Drazeil decided to see the butler before finding Thaddeus.
Edrian had been placed in a room in the lower quarters of the castle — not a cell exactly, but close enough that the distinction was not that much. A chair. A table. A single window too narrow to be anything but decorative. The kind of room that said: You Are Alive, But Do Not Mistake That For Freedom.
He was sitting when Drazeil walked in.
He did not remain sitting for long.
The mont the door opened and Edrian registered who had entered, he was on his feet and pressed against the far wall in one graceless movent, knocking the chair back behind him. His face had gone the particular shade of pale that belonged exclusively to people who had already died once today and were not eager to repeat the experience.
"Si — Sire, I —"
"Sit down."
The words were quiet. That was the thing about Drazeil’s voice when he was being serious — it never rose. It was always low and dangerous.
Edrian sat. On the floor, because the chair was behind him and his body was shaking uncontrollably.
Drazeil looked at him for a long mont without speaking. He did this deliberately — let the silence do the first round of work. People filled silence with confession when they were frightened enough. It saved ti.
Edrian lasted almost thirty seconds.
"I didn’t — I swear I didn’t an to — the execution was — I didn’t ask for any of this —"
"Who gave you the blood?"
The question landed like a blade on a table. Clean. Precise. Edrian’s mouth closed imdiately.
"I —" He swallowed hard. "I don’t know what you an."
Drazeil tilted his head very slightly. Just once.
"Don’t let ask you again, Soone deliberately put vampire blood in you," he said. "That soone had a reason. You are going to tell who it was."
Edrian’s hands trembled visibly on his knees. He looked like a man doing rapid calculations about which answer was more likely to get him killed.
"It was —" He stopped. Started again. "It was Miss Belle. Lady Tiana’s daughter." The words ca out fast, tumbling over each other. "But she was only trying to help — please, she had nothing but good intentions, I don’t want her to get into trouble because of —"
"A girl gave you vampire blood," Drazeil said.
"She ca to about two weeks ago. In the middle of the night." Edrian’s hands were still trembling but his voice had steadied slightly — the way voices sotis do when the subject shifts to protecting soone else. "I thought I was dreaming at first. She looked strange — her eyes were different, the way they go when she has seen sothing. Miss Belle is a seer, Sire. A vision witch. And whatever she had seen had frightened her badly."
"What did she see?"
"She didn’t tell everything. She never does — she says the visions don’t work that way, that telling too much changes what’s coming. But she told enough." He exhaled shakily. "She said I was going to die. That I would be executed in the Royal Court and that if I didn’t have sothing in my blood that could bring back, I wouldn’t survive what was coming." A pause. "She cried when she told . Miss Belle — she is not the type to cry easily. That frightened more than anything she actually said."
"And you let her give you the blood."
"She begged , Sire." He looked at his hands. "She mixed it into my evening drink that sa night. Said I wouldn’t feel anything different and I didn’t — not until today."
Drazeil was quiet for a mont.
A seer witch. Young. Frightened enough by what she had seen to act without her mother’s knowledge. Whatever Belle had seen in that vision extended far beyond a butler’s execution — he was certain of it. He would need to speak with her separately.
"Lady Tiana," Drazeil said. "What does she know about Lady Celestia?"
Edrian blinked at the shift but answered carefully.
"My Lady knows so things," he said slowly. "She has always known Lady Celestia is not ordinary, I think, even if she doesn’t know the full extent of it. She keeps her distance. Treats her poorly but never gets too close. Like she is cautious. Like she doesn’t want to provoke sothing she doesn’t fully understand."
"And her husband?"
"Lord Alwyn handles certain matters in the household that my Lady does not touch. There are rooms I am not permitted to enter. Business conducted without my involvent. I know my place, Sire — I do not ask questions about things that are not my concern."
"The mana irregularities in the house," Drazeil said. "What do you know about them?"
Edrian shook his head imdiately. "That is strictly my Lord and Lady’s domain, Sire. I wouldn’t know the first thing about it. What I do know is that when strange things happened in that house — and they did happen, more and more recently — the staff were told to see nothing and say nothing. We obeyed."
"And Lady Celestia?"
Sothing shifted in Edrian’s expression. Sothing genuine and careful at once.
"She never caused strange things," he said firmly. "If anything she seed as startled by them as the rest of us. But they were always worse when she was nearby. Like whatever was stirring in that house knew she was there. Keep reaching for her."
He shook his head slowly. "She had no idea. She thinks she has no magic at all. She believes that completely but I overheard Lady Tiana talking to her husband that she can sense magic in her"
Drazeil said nothing.
"She believes it completely...that ans Celestia herself doesn’t even know what she is". Drazeil thought, Strange, all Celestial beings had divine knowledge or is she just the dumb type.
A girl with Celestial energy buried so deep even he had not sensed it until she was standing directly in front of him. Growing up in a house where sothing stirred constantly around her and no one told her why. Treated as though she was nothing. Believing it.
"The witch," Drazeil said. "The one who restored your heart. Describe her."
Edrian’s expression shifted to sothing genuinely uncertain. "I can’t, Sire. I was barely conscious. She was simply — there suddenly. And then she wasn’t. Nobody knew where she ca from or where she went. The guards said one mont the room was empty and the next she was standing over ." He paused. "A spirit witch, soone said. But nobody knew her na or her face clearly enough to say more."
A spirit witch who appeared from nowhere, healed a dead man, and vanished without a trace.
Not random. None of this was random.
Drazeil turned toward the door.
"Sire." Edrian’s voice stopped him — quiet, exhausted, the voice of a man with nothing left to lose by speaking. "Lady Celestia saved my life today. She stood in that court and fought for when she had no reason to. She didn’t know . She owed nothing." A pause. "Whatever is coming for her — and sothing is coming, I felt it even before Miss Belle said a word — I hope soone is on her side when it arrives."
Drazeil stood at the door for exactly three seconds.
Then he walked out without a word.
He had a Codex to read.
User Comments
0 comments from readers