## Three Floors Below: The Investigation
The war room that had once been Derti’s study now looked like a alchemist’s nightmare.
Every available surface groaned under stacks of books, loose parchnts covered in desperate scrawls, and glass vials arranged in color-coded rows that had long since lost their organization. The air hung thick with competing scents—purification incense, chemical reagents, the acrid bite of failed experints, and underneath it all, the sour tang of exhausted panic.
Derti stood at the window, one hand braced against the fra hard enough to make the wood creak. His reflection in the darkened glass looked haggard—white hair escaping its tie, eyes sunken and red-rimd, jaw clenched so tight a muscle jumped beneath the skin. He’d aged a decade in six hours.
"Report," he said without turning. His voice was flat, scraped raw from shouting earlier. Now only cold exhaustion remained.
Master Cullens shuffled papers with shaking hands. The elderly physician looked ready to collapse, but fear kept him upright. "We’ve tested seventeen different antidotes, Your Grace. Broad-spectrum toxin binders, magical purges, divine blessings from three separate temples, even a blood-cleansing ritual from the old texts." His voice cracked. "None have reduced her core symptoms. The fever drops slightly, then returns within the hour. Her cognitive state remains... impaired."
"Impaired," Derti repeated, the word like ash on his tongue. "Define that clinically."
The younger healer clutched her notes, knuckles white. "She can’t focus on complex thoughts for more than a few seconds. Her short-term mory is compromised—she forgets what was said monts before. Visual processing is severely affected. When we tested her, she couldn’t identify faces of people she knows well, couldn’t read text, couldn’t—" Her voice hitched. "Your Grace, it’s like the poison is specifically targeting higher cognitive functions while leaving base instincts intact. Possibly enhanced, even."
Silence fell, heavy as a executioner’s blade.
"Weaponized," Derti said quietly. "Strip away her control, her intellect, everything that makes her ’her’, and leave only..." He couldn’t finish.
Captain Vex stepped forward from his post by the door, jaw tight. "We’ve expanded the search, Your Grace. Every known alchemist, poison-master, and hedge-witch within fifty miles has been questioned. We’ve offered immunity for information, threatened imprisonnt for silence, paid bribes that would fund a small war." He paused. "Nothing. No one recognizes the symptom pattern. Several suggested it might be custom-designed, a one-off formula created specifically for this target."
"The letter," Derti bit out. "Where did it co from?"
"The trail dies at the east receiving room," Vex said, frustration leaking into his professional tone. "We questioned every servant who passed through that wing yesterday morning. No one saw it delivered. No one noticed it appear. It was simply ’there’ when the steward returned from sorting packages in the adjacent room—a gap of nineteen minutes."
"Nineteen minutes," Derti said. "In a palace with guards on every corner."
"The receiving room has no direct surveillance," Vex admitted. "It’s considered low-security—just correspondence sorting. Whoever did this knew exactly when and where to strike."
Derti finally turned from the window, silver eyes blazing. "Show the letter again."
The mage-analyst, a thin man with ash-stained robes, carefully lifted the cream parchnt with gloved hands. It lay on a silver tray, isolated like a relic. In the lamplight, it looked utterly, infuriatingly mundane.
"For Lady Elara, with anticipation," Derti read aloud for the hundredth ti. The words curdled in his mouth. "What did the initial analysis show?"
"Alchemist Greaves reported a faint sweet sll when he first opened it approximately six hours ago," the mage-analyst said carefully. "Similar to honeysuckle or vanilla, but with an underlying note he couldn’t identify. He handled it with gloved hands, examined it briefly, reported his findings, then sealed it for further testing."
"And Greaves is fine," Derti stated.
"Completely unaffected, Your Grace. We examined him thoroughly. No fever, no cognitive symptoms, nothing. He’s confused why Lady Elara reacted when he didn’t."
"Because it wasn’t ant for him," Master Cullens murmured. "It was keyed sohow. Blood, magical signature, sothing unique to her."
Derti’s gaze snapped to him. "You tested for that."
"Yes, Your Grace. Multiple tis. We found no curse marks, no blood-magic triggers, no targeted enchantnts. Whatever chanism activated the poison left no trace we can detect."
"Then your detection thods are insufficient," Derti snarled.
The physician flinched but held his ground. "I... cannot argue that, Your Grace."
The mage-analyst cleared his throat nervously. "We ran every test in our arsenal. Reagent analysis, mana-spectrum scanning, resonance detection, even so experintal techniques from the university. The paper itself is completely ordinary—standard oak-gall ink on cotton-fiber parchnt, the kind used in half the noble houses in the capital."
"And the sll?" Derti demanded. "The sweet scent Greaves reported?"
"Gone," the mage said simply. "When we tested the paper five minutes after his initial report, there was nothing. No scent. No residue. No chemical markers. It’s as if..." He hesitated.
"As if ’what?’"
"As if the compound self-destructed after activation. Broke down into inert components that leave no trace. Your Grace, I’ve never seen anything like it. This level of sophistication suggests either a master alchemist with access to rare formulas, or..."
"Or soone with resources beyond what we’re imagining," Derti finished coldly. "Foreign powers. Rogue mages. Soone who ’wants’ this formula untraceable."
The younger healer raised a shaking hand. "Your Grace, if I may... there’s another possibility. What if it wasn’t the paper itself, but sothing ’on’ the paper that evaporated after contact? A volatile compound that exists as a gas for only minutes before breaking down completely?"
Master Cullens frowned thoughtfully. "That would explain why there’s no residue now, and why the first handler wasn’t affected—if it required skin contact with a specific person to trigger full activation..."
"But it doesn’t explain how they keyed it to her specifically," Vex cut in. "How would they know her exact magical signature or blood composition without direct access?"
Silence again. The candles flickered in their sconces, casting dancing shadows across piles of useless research.
Derti picked up the letter himself, turning it slowly in the light. Searching for sothing—anything—that dozens of experts had missed. The elegant handwriting mocked him with its cheerful flourish. ’With anticipation.’
"This wasn’t random," he said slowly. "Whoever sent this knew her schedule. Knew she’d be alone when she opened it. Knew exactly how to make evidence vanish. This is professional-grade work."
"An assassination attempt?" Vex suggested.
"No." Derti set the letter down with deliberate care. "If they wanted her dead, there are a thousand faster thods. Poison in her food. A blade in the dark. A curse in her sleep." His hands clenched into fists. "This was designed to destroy her in a different way. Strip away her control. Her reputation. Force her into compromising situations that would—"
He cut himself off, jaw working.
"Scandal," Master Cullens finished quietly. "They want to ruin her socially. Politically."
"If word gets out that EMPEROR’s daughter and also the one who was working as his stand in was drugged into a mindless state, lost to base instincts..." Derti’s voice dropped to sothing deadly. "Every enemy we have would weaponize it. Her engagent negotiations would collapse. She’d be labeled unstable, dangerous, unfit for any position of power. The scandal would follow her for life."
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