"It's burning. It's too powerful for me to drink I guess." Aefia spoke while putting down the cup onto the table. "I can't seem to decipher what this tea flavour is. It is... Something like the poison I had taken a long time ago." Her voice turned slightly hoarse as she bent her head forward and blood started to drip down with every word she spoke.
"It IS poison, my dear." The woman spoke while walking towards her side of the sofa. "It is in a dose that is too lethal for your age, so even if you tried mithridatism for a long time, you won't be able to rub off the effects of the poison. Because in this one, I added a little bit more of something."
As her steps came to a stop in front of the girl, she lifted a finger in front of her chin, to pick her gaze up those dark purplish eyes of her own face. "And I have the antidote for the poison. If you want, I will give it to you. I don't want you to suffer the effects of course, but I also don't want to get you into drinking liquor to intoxicate your brain enough to get the thing I want done." Her voice turned into something indistinguishable, between sweet and sour, the tongue of a greedy aunt who is about to turn the entire world around.
This woman... I hate her more then my life right now. Aefia thought as her mind started to slip due to the pain. A type of stress settled down against her face, the nerves at the back of her neck started to pull on themselves and caused the head to start tilting without her commands.
"What... Work?" She asked after a long moment of hesitation as she started to lose her strength, and becoming too weak to the point where her limps were starting to feel too heavy.
"Well it is simple." The duchess spoke while letting go of her chin, but sitting beside her while supporting the weight of the girl's head onto her shoulder. Her right hand pulled out something from inside the folds of her gown, a small vile filled with a honey coloured liquid. "You want this antidote... You have to say that you love your mother." She spoke with a grin surfacing at her face.
Well isn't that greedy? As soon as the words entered her ears, the only thing she thought next was fully just the repetition of what the duchess had said. This is uncontrollable now... Her fingers clasped the side of her forehead as her eyes started to shut and her mouth flooded with the metallic taste of iron. Hesitantly, she twisted her tongue to form the words she had been fighting back against.
"I... Love... You... Mother..." Her throat felt like it were ripping itself off from her vocal cords as she coughed into the back of her hand and shut her eyes for a short while, before forcing herself back awake.
"I didn't hear it well enough." The woman judged as she held the vile in front of the Aefia's eyes like it were a chocolate to a toddler. "Say it more louder and clearer."
Hearing this, she almost teared up. I hate you woman! Of course it won't be genuine for your side! I don't even like any aspects of you! I hate everything you do! I can give you genuine infinite hate! But you will never get me to say that I love you truly! You are too greedy to be a mother!
Her eyes started to water as the pain built up against her throat, but with an upsetting tone. I only have one... Genuine... Mother... I had... And they took her away from me like I don't deserve to get the picture of what it is like to be loved as a daughter... They took her away from me the same way they took away my life from me by putting me into this stupid competition I never knew about! They are draining me sick of my mind!
Her tears fell from the corners of her eyes as she coughed up blood with her dying consciousness. I never wanted a better life... I never wanted a better place! ... I wanted a small moment in my life to just be free from my troubles! Why is it so that the only person who managed to buy me this moment was taken away from me without letting me say a proper goodbye?!
They took away so many things from me! They are taking away my powers... My mind... My family... And they are trying to dry me clean now! They want my life! They want me to choose between life and death... Everyday! Everytime I wake up in the morning! And this... Has awakened a fear in me now... That I don't want to get out of bed every single day. I fear about what will happen the rest of the day or the next hour.
She gritted her teeth through her closed mouth, which felt paralyzed by now. Her eyes stared into the far window where a flock of birds flew right past. Her mind echoing with thoughts and screams as her eyes turned blurry from tears. I never got to say anything about how I felt about her... She died in front of my own eyes... She never really got to hear me say anything about how I feel about her as my foster mother... Despite us being forced into this thinking.
At the end, it was her consciousness that was slipping away. Her eyes were covered in a fog that promised death, and once she was able to catch her breathe again, she only thought about the antidote at the woman's hands.
But at the same time, she didn't want to say what she was meant to say. And the thoughts about her sleeping pills reminded her again that she had been doing this for quiet some time now. So she made an attempt to say 'I hate you' instead.
"I–"
"Shut up! Now breathe!" The woman shouted with a concern as her fingers removed from her face, but wrapped around her chin to open her mouth, before emptying the entire glass cartridge. No seriously... What was I even thinking?
In her mind, was the conversation she had with Lewis not so long ago.
"Swallow..." She commanded while watching the girl stare up at the ceiling with almost unfocused eyes. Her bloody mouth slammed shut as she drank the thick substance and a last single drop of tear left her eyes. The woman looked at her hand for a short while, where the blood from her lips had stained and smeared against her palm. Just then, her clean hand hovered over the girl's eyes as she shut them with a delicate touch at her eyelids.
"Sleep..." She spoke while tilting her head towards her shoulder, while trying to remove the hair stuck to her bloody mouth.
"I have lost my mind..." Her voice turned softer as her arms wrapped around the Aefia's shoulders and pulled her closer.
***
Brittany stood at the centre of the room, completely petrified at the sight in front of her. One instinct of hers was telling her to stay for her young master, while the other was telling her to run. Finally, after a long moment of silence and just staring at the two figures at the sofa, she opened her mouth to ask the question she wanted to know the answer to.
"Your majesty... You had me brought to this room to claim the young master back?" She asked while clasping her hands behind her with anger forming inside her mind. Selfish woman... Why do you keep bleeding a young girl who you adopted and didn't even give birth to?! That girl's mother didn't have her eat nutritious food just so you can drain them out in the form of her blood! What? Does she seem granted to you? Are you that desperate to kill her?!
Her eyes stayed stuck at the way Aefia's mouth had blood stains at each corners, making her face a horrifying sight as she took in the entire scene. The girl's head rested on the woman's lap, and her legs hanging at the edge of the sofa in a dead manner. The woman was sending a claw-like hand against the dark and silvering hair of the girl, where every single one of the accessories and hair ties were already removed.
"Why would I send for you I claim her back?" The duchess asked with a new sort of smile, as if satisfied with what she had just done. "Just watch her sleep... Doesn't she look adorable? Like a porcelain doll who happened to be made out of flesh and blood?" She spoke while bending forward to press a kiss against the side of her forehead.
"I wish I could preserve her like this."
The scene turned disturbing in seconds. The servant's knuckles turned white hot as she soon came to the conclusion of what really happened. With a new found confidence, she straightened her face into a stern look, and faced the head of the house like she was about to quit. "Are you sure you aren't mental? She never even made it a matter of thought to harm you." Her eyes caught sight of the shock that rose onto the woman's pale face.
"What makes you think that? She looks more vulnerable when she is like this." The face of the person with the dark purplish, long hair turned more desperate to prove it as she was about to spring forward to just grab onto the servant's collar. "Then how is it so that she is sleeping too comfortably like a toddler, at her mother's lap?!" Her shout echoed as her eyes turned widened.
"That doesn't look comfortable to me... Your highness." The servant spoke with a smile. "It looks like she had been drugged or intoxicated, and then a recovery medicine was applied onto her system. And judging by her look, you probably poisoned her, then gave her the antidote from almost killing her. Do you happen to fear losing her too? Because then, she won't be a useful pawn to you anymore?"
The silence broke in all of a sudden like a shattered glass. The piercing gaze of the servant and the host, stood untouched as the duchess turned calm. Her hands flying to Aefia's head as she slowly lifted it to her own face, while placing a last kiss onto her cheek and then, properly laying her down on the sofa.
"I am sorry..." She whispered at the Aefia's ears as her steps lifted towards where the servant stood. I am sorry for this, my silent bird... But I want to keep you in an environment where I get to keep you around as 'my own' daughter... Even in front of a mere servant's face. And this... May break you.
Hesitantly, she brought out the knife from under her sleeves while taking soft and precautious steps towards Brittany. Just then, Aefia's eyes jolted awake as if sensing the danger, she sat up while holding her head with a hand. Her eyes flashed violent rays of blue and white as she stood up with her mind spinning like a chaos ride.
Her gaze lifted towards her maid and the duchess, with an alert turning into her mind, with her heavy footsteps trying to get in between the two of them. How did it get to this point?! What happened before I fell unconcious?! I can't even remember the date for today!
The duchess pulled out a silver knife from inside her sleeves as she lunged forward with a blurry dark purple motion. In a short amount of time, the knife was pointed towards the servant's organs as Brittany gazed up at the girl who was trying to reach her from the far distance with a trembling figure. She was practically fighting death to reach her place right now, and this was enough to bring joy into the maid's eyes as she shut them.
"At least... I die... Trying to protect her... This time..." She spoke while feeling the sharp pain of the knife spin inside her gut before pulling it out, all slick with her blood.
"You are a bad influence for her... I don't want you near her ever again... She is my daughter... And I am her mother..." The duchess spoke while holding the knife high above her head and then plunging it down at the servant's heart, the blood splattering against the dark red carpet.
"Please... Take care of yourself... Aefia... And please don't break down ever again." Brittany spoke with her last breathe as she fell to the ground with the knife being pulled out of her one more time, and her blood polluting the air with the thick scent of copper and iron. By the time Aefia had noticed, her eyes turned widened and she was just behind the duchess when she tried to reach out a hand at the knife to try and seize it away.
"Why would you do that?!" She shouted as her fingers traced the thin line of the handle of the dagger which was almost far from her reach, as tears of anger welled up at the corners of her eyes. But just as she was about to take the blade out of the woman's hands, the duchess spun on her heels with a fluid motion and sliced the air with a quick arc in the air.
As soon as she had done it, her own eyes blew widened with fear as the knife dropped from her grasp with a clean thud against the room floor. She yanked her hands towards Aefia's throat as she pressed onto the red line across her throat, while pinning her head against the mahogany table. "Why did you do that?!" She shouted while watching the blood flood around her fingers, as the skin around her throat split open, thanks to the dagger's swift movement in the air.
"I didn't–" A very faint word was starting to form at her lips as another hand slammed onto her mouth, with her eyes glancing at the way warm tears fell to her cheeks from the woman's face. "Don't talk! I will figure this out! I need to apply pressure to the wound before you bleed out!" She shouted with a concern at Aefia's face as her eyes darted to every corners of her room for a medical aid.