The Usurper's Queen | COMPLETED

05 | a taste of poison

        The young prince's body was interred in the royal mausoleum at Bellwood Gardens, near the Crown Prince's Palace in Baerston, where he would have lived if had he not died young.

His small white corpse was covered in a long shroud and then placed into the marble coffin, and the Queen had wept broken-heartedly all throughout the procession.

      Edmund was put in an awkward position--he had to watch the royal family as they mourned, all while the Queen and her Ainsworth family kept shooting daggers at his back.

I stared at him silently from behind my black veil, and I gripped my Father's leather gloved hand tightly with my own.
            Even the sky seemed to be mourning for the young prince and a soft, chilling drizzle poured down. The winds howled, and it sounded as if they were chanting prayers for his poor soul. Nature did not inconvenience us that day, but rather it wanted to remind us how fickle life was, and how a young, potential soul had been lost forever.

Even in death, the prince was cherished, and it was like a slap to my face. If it were not for me, that little cherub would still be breathing, and use those plump hands of his shovel loads of food into his greedy mouth.
         He would then become taller and stronger, and since he inherited his mother's golden beauty, Prince George would grow up to be a very handsome lad indeed.

          But I was careless. I did not expect that Grace Ainsworth would suddenly go to hug the prince after I sprinkled the poison on her.

        So, who killed the prince? Did I kill him with my carelessness, or was it Grace's unsuspecting nature that gifted them both a premature death?

But what about Benedict and his damned mistress? If only he did not have the appetite of a horse, and if only that Leanne McCarthy knew a thing or two about preserving chastity, there would be no child. Benedict would have no problem in marrying Grace Ainsworth, and I would not have been ordered to poison her.

     That shameless wench had the nerve to come to court today, dressed in a loose black dress, and a black gable hood covered her long pale tresses. Leanne McCarthy was sweet-faced at most, and in no way was comparable to Grace Ainsworth.

When I looked at the Queen, my heart ached painfully. Even though I am constantly reminded to despise her, to hate her, how can I direct hate towards a mother in mourning?
      
        I was too young to bear children, but I imagined that it would immensely hurt if you were to give birth to a child and see them survive infancy, hoping that they would surely outlive you, but suddenly they die prematurely. And then, there was her sister. Lady Grace was much younger than the Queen, being the youngest of five siblings, but for her to force the King to decree a marriage between Lady Grace and the man she adored, one could see that she loved her sister to bits.

      I doubt that Lisbeth would mourn me like the Queen did her sister, I truly doubt it.

After the funeral ceremony ended, we retreated back into the palace. There was food on the table, but no one dared to make a move, as the Queen had yet to pick up her fork and spoon. I had been starving, and I could only stare at the meat porridge as it grew cold.

     I stole a glance at the Queen. Her eyes were focused at nowhere in particular, and a grim smile formed on her tightly pursed lips. Her pale fingers were gripping a wooden spoon so tightly that her knuckles became white, and her smile morphed into something I could only describe as a silent scream. It was a heart wrenching, guttural scream coming from the very core of her soul, but no voice came out of her throat.
       The spoon snapped in half.

      "Helene !" the King gasped as he grabbed her hand and forced her to drop down the chipped wood she was still clutching on. Finally, her eyes lit up, and it was like she just regained her sense of self.