Then suddenly, it was the third day.
Smack!
"Speak! You bitch!" A man shouted while bringing down the brick once again.
Smack!
"Why aren't you saying a single word?!" The duke held the brick up again, but his wrist was held on place by another hand, who was strong yet gentle.
"Now now... Should we really go that far? She is bleeding." Kazimir spoke with a gentle tone of voice.
Until now... I still wonder why Cedric hasn't done a single thing to him. Aefia thought to herself as her head throbbed from the impacts. Her fingers twitched everytime the brick hit her head, but she couldn't move them because they were tied behind her, who was settled on a chair.
Apparently, because of what had happened yesterday, the duke had gotten enraged and decided to team up with a certain someone who already hated her and today... She was kidnapped for being a captain for the Countess's house.
Her accessories were safely guarded behind her illusion magic, but if they continued their assault on her, she might lose consciousness and her skills will be exposed. So... Before that happened, she tried her best to shut up and for Lewis to appear according to their deal.
But if he truly meant what he said that day... He will be aware of the signal she sent and approach the ducal house with a valid question about what they thought they were doing. That was—
Smack!
"Where did you keep our hunts?!" The duke shouted again, fighting off the Mides Prince's grip and hitting her head harder this time. It was across the centre of her head where it hurt the least, and the most. Her entire skeleton rattled and it felt like her eyes moved a fraction from her skull, but the pain was almost invisible because of the ones at the back of her head.
She bit down on her bottom lip to keep from screaming at them to stop. She knew she needed to wait a moment longer for the situation to go the way she wanted it. There was a fifty percent chance that would happen, but it was never a good amount.
Someone must be listening somewhere! I am in the Mides family's tent!
"Listen here duke, she is still a child. Leave her alone. Rather, the first day there was someone else who was the captain, we should ask..." Kazimir spoke while sugar-coating his words. In fact, he was the one who had this idea to trap her and hit her. She heard it the other day and she recalled it very well.
Yet, she let them do whatever they wanted, all to expose them and disqualify them. However, she couldn't guarantee that. If only somehow...
As she tuned out of the conversation, she noticed how both of them were far from her reach right now. They had a visible opening. Immediately, she let out a breathe of relief and used her fingers to tug at her left sleeve to pull out a pocket knife. Using which, she cut the ropes.
"We can't just—Hey! Where did she run off to?!" The duke shouted while scanning the room evenly for a shadow. "She's ran away!"
In the meantime, while Aefia was on a sprint towards the lake to get to the only creatures who could help her, she had to cross the Imperial territory. Where she was stopped of course and taken hostage yet again. They still couldn't take away her accessories, but they did seize her weapons. Her sword was lost, and they immediately identified her as a captain.
However, they named her a traitor and an assasin at the same time, taking her towards their Captain's tent. She stayed chained up on the ground for quite the long time. But they too had a blind spot and she used the safety pin at her sleeve to pick the lock and run.
Like that, she had become a double fugitive and was in blinding pain. By the time she knew it, the lake was a short distance away. Just twenty more paces or at least, that was what her eyes told her.
Her vision was swimming, the sides of her eyes red from the spilling blood and her fingers and limbs trembling. She wiped her chin, where droplets had collected and was staining her jacket.
"Elanor... Were you aware of this when you were putting me in a such hostile position?", she whispered to herself while taking slow steps towards the lake. A laugh bloomed at the back of her throat at the same time.
"Hahahah! I ran back to the family I tried to escape from... What was I? Stupid?"
When she was told that the third day was going to be pure chaos, she didn't think it would be this bad. For someone like her to be caught twice.
Thinking back, it would have been better to have avoided the capture when she knew there was risk she couldn't take.
"Lewis is as a piece of shit who hated me since I was first introduced to the family, and he still hates me. Why did I even think of asking him for a favour? When he asked for a hug, he was probably plotting for my demise, smirking behind my back so I couldn't see.
"I should have learnt a moral when Cedric spoke about his betraying siblings. But yet, here I am, rotting in my own bravery.
"Honestly? Just because I am a Guardian, why did I become so arrogant? Especially after being an Aethalgard. Ah! I am claiming of being an Aethalgard where I haven't even claimed the throne yet?! This must be my punishment."
There was something about her while being injured, is that... Her thoughts will accidentally become loud and she would forget so many things at once. Like how the next second...
"Can't I just use the healing element I had stolen to save myself? I also have a contract with the devil Daphne. So... What am I doing again?"
She ran along the remaining length of the distance, but before she could proceed any further, she was stopped yet again by the guards.
"We found her!"
That moment in exact, felt like Aefia was standing in front of a mirror that suddenly cracked and from within, multiple hands reached out to grab her throat. Those hands were dark and spilling ink onto the ground near her which immediately clawed at her legs, the sharp nails digging into her skin as she stood frozen in horror.
But before they could really do another thing, a knight stepped forward. His sword was drown and the way he was blocking her, she already knew who that was.
"Stop right there!" He shouted with a protective voice. "No one gets to chain Her Highness a second time. Rather, why are you moving without Prince Lewis's orders?!"
He glanced back to check if she was alright, gasping at the sight of her bleeding. But she just nodded and stared back at him with a questioned look. It was easy for her to even believe that Lewis was probably just seeking a way out of the trouble she was in, and simply could only protect her.
After all, Duke half-dead was always a sarcastic person. Although he never truly wanted to know her or meet her, she saw him and many others in a few council meetings she had gone to. He was a kind of person who would rage if his ideas or thoughts were neglected—let alone rejected.
He and a few others were always the reason the court wouldn't listen to orders and often end up in a tight mess that needed Aefia to stay awake night after night—spitting possible solutions to the empress while taking beatings for her drunken anger.
If anything, that old man and his team was one which Aefia wants to truly expose and ban until a pure-hearted generation had appeared. But who knew if that would ever be possible.
His eldest son and Mr. Bad-haircut are good friends. They are of rotten personalities and partially had a hand in Cedric's dissapearance. He funded it. Using money to bribe away anyone who could carry any sort of news about the Mides family to him.
She tapped her chin while watching as the young knight tried to stop the approaching guards, she suddenly got an idea. Aefia remembered hearing that a Viscount district and a Barony was in this season's hunting competition too. It was currently still early afternoon, and she hadn't started her move as the Countess house just yet...
She could try and climb the ranks in that time, whether Lewis wanted to help her or not. She didn't need to take the Imperial house of cource... But to reach to the top of the board and take the reward which Elanor wanted from her in replacement for the artifact, she would need four earrings from each captains of different colours.
Yellow for the duchy. Navy blue for the kingdom. Barony red, and Viscount Orange.
If its the barony and red hair, then she knew who it was. Same goes to the Viscount, orange head.
She smirked to herself and pulled out Spectrum from thin air. Without a word, she swiped her sleeve through her forehead, wiping away the blood and healing the injury on the way. Sometimes, she was more than grateful to have the Wolf element with such a feature that none others had.
Currently, she had the healing element, water element, ice, fire, mental instincts, physical strength, shadow, and light. If she knew the list, she wouldn't have considered herself to have the most elements on her person this instant.
Being an Aethalgard gave her the right to use all of the elements at once. However, she had mastered it earlier than she had claimed to want to be the Aethalgard. During the time of her forest stay at the Mides Kingdom, she had gone to quiet the dungoens to stack up on her fighting skills.
She didn't know what to use it on, so she could join the Aethalgard. She honestly didn't know she was going to join the hunting competition, because if she did, she would have worked even harder.
The rest of the events were a blur, sneaking in and out of different territories. Checking the conditions before working on a list on which she would attack. First up her list, was the Viscount of course. She went past the security without a care. While at her heist, she felt a curiousity to know why the Empress hadn't caught her brother just yet. As if he was working right under her nose the whole time with her already aware of his identity but she just didn't want to reveal it.
The mystery was something she was just curious about. But she wouldn't care to melt her nose into it. However, it did work as a way to dismantle his team while being right at his fingertips.
As soon as she was right behind him, three steps away with Spectrum already drawn, his teammates had surrounded her.
"Step back! Intruder!" They shouted while holding their weapons towards her throat.
She let out a knowing scoff under her breath while watching the Viscount turn around. His eyes were narrowed, one of his eyebrows arched in question.
"Hello—" She muttered softly, which only drew the weapons closer to her neck. She placed Spectrum back into her scabbard and raised her hands in a surrendering motion. "Alright alright... You caught me..."
"What are you doing here?" The man asked while folding his arms. His eyes turned towards her clothes, blood-stained and occupied without any of her captain accessories.
"Well... I need to climb the ranks. Don't I? I won't lie about it of course. Just trying to win. Its a competition afterall." She answered truthfully.
"How strange. Alright! Kill her!" He ordered while turning his face away for a second. Before the weapons could even graze her...
Snap!
Aefia pressed the tip of her fingertips together, rubbing them against each other. Red strings shot out from behind trees and trapped the team members to the barks. The weapons clattered to the floor near her feet, she just slowly lowered her hands and patiently waited for the man to turn around.
And when he did...
Sling!
The tip of her blade hit the man straight at the throat, pushing him backwards until he hit a tree bark and slid down in fear.
"What are you trying to do?!" He shouted while backing up tightly against the wood. His fingers gripping at the dirt beside him, his teeth clattered against each other as he stared up at a girl he had mocked twice before, and ordered to kill just a second ago.
"Sorry, but I am a very determined person." She answered with a smile, lifting her sword up to her hand. "And I really want to win. The prize is too promising. You have a lot to return to the Imperial family, you know? Lewis and Henry would love you there." Her eyes darkened as she leaned forward to try and creep him out a little more.
"What is wrong with you?! Do you have a personality disorder?! Are you a psycho?!"
"Yes, for both your questions."
"What do you want?!"
She clinked her navy-blue blade against the fiery orange earring and waited. He looked astonishingly at her face, and immediately reached his finger towards his ear, tugging it off and dropping it near her feet.
"Just shut up and get lost!" He shouted while watching her red eyes track the glow of the brown and orange accessory.
"No. Give me a brooch of yours. The most expensive." She added while lifting the jewelry up and vanishing it into her inventory.
He immediately did as she said. She felt like a robber, but there was nothing that can be done here. He passed her the pin, watched as her expression softened an inch.
But she still didn't step back yet. Aefia lifted her blade to her hand and slid the sharp edge against her palm. Starred at his face and wiped her cut hand across the airs to stain his clothes with the dripping blood.
"Why did you just do that?!" He shouted while watching as she started walking away.
"Because..." Her fingers moved again, releasing the team members. "In a game of dominance between adults like you, if you don't draw blood... You are not a true winner."