"Pass me the cinnamon," Frejo said with his mouth full to Ater.

Six Munda and the Queen were sitting at the garden table and eating. The Queen had been confined in her castle for two weeks.

Theresa couldn't understand it. The castle used to receive supplies daily... Loads of food, spices, alcohol, clothes... For these two weeks, the castle hadn't had a single visitor, at least as far as she knew.

Ater carefully picked up the bowl of cinnamon with two fingers. The Prince, who was sitting next to Ater, jumped up and shouted, "RAHHH!"

Arbor screamed, and the bowl of cinnamon slipped from his hands. It hit the table, and a cloud of cinnamon flew into Ater's face. He started sneezing uncontrollably.

The Prince, Frejo, and the three warriors were dying of laughter. Ater gave them a dark look. He glanced at the Queen. She was also smiling. Ater's sharp expression softened. "Please excuse me... APCHOO!... I'm going to... to... APCHOO!... clean up," said the Doctor with orange specks all over his face. He hurriedly walked away.

When the Munda finally stopped laughing, Frejo was the first to speak: "Perhaps you shouldn't have done that, Prince. You know how angry he gets when his white glove gets dirty," the Advisor humorously scolded the Prince.

"Is there a special reason why Ater wears black-and-white gloves and black-and-white boots?" asked the Queen.

The Prince opened his mouth to answer, "Ask him yourself," Antonus interrupted. "There is a reason, but I don't think he'd be eager to tell you about it."

The Prince looked at him and nodded. Maybe it was better not to talk about Ater behind his back.

"That man's past is... Ugh... Truly depressing," commented Theresa.

"Indeed," said Frejo, "And I don't even know half of it."

Ater returned at that moment. The Prince raised a glass of wine: "Let's toast! To the best Doctor on both sides of the ocean!"

Everyone raised their glasses: "To the best Doctor on both sides of the ocean."

Arbor blushed.

Later that day, the Queen was sitting in her room. She had torn her favorite nightgown, and in the absence of maids, she was struggling with a needle and thread trying to sew it. She pricked herself to the point of bleeding four times. 'This is much harder than I thought,' the Queen sulked.

Ater was also sitting in the room. He and the Queen had a tacit agreement that the part of the room north of the massive wardrobe was his, and Arbor had rearranged it for his needs. He had replaced the leather bench with a proper bed, removed the tea table, and had Dinda, one of the three Munda warriors who controlled ice, help him drag a large wooden table from the office of one of the (deceased) castle scribes.

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Now, Ater was sitting at that table, engrossed in some writing. Yet, with every prick of the needle accompanied by the Queen's scream, Ater would flinch, often reflexively dragging his pen across half the page. The noise was incredibly irritating to him.

The Queen pricked herself again. This time under her nail. "OUCHOUCHOUCHOUCHOUCH," she screamed, waving her hand around as if trying to cool a hot steak.

Ater flinched so hard that he spilled ink all over the paper.

"Can you keep it down a bit?" Ater gritted through his teeth, cleaning up the mess he made.

"This isn't easy, you know!" the Queen responded indignantly, "If I'm bothering you so much, why don't you change rooms?"

"Pfm..." Arbor retorted.

The Queen rolled her eyes. The only time during the day she spent alone was when she went to the bathroom. And even then, she was on a timer!

The Queen angrily threw the nightgown and needle onto the bed. She'd give up for now, but she was too stubborn and would try again as soon as her pricks healed.

Theresa walked over to Ater, who had cleaned the table and resumed writing. "What are you doing now?" she asked, peeking over his shoulder. Even though it was daytime outside, the dim light filtering through the blood barrier wasn't strong enough to properly illuminate Arbor's work, so Ater had to lit a candle.

The candle flame flickered at the Queen's words.

"Writing," Ater coldly replied, not looking up from his work.

"Drawing," the Queen added. Indeed, Ater wasn't writing but scribbling various stars and symbols on his paper. Theresa noticed that the papers he had already filled were covered with similar symbols.

"This is important, it's related to the Prince's curse," Ater mumbled.

"Oh? Is it his order?"

"No, just something that came to mind," Ater scratched his chin as he spoke.

"Explain it to me," the Queen said sweetly and tried to sit on Arbor's lap. Ater moved his knees in confusion, and the Queen fell to the floor.

"What are you doing? Bring a chair, and I'll explain it to you," said a surprised Ater.

"You dense fucking log," the Queen retorted and brought herself a chair. Still angry, she leaned her head close to the paper: "So?"

"So... You see these two stars?" Ater pointed to the first two stars, and the Queen nodded. "Such stars can only be drawn with the help of a Blood Master, but without the Great Chief to channel Eldritch magic through them, they are useless by themselves."

The Queen nodded again.

"These stars have no name... I call them 'Blood Stars' internally," Ater said proudly.

'Very original,' thought the Queen.

"Blood Stars, then, are channels for Eldritch. They choose the target," Ater then triumphantly pulled another paper from the pile beside them.

"But! I think that with a few subtle changes, I can also change the direction of the curse!"

"Direction?" the Queen asked.

"Yes, the user of Eldritch would think they are cursing someone, but in reality, they would be removing the curse from them!" said Ater cheerfully.

"So... You can trick the Great Chief into cursing the Prince again, but you'll just draw the 'Blood Star' a little differently, and the curse will be lifted?"

"Mhm," Ater confirmed. That was what he could show the Queen. He pushed some of the papers deeper into the pile. The title on one of them read: "Theoretical Research of Teacher Set on the Dual Use of Blood and Eldritch with a Single Host". Ater was preparing a plan. And only he would know the full scale of it.