Make Your Move Katherine

Lies

A.N. Let’s see what's happening with the staff hmm?

Eric

“What are they saying?” Eric mumbled under his breath when the guard had closed the door behind him. He had a deep frown on his head as he circled the room forgetting the pishogue he was creating. The mage needed to know this. The young man hated when the morning started with such idle talk. Maybe he should wait for the mage to finish with her potions before he upsets her.

Recently she had become just as obsessed with the new queen as she had with the young king years before. She’s even been reading the books that the previous mage had written down, revising each and every single one of the thirty books.

She would be greatly displeased and when she reports what he has to say to her now, to Oscar- whoa. He should tell Oscar himself but he sort of…didn’t want to. In case he got angry and Eric, meh, he didn’t really want to take that chance with a vampire. Ju was someone who could handle that.

Removing his glasses, he rubbed his nose and took a deep breath before releasing it. He paced the floor as he looked to the back of the room at the closed door. The silence meant she had reading on her menu- or maybe she had passed out from exhaustion. It really could go either way at this point for she had been a bit on edge since the King was not merging with the phoenix and had been almost locked away practicing her arcane magic, mumbling that she would fix him. He fixed his white coat and adjusted his thick black-rimmed glasses on his nose, fixing his short hair as he stared at the pink liquid inside the goblet in front of him.

“Why does the phoenix not come out? Why is it stifled inside the queen and not meshing with you, Oscar?” he muttered to himself. Why would a fire God want a mere human rather than a superbeing that could contain its power? Why a human and not a vessel that was strong enough for it? The former King had been the same way, according to Ju. King Drago’s power could have been felt but not shown. He had said he felt his blood flooding throughout his body as if it were on fire but it refused to submit to him. Eventually, it died- or left, leaving the former king with his weakened vampire state. He was stronger than everyone still, for he was a vampire after all and he did rule wisely and protected his nation with his life. His people loved and respected him.

Eric did not really believe Ju’s mad words most of the time but sometimes he did. Eric believed that the former King had spurges of adrenaline pumping throughout his body and Ju was delusional. After all, he was a vampire and Eric could not even imagine what that power felt like. But a phoenix and a vampire? A hybrid? That's impossible.

He had lived through the war between the Dragon King and King Drago that had resulted in their own Queen’s death. The princess too. Eric had never been so scared in his life, especially when the Royals were dead. Alsie, Oscar and Eric had been friends since they were toddlers, so her death had shocked him. He had felt her loss deeply and Oscar wasn’t seen in the next year as he wasn’t permitted to leave Castle Wen. Then he was told his friend was finishing his studies in another country.

In Oscar’s absence, the former mage vanished into thin air and the nation was thought to be vulnerable under a seemingly weakened king but Delun, the former king’s mage had placed the entire kingdom under a shield. No outside magic or spells- incantations nothing could penetrate the protection of the shield. But it was growing weak now and Ju, his apprentice back then had grown stronger in arcane practice but had given it up to practice actual medicine. Which was funny because she had been so adamant about joining two forces that she had no personal life of her own.

And when Oscar had returned, he had taken Ju into the castle as if he believed in her theories too.

“Ju, just what are you trying to prove?” he mutters as he swirled the liquid around the glass.

Julie, the mage had been obsessed with Oscar since he was a child. She was barely an adult when she first met him and had felt his power she had said. And, “He is to be more than what he would become. He is to be a God among man,’ she had chanted to Eric since he had joined her in the Castle as her assistant- he hated being referred to as ‘apprentice’. Just as she had insisted everyone calls her Ju, instead of her name Julie when she had met the maid by the same name.

Ju was also the one that had informed them of King Julian’s soon to be his wife's identity. The weird part was that the shaman had worked with her on it. He had communicated with the spirits while Ju did her chanting. It was the first time Eric had seen Oscar vanish before his very eyes. It had terrified him for he had seen the prince’s body turn into a coal-like flame and Ju had beamed, “She’s a phoenix,” while both Oscar and he stared at his flaming body, both trying to put out the flames. Ju had continued her mutterings and then he disappeared. He didn’t go far however as a few seconds later he opened the door behind them with a wide-eyed stare, fire expelled but he was covered in soot. Before that incident, Eric had just figured she did light charms for people and convinced the plants to flourish plentiful.

The following months after that, Ju and Oscar had been busy. Ju grew stronger as she harnessed her strength. Eric learned since that night that mages are more into the ritual practice rather than the transformation itself.

But Eric also learned something else. Ju and Oscar had been meeting with a doctor privately and nobody else was allowed in the lab except for the royal guards. Why would a vampire and two doctors- one a wicce, go into a room with royal guards? Or substitute guards with ‘humans’. Vampire, doctors, witch and humans…Eric didn’t like it.

Nuwa

Nuwa smiled as the guard tipped his head in her direction as he passed her in the hallway. It was the same guard that thought he would get into her garments if he bad-mouthed the Queen. She could have his head if she let it slip to the King what was being said about the Queen. Oscar was wrapped around her little finger…exactly where he needed to be.

Anthony and the Queen? Hah. Never. The Royal Guard would die foolishly for the King if Oscar asked him to. He would never betray the crown. Even if somehow, Oscar found out about the staff gossips, he would never believe it. The only way Oscar would believe that rubbish is if it was actually true.

Julie

Julie grinned at the gardener who had made sure to leave the door open for her. It was the only way she could meet with the guard in secret. She could lose her neck if found out- so could the guard and any others that were suspected to have been involved.

Oni

Oni trembled as she listened to the whimpered crying of the Queen in her bathtub. She sobbed and drank wine. Oni pretended to not know the woman had been doing so from time to time, as it was her job description to not see and hear anything. The young girl might have been here only a few months, but she knew the happening in the castle at night. She knew the Queen was miserable so she clearly wasn’t here of her own will, now but Oni also knew she wasn’t trying to escape either, so that meant that the Queen had volunteered to be married to the King.

An arranged marriage.

She felt her heart breaking for the Queen, to have to give up on everything to become Queen? Luckily, she wasn’t in love with someone else…the maid hoped. She hoped the queen just had no choice but to keep up with traditions. Oni remembered when she had told the Queen that she had admired the King for he had said he would marry for love.

Back then the young girl thought that the King would clean up his ways after he got married to his fiancé with the pretty eyes but he didn’t. She had admired them on the television shows, for he looked so in love with her then.

It was all a lie. The King was a dirty b*stard and was still bagging the hired mistresses aka s*x workers.

And even months before that, everyone thought he would have chosen Nuwa to be his Queen but he didn’t. Oni had seen the tears Nuwa had cried, for he had given her his word that she would be his wife but he lied.

Instead, he said on the live broadcast, that he had fallen in love with the queen when he was abroad- since they were teenagers.

Another lie, the teenager had come to realize.

It seemed that Miss Julie and Mr. Anthony were the only ones who cared for the queen- besides herself and they were all restricted by the king still. Oni pitied the queen… for as she worked without her mobile phone, she felt the loss of freedom, so she could just imagine what the queen must be going through, without hers and no internet access to anything. Oni couldn’t survive one day without taking a selfie or even looking at others’ selfies. And food pics…ugh.

No family and friends either.

The maid didn’t know how the Queen was coping…she wasn’t, she knew. What a pitiful life one has to live as a royal, she thought as she bent her head to clear her inappropriate thinking, for the matters with royals were strictly forbidden to be spoken about. Shaking her head, Oni walked to the closet and started to pick out the Queen’s evening wear. The King might be joining the queen in the dining room area Mr. Anthony had told her earlier.