Look What You Made Me Do

Part VI

I don't trust nobody

And nobody trusts me

I'll be the actress

Starring in your bad dreams

So I started small. Simple. Three drops of an undetectable poison into a mug of ale, a desperate, wheezing last breath and my first victim, the Castle Herald was dead.

My maid was next. I was sure that she was probably coerced into this; she was quite an innocent thing and we'd been quite close when she was in my service. I tracked her down the night after I killed the Herald. Imagine my surprise when I saw her go into my parents' old chambers where the False King currently resided.

As soon as I saw her go in, I turned around and ran to an inconspicuous storage closet. Making sure nobody was watching, I went in and pulled up a secret trap door. It opened to a passageway that led to a closet in my parents' chamber. There were a number of these secret routes in the castle, but only those who were born into the Royal Family were aware of them.

Standing in the closet, I tried not to hurl as I listened to the sounds of my maid and the False King fornicating. Fortunately, it was over quickly--he never did last long.

She said, "My Lord, when will you fulfill your promise of making me your queen?"

"Soon, my dearest. You know we have to make sure that no one suspects us--we need to let things die down a bit."

"How much longer? It's already been a year."

"I suggest you watch your tone with me darling. I am your king after all."

"And I suggest that you remember my role in your becoming king. I was the one who poisoned the King and Queen. I was the one who hid the murder weapons in the Princess' chambers. So don't try to make a fool out of me, Your Majesty, because you don't want to make me your enemy."

A door slammed shut followed by the sound of his cursing. No response which meant that she must have left.

I couldn't move from where I was crouched in the closet. My body was shaking too much, my hands were curled into fists so tight that my knuckles had turned white.

I'd cried in her arms after my parents' death.

I'd trusted her. I'd trusted him. I'd trusted my own judgement. I'd trusted in Fate. But I'd been betrayed by everything--but no more. Never again would I trust anyone or anything. I would believe only what my own eyes saw, depend only on what my own hands wrought.

Slowly, I made my way out of the closet and back through the secret passageway. I almost pitied her as I thought about what I would do to her--but not just yet.

Three nights later, I snuck out of the cabin. I had washed away the wrinkles from my face, replaced the grey hair with a fiery red. A little makeup made my skin lighter and a little more to make my cheeks look sunken in. I added a couple of fake beauty marks and used a skin-toned clay mixture to change the shape of my nose. Now, I was unrecognizable as either the old maid or the Princess. Heavily cloaked in a beggar's garb, I made my way to a traitorous noble's castle.

He was a childhood friend of the False King's, and he had encouraged him and aided him in gaining my affections. He had been the liaison between my husband and the other nobles in the first days of our marriage but other than that, he wasn't directly involved in my family's murders That in itself might not have been so bad and perhaps I would've given him an easy death.

But then I'd noticed the skittishness of the other maids whenever he came to the castle. They were quick to warn me of him--he liked to take the castle maids to his bed, the more unwilling the better. He liked holding them down as they struggled, choking them as he tore away their dignities.