E V I O U S L Y

"The best way to make alliances is not by pulling out a man's heart or slitting his throat. The best way of making alliances-"

"-is marriage," finished Emerick with a greedy smile.

ARCTON FORTRESS, RIMEBAY, VERTGATE.

EDWINA

"BUT... WHO WILL BE MARRIED?" Llewellyn asked from the crowd, looking at Eros, who always had an answer. Everyone else was busy considering the proposal. It definitely made sense, to be honest.

"You have a grandson!" Eros merrily shouted at Elias, pointing to Favian. "And I have a granddaughter!" he exclaimed, gesturing to the flabbergasted Vanessa. "Let these two cousins marry and put an end to the war!" he yelled happily.

"No!" a cry of protest bubbled straight from Vanessa's lips as she nearly fainted, reeling from the shock.

"Yes!" Favian whistled, chuckling appreciatively as he raked his eyes down her body, making my skin crawl.

"Eric, no," Vanessa worriedly whispered to her elder brother, whose grey eyes were sunk in thought. Frightened, she kept on taking steps backwards as she finally collided with as pillar and hurriedly hid herself behind it, away from Favian's uncomfortable gaze.

"Nessa," he croaked, "this is the way. This is the only way."

"No," she begged. "Please, Eric - no."

"You are a LeVane," her brother looked hard into her gaze. "And you must do your duty like the rest of us," he said after a moment of thinking. "I, Eric LeVane, King of Endollon, do hereby declare this a marital alliance between my younger sister, Vanessa LeVane and my cousin, Favian Rotavelle!"

"No... no, please," Vanessa's eyes began to fill with tears as she collapsed down the pillar, covering her ears to hide Favian's loud chuckles. Amphitrite sadly tried to pull her up, failing, and Llewellyn sauntered over to help her.

Together, the both of them pulled up the weeping goddess of nature, and she fell right into Llewellyn's arms, clutching at his robes for dear life. He gently pulled her to him and hugged her tightly, muffling her sobs.

"They will be married in the span of the next one month," Emerick said coldly without sparing them a glance, angrily rattling his chains.

"You should let go of my to be wife, Llewellyn," Favian hissed from a corner, baring all his teeth, eyes greener than ever. "Such intimacy... is reserved for our wedding night," he leered.

"Please, I don't want to..." Vanessa cried harder, eyes reddening. Llewellyn ignored Favian, hugging her tighter still.

"I am sorry, Nessa. But it is the only way," Eric nodded his head sadly.

"Excellent!" Favian shouted, merrily waving his chained wrists at us. "Unchain me, will you? We are about to become brothers in law soon!" he yelled at Eric. Philip went over to unlock the chains as I fell into my thoughts.

Easily disposable, us females were.

We were their pieces on a board.

Consigned to be protected at all costs, but readily killed if the king was in danger. Because the King could never be killed, only forced into a position where he cannot move. And us Queens, on the other hand...

...mere playthings for them.

It took ten more minutes to release all the chains as the Rotavelles rubbed their wrists.

"Do we have your leave to go?" Justaline demanded, tufts of hair sticking out from various spots of her skull.

"Yes," I spat out, trying to cull in my anger. Anger at everyone. Anger at Tristan for how I let myself be hurt by him. Anger at the Rotavelles for the little circus they set up. Anger at Eric for letting his sister marry that snake, Favian. Yes, I even felt anger at the attendant, for interrupting our near kiss.

Oh, wait... what was I even wishing for? That was clearly not going to happen!

"Thank you, your Graces," Vivian said gratefully, calm and collected again. "You could have killed me, but you chose to spare my life. The tales of your generosity do not do you justice," he said quietly, his eyes asking for silent permission to leave. Tristan nodded and the god turned on his heel and disappeared with Rosalva.

The hall began to clear out, once again, with the Rotavelles being let off scot free. It vexed me to no end, yet I fought the fire raging inside me and pushed it in. It had done enough damage tonight, and I was not a fool. If I lit the Fortress on fire again, the structure would collapse in a minute.

We stood, waiting, until the Throne room emptied completely and it was just the three of us standing there.

"Well, we must be on our way home now," Eric told us. "It's been a long day, and an even longer night."

"Obviously," Tristan rolled his eyes. "Vertgate is not a place I would recommend for an extended vacation."

"Keep rolling your eyes, Valmont. Maybe you'll find a brain back there."

He shot me an annoyed look, his blue eyes light with irritation.

"Stop harassing me," Tristan complained.

"Wait," I said suddenly, remembering something as it floated up from the recesses of my mind. "No one is going anywhere. Not before I show you what I found," I said smugly.

"Are you still going on about that flying woman you saw on your wedding night?" Eric asked coolly, not interested at all. "You're imagining things. How can a piano possibly play by itself in the middle of the night? It's ridiculous!"

"And just because I don't second your fantasies of seeing tall ladies doesn't mean you accuse me of being a liar," Tristan added with a whine.

"You prefer ladies?" Eric pressed with a chuckle. "Why didn't you tell us before!"

"Shut up!" I barked, even as both gods regarded me casually. "I am not lying! I am not seeing things! And I'm going to prove that fact to you, right now, you cohorts!"

"How?" Eric simply asked.

"Follow me," I answered, quietly leading the way.

• • • • •

CALCHESTER CITADEL, STEFFITH.

EDWINA

I pushed up the bed, slid aside the tile, and watched the expressions of both their faces, drained of color, gaping at the huge opening of the passage. It was morning again, making it look seemingly harmless, but only I knew how mysteriously dangerous it felt actually going down those steps.

Tristan was the first to speak.

"Is this your idea of a joke?" he asked quietly, his dark eyes gleaming sharp. Biting his lip, he reached down to feel the floor, letting out a gasp of realization when he concluded it was real.

"Do I look like I'm fucking joking?"

"It seems to be a very far fetched idea," Eric quipped uneasily, letting out a chuckle. He stopped when he saw neither me nor Tristan laugh. "Well," he shrugged his shoulders, "I'm going down."

"So am I," Tristan frowned, setting one foot on the first step, then another. Then he began to climb down, the top of his inky black hair disappearing into darkness as Eric descended behind me.

"Go on," I said angrily. "There's a piano in there too, in case you were wondering!"

I heard them both grumbling something to each other as they made their way into the passage. I sighed and climbed in behind the two gods.

Below, the passage looked the same as it had been when Adam and I had discovered it the day before. Tristan had a bolt of lightning in his hands, using it to illuminate the room which was clouded in a bluish glow. He was poking around at objects curiously, whereas Eric was more busy observing the bloodstains on the floor. They both finally spotted the piano in a far corner and twin expressions of surprise crossed their faces again. The musical instrument sat there prettily, soaking up the soft glow as it ominously stood there.

"The fallboard is closed," Tristan whispered, not able to take the eyes off the piano. He must be remembering his own piano at Stormholt.

"Didn't I say I heard a faint piano that night!" I asked, pressing my point. "It must be this piano."

"But - but the fallboard is down, if it had been playing that night, it should be up!" Tristan argued, examining it. Suddenly, he let out a small yelp, retreating from the piano as if it were on fire.

"What is it?" Eric asked curiously.

"It's been tuned," Tristan whispered softly, eyes wider than plates. "And... it can be tuned only if someone was playing it."

I triumphantly brushed off his hands, pressing down random keys to hear the sound they made.

"Stop. Terrible," he clicked his tongue. I glared at him as he pressed a key on the piano with his long finger. A melodious tinkle wrung out from his hands as he coaxed music out of the instrument. It was beautiful.

"It's the same one as that night!" I exclaimed excitedly. "See, I told you. There was someone in the room under us that night!"

"But this is under the ground!" Eric wailed, putting up his hands. "The bed was on top of this passage. How in hell can someone get in here to play the piano if the bed was sitting on top the whole time?" he mused, disbelief written on his face.

"Look, Valmont," I sighed sharply. "Either that night there was something here below our room playing this, or... some sort of magic made it play by itself."

"But there was no one here, woman, that's impossible. And it can't play by itself - that's absurd!" Tristan argued, refusing to budge from his side of the argument.

"Well, the only point possible is that it might be playing by itself..." Eric interjected warily, moving past us both as his fingers pried hard to open up the piano, begging it to divulge its inner working.

"It must be a cheap parlor trick," Tristan grumbled halfheartedly.

"Nothing extra has been added to this to make it play on its own... nothing at all," Eric confirmed, looking at the mechanism inside the piano. "Which means that someone was playing the piano. It wasn't playing on its own."

"Fuck!" Tristan gasped out of nowhere. "You left the room to look for the lady, remember? And I came after you?"

"Damn, yes!" I added excitedly. "Someone lifted the bed and entered the passage in the time we were out of the room."

"And you did say that the bed sheets were rumpled that night?" Eric said with a light shining in his grey eyes.

"The woman was looking for this room," I finally concluded, pulling up my sleeves which were prickling from the heat.

There was another moment of silence. The color had drained from everyone's face.

"Look for music - is there any music?" Tristan asked, showing presence of mind as we tried to figure out the conundrum.

"There are a few sheets here," I said from near the piano, carefully picking up a bundle of parchment that looked like it would fall apart any moment. I dusted it, resulting in a slight rustle of paper, trying to make out what was written on it. The tattered pages were scrawled in some sort of loopy handwriting, covered all over with symbols. It seemed to be in a language I didn't know.

"There's no light here. Better to go back up," Tristan suggested. For once, I agreed with what he said and wordlessly made my way up the stairs with him following close behind. Both of us stopped, looking at Eric, whose gaze was still transfixed on the floor.

"How long are you going to stand there staring at the bloodstains?" Tristan quipped. Eric turned to us, his mouth opening and closing silently like a goldfish.

"What is it?"

"Come... here," he whispered, still pointing to the floor. We both went down the steps again, stopping in front of Eric. "Was this there when you came here earlier?" he asked nervously.

"The bloodstains? There were a few, I guess," I answered.

"This... this is not old blood," Eric said, barely moving his lips an inch. "Look, it's still wet," he showed us, bending down and touching it. The red came away and stuck to his fingers.

My heartbeat began to increase in pace, impatiently curious yet a bit worried at the sudden turn of events. Tristan raised the bolt in his hands to the ceiling, following the trail of blood.

The three of us gasped in unison at the sight revealed. Adrenaline started pumping into my veins, and my breath came in shorter gasps. Tristan's face had turned whiter than ever, Eric was more motionless than a statue.

There was a message written in blood on the ceiling. It was still gleaming wet.

'Gold can only keep a mouth shut for so long, Queen Regnant. Try stopping his heart the next time.'

Just beside it, strapped into the edge between the ceiling and the wall, was a body crudely mauled and stashed. Where the head was supposed to be, sat a huge lump of congealed blood, crawling with maggots. The hands were held open with the head sitting on them, grinning eerily but with the eyes gouged out. Blood was splattered everywhere, pooling around the feet. And there was a very familiar looking bag of gold sitting near the ankles, stained with crimson.

A sound of disdain escaped my lips.

It was Adam's corpse.

• • • • •

See ya next time! Guess how Adam died and who killed him! Oh, and have fun staying awake and breaking your head over it *grins evilly*