The door to his study slammed open, startling the quill out of Elaric's hand. A servant boy stumbled in, breathless. "The Princess... She's- she's been poisoned. The royal mage needs to-"

He stopped short at the scene in front of him. Elaric calmly adjusted the veil over his face, relieved that he had yet to remove it since the servant catching a glimpse of his face would have been catastrophic. For the other, not himself. He wasn't in the mood to scrub another innocent's blood from his sleeves.

Nobody could see his face. It was a figurative curse he bore.

"You were searching for the Royal mage? I am him." He dropped his quill and grabbed his bottle of supplements, his instincts telling him he would need to use up a considerable amount of threadwork, possibly more than his reserves. 

"We do not have time-" The servant boy audaciously grabbed his sleeve, tugging it. "Her highness is-"

The sudden contact prompted a frown from Elaric as he shrugged off the other's grip from his clothing. "Use your words. And do not touch me thoughtlessly. I could have you flogged right now for what you just did."

Elaric fixed his gaze at the threads floating around, visible only to his eyes. Apart from being able to manipulate them seamlessly compared to other mages, he had another use for them, something only he seemed to be able to see. 

Threads of magic were present in every naturally existing living being and object and Elaric was someone with considerable skill in manipulating those threads, a feat considered legendary. These same threads, however, gave him a kind of guidance that was unavailable to anyone else.  His eyes could see red threads appear through humans that spoke a falsehood.

Red threads meant lies. Useless, most days—humans lied like they breathed.

He kept his gaze trained and casually asked, "Explain what happened clearly."

The other frowned and for a split second, his siren eyes narrowed into silts. "We do not have time for this. I am worried that-"

A quiet zing of the thread plucking reached Elaric's ears as he watched the bright glowing thread slowly turn red bit-by-bit, until the servant boy had a bloodlike glowing strand passing through him.

What was it he had said? 

He kept his expression blank and nodded. "Lead the way then. And, you. What's your given name?"

He turned, eyes widening—too much, too suddenly very unlike the expression he had before.

 "Rion. I am Rion, sir."

─── ⋆⋅ ☾⋅⋆ ───

"Will you be able to heal her...?" The guard standing next to the princess's bed asked after a few minutes of Elaric's silent inspection. Since he wasn't a medic, his methods were slightly...unconventional.

He pricked the edge of her finger with a needle, extracting the blood with the flick of his fingers, onto the palm of his hands before licking it with a swipe of his tongue.

"The audacity-" A feeble voice sounded from behind him, which he recognized as the servant's. It tasted bitter, his sensitive tastebuds picking up on a slight twang. Elaric's eyes felt heavy, his tongue numbing ever so slightly. Definitely poison, but...

A thought occurred to him, his brows furrowing deeper. "Who all has her highness met since today morning?" He asked sharply, turning to the guard who would have the most knowledge of her whereabouts. As he spoke, he fished out a handkerchief from his garments, bringing it to his mouth a second before he started coughing. Upon bringing it away, the previously white handkerchief was now stained with copper red. 

"Don't mind that." Elaric said waving his hand. "I simply extracted the poison from myself. The princess's bloodstream, however, has already become one with the toxin. Who has she come in contact with since morning?" He repeated.

The guard hesitated before replying, "The servant boy, Lady Chimeka and myself. She doesn't ask the maids for help while getting ready so not even they have come in contact with her. Still, anyone could have approached her at night since I wasn't at her side then."

Naturally, one couldn't take his word for it. Even if the guard's life thread did not glow red, there was no guarantee that someone hadn't sneaked something to her while he was unaware.

"Will...will you be able to heal her...?" His tone sounded casual, but Elaric noticed his gaze go to the princess's unconscious body again and again. "She won't die, right?" He murmured under his breath, looking troubled, and for a good reason. One would expect the failure in his job to have serious repercussions, considering the gravity of the matter and involvement of a member from the royal family.

And yet, that was not all. Elaric saw doubt and uncertainty in his gaze.

"Do you have an idea of who could have been behind this?" As soon as he asked the question, Elaric knew he had hit a nail on the head, seeing the hand that rested on his sword twitch.

"No." He answered the question in a low voice, the validity of the statement automatically judged by the slow red staining his life thread. 

Elaric narrowed his eyes, eyeing the man called Rion first, and then the guard.

"What's your title?" Elaric asked in resignation. 

"Cahir. Sir Cahir. Your grace." He added the title as an afterthought. "You did not answer...will you be able to heal her?"

Elaric turned to pack his equipment. "There is no need to worry. Her highness has strong constitution. If served loyally, she should recover in around a week without need of antidote. The poison was fortunately not fatal." Then looking at the pale princess one last time, he said. "I will go and report the matter to his majesty. Call the doctor back. He can handle any complications that may arise."

Additionally, there was one discovery he didn't share with them.

Two poisons. Opposites would likely cancel each other out without the need for an antidote. That was either divine luck... or a sign that someone else had tried to kill her first.

That sparked another theory—two separate factions were attempting to harm the princess, completely unaware of each other's existence.

Elaric glanced at the red thread passing through both the servant and guard, the princess's closest confidants in an almost transparent, floating manner, as if calling for his attention.

They were both hiding something.

𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟 𓆝 𓆟 𓆞 𓆝 𓆟