The Substitute Cinderella

Chapter 17 "Bound In Lies"

Henry's POV

I quickly walked down the long hall of the palace that I have spent my childhood full of miseries.

The indoors were unusually dark, the sound of heavy rain and thunder that I'd only seen once in my life could reach my ear no matter the distance. The lightning's blinding light pierced through the window at the end of the hall frequently stimulating my brain.

The dream, nightmare I had, during the sleep state I was forced to stay in, flashed before my eyes among the white light.

It wasn't clear as if I was standing behind thin smoke.

Silhouette of a dark creature.

Mirrors.

Confusion. Desperation. Fury. Sadness.

I stopped for a second and leaned on the wall with an excruciating headache as if I remembered things I never should have.

The emotions that flooded my memory during the time I rubbed my temples almost fooled me into thinking it was an actual memory of a duel I had. A duel with someone deceptive. Something I had experienced many times before.

Then the last words of the creature hit me out of nowhere.

"If you don't save her then I will."

I remembered. The pain in my head was replaced with an urge to run and find out what had actually happened.

I didn't have to wait for long. A maid was running down the hall towards me like she was trying to handle an issue of life and death with worry engraved in her grey eyes. I recognized her, she was Ella's maid, Fleur.

And I could see traces of blood on her brown dress.

She stopped deadly in her tracks to bow to me and straightened quickly in a hurry expecting I would pass by. I turned her around by gently touching her arm.

She turned around, intimidated. But I needed someone to learn what was going on. So I asked her with a solemn attitude.

She was surprised because a king talking to a maid for such matter was unheard of. But she started talking as I kept staring. Proving me right, her voice was full anxiety, that reminded me the darkest day of my childhood again.

"Your highness, I'm.. I mean we.. are so glad you are finally awake. Doom literally fell upon us since the day the Queen said you were struggling at the hands of a fatal disease. Thank God you are still alive..."

A fatal disease?

It was dark magic.

Although as a king who has been through war many times and still managed to make it with cold blood after cutting of so many heads, for the first time one trace of blood made me feel like the world was going to end.

It could belong to Ella. And Fleur was beating around the bush making me feel even worse.

Women.

"Fleur..calm down. Because I really need you to tell me what is happening." I tried to sound as calm as I could, a skill I owned during the years I've grown up in the palace.

Wearing the mask of calmness and looking like I had the upper hand in everything even when I felt scared and desperate.

The responsibility of being the king and a man. Wearing the mask was not a choice but an obligation.

"Your highness, it's your mother, The Queen. She was stabbed. She is... she is dying. And she keeps mumbling of a name in her sleep." I wasn't sure what to do or what to feel but I knew I had to see her.