Page 72 of The Nightmare Queen

I look around for Axel and Will but can’t find them. “MAX!” He doesn’t acknowledge me at first. “MAX!” I try again, his head turning towards my direction. “What happened?” I shout over the commotion.

His face is grim, “after seeing the two of you on the floor. They figured out who she was. They must have spiked her drink with something! Millie took a sip of it before Evie could and started seizing almost immediately. Orem caught her as she went down and now we’re here!” His voice is strained, well practiced as he may be against Eveera’s power it’s evident it takes effort to keep her out of his head.

I feel around her mind through the seal, her walls are fractured as all the focus goes into tormenting the two fools in front of her. I don’t haveto look at her face to know her eyes are completely black, her serpents depth of color pales in comparison to the darkness flowing out of her in droves. Both men are writhing on the floor, whimpering and sputtering.

Stepping away from Bennett I move behind her. “Eveera.” I whisper against the shell of her ear, my hands falling onto the triceps of her arms. She doesn’t respond to my touch but a slight twitch in her scowl let’s me know she heard me. “You’re drawing quite the scene here.”

“Am I?” her words are tight, clenched between her teeth.

“Mmhm.” I drop my gaze watching her work. “We’ll bring them back with us. Doing this here is only going to worsen our position. We need them playing into our hands, remember?” Her eyes flit to the left towards where Millie and Orem are. “She’ll be fine. But we need to go now. I need you to pull back.” Her body tenses at that request.

I move around her assailants and cup my hand over the first man’s nose, my magic filtering through his nostrils until the twitching stops. When I moved onto the next man I recognize his face as the idiot who danced with her. A rage was already building for what they tried to do to her in the first place and ended up doing to Millie. But now that rage was close to boiling over when I think of his hands and body having been pressed against Eveera’s for half the night.

Her magic dissipates, her eyes returning to their gold hue. I meet them for only a second before dropping the second man’s head. The tavern has completely cleared out save for the gold-painted bartender whose pupils are blown. A state of shock is plastered over his face.

Orem is still cradling Millie, her blonde hair spilling across his arm. Max gives her a brief once over, concern etched across his face before looking to me.

“We should go.” The five of us startle at Will’s voice. He and Axel approach us, both of them looking perturbed. “Before it gets out further,who she is. We don’t need another…” He waves his arm to gesture at us and the now empty tavern, “this happening.”

Entering court without alerting anyone was a tricky enough task, but then we had to go about getting a healer mage in here. Armond and Ezra join us in my rooms while Millie is being worked on. They determined it was ragroot that was used and by this point it had drained all the color from her already pale skin. Her blue veins stand out in stark contrast. We all sit or pace quietly as the mage works on her. The glowing warm pulse of magic radiates over her. By the end of it, her color has brightened slightly, but she still looks half-dead.

I thank the healer mage for their help and discretion on their way out of the apartment. “Keep an eye on her. That concoction was strong, but she will recover.” The woman looks warmly at Millie.

Bennett and Orem haven’t moved from her side. The question of when Orem and Millie became so acquainted crosses my mind before Will bursts into the room. “Does anyone want to explain what the bleeding gods happened down there?” He looks directly at Eveera. “Well?”

“I think it’s pretty obvious what happened.” Max says his voice raw.

Will’s jaw slackens feigning disbelief, “no it’s not pretty obv—”

“Where are they?” Eveera’s voice startles us.

“That’s all you can think about? Those men?” Will yells. “Millie could have died!”

A bitter smile crosses her face as she walks over to him, “well, Mousy, you asked what happened down there. Why don’t we go find out exactly what did happen.” His shoulders slump slightly in defeat but he moves to show her the way.

Looking over to Bennett, he shakes his head, his hand clasped around Millie’s. “We’ll stay here with Mill. In case she wakes up.” I nod following after Will and Eveera to the dungeons.

Despite their overall damp feel, they match the same gaudiness throughout the castle. Most of the cells are empty and look almost completely unused. Will quietly leads the group to the end cell. In the dim light two heaps - caked with dirt, gold, and sweat - lay unconscious. The door to their cell yawns open, the brass hinges screaming in protest at the motion. Eveera sweeps in, hovering over them. Her foot swings out and presses down on the larger of the two men’s throat. His body jolts from the pressure on his windpipe, both eyes flying open. The man’s hands dart up to try and grab her ankle but she is too quick for him. She repeats the process on the second’s throat. They try to scramble away from them but the poison in their system however makes their movements choppy and uncoordinated.

“Oh, stop your squabbling.” She barks, making them flinch at the sound. Taking a seat on the bench adjacent to them, Eveera looks over expectantly to Will, “well go ahead. This is your interrogation not mine, Sir.”

He clears his throat, stepping up to the men on the floor. “Last night or this morning, whichever way you choose to see it, the both of you decided to commit not only a crime against a Vellaran but an attempted crime against a guest of the crown and the queen of Obsidian—”

He’s cut off by Ezra’s growl. “Who sent you?” He asks his eyes vengeful. Armond pulls him backwards, muttering something into his ear that gets him to back off. I nod at Will to continue who sighs and turns back to the men.

“While I don’t appreciate the outburst from Commander Wake, his question stands. Who sent you?”

The larger of the two men spits in the direction of Eveera, his saliva splattering on the stone floor. "She’s an abomination.” He snarls.

“Flattery will get you nowhere, dear.” She coos, making him spit at her again.

We do this back and forth for a while and the interrogation takes up most of the day with neither of them willing to give us an explanation as to why they spiked the drink. “I amboredwith this.Is this really how you lot get information from people?”

Will huffs and glares at her, “you said this was my interrogation.”

“Well, that was when I thought you would actually incentivize them to answer.”

“I do not think your idea of incenti—”

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