Staring at Artem’s face, Regina realized that, until this moment, she had never seen him look afraid.

Previously, she had seen Artem look concerned and upset. She could hardly forget the pain on his face in her first vision when he had witnessed her imprisonment and then death following her doomed engagement to Prince Aaron.

In the last few weeks, Regina had grown used to seeing Artem look pleased, surprised, puzzled, and even rapturously happy which was an emotion that she seemed to bring out from him with strange frequency.

Yet now, Artem looked afraid, perhaps even terrified. As Regina stared in confusion, she watched Artem’s fear turn into determination as he suddenly began racing down the halls of the royal palace as a group of harried nobles followed on his heels.

“Wait!” Regina cried, watching them go before she could force her body to follow. “What is happening? Artem, where are you going?!”

Yet no one bothered to answer her, so intent were they on reaching their destination. It was barely a few breaths before they were in front of an imposing metal door that should have been sealed shut via dozens of locks meant to repel all trespassers…

…Only, Regina realized with her heart in her throat, at least one trespasser had managed the impossible.

At least one person had already opened some of the locks and created an entrance that a slender person could ease through…

…and Regina had a terrible feeling that she knew what lay beyond that door.

That feeling only compounded as she watched Artem, displaying a burst of metallurgic magic that Regina had no idea he could wield, wrenched open the remaining locks so that the door blew open so quickly that Regina wondered if it had been pulled from its hinges.

Then Artem and his entourage exploded into a room filled with so many gaudy treasures that Regina was stranded between sheer wonder and amazement at the tastelessness of its owners.

“There is only one family in all of Carcosa that is this wealthy and this gaudy,” Regina realized. “So this treasure room must belong to –”

Yet she did not even have time to finish her sentence before she heard Artem desperately cry out her name, even as he raced through enormous halls glittering with gilt and gold.

“Regina!” Artem cried, as the Regina behind him waited with growing dread. “Regina, please, if you are here – !”

Then his cries ceased, even as the Regina behind him struggled not to scream.

After all, it was hard to get used to staring at your corpse, especially when it was smothered beneath a ridiculous, repulsive, rose-gold necklace whose “feet” were wrapped around a smothered face while its glittering “eye” seemed to pulse.

Distantly, Regina heard a noble in the crowd murmur, “By the blood, was this wench not satisfied by the gifts she got after her engagement? Did her merchant blood make her race to where the Alpin treasure was held?”

Yet those words were no more than wind when she saw Artem drop to his knees, sobbing as he began trying to wrench that horrific necklace from her face and body.

“Regina,” he said, his voice almost unintelligible whilst mixed with his tears. “Oh Regina, I never should have – why did I – I –”

Regina had to look away from his naked grief, only to find her eyes straying to her corpse’s limp right arm, which looked normal except for her…

“No,” Regina whispered, wishing she did not see what she did. “No, no, no, no –”

Except for her strangely discolored fingernail beds, which were a peculiar greenish-yellow…

…a shade all too similar to the color that the beds of her sister’s fingernails had turned after she had been poisoned, before turning a final, gruesome black.

Horrified, Regina jerked back from her dead body —

Only to wake up in a sleeping Artem’s lap.

Thankfully, her sudden moment did not immediately wake Artem, who must have been as exhausted as her from a night of endless socializing.

Yet even as Regina stared at Artem’s peacefully sleeping face, a face so relaxed and so different from the grief-stricken contortions in her dreams…

She wondered who had poisoned her in her last vision of the future…

…and why her assassin hated her and Artem so much that they wished to kill her in such a vicious and mocking way.

~♦♥♦~

For a very long time, Regina found herself staring at Artem’s peaceful face, trying to understand who wanted to destroy him.

After all, given the gaudiness and wealth of that room, as well as Artem’s access to and familiarity with it, it was clear that Regina had been killed in the Alpin treasure room that Artem had spoken of before they had drifted to sleep.

What’s more, she had not merely been killed. Regina’s corpse had been arranged to cause Artem the greatest possible pain.

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

Apparently, whoever had murdered Regina had known that the best way to emotionally destroy Artem was to force him to find her corpse in the same room that he had once promised to take her to –

While also pinned beneath the feet fish necklace that Artem so loved.

“Who hates you that badly?” Regina murmured to her sleeping prince. “So much so that they are willing to destroy you along with me?”

It was at that point that Artem began to rouse, his eyelids delicately fluttering open to reveal his sky-blue eyes, which brightened as they looked down at Regina.

“Regina!” he cried, his whole face alight with radiant delight –

Until he realized that he was breathing stagnant air from last night right on her face.

“Ack!” he cried, before he instantly ducked away to pull out a handkerchief and hide his disgrace.

“Artem…?” Regina inquired, holding back a laugh as she watched the blush on his face continue to grow.

“Forgive me, my lady,” he murmured into his handkerchief, looking torn between dismay and delight. “It – it is truly an honor to wake to your presence but… oh, to assail you with my unclean breath! What you must think of me!”

“I think,” Regina said, amusement overtaking her past fear, “that I have a considerate groom-to-be and he does not need to hide anything from me.”

Artem looked shocked at that and Regina laughed again, though her common sense soon asserted itself as she remembered the danger they both faced.

‘Never mind our discussion of foul breath,’ she sternly reminded herself. ‘I need to focus on my coming death… and based on my fingernail beds in that dream, somebody clearly poisoned me. But who? Even better – how? I need to ask Artem for any information he must have, although…’

Regina softened as she felt the contrast between the warm and happy Artem before her now and the anguished, weeping Artem of her dreams.

‘I should be gentle. Poor Artem has no idea what is to come… nor do I want him to. I wish he could always be this peaceful and happy.’

Thus instead of immediately bombarding Artem with questions, Regina paused for a moment and reflected.

Suddenly smiling, she said, “Besides, we have something far more scandalous than foul breath to concern us.”

“We do?” Artem said, looking adorably confused.

“Of course,” Regina replied, trying to be light-hearted for a moment. “If I have already fallen asleep on you and then you slept next to me… does that mean we have had our first night already?”

Artem’s face somehow went even redder as he cried, “No! I swear by the blood that you will have a much more memorable first night than this! I have already been researching how to please you!”

Regina laughed in a mingle of shock and anticipation, even as she felt her own face flush red.

Still, Regina quickly sobered when she remembered the fate that she was trying to escape and said, “I do have a more question for you, Artem.”

Eyes widening, she realized how that could be misinterpreted and hastily added, “No, I do not wish to know about what you are reading.”

“That is unfortunate,” Artem said, somehow coming across as innocent as a dandelion in bloom. “After all, I am not embarrassed about my instructional literature. I will do whatever I can to make you happy!”

Regina had to smile at Artem’s sincerity and strange taste in what embarrassed him… and what did not. However, there were more immediate concerns than her future husband’s odd personality quirks and Regina could delay no longer.

“My question is about the treasure room,” Regina said and saw Artem brighten immediately.

“So you do wish to visit it?” Artem asked, suddenly as eager as a wiggling puppy. “I can take you to it as soon as you please!”

Blinking Regina asked, “You can just… do that? I assumed you would need to first inform your father or mother or… well… someone.”

After all, though Artem had wrenched the doors to the Alpin treasure room open in an act of desperation, she had assumed that he could not enter a room teeming with priceless family treasures whenever he wished. From what she could see of his family interactions, his family and servants tolerated and perhaps even loved Artem… but they did not respect him.

(From what little gossip she had overheard since reaching the capital, the only exception who respected Artem might lie in Artem’s mother, the foreign noble who had married the king after the death of his previous queen… but then again, it was Artem’s mother. Though Regina was hardly respected by her own mother, she assumed that Artem’s mother was a kinder, less pragmatic person).

“Do not worry!” Artem cheerfully said in response to Regina’s concerns. “As one of only three people left in the direct line of the throne, I am allowed to go anywhere I wish to in the palace. Even our Shadowguard cannot freely go where I do! What’s more...”

Taking Regina’s hand in his own, Artem gently said, “You need not worry about the barriers and locks that bar the treasure room to the unwelcome. Only we royal Alpins and our closest associates are allowed there but now that we are engaged…”

The tender smile on Artem’s face brought about one on Regina’s own.

“Who could I trust more than I trust you? Once you become my princess, I will give you full freedom to enter the treasure room as you please. You can enjoy the wonders of my family without fear.”

Though overwhelmed by how generous Artem’s offer was, Regina could not help but ask, “Well, what would happen if someone, who would definitely not be me, entered the Alpin treasure room without the permission of your family?”

While Artem’s laughter was usually delightful, for a brief moment it sounded almost… sinister.

“Such a person would not be well served by their efforts,” Artem replied. “If the treasure room is breached by anything other than our royal family’s metallurgic magic, that is only found in our bloodline, the entire palace would be alerted. Everyone would come running as soon as the room was breached!”

“Oh,” was all Regina could say, and as Artem held her hand and cheerfully described the many treasures that he planned to give her as soon as they wed, her mind raced furiously.

Later, as Regina trudged to bed to get a few hours of sleep before her official engagement party began, she tried to collect her thoughts.

“Someone,” she muttered, even as she fought to keep her eyes open, “worked very hard to kill me. It was not enough for them to poison me with the kind of toxin that could discolor my nailbeds. No – they wanted to deposit my dead body in the Alpin treasure room to signal something.”

Shuddering as she remembered the horror and pain on Artem’s face in her last vision, Regina sighed.

“I can only wonder what message my murderer is trying to convey… and if that message is for Artem or someone else entirely.”