The sun grew hotter outside and Lyne decided she needed to take her bath. Taking off her dress seemed like hard work so she ended up craving the ginger tea than having a bath.
Sitting back down on the bed, a maid brought a silver tray with a white mug on it, the ginger smell soothing. Taking it, she nodded to the girl.
"This is nice."
"Your casserole will be ready in fifteen minutes." She turned away and she took that time to take her bath.
Walking into the hot bath, she let her pain go away by filling her head with the good memories back home. Ransacking her head, she shook her head. Nothing good had ever happened in Wolf pack without ending in a tragedy. She shut her eyes as the warmth of the water, filled with flowers and oil, seep through her skin.
Enjoying the comfort of the cozy washroom, she felt better. The headache and hopefully, her heart pain, had somehow vanished.
Lyne heard a distant yelling and she wondered who it could be.
"...I said dump it!" She heard the familiar authoritative voice come out of the kitchen as she moved closer, now fully dressed in a white dress and her hair still wet. It stuck to her body although it no longer dripped, it gave her face the freshness of a twelve-year-old.
Turning into the kitchen, she couldn't miss the fighting pants, jacket, and boots. She sighed and rolled her eyes.
"What's the problem this time, Her Royal Highness?"
Luana turned at her voice and her face looked like they could cook a pot of potatoes in a minute.
"Oh, look who just waltzed in like a Queen. The new bride who has nothing better to do than disrupt the arrangements of the palace, look beautiful, and eat."
Lyne heaved another sigh but this time she concluded she has had it. She made to ask the cooks out but what's a drama without an audience.
She folded her arms akimbo.
"And may I ask what your duty is?" She asked and the cooks in the kitchen gasped, excitement written all over their faces as they watched what would happen.
Luana glared at them.
"All of you, out! Now! And pick that garbage with you." She yelled at them and they scrambled about until Lyne's voice stopped them.
"Take a step outside and the last thing you'll ever see is a dark cold room with torture and pain." She looked the other woman straight in the eyes as the young girls stood at a corner of the kitchen, expectant of what would happen.
"Umph," Luana scoffed, "Defiance. I love that." She moved a few inches close to Lyne.
"I'm afraid that you'll be the one to see that dark cold room before they'll set their foot in it."
"What exactly is your problem, Luana?"
"Are you asking me? I hate your ego, sweetheart. It won't get you anywhere."
Lyne burst into laughter as soon as she said this.
"Talking about ego, you reek of it, dear. I'd suggest a bath will do. Not the warm one I took. I mean in boiling water of bleach and soap."
There was a slight sound of giggles around the room.
"Ooh, at least I don't get to walk about my freak face."
Lyne's heart thumped and she dropped her arms. A repeat of what she had tried avoiding back home. A bully.
Her lips quivered as flashes of her brother's face crossed her head. She gasped. Korba teasing her about having the weirdest tiny power and being different from them. Her younger siblings poking fun at her and her father's voice.
Her father sitting comfortably on the throne and watching her cry as they stomp their feet on her little self. Her eyes burning with tears as she felt the pain in her bones as they crushed their boots on her back. Growing up as a princess living a slave life, she felt those memories come back.
"No." She couldn't see anything else other than a watery view of Luana laughing at her and she could hear the same voice of Charles and her siblings laughing at her.
Her headache was back and she felt dizzy as she held the counter nearby to balance. Her throat was runny and she wondered what was happening to her. She closed her eyes shut against the throbbing pain in her neck and shoulder.
"Uh...I..." She tried to speak out as she felt she was running out of breath. She stretched an arm but felt a hand grab her chin.
"Oh, dear, you have a lot to learn. Being a Queen isn't a joke." She heard Luana say but all she could see was a blurry view and she knew all that was needed at the moment was getting help.
"What you don't know is..." Luana placed her lips next to her ear. "...as a Queen, someone is always after your life. Someone like me." She dropped Lyne and walked away, and that was when it dawned on Lyne.
She had been poisoned through the ginger tea.
-----
His hands gripped the steering wheel and his tears dripping down his eyes numerous times, only one thing filled his mind. Finding Sam. He had dragged her into this mess.
He thought she was safe but then he had been selfish. Always been selfish and now it had cost someone's life. First, it started with hurting Luana without thinking about her. Now, he dragged his most trusted human into his mess all for the usual reason.
To save his ass.
He drove past the speed limit as he passed the avenue and turned into the street that led straight to Sam Pharmacy and from afar, he could see tapes of 'crime scenes' everywhere. The police van and an ambulance he guessed were ready to take in her corpse.
As soon as he had seen the headline "A local Pharmacy store attacked early this morning; owner reported dead;" he picked up the car keys without hesitation and headed for the store.
Some meters away from the store, he parked the car near an empty road and got down to avoid further questions.
Walking to the place he had parked his car which has now been stripped of its trampoline, he couldn't help but wipe a tear with his thumb off his eyes. A man with a slightly protruded belly stopped him and he guessed from his uniform that he is the Chief of the police department.
"This place is out of bound, Mister." The chief called, his bald head shining under the afternoon sun.
"I'm sorry, but I'm family and I need to see my sister."
"We need proof."
The chief insisted and Zeidan heaved a tired and frustrated sigh.
"I guess I'll have to do this the hard way."
"Pardon m..." Zeidan swiped past them all in one glide as he used his speed power to get inside the pharmacy store that was now covered up in more crime scene tapes and police officers and detectives walking up and down.
He sighted Sam from afar carried in a body bag and he walked up to her, pleading with the people to give him a minute.
Holding her cold, rigid hands, he found it hard to talk.
"I know, Samantha, that I dragged you into something that was not your fight. I forgot you were just human and can not handle these things. I should have known." He whispered.
"All I ever cared about was my life and ..." His eyes caught a paper under a shelf opposite her body and he could see some cardboards with numbers written on them that indicated how she had been attacked.
Number one was placed behind the counter which stated she was probably locking up. Number two showed that she slid and fell to the ground and there the paper was.
Smart Samantha. Just like her name implies. He chuckled to himself but regretted it immediately as he remembered the poor woman's death.
He picked the paper up and what he saw made him nod his head in satisfaction and he drew a cross sign over her body before heading outside the same he had come in.