Chapter 9 #2
She continued her examination, and Alexander stepped back without being asked, sensing her need for space to focus.
Leaning in, she parted the woman’s lips with two fingers.
His eyes widened when he saw something moving beneath her touch.
A moment later, a pale, glistening slug slid free from the mouth cavity, landing on the rug with a wet splat.
It writhed once before crawling aimlessly toward the edge of the tent.
A shiver crawled up Alexander’s spine, but the princess didn’t even blink. She kept her gaze on the woman, utterly focused. If she was unsettled, she didn’t show it.
“You may want to see this, my lord,” she finally said.
He stepped forward.
“There are ulcers on the inner cheeks,” she said, angling the jaw slightly for him to see. “They’ve begun to rot. And here”—she lifted one of the woman’s limp hands, careful as ever, and turned the palm upward—“brittle nails. Discolouration beneath the beds. Not what I’d expect from drowning.”
Alexander leaned closer, his gaze narrowing. “Poison?”
“Perhaps,” she said softly. “The medical texts I read during my voyage spoke of a substance which, if used in small, precise doses and strict methods, can have healing properties. But it can also be a deadly poison.” She looked at him. “Purple limyerite.”
His head snapped up right away. Their eyes met.
“I reckon from your reaction,” she said, “you know it well.”
He drew a sharp breath. Limyerite crystals were no common mineral.
They had been the hereditary pride of his House, a legacy lost when the mines were stripped from them.
The clear, sometimes pale blue, variety was a treasure coveted throughout the Nine Kingdoms, made into adornments and weapons.
Yet it was its purple counterpart, mined only in the deep veins of Blackwood-Veyrde, that oozed danger.
Alexander stared at the corpse’s brittle nails. “The use of purple limyerite is highly regulated. Its sale, restricted. Its study, near-forbidden, at least in Tremore. But there are those who still covet it—for its potency, its hallucinogenic properties which, I’m afraid, often bring profit.”
“So I’ve heard. But, having no experience with the substance, I’m not much of an expert.”
His eyes returned to the corpse. “Can you tell if she was an Omega?”
JingYi shook her head. “Not without Luneth’s priestess testing her with the Awakening stone, or her scent. And there is none, only lake water and earth.” She glanced down again. “They say Omegas tend to have smaller builds, but that isn’t always true.”
Her steady gaze lifted to meet his, searching. “Do you suspect it?”
He hesitated, then sighed. “It’s possible. Omegas are still bartered like coins throughout the Nine Kingdoms. The ambush earlier made me wary.”
She nodded. “The connection is certainly interesting. Do you know of any missing Omegas?”
“None that I’ve heard of. But Blackwood-Veyrde is rather remote. News travels at a snail’s pace here.”
His eyes narrowed. Death had leeched all colour from her skin, leaving it the hue of stone. Her features were fine, delicate—light-skinned, perhaps—but that offered little information. She might have hailed from any of four or five kingdoms in Issoirea, if not beyond.
And she had died here, nameless.
Alexander exhaled. “I’ve sent men to search the lake’s edge for clues. I’ll also draft a letter to the king’s magistrate to alert him of this incident.” He observed the corpse’s mouth. “Is there any other information you can glean from those textbooks?”
JingYi hesitated, her brows drawing together.
“They do not offer an in-depth exploration. But I—” She paused before cautiously continuing.
“Perhaps I can write to my half-sister, Princess LinXin. She’s someone with .
. . influence. She may be able to send me pages from other books in the Imperial Physician’s library. ”
Alexander’s gaze lingered on her.
She had said the book was in the physician’s library—not hers, as if it wasn’t something she could freely claim. And she’d spoken of her half-sister in that carefully measured way, as if she had to weigh every word before offering it. Someone with influence, she’d said.
As if she, a princess herself, was not included within that influential circle.
“We should burn her body before first light,” she said at last, her voice returning to the composed cadence of a trained healer. “She’s been dead too long. With each hour, the risk of disease spreads. Grief can be forced to wait, but illness won’t.”
Alexander’s jaw tightened. “You’re right. My men will see to it. A pyre by the lake at sunrise.”
She hesitated then, her eyes lingering on the woman. “She is not of my people. I don’t know her customs. Still . . . may I prepare her body for the journey to the afterlife?”
His reply was immediate. “Of course. If one day her family is found, they’ll know someone showed her care in the end. That she didn’t leave this world empty-handed.”
The princess nodded, her gaze drawn back to the still form before her. He watched as she reached out, tucking a damp lock of hair behind the woman’s ear.
He stepped forward before he thought better of it, compelled by the urge to offer comfort, though he wasn’t sure what that looked like between them. His hand lifted to touch her shoulder. But halfway there, he stopped. His fingers curled, and the gesture fell away.
Whatever stirred between them was wrapped in silence and distance. She was a foreign bride, barely known to him. A stranger, truthfully—yet not.
She looked up, and their eyes met. He inclined his head. “Make sure you get some rest, Princess.”
She didn’t answer, but he didn’t need one. He already knew she would rest little, if at all.
Because she would finish what no one else had offered to start.