Absence of Fear
POV: Alexandra
Lucien looked at me and sighed, “It was Dorothea. She decided that you would need more help than a couple of bodyguards, a shadow dog and a force field. She said she had other reasons but that she would keep that to herself for now. I imagine when the time comes, you’ll have to ask her.” I nodded at him, “Thank you for letting me know, Your Majesty. I really don’t understand why she did it really but I’m sort of glad she did. I didn’t want to keep secrets from our King.” The General chuckled, “I know Dorothea quite well, her reasons were likely really good ones or she wouldn’t have risked you to a charge of treason.” I was startled, “Treason? What do you mean? I wasn’t going to betray the King.” Lucien closed his eyes and sighed, “You are a candidate to be the Queen which is as good as being one in the Council’s eyes. You putting yourself in danger without my knowledge, would be seen as committing treason. This would apply not only to you but Lady Kellen as well.” The gravity of our carefully laid plan had now hit me and I frowned. The General asked, “So do you understand now?” I nodded, “I understand. I'm sorry to have gone behind your back Your Majesty. It was really a spur of the moment decision when I was visiting His Highness.”
Lucien smiled at me, “I can understand the want to go after those who harm you. I wanted to go after those responsible for provoking the dragon.” I looked at him confused, “What do you mean, Your Majesty?” The General sighed, “I suppose since you are family to one of the victims, I suppose I can tell you this. We have reason to believe that the dragon that killed both the former king and your uncle Talon, was provoked. Usually, dragons keep to themselves but if anyone messes with them, they come out and get retribution. We found dragon egg ooze on some of the rubble when we started our investigation. Her eggs were messed with that day, possibly killed. We just don’t know by who yet.” My eyes fell to the ground, “Does Vanessa know what happened?” Lucien shook his head, “We didn’t see value in disclosing this information to her. I made the decision to withhold from her for her own good.” I know that Vanessa can be an emotional person especially when we all observed her when she spoke of Talon. I knew Lucien was right in his decision. I smiled at the two men, “Well, I better be going now. Thank you for the information.” I turned back the door and my companions who were waiting by the door quietly. Before we opened the door, the General said, “Jess and Derek, all information disclosed here today is considered top secret to include our recent conversation about Talon. Do you understand?” The two nodded at him and simultaneously said, “Understood sir.”
We made our way home and had a peaceful night. The next night, we heard the bell ring out for the door. Dana scurried up the stairs, “Your Grace, there is a lady by the name Zebinezer here to see you.” I nodded at her, “That is our guest. Did you ensure you prepared a room for her as I asked the other day?” Dana nodded, “Yes, Your Grace.” I rose from my seat, “Great, thank you so much Dana.” We made our way down the stairs to see a woman standing in the foyer. She had long silver hair that was tied up into a bun on her head. She was considerably taller than Dorothea. She had to have been considered the pretty sister when they were younger. Not that Dorothea was ugly, she just didn’t carry herself so gracefully or cared about her appearance so much as her sister. She bowed gracefully before me, “Your Grace, I am pleased to meet you. My name is Zebinezer Argent, I am an earth witch. You know my sister Dorothea. I believe she said that the King has asked me here on your behalf.” I tapped her shoulder, “I am pleased to meet you Zebinezer. I have heard much about you.” She frowned, “I imagine my sister has probably not given you a good account of me. We’ve never been close and it got worse once our sister Evelyn died.” I blinked at her, “Did you say Evelyn?” She nodded, “Yes, did you know her?” I shook my head, “No. Was her last name Tannen?” She nodded, “Yes, that was the name she assumed so that she wouldn’t be associated with the Argent family. She was shunned by our father for getting pregnant before marriage. Society was very different back then.” I had not imagined that Dorothea and Zebinezer were Vanessa’s aunts. I looked at her trying to keep my face as even emotioned as possible, “Had you ever met her child?” Zebinezer shook her head, “No, we weren’t allowed to speak to her or we would be shunned. I had status and I didn’t want to lose it. Dorothea tested our father and was also shunned. I had heard she joined The Order out of necessity but I wasn’t too sure if that was a substantiated rumor.”
I was beginning to wonder if Dorothea’s account of her sister was too far off considering she placed her status ahead of that of her own sister. I sure as hell would defy my father if he tried to shun my sibling from the family. I never had to worry about that since I had no sibling not to mention, my father wasn’t so cruel as to shun his child. I had wondered in that moment if Vanessa’s grandfather was anything like Zebinezer. I shook my head to rid myself of distracting thoughts, “Anyhow, welcome to Blackwood Manor. I have assigned a maid here named Alison to serve you while you stay with us. If you need anything, just ask her.” Alison came forward and took Zebinezer’s bags from her, “Welcome my lady, I will ensure to unpack these for you. Dinner is ready if you would join Her Grace in the dining room.” Zebinezer nodded at her and she followed me to the dining room. Jess and Derek, like always were waiting for us in there. I made the introductions to all parties in the dining room and we settled into eating our meal.
A little way through the meal, Zebinezer spoke, “Forgive me, Your Grace. I was not told why you needed me. Could you enlighten me?” I looked at her, “Oh, of course. I don’t know if you are aware that I am touched by the Goddess Aphrodite.” She wore a shocked face when she answered, “No, I had not heard that Your Grace. I have been residing in the Seely realm so rumors had not reached me there.” I nodded my head once, “Well when Aphrodite made my soul, she put too much of herself in me and as a result my gift is too strong. My godmother made this magical tool for me to suppress it. The problem is that the suppression is so strong that it has inhibited my ability to communicate with her. In recent days, we have found this to be a much-needed ability.” She placed her hand on her chin then nodded, “I understand so I was summoned to imbibe magic into this tool to make that part of suppression lift. Right?” I nodded at her, “Aphrodite said that you would be the only one who could achieve this.” She sighed, “She was half right. I do have this ability but I would need instruction from my sister to know how. I guess seeing her on this trip is unavoidable. This will take me a few days to do if you can patient.” I affirmed to her that this would be okay and that I could wait, hoping she could achieve the task before I heard from Blake.
It was two days before one of Blake’s spies appeared at Blackwood manor’s door. Dana summoned me from my studies to go downstairs to see him. He bowed at me, “My lady, His Highness has sent this for you.” He handed me a letter and then said, “He asked that you read it in my presence and give a verbal answer. If you can please?” I nodded at him, “I understand.” I pulled the letter out the envelope and read aloud: “My beloved, now is the time to show your absence of fear to your would be killers. I am confident that I have achieved enough to feed The Order the intelligence of you from the inside.” I sighed and pondered aloud, “I wonder if Zebinezer is ready to lift this suppression.” The spy asked, “What was that Your Grace?” I shook my head at him, “Tell His Highness that I will make the announcement tomorrow afternoon.” He nodded at me and took his leave. I turned to make my way to Zebinezer’s room to see what progress she made. As I was about to knock on her door, she burst out of her room. She gasped, “Your Grace! I was just about to come see you. My sister and I have made progress. We should be able to lift it tomorrow morning. She is preparing the necessary tools right now. She will come here in the morning.” I breathed a sigh of relief, “You ladies have impeccable timing. I was going to need it before the afternoon. I have to make my announcement denouncing the threat that I had received.” She nodded, “Dorothea did explain the situation to me. My next task is to have a meeting with both my sister and the young witch Vanessa to make your tool for a force field type device. I have to say, this trip here has been so enlightening.” I yawned then gasped, “I am so sorry Zebinezer. I must have worked really hard on my studies after dinner.” She giggled, “I understand, Your Grace. You should go get some rest.” I nodded at her and excused myself to go to bed.
The next morning, as promised, Dorothea showed up at my door with a long staff with a cat’s eye looking stone at the end along with a potion, a flower crown and a bag of rune stones. Zebinezer was pleased at the sight, “I have to hand it to you sister. You really came through quickly. You must hold Her Grace in high regard.” Dorothea gave me a knowing look, “Her family has taken care of me for several years now. Of course, I would do everything I could to help her to repay that kindness.” Zebinezer nodded, “I understand. Let’s get started.” They laid the rune stones in a circle, placed the crown on my head and had me step into the stone circle. Dorothea said, “Now, there’s a strong possibility this could send you to the Heavenly realm or summon Aphrodite here. This is expected and that means that we have succeeded.” Zebinezer performed the task by touching her cat’s eye staff to each rune and chanted something each time. Each time this chant and touch happened; the rune would light up purple until she got to the last one. The stone lit up and sudden a bright light lit up the room and I felt a hand in mine. I looked over to the light as it dimmed to find Aphrodite smiling at me. She winked before she disappeared again. Zebinezer’s eyes widened at the sight and I smiled at her then she spoke, “I can’t believe it worked and I got to see the Goddess.” Dorothea put all the items away and pulled her sister away towards Vanessa’s cottage but in the process shouted over her shoulder, “See ya later pretty one. Good luck with the press conference.”
In the afternoon, the press showed up at Blackwood manor also in attendance was the General. Many of them had Mesha stones, presumably to broadcast what both the General and I had to say. The General started the press conference giving an official statement on the results of the investigation into the threat sprawled on my wall in blood. That it was determined that the blood was from an unknown source but definitely not of myself or any of my family members. Next came my turn. I closed my eyes, inhaled then exhaled before I spoke, “Thank you all for coming today. I would like to first thank the Citadel for their hard work on investigating this matter and though we don’t have a solution yet as to who did this, I have every confidence that they will find out who did this and bring them to justice. That being said, I would like to send a message to those who would dare to threaten me. Just know that I am not intimidated by your threats and I will not be fear mongered into leaving my rightful home. If you think that was enough to get rid of me, you’ll have to try harder.” I stepped away and the General escorted me into Blackwood. I had quietly agonized whether that was enough to provoke The Order into sending their assassin after me once again. We would have to see.
