Chapter 68

68 New Discoveries

Caspian caressed his under-eye in a shocked manner. He knitted his brows in tune and kept on gazing at his grey irises.

‘What is wrong with my eyes? Am I losing my vision or something?’

He looked out of the window to check his vision. However, there was nothing wrong. He could still see as clear and as far as his red eyes.

He turned to see his eyes in the mirror again.

“Why do you look so shocked? Grey eyes aren’t a good thing for vampires?” Anastasia stood behind Caspian and asked him with a hint of worry in her voice.

Caspian was as clueless as Anastasia. He had never heard of any vampires whose eye color changed like this. And he definitely hadn’t seen his eyes changing colors before this, even when he was more than four centuries old now.

Caspian blinked his eyes rapidly, and he mumbled to his wife, “I have not a single clue.”

“Shouldn’t you go and see a doctor... a vampire doctor?” Anastasia asked while furrowing her brows.

Caspian replied while rubbing both of his eyes, “There isn’t such thing as a vampire doctor. We heal on our own, so there’s no need for a doctor.”

.....

He opened his eyes and glanced in the mirror again. The grey color of his irises finally reverted back to its original blood-red color.

“They’re red again!” Anastasia exclaimed in relief.

Caspian also let out a sigh of relief. “They are...”

He turned to face his wife. She still looked a little worried for him, which he greatly appreciated. He wrapped her in his embrace and whispered, “Thank you for worrying about me. But I’m sure it’s nothing serious.”

Anastasia put her arms around his back, and lightly stroked him. “I sure hope so.”

Caspian pulled away from the hug to look at his wife’s face. He pinched her chin and leaned for a soft peck on her lips. He then apologized to her, “And I’m sorry for spoiling the mood.”

Anastasia smiled and shook her head. “It’s alright.” She pointed her brows towards the bed and said, “I think we should rest for the night.”

“Yes, let’s do that.” Caspian swiftly lifted his wife off the floor and headed for the bed.

He gently placed her down. Then he proceeded to unfold the blanket and tuck his wife in.

“Shouldn’t you change into your robe?” Anastasia asked Caspian, who was still in his shirt and trousers.

Caspian gave a playful grin to his wife and asked, “Do I need to put my robe on when I am sleeping with my wife?”

Anastasia narrowed her eyes at Caspian. She recalled how he had done the same once before. She instantly turned to face the window and covered her face with the blanket.

Caspian expected her to shout at him. He thought that she would either chase him back to his chamber, or she would make him change into his robe and return.

However, unlike what he had thought, he heard Anastasia speaking in a muffled voice, “Blow off the lanterns and candles before you strip down, my shameless husband.”

“Wow! That’s some progress!” Caspian chuckled and teased her.

But before she would change her mind, he blew off all the light sources in a blink. He took off all of his clothes and jumped on the bed.

He pulled the blanket up and snuggled beside his wife. However, he instantly wrinkled his nose and said, “Ugh! This bed reeks of your handmaid’s smell.”

“She smells nice!” Anastasia defended her handmaid.

To which, Caspian agreed. “Yes, she does. But I don’t like it.”

He then rested on his back and wriggled side to side.

“What are you doing? Stop it!” Anastasia slightly turned her head to the side and scolded her husband for being a nuisance.

Caspian answered while still rubbing his back on the bed, “I am getting rid of her scent by rubbing my own.”

And he shouted as if he was talking to the lingering smell of Tilla, “Get out of my wife’s bed! This side of the bed belongs to me!”

Anastasia heaved a sigh and left her husband to whatever he was doing.

Caspian finally stopped wriggling like a worm. He shifted closer to his wife, and he spooned with her. He entangled his fingers with hers and closed his eyes to get the rest.

“Goodnight, Anna,” he said with a smile on his face.

Anastasia tightened her grip on her husband’s hand and greeted back, “Goodnight, Caspian.”

—

Tilla woke up early in the morning as usual.

It wasn’t time to wake the Queen yet. Also, Martha was the one with the morning shift today. So she went to see Percy to ask if there was any task that he would assign to her.

Percy was in the common room of the servants as usual. This room was near the servants’ quarters. Here, the maids and servants could gather and socialize. This was also where Percy would assign the daily tasks to the maids and servants.

“Tilla, you’re early!” he said when he saw Tilla in the room.

Tilla gave a respectful bow, and asked, “Is there anything that I can help you with?”

Percy looked through the parchment that he was holding. And he asked, “Yes, why don’t you take a few human maids with you and clean the ground floor of the central wing?”

He sighed and muttered, “The vampires do the job way too fast and leave several spots. They won’t listen no matter how many times I tell them to clean slowly.”

Tilla smiled and bowed again, “I will make sure to clean all the spots.”

As Percy had ordered, Tilla took Holly and three other maids with her to do the cleaning. They carried a half-filled bucket and a mop each and then headed towards the central wing.

They all spread out and began to clean the stone floors. Side-by-side, they were also dusting the corners of pillars, doors, and windows, where dust had settled down.

While moping one of the corners of the building, Tilla came across a very old-looking black wooden door. It had a huge lock as well as a heavy iron knocker on it. The door had gathered some dust on it, so Tilla pulled a piece of cloth from her apron’s pocket to dust the door.

As she was dusting, the door creaked open on its own.

‘It wasn’t locked, or did I just break this door?’ Tilla examined the lock to find that it wasn’t fastened properly.

She slowly peeked through the gap of the door and discovered a flight of stairs, which by the way, looked as if they hadn’t been cleaned in centuries. The corners of the stairs had gathered an incomprehensible amount of dust.

“Whoa! Did no one ever clean this place? Where does it lead? Is it an abandoned basement or store or something like that?” she asked herself.

She looked around to see if she could find anyone whom she could ask those questions to.

However, there was no one around who could give her the answers. So she decided to clean the stairs, as well as whatever was down below.

‘I will report it to Mr. Percy later,’ she thought to herself. She then picked up the bucket and the mop.

And she pushed the door further open and stepped inside the dark stairs.