Chapter 25 - Four Words

It took Lilith a couple of seconds to process the news. How could she understand something to obviously wrong. It was wrong. The King could not be dead. He wasn’t supposed to die until November. That was six months away. They had just entered into May. It was only a month and some after King Montey’s birthday.

“Are you sure?” Lilith asked Gloria.

The old woman glanced at her as if she was speaking another language. “What do you mean, am I sure? The news came to the manor early this morning. Immediately upon hearing it, the Duke left to go to the castle to check and see what happened. And when he came back, his expression said it all.”

News spreads quickly, and by mid-day, the entire country knew about it. But of course, it would, the King was killed. And not just any way, he was murdered by his son. Which made the situation even worse.

Lilith did not know the details about it, but there was news that Landon was detained with evidence that proves that he did it. Why? He was going to be King in time anyway. Or did he want to start his ruin of the country early? Why? It was supposed to be Nora. Nora was planned to kill the King in November. She was the one who would kill him and then get away with it like nothing ever happened.

Something changed, something shifted. And Lilith had a creeping suspicion when it was and more importantly, who’s fault it was. But that would be too much of a coincidence. The noble who approached the Queen that day could not have been Harvey Dunton. Could it have been that that was the first day that he approached her? And if that was the case, then Lilith scared him off and prevented the Queen from even entering into an affair.

As she walked back up the Duke’s office, she thought about the progression of time. How will things change? How much will there be to change? Those were all anxiety-inducing thoughts since Lilith would not know what comes next. It was exciting while it lasted to know the future. But it also made her feel excited. She shivered at the thought of being there while the events of time took another path. Lilith was the reason history was going to change. And what an honor that was.

Raymond had not left his office since he got back from the castle. Leaning on the threshold, she studied his expression. On the outside, he looked calm, serious as he usually did, but she was sure there was a storm raging on the inside. He acted like it was any other day, writing on the papers he had on his desk, working as if he were on the clock.

Since coming to 1815, Lilith had to deal with the fact that she would not be seeing her family for the next fifteen years. The realization had hit her as hard news they'd died would've. She would not be able to hug her mother for fifteen years. She would have no family, no one to rely on, no one to call, for fifteen years.

But right now, Raymond faced real loss in his life. He had to deal with the death of his father but he also had to deal with another reality.

He would be the next one in line for the throne. If Landon was only incarcerated and had not killed his father then Raymond would have time to prepare. But he did not. Life was now coming at him as an unstoppable force. And he was acting like everything was fine.

Raymond was too distracted to notice Lilith’s presence. There was so much to do- too much to do. How could he stop now when things got even more serious? His father was dead. Gone. Murdered by the most unlikely and yet obvious person.

His hand scribbled furiously on the papers. The papers begin to break under the pressure of the pen.

Raymond could not take the place of his brother, he could not be the next to take the throne. There was so much to do- too much to do. He could not step away from his work. The Duke of Equiron. That was his title. And it was the only title he ever wanted. He was very happy ruling his Duchy. He made the laws, took on the problems and he tried to help his people as much as he could.

Raymond could not be the King. He would forfeit the crown and give it to Rory. But Rory was only a child, Raymond was twenty-nine. His mother would strongly approve of it and in the end, he would the one to bear the weight.

His head felt heavy. The millions of thoughts he had were weighing him down. His father was dead, his brother did it and he would be the next King. But there was so much to do- there was too much-

“Mr. Cavill.”

Lilith caught his hand before he could tear through the paper. She had watched as his hand got progressively faster and it did not look like he would be stopping anytime soon. She was not even sure he knew what he was writing.

Realizing what he had been doing, Raymond pulled away, discarding the pen on the table with a heavy breath. Raymond rubbed his forehead, trying to calm his racing mind.

“I know that you don’t want to, but you need to step away from this. You are going to upset yourself even more.” Lilith shifted her weight to her right side.

“I’m fine,” he grumbled and picked up the pen once more.

“I am very much willing to argue with you again Mr. Cavill. You need to stop.”

He let out a defeated sigh. He clearly did not have the energy to. “There is work to be done. I have no time to stop, even if things are different now.”

Lilith was unable to take him away from his desk. For the following week, she had to physically restrain him in order to get him to eat and it was even more fun when she tried to get him to sleep. She lost count of how many times Raymond said that he would fire her if she touched him again. But she always would and he never did.

And after that week, the news of how Landon killed the King was released. He had hired some men to do it. They snuck into the castle and were able to his quarters and kill him, but as they were making their escape they were caught, and immediately sold Landon out. It was a mystery why he had not done that in the past and why it was before the Queen was due to kill him.

What also happened after a week was that Nora come to see Raymond. During the week, they had been sending requests for him to come to the castle. He ignored all of those, and so the Queen decided to come herself. It was unexpected and Lilith had to suddenly prepare herself when the groundskeeper raced to inform the house that she was coming.

Raymond was as ignorant as ever and when she nearly tripped over her feet coming through the door, he only looked up at her with a slightly raised eyebrow. “Is the house on fire?”

“The Queen is here.”

It took those four words, and he was out of his chair before she could process it. The entire week she had been trying her hardest to get him to move from his office but at the mention of his mother, he was out the door. She could have used that as a lie to get him up but she would have definitely been fired if she went that far.

The thought had crossed Raymond’s mind. He did suspect that his mother would come to visit him, seeing as the country now rested in his hands. But he never took the thought too seriously. Now he wished he took the letters of summoning more seriously.

But suddenly, he stopped. Looking behind him, he saw Lilith following closely behind him. She looked up in confusion. “Your Grace?”

“Go put on something a little nicer. It’s best that we try to avoid things that would make her even more upset."

“Then why not just hide me away altogether?”

Raymond didn’t say anything and Lilith took that as her sign to leave in silence. Maybe she would take her own advice and run away.