Chapter 5: The Poison in the Silver

The servant girl’s name was Elara, and she was bleeding out on the cold stone floor of the servant’s quarters when I found her.

I had been wandering the endless corridors of the palace, trying to memorize the map of exits and hidden alcoves that any queen should know, when I heard the choked sob. It was a sound I knew intimately—the sound of pain swallowed for the sake of survival.

The door was ajar. Inside, a young maid with dirt-smudged cheeks was hunched over a wooden basin, her hands wrapped in a blood-soaked rag. The gash across her palm was deep, the kind of wound that would fester in a day if untreated.

She looked up, her eyes widening with terror. “Your Majesty—I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to—please, I’ll clean it up, I swear—“

“Show me your hand,” I said, my voice softer than I intended.

She hesitated, trembling. In the royal court, a servant’s wound was a nuisance, not a tragedy. I knelt beside her, ignoring the mud on my gown, and gently unwrapped the rag. The cut was jagged, likely from a broken dish in the kitchens. She was shaking—not just from pain, but from fear of what I might do to her.

I had been that girl. I had been the one bleeding on the floor while the nobles walked past.

I pressed my palm over her wound, feeling the warmth of her blood against my skin. A soft golden light flickered between my fingers, and I felt the familiar pull in my chest—the healing gift that had been both my salvation and my curse. In the village, they called it a witch’s touch. Here, in the palace, it was a secret worth dying for.

The skin knitted together under my palm. Elara gasped, staring at her hand as the blood disappeared, leaving only a faint pink scar. “How—Your Majesty—what did you—“

“You were never here,” I said, rising to my feet. “And I was never here either. Understood?”

Her eyes glistened with tears. She grabbed my hand and kissed it, her lips brushing my knuckles. “I am yours, my Queen. Whatever you need, whenever you need it—I will be there.”

I nodded, slipping back into the corridor. My heart was racing. The power was growing, I could feel it. Each use of the gift left me a little weaker, but the need to heal was stronger than the fear.

By the time I reached my chambers, the candles had burned down to stubs. The room smelled of lavender and something else—something sharp and metallic, buried beneath the sweetness.

My gaze swept over the vanity, the wardrobe, the small writing desk by the window. And then I saw it.

A silver vial, half-hidden beneath a silk scarf on the nightstand.

I had never seen it before. My heart dropped like a stone.

I picked it up with two fingers, holding it to the candlelight. The liquid inside was dark amber, almost black. I uncorked it and caught a whiff of bitter almonds—a scent I knew from the village apothecary, where the old healer had warned me to stay far away from anything that smelled like that.

Nightshade. A slow, quiet poison, designed to mimic the symptoms of a wasting illness. It would take weeks to kill a man, but by the time anyone suspected foul play, it would be too late.

I stared at the vial, my mind racing. This was not a mistake. This was a trap.

King Aldric had been growing weaker by the day. The court physicians blamed exhaustion, old battle wounds. But I knew better. I had seen the shadows under his eyes, the way his hands trembled when he thought no one was looking. He was being poisoned—slowly, methodically—and if this vial was found in my chambers, I would be the one blamed.

Someone was setting me up to take the fall.

I heard footsteps in the hall. A guard’s heavy tread, growing closer. My fingers closed around the vial, and I shoved it into the hidden pocket inside my bodice, the one I had sewn myself before arriving at the palace.

The door opened.

It was Captain Rourke, the King’s most trusted soldier. His eyes were cold, scanning the room before landing on me. “Your Majesty. The King requests your presence in his chambers. Immediately.”

My blood turned to ice. But I smiled, the practiced smile I had worn since I was twelve years old. “Of course. Lead the way.”

As I followed him down the torch-lit corridor, I felt the weight of the poison pressing against my ribs. Someone in this palace was playing a game of death, and they had just made me their pawn.

But I wasn’t a pawn any longer. I was the queen. And queens don’t bleed—they make others bleed.

The door to the King’s chamber loomed before me. I could hear his ragged breathing through the wood, the sound of a man slipping away.

I pushed the door open.

Aldric was propped against the pillows, his face pale as death, his eyes feverish. He looked at me, and for a moment, I saw something other than a king. I saw a man fighting for his life.

“Lyra,” he rasped. “Come here.”

I crossed the room, my heart pounding. As I reached for his hand, I felt the poison singing beneath his skin.

And in my hidden pocket, the vial burned like a secret flame.

I had a choice: expose the plot and risk my own head, or play my hand in silence and let the poison setter believe I was their pawn.

But they had made one fatal mistake.

They had given me a reason to fight.

And I would burn this palace to the ground before I let them take another life I was sworn to protect.