ZEPHYR RAVENSWOOD

Zephyr and Flynn now sat on the rose-coloured cushion, which had once been home to the dropping weight of the slender Madame Rose, and placed on the low table before them were two silver cups of freshly plucked grape wine, finely made in the brewery at Mistridge, retained to the Lady of House Redwyne.

It had been served by a squat girl with the colour black tinting her short hair. From the youngness her face bore, it was obvious she had breathed nothing more than eighteen years of air.

As the grape wine swirled from the ewer in her hands into the silver cups, she giggled beneath her breath while she took short glances at the chiselled face of the man she knew not was the king.

She had been at the brothel half her life and had seen a lot of men stride past the red-haired siren façade—most ugly, but some wore handsome faces. Still, neither of the handsomes’ came close to the man seated before her, bading her watch as she filled his cup. His beauty had captivated her, and she knew not when she began thinking of the dreams that might befall her as soon as the sky turned dark, and a crescent of white rose above it.

After the serving worker had reluctantly removed herself from the room, Zephyr smiled thinly and inquired from the madame on how she and Flynn had come to know each other. A great deal of curiosity on his part, but one justified by his current sitch.

He had chosen to give his advisor the benefit of the doubt, but surely he didn’t trust him yet. He believed it good to find out everything he could about the auburn-haired Flynn of the House Claymore, since he had taken the name Zephyr in this world, but held none of his memories.

“A rainy night,” Madame Rose began, taking up the tale, “the night I stumbled upon the young lord. I was still a young maiden brought from the farmlands to serve as a whore. Disgusting it was; the smell of perfume and incense was much thicker that time, and it displeased me.” Discomfort soared her body, courtesy of the thick wooden chair across the low table she sat upon. When last had she placed her body on such hardness.

She then gave a thought of crossing her legs, but a single dart of her eyes towards the king dispersed that thought.

If he was anything like the kings of old, it would be stupid to try such. She hoped he wasn’t, but her hopes were nothing more than a flickering flame fighting to survive. They all share the same blood, her father had told her long ago, along with the stories of kings when she was still a babe, and in her years in King’s city she had seen men drunken with power—if he wasn’t already, sooner or later he would fall captive to its scorching heat as well, she believed.

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“I had come out to breathe the soft air that accompanied the drops of rain, then I heard a cry. The wind seemed fated to carry it from the alleyway beside the brothel towards me, so I followed it, and that’s how I met the young lord. A boy of seven in tears, sitting in a dark alleyway.”

Zephyr turned a momentary brooding stare towards the side of his advisors’ stagnant face and closed eyes before returning it forward—he had remained that way through the tale, it was as though he cared not for the story.

“He never told me what bothered him that night, but he did keep coming back, and the alleyway became where we told each other stories under the light of stars.” She turned her gaze towards Flynn. “Until he never came again… before now.

“But I have little doubt you have come down from the castle for tales. So if it pleases His Grace, may I know why a woman such as I have been honoured with a visit?” Questions sailed her mind, but she had no doubt this was the one to begin with.

Flynn finally threw his eyes open. “We have come seeking answers,” he took up the reins, answering in the stead of the king of Ravenwing.

Madame Rose’s face screwed worriedly. “If I may ask, to what questions, young lord? Surely my girls haven’t done anything wrong.”

Flynn shifted slightly on the cushion. “Two royal guards were found dead in that alleyway after a night of pleasure at your brothel. Poisoned, they were.”

“We sell no poisons,” she said airily.

“But wine you do,” Zephyr chipped in. A boy of eighteen he was in his past life, with little to no investigative skills, and so, for a brief moment he thought to leave it all up to Flynn, but little chance he did that as well; it was his life at stake, and it was his duty to keep himself safe.

“Traces of wine were spotted on their tongues after the examination of their bodies, and as he said, they were found in the alleyway of your brothel. The wine they drank had been poisoned.” Rose’s body surged with uneasiness that seeped deep into her skin. If word of two royal guards dying in the alleyway of her brothel got out, it could spell trouble for her business—if it hadn’t already.

Flynn noticed the sullen eyes of his old friend. “It’s a brothel,” he told her. “Tons of common folks and lords flood it at night, anyone could have done the deed. What we want to know about is the wine they drank; it’s not something guards should have been able to request. How did they manage such?”

Her voice trembled slightly as she quickly sought ears to her words. “We serve a lot of wine, young lord, of which most are expensive. You might as well tell me what sort they ordered, that even guards of the royal household could not afford.”

Silence sailed for a moment, before Zephyr and Flynn replied in unison, their voices overlapping each others’, “The red mist!”