Long Suffer the King

II

A/N: For my fellow fantasy writers, there's this awesome playlist on 8tracks called writing: intrigues and conspiracies. Check it out! It's what I use to write

♛♛♛♛♛♛♛

Ophelia is woken by the shouting of guards and pounding on her door. She bolts up and calls for her maids. "What is going on?" she asks. They're hysterical, crying out and running around.

"Answer me!" she yells, calling them to her attention. One finally comes to her senses and gasps out, "the king is dead."

She sits back on her bed in shock. "How?"

"Nasty shock or something. He was in his chambers readying for bed when the guards heard a yell and thud. Must've been a heart attack." another maid whispers. Everything starts closing in around Ophelia.

"My brother... where's my brother." she demands, closing her eyes. She felt lost. Like she was five again and stuck in the gardens screaming for someone when she couldn't find her way out. Except her father wouldn't come save her this time. She was entirely on her own.

She pulls a shawl over her shoulders and nightgown and walks out of the room. You're a princess, act like one.

Her father's chambers aren't far from her own. Her father always made sure the three of them were on the same floor. Just in case.

In case of what she never knew, the only really threat was Dimitri when he was drunk.

There are hushed whispers and shuffling feet around her father's door. The guards are blocking anyone from coming in. Ophelia walks over calmly, head held high. "Allow me in, I wish to see what happened to my father." always formal, never any room for crying hysteria or weakness. The guards parted to let her in and as soon as she turns the corner to the bed she loses all composure.

Her father is lying half on the bed and half off. Her brother is cradling his head, eyes red from crying. She puts a hand over her mouth and stifles a sob. Her brother looks up, face emotionless. "Sister." his voice cracks.

She runs over and slides across the wood floor to sit beside her brother. She gently takes her father's face in her hands and begins to cry. Her brother goes stiff for a moment but soon he's holding her.

"He wasn't supposed to die. Not so soon." she whispers. Her brother nods. "The nurse, she said that it was a heart attack... she thinks he saw something and scared himself."

Ophelia stares at her father's face in shock. His hair was barely grey, face aged gracefully with barely a wrinkle of oldness. He wasn't young, no, but he wasn't old enough to die. She cradled his head in her arms and sighs. "Send guards out to search around the castle and town. We need to find who did this."

Dimitri doesn't budge. "I say what we do and what we do is capture anyone who was seen in the last hour and question them."

She bites her tongue to keep from arguing. She's learned it's no use with him.

He calls for the guards and orders them to round up every servant, lady and lord who had been around in the past hour. Ophelia helps one of the maids place her father peacefully back in bed. She stares at him and thinks. Maybe he had died of a heart attack. It's common and he never took care of himself.

She looks around the room next, around the bed and then towards the windows. Her fingers feel around the opening latch and on the window sill but there's nothing. She sighs and looks back at her father.

Dimitri strides back into the room and crosses his arms. "What are you doing?"

"Doing what you won't, searching around for clues." she says back in spite. He glares at her, it should be his permanent expression he wears it so much, and walks over. "The walls on this castle are flat and straight up. If someone had tried climbing we would've known."

"Well what if they don't need climbing." she argues. He shrugs. "Anyone allowed in and out of this castle is escorted around by a guard. Even if they tried sneaking in-"

"But what about the secret passages?" she interrupts. Dimitri rubs his chin and as if the information just hit him he groans. "Guards!"

She watches as he yet again storms out of the room.