Pampered by the Villainous Tyrant King

Chapter 21

A/N: I own nothing but plot. Enjoy!

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Many people thought that if the queen became ill and couldn't serve the king anymore, they thought of inserting someone to take advantage of the situation. But they would be proven sorely wrong.

Of course, the king was working quietly behind the scenes. A low-level aide was found to have harbored some suspicious incense on the day the queen fell into the water and quietly disappeared the next day with the excuse of returning back to his hometown. His body was rumored to have been found dead three days later with signs of a bandit attack. A seamstress accidentally left needles in the dress for the queen and was fired, never to appear again.

Although the queen's illness made her stay in bed for a whole week, the king stayed at Dahlia Palace every night. There were some who praised the king for being a thoughtful and caring husband. Others said that the queen must have saved a nation and accumulated enough fortune to have a good husband, while others said that the new queen must be a witch and had the king wrapped around her fingers.

In truth, Annabeth wished the king could stop coming over so often. Ever since that incident at the lake, the king was being much more careful and affectionate than usual.

Until her cold was over, she was made to stay inside Dahlia Palace and bundle up with woolen clothes. At this point, Annabeth felt like her limbs were going to grow wool, and she would be ready for shearing like a sheep. She didn't even have any more socializing to do, as all the guests from the wedding had gone home after the boating incident. Annabeth was satisfied to hear that at least Princess Alana had gone back to Kiran with her good reputation tarnished somewhat, and that the Tynan crown prince had been quite disappointed when it was time for him to return to Tynan. But judging by the small smiles on Lady Piper's face as she often wrote letters, Prince Jason was in frequent contact with Lady Piper.

Hearing that Annabeth was bored with being confined in Dahlia Palace and banned temporarily from her queen's duties, the king thought over ways to entertain her. He brought over novels and joined her for chess (he was horrendous). The king even began to bring his own work into her study. Whenever the king was at her side, all the maids and Lucy were in states of silent panic, distracting Annabeth and making her antsy for them. Privately, Annabeth wondered whether her cover was almost blown, and perhaps the king was keeping a closer watch on her.

Today, the king was in a rather good mood, humming as he went through the memorandums his court had sent him. That is until Annabeth got the tiniest paper cut from reading an economics textbook she had managed to wheedle out of him. The king glared at the maid behind Annabeth as though the maid should have prevented the paper cut.

Annabeth sighed. "That's enough."

The king was about to order the maid to turn the pages of the book for her. With a wave of her now overly bandaged hand, Annabeth dismissed all the maids. They were all going to have a heart attack or grow white hairs early at this rate. The maids sent grateful looks to the queen. By now, they had grown accustomed to the king's preferential treatment to his wife.

"The book pages could have been poisoned, you know." The king said.

"What?" Annabeth blinked.

The king carelessly scribbled on his documents and stamped his seal before replying. "It's not like it hasn't been done before. There was once a case in my great-grandfather's generation when an assassin placed poison on all the edges of a book because his target liked licking his fingers as he turned the pages of his book. So your treatment of a papercut isn't overdone by any means."