Chapter 109

109 The Silent King

In the King’s absence from the official matters, Zenon had taken the liberty to deploy all the 60 soldiers who were under the command of Commander Jasper in search of Ruby.

Zenon was dead set on finding Ruby first and then only telling everything that had happened to the King. He wanted to minimize the rage of the King by first finding the werewolf responsible for causing all the problems in the castle.

All the soldiers spread out in search of the runaway wolf. They ran across all the towns, villages, forests, and woods of the Kingdom.

However, rather than finding Ruby, the soldiers were successful in making all the vampires of the Kingdom aware that something was going on in the castle.

Lord Bartholomew and his men were no strangers to this recent manhunt that was taking place throughout the Kingdom.

“Did you find out who they were looking for?” Bartholomew asked one of his private guards who he had sent to gather information.

That guard bowed and then revealed all the information, “Yes, Milord. They were looking for a red-headed woman. A human.”

“A human?” Bartholomew furrowed his brows and then asked, “What do they want with that human? Is she a criminal? Or is she someone important to the Queen?”

The guard lowered his head this time while answering, “I’m not sure, Milord. They were simply asking some of the vampires if they had seen a human running around. When I asked what she did and why they were looking for her, they simply chose to ignore.”

.....

“It was your job to dig further. You should have come back with the whole information!” Lord Bartholomew snapped at that incompetence of his guard.

The guard kept on lowering his head and listening to some more insults from the Lord.

“I pay you well and feed you well. And you cannot even find something as simple as that? Shame on you bottom feeders!”

Bartholomew slammed his cane on the floor and startled that poor guard.

Suddenly, the guard recalled how one of the soldiers was instructing the other to be mindful of the smell of the sweetest blood.

“Ah!” He looked at the Lord with wide eyes and said, “Milord, I remember something. The soldiers were saying that that woman’s blood smelled the sweetest.”

Bartholomew scoffed in disbelief, “Ha! Don’t tell me that the King who punishes the vampires for illegal hunting is now utilizing his forces to hunt down a human because of her sweet blood! Don’t be ridiculous!”

“That’s what I heard, Milord,” the guard bowed to Bartholomew. “I am not sure if they were hunting her because the King was after her blood or not. But it is true that they did mention her having the sweetest blood.”

“Hmm...” Bartholomew sat down on the sofa. He rested his chin on his palm and went into deep thoughts.

After a while of thinking, Bartholomew ordered his guard, “Then let’s look for that woman. Let’s find out what’s so special about her.”

—

It was almost dawn when Jasper finally returned to the castle.

He looked extremely tired. He had been running around for the whole night after all.

And he finally returned when he had some information on Ruby.

“Commander, please, take a seat,” Zenon asked the commander after leading him inside his workroom.

Jasper instantly started to speak after sitting down comfortably, “Some of my lads were tracking her blood trail while all the others were looking everywhere in the Kingdom. The werewolf girl is no longer in our territory. But-”

“But?” Zenon gripped the edge of the table he was resting his back on.

“But we do have a guess as to where she could be.”

“Where?” Zenon asked restlessly.

Jasper let out a sigh of frustration and replied, “The blood trail led us to the wall that we share with Xanmar. There were bloodstains on the walls as well. Our guess is that she climbed the wall and went to the other side.”

“Darn it!” Zenon shouted in rage and slammed his fist on the table, breaking it in two.

He covered his face with both of his palms. He was having difficulty suppressing his urge to smash everything that was in the room.

“Now what the hell am I going to say to the King? That we can’t touch her now?” Zenon snarled again.

He was angry at everyone who was responsible for taking Ruby to the Isolation Center. And he was angry at the King as well for trusting Vincent with such an important task.

And he mumbled to himself, “He should have given that task to me or any other commanders. We wouldn’t have been in this mess at all.”

Jasper was surprised to see Zenon losing his temper like that. And seeing how he was even angry at the King, he was a little scared for his own safety. He wanted to get out of that room before Zenon did something to him in his blind rage.

But thankfully, Zenon was back to his normal calm self within the next few minutes.

He looked at the commander and said in his polite voice, “Thank you for your hard work, commander. Now that the matter is settled, I think I should go and talk to the King.”

“I’m sorry that we couldn’t capture her,” Jasper said with a bow.

However, Zenon dismissed him by saying, “There was nothing you could have done when she already crossed the border.”

He then calmly walked towards the Queen’s chamber.

Upon reaching the main door, Zenon gave a knock and said from outside, “Your Majesty, I need to talk to you for a while.”

After a few seconds, Caspian came out of the room and locked the door behind him. He then asked his advisor, “Zenon, what took you so long to come and see me? I have been dying to know what all those screams and uproars were about.”

Zenon looked the King straight in the eyes. It was not his fault that Ruby had run away. So he answered Caspian without any kind of guilt or fear in his eyes, “The werewolf was being transported by Vincent and two other guards. She somehow managed to bite those guards and run away.”

“Wh- What did you just say?” Caspian was stunned to hear that. And he was even more surprised at how he wasn’t informed about this sooner.

Zenon replied with the same confidence, “The guards are currently being treated by an old vampire with some knowledge regarding the werewolves. I had deployed the soldiers under the command of Jasper to look for Ruby. I was just informed that the blood trail led them to our border with Xanmar. She is already out of our hands now.”

Caspian was dumbfounded by everything that Zenon was saying.

And taking advantage of the King’s silence, Zenon further added, “And the werewolf who could have possibly bitten Ruby is also nowhere in our Kingdom. We’ve searched the whole Kingdom thrice since yesterday morning. We would have come across that other werewolf if it was still here.”

Caspian still couldn’t say a word back to Zenon. He was already stressed out because the condition of his sick wife wasn’t improving much. And now, the one lead that he had on finding out about the intruder was also lost.

Zenon, on the other hand, was prepared to see the King’s fury. But he was surprised when Caspian simply leaned back on the door and silently stared at the floor.

For some reason, the King’s silence scared Zenon more than his violent behavior. So Zenon asked the King after some hesitation, “Do you want me to punish those guards and reprimand Vincent?”

But the King’s answer surprised Zenon even more, “How’s Vincent? He wasn’t bitten, right?”

Zenon nodded in confusion. “Vincent is alright. He said that he chased after that wolf for a while but decided to save the guards first. They were in terrible condition when they were brought here.”

“How are the guards now?” Caspian asked without showing any signs of aggression on his face.

Zenon was surprised yet again. He took a deep breath in and replied, “Their consciousness has returned. But their healing hasn’t kicked in yet. The werewolf venom that had spread in their bodies has been contained though, with the help of the wolf’s bane. They might need about a week to heal completely.”

“We had wolf’s bane here?” Caspian asked with a little frown in between his brows.

And Zenon answered, “No, there was no need of wolf’s bane before this incident. So we didn’t have it in our reserve. The soldiers had to search for hours to get that plant.”

Caspian pondered about it for a while. And then he said what he was thinking to Zenon, “I think we should start to collect those plants. Who knows? We might need it in the future. It’s better to be prepared.”