50. Chapter Fifty
Chapter Fifty
The plan was set.
I wrote a letter to my future self using blood magic in case I forgot everything I heard and learned thus far. The invisible ink would only appear with my blood, thus securing it in the event anyone evil found it.
My memory grew foggier by the hour, and when I eventually took out my core, there was a chance I could suffer the side effects like amnesia. I’d take the risk. I’d leave myself clues on how to save the Heart Tree and defeat Verin.
I hired Emrys again to cause chaos to draw Verin out of his hiding place while he worked on his “concoction” so I could sneak in, and tamper with it.
Did I know what I was doing? Nope. But I was already dying, so what’s the worst that could happen to me?
Fire blasted outside the palace walls. Soldiers shouted, and I knew Emrys was doing his job. I listened against my door, waiting to hear Verin leave his room. Mother said he’d locked himself in there all night when I saw her at dinner. So, I knew he was there.
“Darkness, darkness creeps around,” I whispered to myself while I waited.
“Come out, come out, oh, King,” I called and that’s when I heard him. A door opened and closed. Hurried steps, surprisingly light, like he glided instead of landed with the full weight of his body on each foot.
Rune could likely match every person in the kingdom with how they walked just by feeling these vibrations.
I waited with my ear pressed against the wood until I heard the heel of his boots hit the stairs before rushing into the halls. Then, totally playing it cool for the guards, I entered Mother’s chambers.
She was outside, too, dealing with Emrys and the guards. Verin’s voice bellowed, the sound echoing in the room with the balcony doors open. A part of me wanted to look over, and see the commotion, but time was still running short. Verin wouldn’t leave his little project for long.
Rushing through the common living space, I checked the handle to his quarters first despite knowing he always locked it.
The king was busy. It wouldn’t be strange if he forgot the small details like locks.
Yep. Locked as suspected.
All right. I’d just do this another way.
Breathing in, and out, shifting my feet shoulder width apart, I held out my hands to the stone wall separating the spaces.
With no room for error, I visualized myself as stone, as the little grains of sand and organic material pressed together to create each block of this magnificent palace. It was earth, I am earth. I am steady, and if I move my hands forward.
The ground trembled, and I kept pushing. The stone is not stronger than I, for I am earth, a grounding mountain that this wall bends to.
I peeked through one eye and smiled.
It wasn’t a full door, but it was enough for my body to slip through.
The king’s quarters were decorated like one would assume King Lachan’s would be. Stuffed heads of his prized hunting kills were displayed on the wall. A stack of books on his nightstand, a roaring fireplace, and nothing out of the ordinary.
“Where do you drop the mask, Your Highness?” I scanned the walls and the floors for a secret passage and found none. There had to be something. Come on, Sapphira. I swallowed thickly to push back a wave of nausea.
Perhaps he was doing his nefarious deeds in the bathroom. Besides a bathtub that was larger than my mother’s and mine, nothing else stood out.
Pain flared in my lower back causing me to fall to my hands and knees.
“I sense your unease.” Rune’s voice spoke to me, and I hissed. The pain travelled across my spine to my hips.
“I’m not doing great,” I answered even though the voices had yet to have a conversation with me.
Which I thought was the worst part of the voices.
If they were gonna talk, at least be a contributor to the moment.
Help me work through my thoughts, and real predicaments.
Instead, they were shouting or saying random things I did not understand the context for.
Pressing my face to the ground, I focused on the cold feel of the stone against my skin.
Drip.
Great, another form of torture. A leaky faucet.
Drip.
The noise and the chill worked, and I pushed past the pain by focusing on those sensations over the poison. My body ached as I stood, but I managed without needing to hold onto the walls for support.
Drip. The noise echoed in my ear so loudly I flinched.
“Fucking water dripping.” Cursing, I stomped over to the closest faucet and paused. It wasn’t the bath, nor the sinks, or the shower leaking.
Excitement hummed inside me. The room lit up in orange and I stood confused. Had I set off an alarm?
Nope. The tips of my fingers were on fire.
Shit. Shit.
“Hurry the hell up, Sapphira.”
Shaking out my emotional fire, I focused on that drip. It was the key. It had to be. It took a few minutes, but the drips led me to his black wood closet. Come on secret door.
I pressed behind his shoes, his dress shirts, and—click.
“Gotcha, bitch.”
I opened the door cautiously at first, but once it was clear no one was inside, I darted inside. Dripping black liquid flowed through various tubes and glass beakers. This was Verin’s lab. Mother said his body was like a lab, but it made sense he’d have a physical one as well.
It was artificially so bright which made my headache worse. Bookshelves lined the opposing wall of this small room. If I had more time, I’d search through his books, these hidden treasures. Perhaps another day if I remembered.
“What’s the plan, Sapphira?” I asked, standing over the final glass vial at the end of the tube.
Drip.
Poisons, potions, and science like this all had to be exact like Verin said.
It’s the reason I’d been warned away from trying to heal myself with Verin’s power.
One small deviation could cause a major reaction.
I needed to change the mixture and hope it would be enough to change this little dark cocktail of suffering for the realm.
“What if you make it worse?” My finger ran along the glass, feeling its fragility. One little flick and it would crack.
There was a risk of that.
“What if you smash this lab?”
Time, Sapphira, you don’t have it, I reminded myself.
I sniffed the liquid, noticing it smelled like cinnamon, as long as it stayed the same color and scent. Verin hopefully wouldn’t know the difference.
“Time to make a choice and hope you make the right one. Just change the ingredients, Sapphira.”
So, I did the first thing that came to mind without overthinking it.
Lifted a thumb to the sharp canines in my mouth and pressed up. Blood pooled on my skin from the small puncture hole as I held it over the vile.
Drip.
Drip.
Drip.